"The Twisted Path: Chapter 9" by Melissa Jones

“The irresponsive silence of the land,
    The irresponsive sounding of the sea,
    Speak both one message of one sense to me:—
Aloof, aloof, we stand aloof, so stand
Thou too aloof, bound with the flawless band
    Of inner solitude; we bind not thee;
    But who from thy self-chain shall set thee free?”

-Aloof, Christina Georgina Rossetti

Chapter 9: Last Light of the Sun


I blotted my face with a scrap of cloth, wincing as the rough fabric snagged on the wounded skin of my bottom lip and cheek. Somewhere in the sea-chest was a looking glass, but I did not want to find it. I did not want to see the blood on my face, nor the bruise blossoming around my eye. But I could still feel the touch of the ink-tipped stylus on my cheek and I had to know, so carefully I dug through the chest and lifted the little circle of metal free. With my heart pounding in anxiety, I looked.

There was nothing. I could have wept again, this time with relief.

If only the pounding at the door would stop. "Dae, let me in," Rhys yelled, as he had been for the past ten minutes. I would have let him in had it not been for my wet cheeks and red eyes. To be seen crying was a weakness I could not afford. I checked the looking glass once more, making certain my eyes were clear and dry, and then opened the door.

Rhys had a fist ready to knock. Fox stood uneasily behind him, looking worried. Both stilled when they saw me, and Rhys paled.

"Dae, what happened?" the dark-haired man demanded. "Who did this?"

I stood back from the door and motioned them both inside. When they had entered, I closed the door and retired to my bunk, keeping the cloth pressed to the slash on my cheek that continued to weep blood. "Marcus happened," I answered, seated with my back against the wall and my feet tucked underneath me. I still felt numb and so very stupid to have been trapped in that situation.

"Why?" Fox asked over Rhys" heavy cursing.

I glanced at Rhys, knowing our secret was about to be revealed, and spoke. "I went into the hold. Riles" injury led me there. One of the crewmen saw me."

"You said that was impossible," Rhys interjected, his face black with fury.

"I was wrong," I answered quietly, flinching as I removed the cloth.

"Dear gods," Fox breathed despairingly. "What happens now?"

"Dae," Rhys said, catching my attention again. "What did Marcus say? Tell me before I kill him."

"He said lots of things," I said, staring at the door so I would not have to look in their eyes. I wanted to kill Marcus but that would complicate things even more. "He gave me a choice of punishments. Die or live as his slave." I touched my cheek, feeling the stylus again. "I chose neither, but it was close. He wanted a slave badly." I closed my eyes, feeling a deep pain in my heart.

"Is he dead then?" Fox inquired, stunned.

"No. I left him alive," I replied. "He promised to leave me alone until the ship docked, and that he would not retaliate against you as well."

"How did you manage that?" Rhys asked, and I hated the sympathy in his eyes although the draining bloodlust was a relief.

"I fought him," I growled abruptly, "and won."

"I don"t expect him to keep that promise." Rhys settled back on the opposing bunk, running a hand through his shaggy hair. Then he exploded. "By Oryn"s blood, Dae, you should have been careful! I knew this was a bad idea, letting you go off alone with him in that room."

"Careful?" I snarled, suddenly angry. "How could I have been any more careful? Who lives in the hold of a gods-damned ship? I have gone two months without incident, without concern, and then I am supposed to anticipate a sudden hand at my throat?" I breathed hard. "If this was such a bad idea at the beginning, then why did you agree?"

His mouth opened and closed like that of a landed fish. I could see the shock in his dark eyes. "I...I"m sorry, Dae. I didn"t mean to snap at you. It"s Marcus that"s got me angry."

"You are angry," I snorted derisively, looking away in disgust.

"Wait, someone lives in the hold?" Fox inquired tentatively.

