Текст книги "Water & Storm Country"

Автор книги: David Estes

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Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 21 страниц)

Chapter Fifteen

Huck

I’m tired of dreams, because most of the time they turn into nightmares—nightmares from my past.

For once I wake up and I’m not in a cold sweat, not holding my breath in terror, not clutching at my pillow like it’s a lifeline. Sadly, I’m smiling, because my dream was not of my mother falling from the ship, but of her holding me, watching the sunset like we planned, telling stories and laughing, laughing, laughing…

And the boat lurches—

And I know it’s time for her to go, for me to fail, for the blood in the water, for my father’s dark and unforgiving stare—

But my mother just stumbles against the rail and holds on and laughs.

So I wake up smiling, sad that this beautiful dream is the biggest lie of all, further from reality than blue sky or peace between the Stormers and Soakers.

A beautiful lie.

“Good afternoon, Lieutenant,” a voice says, startling me. Barney. Watching me sleep, or awake, or both.

“What are you doing here?” I ask, squinting, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes with a fist. When I can see again, the yellow of Barney’s smile is like a lantern in the semi-darkness. If anything, his brown beard and hair are more unkempt than the last time I saw him.

“I’m your steward, sir. It’s my job to stay with you. And since Lieutenant Hobbs has dismissed me from his service, I guess my every waking moment will be spent catering to your every need. Sir.”

I sit up, rest my back against the wall. “Why would Hobbs dismiss you?” I ask.

There’s a twinkle in Barney’s eyes that’s somewhat disconcerting. “Since your father ordered Cain and Hobbs to conduct the investigation into your attack, Hobbs doesn’t want any distractions. And apparently I’m a distraction.” There’s no anger or frustration in Barney’s voice, despite him being released from Hobbs’ service. If anything, I sense humor, like it’s all a big joke.

With his words, everything comes screaming back. Getting knocked out by the girl, how neither Barney nor Cain saw what happened, how Cain and Hobbs volunteered to investigate. The brown-skinned girl—one eyewitness or piece of evidence away from being chucked overboard to the sharp-tooths.

Which is probably what she deserves, right?

Then why does the thought send shivers up my spine and acid roiling through my stomach?

“I’d like you to monitor the investigation,” I say softly. “Inform me if they find anything.”

Barney nods thoughtfully. “I thought you might show some interest in the apprehension of your attacker,” Barney says, winking. “The first day yielded no promising leads, sir. Perhaps tomorrow will be more fruitful.” There’s something in his tone that tells me he doesn’t think so.

Wait. A day? “How long have I been asleep?” I ask.

Barney chuckles and the hairs around his mouth dance and bob. “If you count the time when you were pretending to be asleep while your father questioned us…”—he laughs even harder when he sees the frown that creases my lips—“…you’ve been out for near on a few days. Sir.”

That long? I absently lift a hand to my forehead and feel a bulge. The wooden handle on the brush packed quite a wallop. And the bilge rat’s aim was near-on perfect. Why shouldn’t I turn her in?

“Did you want this, sir?” Barney says, reaching out to hand me an object, flat and hard on one side and rough and bristled on the other. A brush. No. The brush. The very one that hit me, obvious only from the specks of dried blood on the handle. My blood. Evidence.

Barney lied to my father. He lied to the admiral. Right to his face, knowing full well I was awake and listening.

“Why did you—” I start to say.

“It wasn’t my choice to make,” Barney says, still holding the brush in the palm of his hand.

I shake my head. The attack, Barney lying, the investigation: it’s all too much to think about. Just when I thought I was starting to instill order on the Mayhem, the ship reverted back to its namesake with one thrown scrub brush.

“Shall I hand over the brush to Hobbs?” Barney asks, raising an eyebrow.

“No!” I say, louder than necessary given our close proximity. “I mean, no, just, um, just toss it overboard.” I close my eyes, wait for Barney to laugh at me, to reprimand me for being a silly boy, to mock me with sarcastic sirs and Lieutenants.

“Aye, aye, Lieutenant,” he says, his words firm and respectful.

