Forty-Nine Possession
FORTY-NINE
Possession
MARY
B enedict leaned against the ramparts next to Charles and I, watching the Mereish Fleet with an ever-shifting regiment of curious townsfolk.
Hours had passed since the fleet filled the horizon, and Samuel, along with the captain of nearly every other ship in Renown, had been summoned to the fort. The remainder were either already cruising or had departed to reinforce key points along the anchorage, and message flags flew continuously from the fort’s heights.
“The Anchorage is soon to fall,” Benedict said without preamble. “And my career is over.”
“Your career should have been over a long time ago,” I reminded him.
Charles was silent, either lost in his own thoughts or determined not to involve himself in another of Benedict’s self-pitying moments.
“I have been a good officer,” Ben countered. “I have obeyed orders. Protected my country and my crew. I helped bring down Lirr and escaped Mere, and brought back word of the Mereish Fleet and other threats besides. Why, then, am I punished for a private action in the dark? ‘Conduct unbecoming’—who are they to dictate who I bed?”
I met his heated gaze. I knew the brunt of his resentment wasn’t meant for me, but my heart still gave a primal, terrified twist. I kept it from my face, responding with dignity and coldness to rival his ire.
“Ben, for once, think of someone other than yourself.”
“I am,” he growled. “I need a ship. I need the opportunity to do my duty and prove myself once again.”
Charles cleared his throat and straightened. “I’ll take a turn down the wall,” he said, shoved his hands into his pockets and meandered away through the sober, chattering townsfolk.
“Still, selfishness,” I said to Ben. “You will never feel true compassion or sincerity or regret unless you’re healed.”
Ben watched me a moment, a cat deciding whether to torture a trapped mouse, then looked back out to sea. “Do you truly believe it would work?”
“I do.” I gestured to the fleet, deflecting from the truth. “There must be a High Cleric out there we can capture. You did tell Samuel you would have done it, if we had found a cure in Mere.”
Ben grunted. “I meant it at the time. But I enjoy what I am. My existence is not a crime.”
I suppressed a wave of frustration. “Ben. What did you feel when Lady Alice took you to bed?”
His mouth started to twist in a leering grin but stopped as I continued, “What did you feel when she smiled at you, and looked at you with love?”
“She thought I was Samuel.”
“Yes, and?”
He seemed perplexed by the question. There was a lull in the sound of the townsfolk around us too, and for a time the wash of waves and the distant toll of a bell rose to prominence.
At the fort, the flags changed again, and spyglasses glinted.
“Jealous,” Ben said finally. “Surprised. I did not have to use my power on her. She was… still happy.”
“And knowing you caused that happiness, even accidentally? Is that a feeling you’d want again—but truer?”
He turned his head, and suddenly his eyes, his breath, were very close. He asked in a soft, power-laced rumble, “Are you asking to go to bed with me, Mary?”
A passing man shot us a disapproving look and hurried on, propelling his staring daughter ahead of him.
For an instant I couldn’t think, wrapped in power and want and a blooming heat, then Tane nudged me. I breathed again, swallowing my temper.
“I am trying to help you,” I replied, dropping my voice equally low. “Your career might be over, but your life is not. And—as useless as it might be for me to point this out—Samuel needs you to be healed. One day he will become trapped in the Other and no one will be able to save him.”
“He manages.” Ben tossed aside the notion, but there was something raw, half-buried, in his expression. “I know he will not bed you or marry you unless he is healed. But Mary.” He smiled, slow and seductive, and leaned closer to whisper, “I can be him.”
His power brushed over my skin again, but less potent.
“Let yourself be healed, if the opportunity arises,” I returned coldly, though we were nearly nose-to-nose. North of the Stormwall, Samuel had ensured Benedict’s co-operation with promises of glory and power. I could do the same. “Promise me you will. And I’ll do everything in my power to make you the hero of this battle.”
“How?”
“The Mereish ships with the red sails, they’re important, right? Jessin Faucher’s is one, and he’s son of the head of the Ess Noti.”
His smirk told me I sounded ignorant. “Yes,” he said with exaggerated patience. “Purple sails are flagships. Red are squadron heads.”
“We’ll take one, and I’ll ensure you get the credit. Saint, we’ll capture their admiral and her flagship and cause chaos. And I, under your command, will shatter that fleet.”
Ben’s mouth quirked. There was fascination in his eyes, as if he couldn’t believe what I was saying, but was delighted by it. “That is madness.”
“I can sink their ship with a word. I cannot die. You can bring the crew to heel without speaking.”
“We sound deadly.”
“Will you do it?”
“I cannot control a thousand men at once,” Ben warned. “They will have Sooths and Stormsingers of their own, if not Adjacents and talismans. And Samuel will want to participate in our little game. They will give him the credit if they can.”
