I was beginning to smile when I felt a tug at the back of my pack. I spun. Afraid we’d been caught after all, but it was only Nasataa slipping out and darting through the water beside me. He’d better stick close! Could he manage to swim against such a strong current? He seemed just fine, but I kept a close eye on him as the hours passed until finally, the boat anchored again.
I swam up to the surface, checking on what was happening and Captain Yvon called down to me.
“We’re at anchor for the night. The hands and I will sleep on deck, but the shore is close. We leave again at first light.”
I nodded, grateful for his help but so tired I could hardly rest at all.
We made camp on the shore, lighting a fire on a sandy beach and sharing the canteen and dried meat. Nasataa was out immediately, curling up so close to the fire that the flames almost licked his gleaming scales. Heron slumped nearby, not even bidding us goodnight before he was asleep. I was about to join him when Vyvera shook with wracking coughs and then pointed to me.
“No sleep. Practice.”
“What?” I asked, incredulous.
“The Staff. You need to practice. It will guide you.”
She curled up by the fire, coughing her terrible barking cough and I was left sitting there with a choice. She could hardly force me to practice when she was so ill. And I was so tired that I wanted to ignore her instruction. But then again. How could I defend Nasataa if I didn’t have any ability to use this staff?
With a tired sigh, I stood up, paced down the beach and then began the forms Vyvera had shown me, slowly and carefully at first but picking up speed as they grew more familiar. I was probably imagining things, but the staff seemed to glow slightly as I worked with it. And it did feel as if it was guiding me in my awkward forms, helping me to adjust them as I practiced. I must be really tired to think that.
I worked until I was so tired that I was beginning to forget what I was doing. Eventually, I returned to the fire and collapsed beside Nasataa, drifting off to sleep.
Our next two days were the same as the first – a combination of clinging to ropes until our muscles hurt and desperately avoiding the notice of the patrols that roamed the river. Sometimes their hulls went by so close that I could see what color they were in the dark water. Other times, we had to scramble to hide from bubblers boarding or riding along their own patrol boat hulls. It was nerve-wracking and exhausting, but I kept reminding myself that it was still an adventure and adventures were not comfortable things. Captain Yvon passed food to us at night – just enough to keep us going – and I worked the staff on each break, but so far, no magic had come to me.
On the second night, Vyvera drew us a map in the sand of where we were going, demanding that we memorize it and repeat it back to her. Our destination lay under a waterfall. I would like to see a waterfall. There weren’t any on the Havenwind Isles and I felt like seeing one would be a true adventure.
“Just in case,” Vyvera said the third time she made us repeat her directions. Her coughs had grown worse and black fluid sometimes leaked from her eyes. I was beginning to worry that she didn’t have two weeks. She might not even have two more days.
I wanted to say or do something to comfort her, but the only thing I could think of was to comply to her wishes, so I memorized the map, and I worked the staff, and I hoped with all my heart that she would live to see the Troglodyte she was going to die to serve.
Chapter Eight
The third morning Captain Yvon had a quick word with us before we ducked under the waves.
“We’ve been hearing news all up the river that revolution is spreading from the coast.”
“Revolution?” Vyvera asked before beginning another coughing fit.
“They say that a dragon attacked one of the Sentinel Towers. Since then, the people have been astir. Some have wanted to see the Saaasallla overthrown for a long time.” He looked around warily. “But I shouldn’t be discussing such things. I only mention it to remind you to be careful. I agreed to hide you until Tinlin City, but I’ve never seen so many patrols and Bubbler Atura Feliciano herself is hunting for you. It’s going to be hard for you to hide – especially since you look like foreigners. And now with tensions so high, any attention drawn to you could lead to violence. Be careful. Watch yourselves. Try not to stand out in any way.”
We nodded, and Heron looked worried.
“Do you think there will be a war?” he asked.
