Page 27 of Saint
“You’re kidding.” The faintest trace of mirth laced the words.
“Seems the dredger showed up after all.”
“The gems? She has them?”
“Someof them.” I shot her an irritated look.
The low beat of steady pounding reverberated in the floorboards of the cabin from the cargo hold below, and the girl looked between us warily.
“Shut him up before someone on the docks hears him,” I muttered.
Clove’s gaze lingered on the dredger for another moment before he took two steps backward, toward the door. I followed him out, closing it behind me.
He took the stairs belowdecks, stopping halfway down. When he looked up at me, it was with a look I knew well. “So?”
My eyes lifted to the closed door of my helmsman quarters in the passageway as I reached for the knife in the back of my belt. I closed my hand over the blade before pulling it through my fist and then I lifted it into the air, over the railing. A steady stream of blood dripped into the water below.
“Raise anchor. Set course for Sowan.”
Clove let out a long breath. “You sure about that?”
I met his eyes reluctantly. He always saw more than I wanted him to. “No.”
He was so still for a moment that I was almost sure he would argue. But instead, he gave me a nod and climbed down the ladder.
If we did this, things would be different. The rivalry with Zola had been beneath the surface until now. This would change everything.
I glanced up to the raised sails of theRiven.She was half cloaked in fog, making her look more like a ghost than a ship. And maybe she was. I’d seen enough strange things at sea to believe it. TheRivenhad lost her soul a long time ago. So had we.
11SAINT
The sun disappeared over the horizon, the light striping the surface of the water in one long pillar of gold before it began to fade. It was crisp and clear, wavering on the surface, but the sight gave me an uneasy feeling. The sea was too quiet, and that could only mean one thing—that she was readying for something. There was a distant whisper I could hear on the wind, an echo from miles away. A storm was coming. It always was.
The adder stones jingled in the open window, where they were strung on a thin stretch of twine. It was an old helmsman’s trick to ward away the eyes of the sea demons, and I’d paid a few Waterside strays in Ceros to collect them for me in the early hours before dawn the day Clove and I first set sail. I’d stood up on the rocks, watching their lanterns bob on theblack sand below, and I’d given them a copper each before I hung the stones up.
I knew better than to ignore the traditions. I’d learned the hard way what happened when you did. And though my piety and consecration of the old ways sent myths about me trailing through the Narrows, there was one that only Clove knew. The black sea. The open mouth of the wave. Wide eyes looking up at me from beneath the water as they disappeared. There were some sins you paid for your whole life. I knew that now.
The light cast an orange glow in the cabin as I dipped the finest-tipped quill into the pot of blue ink and tapped along its rim. I’d managed to get a pint of oil for the lanterns to last us until we got to Emilia’s croft by promising the barkeeper at the tavern in Dern two extra bottles of rye on our next stop. If I caught Emilia in a good mood when we reached Sowan, maybe she would see us off with more.
Before me, the map I’d spent the last year working on was unrolled across the desk. The thick parchment was unmarked, every edge still sharp. It was the only thing on the ship that wasn’t tattered or half rotted with damp, and in another month or two, it would be complete.
The Narrows.
What lay before me was the first accurate rendition of the entire mercurial shoreline that crept in from the Unnamed Sea into spidering veins of water that spilled in from the rivers. I was no mapmaker. My father had been the one with that talent, even if he’d never properly used it, but I knew how to mimic him. Every careful brushstroke, etch, and symbol.
No one had ever made a complete map of the Narrows. Ceros had its share of charts, but not the whole of the waters. And why would they? Every helmsman worth their salt had its shape and depth and width carved on their bones. Had its waters running through their veins. But to the outside world, the Narrows was more of an idea than a place. A reputation. In a way, I figured, we didn’t really exist until we were recorded with parchment and ink. Until we were, we’d never be seen as a people standing on our own.
The map archived every angle, every degree, every depth in careful detail. I set the heel of my hand onto the edge, letting the breath ease out of my lungs before the tip of the quill touched down. I dragged it in a stack of straight lines, shadowing an arch of reef that snaked east and opened to a circular well that plunged forty feet deep. The water there was crystal clear, and on sunny days, you could see the gold glittering on the sand below.
I picked up the quill and set it onto the linen beside me, unfolding my fingers to stretch the sore muscles in my hand. My father had been a much better artist than I was, but he’d made me practice every night, painstakingly drawing the fishing routes on scrap parchment that would later feed the fire.
Mind the ink, Elias.
I could still hear his voice, hovering in the darkness around me.
I picked up the bowl of sand and sprinkled it over the map to dry the ink and it scattered, covering the work I’d just done. When it was dry, I carefully rolled up the parchment,returning it to the waxed-leather cylinder case and fitting the lid on tight.
The trip to Emilia’s was usually an easy one. Those were the nights on our route when we had coin in our coffers and gems in our rye. It was the leg back to Dern that had our bellies growling and our hull light. But this time we were sailing with shadows following us. Zola. Henrik’s gems. Rosamund’s missing apprentice.