“He will do anything for you,” I reminded him, bitter though the words felt. “Come now, Benedict. Let’s do it. We’ve faced worse odds.”
“Fine.” Abruptly, Ben straightened and looked over the crowd. The sound of their chatter had changed, and, following his gaze, I saw soldiers making their way along the wall.
“No loitering about!” one soldier called. “These ramparts must be cleared for military action!”
“Time to go back to the ship,” Ben observed. His breath curled as he shoved his hands into his pockets and strode away.
I paused, but a quick glance through the now-thinning crowd turned up no sign of Charles. Deciding he would likely meet us back at the ship and unwilling to face the soldiers, I joined the flow of townsfolk down the stairs and into Renown proper.
Mary , Tane’s voice sifted up through the back of my thoughts. There is a disturbance in the Other. Take a breath.
I left the flow of the crowd and stepped into a quiet street, tucking myself into an alcove between the cluttered old buildings.
With a long, slow exhale, I relinquished control, and Tane pulled us into the Other. The houses faded, and water began to lap around my ankles, colder than I remembered.
There.
I followed the push of Tane’s will and looked not north or south, but directly up.
I see nothing , I said, disquieted. Nothing but the fleeting passage of a few distant creatures, glowing soft oranges and yellows. The glows of ghisten ships and Stormsingers occupied the harbor, and a gathering of other mages lingered at the fort.
Look at the moons , Tane urged.
My lungs began to ache. I released my first breath and stole my second as I searched the Other’s sky.
Four moons presided, all of them precisely the same—the barest of sickles, nearly invisible.
A chill crept up my spine. Our moon is visible in the Other too? Is this what you wanted me to see?
Look more carefully. A purple glow.
I did, filtering all the other clashing lights of the port away and focusing on the four darkening moons. Gradually, I registered a deep purple glow, the color of overripe plums and old bruises. There was a shape to it too, winged and bony.
To be discernable at this distance, it must be massive.
What is that? I whispered to Tane.
Her response was more chilling than the sight of the strange, skeletal creature against the moons.
I do not know . A pause, then an urgent, Someone comes .
I exhaled my last breath and slipped back into the human world to the rhythm of boots on the cobblestones. They were quiet, not creeping but contained, and by the time my eyes found their owners, my exit into the street was already blocked.
The foremost figure, a middle-aged woman with narrow shoulders and broad hips, held out a sheaf of papers. She spoke in a hard, bracing voice that made my blood run cold. “Mary Firth. I am Lieutenant Isolde Barlowe. You have been reclaimed by Her Majesty’s Royal Navy. Come willingly for the sake of your country and your captain. The tide is rising, and Aeadine’s hour of need has come. Resist, and you will be taken by force.”
There was a pace and a half between the woman and I. She had a sword at her hip, one gloved hand resting on its hilt. The six burgundy-coated marines behind her had bayonets fixed to their muskets, their eyes shadowed beneath cocked hats.
“Reclaimed?” I repeated. “I have never belonged to them. I am protected by the Usti Crown.”
“Then your captain is free to bring your contract to the Admiralty and speak your case, but for now, you must come with me,” Barlowe said.
“I will not go.” The words left me of their own accord, but I meant them. Rage burned up my throat, indignation and injustice that made the air feel taut around us, like water on the brink of freezing.
Barlowe noted this with a long, unimpressed blink. “If you do not, your captain will be arrested and tried for withholding property of the Aeadine Crown.” She raised a hand, two fingers up, as if to gesture her soldiers forward.
My stare turned into a glare fueled by a lifetime of warnings, fear and injustice. “You’re bluffing. You’ve a Mereish fleet on your doorsteps, and the Black Tide is rising. My ship needs me, and you need him.”
“If you fear the Tide, lend your voice where it matters most.” Barlowe’s voice was iron. She waved her soldiers forward, and rough hands seized my arms. “Come. Now.”
“I won’t be used!” I felt Tane in my glare, not in spectral shadow but in essence—her long years, our power. My winds came too, swirling and ready to act, ready to assault and disorient. Another song lingered on the back of my tongue, prepared to pull the breath from the soldiers’ lungs.
But I faced a dozen enemies in an open space, and my chances of winning this battle were low. Ben was long gone by now, and there was no sign of Charles. Samuel was still up at the fort. I hated how vulnerable their absences made me feel, how abandoned.
I steeled myself, though a trembling had set into my hands. I knew from experience that if I fought back, I would only earn myself pain and a tighter leash. But if I went willingly, I might find a chance to escape.
So I allowed myself to be hustled from the alleyway and into the clutches of the Aeadine Royal Navy.
* * *
Admiral Evane Solace was a broad woman with a trim black wig, contained by a dark-blue ribbon at the nape of her neck. Her bicorn hat threatened to jostle the brims of the dozen other captains crammed in the grand cabin aboard Recompense , flagship of the Aeadine South Fleet.
