Chapter 130: Aella’s Journey
A day later, the wind was favourable, if cold, and Aella was stepping aboard a small sail boat. The mast was so small compared to the Tooth’s that it almost seemed like she had stepped aboard a child’s toy. She was dressed in new clothing, courtesy of her brother-in-law, who insisted she needed clothing that fit if she was planning to sail. He was right, of course, but that hadn’t stopped her from grumbling at the charity. Now, however, she was glad to be in boots and trousers. She’d felt utterly ridiculous in the frock, with the stupid little roses and the flimsy, light fabric. Now she was dressed almost the same as the fisherfolk, in leathers and heavy linen, wool and furs. She had a dagger tucked in her belt, a tool as much as it was a weapon. She was in her own skin, boarding a boat that, while not hers, would do for now.
“Alright, Tiny,” she said, placing her hand on the mast. “Time to race, yeah? We’re going to get to the Sylph first, and prove that we belong on the sea.” She’d already told her wife not to sing, that she had to do this on her own merit. Nereida had accepted that, though she was grumbling as she boarded the boat.
“She’s small,” Nereida grumbled. “We’re going to get wet.”
“Your brothers aren’t complaining.”
“They’re afraid of you,” the siren retorted, sitting on a bench with as much dignity as she could muster on the small fishing boat. It reeked of dead fish, and Nereida’s face kept crumpling in disgust. Aella was tempted to kiss her wife, the pinched expression almost adorable, but she knew Nereida would not appreciate the public affection. Basiano and Caleb, still injured, weakened and grieving, settled next to Nereida, one on each side of her.
“I may need a hand,” Aella said, only realizing how thoughtless her words are when Basiano lifted his seared stump to wave at her. “If the waves are rough,” she plowed on, not letting his highness knock her down. “I’ll show you.” She took a moment to teach Caleb and Basiano which ropes to pull and when. Basiano nodded, though his expression was sour. The former traitor was at least trying to help, and he also seemed to know the basics. It was only after that Aella realized that he, too, was ship-bound, though she seriously doubted his ship did more than patrol friendly seas.
The race itself was almost anticlimactic. The wind was favourable, Aella was in her element. She barked orders, pulled ropes, and felt the sea-spray on her face. It was colder than she had remembered: on the Tooth, in the winter, the spray did not reach the deck unless there was a storm. Nereida kept quiet, even as they cut across the waves at speeds the little boat was not designed for. Basiano was sick overboard. They left the asshole fisherman in their wake, reaching the Sylph ship. Theirs was a proper ship, a merchant ship with no weapon ports at all. But then again, the Sylph could out-run any other ship on the ocean, so long as they had wind-casters on their ship. Weapons would only slow them down, and take up valuable cargo space.
“You’re not bad,” the Sylph crewman said as he fluttered down with the ladder for them to climb. He started to say something else when he really caught a glimpse of Nereida, her hood blown loose by the winds. “Admiral!” He switched to signing, while speaking aloud about how she could improve. “Are you safe? We received word that the Siren Ship the Dragon’s Tooth had her Admiral taken by the Salamander King!”
“That is a twisty tale,” Aella signed, hoping that he’d understand what she meant. She understood signing better than she could sign. “The dead King did keep us, but we are not prisoners of the new King. We wait for the Tooth to come back.”
“She was going to Limani to ask for aid. But another Sylph ship was sent the same night with a royal invitation to a grand wedding. The Tooth won’t beat the Gale.”
“The Tooth’s Captain is a Sylph and we have permission to cross the Cursed Waters.” Aella said the last bit out loud, in part to show her new Sylph ally that she trusted those she was with. Caleb looked up at that surprise on his face but he had only seen Epelda when she was playing a role. Aella grinned at the not-quite traitor, and then turned back to the youthful Sylph. He opened and closed his mouth several times, before laughing.
“So, if I am understanding,” the Sylph youth said, laughter bubbling from him like a child. “The Dragon’s Tooth is a Seliniak vessel, flying the Siren flag with permission, whose captain is currently a Sylph? Winged or unwinged?”
