Princess at Sea

by Dawn Cook

  “I know,” he murmured, his fingers pressing against my head easing. “You survived it. You’re strong, Tess. Don’t let it break you.”

  I took a shuddering breath, smelling his leather jerkin and the briny stink of low tide over the sharp smell of burning. His arms were about me, warm and secure, giving me something real to fasten upon. Slowly, I realized the wind had slackened to almost nothing. Exhausted in mind and body, I let my head rest against the front of his shoulder and listened to the crackling of the last of the flames and the tinkling of slowly moving water moving out with the tide.

  “Why?” I rasped, hearing the soft soughing of the burning trees as the wind forgot about me and blew out to sea to play with the stingrays. Around us was the reek of burning green, but here in the creek we were safe. “I thought he loved me,” I said, my eyes on the filthy water swirling around us, my tears joining it freely. “Why did he do that to me?” I breathed, not expecting an answer. “Why?”

  Jeck’s arms around me tightened and released. “I don’t know.”

  Twenty-six

  The soft thuds of our horses’ hooves were a gentle cadence swallowed up by the leaf mold, and the sound of the wind soughing in the treetops taunted me. I sat without feeling, the reins slack and slipping from my fingers, balancing by instinct as we made our slow way back to the capital. In my ear was the unrelenting voice of the wind still trapped inside me, its message once blurred and indistinct, now obvious and painful.

  It mocked me, telling me that Duncan didn’t love me, over and over and over. First a whisper, then rising to a laughing chortle, then back to a sly burble, never ceasing. Duncan doesn’t love you. It was a warning heard too late. I had blinded myself to it, not wanting to believe. No one had told me truth could be found in the voice of the wind, and now the truth was trapped within my head.

  Before me upon a single horse were Contessa and Alex. The prince had his arms about her, the curve of his arms gentle and loving as he held her with her feet politely to one side of the animal. Their soft conversation was unheard but for the comfortable come-and-go of their intertwined voices. Jeck was half a horse length behind me on one of the three horses that had been tied behind the wagon. Alex, being an expert horseman, had caught them all after escaping the shack with Contessa.

  Farther back was the creaking of the wagon and the loud voices of Jeck’s men. There were far more than the four he had discussed with Kavenlow, and they were on foot as the wagon held semicomatose pirates along with the chests of spice. Most were awake now, not remembering Jeck pulling them from the burning building before finding me kneeling on the front porch. Of Captain Rylan, there had been no trace, but I knew he was too clever to have died in the fire.

  I was exhausted, shamed in body and spirit. But it seemed I had changed the punta dream: I was not a prisoner upon a horse before Jeck; Alex and Contessa were with us, and the pirates were captured. Betrayal had made my heart a sodden rag, though, and the misery haunted me still. But my sister was alive and unhurt. I would not seek to change the future further but rather be content with what I had.

  The voices of the men surrounding us grew louder as the trees thinned and the light brightened to early evening. Their voices were cheerful with the sound of anticipation. I pulled my attention from my fingers knotting in the horse’s mane as we stepped out from the shelter of the woods and into the fields about the capital. The setting sun struck me, almost a pain upon my heat-damaged skin. I squinted and hunched deeper into my saddle, wanting to hide from it.

  I had lied to Kavenlow. They must have realized it to have gotten to me so quickly. Not only had I lied, but I had been caught.

  “Look!” came Contessa’s cheerful voice. She was rescued and restored. Nothing could go wrong for her now. “In the harbor. They’re back already! See? The pirate ship and the chancellor’s.”

  My head came up, and I blearily focused. Far below in the harbor were the ships in question, their sails furled and their decks empty. A small group of soldiers on foot were headed our way, two men on horseback with them. One broke away and cantered to us. The man left behind reined his horse in to keep it from following, bending to talk to a man on foot. I could tell from his silhouette and black leather jerkin and cap that it was Kavenlow. My heart clenched. What would I say to him?

  Distressed, I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, noticing with an uncaring detachment that the tips were twisted and burned, singed from the fire’s heat. I glanced at Jeck, who had nudged his horse up equal with mine now that there was room. He hadn’t said a word to me since pulling me sobbing from the water when the first of his men on foot arrived. I knew he felt my gaze on him when his jaw clenched and his eye ticked.

