Above, the sky boiled in a vortex of flame and shadow and fire fell back upon the already burning city in a hail of indescribable destruction. Damisa was weeping. One of the sailors swore in a murmur of meaningless sound. They had already come far enough that the figures who were casting themselves into the water were silhouettes without faces or names. Micail was not among them – Tiriki would have known if he were that near.
They were passing beneath the cliff now. A boulder splashed down before the bow and the deck canted over, sending Tiriki sprawling into Chedan. He hooked one arm around her and the other around the mast as the ship righted itself and leaped forward.
‘Micail will be on one of the other ships,’ murmured Chedan. ‘He will survive – that too is part of the prophecy.’
Through eyes that blurred with tears Tiriki stared at the funeral pyre that had been her home. The motion of the ship grew more lively as the sails filled, carrying them out to sea.
Black smoke billowed up as the volcano spoke once more, blotting out the sky. In the moment before everything went dark, Tiriki saw the tremendous image of the Man with Crossed Hands, covering the sky.
And Dyaus laughed and stretched out his arms to engulf the world.
Tiriki clawed her way out of a nightmare in which she was drowning. Reaching out to Micail for comfort in the dark, her fingers closed on cold wool. As she groped, the floor rolled and she tensed yet again, bracing herself for another earthquake; but no, this was too gentle, too regular a rocking to sustain her fear. Exhausted, she sank back limply upon the hard bed, thankful for woolen winter blankets, her eyes half closed again.
A dream, she assured herself, brought on by the cool breeze through the window…
For some reason, she had thought that it was spring already, and that the disaster had come – that somehow she and Micail had ended up on different boats. But here we are side by side, as we should be.
Smiling at the foolishness of dreams, she shifted position again, trying to stay comfortable despite a vaguely dizzy feeling and a persistent chill. Something hard through the blankets…And then, close by, someone began to weep.
Her own discomfort she could ignore, but not another’s pain. Tiriki forced her eyes to open and sat up, blinking at the dim, recumbent shapes all around her. Beyond them she could see a narrow railing, and the darkly heaving sea.
She was on a boat. It had not been a dream.
As she looked about, someone out of sight, toward the bow, began to sing—
‘Nar-Inabi, Star Shaper,
Dispense tonight thy bounty—’
As she listened, additional unseen voices joined the song.
‘Illuminate our wingsails
As we fly upon the waters.
The winds here are all strangers
And we are but sailors.
Nar-Inabi, Star Shaper,
This night reveal Thy glory…’
For a moment the beauty of the song lifted her spirit. The stars were hidden, but no matter what happened here they remained in the heavens, afloat in the sea of space as their ship floated on the sea below. Star father, Sea lord, protect us! her spirit cried, trying to feel in the uneasy rocking of the ship the comfort of mighty arms.
But whether or not the god was listening, Tiriki could still hear someone crying. Carefully, she peeled away enough of the woolen blankets about the curled-up figure beside her to recognize the youthful face of Elis, fast asleep, her dark hair tangled, her eyes wet with unhappy dreams.
Poor child – we have both lost our mates – Tiriki choked back her own grief before it could overwhelm her. No, she told herself sternly, though we shall surely never see Aldel again, Micail lives! I know it.
Tenderly, she soothed Elis into deeper sleep, and only then withdrew enough to stand up. Shivering in the stiff breeze, trying not to let the continual gentle swaying underfoot disturb her stomach, Tiriki tried to will away the lingering tensions of her unrestful sleep and strained her eyes toward the foggy seascape beyond the railing. The wake of the ship glinted redly in the bloody glow that pulsed along the horizon, illuminating a vast cloud of smoke and cinders that roiled the heavens and hid the stars.
It was not the sunrise, she realized abruptly. The raging light was from another source – it came from Ahtarrath, even in its final death throes unwilling to submit to the sea.
As the lurid dawn light grew she recognized Damisa standing by the railing, staring forlornly at the distant flames. Tiriki started toward her but Damisa turned away, her shoulders hunching defensively. Tiriki wondered if Damisa was one of those people who preferred to suffer in privacy, and then she wondered whether she wanted Damisa’s company for the girl’s sake or for her own.
Most of the other people huddled on the deck were strangers, but she could see Selast and Iriel not far away, lying curled together like kittens as Kalaran snored protectively beside them.
From amidships came a quiet voice giving orders; then Reidel appeared carrying a lantern, his bare feet almost silent on the wooden deck. She nodded in automatic greeting. Since yesterday he seemed to have aged ten years. For that matter, she thought, I wonder how much older I must look by now!
Reidel returned her greeting, rather anxiously, but before they could exchange words, he was beset by a pair of red-faced merchants wanting something to eat.
A man whom she recognized as Reidel’s sailor, Arcor, had been hovering nearby. ‘My lady,’ he said, as she finally turned to face him, ‘we hoped not to trouble you while you slept, but the captain wishes you to know, there be comfortable beds for you and the young folk below. The honored ones, the adept Alyssa and the priestess Liala, rest there already.’
Tiriki shook her head. ‘No – but I thank you—’ she looked at him inquiringly and he murmured his name, once more touching his brow in a gesture of reverence. Living at such close quarters during this voyage, she mused, how long will the old caste distinctions last?
‘I thank you, Arcor,’ she repeated, in more pleasant tones, ‘but so long as there is anything to see here—’ She broke off. ‘I must go,’ she murmured, and quickly made her way amidships, where she noticed Chedan standing alone, gazing at the waves and the troubled sky.
‘I am sorry. I meant to help keep watch over the Stone,’ she said, as she reached Chedan’s side. She intended to say more, but found herself coughing, and a sharp, growing ache in her chest reminded her that the very air they were breathing was poisoned with the ashes of Ahtarrath.
Chedan smiled at her fondly. ‘You needed rest,’ he said, ‘and should feel no shame for taking it. In truth, there has been nothing to see. The Stone is at peace, even if we are not.’ He gathered her against him, and for a moment she was content to rest within the steady support of his arms, but the mage’s sparkling eyes and ash-whitened beard could not conceal his worried frown.
‘No other ships?’ Her voice was a rasping whisper.
‘Earlier, I glimpsed a few sails, heading on other courses, but in this murk—’ He waved at the smoke and fog. ‘A hundred ships might pass unseen! Yet we can be confident that Micail will direct whatever boat he may be on toward the same destination as we—’
‘Then you agree he is alive?’ She gazed at him in appeal. ‘That my hope is not just – a delusion of love?’
The mage’s