27. Black Sails | Wilder
The day began just like any other.
The sun rose in the east, and a light rain shower followed shortly after. It kept the temperature mild despite the calendar’s fast approach to summer.
After the skies had cleared, Wilder, Ridge, and Otto found themselves on the rocky shore near the cottage.
It appeared his friends had worked out some kind of rotation among themselves, ensuring that he was never to be alone with his thoughts.
Thoughts that circled her like a whirlpool, sucking him beneath its depths with each passing moment.
He didn’t try to fight it.
The ocean hurled wave after wave at them, water bubbling and racing up the shore, still reaching for him, but coming up empty.
“We could go fishing?” Ridge suggested, tossing a sizable rock into the water.
It plunged into the depths, casting ripples that were almost immediately erased by the next swelling wave. His dark skin had become richly bronzed in the hours they had spent on shore already, the tree bark swirls standing out in an intense way.
Otto sighed and tilted his face up to the sun. A flush of red glowed on his moon-white skin.
“We did that yesterday.”
Ridge plucked a flat rock off the beach and wiped the sand away with his thumb before whipping it across the surface.
It bounced perfectly five times before succumbing to the water.
“I don’t see you coming up with any bright ideas,” he grumbled.
“Because I’m content to just sit here. You should try it,” Otto replied, concealing a smirk. “Or are you afraid there’s nothing in your mind outside of Maelys to think about?”
Wilder slid his attention from the horizon to Ridge just in time to see red creep up his neck before he bent down to pick up another rock.
“Very funny,” he grumbled. “Like you haven’t been eyeing the witch.”
A frown tugged Wilder’s brows together. He hadn’t noticed anything of the sort, but he hadn’t been paying attention to anything outside his own problems in quite some time.
Otto sat up. “That is ridiculous. We’re in the middle of planning a coup. I have no thoughts outside of that.”
A coup.
Calling it that was laughable.
Their only plan had been to strike when the iron was hot, when Otto and Jordania had agreed would be the most ideal for success.
As the Wilds slowly descended into chaos, it would be ripe for the taking, with Wilder swooping in and challenging his father.
But waiting was the worst part.
It was unbearable to listen to his home devour itself like an Ouroboros while he did nothing but lounge by the sea, train with his sword, and miss her.
“Is there anything we can do now?” Wilder asked. “I feel useless just sitting here and waiting.”
Otto grimaced and shook his head.
“We can’t move before it’s time. Then you’ll never be able to help her.”
Wilder exhaled and tilted his head towards the sky. He had already asked that question no less than a hundred times.
Otto and Jordania had given him the same answer.
Wait.
“We should bump our training up to three times a day,” Wilder announced. “With war on the horizon, we could stand to be more prepared.”
Otto’s grin vanished.
Wilder sat up and focused intently on him. His stomach tightened at the dread on Otto’s face.
“What is it?” His voice came out more brusquely than he intended.
The small pebbles beneath Otto’s hands shifted as he clenched his hands into fists before releasing the stones to point at something in the ocean.
There was something happening.
Wilder raked his gaze across the horizon and froze.
A ship.
A human ship had crested the horizon.
The billowing, black sails cast an ominous chill in the air.
“What are humans doing this far north?” Ridge asked, stepping closer to the surf and resting his hands on his hips. “This is enemy territory for them.”
Wilder rose from the beach and stood beside him as the view of the ship lured him in.
It was far away, but still close enough that Wilder could make out the dozen cannon ports along its hull. The steel caught the light and flared.
“They’re heavily armed,” Ridge murmured.
Wilder let loose his magic.
The ship’s sail caught the wind and sped away, disappearing over the horizon once more.
“What do you think that was about?” Wilder asked, turning to look at Otto.
He had remained seated, but he was miles and miles away.
Otto’s eyes swirled like liquid smoke. “We need to send a guard …” Otto’s voice was distant and hollow. “A message on the tree.”
Ridge squatted down beside Otto and gripped the top of his shoulder. “Which tree?”
“A hawthorn.”
Oron had drawn the short stick.
Armed with a broadsword, he crept through the Valewood in search of a hawthorn tree with a message.
Otto hadn’t been able to give any more information. And whatever he had seen or had gone through to be able to see had depleted his energy.
He sat in the plush armchair by the back window, a steaming cup of tea in one hand, his head in the other.
Jordania sat across from him. Something was gripped in her fist, and by the sounds of it, Wilder assumed they were stones.
They clacked and clicked together as she moved her hand in small circles.
“And that was all you saw?” she asked in a low voice.
Otto grumbled something too quiet for Wilder to make out from the kitchen.
Jordania leaned forwards, her chestnut hair falling in waves over her shoulder as the stones tumbled from her fist and onto the low-lying table.
Wilder didn’t catch a glimpse of them before she had scooped them up again.
“They must have stayed outside the ward. I wasn’t alerted,” she frowned.
Maelys breezed in through the front door. Her golden-brown hair plaited back, and a flush of pink on her freckled nose.
She hoisted a basket of greens onto the table. Dirt rained down from the freshly picked vegetables, and she wiped her hands off on her sage-green tunic.
“That garden is in need of a reaping,” she muttered more to herself than to anyone.
Before Wilder could question if Ridge could attend to it, he stumbled in through the front door. His eyes were bright, and his shirt was disheveled.
“Was there much sowing?” Wilder asked, a hint of mischief quirked his lip up in the corner.
The tips of Maelys ears turned bright red before she turned around and began unloading the basket into the small wash basin.
“What’s going on?” Ridge asked.
Wilder was about to make another jest at their expense before he caught Ridge’s line of sight to see Jordania stand abruptly, her face ashen.
“He’s back,” she said. “Oron’s back.”
There was something about the gold in her eyes that led Wilder to believe she was seeing more than they were. But it was the grimace on her lips that made his stomach drop.
He couldn’t bear the weight of someone else getting hurt—at his expense.
Wilder tore out of the cottage, heading towards the road that led into the Valewood just as Oron appeared on the tree line. His legs moved so swiftly it was as if his magic carried him on the wind.
Oron appeared uninjured, his gait strong, and shoulders leveled.
He was far enough away that Wilder couldn’t make out his expression clearly, but from here it appeared there was a grim set to his mouth, and his fist clenched tattered parchment.
Their paths converged halfway between the cottage and the forest.
Ridge and Maelys appeared right behind Wilder, their breaths still calm despite the speed at which they had run to keep up with him.
Oron held out the parchment.
It was thick and finely crafted, despite the shredding around the edges. It smelled strange, though, not like the forest he had plucked it from or like the hawthorn it had been nailed to.
It smelled of smoke and mud.
Wilder unrolled it. His eyes scanned the scrawling script and then widened.
“Well?” Maelys asked, bouncing on her heels.
“It’s from the humans,” Wilder said, still reading the missive.
Ridge leaned closer. “What do they want?”
Wilder’s eyes slid closed as he let the parchment fall to the trodden grass.
“It appears Maelor had not been bluffing.” He swallowed, his eyes sliding shut. “They want Lyra.”