  My face flamed. I had cried in his arms over a thief, a man he’d warned me about if I had cared to listen. Jeck had seemed to understand at the time, his arms around me as we sat in the tidal river, him holding me together as my world fell apart and I realized just how foolish I had been. But now I wondered. Maybe I had just imagined his compassion. Maybe I had needed it so badly that I fostered the emotion on Jeck when it wasn’t there. He certainly wasn’t compassionate now, having returned to his usual stone-faced, closed-lipped self.

  Ignoring me, he wiggled his heels into his horse’s flank and trotted up to meet Captain Resh cantering closer. The captain of my sister’s guard looked exuberant as he reined his horse to a four-posted stop, his back stiff and powerful arms tight.

  “Captain Jeck!” he exclaimed, bobbing his head respectfully to Contessa and Alex. “We have the enemy’s ship, sir. Duncan wasn’t on it. Nor was the ransom.”

  I watched the play of emotions over the Costenopolie captain. Though he was excited, it was tempered with anger—anger at himself for having been played the fool. He, along with the entire company of Costenopolie palace guards, had trusted Duncan to a fault. I wasn’t the only one to have been duped. It didn’t ease the tightness of my chest, though, or the disgrace I felt. I wondered when his plan had evolved. Perhaps after having befriended the palace guards? During the time the plans for a nuptial voyage were discussed? Or possibly even as soon as when we had been fleeing Jeck last spring and he realized I had a claim on a royal title?

  Jeck nudged his horse into motion as the rest of us caught up with them. “Take a regiment,” he said softly. “Search the river for any trace of him. Both sides. Put four of your most even-headed men on horse and have them ride to Saltwood. I want a noninvasive house-to-house inquiry to see if he’s been there and gone, then I want them to sit quietly in case he has yet to go through.” The dark-eyed man turned to Queen Contessa and Prince Alex. “If that meets with Your Majesties’ approval?”

  He was playing his game with my pieces. I should care, but I didn’t.

  Her face grim, Contessa nodded, and Alex’s grip on her tightened. “Yes,” Alex said evenly. “That would meet with our approval.”

  “You’ll never find him,” I whispered, then coughed, leaving my throat feeling as if it were bleeding inside. No one heard me.

  “I’ll attend to it immediately, sir,” Resh said. He gestured for one of the men with us to accompany him as he wheeled his horse about and started back to the city with a slow pace. The small group of approaching men on foot had already turned back to cluster about the entrance to the city, leaving Kavenlow to come forward alone. He sat straight and tall in the saddle, looking more at home there than in front of his books and ink. It grew harder for me to breathe, and I wished I could drop back and hide at the end of the line but knew any movement from me would only draw more attention.

  My self-blindness had allowed Duncan to use us all: the nautical nuptial journey, the ship waiting conveniently at anchor captained by his old master, the lamp that fell to set the fire to my ship, the anchor line probably cut, the time such that only their ship could slip over the reefs. Believing he loved me, I had told him what Contessa’s letter had said. God help me, I was the fool.

  I wanted to believe that the punta b
ite had been unintentional, that he hadn’t been trying to kill me. I wanted to believe his last plea that I leave with him had been an act of love, that he saw a life with me in it even if it was one fleeing the wrath of a betrayed master and a kingdom shunned. But I didn’t know. He hadn’t come back when I called him, in agony at Rylan’s hand. Maybe that was my answer.

  I kept my eyes down when Kavenlow’s horse joined the line, prancing, neck arched. “Your Majesties,” he said, his low voice full of relief and import. “You’re well? Here, take my horse. I can walk.”

  “No,” Contessa said, her voice bringing my gaze peeping from around my singed hair. “I’m comfortable upon my husband’s horse. Stay. Captain Jeck has done justly by us. And it would do the people good to see us together and well.”

  Her accent was clear and precise, sounding like our mother. “As you will it,” my master said, his gaze shifting from theirs to mine, trying to catch it. I wouldn’t let him. His voice seemed as it always had, but I had betrayed him. I couldn’t look at him.

