Chapter 97: Aella’s Journey
The Grand Admiral watched her daughter as the young Sylph woman bid goodbye to her fiance. She could see the tension in her daughter's posture. It took all her strength to not corner Epelda, demand the young woman apologize to her step mother. That would serve no one. Instead, she waited until the young siren had gone back below deck.
“Epelda,” Aella greeted, her tone gentle. The young woman turned toward her, her expression sullen.
“Yes, mother?” She paused, straightening her posture. Each sign was careful, slow and methodical. Oh, her daughter was in a snit. “Or are you the Admiral right now?”
“Right now, your mother,” Aella replied, trying to match her daughter's tone with her signing. “Why are you taking that tone with me?”
“You know why. Or you wouldn't be here.” The young woman crossed her arms and glared mutinously, refusing to talk any more. Aella checked a sigh. Fighting with her daughter now was not in her plans. She wanted to be in bed, resting, sleeping even.
“Are you going to treat your brother any different?” Aella asked softly. Epelda stared at her as if she were daft.
“Of course not!” She signed with more emotion, her signs bigger, less restrained than before. “He's not to blame.”
“Ah, and who is to blame?” Epelda stilled at the question. Her shoulders came up. The wind picked up around them, and Aella felt the cool touch of Epelda's magic. The girl was losing control. That was the last thing they needed with enemies circling them.
They stared at each other, neither backing down, as the crew around them began to move farther away, everyone appearing busy with their tasks. No one wanted to be between the Admiral and her daughter. No one wanted to draw their ire either. Epelda's breathing was becoming ragged as she fought for control.
“She was their prisoner as much as you, daughter,” Aella said at last. She could feel the hairs on the back of her neck rising in response to Epelda's magic.
“She never said!” Epelda's words were rushed, her expression pained. She didn't finish her thought, but Aella smiled at her sadly.
“You're barely an adult, daughter. Did you expect her to bare her soul? To tell you how terribly she was treated? They had her for a year. She made choices to make her life safer, easier.”
“She could have fought them!”
“They'd have killed Alejo if she had.” Aella spoke these words. Epelda's face crumpled at that, her rage crumbling as she considered Aella's words. “She told you, darling, not because she had to but because she didn't want a secret like that hanging between you. She hasn't even told Alejo yet, because that will be another hard conversation.”
“But Alejo's her son?” She looked confused. The wind around them was dying down, and the prickling magic was abating.
“And you are her daughter.” She spoke out loud, and took her daughter's hands in hers. Epelda's pale blue eyes shone with tears, but she did not cry. “Talk to her, after this, alright? Don't let her think you hate her.” Epelda nodded miserably.
Aella stayed with her daughter until the young woman could re-center herself. Once the sylph smiled with a shaky smile, and proclaimed she was ready for duty, Aella wished her luck, and watched her fly up to the crow's nest. The crew was no longer suspiciously chatty, returning to normal volumes as the drama had ended and no one needed to pretend they couldn't see or hear what was happening.
The rest of the preparations went off without a hitch. The guns were readied, but the covers were left closed. Dangerous, given the children on board, but necessary. They had made it appear as if they had stopped for repairs, one of the rowboats left full of tools. There was an island nearby, and Dymion's carpenters had brought in a large tree trunk. It floated near the ship, ready to be launched by siren magic. She did not cancel the storytelling, but instead scheduled shifts to make it seem as if there were fewer of them awake. If the demons attacked in the night, they would be ready. Aella even managed to get some rest, though not proper sleep, her bed still warm from when Nereida had been in it. She wished she could have rested beside her wife, but the siren had a complex job. She tried not to worry, not to picture Nereida beneath the waves, doing dragons' knew what kind of magic, keeping herself alive with her magic. The thought made her skin prickle, and she felt a wave of fear. She just was unsure if it was her own insecurities, or if it was a warning from the Moon.
She knew her wife planned to use dolphins again. The thought made her shiver. She couldn't bring herself to trust those fish. She'd seen them drown a man. She forced the thought from her head, moving to the main mast, touching the solid oak, running her fingers over the small dents and blemishes.
“Protect us, old girl,” she whispered. The ship beneath her feet gave her no answer, no comfort. It never did, never would. But still she felt calmer. She whispered to the mast, whispered their plan to set a trap, whispered her worries and whispered her hurts. She let the Tooth take her burdens so that she could be the Admiral they needed now.
