Chapter 19
Carolina stirred on her bed and rolled onto her back, keeping her eyes shut tight against the moonlight pouring through her cabin’s window. Even though it felt like the middle of the night, she lay there for several moments without being able to drift back to sleep, and it wasn’t normal for her to be so restless. She was contemplating sitting up to find the pocket watch on her desk, and was just about to let out a sigh when there was the slightest creak of a floorboard in the middle of the room.
Every muscle in her body froze except for her heart, which skipped several beats as she realized why she’d so restlessly awoken. She didn’t feel alone.
Ribbon wasn’t there to alert her because the whippon was even more in love with Ophelia than she was, and she opened one eye just a crack to scan the room. But though she was indistinguishably on edge, there was no one there. So she lay there for several more seconds, body tense, watching the shadows in her room for movement. Her eyes told her nothing, but she knew what she felt. And what she heard. The barest brush of a footstep against the wood, closer to her than the first noise, and she cracked both eyes to locate her daggers in the dark. They were within arm’s reach, hung on a belt hook around the corner of the wall that made up her headboard.
She steeled herself, ready to unsheathe her weapons the instant she’d need to, and said, “Show yourself.”
The air around her stilled. The only sound in the room was her own heartbeat, but while whoever was in her cabin froze, she slowly and silently inched her hands toward the top of her blankets. And when they reached it, she acted. She flung the blanket off her as she threw her legs over the side of her bed and grabbed her weapons. It was the same moment the person in her cabin revealed themselves. The hooded figure dropped their invisibility spell as they went sprinting for the door.
“Stop!” Carolina shouted, hurling one of her daggers toward them.
It struck the doorpost with a thud, and she must’ve caught their clothing with it, because there was a loud tear as they kept running. She didn’t bother with her boots, nor with retrieving the dagger stuck in the wood as she tore after them, flying past Ophelia, who’d just opened her own cabin door to see about the commotion.
“Intruder!” Carolina yelled to her, and though she didn’t look back as she chased the intruder toward the ramp, Ophelia’s footsteps pounded after them.
The person ahead of her was supernaturally fast, and she was losing ground until Ophelia reached her side, surging a gust of wind at their backs that compelled them forward.
“Who is it?” Ophelia asked.
“I don’t know,” Carolina panted, barreling around a corner after them. “But I think they’re a Caster.”
The hooded figure glanced back at them for a moment, and then used their magic to pull a stone from a building as they ran and hurled it backward at them. They almost didn’t see it in time in the darkness because the arched buildings blocked their paths from the excess moonlight, but Ophelia caught sight of it at the last second and clumsily knocked it aside.
“Alright then,” Ophelia huffed as they burst into an open market square, and with a wave of her hand, she sent a ripple through the stones in the person’s path.
They caught their foot on one of them and fell, tumbling head over heels before slamming a fist into the stone beneath them. It shot them upward, and their momentum sent them sliding backward as they landed on their feet facing Carolina and Ophelia. They both skidded to a stop too, and though the person was only twenty feet away, it was too dark to see past their hood.
All three of them stood there, staring at each other silently except for their gasps for air.
Carolina turned the hilt of her dagger over and over in her hand while debating whether to throw it. Instead, after several more seconds, she asked, “Who are you? And what do you want? ”
More silent seconds ticked by before the person’s shoulders rose like they were taking in a breath to reply. But, before they could, there was the soft sound of beating wings as a large, brief shadow passed by overhead.
Ophelia looked upward, lighting a flame in her hand for defense as she whispered, “Nightwing.”
Still, none of them moved.
“We can talk somewhere safely,” Carolina offered, “and you can tell me what you want.”
There was no response from the intruder, and though Carolina would’ve stood there longer to give them more time to consider, there wasn’t time. Because there was hardly another flap of wings in warning before a dark figure came diving out of the sky. It was aimed right at her, and both she and Ophelia leapt apart as the nightwing crashed to the ground between them.
Carolina rolled to her feet as she searched for the intruder in the dark, and she found them right as they motioned their hands in front of them and disappeared from sight.
“Ophelia!” Carolina shouted.
But her yell drew the nightwing’s attention as it whirled around on her. And it was big. At least three feet taller than her while bent over onto all four of its taloned feet. It perked its giant ears forward as its fanged mouth opened wide, and it let out such an ear-piercing shriek in her face that the vibrations from it made her dizzy.
“Cover your ears!” Ophelia called to her, gesturing her hands outward as a large shadow formed in front of her. “It’ll give you vertigo!”
