PART I | Chapter IX
1:9 | Out of the Pirate Ship, Into the Sea
When the gun went off, Kedean’s stomach lurched, violently, his mind still reeling with the swarm of previous revelations, and he thought for a blind, dizzying moment that he might actually be sick. Then, the orc to his right cried out, one leg crumpling beneath him and his hands flying to it as he hit the deck. Only when the dark liquid pooling on his hand through his fingers registered as blood did the chain of events click together.
His charge hadn’t shot hers-himself, he’d shot the
pirate.
Why, Kedean couldn’t imagine, but he didn’t spare it a second thought, his head snapping up instead just in time to catch the resounding splash of a body hitting water and note that his charge was, obviously, no longer on the ship. Mentally, he swore, thoughts spinning all over again, as he physically fought the impulse to make an immediate break across the deck.
He wouldn’t be able to save her—him. She’d—
he’d try to push Kedean under the second he got to him; it would be useless, stupid, even, to follow. Maybe he didn’t even want to live, and Kedean had a brother to look after. He couldn’t afford to die playing hero for an
insane, suicidal nobleman with pretty sea green eyes and-
When he heard a smaller, scattered splash and a choked cough, barely audible over the sound of the rain, he stopped thinking and shed his belt and shoes.
Behind him, the wounded orc was swearing in a language he didn’t recognize; to his side, the fairy captain was shouting almost as foully as he neared the rail, and on reaching it, Kedean touched two fingers to his forehead and then his breast, shutting his eyes for a fraction of a second as he whispered, “Great Father and Mother Mele, protect…
please, don’t make me regret this…”
And he jumped.
The water bit at him as it encased him, cold and sharp from every angle and needle-like against his skin, and Kedean’s mind went to work without him willing it to, calculating how long they had before cold sickness set in, how long before their heart rates dropped so low that their muscles failed them and they sank beneath the sea no matter what.
He guessed fifteen to twenty minutes—assuming, of course, that the rescuing process didn’t drown them both first.
With two powerful kicks, he broke to the surface, opening his mouth and filling his lungs, his eyes already at work scanning the waves, seeking a blip of white on the black, uneven splashes, or even bubbles. Luckily enough, he spotted his target quickly, a head bobbing just above the surface in that moment but already sinking again quickly, obviously fighting a losing game of drowner’s yoyo with the water.
Kedean approached from behind, coming up on his charge’s back so as not to be tackled and shoved immediately beneath the surface on approach, and once close enough, he caught his charge’s wrist, the only thing above water at the time, and dragged up. As soon as he got his the man’s head above water, he forced his arm behind his back, pulling him close enough to where his back fit against Kedean’s chest while keeping his arm and wrist pinned as a further precautionary measure against panicked shoving. This also served as a manual way to force him into arching his back and keeping close without letting his head dip below water lest he snap his arm, and Baisyl did, indeed, keep his head above water after that: gasping, sputtering, and coughing on rain as he did so, but otherwise dragging in oxygen rather well, all things considered.
From there, Kedean caught his charge’s chin, holding it up, but also bringing his head close enough so that he could speak and be heard over the storm and shouting from the ship above.
First things first.
“Do you…
want…to die?” he asked, forcefully, treading water to keep them afloat and hating the time it took to ask, but figuring it was a rather relevant question, given the situation.
After opening his mouth, Kedean realized he wasn’t sure what he’d even do if the man said yes—would he be able to just let him sink, now that he had him in his arms? But his charge just coughed again, clearly still catching his breath, his body faintly shaking in his hold, and in case he hadn’t heard properly, Kedean took a breath, preparing to repeat himself.
“Do you-”
That time, though, Baisyl shook his head almost immediately—jerky and obviously worse for the wear, not that Kedean could really blame him, but unmistakably signaling ‘No,’—and something in Kedean’s heart that he hadn’t realized was tense relaxed a fraction.
But there would be time for relief later; they hadn’t made it out alive, yet.
“Alright,” he said, “I need you to listen to me very carefully, and do exactly as I say. Are you listening?”
He felt the jerk of Baisyl’s nod against his shoulder.
