by H. D. Gordon
Amadika reached into the folds of her blue overcoat, and held something out to me. I took it, seeing that it was a conch shell. I twisted it in my hand, running my fingers over the smooth pearlescent inside and crowned ridges on the out.
“What is this?” I asked.
Amadika swung her dreadlocks over her shoulder. “I’m going to assume you’ll need a ride back, and so when you’re ready, just stand by the sea and blow into this. Then just wait, and I’ll come find you.”
I looked down at the shell again, realizing that I did sense a little magic hanging around the object, and wondered just what sort of creature the pirate captain had obtained it from.
I jerked my chin toward the docks in the distance. “Does it have to be right here? This spot?” I asked.
She shook her head. “No. You can stand at the edge of any shoreline and blow into it and I’ll be able to find you. So if you end up finding alternate transportation back to wherever the hell you came from, you can return it, and the map, to me anytime thereafter. Preferably soon thereafter, so that I don’t have to come hunting for you.”
I tucked the shell into my pocket and nodded once. “I’ll see to it that they both get back to you.”
Asha and Vega returned from the lower deck then, ready to go. I gave one last nod to the pirate captain, who winked at Asha before she jumped over the edge of the ship and began swimming to shore, giving Amadika a one-finger salute before doing so.
The captain only chuckled in response, but when I turned to follow my companions, she gripped my arm, halting me. Her brown eyes were deadly serious now, and the look behind them gave me pause.
“You saved my life when those other pirates attacked us,” she said, “and so I’ll warn you, do not trust the Seers, and if you can avoid it, don’t make a deal with them. I’ve wandered the earth a long, long time, and have known enough evil to recognize it, even when it’s wrapped up in the finest of white linens... I hope you can trust your companions with your life, because they’ll be the only ones in that city you can count on.”
I nodded again, not knowing what to say to these cryptic words.
“I wish I had more to tell you,” she added, “but the most powerful of forces are always the best well-hidden, same as the most precious of treasure. This doesn’t repay my life debt to you, but I hope you’ll keep my words in mind.”
“Because you want this map,” I said. It was not a question.
Captain Amadika bit her bottom lip, gold teeth flashing again, and looked off into the distance. “Because whether the stories about you are true or not, the world needs more freedom fighters, and whether you agree or not, that is what you have become in the eyes of the world.”
That sounded like a lot more responsibility than I could remember signing up for, but I did not say. Instead, I thanked the pirate captain for getting us across the Seventh Sea, and then jumped overboard to follow my companions to shore.
16
Swimming a couple hundred yards in the ocean was harder than it looked.
By the time I reached the docks, I could barely climb the ladder that led out of the water.
Vega stared at me as I struggled to pull my weary body up, offering no assistance. Though I still had not seen his face, I had a feeling that he was smirking under that stupid mask, recalling how I’d pushed him into the water for not jumping in during the tavern fight.
I scowled at him as I finally made it to dry land, and followed Asha off the dock and into the sprawling town.
We were soaked, and hardly inconspicuous in appearance, so we received a number of stares that I thought I was starting to get used to.
The early morning had given way to midday, and the port town was bustling with activity. The structures were all made out of gray stone, and they had been built sturdily, stacked on top of tall beams so as to always be above the tides.
As we wandered a little further into the town, I saw that the place was powered by magic, and again found myself gawking at the novelty of it all. The streets sloped upward, those stone structures topped with arched roofs that reached up toward the blue sky. Seabirds swooped and flew overhead, and venders with carts called out their wares, which were mostly fresh fish and bait.
I sniffed at the air, picking up a scent that I had not encountered before, and turned toward Asha, who looked downright miserable in her wet clothes.
“What are they?” I asked.
“Sorcerers,” she answered. “Magic users. This is part of their territory.”
With that, she headed off in the direction of a little eatery nearby, leaving Vega and I to follow, as usual.
I rolled my eyes and headed after her. I’d thought we’d bonded a little on the ship, but clearly, I’d been mistaken. The pirate captain’s words about trusting my companions came back to me, and I tucked them away for later. First, I needed dry clothes and food. Then I would deal with the Demon and her relentless attitude.
The little eatery was nearly full, but Asha managed to snag a booth near the wide windows making up the entire eastern end of the room, and Vega and I took the seats beside her.
We sat for a few moments in silence, staring out the windows at the massive expanse of blue water we’d just crossed, at the ships pulling in and out of port, and the seabirds swooping and gliding across the clear skies.
Then a barmaid came over to take our order. She was young and pretty, with a face that looked too kind to be in a place like this. Her accent was one I’d never heard before, which I was starting to realize was pretty much every accent. And she had the greenest of eyes and honey brown hair that flowed down to her waist.
“Oh,” she said, as she took in our soaking conditions. “Take a swim in the sea, did ya? I can dry you for a copper each.”
Asha gave the female a look that took me a moment to assess, as I’d never seen her use it before. It was almost… charming. She reached into her pocket and produced another one of those gold coins.