"Teo," I said flatly. I wondered if Teo was a slave with a tattoo on his face, relegated to a life of stinking, cramped blackness amongst the rats and crates below. A tattoo gave choices that a stone did not, and thus I did not pity Teo. Ink could run, could hide, but stone gave no such choice. However, ink lasted indefinitely. A mark always there, always noticeable. A hindrance and constant concern. A stone could break and fall away. I sighed sadly, feeling a trickle of grief in my veins. Things were never so simple and easy as they first appeared - something I kept forgetting. I touched my cheek again, wondering what I would look like with a mark forever on my skin.

There was a light touch on my arm. "Dae?"

I snapped free. "What?"

"You keep touching your cheek," Rhys said concernedly.

I decided to speak. "The needle touched me. He was going to mark my face."

"There"s no mark there, only a bruise." His voice was soft, lulling, but underneath was a vein of stone.

"I know, but I feel it." It was something I would feel for a long time; another brush with slavery. Another brush with death.

"Rhys, what should we do?" Fox asked. "This can"t go overlooked!"

"It must," I said before the dark-haired man could speak. "We must act like nothing has happened. The only thing that has changed is that I will no longer train Marcus. That is it."

"Dae"s right. We are still at Marcus" mercy," Rhys agreed, albeit not happily. "If we react, then this shaky truce could very well be broken completely. It would be us against the entirety of Marcus and the crew."

"Would it?" Fox asked. "Dae"s patched up dozens of these men. Dozens! I don"t think they"d like to see their pretty physician treated this way."

"Does it matter, truly?" I asked. "Will we not be in the Isles soon?" I just wanted to be left alone, to retreat into my shell and concentrate on the sounds and sights of the sea.

"Mayhap a few weeks," Rhys replied offhandedly, and then turned back to Fox. "But there"s still the matter of the hold. She went in, that"s all there is to it. The crew won"t like it."

Fox sighed. "I don"t like it."

"You don"t have to," Rhys said flatly. "That"s how it is."

"Was there anything good in the hold, at least?" Fox asked with soft exasperation.

Rhys glanced at me. "No," I answered. "Just dust."

//~*~\

The weeks passed without further incident. Wren had fretted at first, worried about my well-being, but she calmed down after being reassured that I was and would be fine. Fox and Rhys watched me like hawks although they tried to be unobtrusive, to their credit. I ate in the galley, patched up sailors, and paced restlessly in my small cabin. My nausea returned in small bouts but I had none of the seeds left to combat it. I wanted to hit something, to vent the uneasy anger bottled up inside me. Slavery again. Why did it haunt me so?

My companions knew something was amiss but I would not speak of it. Things had been going so well, and now I was unsettled and fearful again, lost in memories of the past. For the first time in years, I had nightmares. Wren told me I tossed in my sleep and she asked questions, but I had no answers for her. I would not tell them I had once been enslaved, a captive, controlled. Powerless.

I thought often of the small pouch of firedust in the chest, wondering what to do with it. It had been a mistake to bring it topside, and an even greater one to place it in the chest. I wanted rid of it, and so I took a square of muslin and greased it with tallow from a candle so it would be watertight. I wrapped this around the deerskin pouch and tied it tight, looked at it carefully, and then placed it back in the chest. Soon, I told myself. When I was certain it would not be needed.

By Lenos, I thought I was through with this! I swore internally, fuming at my own mental anguish. Planning, thinking and fear was all I ever did, and I wanted done with it. I wanted more. I wanted a life -one that was not an offshoot of my younger days. But was that possible? Sometimes I thought so, that I might have a chance at normalcy. Other times I could have wept over that foolish wish. Sidh often made me remember that I was different, that I was something to be feared. Something inhuman. I was able to ignore my pains when Rhys was around. He made me smile, laugh, forget. Things only Nyx had done, back when we were living free in Havosiherim, and I had loved him for it.

