Final Fieretsi: Part I of the Fabula Fereganae Cycle

  Chapter XVI: Spirit of the Sea

  “Let’s run over the plan one more time.”

  Stefi paced back and forth, wearing a track in the sparse grass as the sun finally began to set. With only a little daylight left, and the streets nearly deserted, it was time to “acquire”.

  “Cédes, are you focused enough to veil us all now?”

  Cédes nodded. “We shall be able to see each other, but others may not see us.”

  “Then how do we know it’s working for sure?” Stefi pressed.

  Cédes shrugged. “We do not.”

  “Let’s just assume it works, okay?” Stefi said nervously. “I’m not in the mood for something to go wrong again. Once we get to the boat, then what?”

  Ifaut shot up her hand and waved it above her head like a child in class who desperately knows the answer. “Then it’s me and do-” she broke off and checked herself, “Rhaka’s time to shine! We make sure it’s all clear.” Her excited grin revealed her fang-like canines.

  Stefi nodded. “Very good. And if it isn’t?”

  She slowly lowered her hand, and when it reached the ground she said simply, “Splash!”

  Stefi turned to Sansonis. “And once we’re in the clear?”

  “I cut the mooring line and the wind takes us out to sea. Then I take over and, to use an expression, it’s smooth sailing from there. At least I hope so.”

  “Good. Everyone knows their place,” Stefi said, still pacing restlessly and feeling like a general before a great battle. Only, she thought, generals probably don’t feel like passing out.

  A moment later Cédes announced they were now hidden from outside eyes, provided her concentration didn’t waver or her already tensed nerves weren’t stretched any further.

  Stefi took her arm. “Remember, I’ve got you. And this time we stay together, no matter what. We all stay together.”

  “You mean like this?” Ifaut asked as she draped herself across Sansonis’s back.

  “Not quite…” Stefi said as Sansonis shrugged her off. “Just don’t wander off. Hold his hand or something, okay?”

  “Still good enough for me!” she squeaked and did just that.

  Sansonis sighed. Everyone else was in such high spirits. But there was still a lot of ground between them and the boat, assuming they could even take such a thing. No, he’d save his elation for when Valraines was left far behind. And if the boat did what it was told.

  Their second journey into Valraines was as uneventful as the first had been chaotic. And despite Cédes’s concerns, no one was even aware that the Fieretka, a group of now wanted criminals and a supposed Furosan terrorist, had wandered back into their midst. It seemed almost too easy.

  When they reached the waterfront and the wharf to which the boat was moored, Stefi stopped, causing Cédes to walk right into her.

  “Is something the matter?” Cédes asked.

  For a moment Stefi could barely move. Her heart pounded in her chest and her breathing grew shallow as she tried to make sense of what she saw. “Do… do you see what’s written on the boat?”

  Ifaut looked up and squinted thoughtfully, furrowing her brow at the faded letters painted on the bow. Next to them was a roughly painted star-shaped white flower. “Sh…i…p?” she spelled out, carefully dropping each distinct sound while pretending for a moment she remembered how to read human writing. “Wait, that last letter’s a ‘t’ sound, yeah?”

  “No,” Stefi said. “It says ‘Valtela’. My last name.”

  “That’s a good omen then, isn’t it?” Sansonis said. “Like we were meant to take this?”

  Stefi shrugged. “I don’t know,” she said warily. “I can’t help but feel weird about it.” She shuddered. Her last name wasn’t common by any means, and as far as she knew, only her family in Sumarana and a few relatives in Bandārun bore it. Somehow it seemed wrong to steal a boat with her last name on it, almost like stealing from family. But they had come too far to back down now because of a name.

  “Everyone ready?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Cédes said. “However, due to my heightened emotional state, and yours, I believe we are now visible. I am sorry.”

  Stefi gasped. “Okay, change of plan. Run!”

  The Fieretka sprinted along the small wharf as its boards creaked beneath their feet and the surf lapped close in the receding high tide.

  Ifaut was the first on, and she hurriedly ushered everyone else on board until only Sansonis remained behind. He unsheathed a knife and used it to saw through the two mooring lines. The Valtela, free from its shackles, eased out to sea like an escaped animal testing the waters of freedom.

  “Hurry up!” Ifaut yelled, her voice shaking in panic as Sansonis scrambled up the boarding plank. She caught his hand and hauled him aboard. The two collapsed in an ungainly heap on the deck, their faces close together.