“Winged. Our daughter, by adoption.” She took Nereida’s hand at that.
“Oh you must tell the tale, please!”
“As you are taking us back to port, I will consider this part of payment,” Aella replied. “Though my wife will do the telling; she’s far better at it than I.”
The ship’s deck was slippery with ice after the Sylph crew had run past a storm.
“Weather’s been worse than in recent memory,” their guide told them as he helped them up the ladder. It was harder for Caleb and Basiano to climb with only one hand each. There was pity in the Sylph’s eyes, but he made no comments, other than to ask they go up one at a time to prevent falls. To his credit, he was mostly looking at Nereida when he spoke. The four of them were herded below deck. Aella considered arguing, but she did not know their commands in sign, nor their whistles, and she did not expect they’d teach her.
Still, it was odd, being crammed into one of the small rooms below deck and told to stay like she was a useless passenger. The room had six hammocks and no privacy. Basiano and Caleb were given the two lowest hammocks, so they could focus on resting and recovering. Aella took one at the top, so that she was above everyone. She knew how to descend without difficulty, and was now the only one of them with all four of their original limbs. Nereida got stuck trying to climb in, her lizard leg still not quite as agile as her human one. If only her wife would accept it as hers, instead of ignoring it, maybe she would make progress. At least she had not asked for a cane since they had reunited. It was as if Nereida forgot she had needed it.
The journey was only a day and a half, made slightly longer because they had to go around a peninsula. Basiano barely left the hammock until the capital was back in sight. Caleb sat with his back against the wall, staring at the stump where his hand had once been with a haunted look in his eyes. Aella waited for the two royal siblings to head up to the deck before she cornered the former traitor.
“She nearly died to keep you alive, you know,” Aella said, sinking down next to him as if they were friends. They weren’t, but Nereida cared for this idiot, and so she would keep him alive. Even if he stank of ash and old blood. “So don’t throw her efforts away by wasting away into nothing.”
“I lost a sister, lost a hand. How am I supposed to be captain?”
“Get a hook?” she suggested, mostly in jest. He blinked at her in horror. “I have seen it as an option. One of my crew has a wooden leg. Nereida has a dragon’s leg. You don’t have to be useless or lost to your emotions.”
“What do you know of loss?” he demanded angrily. She did not rise to the bait. He wanted her to hit him, to rail at him. Like Alejo when he was having a temper tantrum.
“I have just spent months as a literal prisoner of your father, waiting and praying that my daughter, who is only eighteen, managed to safely get to my ship and flee. Months where I did not know if she lived or died. And I still don’t know. That there are rumours of the Tooth here is just enough to give me painful, agonizing hope.” She kept her tone even, firm. He could not see her true feelings on this, he was not to be trusted. But she had learned from her wife: emotions could be weapons, tools, in the right hands. “So yes, I know loss. The Tooth was my heart before I met Ner.”
“I won’t get my commission back. The old King took it from me, because I failed him. Told me I “needed to grow”. Bassi can’t undo that, the optics are bad. I may still have ships loyal to me, but I won’t be able to set foot on them again, unless I want to go freelance.”
“Too good to swab?” she teased. He glared at her and then laughed, but it was a broken, hollow sound.
“One-handed deck hand? That goes nowhere fast and gets someone killed.” He leaned back and closed his eyes. “I should have just… let the stupid dragon kill me. Then Bassi wouldn’t be hurt and I wouldn’t be able to feel sorry for myself.”
“On the branch of sacrifice, grief and sorrow reign.” Aella did not try and stop the words, even though she knew they weren’t hers. Caleb looked at her with real fear, his body trembling, his eyes wide. There was more knowledge, dancing just out her reach. She closed her eyes, breathed in as Nereida had taught her. She let herself fall into the power, feel it, and then reel it in. She was in control, not the power. “Star’s Scions must split to grow, one to find the hidden brother, the other to become father of a nation reborn.” There were images again, the same as she had seen under the light of the moon. Caleb, on her ship, nursing his wounds, sickly, but living. Basiano, on his throne, but now, along with more grey hairs, he had a baby dragon sitting on his shoulder. “Stars will grow in grief, but find peace.”