And when I open my eyes he’s gone, having opened and closed the door to my cabin so quietly I didn’t hear it.

~~~

From the shadows streaming through my porthole, it’s clear night’s upon us already, so I don’t leave my cabin.

The ship lurches and rolls and I know we’re moving—have probably been moving for a while now, the last ship in the fleet, falling behind the others already.

Barney brings me supper an hour later, and although the baked waterfowl looks, smells, and tastes delicious, I pick at it, unable to stomach such a hearty meal with my head still pounding between my ears.

“Is it done?” I ask between nibbles.

“Is what done, sir?” Barney says, but his smile doesn’t match his words. The blood-flecked brush is on the bottom of the ocean, or in the stomach of a sharp-tooth. And if Barney is the only witness…

“Will Hobbs and Cain find anything else?” I ask.

“I cannot predict the future, sir,” Barney drones.

“I want to go on deck,” I say, but each word cracks like a hammer to my skull.

“You should rest, Lieutenant.”

I push the plate away, clench my fists in frustration. I was gaining respect from the men, improving the ship’s performance, instilling work ethic…and then a bilge rat—and a girl no less—had to go and mess it all up. If I can just find her, talk to her, ask her why she did what she did. Try to understand. And if I don’t like her answer, maybe I’ll throw her over the rail myself. I laugh inwardly at my thoughts, knowing full well I wouldn’t have the stomach for that sort of thing.

“Bring Cain down if he’s available,” I say.

“Aye, aye, sir,” Barney says, opening the door. Over his shoulder, he asks, “Shall I invite Lieutenant Hobbs, too?”

“No. This will not be in regards to the investigation.”

“Very well, sir.”

I sit in bed for a few minutes, chewing on my lip and thinking, but eventually my eyelids grow heavy and I slump onto my pillow once more. I hear the door open and, behind my eyelids, see the room darken as someone blows out the lantern.

“Goodnight, Lieutenant,” Cain says. “I’ve spoken to Barney. Don’t you worry, your secret’s safe with me.”

And my last thought before sleep takes me: He knows.

~~~

I’ve been watching her for a week. And she’s been ignoring me, going about her business as if I don’t exist. But I know she knows I’m watching her, because yesterday she walked right past me carrying a bucket of soapy water, and “accidentally” sloshed it over the side and onto my boots. She didn’t look at me, but I detected the barest hint of a smile tugging at the corner of her lips. The nerve of this girl!

She has to know I hold her life in my hands, that with a simple accusation I can make her life worth less than the new scrub brush she’s been using to scour every inch of the ship.

And yet she continues on with her disrespect and subtle insults. Even now, as she uses her extraordinary and unique climbing ability to scrub the main mast so hard it’s like getting the salt off is an offering to the Deep Blue, I can see the rebellion in the lines of her hard jaw, in the way her eyes smolder each time they flash around the mast, piercing me with hot anger. I know she wants to throw another brush, perhaps to add a matching red bulge to the opposite side of my forehead, but thus far, she’s restrained herself, either fulfilling a deep need for self-preservation, or simply due to the multitude of witnesses on deck.

As I keep the bilge rat girl on the edge of my vision, I curl my nose when a putrid scent fills my nostrils.

“Why does it always smell like fish?” I ask, sniffing the air.

Beside me, Barney laughs. “It’s Stew, the cook. He thinks fish heads keep away the demons. He stashes them everywhere. No one can stop him or find them all, so we’ve all just learned to live with it.”

Typical Mayhem mentality. “Tell him that I order him to stop with the fish-head-hiding,” I say, shaking my head. “Or I’ll send him to the brig.” Since recovering from my head injury, I’ve used the brig as often as possible. Although the ship is still the worst-performing in the fleet, our speed has improved by double and you won’t find a single midshipman lounging on the deck under the warmth of the afternoon sun. Everyone works.

“If you send Stew to the brig, we’ll all go hungry,” Barney says.

I’m finally getting used to Barney’s awkward sense of humor, so I don’t bat an eye. “If I’m forced to send Stew to the brig, you’ll take his place as cook.” Although I say it with a light tongue, I’m not joking.

“I’ll inform him immediately,” Barney says, scurrying off.

As I watch him go, I feel the hairs prick up on the back of my neck. I glance at the bilge rat to see if it’s the strength of her glare that’s raising my hackles, but she’s no longer clinging to the mast, having slid to the deck in search of something else to clean. A presence looms behind me.

