Ship of Magic

Page 324

“How? No one listens to me. I'm nothing to them. ”

“You are everything to me. Be strong, be brave. ”

In the waist there was a sudden stir, a muttering that grew to an animalistic roar. Wintrow didn't need to look. “They have my father down there. We have to keep him alive. ”

“Why?” The sudden harshness in her voice was chilling.

“Because I promised him I would try. He helped me through the night, he stood by me. And you. Despite all that is between us, he helped me keep you off the rocks. ” Wintrow took a breath. “And because of what it would do to me if I just stood by and allowed them to kill my father. Because of who that would make me. ”

“There is nothing we can do,” she said bitterly. “I could not save Gantry, I could not save Mild. Not even Findow for the sake of his fiddling could I save. For all these slaves have suffered, they have only learned to disregard suffering. Pain is the coin they use now in all their transactions. Nothing else reaches them, nothing else will satisfy them. ” An edge of hysteria was creeping into her voice. “And that is what they fill me with. Their own pain, and their hunger for pain and . . . ”

“Vivacia,” he said gently, and then more firmly, “Ship. Listen to me. You sent me below to recall who I was. I know you did. And you were right. You were right to do so. Now. Recall who you are, and who has sailed you. Recall all you know of courage. We will need it. ”

As if in response to his words, he heard Sa'Adar's voice raised in command. “Wintrow! Come forth. Your father claims you will speak for him. ”

A breath. Two. Three. Finding himself at the center of all things, finding Sa at the center of himself. Recalling that Sa was all and all was Sa.

“Do not think you can hide yourself!” Sa'Adar's voice boomed out. “Come out. Captain Kennit commands it!”

Wintrow pushed the hair back from his eyes and stood as tall as he could. He walked to the edge of the foredeck and looked down on them all. “No one commands me on the deck of my own ship!” He threw the words down at them and waited to see what would happen.

“Your ship? You, made a slave by your father's own hand, claim this ship as yours?” It was Sa'Adar who spoke, not one of the pirates. Wintrow took heart.

He did not look at Sa'Adar as he spoke but at the pirates who had turned to stare at him. “I claim this ship and this ship claims me. By right of blood. And if you think that true claim can be disputed, ask my father how well he succeeded at it. ” He took a deep breath and tried to bring his voice from the bottom of his lungs. “The liveship Vivacia is mine. ”

“Seize him and bring him here,” Sa'Adar ordered his map-faces disgustedly.

“Touch him and you all die!” Vivacia's tone was no longer that of a frightened child, but that of an outraged matriarch. Even anchored and grappled as she was, she contrived to put a rock in her decks. “Doubt it not!” she roared out suddenly. “You have soaked me with your filth, and I have not complained. You have spilled blood on my decks, blood and deaths I must carry with me forever, and I have not stirred against you. But harm Wintrow and my vengeance will know no end. No end save your deaths!”

The rocking increased, a marked motion that the Marietta did not match. The anchor rope creaked complainingly. Most unnerving for Wintrow, the distant serpents lashed the surface of the sea, trumpeting questioningly. The ugly heads swayed back and forth, mouths gaping as if awaiting food. A smaller one darted forward suddenly, to dare an attack at the white one, who screamed and slashed at it with myriad teeth. Cries of fear arose from Vivacia's deck as slaves retreated from the railings and from the foredeck, to pack themselves tightly together. From the questioning tones of the cries, Wintrow surmised that few of them had any understanding of what the liveship was.

Suddenly a woman broke free of the pirate group, to race across the deck and then swarm up onto the foredeck. Wintrow had never seen anything like her. She was tall and lean, her hair cropped close. The rich fabric of her skirts and loose shirt were soaked to her body, as if she had stood watch on deck all night, yet she looked no more bedraggled than a wet tigress would. She landed with a thud before him. “Come down,” she said to him, and her eyes made it more a command than her voice did. “Come down to him now. Don't make him wait. ”

He did not answer her. Instead he spoke to the ship. “Don't fear,” he told her.

“We are not the ones who need to fear,” Vivacia replied. He had the satisfaction of seeing the woman's face go blank with astonishment. It was one thing to hear the liveship speak, another to stand close enough to see the angry glints in her eyes. She glowered scornfully at the woman on her deck. The Vivacia gave a sudden shake to her head that tossed her carved tresses back from her face. It was a womanly display, a challenge from one man's female to another. The woman brushed back from her brow the short black strands that had fallen over her forehead and returned the figurehead's stare. For an instant it shocked Wintrow that the two could look so different and yet so frighteningly alike.