Chapter 11
Twelve days later, aboard the Voyager.
“Much better,” Iannis praised, examining the wooden blade I’d magically sculpted out of a log of wood. “That was a distinct improvement on the last one, Sunaya.”
“Thanks,” I said, grinning with pride. The knife he held in his hand was a far cry from my first attempt, which had essentially been a pointy wooden plank.
This blade was long, with as sharp an edge as one could achieve with wood.
I’d even managed to carve a little floral design into it.
“Do I really have to change this one back?”
“I suppose not,” Iannis said, handing it back to me.
We were sitting in an empty room on the main deck that he’d cleared specifically for my training—it held nothing aside from a table, two chairs, and a small shelf with some magical textbooks.
“But there is not a large supply of these on the ship, and I promised to return any we took.” He pointed to the small pile of logs by the door.
Since there was nothing much to do aboard the ship aside from sleep and eat, Iannis and I had taken the opportunity to catch up on my magic lessons.
I’d made good progress with my Loranian, and had mastered the juggling exercise to the point that Iannis felt comfortable with letting me practice spells that required greater control.
Transmogrification was one of those, and over the last few days he’d been having me reshape logs of wood into various objects.
Technically this barely qualified as transmogrification, as the real purpose was to transform an object into a completely different material, like taking a piece of metal and turning it into marble.
But I wasn’t advanced enough for that yet.
“Do you think dinner will be ready soon?” I asked, tucking the blade beneath my belt. Performing magic, as always, had left me with a healthy appetite.
Iannis opened his mouth to answer, but he paused as the floor beneath us began to sway, faster than usual.
I tensed as the boat shifted in one direction, then the other, then gasped as a huge wave rocked the boat very suddenly.
Iannis and I grabbed onto the table, and I was glad it was securely bolted down.
The wooden logs rolled across the floor, one of them smacking into my boot.
“By Magorah,” I gasped. “What the hell was that?”
“Nothing good,” Iannis said, rising from his chair with a worried frown. “It would take a very large wave indeed to rock a steamship of this size.”
He opened the door, and I followed him as we climbed the single flight of stairs to the main deck.
My mouth dropped open at the sight before me—the sky had turned dark, and the sea around us was very choppy.
A cold wind whipped around us, yanking at my curls, and I snatched at my wooden knife as it was almost torn out of my grasp.
The crew was rushing about, the first mate barking orders, and I was nearly mowed down by a sailor rushing full speed along the walkway.
“Hey!” I snagged him by the collar and brought him to a screeching halt. “What’s going on here?”
“There’s a storm coming, miss,” the sailor said, his eyes wide. He looked about nineteen, his freckles stark against skin that was pale with worry. “The Captain says it looks to be a typhoon! You and the lord ought to get below decks.”
“A typhoon?” Iannis echoed. “We’d best go find the Minister and other mages aboard. From the look of those clouds, it might not be enough to rely on the crew. We may have to use magic to save the ship.”
We hurried over to the Minister’s cabin, which was above deck and close to the bow of the ship.
About halfway there, the clouds opened up, and a heavy rain began to pelt down on us.
I conjured a pocket of air around us to keep Iannis and me dry, but by the time I got the spell going, we were already soaked, our hair plastered to the sides of our faces, our clothes clinging to our skin.
Iannis could have done the spell himself, but doing such tasks for him was part of my apprenticeship.
Though he probably would have done it anyway if he hadn’t been distracted.
“Minister!” Iannis shouted, pounding on the door. He didn’t wait, but let himself in. “Are you aware of the storm?”
“The Captain just sent a cabin boy to warn me it’s going to get rocky,” the Minister said.
He was seated at the small desk inside the cabin.
Malthasius, his private secretary and assistant, was there already, but the other delegates were nowhere to be found.
“Rather annoying, considering that we’re only a few days away from reaching Maral.
But there’s nothing for it but to put our trust in the Captain’s seamanship. ”
“Perhaps we can help. There is an anti-storm spell I know from previous sea voyages,” Iannis said. “For diverting a typhoon, it requires at least ten mages, the more the better. Since all the attendants are trained mages, we should be able to do it.”