“I’m going to let go of your arm, and I’m going to turn you around. When I do, I need you to put your hands on my shoulders, close to my neck, and hold onto me as I swim, but you have to relax, and you can’t push me down or clutch at my head, because you’ll drown us both. Do you understand?”
Another nod, less jerky this time.
“Alright, here…” When Kedean first started to release Baisyl’s arm, his charge instinctively tensed, a wave of panic hitting as he started to sink, but Kedean quickly moved in, catching hold of his elbow and waist to brace, guide, and keep him up as he turned. “Just a little more, and…there you go.”
Kedean wasn’t sure which of them breathed the first shaky sigh of relief when Baisyl made it around, but their mingled breaths hung in the air between them like a spirit, the only thing filling the six inch space between their faces as cool, quivering fingers wound obediently over his shoulders, clutching to him like the lifeline he supposed he was. Baisyl’s hair looked black, this wet, like spilt ink on his porcelain pale skin, and his dark lashes stood out, clumped together by the sea—as did his lips, the cold already deepening their hue, and his eyes. His eyes reflected moonlight.
“Wh-why…” Baisyl started to ask, “…why did you—why would you-”
“Save your breath, for now,” Kedean advised, not sure if he could have answered that question even if they had the time. “Ready?”
Baisyl opened his mouth, but apparently changed his mind before speaking and shut it again, nodding in silence. He shut his eyes when Kedean moved them, his grip tightening and his body stiffening briefly, but he cooperated as promised.
Fortunately, the water in this particular part of the channel seemed to have an especially high salt content—likely because of its nearness to the sea—making them more buoyant and lessening the strain of keeping them afloat. In addition, their close proximity allowed them to preserve more body heat, lowering the rate at which their bodies chilled in the cold water.
Unfortunately, with each flash of white to illuminate the shore, their destination seemed to barely inch closer, much farther away than it initially seemed from the ship, and barely halfway there, with his muscles already more numb than tired and his skin tingling with the slow, seeping cold, Kedean was beginning to seriously doubt their chances of survival.
Fifteen minutes in, he could feel the sluggishness affecting his system, like a fog over his mind and a slowing poison in his veins, dulling his senses and making each kick and stroke more clumsy and strained than the last. Twenty minutes in, his thoughts where molasses, and five minutes after that, the shore felt illusive, as if it darted farther away with each foot closer they progressed, so that by the thirty minute marker, the thought of resting for a moment, relaxing his arms and just sinking didn’t sound quite so unthinkable as it once did.
What did it matter, really?
His brother would be fine. Zyric had always taken better care of himself than Kedean ever had anyway, and their father would be too drunk to miss him, assuming they ever even learned of his passing.
Maybe, in that sense, he reasoned, it wouldn’t even be like dying, if no one knew—just disappearing. Disappearing, under the waves, into the blackness; falling asleep in this world and waking up in the next.
A shame, to be sure, that he’d never really loved anyone—aside from his family—and that now, he never would, but it was alright, he supposed. It was too late for regrets, in any case. He was too tired; the shore was too far and the water too cold. No songs would be sung for him or of him, but he’d never been a fan of that, and at least this would be calm and quiet, peaceful and painless compared to so many other ways one could-
The body against his stirred, drawing Kedean momentarily, groggily from his hazy thoughts, and ‘
Oh, right…’ he mused.
He’d almost forgotten about his charge, and for a second, he felt a brief, tired stab of guilt. It was the man’s own fault for jumping, and Kedean still wasn’t honestly sure why it bothered him quite so much to think of him coming to harm or why it felt so imperative that he personally carry the man to safety, but it did. And yet, in this moment he was simply too exhausted and there was…no…
way…
At first, he didn’t recognize the source, his conscious only registering the first faint, gradual stirrings of heat as they began to gather—first at his neck in a tiny, nearly insignificant blip but then slowly, slowly sinking through the surface of his skin and down. Then, as the first hints of its effects began to show themselves—Kedean’s mind loosening up as a hibernating animal might shake off a coat of snow, and feeling seeping back into his numbed skin again—the collected bits of information began piecing themselves together.
It wasn’t a dream, a hallucination, or any other hysterical side effect of lapsing into the cold sickness; it was magic. Slow, focused, and relatively weak, but magic nonetheless, and unlike the sharp burst of concentrated, burning heat that had convinced him to drop his weapon—‘
Was that really only a day ago?’—this spell stayed, fighting the cold and thawing him from the inside out.