  “Chancellor,” Contessa whispered, her affected noble speech falling from her. “Something’s wrong with Tess. She won’t talk to me. I think she blames herself solely for Duncan’s betrayal of us all. You’re close to her. Go ride with her. Tell her it wasn’t her fault for me. Please?”

  My heart clenched, and I hunched farther into my saddle. My fingers on the reins tightened. I wondered if it might be easier to bolt and run.

  “Thank you, Your Majesty. You’re as kind as you’re observant,” Kavenlow said, turning his horse in a small circle to fall back.

  Heart pounding, I kept my eyes on my fingers when Kavenlow worked his horse between Jeck and me. From the corner of my sight I saw him nod to Jeck. Something unsaid passed between them, and I felt my heart crumble, the jolt of my horse’s steps jarring me.

  “Tess?” Kavenlow said, sorrow heavy in his voice. “Oh, no. He burned your hair? Are you all right? Tell me what happened.”

  I had betrayed him, and he was worried that I had been hurt? I shook my head, only able to bring my head up far enough to see his strong hands gripping the reins. The gold ring upon his thick finger glittered, catching my attention until the shifting of the horses broke my gaze. He had given the ring to me once as evidence that I was Costenopolie’s legal player, entrusting me to win his game for him and give it back.

  My shoulders tightened from an inner pain. It would never happen again. Even if I somehow lowered my residual toxin levels, I’d never be able to remain his apprentice. I couldn’t be a player. I had broken the trust of my master.

  “Tess?” Kavenlow prompted, and I flinched at the comforting hand he put on me.

  “I can’t,” I whispered. “Kavenlow, I can’t.”

  His hand slowly fell from me. “We’ll talk later,” he said softly. An uncomfortable silence took root. My throat tightened, and I forced my gaze up, focusing upon the towers of the palace, bright with light and promise. I took a deep breath, holding it for a long moment before letting it go shakily.

  Alex and Contessa dropped back to force me into the coming conversation whether I wanted to be or not. “Chancellor?” Alex asked, leaning to look across Jeck and me. “What did you find at the pirates’ ship? How many men were injured in the taking of it? Not many, I hope.”

  Kavenlow’s eye made a single tic. His mustache and beard met as he pressed his lips together in worry. “Not a one, Prince Alex,” he said. “We found Kelly’s Sapphire at anchor with her crew unconscious and tied up for us.”

  “Duncan?” Contessa guessed, probably correctly. “He never intended to go back to the ship, did he? The pirates in the shack were poisoned as well. Captain Jeck told us how he pulled them from the flames.”

  Jeck’s jaw clenched and relaxed. They had been downed by his toxin, stolen from him before they burned my boat to the waterline. And Duncan had known what it was capable of, thanks to me. The rival player visibly steadied himself. “I think we can be fairly confident that Duncan and Captain Rylan were working together, Duncan immobilizing the crew on the boat and Captain Rylan taking care of the crew that came ashore for the ransom.”

  “His name is Lan,” I whispered, my voice sounding raw to me. “He isn’t a captain. He’s a thief. Mr. Smitty is the captain. Lan bought their services, fully intending to leave them with nothing. He didn’t count on Duncan’s doing the same to him.”

  No one said anything. The horses plodded forward, unaware and uncaring. Behind us the men talked among themselves, exchanging cheerful ideas of what they would do to Duncan should they find him alone in the dark one night. I felt sick and weary at heart.

  Kavenlow made a soft sound. “He deceived us all, Tess. Don’t take the entirety of the blame on yourself.”

  My intake of air caught in a rush of heartache. I had thought he loved me. The wind in my head laughed and gibbered. He never loved you. He never loved you. He lied and used you. He never loved you.

  Head drooping, I held my breath, not caring that everyone could see my pain. I forced my emotions to dull. The voice in my head giggled and tittered, laughing at me for my foolishness, telling me it had warned me—but I hadn’t listened. Around me, an evening breeze lifted off the bay, fluttering the horses’ manes and shifting Contessa’s green-stained dress before dying.

  I blanked my thoughts, compelling the voice to go as empty and still as I tried to make my mind. There was an unexpected strength in apathy, and slowly the voice of the wind diminished to where I could ignore it.

  “I’m sorry, Tess,” Kavenlow said, seeming to be the spokesman for all of them. “I know you cared for him.”

