Текст книги "The Assassin's Curse"

Автор книги: Cassandra Clarke

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Текущая страница: 11 (всего у книги 15 страниц)

  He lifted his head when I came in, just enough that I knew he wasn't dead.

  I splashed forward and picked up one of the scraps of cloth. His writing was all over it, the ink a brownish-red color, not black like Marjani's ink. It wasn't a story. I stared at it for a long time, not making any sense of those symbols, knowing full well it was a spell. I balled the cloth up in my fist and dropped it at my side. Naji moaned, dropped his head back. My anger swelled up inside me like a wave.

  "You son of a whore," I said. "You filthy, mutinous, lying sack of shit–"

  Naji tried to say something, but his words came out all slurred, and for a second I wondered how bad it had hurt him when I fell out of the rigging, if his body shattered like it was made out of glass. I hoped so. And then my anger was this flash of white light, hot and searing, and I waded up to him, pulled my arm back, and punched him square in the face.

  "Ananna! What are you doing?"

  Marjani crashed into the room. I hit Naji again, open-handed this time, and he tried to squirm away from me, shoving his hands between us to block me. I grabbed his wrist, dried blood flaking off on my fingers, and yanked him up off the hammock and punched him again. He slammed up against the wall.

  And then Marjani had her arms around my waist.

  "Stop it," she said. "Stop." She pulled me away from him, dragging me through the water. I strained against her, arms flailing, but it wasn't no use.

  "Calm down," she said, over and over. "Ananna, this isn't the time. Calm do–"

  She froze in place, staring at the walls, and I wriggled out of her arms and turned to look at her. Over on his hammock, Naji moaned my name.

  "Shut up," I told him. My heart pounded up against my ribs and it didn't have nothing to do with the fight.

  "The air," Marjani said. "It's all wrong…" Then she picked up one of the sail scraps and stared at it good and hard. I stood there with my chest heaving, waiting for her to get angry, as angry as I was. But she only seemed sad.

  She looked up at Naji. "You shouldn't have done this."

  "You don't understand," Naji said. "The curse–"

  "Shut up!" I screamed at him. "You're going to get us killed." I turned to Marjani. "We were always headed for Port Idai, like I said. I never thought he'd do something like this."

  "Neither did I," Marjani said. She splashed over to me. "I know about the curse," she said, her voice soft. "He told me."

  "What?" I said.

  "I tried…" Naji gasped. "Tried to save–"

  "Get him," she said, jerking her head at Naji. "And come up on deck. And for Aje's sake, play along."

  "You knew?" I said. "How long?"

  She didn't answer, just made her way out of the crew's quarters, the water splashing up around her knees. I turned to Naji. He'd sat up some, and there was a bruise forming around his eye from where I hit him.

  "You heard the lady," I said.

  "We are… The islands? We're… here?"

  "Shut up."

  I grabbed him by his arm and jerked him up to standing. He slouched against me. Fine. I threw his arm around my shoulder, and together we waded through the ship's belly. I wasn't screwing around with this. We'd been caught, flat-out. Having Marjani on our side helped, but it wasn't just Marjani who'd caught us, it was everyone. The crew. The captain. If we were lucky we'd be thrown in the brig for the rest of the trip. I didn't think we'd be lucky.

  It took us a while to get up on deck, cause I pretty much had to push Naji up the ladder. He pulled himself up through the hatchway, Kaol knows how, and then he slumped against the deck, wheezing and grasping for breath. The captain and Marjani were waiting for us, standing side by side with the rest of the crew fanned out behind 'em.

  "This true, Ananna?" the captain asked me. Marjani had this right mean look on her face. Play along.

  Naji coughed and pushed himself up on his hands. His hair pressed in thick clumps against his face.

  "I did it," he said. "Don't blame her."

  The captain looked like he wanted to whip out his sword and take care of the problem the old-fashioned way, but instead he just spat at Naji and turned to me.

  "Wasn't asking him," he said.

  I closed my eyes. All I could feel was my heartbeat, the blood rushing through my body.

  "Well?" he said.

  "Yeah, it's true." I forced myself to meet his eye. Any of that kindness I'd seen before had disappeared. "I didn't know he was gonna do it, though, or I'd have stop–"

  The captain held up one hand, and I shut my mouth. I was shaking from the cold and from fear, wondering what he was going to do to us.

  "Blood magic," the captain said, spitting the words out. "Can't believe you'd bring something like that on board. I trusted you, little girl."

