by Tara Sim
—“NERALIA OF THE CLOUDS,” AN ORAL STORY ORIGINATING FROM THE LEDE ISLANDS
The first week on the Brackish was difficult.
Cayo was a stranger to the Bugs, so it took a while for them to adapt to his presence. There weren’t very many of them, but sometimes the children got so loud it felt as if the entire ship were full.
It used to be, he reminded himself. When his father had owned it.
He decided to think as little of his father as possible.
Instead, he acquired a barnacle named Fera, the girl who wanted to learn all his coin tricks. He often saw her concentrating with a coin in her hand, and it made him smile despite everything. It reminded him of Soria, sighing and complaining it was not fair that Cayo had inherited the good hands of the family.
Her ashes still rested in his pack. He was back in Moray, but he couldn’t bring himself to do what he had to. In the quiet, bleak moments, he sat with the pack in his lap, staring out at the ocean that shifted from dark gray to crystalline blue. His mother had often done this with Cayo or Soria in her lap, just staring out at sea, staring at something they’d never been able to perceive.
And then there was Amaya.
He did what he could. He gave her space, letting her navigate herself the way she wanted. He practiced making tea and left steaming mugs beside her hammock when she was too weary to visit the galley.
She didn’t speak much. Didn’t have to. Her father had died underneath her, his blood dried and flaking on her skin. It had drained something out of her, just as losing Soria had drained something out of him.
This was the thing about grief: It was always there. It would always take something out of him, out of her, carving its initials into their hearts. The pain would flare bright until it dimmed, until it needed kindling in order to grow again.
Amaya flared, and Cayo could hardly look at her. He knew if he tried to speak to her, he would flare, too, until they were burnt up to nothing.
So they both hugged ash to their chests and stayed silent, listening instead to the waves in the distance, their rhythm steady, unbreaking.
During the second week, Matthieu came back with reports that soldiers from the Sun Empire were beginning to infiltrate Moray by land, setting up a barrier to the west. Plumes of smoke rose from different points in the city, and Cicada said they were from massive pyres for those who had been claimed by the fever.
Cayo stole into the city to assess what was happening, but the streets were too choked with guards wearing masks and herding people away from closed-off sectors. Gunshots echoed farther down.
They sometimes heard wails and alarms in the distance. The children grew tense at the sound, eyes fixed on the skyline. But then they would relax again and play a card game, or try to roll coins across their fingers (Fera had recruited the others), or simply talk about impossible and fantastical things.
There was a night where the air was balmy and sweet, and Cayo closed his eyes and turned his face toward the wind. The deck was lit with a few lanterns glowing like watchful eyes in the dark. Cicada was teaching the children a new card game, and they sat in a circle to watch, yapping like a herd of puppies.
The wound at his shoulder ached. He had never been stabbed before; he hadn’t been prepared for the sharp cruelty of it, the way the shape of the knife lingered even now in his flesh. It was mostly healed now, though moving his arm in certain ways proved difficult.
Someone joined him at the railing. Cayo didn’t need to open his eyes to know it was Amaya. He knew how she moved, like a blade through the water.
“I’m worried,” she whispered. It was the most she had said to him in days.
He looked at her then. Her face was wan, her hair tangled. She was thin—they didn’t have much food, but Cicada got what he could from the city—and it was as if she were trying to disappear off the earth entirely.
Cayo had already determined that he wouldn’t let her.
“I’m sure they’re still traveling,” he said. “It takes a week just to sail to Baleine, and they had to go on foot for the first few days at least.”
She bit her lip, eyes dark and moonlit. She twisted the jade ring on her finger. Cayo thought of taking her hands in his, to make her look at him, but he made no move to do so.
“They’ll be all right,” he said.
Her breath hitched. Ever since he’d known her she had been closed off, sewn up, but now she was breaking open, practically snapping her ribs away to reveal what lay beyond.
Cayo may have shied away from it once. Now he accepted it like an unfinished gemstone, rough and heavy and worth more than he could imagine.
“I’m tired,” she whispered, gazing out at the dark water. The lighthouse atop the nearby cliff flashed its light in a steady tempo. “I’m tired of feeling like this.”
“I know.”
“Why did he have to keep it from me?” A tear fell slowly down her cheek, gleaming like a pearl. “Why couldn’t he have just told me the truth from the start?”
Cayo was afraid of touching her, of being burned alive by the pain that raged around her. But still he reached up and brushed the tear away with his thumb. It spread across his skin, warmth and salt.
“He was scared,” Cayo said. He hadn’t known Boon the way Amaya had, but he could understand that, at least. The truth was often horrifying—it was difficult to know when to divulge it or keep it close.
“So was I,” Amaya whispered. Then she turned her head slightly, resting her cheek against his hand. His heart kicked in his chest, so sudden and hard that Cayo wondered if it had been beating at all before now.
He stepped closer, and she let him. He thought it would be difficult, but it was simple, really: just the two of them standing together, bodies close, sharing heat and breath and light.