That thought stopped me in my tracks. This was not Nyx I was thinking of now. Nyx had not entered my thoughts for months. The man in my mind was not an elf, not even a halfblood. He was human, something fearful, but I was not wary of him. I enjoyed his presence, his conversation, our repartees and banter. I had never jested with Nyx as I did with Rhys. I had never felt my skin tingle strangely after brushing past him. Was it possible that I -- No, I stopped that glimmer in its tracks. That was a dangerous thread, one I was not ready to examine quite yet. Instead, I remembered Lyna the witch, Lenos the goddess, and her admonition. I could sink into despair again, or I could steer my own fate. Why should I huddle in fear of Marcus and the needle when I could walk on the deck, bathing in the sun, and basking in the company I enjoyed? There was no telling how long it might be available to me.

Decided now, and feeling stronger, I went up onto the foredeck, perched on the shoulder of the figurehead and waited for Rhys to find me. I knew it would not take long.

//~*~\

We were two days from port when the storms began. The sky went black and the sea dipped and crashed against the hull. The wind howled like tormented wraiths, pushing hard at the working men on deck. I stood against the mizzenmast, eyes squinted against the windblown rain. I wished I could see but even from the crow"s nest, where I was not allowed, I would be useless. The clouds were too low and the horizon was simply part of the turbulent waters. There was nothing to see; it was like being trapped in a smoke-filled room. Everything was the same color.

The sea surged and I was lifted off my feet as the ship dropped from underneath me. I twisted, grasping the mast, and tried to keep my stomach in check. Hurry, I told myself. Do what you came to do and go back below! I touched my belt, felt for the tallow-greased sack of firedust. I had to throw it over. No one would be paying any attention to me, not while they were fighting to keep the ship afloat and on course. Rhys and Fox were somewhere on deck, but they were busy at the ropes. Sidh and Wren, huddled belowdecks, had not noticed me leave. I had waited for my chance and took it when it came. I was still quick and silent when I wished, and I wished now. Still, there were too many people on deck, too much commotion. I did not have long to act if I had any time at all.

I went as close to the edge as I dared, keeping my hands on anything anchored. The waves crashed against the gunwale, soaking my already drenched body. I could hear nothing over the rain except the shrieking wind and the blood pounding in my head. I carefully lifted the deerskin from my belt, ready to throw it into the endless sea where it would be safely swallowed.

"You could have lived," Marcus said.

I whipped around, reaching for the blade in my belt. He snapped forward, knocking the tiny bag from my hands. My heart stopped as the bag landed on the deck, but nothing happened. There was no time for relief as Marcus swept forward with a length of chain in his hand. No one was watching. I knew he meant to shove me over the gunwale.

"And what"s this?" he sneered, eyeing the little pouch on the rainswept deck. "An offering to your god, perhaps? It won"t help you."

"No!" I shrieked as the captain brought his foot down on the deerskin. There was not time for more.

The side of the ship erupted in blinding white heat and I could feel myself flying. Save them! I screamed, meaning my friends, but whether I cried aloud or internally I could not tell. There was pain, stabbing, aching, biting pain - like fire in my flesh. I tried to cry out but my voice was frozen. I knew nothing more until I hit the water.

I could not move. Shock had taken hold of me, stiffening my limbs until the waves pushed me under. I broke through, forcing my joints to bend, fighting for air. The waves crushed me and I was powerless. I could see the bulk of the ship angling in the water, already sinking below the waves. I moaned in grief and horror. The lifeboats not destroyed by the explosion were sinking toward the furious sea, holding the crewmen that had survived the initial blast. I prayed my companions were among them.

The last and largest blast rocked the ship heartbeats later. I could feel it under the water, a terrible pressure against my legs and chest. A fountain of debris rose into the black sky with a rumble like thunder, crashing back into the sea with a horrible silence. I shrieked in horror and anguish and fear. Lenos, if I have ever asked for anything I ask for this! I cried. Do not let them die! Flailing in the water, I waited for the sea to claim me.

A barrel came, riding high as it was pushed along by the waves. I grasped for it, wrapping my arms in the ropes tangled around its bulk. There was nothing to do now but wait, and I barely felt hot tears mix with the seawater on my face.