I was damp and cold from the journey through the towering forest of masts west of the Aeadine Anchorage. Anger smoldered in my chest, but my hands had stopped shaking by the time Solace met my gaze.
I hoped she would see my righteous indignation, that it would at least give her pause. But Solace’s eyes barely lingered before she returned to the conversation. She gestured absently to one side, and Barlowe pointed me into a line of four other women against the bulkhead.
One wore a Stormsinger’s mask. She was young, barely into womanhood, her cheeks tear-stained and plump. Two others were grey-haired, one with a distant gaze and the other with a steady, confident air. The last was a spindly, middle-aged woman with a narrow face and eyes that reminded me of my mother—harrowed, resigned. Hollow.
“Who are you?” the spindly woman asked. The words were barely out of her mouth when she cut off into a pained grunt.
One of the grey-haired women reclasped her hands in front of her skirts. The spindly woman tucked her arm protectively into her side and fell silent, staring straight ahead.
I followed her gaze across the cabin, looking through the company as my mind churned. Clearly, just because these other women were Stormsingers did not mean they were allies.
“Attention,” a male voice snapped. A lieutenant situated himself in front of us, marked by the broad black cuffs on his dark navy coat and the three points of his hat instead of two.
Lieutenant Adler. Of course. This was his ship, Recompense .
The girl in the mask started to cry. The urge to go to her, to put an arm around her, made me waver on my feet.
In my bones, Tane stirred. We free the girl first.
Agreed.
“Ms. Slorach and Ms. Elsher have seen fleet action before and are experienced working in concert with other Stormsingers,” Adler stated. “They will direct you. You will obey all orders. One step out of line, one note of deviance, and it will be marked.” At this, his eyes swung to the wiry woman, then to me. His gaze narrowed, then returned to Slorach and Elsher—the older women with grey hair. I wasn’t sure which was which.
“This,” he pointed at me, “is Anne Firth’s daughter. She is untrained, but I am sure you can make good use of her.”
I watched him, my expression flat. “Let me loose and I will sink the fleet alone,” I baited.
The lieutenant advanced to stare directly into my eyes. The man from the docks was nowhere to be seen, startled by an offer of toffee. Here, he was in his power, and his superiors were watching us.
Perhaps he’d hoped to loom, but we were of a height, and I’d faced down Benedict Rosser at the height of his rage.
I stared right back.
“Ten lashes for Ms. Firth,” the lieutenant said without taking his eyes from me. “On the legs. We do not want her struggling to fill her lungs.”
I Quelled the air around him with a single inhale—and didn’t even realize I’d done it until he started to gasp and weaken at the knees.
A hand seized the back of my neck. I cried out and twisted to find one of the grey-haired Stormsingers hauling me backwards, spinning me around and pinning me to the bulkhead. More hands came, crushing me. I struggled until I felt the familiar straps of a mask around my head, then I lost control.
These men and women were not my people, not the only defense of my homeland and kin and the village between the Ghistwold and the slate hills. They were my enemies.
Fresh air hit my face above the mask. I blinked streams of rage-filled tears from my eyes as I was hustled onto the forecastle of Recompense , into the wind. I was divested of my coat and outer garments, stripped to shirt and trousers. My arms were forced above my head. I jerked and struggled, trying to turn, only to glimpse a grim-faced man with a whip taking position behind me. Around him, sailors stared from the rigging, gunners faltered at their work and the other Stormsingers were lined up to watch. The young girl was crying again, near the point of smothering herself with tears and snot.
I wanted to scream, to demand the wind tear across this deck and prove I couldn’t be subjugated and controlled. But I had no voice.
The wind gentled, as if it watched. The rocking of the ship was light, and across the deck, crewfolk continued to stare even as the bosun’s whistle shrilled and an officer shouted for them to return to work.
I wondered if those on the other ships watched too—Stormsingers and Sooths, officers and common sailors, marines and soldiers.
I twisted, searching uselessly for Hart . I saw only the other Stormsingers again—the girl, the older women, and the spindly one—holding my gaze with something that might have been compassion, had it not been so cold.
Courage , that look demanded.
Tane, help me , I whispered. Tears began to freeze on my cheeks and lashes. I wanted to step into the Other, to slip from my bonds and leap into the sea. Tane knew that, as readily as I knew that if I did, I’d just be fished out of the water again and Sam and Hart would be punished.
My plea shifted. Help me endure this.
I felt her slip to the front of my mind, taking control. My panic ebbed as if I wandered on the edge of sleep, as did the pain of my strained arms and a dozen new bruises.
We will endure , I murmured in the quiet of my thoughts as I leaned my forehead into the damp wood of the mast and heard a whistle pipe. We will endure. And we will break fleets upon the water.
Sleep, Mary , Tane whispered.
I closed my eyes as the first lash struck.