By the fifth week, he was woken with a shake as Amaya leaned over his hammock.
“News,” she said simply.
He followed her out onto the deck, where the early morning light was being filtered through thick, heavy clouds. A stranger stood waiting by the gangplank with an envelope. Amaya tossed him a coin, which the stranger bit before handing over the envelope and taking off.
Amaya drew out the letter inside. Cayo read over her shoulder.
A.—
It’s been done. R. had the brilliant idea to raid the currency exchange offices across the city, to pile up the counterfeit coins. My sister kept the Silver Star, and so she and J. helped us navigate it back to Baleine. Once we had all the counterfeits we could find, we put them on the ship and left it in the harbor. R. said he was inspired by the Ghost Ship incident. He put in a report to his officers. The ship was confiscated, and the counterfeits discovered.
All of it, of course, tied to Basque, who owns the Silver Star. His manor was raided, and he was brought in for questioning. You wouldn’t believe the secrets in that house of his, double rooms and compartments and even a laboratory. Deirdre and her alchemists found a few useful reports and ingredients in that laboratory, all contributing to what they believe to be a cure.
This whole time Deirdre was just trying to seduce him for his money so she could funnel more funding into her research, to mobilize the alchemists against the Rain Empire and drive them out of Chalier. Believe it or not, she and I are on the same side. I might consider working with her in the future.
Basque was arrested. His debtor ships are being recalled, the debtors’ contracts now null and void. My sister is a free woman and doesn’t have to run anymore. And what’s more: His ties to Moray are now severed.
They sentenced Basque to hang on the Sinner’s Shelf. I made D. row me out there to see it for myself. He made a pretty corpse. I spat on it. At least now R. can work with his superiors to revoke my Landless status, thanks to my contribution in Basque’s arrest.
The cure is still in development for mass distribution here, but Deirdre’s alchemists and the doctors are working together to bring it into circulation as soon as they’re able. Avi was in th
e first testing group to see if it actually works. He tells you hello, and that he feels like he can do a dozen backflips. (I tried to convince him to perform those dozen backflips, but he made up some paltry excuse and made me leave.)
Now for the bad news, because of course there must be bad news. Although the cure will surely come to Moray, and although Basque is done, the city will remain ravaged for quite some time. We’re already seeing it here in Baleine. The loss of the counterfeit money is putting it under financial strain, and I can only imagine the impact it will have on Moray. It may take years, even a generation, to recover from this.
But at least this is a beginning. The worst of the nightmare is over, or so we hope.
I cannot tell you what to do, but I hope whatever path you choose now, you know you have a place with me and A. and D. in Viariche. (And J., if he survives my interrogation.) R. says he has to stay in Baleine for a while yet, but I trust the two of you will reunite soon enough.
I’m proud of you. I don’t know if I’ve actually said it. You and C. both. Please be safe, and remember who your friends are.
—L.
Amaya’s throat worked as she swallowed. She read it through again, then one more time, before folding it carefully.
“A cure,” she whispered. “André Basque had the components for it all this time.”
A bright, burning rage grew in Cayo’s gut. He desired nothing more than to travel to Baleine so he could follow Liesl’s example and desecrate the man’s corpse.
“He was weeding them out,” Amaya said softly.
“What?”
“The poor. The hospitals in Baleine were filled with those who could afford treatment, remember?” She turned to him, her face contorted in grief and the same fury that sat within him. “They left the poorer citizens to die in the streets. He didn’t bother to make a cure because he wanted to weed them out.”
Cayo held on to the ship’s gunwale, taking deep breaths of briny sea air. It did nothing to staunch the damage. He hung his head, choking on a sob.
If the cure had been found just a few weeks sooner, Soria could have been saved.
Amaya held him from behind, and they swayed together, the flare building and building until it burned brighter than the hidden sun.
“I want to bury my father’s ashes.”
Cayo looked up from reading the news sheet that Matthieu had stolen. Cicada had read it out loud for the Bugs who didn’t know their letters, breaking the news they already knew from Liesl: A cure had been found, and the Rain Empire was sending shipments of it to Moray in good faith, but it was more likely a favor they expected to be repaid in the future. So long as the Sun Empire decided to let them pass, it would circulate within the city shortly.
But that still didn’t relieve Moray from its financial sinkhole. It didn’t take care of the counterfeit money still running through the city.
Cayo had been reading through the details—and then rereading, his focus slipping—when Amaya showed up beside him, her pack heavy on her shoulders.
“Bury?” he repeated.
She nodded. “I thought about scattering them, but I don’t want to. He already spent so much of his life away from home.” She turned to the gangplank. “Will you come with me?”
A simple question that wasn’t simple at all. He wondered if he should grab his own pack, if today was the time to say goodbye, but he decided against it. This was Amaya’s day, not his.
He did make sure to take Jazelle with him as they left the ship. There were still dock workers performing their duties, because what other choice did they have? The city had to go on even as it decayed. Some of the workers were coughing, and Cayo spotted splotches of gray on their skin.