“Very well.” The Minister turned to his assistant. “Malthasius, please round up the others, as quickly as possible. Miss Baine, go and help him. We’ll meet at the bridge to confer with the Captain.”
Malthasius and I did as we were ordered.
Several of the delegates and all the pretend “servants” had berths below decks, so Malthasius went down to collect those while I grabbed Director Chen and Solar from their cabins on the main deck.
It wasn’t hard to find them—they were already on their way toward the Minister’s cabin.
“I knew it was a typhoon,” Director Chen said as we hurried through the wind and rain toward the bridge. Her teeth chattered despite the air pocket I was using to keep us dry. “I had hoped we would be able to avoid one, but, unfortunately, this is typhoon season.”
I guess it was too much to ask the Mage-Emperor to wait until after typhoon season to die, I grumbled to myself as I pushed open the door to the bridge.
It was a large room surrounded by windows that offered a three-sixty view of the ocean, with various gadgets, dials, and levers that I couldn’t begin to understand.
In the center was a raised platform where the helm stood.
To the left was a large table with nautical maps spread out.
The Captain and another man stood over the table, along with the rest of the delegates and attendants, poring over a map.
“Normally I would tell you not to bother, as this ship is very sound,” the Captain was saying. “But I really don’t like the look of these yellowish clouds or these giant waves.”
“Good, you’re here,” the Minister said as we entered. “We need to start on the spell right away.”
“Lord Iannis, if this is the spell I’m thinking of, I can help direct it,” Chen said. “I am familiar with these storms, though the version of the spell I learned is in Garaian.”
“Very well,” Iannis said. He waited until Malthasius returned with the other mages, then gave us the rundown.
The spell had to be performed outdoors, on the deck, and involved the heavy use of elemental magic, specifically air and water.
If done properly, the spell would direct the storm away from our ship.
But we needed to do it quickly, because the closer the typhoon’s center got to us, the more power it would take to turn it away.
After Iannis explained the procedure, and the first mate distributed stout ropes to all participants, he and Director Chen ushered us out and began guiding us to our stations.
The deck was slippery now, the gale howling around us, and we had to proceed slowly, gripping the railings tightly.
As soon as I got to my position by the starboard beam, I lashed myself to the railing using one of the ropes.
Everything on deck had been lashed down or cleared away to reduce the chances of being hit by flying objects or debris, but as I watched the high winds batter the tied-down masts, I knew that our safety was far from assured.
I wished that I could be close to Iannis, but he was at the prow of the ship, with Director Chen at the stern.
Instead, I was stuck near Director Toring, the last person I wanted to be close to when facing death.
I did my best to ignore him, and focused on the power deep within me.
It pulsed to life as I called it to the surface so that it sizzled just beneath my skin, making my fingertips glow in the darkness of the storm.
A wave crashed against the ship, soaking me to the skin, and I held onto the rope for dear life as water sluiced over the railing—I’d abandoned my air bubble to conserve power for the more important spell.
A faint tearing sound raised my hackles in alarm.
Frantic, I peered through the rain and wind just in time to see Toring flying over the side of the ship, his torn rope flailing out behind him.
I sprang forward, my fingers grasping for the rope’s jagged end, but it slithered into the abyss before I could get a hold.
“Shit!” I shouted over the howling wind as I watched Toring disappear into the darkness.
Though he wasn’t exactly my favorite person, I couldn’t let him die.
I ripped the rope from my body, then flung myself into the sea without a moment’s hesitation.
There was no time to ponder—if I didn’t act now, he’d be lost. But as I started to kick up to the surface, using all my strength against the tumultuous current, I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d thrown my life away on a stupid impulse.
“Iannis!” I called mentally as I broke the surface, squinting through the foam and rain as I searched for Toring. I caught sight of him being carried by the crest of a wave, and from the utter lack of struggle and his closed eyes, I gathered he was unconscious. “Toring fell overboard!”
“What?” Iannis shouted in my head. “Where?”