//~*~\

Starlight on water; sea flat as glass. I looked up, feeling the cleanness of the perfect blue sky above me. My arms were knotted in the cordage around the barrel. I was dreaming, for Lyna perched weightlessly on the end of the barrel. She spoke to me, that earthbound avatar of Lenos, the goddess to whom I was given at birth. Her pale hair was swept up, tendrils hanging like gauze across her face, hiding the wrinkles of her age. The staff with its crystal was blazing as brightly as her eyes, illuminating the curdling mist around our ankles that shielded me from the sea.

"There is no gain without suffering," Lyna whispered gently, urgently. "Gods rise and fall, are born and die. Nothing lasts forever. There is no immortality."

"Speak sense," I breathed, feeling faint. The damp wood of the barrel left flecks of wood under my nails. Thunder crashed in my ears., echoing from the cloudless sky.

"You have suffered greatly. You will gain much, even more than you know. We gods give and we take." Her voice was an echoing spiral, dripping through the dust of ages to find me.

"Take nothing more from me. You have enough." My words were wind in the trees. A bird fluttered its wings in the space where my heart should be. They were gone, my companions, my friends. Gone beneath the glassy surface of the sea.

"Lenos withers. Oryn dries. Joilu grows dark. We die, as we always have, gradually forgotten. Others are born, known and watched. Nothing is gained without suffering."

"I am content with my lot... but I want life for them," I sighed. A voice called from the darkness and I turned my face toward it. It was familiar, but I could not place it. The sound was a wolf in the night, unseen and haunting. Time slipped away, ephemeral, gone forever. I suddenly wanted to flee after it, to catch it and hold tight. I was not finished here yet.

"You do not always have that choice, dear one. We gods give, and we take."

"Will you wait?" I asked. It was suddenly important that I do so. Time slowed, but did not return. It waited like a hungry mouth in the shadows. "Please." The word was a boulder, unmovable. Lenos saw it and her eyes glistened with pride.

Softly, the goddess smiled, a flash of steel against a starlit sky. "You will be a wonder, when your time arrives, Tylidae Teriel, Thunderheart, the Nightingale, my Starlit Blade. You will make them tremble."

"I do not wish for them to tremble," I answered, knowing and not-knowing at the same time. "I wish for them to see."

"When you come into your own, they will," Lenos answered lovingly. She touched my face softly, with a hand that was no longer that of an ancient, wrinkled crone. Her skin was smooth and soft, like new spring leaves. "We will wait for you. You are not finished here yet."

And I awoke.

I lay there a moment, figuring out what had happened. The dream faded into the background, a distant recollection, as water spewed from my lungs. I gagged and coughed, bringing up saltwater until I felt empty, and realized I was clenching sand between my fingers. "Oh!" I gasped in shock, flinging myself up to my knees. I looked on in wonder as I viewed the waving green trees beyond the shoreline and the clear, unclouded sky above. I became conscious of my ravenous thirst and a gnawing in my belly. How long had I floated on the barrel? I looked around. Where was the barrel? Where was I? I stood on weak knees, waiting half-bent until my heart slowed before I fully straightened.

There were footprints in the sand. I licked my dry, cracked lips in befuddlement. The prints seemed too small for a human, and I was discomfited to see how close they had come to my prostrate form. Quickly, I checked the contents of my belt and boots, noting with relief that nothing had been taken, although my belt-knife was missing. I recalled dropping that on the ship and my heart sank at the memory. I pushed the grief away, knowing I would give in later. Instead, I followed the prints in the sand, noting that for all their size they sank extraordinarily deep.

I went carefully, feeling the hot sun bake my skin and exacerbate my thirst. The sand did not sink as much under my feet and I walked easily despite my fatigue. Pieces of my dream resurfaced as I walked. A voice had called me, but whose? I had turned away from a deity for it. The thought of gods made me uneasy and so I tried to put it all away, focusing only on the footprints and my current predicament. It was not easy. My mind was loose and fluttering. I knew I was hurt in places, but could not remember to examine myself. I was not dead, that was all that mattered.