The two of them carefully navigated the streets to avoid the ones that were closed off. The air smelled of smoke and soot, growing stronger and stronger as they walked. Cayo pulled his shirt over his nose and mouth, Amaya doing the same.
Eventually Amaya led him to one of the residential districts. Cayo instantly recognized it. They had passed this street before, back when they had been a countess and a merchant’s son. She had gotten mad at him for… something. He couldn’t quite remember. It was a lifetime ago, when he had worn a different skin.
She stopped in front of a humble-looking house with a red door. She stared at it for some time, arms hanging at her sides, face giving nothing away.
“This is where you lived,” he said.
She nodded, then led him around the house, through the narrow space between buildings. In the back was an overgrown garden fenced in with rotting wood, the small plot of land studded with weeds and wild herbs. Bushes had been left to turn wild, and morning glories snaked across the fence, up toward the house.
Amaya climbed over the fence and Cayo followed, half worried the wood would give out under them. In the middle of the garden, Amaya sank to her knees and set her pack down. Then she began to dig.
Cayo knelt beside her to help, but she took his wrist with a dirt-smudged hand and shook her head, so he sat back and watched as she scraped out as deep a hole as she could make. The beds of her fingernails turned dark, the earth clinging to her, fresh and soft.
When she took the box out of her pack, Cayo spotted a glimpse of her mother’s cloth. She still hadn’t taken it out, hadn’t found a purpose for it yet. It felt right for it to be here, though; for some part of her mother to join them for the ceremony.
Amaya took a deep breath. Another. She opened the box, revealing the gray ash studded with bits of bone, all that was left of the man who had raised her—destroyed her.
“I meant it,” Amaya whispered, and Cayo knew she wasn’t speaking to him. “When I forgave you. The world ruined you, and it ruined me. I understand.” Her voice broke, and she gripped the box tighter. “I loved you. Maybe I still do. I hope you know that.”
Cayo watched as she tipped the box over, letting the ash pool into the hole she had made.
“You’re home now, at least,” Amaya said.
She covered up the hole, patting the earth back into place. Cayo watched on, a silent witness, until a rustle made him turn. He jumped back at the sight of a dozen spiders in the overgrown bushes nearby.
“Don’t worry about them.” A weak laugh escaped her. “That’s what my mother would tell me. She was fond of spiders.”
“Don’t know why she would be,” Cayo murmured, taking in the blue triangle on the spiders’ bulbous bodies.
“Something about how their silk is special.” Amaya rubbed a sleeve over her eyes, then placed her hand over the disturbed dirt. “Say hello to her for me, all right?”
It almost broke her, made the tears come again, but she brushed them away and got to her feet. The two of them climbed back over the fence, returning to the main street.
“I thought I would feel different,” she admitted as they walked through the quiet streets. “But it’s more like the ending to a story I already knew.”
Cayo didn’t know if he could relate, if it would be the same for him when he finally let Soria go. Instead, he held out his hand and she took it in hers, grave soil pressed between their palms.
Blood is more costly than any coin or jewel.
—REHANESE PROVERB
You’re bleeding.”
Amaya pulled Cayo to a stop. They were still a ways from the ship, but she had just noticed the cut on Cayo’s hand, blood tickling her skin where it dripped between them.
“Must have snagged it on that fence.” Cayo reached for the hem of his shirt as if to rip off a makeshift bandage, but she stopped him.
“That’s too dirty. The wound will get infected.”
She made him sit as she dug through her pack, but most of her supplies had been taken out to make room for the cloth. Hesitating, Amaya ran her fingers over the fabric before using a knife to cut a strip away.
“You didn’t have to do that,” Cayo said, watching her wrap his hand.
“It’s fine. Not like it has any other uses.”
But as she tied the bandage securely, she realized for the first time that there was something off about the fabric. The parts that weren’t already stained pink with blood were… shimmering.
The clouds had parted, the sun beating down on them. The longer the sun shone, the stronger the fabric glowed. Amaya gathered more of it in her hands as the shimmer took it over, a strange buzzing sensation making her palms itch.
The cloth was absorbing the sunlight.
A cloud skidded across the sky and cut off the connection, but the cloth still shone, still humming with that unexplained energy.
She and Cayo exchanged a bewildered look.
“Well,” he said weakly. “That’s new.”
It was Cicada who figured it out.
They spread the fabric out on the deck of the Brackish, a huge square of canvas-like material that began to glimmer when the sun hit it. The children gasped and squealed in delight, but Cicada rubbed his chin and frowned in perplexity at the reaction.
“Never seen cloth do that before,” he said.
“It somehow absorbs light,” Amaya said. “The longer it’s out in the sun, the longer it glows.”
“It feels weird!” Matthieu exclaimed, his hand pressed against the cloth. “Like bugs crawling up my arm!”
“Eww,” Fera said.
Cicada walked around it with a thoughtful frown. He lifted the edge to fan it out, the cloth rippling.
The Brackish jerked beneath them, throwing them all off balance.
“What in the hells?” Amaya peered over the railing, but the water below was calm.