Realizing without a doubt that it was Baisyl, pouring energy into him despite the fact that he himself must be at least as weak and chilled, Kedean wondered, bemusedly, if it technically classified as saving someone’s life if the person being rescued was only in need of rescuing due to the fact that they, in turn, were saving the rescuer, but-
Mud under his feet caught him off guard.
They’d actually
made it?
The swell and consecutive breaking of the next wave propelled them forward, more or less beaching them on some undeterminable combination of rocks, sand and silt, and Kedean coughed, body shaking with the lingering effects of cold and over-exertion as he half-dragged, half-carried his charge with him ashore. When they made it far enough up that each incoming swell only lapped at their ankles, he gratefully collapsed.
On his side, eyes shut, and one arm draped loosely—absently protective—over the smaller, shivering body curled at his chest, Kedean kept still for some time: savoring every inhale, drawing full, dry breaths deep into his lungs and holding them there, briefly, before releasing them again as his exhausted heart gradually regained strength. Only when the rest of the world, bit by bit, came back into focus around him—first the soft, gentle patter of rain on his cheek and fingers, washing away the salt of the sea; then the quiet hiss of each new wave as it skittered up the sand at their feet, and finally the distant, quiet call of the birds and small critters that inhabited the trees farther inland—did he start to stir again.
When Kedean worked his eyes open, the first thing to come into focus was dark, wet, tousled hair on ghostly white cheeks and full, barely parted, deep purple lips. He frowned, drawing a hand up the cold, soaked cloth covering his charge’s back. At least his responding shiver was a positive sign; it meant he was alive, and hopefully conscious. When he opened his mouth, though, Kedean realized abruptly that…
He had absolutely no idea what to call the man.
Was he a man?
Honestly, Kedean suspected so, since the fairy captain seemed to think that he was, and he certainly acted like one, regardless of whatever he looked like before. It would explain a lot of things (as well as raise questions, of course, but those could be dealt with later). In any case, his charge’s current lack of breasts, or any other defining feminine attribute, for that matter, prevented Kedean from feeling comfortable calling him ‘miss’ or ‘milady,’ which left him with…
“Milord,” he said quietly, “…it would be advisable that you remain conscious, if at all possible…”
His charge’s eyebrows drew together, his lips pursing momentarily together and before parting again when he coughed, curling in on himself and bringing a fist to his mouth when he did so. After that subsided, his shoulders relaxed some, and another few seconds later, his lashes fought their way up, eventually revealing two seeking starlit eyes, like a sea-green forest coming into view from behind black curtains.
Did it make any sense that his eyes would be a softer, greyer green as a man? Perhaps it was the lighting.
“We’re…alive?” his charge asked after a time, and Kedean felt a wry smile struggling for purchase on his lips before he could stop it.
“So it would seem, my lord,” he concurred. “How are you feeling?”
“Like…” His charge’s brow furrowed, pensively, as he attempted to push himself up onto an elbow, but he swayed the moment he did, losing balance and then collapsing back the half foot to the ground a second later with a wince and a shiver. “Horrible,” he concluded. Kedean opened his mouth. “Like I swallowed…f-frost oil and…sleeping drought…by the barrel full,” his charge elaborated before he fit a word in. “How is it we’re still alive?”
Curious, Kedean ran the same test on himself, pushing carefully up onto his elbows and then, finding himself steady enough, sitting fully upright. “Frankly, I’m not entirely sure, myself,” he admitted, and took the time to examine their surroundings more thoroughly, gauging the distance of the trees farther inland and seeking out a sign of life—a city or village, preferably. There were usually plenty scattered along water fronts.
“I still can’t…believe th-that you…” His charge trailed off, still on the ground, apparently having given up on moving, and he shook his head. “What in the stars’ names possessed you to jump in after me?” he asked at last. “It was…impossibly foolish of you. If the fates had thrown any grain of logic into the situation, we both would have died.”
“I realize that,” Kedean remarked neutrally, his eyes fixing on a promising patch of firefly-esque lights in the distance in the direction they’d been headed: a port town, if they were lucky, “…but with all due respect, my lord…it was impossibly foolish of you to jump off a moving ship into near freezing water in the first place.”