The waiting game was the worst. She paced about the deck in the darkness. The ocean was calm, deceptively so, as the moon rose higher into the sky. It was almost full, so the light was reasonable. The gentle waves were quiet, and the stories less rowdy than usual. The tales seemed so mundane and boring without Nereida's tales, without Jules telling stories about his people, without Evander's tenor tones lifting everyone’s spirits. Dymion made a short appearance, the egg strapped to his chest, but his face was set in a frown, and the mood dipped further.
At some point, Aella dozed off beneath the nearly full moon. She felt strangely energized when she woke. She knew she had dreamed, but not of what. She took a moment to clean her boots before she continued her pacing. The moon had moved more than halfway across the sky, and all was calm and still. A lazy cloud drifted across the sky, blocking out the stars' light. She looked south-east on a whim. In the darkness she saw a hole; the stars were not there. The enemy was coming.
Calmly, carefully, Aella rose the alarm with whispered words. It wouldn't do for their trap to be sprung too early, for the demons to realize that the ship was not being repaired. Slowly, as if they were not truly awake, those on deck reached for weapons. One of the men strolled to the cabins and headed below as if he were going to bed. He even took a moment to stretch and yawn at the doorway, on the off chance that the demons had a spyglass powerful enough to see him.
Aella moved toward the circle of storytellers, whispering orders as she went. Epelda, still in the crows nest, was humming softly. The tune was too quiet for Aella to make out, but she felt the shifting of magic across her skin, as Epelda sang the wings toward them, urging the winds to pull everything toward them subtly. Down on the deck, Aella saw Evander emerge from below. The way he strutted about, she was certain it was the Dragon. The Grand Admiral squared her shoulders and headed to speak to him. She was uncertain if he knew the plan, but he was supposed to have let Evander to the surface for the first part.
The Dragon smiled at her, his grin toothy and insincere.
“The trap is set,” she informed him, keeping her tone professional. She would not wipe the grin from his face by punching him. She would not give in to her anger at him.
“Ah, excellent. Before I give over the body to the human, when is the line that I should interfere?”
“If we are boarded. I give you leave to do whatever you feel you must to keep this ship afloat. You will get no censure from me after.” He laughed, a bright but mean sound.
“Oh, Moonlet, what makes you think I fear your censure?” She scowled at him, at his stupid, arrogant face.
“Oh, I can make your remaining time in that body unpleasant or longer than necessary. I am not to be crossed, Great Dragon.” She glared at him, one of her best glares, but the Dragon was unmoved. “I can also deny you access to my egg when she hatches. I will teach her to be human before she is dragon.” That got a reaction, a slight shift of his expression, his posture. Good.
“You wouldn't dare.”
“You'll find, Great One, that I dare to do much that is forbidden or stupid. I will not be told what to do, I will not accept those who will not do as they have sworn, and I will not tolerate my crew being at risk from your people any more than is necessary.” She huffed, crossing her arms and staring at him, daring him to contradict her.
Instead, the Dragon laughed, this one more mirthful.
“Oh, Moonlet, what a dragon you will be.” She blinked at him, not understanding, but before she could ask him to clarify what in the hells he meant, he dropped limp, and she had to surge forward to catch him.
“Admiral?” Evander's voice was almost sleepy.
“Evander? Good. Get up, you and I have enemies on the door and I need you. I trust you more than any forsaken dragon.” She pulled him to his feet, then gave him a gentle punch to the shoulder. He gave her a quick nod, grinning wickedly.
“Am I going to get to stab someone? I've got an itch that needs scratching.” She laughed, punching his shoulder again.
“Go, you lug. Be ready.”
He sped off, heading to the guns. Aella climbed back to her post, looking out over the water. She saw something in the water in the distance, a strange bubbling. The dolphins had arrived.
In the distance, the demon ships were finally visible as ships in her spyglass. There were only two, which meant that there was a third out there that they would have to deal with. Aella frowned. She had been hoping that they could be done with this, be done with being chased.
“On my signal, drop the sails and we will head toward them!” she called out. The crew waited, the tension in the air thick. She waited, watching from her spy glass as the dolphins swam closer to the ships. When the demon ships began to fire toward the pod, Aella lifted her whistle to her lips and blew out the signal.
The demons wouldn't know what hit them!