I shivered. I hated the thought of war. People killing other people was such a terrible thing. No one deserved to die just because someone else wanted what they had. But that hadn’t stopped me from lashing out with the staff when Nasataa was threatened, did it? That was blood I’d seen in the water and bones my blade had caught on. I wasn’t innocent in this.
The Captain shrugged at the question. “Who can say? When we reach Tinlin City I will anchor in the docks there for a few hours while we unload. That will be the best time for you to make your way to shore and on to the next leg of your journey. I hope you arrive at your destination safely.”
We nodded.
“Thank you for helping us,” I said, smiling my sweetest smile. I had nothing else to offer him. “I hope you don’t get into trouble for it.”
“I won’t if you don’t get caught,” he said. “So, don’t get caught. We will be at Tinlin City by midday.”
It had felt longer than just a morning, but the sun was high in the sky when we started to see other hulls and the paddles stopped and we drifted in beside the base of a pier. The anchor dropped, and Heron and I made eye contact and nodded.
It was time.
We needed to get away from the barge and into the city and we needed to do it without anyone watching.
I looked to Vyvera to see if she realized where we were, but she seemed barely conscious. Heron shook her gently, putting an arm around her to help guide her to the muddy river bottom along the pier. I felt for Nasataa’s mind with my own, but he was worn out from a night chasing and snacking on glowbugs while the rest of us slept and he was – fortunately – fast asleep. My belly rumbled at the thought of food – even glowbugs – but I ignored it. Adventurers were always hungry in the stories. Eventually, I’d find food again.
We slid along the mud bottom, and my senses were on high alert, watching for any Bubblers. We couldn’t surface here. People would notice soaking wet people coming out of a river they hadn’t gone into. So where could we go? We needed somewhere quiet. I led us along the shoreline, keeping far enough back from the bank that we wouldn’t be seen.
The world above could be seen from under the waves, but it was too blurry to make anything out beyond vague shapes and colors. I was going to have to risk putting my face above the water soon, but I didn’t dare do it too soon.
Eventually, we found another dock. This one was more worn with rotting wood and old debris around it. Good. There were only a few boats tied up here. A better place to try to scope out our chances.
I crept to the far side of the dock and carefully crept to the surface, bobbing up between two of the boats. I managed not to cough, choking quietly as the water came up out of my lungs. I was in luck! No one was in the boats tied here and they were small and shabby. I risked rising a little higher to look past their hulls.
We were on the far side of the river port, on the furthest dock upriver and the most decrepit of them all. Debris from the river was stuck in a churning eddy at the shore and tall trees draped over the water, trailing their unkempt branches into the pollen-coated surface. Further along the river, the real docks were teeming with boats and people. I could make out the barge we’d traveled under and on its deck, a Bubbler patrol was boarding. They wouldn’t find anything, but I sure hoped they wouldn’t make trouble for Captain Yvon.
We needed to get to shore quickly before they thought to look under the water, too.
I dove back under, signaling Heron and Vyvera to follow me, and I led them up the muddy bank to surface near the heap of debri
s and the trailing tree branches. They lent us perfect cover as we slid quietly out of the water, trying to wring out our clothing as we made it to shore. Heron and Vyvera tore off their patches, leaving them in the heap of debris.
“We will do better in our own clothing than the Bubbler robes we’re wearing on top,” Vyvera said, and Heron quickly shed the waterlogged red cloth as she spoke, flinging the mask and goggles aside. “Bubblers get noticed more than foreigners do and you two won’t pass as bubblers.”
I was more reluctant, but I saw her logic, and quickly stripped my own disguise off, stuffing it and the others in my pack.
There was a shout from down the beach, and I peeked through the branches to see what it was.
The Bubbler patrol had Captain Yvon between them, hands tied in front of him as they marched him swiftly away from the docks. A spike of cold shot down my spine.
“I guess we’d better hurry,” I said, sharing a worried glance at Heron and Vyvera.
Chapter Nine
There was nothing we could do for Captain Yvon.