I followed the footprints down the shoreline and around a spur of land that jutted into the calm waters. The barrel sat around the next bend, half-buried in sand and swollen ropes. A small person was prodding it with a stick, rapping it to hear the echo of liquid inside. I thought it was a child until I saw the beard.

"I did not know dwarves lived by the sea," I said abruptly, unthinkingly. My voice sounded strange, low and fading and hoarse.

The dwarf turned and regarded me blankly. His gray beard was matted with sand, as was the thick hair on the tops of his bare feet. "And I thought your kind was myth," he replied in turn, in a deep, grating voice like stone against stone. It was hard to hear him; my head seemed full of sand. I reached up; my headband was gone, my ears exposed. There was dark crust on my fingers. The dwarf did not seem to care.

"Have you seen anyone on the beach?" I asked, knowing the explosion had had an affect on my hearing. My stomach dropped. Later, later! Focus on information now, I commanded myself, straining to my ears.

"Just yourself," he grunted, pushing the barrel over to expose the bunghole.

I looked out over the vast waters, hoping to glimpse a lifeboat or a figure. There was nothing. I turned to look back at the dwarf. He had walked up to my unconscious body on the sand and had done nothing to help. He had walked past a potentially dying woman to attend to the barrel. I had hoped for anger, for indigence, but there was nothing. "How far am I from Lugnayos?" I asked, remembering the name of Rhys" town. If they had survived, they would go there.

"Lugnayos?" the dwarf repeated in surprise as he pulled the cork free. The heavy smell of ale floated forth. "Full of humans, that place. Dangerous for your kind and mine."

"I am going anyway. Tell me if you know."

He pondered for a moment, sniffed the ale, then plugged the hole again. "Walk west, take the game trail over the cliff. Go west again. No swimming."

"Thank you," I said, uncaring of his vagueness and reluctance. I was just grateful I was on the correct island and turned to leave.

"Wait, halfblood," he called, sounding like he was at the distant end of a tunnel. I paused, then turned around, barely catching the bladder he tossed at me. "Drink first," the dwarf said. "Water"s scarce here and you will not make it to the spring in your condition."

"Thank you," I said in surprise, and raised the bladder. The water was warm but delicious, and I drank the bladder nearly dry. I tossed it back to the dwarf, who caught it deftly and reattached it to his belt. Then, to my astonishment, he hauled the barrel on his shoulder and began to stride away with little apparent effort. The barrel was bigger than he and likely nearly as heavy. I watched until he vanished into the trees, then took a deep breath.

I turned my face to the west, and started walking.

//~*~\


The little lifeboat bobbed gently on the soft waves but Rhys felt sick. Fox was bruised and battered, Wren"s arm was broken, Sidh was still unconscious, and Dae was missing. The dark-haired man was astonished that they had survived. It seemed miraculous, and he could not even remember how it had happened. It hardly mattered to him, though, how they had come to be in the boat, alive and intact. Dae was gone. Rhys had called her name until he was hoarse, but to no avail. Wren and Fox had joined him until they no longer had the breath for it. Three crewmen had crawled aboard soon after, but one by one they had succumbed to their wounds. Their bodies had been dumped overboard. There was nothing else to do.

Rhys wedged himself deeper into the prow of the lifeboat, feeling a pain in his ribs and along his left thigh. Deep grazes that no longer bled patterned his damp, sunburnt flesh. Four full days had passed. Four days of helpless waiting and wondering. Without oars, the boat was at the mercy of the current. He thought they were headed in the direction, a slight southwest course, but whether they would make it before the small cask of water underneath the bench ran out he did not know. Flotsam still occasionally drifted past the survivors and they salvaged what they could. The sea-chest had even drifted by, the lid nearly underwater, but it was too large and heavy to lift into the boat. Fox had secured it to the stern with a length of waterlogged rope, allowing it to float along behind them. Miraculous, Rhys thought again.