It already had, and Carolina’s vision spun as a claw came sailing through the air at her. She dodged, miscalculating the angle of her drop to the ground and landing hard on her shoulder. She also hit the side of her head, and was struggling to sit upright when a claw closed around her ankle. She made a desperate slash with her dagger and connected with some part of the nightwing’s arm as Ophelia slid behind her.
Ophelia tucked her arms under Carolina’s armpits and hauled her to her feet, dragging her aside and just out of reach of the retaliation snap of the nightwing’s jaws. The massive creature stomped toward them, and Carolina covered her ears as it opened its mouth a second time, blocking out the sound as she searched for the intruder again.
It appeared that Ophelia had summoned a nightwing of her own, and it had found their invisible intruder and pinned them to the ground. But as the real nightwing before them lifted a winged arm to strike at them again, the intruder did something to Ophelia’s creature. Their hands pierced through the nightwing’s charcoal flesh and set against either side of its glowing heart, and the moment they did, Ophelia took in a pained and labored gasp and fell to her knees as her hands clutched at her chest.
“ No! ” Carolina screamed.
She turned to throw her dagger at the intruder, but the nightwing grabbed her again by the ankle. It knocked her aim off as it pulled her off her feet, and she fell, striking her forehead so hard against the ground as the nightwing hauled her straight into the air that she lost vision for a handful of seconds.
When she regained full consciousness moments later, her eyesight was still blurry, but she was undoubtedly dangling upside-down by the ankle, several dozen feet in the air and climbing. Another shadow, absent now of a glowing heart, darted up past her vision, and she struggled to keep her eyes open as she stretched to look upward. The nightwing that had her by the leg screeched, sending her already poor vision spinning, and she was jerked in its grip as the other shadow collided with it. There was the wet squelch of tearing flesh as a hot spray of blood hit her in the face, and the grip on her ankle released.
She fell. Fast and hard as she flipped several times in the air, arms flailing to try and get some sense of herself, but she wasn’t conscious enough to even tell how far she was from hitting the ground. And when she hit, it wasn’t the stone. It was something softer, something that caught her so that she didn’t die, but it was still with enough impact from the fall that her head couldn’t take it, and the last thing she saw as the hooded figure set her gently on the ground was two tangled nightwings hitting the cobblestone with a sickening thud a few feet away.
She came back to consciousness with a jolt and her last image of Ophelia the only thing in her mind. She shot upright with a gasp and yelled into the darkness, “Ophelia!”
“Whoa, hey.” Ophelia was at her side, and gentle hands set on her shoulder and the back of her head to coax her back down. “I’m alright, Carolina. Lay down, I need to get you back to the ship.”
She let herself be guided down as she drifted helplessly back out of consciousness. Sometime later, she awoke again with a similar start, flailing herself upright and regretting it instantly by the whirling pain in her head .
Ophelia hurried to her. “Relax,” she said softly, easing Carolina down again, “we’re safe.”
Carolina laid back a second time, but her hand clutched desperately at Ophelia’s arm as her eyes flooded with tears. The gasp Ophelia had let out. The creature’s lack of a glowing heart. Its dark, lightless figure hitting the ground with a deadly crunch. She thought Ophelia was gone, and the pain of that perceived loss mixed with the splitting agony in her skull was too much to bear. She held on to Ophelia’s arm for dear life, hugging it to her chest as she squeezed her eyes shut and tried to breathe deep.
Ophelia’s other hand set against the side of her head, and a soothing warmth radiated from the touch as her thumb stroked softly above Carolina’s eyebrow. Carolina let that touch soothe the pain for almost a minute before she eased her grip on Ophelia’s arm.
“We’re on Omen?” she asked, squinting her eyes against the daylight coming through the door’s window.
“Yes,” Ophelia answered. “In the infirmary.” She gestured toward the table, where Carolina’s weapon belts were. “I brought your dagger back.”
“How long has it been?”
“It’s morning. I made sure you stayed asleep.”
She looked up at Ophelia, and then down at Ophelia’s chest before saying, “I thought you… I thought they…”
“No,” Ophelia told her, stroking her eyebrow once more and then brushing some hair out of her face before pulling her hand away. “They were strong, Carolina. They banished my energy from my nightwing and took control of it. They used it to save you.”
“I didn’t know you could do that,” she said.
“Nor did I,” Ophelia replied.
“Why would they save me?” she mumbled to herself. She finally let go of Ophelia’s other arm and held out her hand, and Ophelia helped her slowly sit up. But being upright brought that splitting pain back, and she bent forward to cradle her head in her hands.