  I thought he loved me, ran through my mind. I had been ready to leave everything for him, and it would have been for a lie.

  “Captain Jeck,” Alex said, stepping smoothly into the awkward breach. “We were there, but we missed most of it. How did the shack come to be on fire?”

  I shrank into myself. It was going to come out. Not now, in front of other ears, but it would come out: how I had tried to kill Jeck, how I called the wind and couldn’t control it, how I set the very wood and trees aflame with my anger and lack of control.

  Despair soaking into me, I waited for what Jeck would say, not believing when he kept himself to a subdued, “The shack was on fire when I arrived. I would guess it was Captain Rylan’s attempt to murder you and Prince Alex and keep his hands clean of it.”

  Contessa shifted before Alex to see Kavenlow better. “He was going to kill us, Chancellor Kavenlow, whether or not he got the money. Tess stopped him.”

  I did nothing, I thought.

  “She gave us two knives without his seeing, allowing Captain Rylan to capture her so he would be distracted while we freed ourselves.” Wide-eyed, she looked at me in pride. “She was very brave.”

  My chest grew heavy with heartache. I was a fool.

  Kavenlow leaned to me. “Tess?” he prompted. I took a quick breath scented of leather and ink, holding it. I was dead inside. I was dead so I didn’t have to hear the wind laughing at me.

  My teacher pulled away, tightening the reins of his horse, and my tension eased. “I saw the smoke,” he said. “I thought it was your signal to take the pirate’s ship. Just as well I didn’t wait. Too much longer, and the pirates would have been conscious and working themselves free of their ropes our good cheat had wrapped them in.” He hesitated. “And the wind?” he asked.

  I gritted my teeth. I could feel more than his eyes on me, wondering.

  “Oh!” Contessa exclaimed, oblivious to the weight the question had. “Did you feel it, too? It was awful. It came out of nowhere and left just the same. It was as if I could hear the souls of the lost in it, come to take me with them if I didn’t hold on to what was dear to me.”

  It was almost too much to bear. I held my head down and watched the track under us turn from flattened grass to dust and widen. A sudden swelling of noise cascaded over us as we neared the city. The sentries had temporarily closed the gates, but
I looked up as they opened, and the people swarmed out.

  The sun pierced my eyes, and I blinked the tears away. People cheered and waved bits of fabric, making the horses nervous. It was obvious the news of retaking Contessa and Alex had come before us. I numbly watched the smiling faces, the individual cries of well-wishing and approval lost in the tumult. I wanted to hide in shame. Had no one told them? Didn’t they know that their beloved queen and prince would never have been in danger if I hadn’t let my desire for love cloud my reason?

  Apparently not, I thought, as they surrounded us. The crowd redoubled their noise upon seeing Alex and Contessa together. She rested easy in his arms, smiling and happy, looking like our mother despite the grime and that her snarled hair was tumbling about her shoulders.

  A bittersweet pang went through me when she looked at Alex and whispered something to him, the love and caring obvious in her eyes. He gripped her more tightly, stealing a kiss to the delight of all as they crossed the threshold into the city.

  My eyes lifted from the happy faces, lost in the joy and relief of finding their lives would continue unchanged now that their royal family was safely returned. The narrow streets echoed with them, spreading the news to those struggling to catch a glimpse. My hands automatically soothed my horse, and when a cheerful young soldier in the palace uniform took his head, I numbly let go of the reins. The noise was like a weight, and my gaze roved for a spot of unmoving color to stare at among the joyful commotion. I blinked as I found Thadd.

  The squat sculptor stood high above the crowd atop a roof. His round, simple face was full of a raw despair as he watched the procession, his eyes riveted to his beloved Contessa. I thought of the kiss she had returned to Alex, knowing Thadd had seen it—knowing he had seen the caring and feeling behind it—knowing it had struck him to his core.

  Shoulders bowed as if having been beaten, he stood with his arms slack at his side. He never moved, but I saw something in him die.

  A spark of shared feeling lifted through me. I wasn’t the only one hurting amid the combined joy swirling around us, leaving us untouched. We are alike in that, I thought as the tide of well-wishers pushed us round a corner and into the wide boulevard that led directly to the palace.