Below him, Baisyl opened one eye. After a long moment—his lips twitching haphazardly upwards, much as Kedean’s had at his initial question—he shut it again and shook his head. “You—very well,” he conceded, “you make your point. Chances of you permitting me to…rest a moment now? While you…make up your mind about what to do?”
“Slim to nil,” Kedean responded, rising to his knees and standing, pleased to find that his legs carried him well, “…if only because I’ve already made up my mind.” When he turned to his charge, he looked down to find green eyes watching him from beneath the canopy of a shielding hand, braced there to keep the rain out, and he added, “This would also, unfortunately, be a very poor place to take a rest.”
“Nn…” Baisyl’s lashes fluttered back shut. “I am…pitifully uninclined to be selective, at the moment…” he confessed.
“Come…” Kedean took a step closer and offered up a hand, “…can you walk?”
His charge looked up, his eyes seeming to take a moment to focus in on the offer. When they did, his lips pursed thinly, but he made no complaints and reached. His fingers, when they fell into Kedean’s, were
cold.
He rose easily enough, his body lighter than Kedean would have suspected for a man of his stature—not large, or even particularly heavily built, but certainly not petite. He was, for lack of a better word, lean, and made up for what he lacked in size and bulk with lithe, compact strength—like a pure bred hound of the sort noble hunters trained for sport.
Right now, though, he shook like an underfed mutt.
Given that his skin felt like ice and his jaw chattered when he breathed, though he looked like he was trying to keep it shut, it didn’t surprise Kedean in the least. But it did worry him.
“Milord,” he started, concern edging into his voice again despite his best efforts to keep his tone flat, “you’re-”
“I…m-may have given you a…bit more of my heat than I…originally intended,” Baisyl cut in with his admittance, clearly fighting with his words to keep them even—with limited success.
“Your…” Kedean blinked, remembering the warmth of Baisyl’s magic and contrasting it to the shaking, chilled fingers now in his grasp. “That was your
body heat?”
His charge winced. “What…
else would it have…been?” he clipped, the sharpness in his words strained and any force he might have hoped for severely undermined by the incessant chattering of his teeth. “I…t-told you before that my magic is…weak, I c-can’t just…” He swore, beneath his breath.
“Milord-”
“Can’t conjure straight heat,” Baisyl snapped, determined to get the words out before a stutter infected them. “Not real heat—not out of nowhere—and you…y-you…n-need it m-more than…gods, my tongue be damned! Can we…just…start walking?”
Kedean opened his mouth, fully ready to point out that the man could barely talk, let alone stand straight, and he wanted to
walk? But on meeting Baisyl’s eyes, Kedean held his words. Instead, he held out an arm, and after a moment spent blinking at it, Baisyl shifted his grip, releasing his hand in favor of taking his arm and accepting the much needed support.
“You realize,” Kedean said evenly as they started off, “that we have much to discuss, once you’re in better sorts.”
“We have nothing but time now, do we not?” Baisyl quipped, his steps slow, but steady enough, and after a moment’s consideration, Kedean consented.
“Very well…who
are you?”
His charge’s brow drew together, his foot lagging and staggering on a step—though he regained his balance quickly—and at length he shook his head. “A-actually, you’re right,” he said. “Later, I think, would be…better.”
Though sorely tempted, Kedean refrained from making a comment, and they lapsed into silence, the resulting quiet filled only by the paced crunching of forest foliage and the steady trickle of rain. Kedean took the time to examine his charge—or, at least, as best he could, allowing for the rain and lack of light.
At just over a head shorter than Kedean himself, the man stood taller than Zyric by several inches, and looked to surpass his width in the shoulders as well, though not by as much; a fencer, not a brawler. Surprisingly enough, his masculinity seemed to soften the previously wickedly sharp features he sported as a woman, so that while he was still strikingly attractive, he appeared less otherworldly and untouchable and more…real.
Thinking back, Kedean decided that he looked
less like his brother—Rhyan, was it?—this way.
