Witchbreaker (Dragon Apocalypse) (16 page)

Sage nodded. “I do my best not to invade the privacy of others. Alas, some of my siblings don’t feel the same way.”

“Jetsam eavesdrops at every opportunity,” said Gale. “Mako can hear things much better than an ordinary man. It’s difficult to keep secrets from them.”

“What secret do you think I need to keep?” Sorrow asked.

“You?” Gale asked. “I imagine that is between you and your conscience.”

“Jetsam warned us about your condition,” said Sage. “I don’t see how you could keep it secret if you wanted.”

“Then what—”

“Can we trust that nothing we say will leave this room?” asked Gale.

“You have my word,” said Sorrow.

Gale motioned toward the figurehead. “This is all that’s left of the
Freewind
. I’ve saved it not because I’m sentimental. I rescued it because my mother’s soul is trapped inside.”

Sorrow looked at the wood. “I fear you’re mistaken. I would see an aura.”

“I see the aura,” said Sage. “But it would be concealed from you. When grandmother’s soul was bound to the ship, steps were taken to conceal her spirit from Rott’s gaze. Otherwise, the
Freewind
couldn’t sail the Sea of Wine unmolested. This same spell of concealment hides her from the gaze of other magically aware individuals such as yourself.”

“Okay,” said Sorrow. “What do you need me to do?”

“We can’t leave her trapped in this figurehead,” said Gale. “Before, my mother’s ghost could roam the
Freewind
. Watching her family carry on was her own personal heaven. Now the magic that sustained her has been damaged. We don’t know if she can see us or hear us. If she’s withering away, deaf and dumb, she may be in her own private hell.”

“How long has your mother been dead?” Sorrow asked, tracing the lines of the figurehead’s face.

“Eighteen years,” said Gale.

“Are you certain her soul is still in the wood? Souls don’t last forever in the material world. They’re like the residual heat from a fireplace. Once the fire dies out, the heat may linger a long time in the stones, but it isn’t eternal.”

“I know this,” said Gale. “But mother’s soul drew power from the Sea of Wine every time we crossed it. The Sea of Wine embodies the dreams and myths of all Wanderers. It sustains our souls for all eternity.”

“Can you not return to the Sea of Wine? I was under the impression this was one of your magical talents.”

Gale shook her head. “I could trigger the transition, but mother was the true cause. When she bargained with Avaris to bind her soul to the ship, she didn’t know that her state, bridging the gap between life and death, would weaken the fabric of reality, to the point that the
Freewind
could tear through.”

“Wait. Avaris? Your mother knew her?”

“So I’ve been told,” said Gale. “Truthfully, my mother’s biography is a complicated matter. She really did live a life of grand adventure. Alas, she was also prone to, shall we say, fabricating certain elements of her history.”

“If we found Avaris, she could explain the spell she used to bind your mother to the ship.”

“We know a good deal about the process,” said Sage. “Grandmother was quite ill when she made her bargain with Avaris. She knew she had very little time left. So she allowed Avaris to kill her. All the blood was drained from her body. The blood was diluted in wine, then soaked into to the
Freewind
board by board.”

“This is why our former ship had such a distinctive hue,” said Gale.

“Right,” said Sorrow. “But problematic. Since your mother doesn’t have any blood now, we couldn’t duplicate the original binding.”

“If we can’t place her spirit into a ship once more, can we release her? Better to swim on alone into the Sea of Wine than to live in a prison of wood.”

Sorrow nodded. “I agree. But we shouldn’t give up hope. As it happens, I’m on a quest to find Avaris. I think she can help me with my, um, skin condition. If your mother’s soul can last until then, Avaris may know some new trick to save her. Right now, my best hope of finding her lies in the Silver City, so it’s fortunate you were heading there, yes?”

“Good fortune indeed,” said Gale. “We’re departing later in the day. We can—”

Gale was interrupted by a knock on the door.

Sage whipped out her spyglass. “No one’s there,” she whispered, confused.

There was a second knock.

“Who is it?” Sorrow asked.

“Slate,” a deep voice answered.

Sage lowered her spyglass as her mouth went slack.

“I’m getting dressed,” Sorrow said. “Go find the galley and get some breakfast. I’ll join you later.”

“May I prepare something for you?” he asked.

“I’m not even a little bit hungry,” Sorrow said, doing her best to ignore the feeling of fullness in her abdomen.

She heard Slate’s heavy feet as he climbed the stairs up to the deck.

“You look spooked,” Gale said to Sage.

“I didn’t see him!” Sage said. “I mean, once he started talking I realized I could see him, but I hadn’t seen him the way I normally see people. He’s like a big, walking sack of meat. He has no aura at all!”

“Is he undead?” asked Gale.

“He breathes, he sweats, he bleeds,” said Sorrow. “He’s alive in every way I’ve thought of testing.”

“Sounds like you were pretty thorough in your testing,” Gale said with a sly grin. “I don’t blame you. Jetsam makes him sound like quite a feast for the eyes. Is there any sort of agreement between the two of you? A partnership that it would be impolite to intrude upon?”

“What? Are you... are you asking if we’re lovers?”

“You said you’d tested him in every way you could think of. I know the first thing I’d test.”

“By the pure metals, no! It’s nothing like that.”

“Good. I’d thought that, since you slept alone, you might not be possessive of him.”

“I’m not, but, really, I don’t think you should, um, test him yourself.”

“I agree!” said Sage. “I’m not even certain he’s human!”

“Also, you would drive Brand absolutely insane,” said Sorrow.

“Brand employs me,” said Gale. “He’s not my husband. He has no say as to whom I share my bed with.”

“You know he’s in love with you.”