Hobbs. “What do you find so interesting about the bilge rat girl?” he asks.

Good morning to you too. I stand, look him in the eye, try to conceal the fear I still feel when he’s near with a steady gaze. “I’m concerned with everyone on my ship,” I say. “A watchful captain is a ready captain.” When my father taught me that expression he had just forced me to watch as a young boy was horse-whipped for stealing bread from the kitchen. I’m still not sure what watching a beating prepares anyone for, but the lesson stuck with me, so maybe that was the point.

“It’s not your ship,” he says.

“Is it Captain Montgomery’s?” I ask, motioning to the opposite end of the quarterdeck, where Jeb swings back and forth in his hammock.

Even Hobbs, with his rules-are-rules mentality, doesn’t have an answer for that one. He frowns. Score one for me.

“How’s the investigation going?” I say, changing the subject without ever really changing it.

“None of the women saw anything,” he says. “And Lieutenant Cain is questioning the last of the men as we speak. We may never find your attacker.”

I nod absently, watching as, right on cue, Cain crosses the mid deck. A handful of bilge rats do their best to get out of his way. In his wake, I see the girl, angry and brushless, her scrubber discarded on the deck, issuing what appear to be whispered rebukes. Is she berating them for having been in Cain’s way in the first place, or because they were so quick to move aside for him? In any case, even her own friends seem to be scared of her wrath. Strange.

We meet Cain at the top of the steps. “Anything?” Hobbs asks.

I try not to hold my breath, but I do anyway.

Cain’s gaze flickers to me before settling on Hobbs and his question. He shakes his head and I push out my breath slowly. “Nothing. No one saw a bloody thing.”

Hobbs curses, lifts a fist to his mouth where he bites on his knuckles. “The admiral will not be pleased,” he says through his hand. “I’ll tell him at first light when we drop anchor.” He stomps away so loudly that Captain Montgomery snorts out a throaty snore and rolls over, his eyes flashing open for a moment before fluttering closed once more.

“Huck, we need to talk,” Cain says when Hobbs is out of earshot.

“I know,” I say. Although on multiple occasions I’ve felt compelled to ask Cain to explain exactly what he meant when he said my secret’s safe with him, I haven’t broached the subject as of yet. Secrets are better kept if they’re left unspoken.

“My cabin. One hour,” he says.

Chapter Sixteen

Sadie

The world flashes by in blurs and blustery whispers. There’s dark skin and pulled-on clothing, and I should be embarrassed by mine and Remy’s exposed nakedness, but I’m not, and we’re not even looking at each other anyway, because…

There are so few Riders returning from the mission. My mother—his father: Are they among the survivors?

I’m breathless and frantic, and I can tell Remy’s in a similar state because he keeps stumbling as we run side by side back to camp, hearts pounding.

The Riders are already there when we scramble between the borders, past the circles of tents, and into the center. Dark horses stamp and snort, their hides crusted with dark-red dried blood. One of them falters, its legs giving way, crumbling beneath its weight. The young Rider atop the horse tumbles off, clutching her side, red staining her fingers. It’s not my mother, but familial bonds don’t matter now.

I rush to her, help her put pressure on the wound, which is deep and gaping, her robe shredded to the skin. “Help!” I scream. Her name is Aria, but the Riders call her Demon Blade due to the quickness with which she wields the duel daggers that are her weapons of choice.

But no amount of deft knife-work can save her now as I press my palm against her wound, my flesh the only thing keeping her insides from spilling out.

Remy’s at my side, mouth agape, yelling for help, too, but his voice, like mine, is lost in a chorus of men and women with similar pleas.

Aria’s eyes roll back as blood trickles from the corners of her lips. She stops breathing at what seems like the exact moment her horse does. I want to cry for them both, but I can’t because my mother might be out there, and because I’m a Rider and I have to be stronger than the common Stormer.

Remy clutches at Aria’s robe and I remember that she was like a sister to him growing up, that when her mother and father died of the Plague, Remy’s family took her in as one of their own, clothing and feeding and training her.

I grab his hand and pull him to his feet, slap him hard across the face. The time for mourning will come.