Ophelia stood and hurried to one of the cabinets, grabbing a bottle of medicine and a dosage spoon and bringing them back over. She poured some of the medicine and fed it to her, and then set the bottle and spoon aside.
“The painkiller should set in soon,” Ophelia told her .
“You can’t heal me?” she asked, trying and failing to mask the desperation in her voice.
“I’ve done all I can,” Ophelia answered, setting an apologetic hand on her knee. “The brain is complex — healing it more so. There’s no internal bleeding, and I’ve taken care of the damage I could find, but I’m afraid you’ll have to suffer some side effects of concussion while your body heals the rest on its own.”
She hummed her acknowledgement instead of nodding, and reached up to feel that, if there had been any cut in her forehead from hitting it, Ophelia had already healed that too.
She searched what she could see of Ophelia for injuries and asked, “Were you hurt?”
Ophelia shook her head. “Having my energy displaced like that was jarring, but it caused me no harm.”
“Good,” she said, grabbing the hand Ophelia had set on her knee and giving it a gentle squeeze, but Ophelia forced a pursed-lip smile and quickly looked away. “What is it?” she asked.
“Nothing,” Ophelia said.
“Please,” she said, caressing her thumb over the back of Ophelia’s hand.
Ophelia sighed quietly before saying, “It’s just… watching you fall like that while still trying to recover my magic was… well, I haven’t felt that helpless in a long, long time.”
She wrapped her other hand around the one she was holding, so Ophelia’s hand was tucked securely between both of hers. “I felt the same when they grabbed your nightwing’s heart.”
Ophelia nodded, and didn’t pull her hand away even when Carolina met her eyes, and for a moment, Carolina almost let herself hope that Ophelia’s worry was rooted in something deep. Almost imagined that she could feel a familiar warmth in her soft gaze. But then there was a knock on the door, and Ophelia slid her hand away and stood as Berkeley and Rue came in.
“She’s awake,” Ophelia told them.
“Good,” Berkeley said, and pointed a finger at her, “you’re an asshole for killing that nightwing without me.”
Carolina let out a laugh, followed by a pained groan at the ache it put in her head. She eased her feet over the side of the cot so she could lean back and rest her head against the wall beside it.
“What the hell happened last night?” Rue asked .
“Someone was in my cabin,” she answered. “We chased them, but they got away.”
“Any idea who?” Berkeley asked.
“All I know is they’re a Caster. A strong one.”
Rue’s eyes widened. “What were they doing in your cabin?”
“I’m not sure,” she said. “I don’t think they were trying to kill me.”
“And I doubt anyone would try to rob the ship,” Berkeley added.
She hummed her agreement. “They were near my desk, but I can’t fathom what they hoped to find.”
Rue nodded toward Ophelia. “Do you think it was about her?”
“Me?” Ophelia asked, and she and Carolina looked at each other. “The only person here outside Omen crew who knows I’m a Caster is Kala.”
One of Rue’s eyebrows lifted, but Carolina said, “Not possible. Kala would never.”
“If you say so,” Rue murmured.
“But she may know something,” she said. “Or be able to find out. I need to go see her again.”
“I’ll come,” Berkeley said.
“No,” she replied. “Rue and I will go. I want you and Ophelia here guarding the ship in case they do come back.”
“Got it,” he said.
“What do you need me to do?” Ophelia asked.
“How’s your stamina?” she asked. “Could you summon another nightwing to guard the ramp in case they come back cloaked?” Ophelia nodded, so she told Berkeley and Rue, “Give us a minute. I’ll be right out.”
As soon as they were gone, Ophelia asked, “Are you sure you don’t want me with you?” And she nodded toward the manacle. “In case you’re gone too long.”
“We won’t be,” Carolina told her.
“You’re still concussed. Please be careful.”
“Worried?” she asked, trying and failing to mask a smile.
And though Ophelia tried to look stern, she couldn’t hide a tiny smile either as she said, “Not in the slightest.”
She laughed, realizing then that it didn’t cause as much pain in her head as before. She rolled her neck and then stretched it side to side to test it further. It still hurt, but in a much more bearable way. “I think the medicine is working now.” Not wanting to waste time, she stood, but stuck her hands out for balance as she wavered on her feet.
Ophelia reached out to steady her, asking, “You’re sure I can’t I convince you to rest more?”
“I can’t imagine what you mean,” she said, finally feeling steady enough to straighten up, and she gave Ophelia the most confident puff of her chest she could. “I’m peachy.” Ophelia hummed and rolled her eyes.
