Chapter 16 Tears of the Moons #2
“I’m not,” I insisted. “But maybe I just don’t want to kill him now.”
“Lying like the best of us, I see.”
“That’s how we serve the Ship of Spells.”
“Fog you.” He laughed.
“Not today,” I answered, but suns, how I wished my body did call to this man’s instead of someone far more dangerous. Dev would be easy to fog. At least the ship wouldn’t try to kill me if I did.
I patted the rail. I would leave her captain be. In answer, the canvas rumbled above my head.
Fahr shook his head, but he grinned, and I did, too. This was nice, this banter and this talk. It felt good. I felt good. Even sailing through a gap on the deck of a living ship, I finally felt like I might have just found my place.
Don’t let your guard down, Smoke had said, and don’t be fooled by the camaraderie aboard.
Well, fog Smoke, too.
“Mr. Fahr, sir,” came a voice from the main. “Oh, forgive me, sir…”
It was Worley.
“The captain has asked for you, sir. If you please, one of m’birds has brought a note from your, ah…from, from the king.”
Fahr sighed and pushed off the rail.
“Good night, Blue. Dream sweet.”
“When the moons meet,” I returned, and he disappeared in the dark.
I cast my eyes to the fore, where the night sky was turning a sickly yellow. I knew it wasn’t the dawn but the Silence. I looked at the figurehead, the haunted, carved face that led the Touchstone wherever she went.
The chimeric leans into wylde magik, he had said.
I removed my gloves, tucked them into my sash, and laid one hand on the rail.
“Touchstone,” I said. “Help me.”
Child.
I drew a deep breath and surrendered.
The web of rune ran like currents through my body, from my toes to my fingertips, from my belly to my brain. Rune and pattern connected and alive. Moons and stars, suns and erthe, and the chimeric that bound them all.
Fauns have practiced wylde magik for centuries, Echo had said.
I removed my hand and took the stance.
“Auctorus Circulaia,” I said aloud and made the patterns. The rune shield sprang to life, pulsing with chimeric, stretching with life.
Tears of the moons, said the Touchstone. Weaver of suns. Child of the north, come home.
Instinctively, I crooked the left fourth finger, and my shield pushed outward, tentative at first, heaving and contracting and sparkling like stars. Suddenly, it burst free, a crackling orb of connected lines.
I bent the right fourth, and I had two orbs now, circling each other like the suns.
Forge and Ember, Brother Suns of Oversea. Two suns. Two names.
But Rhi’Ahr had three.
I needed moons.
I kicked off my boots and flexed my toes, drawing magik from her boards as I had done on those very first days.
I felt the planks of the Touchstone reach for me.
I closed my eyes, and her life flowed through me, wylde and deep and as old as the world.
I flattened my palms together, slid them swiftly apart.
Child, look.
I opened my eyes. Three orbs hovered before me. Orbs of glittering, spinning runes. I had done it.
Auctorus Circulaia.
Home.
Now, could I use it?
I remembered the section on the hull still broken by cannon shot, so I leaned over and laid my hands against the bulwark. I was a runechaser, wylde and filled to the brim with power.
“Auctorus praesidium in ligus,” I said.
“Create to protect and bind.” I had no idea if it would work. It was all instinct. Plucking the Worldrune like music, raw and real and, this time, all mine.
I felt the chimeric wash through my skin and along my fingers as runes glittered down the side of the hull. I leaned over, watching as plank by plank, splinter by stave, the boards began to knit together. It was a miracle, and it had come from me.
I leaned farther.
“Blue,” came a voice.
My head spun, and I wiped my brow with a trembling hand. I couldn’t feel it. Not my head, not my hand, not my toes. They were all tats and needles, buzzing with light and heat and rune.
“Blue, you need the doc? Blue?”
Slowly, I turned my head to see Neale standing before me, Thom and Bergy at his flanks. They were twisting, bending, as if made of taffy. I could see the bones in their bodies. I could hear the blood in their veins.
I staggered, and Neale grabbed my arm but yelped as the chimeric flared at his touch. I didn’t care. I wanted the water. I needed the sea. I turned and leaned back over the rail.
“Get the captain,” said Neale. “Quick!”
I could see fishes below us and eels and sharks. I could see the runes between them all, rocking the water and bending the waves. I could see right down to the depths of the locker, to the bottom of the Old Sand. Our Mother the Sea calling, promising warmth and magik and runes and peace.
Runechaser. I needed it. I needed, so I reached…
Home.
“Forge, she’s going over…”
A flash of white and daggers now, piercing my shoulders and yanking me off my feet.
White and feathers and flash and blood, and I hit the deck hard, cracking my head against the boards.
Patterns ebbed and blackness flowed, and I knew there were voices, but I couldn’t hear a sound.
The last things I remembered were the gold-shot eyes of Gavriel Thanavar.