Aella opened her eyes and crawled across the room to be sick in the pail. She could feel the ship rocking, could hear the way the ocean slammed into her body, could taste the salt in the air. It was too much, too sharp, too loud. Caleb staggered to his feet with the grace of a newborn foal. He grabbed one of their thin blankets and put it over her shoulders.
“What did you see?” he sounded like a terrified child, the way his voice shook.
“The answer to your problems,” she replied, pulling the blanket tighter around herself. It needed to be aired out, this blanket. There was a musty smell to it. “When the Tooth comes for us, and it will, you, princeling…. You have a place on it.”
It was as if someone had sucked the air out of their small little cabin. Everything became still and silent, until Aella could only hear the sound of her own heart and the waves outside. Caleb sunk into his hammock.
“You… are serious?” He nearly wheezed out the words.
“As the tide.”
“Me, on your ship?”
“Yes.” She grinned at him, a feral, frightening grin that sent most folk running. “Of course, that means you’ll likely have to deal with dragons. Not just us. The wild ones that we wake.”
“On… purpose?”
Aella laughed, a deep, belly-shaking, heart healing laugh.
“You are so like Basiano.”
“No,” Caleb muttered. “I don’t think I am… He left his children to come find her, Admiral. I could never.”
“They could come too,” she replied with a cheeky grin that she did not feel. He snickered at whatever he was imagining, and then silently took her bucket to get a fresh one.
The rest of the voyage passed without event, and soon they were docking. Aella had never been more excited to leave a ship. But this one, the Eye of the Storm, was not the Tooth. It was not her home, just a pale imitation. And so heading to land, even if it was to a place she had come to despise, filled her with joy. Because she could finally see her children.
When they disembarked, there was a contingent of Royal Guards waiting for them. They were dressed in sharp purple and black, all wielding pikes. There was a crowd gathered on the other docks, on land, even on the roofs of other buildings. When Basiano and Nereida disembarked, the soon-to-be King pulled back his hood and strode to the guards. A cheer rose from someone in the crowd, and the cheer caught like wildfire.
“The Crown Prince is Home!”
Much like their first arrival, Basiano controlled the crowd with his booming voice and disarming smile. The guards were stiff and disciplined, keeping the crowd at bay, for Basiano was heir and though he had not yet had his coronation, he was king in all but name. No peasant could be allowed to touch him. Not now. Aella followed her brother-in-law wearing a sullen expression. He controlled the crowd through smiles. She kept people at bay with scowls. Both worked. Caleb followed close to her like a puppy, holding his cloak closed to hide both his injury and the egg tied to his chest and hidden beneath too many layers of fabric. They had all agreed that the egg could not be revealed until after Basiano was King.
The echoes of their first arrival continued when they reached the garden. This time, waiting in her chair was the former Queen. On her lap sat tiny Damara, the baby chewing on her grandmother’s sleeve. Alejo and Egaz were on either side of their grandmother, holding her chair and trembling. Once they saw Nereida, though, their faces split into grins and both began to cry. They ran down the stairs, breaking away from the guards at the top to run to their mother’s side.
“Mama! Stepmiral!” Egaz practically threw himself at his mother. Aeljo, with no more grace, came at Aella, burying his face into her tunic and covering her with snot and tears.
“You came back!” he cried, holding her tightly.
“Always will, little crewman,” she promised softly.
“Guards,” the former queen called out. The boys hushed at her words. Aella felt a stone in her stomach. Had word reached the Queen Dowager about Caleb’s sister? Would Nereida be charged with murder? “Close the gates, and then you are dismissed. My family is home…. And we have a coronation to plan for.” She grinned at Nereida and Basiano, relief plain on her wrinkled face. She lifted the baby to give her a kiss on the head, and Damara squawked indignantly, wiggling about as if she planned to escape. The baby looked as if she had gained a stone while they were gone.
“Nereida, love? Tomorrow, when you and your lovely wife are refreshed, I think we need to have tea.” With that, the old woman snapped her fingers, and her attendant pushed her, and Damara, back inside.