  I flushed with shame, but I didn't hang my head. Kaol, was I proud of that.

  "Believed that whole damn story you told…" The captain shook his head.

  "I'm sorry," I said, looking at the captain, looking at Marjani. She frowned, little lines appearing around her eyes.

  "Throw 'em overboard," the captain said.

  Marjani whipped her head toward him. "Captain, I don't think… In this water, that will kill them."

  "Good," he said cheerfully.

  I about started to cry. I've cried out of desperation twice in my life and both of those times were nothing compared to the mess I was in right now, about to get cast out in the icy northern sea cause of a blood magic assassin with no manner of patience.

  Marjani gave me this look of full-up desperation, quick as a flash, and I knew whatever plan she'd made just fell through. I'd never felt so small and vulnerable and doomed.

  And then Chari spoke up.

  "Sir," he said, stepping forward out of the crowd. "I agree we shouldn't keep this pair of hijacking mutineers on board, but I did see the girl during the, ah, storm and she about near died trying to save this ship."

  The captain stared at him. Chari held his gaze. He was the kind of old that commands respect.

  "So what do you suggest?" the captain said.

  "Give 'em a boat," Chari said. The crew didn't like that, and they all hissed and booed behind him. "Or a piece of plank board, captain. Enough to get 'em to the island."

  I wanted to kiss the old son of a bitch, I really did.

  "They'll be good as dead there anyway," Chari said. "It's what you'd do if we were down in the south."

  Something flickered though my head. Ain't got nothing to lose.

  "Confederation rules," I said. "Mutineers are always stranded. Not killed."

  Everybody stopped talking and turned to me.

  "We ain't part of the Confederation," the captain said.

  "I am," I said. I pushed out my chest and took a deep breath. "My full name is Ananna of the Tanarau. My father is the captain of that same ship." Then I lifted up the hem of my shirt to show him my Confederation tattoo.

  The captain's face got real dark.

  "You drew that on," he said. "You're faking me."

  "You want to risk it?" I said. I nudged Naji with my foot. "You have any idea what he's capable of this close to death? That's blood magic's nexus, captain, death. This close to the other side, he could send a message to my father so quick you'd be dead in a week."

  The crew fell silent, so I figured I must have convinced most of 'em at least half-way. The captain didn't look too doubtful himself, either.

  "I don't want no business with the Confederation," he said. "I could kill you right now and not worry about a thing."

  And then Naji started chanting.

  It gave me pause, ain't gonna lie. I thought maybe he was working some kind of darkness over there, maybe calling down demons to swoop in and save us. But when I glanced at him his eyes were dark as night, not glowing at all. And I realized he was faking for me.

  "You hear that!" I shouted, getting into it. "Speaking straight to my father, he is. You can't kill me now. Neither one of us."

  The captain's eyes went wide with fear. Marjani's didn't. She glanced back and forth between me and Naji but didn't say nothing. But the chanting got the crew into a tizzy, and they all backed up against the railing.

  "Make him stop," the captain said.

  "Can't," I said. "He don't listen to me. If that were the case, we'd still be on our way to Port Idai."

  The captain took a few steps back from Naji. "Fine," he said. "You want me to treat you like some Confederation mutineer – Marjani, get them a boat."

  "And a pistol," I added. I didn't want to push my luck but those were the Isles of the Sky.

  "And a damn pistol." He spat on the deck.

  Marjani dipped her head and disappeared over to the starboard side.

  Naji stopped chanting and slumped over. The captain took a deep breath and looked relieved.

  Then he jerked his head back to the crew and called up a couple of the rougher fellows to drag me and Naji over to the side of the ship, where Marjani was waiting with a rowboat and a pistol and a thinly-hewn rope net that she probably meant to serve as a blanket. The crewmen shoved Naji and me into the boat. One of 'em looked like he wanted to spit on me, but he glanced at Naji and nothing happened.

  "Leave," Marjani said to 'em.

  They didn't.

  "Do what I tell you," she said, pulling out a thin little knife I didn't even realize she carried.

  And what do you know, both of the crewmen took off.

  She held the knife up to my throat and leaned in close. I could tell she didn't aim to use it, but still. Nobody likes having a knife at their throat.

  "Listen," she said, talking real close to my ear, hissing like she was threatening me. "He said something the other day about somebody following him."