He stares at me with blank eyes, but lets me pull him away from Aria, away from his pain, which, based on his expression, tries to cling to him like mud on a rainy afternoon.

Through the chaos we move like skeletons, stiff and numb and searching. Dark-robed Riders stride here and there, some spattered with blood, some clean because they weren’t sent on the mission. All carrying the injured, trying to get them into the hands of the Healers, who are visible due to the white robes they wear.

We force ourselves to look at the faces of everyone who passes.

Eventually we see Gard, as upright and gregarious as ever, bellowing orders and pulling the wounded Riders from their horses, carrying two at a time to the area that’s been set aside for healing.

“Father!” Remy shouts, but his voice is a whisper. He releases my hand and runs to Gard. The bubble of joy that bulges in my stomach is popped instantly by the dozens of needles of jealousy and fear that prick my skin and dart through my insides like tiny hunters.

He’s found who he’s looking for and I’m alone again. I start to turn, anger and frustration and sadness burning in my chest, when I hear him say, “Have you seen Sadie’s mother?”

I whirl around, shocked.

Gard places two groaning Riders on the ground next to a line of five other groaning Riders. Two waiting white-clothed Healers immediately begin cutting their clothing off to inspect their wounds. He looks past his son, sees me, and I know—I know. His face is grim and he shakes his head, but then he says something that makes me gasp. “I brought her back myself—she’s in her tent,” he says, answering his son’s question but speaking directly to me.

And I’m gone and leaping over the body of a dead horse, my bloody hands churning at my sides. Our tent is wide open and I dive inside, nearly colliding with the Healer who’s tending to my mother.

Her head is up, held by my father, who’s squeezing drops of water from a wet cloth into her mouth, whispering words that sound eerily similar to ones spoken while he’s in his deepest meditation. The front of her robe is cut away and ragged on the ground next to her, revealing her wound.

Her wound.

It reminds me of Aria’s wound, a deep chasm spilling endless streams of blood and showing pink tube-like parts of her that were never meant to be seen.

I choke and the tears are hot flashes of lightning in my eyes that burn and blind me. “Save her,” I croak out, as if it will empower the Healer to perform miracles that only Mother Earth is capable of.

But my words don’t have power. And my tears are for nothing.