  Ifaut giggled. “What brought this on all of a sudden?”

  “Clumsiness,” Sansonis said in a way that was almost cold. He climbed to his feet and helped Ifaut up.

  Before she could dwell on his reaction, Stefi interrupted. “Ifaut, Rhaka, make sure we’re alone here. We’re not out of the woods yet.”

  “Actually, we have been for some time,” Cédes said earnestly. “Oh, perhaps it is sarcasm? Or a human expression where the woods are a metaphor for danger?”

  “Right the second time.”

  “Why are the woods used to represent danger? I find them to be rather safe compared to your towns.”

  A thought suddenly came to Stefi, the reason why the expression may have come about. The woods, or Sumarana forest, contained Furosans, thought by humans to be dangerous. She didn’t have the heart to point it out to Cédes.

  She didn’t have to answer, for a series of crashes and the sound of Ifaut swearing rose up from below deck, muffled by the timbers. Ifaut emerged a moment later, dragging a bundle up the steps by the scruff of its neck. She tossed it contemptuously at Stefi’s feet and gave it a swift kick. It moaned.

  “Look what I found,” she said and hauled it to its feet again. “A plaything! Perhaps a chew-toy for Rhaka and the ferrets?”

  Stefi gasped as she saw its familiar face. It refused to look at hers, keeping its eyes downcast the whole time as if the sight of Stefi frightened it. It was Elian.

  The look of open-mouthed surprise on Stefi’s faced melted away and was replaced by a twisted smile; the corners of her lips rose ever so slightly, contorting themselves into something between a grin and a grimace. “Well, well, well, what have we here?” she taunted as the memory of Cédes’s pain came to the front of her mind. The sight of Elian, beaten and helpless, provoked a perverse pleasure she had never felt before. But, strangely, this new feeling didn’t disturb her. In fact, she almost relished it. Perhaps this was how Sansonis felt when the darkness seized him.

  Elian said nothing.

  “This is your boat?”

  He nodded weakly.

  She laughed. “How very poetic! It looks like the world has a way of working things out.”

  “I’ll… kill you…” Elian muttered so quietly Stefi couldn’t hear the words.

  Ifaut, however, did. She shook him as easily as if she were a dog worrying a bone. “What was that? I don’t think Stefi heard you. Speak up!” She shook him some more.

  “I’ll kill you, I’ll kill you all!” he screamed and strained at Ifaut’s grasp.

  Stefi tutted and shook her head disapprovingly like a parent witnessing a child’s misdeeds. “You are in no position to make threats,” she said. “We are.” She slapped him across the face. “Now, apologize to Lady Cédes.”

  “For what?” Elian spat. “For being a dirty Furosan?”

  She slapped him again. Harder.

  “Because of your betrayal Cédes had to resort to destruction to save us. And it’s not just her you should apologize to. Look around.”

  Elian lifted his head. His gaze brushed over the other Fieretka, never making eye contact. Ov
er everyone, that is, except Ifaut, who still held him by the scruff of the neck. “Apologize? To a bunch of misfits and heathens like you lot? You all deserve to be damned by Kardin.”

  Now it was Ifaut’s turn to face him. She hurled him to the deck and towered above his prostrate form, her hands planted on her hips, her tail bristling. “There’s that damn name again! What is it with you humans and your precious Kardin, anyway? How about thinking for yourselves and not thinking something just because a stupid book tells you to?”

  Elian said nothing, and Ifaut produced a pouch from her pocket. It bulged with coins and jingled as she shook it.

  “Hey!” Elian protested. “That’s mine!” He moved as if to stand but Ifaut planted her foot on his chest and forced him back.

  “The reward you got for reporting us, eh?” she asked and dangled it teasingly like a finger before a biting ferret.

  “Worth every last coin,” he said with a dark smile.

  Ifaut tossed the heavy pouch to Stefi. She caught it and pocketed it herself.

  “I got Sansonis’s revenge out of you below deck. Stefi’s received adequate compensation. All that’s left is an apology for Cédes. And Rhaka to eat his fill.”

  At the mention of Rhaka, Elian’s eyes widened in alarm as his tough, angry façade crumbled. “You wouldn’t!”

  “Oh, wouldn’t I? If Stefi wills it, it’s as good as done.”

  Elian turned his pleading eyes to Stefi. “Don’t let the dog eat me! Please!” he begged, shaking all the while.