“Here you go, beautiful,” she said. “We would very much appreciate you drying us.”
A blush came to the female’s cheeks, and the way she fluttered her eyelashes at Asha revealed that the Demon’s apparent attraction was returned. The barmaid scooped up the coin and slipped it into her apron. Then, with a small smile on her lips, she flicked her fingers a few times, and I blinked as I felt a kiss of magic swirl around me and realized my clothes and hair were no longer wet.
“Brilliant,” Asha said, still eyeing the young waitress. “We’ll just look over the menu for a moment.”
With one last grin, the female scooted away to attend to some other customers, and I looked at Vega for some kind of reaction, but of course, the oaf said nothing.
“So you can be amicable,” I mumbled, picking up one of the menus and sighing in relief when I saw it was written in the common tongue.
Asha was still staring after the girl, but she looked at me now. “Of course I can,” she scoffed. “When I actually like someone.”
I leaned forward across the table, my teeth bared. All of a sudden, my patience with the Demon had run out.
“Next time you fall from a height that could kill you,” I said, “I’m just going to let you do it.”
Asha only rolled her eyes and looked at her menu, as if nothing I said mattered in the least. Conversation evaporated after that, and I didn’t try to rekindle it.
We ordered, ate, and drank. Then Asha excused herself and did not return for an hour, during which our honey-haired barmaid was also mysteriously absent. That left me to sit with Vega, who was the absolute best of banter partners. After half an hour of utter silence, I told Vega I’d be back, and went back out into the street to absorb the sunshine and consult the scroll about the next leg of our journey.
I found a private spot in a narrow alley between buildings, and made sure no one was near before removing the map and unrolling it. The wound on my hand had already closed thanks to my supernatural healing abilities, but I reopened it with the tip of my bl
ade and squeezed out a few more drops onto the waiting parchment.
It gulped down the offering in the same fashion as it had previously, and two familiar words appeared.
Head west
Scowling, I rolled the paper back up and slipped it into my jacket, wondering how long we could head west until we just ended up back where we started.
In honesty, I was starting to doubt this entire mission. My mind understood logically that we had only been traveling for less than a week, but I felt as though a lifetime had passed between now and the last time I’d seen Adriel or the welcoming streets of Mina. The possibility that the Erl Queen had given us a map that was sending us on a wild goose chase was starting to look more likely, and it didn’t help that my companions were a couple of the most antisocial creatures I’d ever encountered.
Walking along the streets of this new location, I saw that many of the females had covered themselves with silky fabrics wrapped around their heads and necks, some concealing the bottom halves of their faces. The sun glared down harshly overhead, and the heat was already considerable, but the females were draped from head-to-toe in the gauzy fabric. It was a style I’d never seen before, and I decided that it was pleasing and mysterious.
As I traversed up the sloping street, I caught the same kind of curious and semi-hostile stares I’d been receiving for this entire journey. I couldn’t really blame the people I’d been encountering for their gawking, because in my head, my reaction had been much the same to seeing them. What struck me the most, however, was that despite having different supernatural abilities and racial backgrounds, people were still just… people.
This revelation seemed so simple and obvious that for the millionth time since I’d been awarded my freedom, my ignorance shamed me.
I glanced around at the bustling market that I’d strolled unwittingly into. Tents and carts and stalls covered in white canvases were set up around displays of various wares. Rather than selling mostly fish, as the venders were closer to the water, this market was the center of the little port town, and from my quick assessment, all manner of objects seemed to be available for sale.
I didn’t have any money, or any objects on me that I wanted to trade, but my curiosity drew me forward, and I wandered through the tents and stalls with no particular direction.
“Hello, moonchild,” said a voice from nearby, the exact location of which I could not pinpoint.
I paused in my steps, glancing around me. Save for the looks they occasionally tossed my way, no one seemed to be paying any particular attention to me.
I sniffed at the air, trying to pick up something useful, but was unable for the jumble of new scents and foreign aromas. With all the conversation and bartering going on around me, my ears were of little assistance, either.
“Over here, dearest,” the voice crooned again.
I spun on my heels, searching for the speaker, and spotted a small tent to the west. Between the folds of the entryway stood a small woman with a hunched back. Her face was dark and kind, set with wrinkles as deep as rivets around her almond-shaped eyes and mouth. She wore the same head-to-toe cover as the other females I’d glimpsed in town, but had left the bottom half of her face visible.
She raised a hand and beckoned me forward. “Come, moonchild,” she said, and disappeared behind the flaps of the tent. I paused, glancing around. The bustle of the marketplace carried on around me, and the old lady’s sweet voice drifted out again.
“Do not be afraid, moonchild,” she said.
I considered the possibility that there might just be any manner of horror or trickery waiting for me behind the flaps of that tent, but for whatever reason, my feet carried me forward, anyway, and I followed the crone inside.
I wasn’t sure what I’d been expecting, but it was not what I saw.
