My command to prepare for Tiirdan’s Fury only stunned the crew a little bit. At least a few people even moved to obey without stopping to stare at me.
Little shook his head exactly once before turning for the main deck.
Ready stormrigs, he repeated, signalling with his hands. All injured belowdecks.
Once upon a time, before Strahl had come aboard, Evie had done his best imitation of a bosun, translating Little’s sign language into shouts which carried further along the deck. Now, he fell back into that role as though he’d never left it.
“Ready stormrigs!” he called, as loudly as he could. “Clear the wounded!” He hurried down to the main deck to assist. Little nearly moved to join him—but I snapped my hand out to stop him by the arm.
“The three of us need stormrigs, too,” I reminded him. “Go grab one for each of us. No Chamberlains today.” It was a grim joke between us—a warning I’d always repeated before inclement weather. Everyone on board my ship knew what happened to crew who fell overboard without a rig.
Little nodded sharply. No Chamberlains, he repeated. He headed for the nearest equipment locker, while I turned for the longhorn and switched to all channels aboard the ship.
“This is Captain Blair,” I said. I kept my voice as steady as I could manage. “All hands, prepare for severe weather. Heave-to, and secure yourselves. We sail through Tiirdan’s Fury. I repeat: We sail through Tiirdan’s Fury.”
Little returned with our stormrigs, and I hung up the line. I shucked my coat and tossed it over to him, before pulling on the harness. The rest of the crew had already begun hooking themselves to the lines fixed to the base of the masts. I took one of the lines for the quarterdeck, which was set into the deck a short distance behind the helm. If I ever descended to the main deck, I’d have to unhook myself; the last thing we needed was someone tangling a line in the wheel while Syrene tried to navigate the most dangerous storm known to Avalon.
The longhorn bleated urgently behind me. I spun to pick it back up, as Little yanked experimentally on my line, testing its strength.
The sharp tug nearly bowled me over, but I caught myself against the longhorn. “Blair speaking—” I began.
“What do you mean, we’re sailing through Tiirdan’s Fury?” Mr Finch demanded. “Captain, the ship is in no state to survive this! And if there really is a herald in there—”
“Mr Finch,” I interrupted calmly, “have you secured your tea sets?”
My chief engineer paused in momentary horror.
“Oh,” he said. “Oh no.”
The line promptly went dead. I entertained myself with the mental image of our dapper academic scrambling across the engine room to snatch at teacups.
Little patted me firmly on the back. This is going to get us killed, he signed at me.
I squinted at him. “Why aren’t you arguing me out of it, then?” I asked.
He flashed me a wry grin. I don’t have any better ideas, he admitted. Besides… you’re the captain.
“One of these days,” I told him, “we’re going to have to talk about your allergy to wearing a captain’s hat—”
The line rang again.
I snatched up the chatterbox with a heavy sigh. “No, Walther,” I said. “Whatever just broke, I am not buying you a new one.”
“This is Captain Altera of the Conflagration,” a rich voice replied. “You will put your captain on the line.”
My blood froze in my veins. I drew in a soft breath, forcing a hint of steel into my voice. “This is Captain William Blair of the Iron Rose,” I replied, far more calmly than I felt. At least, I thought, Captain Altera and his merry band of war criminals seemed somewhat less imposing when compared to the impossible storm that loomed before us.
“Blair.” Somehow, Altera made my name sound simultaneously like a friendly greeting and an unutterable curse. “Your ship is limping. You’re backed into a corner. Surrender now, and I’ll spare your crew. Refuse, and I’ll blow you out of the sky.”
I stifled a laugh at the obvious lie. Captain Altera had made his reputation on butchering innocent civilians; I somehow doubted he would spare any of the people who’d actually ruined his week. I cast a swift glance at Little. Finish preparing the crew, I signed at him. I’ll buy us some time.
He nodded sharply, and hurried down the stairs.
“Did I forget to mention we still have some of that Unseelie aether on the ship?” I drawled into the chatterbox. “It would probably react badly with our core if it exploded. It might even be enough to destroy the silver sword we have on board—forever. Do you really want to be the man who annihilated one of the holiest gifts of the Tuath Dé?”