She strapped her belts back around her waist, and then walked out of the infirmary and to the open door of her own cabin. Her other dagger was still sticking into the wood, and she yanked it out and retrieved the torn piece of black clothing it had ripped from the intruder’s garment. There was nothing discernable about it, but she stuck it in a pocket of her trousers anyway and then closed the door behind her. She got dressed and put her boots on, tucked some coins into her pocket, and then went back out to meet the others.
As she and Rue left Berkeley and Ophelia behind and started for the ramp, Rue asked, “If you don’t think it was about Ophelia, what could it have been?”
“I really don’t know,” she answered.
“Perhaps the rebellion?” Rue suggested. “And Remigan.”
“I guess that’s possible,” she said.
“Did you see anything about them?” Rue asked, and she shook her head. “Was it a man or a woman?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “It was impossible to tell.”
Rue hummed, staring down at her feet as they walked along the comfortably shaded streets. “Are we staying here until you have answers?”
“No,” she said readily. “My priority is still breaking the curse.”
“And what if this reversal doesn’t work?”
“I don’t know,” she said again.
And that was the truth, because she’d been trying her best to avoid thinking about it. As if matters weren’t complicated enough, lately she was finding herself more conflicted than ever. She wanted the curse broken as much as she ever did. She was so desperate for it that she could cry. But then, fresh in her mind, there was the image of Ophelia falling to her knees as the intruder’s hands clasped her nightwing’s heart. She hadn’t been prepared for the sharp agony of losing Ophelia again, and as far as they knew, Ascension came with all the risks associated with it. What, then, would she do if the reversal failed? What would she do when the thing that could free her was the thing that could break her heart forever?
“Well?” Rue prompted.
She let out a deep, heavy sigh, and shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Rue looked over at her, studying her for several quiet moments. “You still love her,” she said, “don’t you?”
“More than ever,” she admitted quietly.
“More than your freedom?”
And what could she even say to that? She’d always loved her freedom more than anything. But it had been so long since she’d truly been free, and before finding Ophelia again, it had felt like the longer she went without freedom, the more she’d idolized it. The more she would’ve done anything to get it. But now…
She’d stopped in the middle of the street at the question, and as she stared down at the stone road, she murmured, “Do you have any idea what it would mean to choose one way or the other?” She finally looked up and over at Rue, her brows drawing together tightly at the mere thought of making a choice. “Can you fathom what I’ll be giving up if this doesn’t work and I have to choose?”
Rue’s mouth pursed, and she took in a deep breath as she stood there watching Carolina, until she let that breath out and shook her head. “The reversal has to work.”
“It has to,” Carolina agreed almost pleadingly.
It didn’t take them long to walk to Kala’s after that. When they reached Kala’s door, she gave it a knock and waited several seconds until it swung open.
“Carolina,” Kala said with a smile, “find your laibralt already?”
“I wish,” she said. “Can we come in?”
“Of course.” Kala opened the door wider and then closed it behind them. “Something to drink?”
“No, thank you, we’ll be quick,” Carolina told her. “Someone broke into my cabin last night. A Caster.”
Kala’s brow furrowed. “A Caster? From Trayward?”
“I assume so,” she answered. “Though it doesn’t look like you’re familiar.”
Kala frowned as she shook her head. “I’ve never heard of anyone around here being a Caster. That doesn’t make it not true, though. What did they want? ”
“I have no idea. I have few secrets, and none of them are hidden in my cabin.”
“Well, perhaps the one,” Kala said, making an indicative glance toward the manacle.
“They didn’t seem interested.”
“Interesting…” Kala folded her arms across her chest, chewing the inside of her cheek as she thought about it. “I can do some digging,” she said eventually. “If there’s something to be found, I’ll find it.”
“I know you will,” Carolina said.
“Where will you be? I’ll send a letter when I have answers.”
“How long will it take?” she asked.
“Give me a week, at most,” Kala answered.
Carolina hummed. There was no telling where she’d be in a week’s time. If- No, when the reversal spell worked, then there was nothing stopping her from coming back to Trayward and sticking around until she found all the answers she needed.
“I’ll return to you,” she told Kala. “You can tell me what you’ve found in person.” She reached into her pocket to retrieve the coins she’d put there and held them out. “For any trouble this causes.” Kala took them with a grateful nod, and Carolina reached into her other pocket to grab the strip of torn cloth. “This came off their clothing. Not sure if it’ll help.”
“It might,” Kala answered, taking that from her too.