  "What–"

  "He tried to get me to change course. He wouldn't tell me details, but just – be careful." Her face got kind of soft and understanding. "Stay on that island," she said. "And for Aje's sake, stay alive. Keep warm and keep dry. There are ways off every island."

  And before I could respond, she turned away from me and cut the ropes holding the rowboat aloft. We crashed down into the black sea. The Ayel's Revenge rose up in front of us like a leviathan, and I had no choice but to grab hold of the oars and row us away.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

The island really did float. Once we'd cleared the Revenge, once my arms got so sore I could barely move 'em, I drew the oars back into the boat and drifted along the choppy water, shivering from the cold, from my injuries, from the distracting knot of fear coiling in my stomach. Up ahead the island hovered above the sea, chunks of smooth black stone tapering into points beneath the gray beaches and the trees. In the distance, you could just make out the other islands through the haze drifting off the water.

  "Hey." I shook Naji's shoulder. He was curled up on the net and didn't move. "E'mko and his twelve dancing seahorses, you better not be dead."

  He stirred, moaning a little. His breath blew out in a white cloud.

  "That spell of yours have any way for us to get on land?"

  That must have gotten his attention. He sat up, pushed his hair back away from his face. "We're here," he said.

  "Of course we're here," I said. "We just got kicked off the Ayel's Revenge for it." I frowned at him.

  His expression glazed over as he stared at the island. The sight of the damn thing made me dizzy, so I stared at Naji even though I wanted to throttle him.

  "Vaguely. I vaguely remember…" He dug his hand into his good eye. "I can't seem to keep my thoughts straight."

  "Oh fantastic." Figures I'd get stuck with a blood magician who'd driven himself insane.

  Or maybe it was the island, working its magic like in the stories. Changing him, making him forget himself and who he was. I studied the angles of his face, looking for some sign that his bones were pushing out of his skin. He looked gaunter than usual, but maybe it was because of the spell. I hoped it was because of the spell.

  "It's cold," he said, and his voice sounded small, like a kid's.

  "Not a whole lot I can do about it." We drifted along, the water pushing us toward the island, like it was a normal island and there was a tide to pull us ashore. Part of me wanted to look back, catch a glimpse of the Revenge as she sailed away. But I didn't. Water slapped up along the side of the rowboat, spraying us with a cold fine mist. Naji moaned and rubbed his head, and I was still dizzy myself.

  The rowboat jerked up, her bow clearing the water in an arc of gray water drops, and then slammed back down.

  "What the hell was that?" I shouted. I yanked the oars in even though it didn't do much more than make me feel more vulnerable, the two of us sitting there in the open ocean like that. Naji slumped down, his eyes wide, and mumbled something about being weak.

  "Shut up," I said. I didn't hear nothing unusual: just the howl of the wind, the rush of the waves.

  The boat jolted again, knocking me forward into Naji's lap. I bit down on my tongue to keep from screaming.

  "Ananna," he said.

  "We need to get on land." At least on land any enemies couldn't lurk beneath the depths. "Is it safe to row?"

  "Don't… I don't really know."

  "Kaol!" I shoved the oars into the water and pushed us toward the island. We weren't far, almost to the line of shadow the island cast onto the water. I tried to lift the oars up but the left one wouldn't move. I shrieked and let go, and it slid into the ocean without a sound.

  I yanked the other oar into my lap and sat very still, heart racing. We floated underneath the island. Dark as night down there, although the ocean water gleamed silver. The boat bumped up against a hunk of low-hanging stone. It was too smooth to be any use for climbing, and besides which, it would only take me to the underside of the island. I didn't have time to try to make some kind of rope throw.

  The boat tilted again. Naji gripped the sides and his eyes gleamed like the water.

  I had an idea.

  "How weak are you? Can you do anything?"

  "What?"

  "Your shadow thing," I said. "Can you take me with you?"

  He didn't answer.

  "Naji?"

  "Under normal circumstances, I could."

  "Naji! There's something in the water!"

  Naji didn't answer, and I glared at him in the dark.

  "Maybe somebody shouldn't have used up all their energy blowing a brigantine off course. But you wouldn't know anything about that, would you?"

  "It wasn't just the magic," he said darkly.

  "Yeah, you put me in a spot of trouble with that wind. Damn near killed me."

  "It nearly killed me as well."

  "Well, I imagine we're both going to die if we don't get on land." My whole body was tense, waiting for the boat to rock again, but the water stayed as smooth and still as a mirror. "Do your thing."