“I’ve done worse,” Captain Altera replied smoothly. “Though I would certainly prefer to recover the sword instead. Allow us to board, and it need not come to that.”
Activity continued on the main deck below. I knew I was running out of ways to keep Altera talking; he was ruthlessly focussed on business, and not on idle conversation. But I had one more card to play.
“Would you spare me?” I asked him. I allowed a hint of cowardice into my voice.
Altera laughed incredulously. “Why would I spare you?” he demanded. “You stole the shipment we were supposed to collect. You killed my men. You shot down our outflyers. In what reasonable world would I deign to let you go, Blair?”
I’ve always had a talent for getting people angry with me. But there’s nothing quite like eliciting both anger and contempt to make a man rant at you despite his better judgement.
I doubled down.
“I didn’t want any part of this shipment to begin with!” I whined at him. “Now I’ve got some woman on board my ship pretending to be a Silver Legionnaire, ordering us all around and dragging us halfway across Avalon! It’s her you really want. Let me live and I’ll hand her over to you, silver sword and all.”
“What sort of gutless captain are you, Blair?” Altera sneered. “You’d rather hide behind a woman than face your end with dignity?” Pure disgust dripped from every word.
I had to hide a smile from my voice. “I don’t even know her!” I protested dramatically. “Why should I care what happens to her?”
The main deck had finally settled. Syrene had brought us dangerously close to the edge of Tiirdan’s Fury… but now, she turned the ship to plunge into it.
“This world is going to be a better place when I wipe the stain of your existence from it, Blair,” Altera said. “Make your peace with Death Victorious with what little time remains to you.”
“You know, Captain,” I mused, “you bring up a really interesting philosophical point that I hadn’t thought of yet.” I turned to consider the Conflagration, as though I could look the man in the eyes despite the great distance between us. I dropped the whine from my voice, now talking conversationally. “Once, I would have said I’m ready to tell my story to Death Victorious… but now, I think I might have a few stern words for them if I did meet them. In the last few days, I’ve discovered that I’m a shockingly sacrilegious fellow.”
“Blair.” Altera had clearly noted the change in our heading. His tone had sharpened. “What are you doing?”
“Making my peace with Death Victorious,” I told him mildly. “Or, well… with their herald, I suppose.” I smiled at the Conflagration. “You’re free to follow us if you want. Though you should probably make your own peace with Death Victorious if you do.” I paused. “What about you, Captain? Have you got any stories you’re ashamed to tell?”
Altera didn’t respond immediately. Perhaps it was just my imagination… but I thought I heard him hesitate.
“You’re bluffing,” he said finally.
“I never bluff,” I lied.
I couldn’t recall the last time I’d closed the longhorn in the middle of a conversation. I knew I’d never felt so much satisfaction while doing it, though.
There was no way Captain Altera could see me from where he was. But I waved goodbye to the Conflagration all the same, as we dove into the storm.
The first sheets of driving rain hammered into us in a sharp wave. Wind buffeted the Rose; the ship bucked like a wild griffon, rattling loudly beneath my feet. Midnight clouds reared up before us, roiling like the sea and snarling like a hungry beast.
I stared down the storm as Syrene took us in, clinging to the last manic joke I’d told Altera and using it to buffer myself against the intimidating sight. “Hold fast!” I yelled to the crew below. Little flashed his hands, and Evie echoed the order, struggling to make himself heard over the squalling winds.
Our windshield flared brighter and brighter at the prow, until the blue aetheric light was nearly opaque. Like a spear of light, the Rose’s bowsprit plunged us headlong into the inky abyss.
Everything went pitch black.
The darkness inside of Tiirdan’s Fury was absolute. Normally, I could make out dim shapes, even on a moonless night—but as soon as we crossed that barrier, I was as blind as the rest of my human crew. The reality of it jarred me; I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been unable to see anything.