  “I won’t, as long as you apologize to Cédes,” Stefi said levelly with just a hint of a threat.

  Elian’s expression switched back to one of disgust as readily as the wind may change direction when the weather is feeling fickle. His hatred for the Furosans, it seemed, overrode even his fear of Rhaka. “Never. I’d rather die!” he shouted and spat at Ifaut.

  Stefi sighed. “Ifaut,” she said simply, “splash.”

  Hearing her favorite sound, Ifaut grinned and hauled Elian to his feet. She dragged him to the low railing that surrounded the deck of the Valtela and held him there. Stefi approached and looked into his eyes, hers displaying a genuine pity for the hatred in his heart. Her own hatred towards him was beginning to wane, but like his it would always be there. It was the last traces of this that made up her mind. That, and his refusal to apologize to Cédes.

  “Goodbye.” She nodded at Ifaut.

  The Furosan took a step back, withdrew her right foot, and with a swift kick to Elian’s backside sent him, screaming, headlong into the waves below. He hit the water with a satisfying splash.

  Speaking for the first time since Elian had been dragged up, Cédes asked, “Do you think he is able to swim?”

  As the withdrawing tide dragged the Valtela out to sea, Stefi glanced over the side and saw a small brown object bobbing in the water. It made slow and labored progress against the same pull. “Unfortunately, yes.”

  Cédes gasped. “Despite what he has done, you cannot truly mean that!”

  Stefi’s patience, already wearing thin, finally gave out. “And why can’t I? Didn’t he sell us out for a few lousy coins?” She clenched her fists in anger.

  Cédes leapt back as if stung. “Surely you, of all people, cannot wish someone dead.”

  It was then that Stefi’s emotions finally boiled over. “Of course I can!” she shouted so loudly that Cédes fell backwards over her own feet and hit the deck with a thud. “I can talk to ferrets. So what? I’m supposed to save the world from who-knows-what. Who cares? Because of your whole ferret religion you may have seen me as some perfect person who can talk with your god or whatever, but deep down I can still hate people. I’m just like any other human. Hell, even Furosan. I have darkness in my heart, all right? I’m flawed just like everyone else here. I make mistakes. But at least I’ve never actually killed anyone, like you!”

  She tossed her staff to the deck and stormed off towards the bow, where she sat with her head hidden in her hands, partly to hide her shame at her behavior, partly to hide her anger.

  It was all Cédes could do to keep back her tears and struggle weakly to her feet, leaning on her own staff for balance. Ifaut hurried up to help, but Cédes shrugged her off and turned away. “I hurt everyone,” she muttered. “Everyone I get close to, I hurt.”

  Ifaut stepped around in front of her and seized her shoulders. “That’s not true!” she said. “I think Stefi might feel like you expect too much from her, that’s all. I just have to worry about looking after Sansonis. Stefi has the whole world to worry about. Just give her some space, m’kay?”

  “B-but,” Cédes stammered, “the Fieretsi is meant to be pure of heart. Hatred only creates more hatred. And if Stefi has darkness in her heart-”

  “So does Sansonis. And you know what? He’s the most caringest guy I know. It’s just a part of everyone.” She looked up to see that her kamae had already raised the sails and was at the stern steering the boat as the wind hurried it along. Yes, he had a lot of darkness within him. Also goodness, a kindness she felt so drawn in by. The same had to be true with Stefi.

  “Anyway,” Ifaut continued, “too much good can be bad, can’t it?”

  “I suppose so,” Cédes said.

  “Just look at chocolate,” Ifaut said and grew excited at her own mention of the word. “It’s really, really good. But too much makes me say silly things. In that case, too much good is bad. Now, Stefi is much the same. Sweet, slightly bitter, warm, comforting, silky texture…” she trailed off and, her eyes glazing over in pleasure, salivated at the memory of the delicious beverage.

  “I see what you are saying, Miss Ifaut,” Cédes said. “That was a very deep analogy, coming from you. Thank you. Like chocolate, too much good is bad. If Stefi were too good, that in itself would be bad.”

  Ifaut snapped out of her trance. “Chocolate? Where?” she asked expectantly.

  “In all of our hearts. Now, I must make amends with Stefi once she has had some time alone.” She gripped her staff and used it to guide her way across the unfamiliar deck, leaving Ifaut standing alone.

  “So, no chocolate then?”