Because there, in our tent, my mother’s eyes find me, her lips part, and she says, “Listen to your father, for he is wise,” and then she dies.

~~~

The clouds will forever be darker, the rains harder, the lightning brighter, and the thunder louder. For my anger is in the sky, in the air that we breathe, in my every act and my every word. It washes the sadness away to a place where no one will ever find it.

“You knew!” I scream at my father. “You knew and you didn’t try to stop her!”

The heavy rain pounds our tent, but I can feel every drop on my skin, as if I’m one of the dead lying in the center of town, awaiting the passing of the storm before they can be burned atop the funeral pyre. Like my dead mother.

He says something, but I can’t understand him because he mumbles into his hands and the anger-infused thunder booms at just that moment, drowning him out.

“Why?” I scream. “Why did you let her go?”

I’m standing and Father’s cowering. His cheeks are wet with tears and mine are dry. I allowed myself the weakness of tears for half a day, my head buried in my pillow like a child, until I could take it no more. When I wiped away the wet and salt, the anger swallowed me in red and black and questions. I won’t cry ever again.

Not ever again.

“It wasn’t my choice,” my father says, and I think he’s repeating what he said a moment ago, when the thunder overwhelmed his grief-stricken voice.

I shudder as a burst of cold finds its way through our tent. “She knew?” I ask, my voice losing a small measure of its sharpness.

He nods, buries his face in both hands.

I look away, at the wall of the tent, which is dancing with shadows. Our shadows: anger and grief.

“Tell me everything,” I say to the tent.

My father’s shoulders are shaking, convulsing, his tears spilling between his fingers like rivers through cracks in the rocks. Like blood through flaps of torn skin.

“Tell me,” I say more firmly.

His shaking stops, but the tears keep dripping off his hands. I should go to him, comfort him.

I don’t.

A few minutes pass, and when he finally looks up his face is shiny black and puffy. “Sadie, I—”

“You owe me the truth,” I say through my teeth. “Tell me what you should have told me from the beginning.”

He tries to speak, but his voice falters. He stops, takes a deep breath, starts again, his voice clearer this time. “I had a vision, Sadie.”

“Of a battle,” I say, not trying to hide the frustration in my voice. “That much you told me.”

He shakes his head. “There was more. Another battle.”

What a novel idea! Of course, why didn’t I think of that? I close my eyes, count to ten, try to breathe. “What other battle,” I say, eyes still closed.

A pause. And then: “One you were fighting in.”

My eyes flash open, meeting my father’s, which are red and swollen, his tears drying around them in white circles. “Me?” I say, finally feeling like I’m talking to a human and not a Man-of-Wisdom parrot.

He nods. Then shakes his head. “I’m not saying this right. Before the battle that you were fighting in, was the battle with the Icers. Their king had gone mad, was taking children and selling them to the Soakers. This much we knew. It was—”

“Our duty to stop them,” I interject quickly. “Did the Riders kill him?”

“I haven’t been able to confirm with Gard yet, but if my vision was correct, then yes, the Icer King is dead.” The way he says it leaves me wondering whether it was a Rider that killed him. But that doesn’t matter. Not when my mother is dead.

“And in your vision you saw Mother die?” I surprise even myself with how steady the words come out, like I’m asking about the weather, or what’s for the evening meal. I wince when I realize I don’t feel sad anymore. Everything is hot.

Father closes his eyes, dips his chin, nods. “And you sent her anyway,” I say disgustedly.

His eyes open and his face contorts into an agonized crunch of skin and expression and fresh tears. But he doesn’t deny it.

He doesn’t.

But even in my anger I know the truth: He couldn’t have stopped her if he wanted to. Because my mother is like me—she doesn’t fear pain or death. Not is—was. Not doesn’t—didn’t.

I move on, still hating him for his weakness. “The other battle?” I say.

He sniffs, wipes away the tears with the back of his hand. “My second vision was more muddled,” he says. “I didn’t understand everything. There were many Soakers, hundreds—fighting the Riders.”

“And I was a Rider?” I ask. “Like a real one—with a horse?”

“Yes.”

“Then your vision must be of events further into the future. There are still months before my training is complete.”

“Maybe,” he says. “But I cannot be sure.”

I stare at him for a moment and then motion for him to continue.

“There were others at the battle, too, some with brown skin.”

“Heaters?”

He nods. “I believe so. And two with pale white skin and beards. Young men from ice country.”

I rub my hands together, for once appreciating one of my father’s visions. A chance to not only fight the Soakers, but to avenge my mother’s death. Revenge must gleam in my eyes, because my father says, “Bloodlust can destroy a person.”

“So can weakness,” I say.

I’m surprised when his gaze holds mine, steady and tear-free. Normally a comment like that would send his eyes to his hands.

A memory tumbles through my mind. “When you told me of your vision before,” I say, “you said I would have a choice to make. What did you mean by that?”

He sighs heavily, as if a deep shot of hot air might be just the thing to change the future. “In my vision there was a boy…no, a young man.”

“One of the Icers?” I ask hopefully.

“No. A Soaker, clad in officer’s blue.”

My thoughts immediately pull up images of the officer boy atop the hill, his contemplative expression, my attempt to kill him—stopped by Remy. “What about this boy?” I ask.

“He was in the fight, but he seemed unsure of himself.”

“Weak and pathetic,” I say.

“No. Not like that. More like he was deciding whether to fight, and who to fight.”

“And I’m there?”

He nods. “And you have to decide.”

“Decide what? Whether to kill a Soaker officer? Like that’s even a decision.” Heat courses through my veins just thinking about seeing the Soaker boy. Why did Remy have to stop me? If I had killed him then, before my father’s vision had come to pass, would that have changed the future? Would it have changed his first vision, which ended in my mother’s death?

Remy’s face joins my father’s in my mind, surrounded by Icers and Soakers—the officer boy. My mother’s assassins.

“First Paw, and now Mother,” I say, choosing my words like you choose a knife—the sharper and longer the better. The pain that flashes across my father’s face proves the strength of my choices. A tear drips from one eye, then the other.

He extends his arms, beckoning. “Mourn with me,” he sputters.

There’s no kindness left in me, no forgiveness. My scoff is my response.

I push through the flap and into the storm.