Dae had warned him, he realized, or had she foretold the destruction of the ship? The dark-haired man would not put it past her to have some leaning toward fortune-telling. She had already shown some skill in magic in the ruins, small though that was. It did not matter. He wanted her back. Dae had come out of her self-imposed reclusion mere days ago, perched on the figurehead, acting as if nothing had happened to her. She had smiled when he found her and laughed when he made jests. She did not seem to realize she was flirting and Rhys made no mention of it lest she stop. Dae did not seem like the type of person that often let down her guard, and Rhys was flattered that she did so around him. Fox had told him that she was never like that with anyone else.

And now she was gone, lost in the sea.

The small boat floated on, moved along by the swift current. Rhys slept for a time, lulled into a daze by his heartache and the silence. He awoke to Fox"s shouts and the rough jostling of the breakers. Wren was grimacing, hugging her arm to her chest. Sidh groaned from his place at her feet but did not open his eyes.

"Land," Fox cried wondrously. "The waves are taking us right to shore!"

Rhys turned and gazed in heartfelt relief at the sun-bleached sand and the shoreline of tamarisk, pine and carob. The boat rode high, then crashed down the other side of the wave. Rhys received a face-full of saltwater, bringing him roughly from his lethargy. The sea-chest dragged behind, slowing their progress, holding them at the edge of the waves. "Fox, paddle with your arms," he called over the noise of the sea.

The two men fought the waves until their arms burned in agony. They were drenched with ocean spray and abysmally thirsty, but the shore was closer now. Rhys leapt from the prow, followed swiftly by Fox, and landed chest-deep in the surf, struggling to find his balance amidst the forces of the currents and the shifting sand under his feet. Grabbing the oarlocks on either side the side of the small vessel, they heaved the boat on the packed sand of the beach.  They then cut the sea-chest free and dragged the waterlogged crate far beyond the waterline.

"Where are we?" Wren asked as she stepped gingerly from the lifeboat. Fox and Rhys dragged the boat, with Sidh inside, above the high-tide mark, then dropped limply into the shade, out of breath and exhausted.

"Near home, I expect," Rhys said, taking a swallow from the water cask. He passed it wordlessly to Fox. "We weren"t that far out and the current was going the right direction." The dark-haired man leaned back against a tree trunk, resting and thinking about what to do next. Water was a priority, then shelter and food. They also needed a physician badly. Rhys thought of Dae again and grieved the fact that she was gone. "Stay near the boat," he said to the others. "I"m going to look around. Fox, see what kind of shelter you can make and get a fire going if possible. I"ll be back before dusk."

The siblings were too tired to argue and as Rhys left he heard Fox tell Wren of his plans to try and fashion a splint for her arm, even though he knew nothing about broken bones. Rhys felt his throat close, recalling Dae"s face in his mind, and paced away. He did not want the others to see the glint of unshed tears in his eyes. The trees and shadows swallowed him whole, and Rhys welcomed the coolness on his parched and flaking skin.

He wandered up the gently sloping land, notching the tree bark so he would not lose his way. The ground was soft underfoot with countless years of fallen fronds and leaves, providing fodder as they decayed for the twisted vines and shrubs that littered the floor. A rat skittered away from Rhys" passage; a flock of red-billed birds flew squawking from the canopy as he passed underneath. Eventually, Rhys came to a high point of land surrounded by low trees and brush. He scaled a leaning pine, the highest thing he could find, to get a better view of his surroundings.

The tendril of smoke against the horizon caught his eye. He followed the wisp down to the trees, and was both stunned and elated to see a small village nestled amongst the trees. A boy was visible, herding goats to a small enclosure, and beyond that was a well. Rhys" dry mouth cried in agony. He slid hurriedly down the rough trunk and quickly made his way back to the beach. They were saved.