  "My thing?"

  "Damn it, Naji! The shadow thing. We're in shadow now. There's shadows up there – have to be, all them trees. So do whatever it is you do to get both of us out of this boat and on that bloody island."

  Silence. I sucked in a deep breath. I could barely make out his outline in the silvery shadow of the island.

  "This might hurt me," he said.

  "I don't care."

  He didn't say nothing. I shoved the pistol into the waistband of my pants. Nothing happened.

  "Well?" I said.

  "You have to touch me," he said. "Well, not just… We need to… Come here."

  And then he reached out his arm and drew me into him. His touch surprised me, and suddenly I wasn't cold anymore.

  "We need to be close," he said. "As close as possible."

  I slid across the boat, pressing up against his body. He didn't have his armor on and I could feel him, the muscles in his chest and his arms. He smelled like magic and sweat and the sea, but there was something else beneath all that, something sweet and warm, like honey, and just for a moment I didn't feel afraid anymore.

  I was furious at him, and I was terrified, but I didn't want him to stop touching me.

  Then the shadows started moving around us, slinking like cats. I stiffened, thinking that it was the island and her magic, but Naji tightened his arms against my back and said, "It's fine." I let out a slow, careful breath. Something prickled against my skin, cold and damp. It soaked through the fabric of my clothes. It pressed my hair against my scalp.

  And then I couldn't see nothing at all, just blackness. And there was this roaring in my head that scared the shit out of me. But at least I could still feel Naji even though I couldn't see him. I could still smell him, that scent like honey.

  And then I smelled soil and pine and rotting wood. We were on the island. It was like I'd opened my eyes and here we were, curled up together beneath a tree taller than any ship I'd ever seen, the sand of the beach not ten feet away.

  Naji's arms loosened and he fell with a thump against the soil and the fallen pine needles.

  This might hurt me. His words echoed around inside my head and I thought maybe he said hurt when he meant kill and I rolled him over onto his back and pressed my fingers against his neck until I felt his pulse fluttering beneath his skin. I lay my head on his chest and listened to his heart beating.

  "You're alright," I said, just in case he might've heard me.

  A breeze blew in off the sea, biting and cold. I remembered what Marjani told me: stay warm and stay dry. We weren't doing too good on neither count.

  And I hoped those woods didn't hold the same kind of monsters as the water.

  I pushed that thought out of my head so I could concentrate on not freezing to death. I left Naji lying beneath the tree and picked my way down to the beach. The sand was rough and dark, coarse like Orati salt, and littered with bone-gray twists of driftwood. I gathered some of the driftwood, trying not to think about how it got there, and stacked it in the sand. Then I sprinkled some powder from the pistol into the wood and fired off the one shot I'd been allowed, wincing as it rang out through the trees, echoing and echoing. Streaks of white birds erupted from the trees and I slammed down on the sand, fumbling around for my knife – but they were only birds, and they flew off and disappeared into the gray clouds.

  Thank Kaol, the shot took. The powder sparked and smoldered and burned. I watched the fire for a while, sitting close enough that the heat soaked into my skin. The light of it made me feel safe.

  I walked back over to Naji. He was still passed out. I took off his boots and his cloak and lay them out by the fire to dry. Then I gathered up my strength and wrapped my arms around his chest and dragged him over the pine needles and the sand to the fire. He squirmed a little, twisting his head this way and that. I brought him as close to the heat as I could. He moaned and fluttered his eyes and kind of looked up at me and then at the fire.

  He said something, but I couldn't understand it. I sat down beside him and took off my own boots so they'd dry out. I stuck my feet close to the flames. I warmed up pretty quickly, all things considered.

  Just once in all that work, I let myself look out at the horizon, to see if I could spot the Revenge one last time before she left us. And I did. It wasn't nothing but a few specks of sails against the gray sky, but Kaol, did it ever fill me with despair.

I was dozing on the sand, drowsy from the heat of the fire, when Naji shook me awake hours later. I rolled over and looked at him.

  "You're alive," he said.

  "Course I'm alive," I snapped. "You're the one who keeps passing out."

  "I feel better now."

  He didn't look better. Still death-white and haggard. One bruise blossomed out on the unscarred part of his face and another ringed around his eye. Kaol, I got him good.

  When he reached up to shove his filthy, clumped-up hair out of his face, his hands shook.