While the younger Merseille wasn’t
necessarily feminine, Baisyl was inarguably taller and broader, as well as decidedly less—Kedean mentally sought out a suitable word—delicate, he decided. Rhyan, in the proper dress, could have easily passed himself off as a woman (without the aid of magic), while Baisyl, without actually
being a woman, looked nothing like one. Fair, no doubt—and Kedean still would have called him beautiful—but not womanly.
An abrupt stutter in his charge’s step drew him from his thoughts.
“Milord, are you—?”
“I’m…going to-”
With no further warning than that, Baisyl teetered, and a moment later Kedean’s arms filled—occupied completely in seconds by the soaked and groaning nobleman, rapidly diving towards unconsciousness. When he opened his mouth, though, his charge spoke up just loud enough to hear, shaking his head.
“I…my legs aren’t…won’t…and my head…”
Given that the words were half buried against his chest, and muddled on their own besides, Kedean blinked, confused. “You’re—what?”
“You may…leave me…you don’t have…t-”
As soon as his meaning sank in, Kedean snorted and dipped down, catching behind his charge’s already bending knees and securing support behind his back before lifting as easily as one might lift a child. Baisyl opened his mouth, keening with what was probably meant to be some sort of objection, but his strength was clearly failing him, his eyes already dipping to half-mast and his breathing fragmented. He managed a meek shake of the head.
“You shouldn’t…why…?”
“Later,” Kedean advised, and Baisyl shivered, his lashes sinking slowly shut as if weighted down and falling against his will.
“But…y—nnn…” At last, he gave a broken sigh of defeat and turned his head in, towards Kedean’s chest, tucking it there. “Feel…rid…iculous…” he mumbled tiredly, the words warm against Kedean’s skin even through his wet clothes, “…like a…woman…”
And in spite of everything, in that moment, a smile itched to secure a place on Kedean’s face; he fought it. “No offense, milord,” he responded, letting only the barest hint of teasing into his tone, “…but I’d think you’d be rather accustomed to that by now.”
Baisyl’s eyes struggled to reopen, dark lashes flitting in vain against pale cheeks, but in the end all he managed was what might have passed in some circles as an indignant snort. And then he was asleep.
Both wet to the bone, exhausted, and one unconscious, Kedean thought, all in all, they were fairing rather well for two unarmed men who’d only just an hour ago escaped a fleet of fairy pirates into frigid water in unknown territory.
Aboard the Havana Fern gripped the rail, a sea of curses teetering on the tip of her tongue. Behind her, over the sound of Mervil’s groans, Derg asked, “After them, captain?” and she waited a moment, letting the temptation and necessary repercussions of such an action sink in. At last, she shook her head.
“No. Leave them.”
She turned back to her second-in-command, resisting the urge to sneer at her downed crewmate; whether he thought so or not,
she hadn’t missed the action he’d pulled earlier—the most likely reason he’d been shot, too.
“It’s too dark,” she continued flatly, “…and our chances of finding them before they sink are about as poor as their chances of surviving without doing just that. If they don’t die…we’ll be able to track them easily enough in time. Take…him…” She motioned her head towards the simpering Mervil, “…back to the
Dawn Strider and wake Terranah…have her attend to his leg. We’ll make contact with Tyrius when we make it to port…”
Little did the fairy captain know, in just over an hour’s time, in the nearby seaside town of Rochve, the groggy daughter of the only innkeeper in the village would open her doors to the very same men she was letting go.
Rochve Village, the Black Rose Inn The first time, Meria tried to ignore it.
Rain beat at the windowpanes, seeping easily through the hole that poorly placed wooden panels failed to block and dripping down to a growing pool on the floor by her sleeping matt. She’d already slid it farther away twice, but any farther and she’d be on top of her mother and baby brother. Still, she didn’t want to wake again. She’d have to wake in only a few hours as it was.
Who came calling at this hour, anyway? Surely-
Again, the door sounded, though less powerfully this time, and she bit her lip, listening as her father groaned in the corner, stirring—though whether from pain or the sound at the door, she couldn’t tell. Whoever was out there had it worse than she, she told herself. They were in the cold and rain, with no shelter; no one else would come to their doors, not in this weather…
Before she could change her mind, she pushed herself to her feet, ignoring her tired muscles and protesting joints and stepping as nimbly as she could over her sleeping family members, creeping out the door to the room they shared and down creaking steps to the front.