“They have no evidence that he helped us,” Vyvera said through muffled coughs. “They won’t keep him for long.”
I wasn’t so sure. Our enemies hadn’t seemed terribly reasonable so far.
“We need dry clothes. We stand out in these wet ones,” Heron grumbled as we scrambled up an alley, dodging an old man who was scowling at us from a bench where he sat feeding birds.
“Follow me,” Vyvera said, leading us further up the alley. “You’ll find if you travel much that most cities operate the same way. There are only so many ways for a lot of people to live in one place.”
“What does that mean?” Heron asked.
“It means they hang their washing in the alleys and if we are lucky, we can steal some clothing to wear.”
I didn’t like the idea of stealing. What if I took someone’s favorite shirt or pants?
Heron hung back a step to walk beside me. “I think that having your world saved is probably worth losing an outfit from your laundry line.”
“Won’t they be watching them if theft is such a possibility?”
He shrugged. “What do I know? No one steals in the islands. Not much, anyway. And we don’t have alleys.”
It didn’t take long to find and steal clothing that fit us. I felt strange in my outfit. I was wearing sandals again, which I was grateful for, but the clothing here was all of a soft fiber I wasn’t used to and they used more cloth than we did in the islands. My clothing felt bulky. So did the pack on my back.
We wrapped our old clothing into a tight package and added it to my pack under a sleepy – and irritated Nasataa. Hopefully, he would go back to sleep. If he popped a head out of the bag in this city, someone would notice, and we’d be in huge trouble.
I strapped the canteen over my shoulder. It didn’t fit in the bag anymore. We’d need to make difficult decisions about what to keep soon – the bag was stuffed to the top.
Almost everyone in Tinlin wore hoods – which was handy when trying to disguise a foreign complexion. We kept ours pulled low to disguise our features in shadow. But we were still garnering looks as we strolled out onto the streets.
“I think it’s the seaweed,” Heron whispered after a few minutes.
I looked down, but there were no weeds clinging to me. What was he talking about? But then I saw it. All along the street, the people walked with chains of seaweed around their necks. Some wore purple and some green and those with green seemed to avoid those wearing purple and vice versa. What in the world was going on?
We paused beside a cart selling the necklaces and Vyvera ran her fingers over a purple chain of seaweed.
“Best seaweed in stock, mistress. Shipped from the sea yesterday,” the vendor said, which was clearly a lie since it had taken us three days to make the same route. “You’ll need to wear your own. You and your friends. No one is willing to trust anyone who hasn’t declared just yet.”
“Declared?” I asked as a shout broke out from down the street. Heron’s head whipped in that direction, like a dog scenting prey.
“The seaweed declares your side in the discussion, mistress,” the vendor said, but the look he gave me was longsuffering, like he was used to young women being a bit slow to follow politics. I bit my tongue. If I tried to show him that he was wrong about me, I would only be exposing us.
“It seems that those in purple are not fond of the Saaasallla’s patrols,” Heron muttered.
“The rebels, you mean,” the vendor said. “Yes, purple is a dangerous color to wear.”
“Coins,” Vyvera said, looking at me.
Reluctantly, I fished out a pair of coins from my pack, trying not to disturb Nasataa as I reached blindly around his sleeping body, and handed them to her.
“We’ll take three green,” Vyvera said.
The vendor grinned. “An excellent choice!”
I struggled to mask my shock as Vyvera and Heron hustled me away from the cart, jamming the seaweed over my head.
“But,” I began, and Heron shushed me.
“Disguises aren’t meant to express your true thoughts. They are meant to make you blend in!” Vyvera reminded me. “And we need a way to find a ship headed upriver, so we need to go to an inn and listen to what the riverboat captains are saying. And that will mean looking loyal.”
I kept my mouth shut but I didn’t like this plan. Lying didn’t seem like a good idea and I hated the looks of disapproval and headshakes I was getting from every person wearing a purple necklace. I agreed with them! We should be natural allies, not enemies!