  "We need to find fresh water," I said, really meaning I would have to do it, cause in his state he didn't need to be traipsing through the woods. "I hope it won't turn us into monsters." I squinted up at the soft gray sky. "Do you think it's gonna snow?"

  I'd seen snow once when we sailed to the ice-islands, and I knew that it was cold as death and not anything we'd want to mess with in our present state.

  "It shouldn't," he said, and I didn't know if he was talking about the snow or the water's magic, and I didn't ask.

  I sat up best I could – my body was stiffer than it'd been before, like I'd just gone eight rounds with a kraken. "I don't know about you but I ain't too keen on dying." I grabbed my boots and patted the leather. All dry, but also stiff and shrunken. I kneaded at it while I talked. "One of the first things I learned. You get stranded, look for water. Then find a place to protect yourself." I jutted my head at the fire. "I made an exception on account of you getting us stranded in the forsaken north. Figured water wasn't no good if we both froze to death."

  Naji closed his eyes and let his head loll between his knees.

  "Though I'm also a bit concerned with whatever the hell's following us."

  That jerked him back up to full alert.

  "It's the Mists, ain't it?"

  "The Hariri clan would not have followed us this far without attacking."

  I sighed and started kneading at the other boot.

  "Ananna, your detour took us through a part of the world where the barriers are thinnest. They'd picked up on my trail while we were out at sea. I was trying to save the ship." He leaned forward. "You must be careful. This place is part of the Otherworld that found its way to our own…"

  His voice trailed off as though speaking had worn him out. I stared at him with my mouth hanging open.

  "Are you kidding me!" I shouted. "You couldn't have told me that earlier?"

  "We need to find the Wizard Eirnin."

  "Don't ignore me."

  "You have no idea… I'm utterly incapacitated by this curse… If the Otherworld finds me, if they find you–"

  "I'll hand you right over! You don't think this curse is hurting me, too? Kaol! I should have let you die in the desert."

  Naji's face turned dark as a typhoon sky, and I immediately regretted shooting off like that. I didn't really want him to die, curse or no. So I pulled on my other boot and stood up. I hated stepping away from the fire, but it'd gotten big enough that its warmth spread all up and down the beach. I did not want to go into those woods, though, all dark and misty and shivering.

  "Stay here," I said. "I'm going to find a stream or a pond or… or some dew. Something for us to drink." I glared at him. "You probably need it more than me, and I've fallen out of sail rigging once today."

  I stalked away from him before he could say anything, up to the treeline. When I figured I was far enough away I chanced a glance back at the fire, and there he was, yanking on his boots to follow me. Fantastic.

  Still, I waited for him.

  He leaned against a tree to steady himself.

  "You ain't going to make it," I said.

  "I'm fine." He wobbled a little in place. "And I'll be worse if you go off on your own. We shouldn't… We shouldn't stay too long–"

  "Naji, we're stranded here!"

  I took off deeper into the green shadows. The air was damp and cold and wrapped around me like an old wet shawl. Everywhere I stepped I made noise, branches snapping, pine needles crackling. But so did Naji, and he was usually as graceful as a Saelini dancer and twice as silent.

  We walked for twenty minutes when I heard pattering up in the tops of the trees, distant and soft. I cursed. All rain would get us was wet – we didn't have nothing to collect it in.

  "We gotta head back," I said. "I don't want to lose our fi–"

  I stopped. Naji was leaning up against a pine tree, his skin waxy like he had a fever.

  "Kaol's starfish," I said. "You look like you're dying."

  He moaned a little and rubbed at his forehead. "I'm not sure I can go on. I was hoping the spell would lead me to Eirnin, but…" His voice trailed away.

  I glared at him, not wanting to think about his spell, the whole reason we were gonna die on a magic floating slab of rock in the first place.

  "I used the last of my magic to bring us on land," he said mournfully. "It's run out."

  "Good," I snapped. "If only it'd run out when we were on board the Revenge." Then I turned and stalked away from him, blood pounding in my ears.

  "Ananna! Wait!" I heard the snap of branches that meant he was following. "You don't understand."

  "I understand plenty. You stranded us here without any kind of protection." I whirled around to face him. He looked shrunken and old. "That's what you're going to tell me, isn't it? You can't do your protection spells?"

  He didn't have to say anything to answer.

  "At least you were able to get us on land before the ocean sucked us down." I dug the heels of my palm into my eyes. I was exhausted and in truth all I wanted was to lay out by the fire and sleep. But I knew I couldn't.

  "Give me your sword," I said, "and go back to the fire."