First of all, the inside was much, much larger than the appearance of the tent allowed for on the outside. From outside, the tent could not have been larger than an eight-by-eight foot area, but on the inside, it was sprawling.
While the outer part of the canvas had been starkly white like the other venders’ stalls, the inside was a deep purple. A large violet woven carpet covered the ground completely, and countless plush pillows trimmed in gold were set all about. On some of these pillows, people who looked as though they’d seen better days were sleeping, sitting, praying, or eating.
As I stood in the entrance of the tent, the top of which was now several feet over my head, despite the impossibility of this from what appeared on the outside, I sniffed at the air, and blinked several times as I realized something.
There were nearly twenty people in the tent, and they were all of different races.
I drew in another breath. If my nose wasn’t lying, there was even a human among them.
Unlike the people I’d come across so far on this journey, when I entered and stood among them, none of them stared at me. They were each wholly involved in whatever activity they were taking part in, and my presence seemed not to disturb them in the least.
“Come, moonchild,” the crone said again, drawing me out of my stunned observations. She sat at the back of the tent on top of a gold pillow. A young female with bruises on her arms and face laid her head on the crone’s lap, her eyes shut against the world, and as the crone called me forward, she stroked the female’s long black hair.
She gestured to a pillow that was across from hers, just two feet away. “Please,” she said. “Sit.”
I did as I was asked, not entirely sure why I was doing so. My body felt compelled to listen to the old female, and I did not sense any danger in this strange place, despite the novelty of it all.
So I folded myself down atop the pillow across from her, and glimpsed the twinkle that appeared in her eyes.
“The Wolf who shook the world,” the old crone said. “It is a pleasure to meet you, Rukiya Moonborn.”
17
A chill shot up my spine, and I had to grit my teeth against a shudder.
“How do you know my name?” I asked.
The crone stroked the dark hair of the female still lying in her lap. “I know many things, moonchild.”
“What are you?”
She shrugged, her cloaked shoulders rising and falling. “A common Sorceress,” she said.
I glanced around at the other occupants of the tent. “And who are all these people?”
Her eyes, I realized, were an alluring shade of violet, and they flicked around the room, settling on each person briefly before returning to me.
“Weary souls,” she said, and that purple gaze seemed to look right through me. “Not unlike yourself.”
I raised my chin a fraction. “What do you know about me?”
A small smile appeared on her lips, deepening the wrinkles around her mouth. “Only what the wind whispers.”
“That seems purposely cryptic,” I snapped, preparing myself to go. I wasn’t even sure why I’d followed her in here in the first place.
“I want to warn you,” she said, placing her hand on my forearm to stop me.
I looked down at where she touched me, and back into her eyes. “Don’t touch me,” I said.
She removed her hold in a flash. “Forgive me,” she said. “I only wish to warn you.”
My eyes narrowed, but I didn’t rise to leave. “Warn me about what?”
“You’re traveling to the City of the Seers, isn’t that correct?”
“How do you know that?” I glanced around again. “Who the hell are you?”
“I am no one, moonchild,” she said. “I am simply an old Sorceress who offers weary travelers a place to rest their heads. I’ve lived for nearly two thousand years, and in that time, I’ve learned to listen to the wind. It tells the story of the past, but also the future.”
I could not say why, but I believed her. I loosed a sigh and let some of the tension leave my shoulders.
“Forgive my rudeness,” I said. “I’m tired from a long week.”
The Sorceres
s smiled again, and either it was true kindness that I saw in her eyes, or I was the biggest fool ever born.
“Yes, I know.”
“So what has the wind told you about me, then?” I asked.
“That you seek the City of the Seers, and answers to questions that could change the world.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“Depends on whose perspective one takes,” she replied coyly.
“I have to find a way to free the Dogs,” I said. “I feel I owe it to them, to the others… How can I enjoy my freedom when so many others continue to suffer the fate I escaped?”
I hadn’t spoken this thought aloud before until just this moment, and only as the words left me did I realize that they were true. I’d started this mission with the goal of saving Adriel in the forefront of my mind, and I still wanted to save him, but I also wanted to free the others. I wanted to live to see a world where no Wolves wore collars.
The Sorceress nodded slowly, the deep lines around her eyes crinkling as she gave me a look as though she knew just how I felt.
“Plenty of people enjoy their privilege without concerning themselves with the hardships of others,” she said, running her fingers through the young female’s dark hair again in that motherly way of hers. “But you know something, yes? You know that none of us are free until we are all free… Your intentions are noble, I know this, and yet, sometimes the worst of things come from the best of intentions.”
“How can freeing the Dogs be bad?” I asked. “I don’t understand what you’re trying to tell me.”
She shook her head, and a bit of gray hair peeked out of the wrap covering her. She tucked it back in before answering.
“It is not the freeing of the Dogs that could be detrimental, but the manner in which you go about it… The Seers, they play with the most powerful of forces, and those forces will stop at nothing to accomplish their ends. They cannot be trusted.”