When she opened the door, her first thought was that whoever it was had given up, so when she looked and spotted a retreating figure, she called out before any facts registered. Only when the man turned did her heart, like a skittish rabbit, leap up into her throat, choking off whatever might have followed.
The man was huge. And dark. So much taller than her broken, aging father, and like a shadow on the street. Was that a…
body he was carrying?
Meria nearly collapsed. As he came full around and approached, she meant to close the door, but couldn’t find the strength to move, her arms and legs frozen as a corpse and unresponsive no matter how she mentally begged them help her flee. By the time he reached her, she wished only that he would kill her painlessly; instead, he spoke. He was a foreigner.
It took her a moment to recognize the tongue he used. It was common, among foreigners; a language that had immigrated into the western colonies, and her father or mother could have spoken it, but at this moment, no words came to Meria’s tongue. Something about shelter, obviously, and the cold, but most importantly the man he was carrying. Her eyes flicked to said man, and her heart relaxed a fraction at the realization that he was, in fact, breathing.
“I-I’m…s-sorry, sir,” she blurted, “b-but I don’t…speak…” She swallowed hard.
“Please…breathe,” the man advised, his tone suddenly softer and his words recognizable, and her gaze darted up.
“You…speak…?”
His eyes, at least, were kind. “I did, some, once,” he said. “Not so well, anymore…but I mean no damage—harm. My…” He hesitated, looking for a word, “…master, needs warmth desperately. I have…no coin of your kind, but-”
“C-come, I’ll…” She shook her head, and motioned him along, “…follow me…”
Never let it be said that
this daughter of an innkeeper let freezing men lie cold on a street in a storm when there was shelter to be had. She led him through the moaning walls of the main building and around back, to a small, but empty stable. There, she turned to face him.
“This,” she said, running her hands over her forearms as prickles of chill formed on her arms from walking barefoot in the cold, “is…likely warmer than most of our rooms, and it doesn’t leak, ex…except for that far corner…” She pointed. “We haven’t had animals in weeks, so it shouldn’t smell…though it’d be warmer if we had a mare or stallion. You’d best lie with him on the hay,” she advised. “It’ll be softest and warmer than anything I can provide you…and I’ll…” She frowned, second guessing where that sentence was headed. Instead she said, “We have no spare sheets, but you may still find a riding blanket in one of those far storage cupboards…”
He bowed his head. “I have…no words to give you my thanks…come morning-”
She shook her head. “Sleep. Care for him…” ‘
That you didn’t kill me is thanks enough,’ she thought, but didn’t say. “Come morning, perhaps I can find a job for you that my father can no longer handle…” He nodded, and as she moved away, he set immediately to work.
Before leaving completely, though, she lingered at the door, watching, unbeknownst to him, with silent interest as he gently lay the smaller man down, sought out and retrieved the riding blankets spoken of and prepared a place to sleep. As his hands moved, not quite intimately but kindly and carefully over his companion, folding back wet hair from his face like one would from that of a child or lover, she silently wondered if ‘master’ had truly been the word he was looking for.
A/N: Ah, yes, so...here you have it, whether you wanted it or not, Baisyl finally plays the "damsel in distress" (even though, ironically enough, he's finally not a damsel). He's not particularly happy about it, but it can't be helped. Oh, and sorry to have him passing out again; it's really there to show how much energy magic takes out of people, especially those who aren't accostomed to it. Not supposed to be an insult to Baisyl's...durability. XD Posted a little early because...I don't have class tomorrow and I feel like it. Hopefully I'll be able to continue posting weekly for a while.
Also, many thanks go to
Nini who caught two errors in my last chapter, the first being that Baisyl actually referred to himself as a "boy" when talking about his past and his nurse...that was
my bad, completely. It was not supposed to be like that. Thank you for catching it, and she was right, too, I wrote the Roman numerals wrong; both of those things are fixed now.
If anyone catches any more mistakes, please tell me! This is unbeta'd, and I don't really want a beta, but I would very much appreciate people pointing out any obvious errors or plot holes. I make typos too and don't pretend to think of everything. :D
And finally, thanks to absolutely everyone who's been reviewing; I'd never be writing this fast if it weren't for you all. It makes me so happy to hear from you. :)