  He tried to stare me down, but he was too weak. So he just handed me his sword, nodded, and turned away.

  I picked my way through the woods. The rain misted across my hair and the tops of my shoulders and set me to shivering, and the forest pressed up against me, impossibly tall trees and thick green cover and ropy vines. I kept the sword out, although I wasn't sure if a sword could stop whatever creatures the island had hidden.

  Every now and then I stopped and listened for the bubbling of a river. But there were just forest sounds, leaves rustling and water dropping off the tree branches and critters scurrying around in the underbrush, and beyond that, a distant chiming sound like some weird far-off music. I didn't trust it. Didn't trust the normalcy of it. That's when magic's the most dangerous: when it feels like the untouched world.

  The woods grew darker from the rain, and mist started rising up from the forest floor, gray and cold and wet. I tightened my grip on the sword, trying my best to ignore the panic rioting around my chest. I got a flash of pirate's intuition: I wasn't safe in the forest.

  I should go back to the beach.

  My left hand peeled itself away from the sword and found Naji's charm still looped around my neck. I thought about him leaning up against the tree, rubbing his forehead, pale from exertion. He was probably in pain now, all on account of me. I wondered if it was keeping him from healing.

  But if we didn't have water, we'd die of dehydration within a couple of days. And even magic-tainted water was better than that.

  So I kept walking.

  After a while, the forest brightened a little, not from the sun peeking out behind the rain clouds but because the trees were different, tall and skinny and pale, with white crystalline leaves that clinked against one another in the wind. This must have been the chiming I heard earlier – this bright, strange forest. I tensed and hoisted up the sword. Nothing about this forest was natural, and yet after a few moments that sense of danger had passed. The forest chimed and sparkled around me, and I was just too exhausted to stay alert.

  That was when I heard the faintest murmur of water. It was hard to make out over the chiming, but I listened closely and wandered about, trying to find its source. I don't know how long it took me, but I finally stumbled over a spring bubbling up underneath a big normal-looking pine tree, the water clear and cleanlooking. I plunged my hands in and scooped it up to drink without thinking. Water was splashing down my chest when I remembered that I was on the Isles of the Sky, that this water could destroy me.

  I fell back and stared at the spring, waiting for something to happen, for something to change. Nothing did that I could feel. And although I still didn't trust this normalcy, I allowed myself a bit more of that sweettasting water, and I prayed to Kaol and E'mko to keep me safe from the spirits.

  The rain stopped, and I sat beside the spring, listening to the chiming from the trees, half-waiting for the mist to form again, to come creeping along the forest floor. But nothing happened. And after a while I started thinking on Naji, thinking on his curse. He cast a spell so strong it wiped out his magic, and we didn't even know if we could cure his curse. Hell, we didn't know if the Wizard Eirnin was even on this rock.

  Maybe he'd die out there on the beach and I'd be free of the curse just long enough to get swallowed by the Isles of the Sky.

  Maybe I shouldn't have left him alone after all.

  So I ripped some strips of fabric off my trousers – they were soaked through with rainwater anyway – and knotted them in the tree branches as I made my way back to the beach.

  The fire had burned out, just like I said it would, and the driftwood lay blackened and ashy along the horizon line. Naji was crouched beside the remains, his head hanging in his hands, hair stringy from the rain. He stirred as I walked up to him, but he didn't say anything, didn't even look up.

  "I found a spring," I said.

  No answer. I sat down beside him and balanced the sword on my knees and stared at the remains of the fire, trying my best to ignore the dampness in the air.

  "A spring," Naji said after a while, muttering down at his feet.

  "Yeah. You know. For drinking. I had some and it didn't do nothing to me, so hopefully…" I couldn't finish that thought. We sat in silence for a few moments more.

  "I'm sorry I said I was glad your magic ran out."

  Naji lifted his head but he still didn't look at me. I could hear the waves crashing beneath us.

  "It happens," he said, "when I exert myself."

  "I know."

  Another moment of silence.

  "I hope to be recovered enough within the next few days to cast a tracking spell on the Wizard Eirnin, but I don't…" He dipped his head again. "I've never run out like this. And with the curse – I just don't know."

  I toyed with the hem of my shirt and looked down at the sand. My head felt thick with what he had just told me. Maybe he didn't have to die for us to get sucked into the island's magic.

  "Maybe we can find the wizard the untouched way." Not that I liked the idea of wandering the island.