Chapter Nineteen Kit #2
In my head I trace the watery journey to the Hidden Lands. We will travel without the aid of the calm enchantment. Sailing one yole there safely seems risky—two seems impossible.
At the harbor’s edge Byrne steps away from the yole and King Hugh. He calls orders to another, larger ship—one that’s being unloaded by various men.
“What are all those trunks?” I ask.
“Your father apparently brought Catharine’s dowry with him,” Abram says, sounding embarrassed. “I think he was hoping to avoid any further scandal by playing it off that she’d come here to get married.”
I’m no longer surprised by the lengths—delusional though they might be—Byrne will go to in his attempts to secure what he wants.
His daughters have run away, and of course he turns this into an opportunity to force the marriage he needs.
I straighten my shoulders. “Hide me in one of those. We’ll go on one boat. ”
Abram nods and starts forward, catching the attention of the two sailors as they set the trunk down.
He speaks to them quickly, and they open it.
Abram waves me over. I check that Byrne and King Hugh are distracted, then dart to Abram’s side.
The trunk is filled with various silks and fabrics, but the lid has a generous arch to it.
When I step in, the fabrics sink low enough that it can be closed over me without much effort.
I’m grateful for my own body and its small size.
Catharine would not have been able to squeeze into this trunk without holding her knees to her front for the entire journey.
I curl to find a comfortable position. Then I am being lifted.
Holding my breath, I listen as the sailors carry me toward the kings.
“Hold on, what are you doing?” comes the voice of Byrne.
King Hugh’s voice follows, “Abram, we need to keep the yole light.”
“We’re going to the Hidden Lands,” Abram says, “and we’re trying to enter without Idris’s aid, assuming he beats us there.
We might need gifts, and it would take an extra hour to get anything from the manor.
” A pause. “I’m sure King Byrne would not mind if we use some of the dowry that will soon belong to both families to secure our means to save the bridegroom. ”
“Of course,” Byrne says, with only a flicker of doubt in his voice.
The servants place my chest in the hull.
I exhale into the pile of silks. Abram manages to open the lid just a crack, enough to give me some fresh air and a tiny glimmer of light from their lanterns.
The sliver of view rests right at my eye level so I can follow their progress without moving more than my gaze.
True stations himself in front of the opening like a guard on watch.
King Hugh dismisses the sailors.
“Don’t you need the hands?” Byrne asks.
“I won’t risk my men,” King Hugh replies. “It’s enough to take Abram. And I have to emphasize, again, that there’s no need for you to put yourself in danger by coming with us.”
“Nonsense,” Byrne says. “Your family’s troubles are mine.”
I frown. Byrne must be more desperate for the marriage—and the connections it would bring—than I thought.
But though he doesn’t know it, Byrne isn’t wrong that this involves his family as well—Mother has promised his babe to the Hidden Folk, after all.
Another curse I will have to untangle. If he knew his own family’s connection with these magic folk, would Byrne so readily venture into their midst?
I find it difficult to believe he would involve himself were he not certain that he could skirt any real risk while still benefiting from the outcome.
The yole glides so smoothly from its mooring, I don’t realize we’ve begun to move until we pass the breakwater into the ocean.
With a jerk and lurch, the waves rock the boat in long rises and swift falls.
The sea is far rougher than during the enchanted journey with Idris, and rougher even than it had been when Catharine and I made our crossing.
I swallow, waiting for the nausea to rise up my throat.
But I am in my own body, and my own body is apparently seaworthy.
I cannot tell the passage of time from within the trunk.
Bursts of rain and ice occasionally splatter the wooden slats of my chest, but I am protected from the elements.
True remains steadfast in front of me. I listen to Abram and King Hugh calling instructions to each other.
They’re both clearly familiar with the water and the yole.
These men seem born to ride the seas. Idris’s expert maneuvering under enchantment might have had less to do with magic than I suspected.
I hope he hasn’t done something foolish.
My mind circles to the cliffside and his words. I am mesmerized by you.
A vivid warmth tingles through me. I brace, waiting for the panic or anxiety that often follows. But the fizzy feeling in my gut stays … pleasant.
He was right that this body has held delight. Maybe not as much as it—as I—deserve. But there’s still time. I want more. More delight, more joy, more everything.
Catharine accepted me with all my complications. Can I trust Idris to do the same?
After lying in the same position for so long, the shoulder bearing my weight aches.
Carefully, I begin to dig my arm between layers of fabric, trying to find a way to adjust it enough to ease the pressure.
The journey seems to be taking longer than it did when the enchantment spirited Idris along.
My fingers brush embroidered cloth and thick wool, seeking gaps between folds to bury my arm deeper.
A shout rises from the deck. Abram. The wind shifts, carrying his words—along with tiny pellets of ice—to me.
“—cliff, just there! It’s still open!”
I wonder if, without Idris to speak the words that will let us enter and leave, we will be able to depart come dawn.
The spell or password or whatever it is that opens the way has already been uttered, and there was no one to add his lady, or his hound, or his brother, or his father.
Or Byrne’s name, I suppose, if someone wanted him to leave again.
Abram calls directions from the bow, and the yole weaves left and right.
Round the rocks, I imagine. I try not to think of the razor edges slicing through the water.
Idris was guided by magic, in gentler weather and on a smooth tide.
I close my eyes and move my free hand into my bag.
The velvety fur has a comforting warmth to it. I hold on, praying for safe passage.
Outside, the roar of waves suddenly cuts off. I look through the crack into absolute darkness. We have entered the cave. True’s tail thumps against the side of the wooden chest.
Thank you, I think as a follow-up for my prayer.
“We’re here,” Abram says.
My view lightens, barely, but I can see the shadows of the men as they disembark, which is more than I could make out before.
I wait until I hear three pairs of boots splash in the water, and then I carefully lift the lid of the trunk.
The men are beyond my sight here. I tilt it back until it rests, fully open, and climb out quietly.
True squints his brown eyes at me in a doggy smile, his tail wagging double-time.
“Good boy,” I whisper.
My hand is still resting on my bag, and I move the flap to check the skin. The starlight makes the delicate, silvery fur shimmer gently.
“Idris!”
King Hugh’s voice jerks me back to the present.
Quickly, I close my bag and go to the other side of the yole, True against my leg.
Idris is collapsed in the sand at one end of the cove, nearly hidden against the rocky wall.
There is no sign of his yole. My chest tightens, and I clamber over the gunwale into the shallow water.
King Hugh drops down beside Idris and turns him over, Byrne and Abram just behind. Idris doesn’t respond, his head lolling against his father’s chest.
My throat tightens, and I hurry unsteadily across the shore, my gaze fixed on the men clustered round the body. True pins his ears back but remains beside me.
“Is he alive?” Abram asks.
The cold in my heart steals my breath away.
The pause seems to stretch out and out before King Hugh exhales. “Yes. Yes, he’s breathing.”
As I reach them, my gaze snags on Byrne. But there’s no point in me remaining hidden now. I push in front of my stepfather and kneel in the warm sand.
“Kit!” Byrne exclaims.
I pay him no attention.
“Here.” I put a hand on Abram’s shoulder and carefully move him aside. Abram did say I was better at bringing Idris back—hopefully I can do it even if he’s unconscious.
King Hugh casts me a surprised look, but immediately his attention is back on Idris, propped in his arms. Idris’s hands are twitching in a rhythm. I realize there is a faint beat thrumming through the sand. The music from within the Hidden Lands.