  Though the sun had set, the two moons had risen, providing just enough light to navigate by. Off the starboard side of the Valtela the rocky coastline loomed from the sea, the luminous foam of the waves marking where it touched the water. The stars had begun to wink into existence in the heavens, and Sansonis wondered if it was possible to steer a boat, like one’s life, by them. He thought of asking Rhaka, but the Otsukuné had fallen asleep.

  Sansonis continued steering the Valtela on its course while Ifaut dozed nearby on a bedroll she’d found in storage. The ferrets, too fearful to show themselves after earlier, remained sleeping in Stefi’s pack.

  Stefi remained where she’d gone earlier, so wrapped up in her own thoughts that at first she didn’t notice Cédes sitting beside her with the slightest rustle of clothing. The two sat in silence for a long time, no words needing to be said between them. Finally, they both spoke.

  “I-” they began simultaneously, interrupting each other. Cédes, quite flustered, insisted that Stefi speak first. She did.

  “I’m sorry for what I said earlier,” Stefi said softly. “What I said I said in anger. I didn’t really mean it.”

  “I know,” Cédes said. “Still, your words cut deep in a wound that still has not begun to heal.”

  Stefi said nothing but took Cédes’s hand. She held it gently and rested her head on Cédes’s shoulder. “Can you forgive me?” she said after a long silence.

  “Of course,” the Furosan said. “On the condition that you forgive me also. I perhaps thought too much of you, but Ifaut helped me realize that no one is perfect. Not even you.”

  “I forgive you, Cédes.”

  “And I you.”

  “From now on,” Stefi said, “we try to know each other a little better.”

  “Is that an order?”

  “No. A request as a friend.”
>
  “I would very much like that,” Cédes said. She wrapped her free hand about her friend’s waist.

  A warm, familiar feeling seemed to well up from within Stefi, like she’d felt this before. Then she remembered. Her mother once held her in the same way when she was younger.

  That night she fell asleep in Cédes’s warm embrace, comfortable and once more at peace.

  While everyone else was still sleeping, Ifaut awoke with the sun’s early light on her face. She stumbled from the bedroll and struggled for a minute to find her feet upon the shifting deck. She looked about and saw Stefi and Cédes sleeping against each other at the front of the boat, but nearby at the rear, where the wheel sat, Sansonis slept also. The boat’s wheel, free from guiding hands, turned rhythmically back and forth.

  Ifaut glanced about her and was at once struck by the cerulean monotony that surrounded them. Countless miles of the sea’s ever-shifting plain stretched in all directions; not the slightest bit of land marred its mirror-like surface. No birds flew across the sky or broke the silence with their cries. Even the division between sea and sky blurred until the whole world seemed to be one blue and green plane without beginning or end. Her heart lurched in her chest and she dropped to the deck, trying to find a handhold in the cracks of the timbers lest she fall in and drift away. Blood pumped audibly in her ears as her heart, fueled by fear, raced uncontrollably. So much water. So open. Nowhere to hide. Scary.

  She dragged herself along on her stomach to Sansonis and, refusing to look up, shook him awake. “Hey!” she hissed through her clenched jaw that felt like it was glued shut. “You get us back to land at once! Quick! Quick!”

  Sansonis moaned as he sat up and looked around, first at Ifaut and then around them. “Oh,” he said simply. “That’s not good, is it?” He looked up at the sail hanging limp and dead from the mast, starved of wind.

  “Not good? It’s terrible! What if this thing sinks? I can’t swim! Get me out of here!” Her voice rose shrilly with each sentence until it was loud enough to wake the others.

  One quick look around was enough to convince Stefi that they were in trouble. “How could you fall asleep and let us drift like this?” she said, panic rising in her voice. “We don’t even know where we are, how close land is…” She began to breathe heavily.

  “Do not panic,” Cédes said. She found Stefi’s shoulders and began to knead the tension from them with firm hands. “Is there no way to propel this vessel, other than wind?” she asked Sansonis.

  “No,” he said with a sigh. “We have to wait for the wind to start up again. But who knows when that’ll be, or if it’ll take us closer to or further away from land?”

  They stood in silence for a minute until a sudden thought hit Sansonis. “Cédes, you have the fire elemental, correct?”

  “Why, yes,” she said and gave him a look as if he were mad.

  “Does that mean there’s one for the other elements, like wind perhaps?”