“I know he
thinks
he’s in love with me.”

“You’re not worried he’s trying to manipulate you by providing you with a new ship?”

“I’m certain he is. But no matter. Brand may make any attempt he wishes to seduce me. I can see through his every action. When we share each other’s bed again, it will be due to my actions, not his.”

“When?” Sorrow asked. “Why would you...”

Gale shrugged. “Since we can no longer shorten our journeys via the Sea of Wine, we’ll be between ports for weeks at a time. In times of boredom, a woman can be forgiven for seeking... amusement.”

“When I tried to find amusement with Will Fortune aboard the
Monsoon
, you practically broke my arm,” grumbled Sage.

“You’ll thank me later. He wasn’t the right man for your first time.”

“It wasn’t going to be my first time. We were going to just fool around a little.”

“Fooling around a little is how I wound up pregnant with Levi when I was sixteen,” said Gale.

Sorrow folded her arms across her chest. “I’m not really comfortable with this discussion.”

Gale nodded. “My apology. I forgot that you were raised to follow the tenets of the Church of the Book. It’s no wonder they’ve become the most populous faith in the world, considering how they discourage the discussion of sex.”

“Wouldn’t refraining from discussing sex have the effect of reducing the population?” asked Sorrow. “The less the mind is focused on the topic, the less feverish it becomes.”

“So the church teaches. But all their efforts lead only to ignorance. Men and women among the faithful are left to rut like animals on pure instinct. The men know nothing of seduction, and the women know very little about how to entertain themselves without spilling out babies.”

Sorrow thought this was an odd attitude for a woman who had seven children, but let the matter pass.

Gale wasn’t through, however. “In most other cultures, sex is an act of the body. Wanderers, by being free to discuss the act, have turned it into an act of the mind. Until you’ve experienced the difference between the approaches, you can never understand how one is superior to the other. Perhaps you can speak to Brand about it. He was an enthusiastic student.”

“It’s not a topic that’s ever interested me,” said Sorrow. She looked down at her tail. “For obvious reasons, it interests me even less now.”

She led them toward the door. “If you’ll give me a moment, I’d like to get dressed. I’m sure you both must have a million things to do before this ship can leave port.”

“True,” said Gale. Sage lifted the figurehead.

“You know that Mako sneaks out to see Sandy, and you never say a word,” Sage muttered as she passed her mother.

“Mako doesn’t stand a chance with Sandy,” said Gale. “She doesn’t like his teeth.”

“How can you know that?” asked Sage.

“A mother knows,” said Gale, as Sorrow closed the door behind them.

Sorrow dressed, finding her armor no tighter than it had been before. The bloated sensation in her belly was all in her mind. She ran her hands along the remnants of her pelvic bone, letting her fingers pause where her crotch had once been.

She sighed. “I wasn’t using it anyway.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHILD’S PLAY

S
ORROW SPENT THE
following day in the hold. The ship had departed at dawn, and when Sage had come below to bring breakfast, Sorrow claimed to be suffering from sea-sickness. In truth, she wasn’t, but she suspected it wouldn’t take much to nauseate her considering her most recent meal. As horrible as the rat had been going down, she couldn’t bear the thought of having it come back up. She felt her best course to avoid the experience was just to remain in the dimly lit hold and try to sleep until she was certain her unanticipated late night snack was completely digested.

She attempted to distract herself by updating her journal. Writing always took her from the realm of emotion into the realm of objective analysis:

It was only meat. For most living creatures, my meal was a completely natural event, barely worth note. Lions and wolves and housecats survive on raw meat; certainly humans can tolerate the diet. In some respects, the convention of gutting and skinning a beast, draining it of blood, cutting out the bones, then cooking only the muscles seems wasteful.

I should feel proud to have moved beyond such unnatural prissiness. Civilization has done all it can to suppress the hunting instinct that lies within us all. To have this instinct reawakened is an improvement, not a curse.

She closed her journal with a sigh, not convinced of a word she’d written. She began to think that her self-confinement was keeping her from moving past the incident. If she would only go up on deck, she could be distracted by the activities of the Romers.

If all the Romers had been adults, her decision would have been simple. She could hear Poppy and Cinnamon on deck, and they were ten and twelve, respectively. It had been one thing to slither into Commonground and face the stares of scoundrels and ruffians. If they were given nightmares by her appearance, she felt no pity for them. But Sorrow had seen things no child should see at Poppy’s age, and didn’t want to give the girls nightmares. Still, she couldn’t hide below deck for the entire voyage, could she?

Her self-imposed exile in the hold came to an end with a knock on the door. The hold was dark save for the lantern. She threw her blanket around her shoulders to conceal herself before opening the door.

It was Brand, looking concerned as he slipped into the hold.

“Can I help you?” Sorrow asked.

“You’ve been hiding out since we left port. I was wondering if you needed help.”

“I’m just feeling... queasy. I’ve more stomach to upset than I used to.”

Brand held up a gnarled, tan root. “Ginger. Chew on this and you can handle rough seas. Gale’s powers do push a ship across the waves faster than most people are used to.”

Sorrow took the root. It looked tough and fibrous. She had doubts about putting it into her mouth.

“So what’s the real reason you’re hiding?” Brand asked.

“Why do you doubt that I’m sea-sick? On my previous travels aboard the
Freewind
I spent most of my time in my cabin.”

“Some company would be good for you.”

“I’ve been too busy for company,” said Sorrow. “I’ve been updating my journal.”

“Is there a section about how I killed the dragon?” Brand asked with a grin.

“You’ve been mentioned, yes. As an aide in my successful gambit to stop the beast.”

“Do you also talk about me being a good listener with interesting insights into your true feelings and motives?”