“Be careful,” she said finally. “They’re powerful. Don’t put yourself at any unnecessary risk.”
“Alright,” Kala nodded resolutely. “I’ll see you in a week.”
Carolina nodded, clasped Kala on the shoulder, and then gestured for Rue to follow her out. They trekked back to Omen, and much to their surprise, there was a group of five people in uniform — Trayward’s version of law enforcement — gathered around the start of Omen’s ramp. It appeared that the only thing keeping them from ascending onto the ship was the fact that Berkeley, Ophelia, and her nightwing had intercepted them at the bottom.
“Get to the docklines,” Carolina told Rue as they approached the scene, and Rue nodded and separated from her side to sneak away and begin untying the docklines. As she approached the group standing around the ramp, she greeted in a falsely upbeat tone, “Officers!” She set a hand on Ophelia’s shoulder, whispering quickly into her ear, “Go to the heart.” While Ophelia dispelled her nightwing and hurried up the ramp, Carolina took her place between the ramp and the officers, glancing back to make sure Ophelia made it up and also spying Ryland looking down from quarterdeck. As she turned to the officers and asked them, “What can I do for you?”, she also gave a quick and subtle tug at her earlobe — Ryland’s sign to be ready to leave at a moment’s notice.
“They’re trying to keep us from leaving,” Berkeley told her. His fists were clenched at his side, his stance ready for a fight as if he’d been arguing with the officers for some time before she arrived.
Carolina’s brow furrowed. Did this have anything to do with the intruder? “On whose authority?”
“The governor’s,” the leader of the group answered.
“I see,” she said. “And why is she keeping us settled?”
“There’s an issue with your ship.”
Alright, that caught her off-guard, and her mouth fell open for a moment as her curiosity reached the tip of her tongue, but she kept her composure.
“You’ll have to be more specific,” she told them.
“She specifically said not to be specific,” he answered, “but kindly asks for your patience until the matter can be resolved.”
“And I told him,” Berkeley spat, “that if they insist on detaining us, he can resolve to have my boot up his ass.”
The officer’s jaw worked side to side, but whatever retaliation he had, he kept it to himself as Rue rejoined them, nodding at Carolina to let her know they were untied.
“Does the governor have any information regarding an intruder on my ship last night?” Carolina asked. The man stared at her, straight-faced. “Does she perhaps have the intruder in custody? Or admit to being so herself.” Whether he could or not, he refused to respond to those questions in any way. “Well then, you see, I’m afraid I’m going to have to deny recognition of any authority the governor claims over my crew or my ship, and I heartily encourage you to step back so we can be on our way.”
“I can’t do that,” the man said, setting his hand on the hilt of the sword at his belt.
“And I assure you,” she told him, making a deliberate look at his sword, “you don’t want to do that.”
Several long moments of tense stillness passed before Carolina decided to make the first move. As she shouted, “GO!” loud enough to be heard from the quarterdeck, she swung her fist straight upward, catching the officer under the chin with such a solid uppercut that it knocked him square off his feet. Berkeley kicked forward with the whole of his foot, striking a second officer and throwing him backward into a third. Rue charged with her shoulder, colliding into the torso of the fourth officer and sending him crashing into the fifth the same way.
It gave them a few seconds to retreat onto the ramp as Ophelia worked her magic at the heart, and already Omen was a couple feet off the ground. Only one of the officers recovered quickly enough to jump onto the ramp before it got too high to reach, but the sole of Carolina’s boot instantly met with his chest, throwing him back to the ground below as Omen ascended out of reach.
They all sprinted onto the ship, and Carolina leaned her head over the bulwark as Rue and Berkeley pulled up the ramp. Ophelia returned to main deck and reached her side as they finished, and all three of them leaned over too.
“There is something seriously strange going on here,” Berkeley said.
Carolina grunted her agreement as she set her elbows on the railing, staring thoughtfully down at the shrinking figures.
“Is it safe for Kala to be looking into this?” Ophelia asked.
“She knows what she’s doing,” Carolina told her.
Berkeley chuckled and added, “Whoever’s hiding anything they don’t want us to know should be scared of her, if you ask me.”
“She’ll get answers,” Carolina agreed, “and we’ll be back to see this through as soon as I’m free of this manacle.” She left all three of them and paced to quarterdeck, where Ryland and Queenie were waiting for her. “Set course for two-hundred and eighty-five degrees. We’re looking for a group of nomads.”
“Got it, Captain,” Ryland said.
She nodded, turning as they headed away from Trayward. She would get her answers from Kala, but first things first: freedom.