  “Of course. There exists also Earth, Water and Lightning, while Light and Dark are theorized to exist. Unfortunately, I am unable to call upon them. Even with their stones it would be futile. I am only able to speak with Raphanos because I am from Mafouras.”

  “Okay, but could Stefi, with her talking to Furosa gift if she were to be focused enough?”

  Cédes gave a small gasp. “Of course! It is certainly worth a try.”

  All eyes turned expectantly to Stefi. She stiffened. “I’ll try, but I can’t make any promises, you know.”

  “That is good enough,” Cédes said. She removed a familiar bandanna from her back pocket and handed it to Stefi.

  “Just like last time. You need to block out the visual distractions and listen once more to the voice of the world. I know the last time we attempted this it was unpleasant for you, but I am afraid we have few alternatives.”

  “So… no pressure,” Stefi said with a bitter smile. “You guys wait here. I need to be alone for a while.”

  “No,” Cédes said. “You need someone there in case…” she trailed off.

  “I’ll be okay this time. I have to be.” She placed a drowsy ferret on either shoulder. “You two,” she said quietly, “I need your help to try and call the wind, or at least try to ask Feregana for help. It’ll be tough. Can you help me listen and ask?”

  Certainly, Gemmie said. Just please don’t leave us again.

  “I won’t. Help me tune out the bad stuff and ask for help. And if anything happens, bite me so I snap out of it.”

  That’s my job, Maya said eagerly. I have the sharpest teeth!

  “That’s not exactly reassuring,” Stefi said as she blindfolded herself with Cédes’s bandana. Immediately her sense of hearing sharpened and the sound of the gentle waves lapping the Valtela reached her ears, steadily growing in volume. The waves’ hushed voices ran through her head and began to lap at the shores of her consciousness, and before long she felt her mind swept away and into the sea of murmuring voices that encircled Feregana.

  Still with us? Maya asked. Stefi felt his teeth caress her earlobe.

  Yes, she said, and realized that now she was talking like the ferrets were, without real words. All about her she felt the gentle waves of every ferret and Furosan’s life energy, humming gently with thoughts, waves of warm and soft light.

  Then, before her eyes, brilliant colors seemed to bloom from the blackness, giving wondrous, shifting forms to the bubbling of voices and life around her. What appeared to be threads of color weaved themselves about her and amongst each other, dancing and laughing. One flew right before her eyes and she caught a flash of a familiar lop-sided grin.

  Ifaut! she said. I just saw Ifaut’s life force fly past! She tried to follow it but it had vanished.

  As she watched in amazement, absorbing passing thoughts, she heard Gemmie and Maya speaking privately.

  I… I just saw her! Gemmie said, her voice trembling with excitement. Kil-

  Impossible, Maya shot back. Not only is the fool dead, she must have crossed the Bridge long ago. I told that idiot not to wait for me.

  She loved you. Maybe she did wait, Gemmie said. She had to die in Farān, it was her destiny as the last one to fall in defense of home and save us. She died for you. She’d wait. I know.

  Shut up. Just shut up.

  And who’s this? Stefi asked casually despite the fact she was brimming with curiosity.

  The ferrets slammed shut their minds, resisting all efforts from Stefi to get them to speak.

  Fine. At least help me look for the wind, okay?

  She focused her mind, now beginning to make sense of the strange thoughts and murmurs that streaked past her like meteors. That one that just flashed past was a pale young Furosan man who bore a passing resemblance to Cédes. And that one was a small ferret out for a walk. She felt its quivering excitement and nervousness as it whizzed past, and her spirits soared with it on the wings of curiosity and innocence.

  Suddenly she felt another presence lumbering straight towards her, not zipping by like the others. She caught a glimpse of a mountainous, shapeless form that radiated a cool confidence and knew, somehow, that it must be what she was looking for.

  I’ve got it! she said. How do we get its attention?

  Focus, Gemmie said.

  How do you know-

  I just do. I’m a ferret, remember?

  Stefi obeyed and focused her thoughts on the imposing presence, and right away she felt a chilling sensation spreading across her like someone had just poured icy water over her. The next moment an odd sound entered her head, like someone singing in another language, one without words; the haunting, eerie notes made her feel even colder, and for a moment she feared that she might once again be forced to face her darkest secret.

  To her relief, and surprise, she felt herself being jerked like a stubborn dog on the end of a leash. Then nothing.