But Vyvera was right. By the time we found a good inn near the river where the river captains were drinking, it was obvious that no one in a purple necklace was even being allowed in. If we’d chosen purple, we wouldn’t be either.
No sooner had we crossed the threshold of an inn called The Betting Betty than I saw what I was looking for. Chalked up on the wall were the names of boats with a list of when each was departing and for where. By the rough map scrawled beside us, we could hitch a ride on The Sea Serpent, The Dash and Roll, or The Potbellied Pig.
Perfect.
A smile was already spreading across my face when someone in the inn cursed and every eye followed his shaking hand to where it pointed at me.
“What is that?” he asked.
Nasataa chose that moment to lick my ear.
Chapter Ten
I opened my mouth to speak, but Heron already had me by the waist. He lifted me up and practically threw me out of the inn door.
“Run!” he cried, and we were running.
We dashed down the streets, our feet flying as we skidded across cobbles and down winding stone staircases, past shops, and around carts selling fruits and street foods. Calls and shouts filled the air behind us, but we were gaining distance from them. If we could just keep it up!
Nasataa flashed me a feeling of chagrin. He realized that somehow licking my ear had caused this. But it was actually my fault. In all the sneaking and stealthiness, I’d forgotten to keep an eye on him and make sure he was still asleep.
We zigged and zagged from street to alley to street again, up one staircase and down another until we were close to the docks again. I ran past a half-rotten boathouse with a roof half caved-in when Heron whispered to me.
“Seleska!”
I spun to see him and Vyvera ducking into the tumbledown shed and I hurried after them. Heron jammed the door closed again and pressed his eye to a hole in the wall while we collapsed in a heap among the dead leaves and debris in the small shed. Old oars and abandoned pottery were stacked in corners of the shed and everything smelled of mildew and rotting wood.
Nasataa squirmed out of the bag and leapt into my arms, laying his hot little head on my shoulder.
“It’s okay,” I whispered. “It’s not your fault.”
He licked my jaw excitedly.
“Shhhh!” Heron whispered to me.
In the distance, I
heard the sound of feet passing and voices calling. Some were near and some further, but when they finally passed us, no one stopped to look in the dilapidated boathouse.
Eventually, Heron joined us at the back of the shed, trying to catch his breath with the rest of us. Vyvera muffled a cough.
“I don’t think I’ll last much longer,” she whispered in the darkness. Outside, the light was fading to dark. “I pushed too hard when we were running.”
“We won’t have to run again if we’re more careful,” Heron assured her.
“I don’t mean that. I’m finding it hard to breathe.”
We were silent for long moments.
“I’m sorry, Vyvera,” I said.
“I need you to know two things,” she whispered as the moments drew out. Even her speaking seemed labored and difficult. “First, you are essential to the healing of the world, Seleska. Keep that knowledge close, don’t forget it, and don’t give up. I need you to get to the Troglodytes. The world needs you to. Nasataa needs you to. Without the Troglodyte’s blessing, the Rock Eaters will find you and kill you. Promise me that you’ll go.”
“I promise,” I whispered.
“Second, you must keep practicing with that Dragon Staff. The fate of the world hangs in your mastery of that.”
Well, that seemed extreme.
“Promise me,” she insisted.
“I promise.”
Heron shifted uncomfortably beside me. He had wanted to turn back before, and I suspected that he still did. These promises couldn’t be easy for him to hear.
“There was a prophecy that led me to you,” Vyvera said, and then her voice changed as she began to quote it. “One born on distant island far from home. One brought to keep him safe if he roam. One given as a strength to face that day. One who with her life for them will pay.” She paused to cough violently before continuing. “Do you see what it means? What it has to mean? It’s the prophecy of the Restoration – of the return of magic. And it prophesies the birth of Nasataa far from home, of Seleska who will guard him, of Heron who will lend them strength, and of me who will die to help you.”
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