Invisible rain lashed the deck in waves so strong that we might as well have been at sea. The wind screamed around us, wildly disorienting.
I knew then that we could never have dared this storm without Syrene. Everything in this world we’d wandered into wanted to end us—and everyone but our faerie navigator was currently flying blind.
Before I could quite adjust myself to the gloom, soul-shuddering lightning punctured the darkness. Stars swam across my vision despite my goggles, and I lurched on my feet, clutching at the railing. The thunder that followed wracked through my body and chattered my teeth. For just a moment, those wicked bolts illuminated our surroundings.
Tall, ragged poles rose up around us, clawing uselessly for the sky—almost as though we’d wandered our way into a forest. I blinked away the imprint they’d left on the back of my eyelids, staring in blank confusion. An instant later, it struck me that they were masts… but that made just as little sense. Though we’d passed scores of sunken vessels on our way into the Fury, all of them should have been far below us.
As Syrene navigated us out of a particularly thick storm cloud, an eerie haze of light broke through the darkness. My eyes adjusted… though I soon wished that they hadn’t.
Dead ships littered the clouds around us, floating on the air. Somehow, they’d run aground within the Fury, as surely as if they’d struck a reef. Cracked hulls and ruptured engines bled pearlescent aether, spilling it across the sky in uncanny ribbons. Rivers of shifting, shimmering aether lit our immediate path with a coruscating glow. The sight was as breathtaking as it was dangerous; a brush against any of that spilled aether would be worse than a lightning strike.
Tiirdan’s Fury wasn’t just a storm—it was also a graveyard.
Syrene struggled to guide us backwards through the Fury, using our one remaining propeller to push back against the wind. Somehow, she wove us through the gaps in that aether with a combination of brute force and accurate intuition, even as the air currents yanked us back and forth like a child with a toy. Her navigation brought us just close enough to one of the skeletal ships for me to see the blazing blue lights that flickered upon it. A cold chill shot down my spine as I recognised them for what they were.
Echoes still haunted the Coalition vessel, repeating their last living moments again and again. They scrambled up its splintered rigging, trying vainly to secure invisible sails in an endless fight against a storm that had already won.
I had plunged us off the edge of the map, into a realm where dead men sailed. At any moment, I realised, we might well join them.
Even with a faerie at the helm, we fought for every inch of progress, clinging to survival as the storm dragged us deeper. I might have prayed to the Lady of Fools, if I’d been feeling more religious—but I caught myself halfway through the thought and set my jaw grimly. I hadn’t lied to Captain Altera about reassessing my faith.
Instead, I clung to the ship for purchase, watching our sails for any sign of danger. We’d stowed most of them, and reefed the last two—but if either one of those remaining sails tore, we’d spin out of control in a hurry. Every last crew member we had standing would have to scramble in order to fix it.
Cold rain pelted us. Wind screamed in our ears. Very slowly, my shoulders tightened into a single mass of knotted muscle. The misery dragged on until it felt eternal.
Until, very suddenly, it stopped.
The pelting rain had dropped away, leaving us drenched and shuddering on the deck. Wind still whistled past us, tugging at the ship… but its howling had become strangely muted. Though the skies above us still blossomed with the light of countless destroyed airships, the lightning had retreated to the far horizon.
Syrene’s tall figure leaned over the wheel, now stripped of all her leaves and flowers. Four black eyes flickered back towards me. Her form radiated wary vigilance.
“Please tell me this is a good thing, Syrene,” I croaked out. My voice sounded strangely loud in my own ears.
“Tiirdan is not the only danger in these skies, Captain,” Syrene replied calmly.
As she spoke, a gentler breeze kissed my face… and a quiet dread woke in my stomach.
The rain began to pitter-patter once more—cold, but oddly refreshing. A pleasant, wordless singing strained at the edges of my hearing. Dark shapes flitted playfully alongside the Rose in a strange murmuration, following us lightly.
Something dived for the quarterdeck. I jerked back, clutching at my line as a long, feathered tail snapped past me. A soft, inhuman laugh trickled into my ears as that shape retreated back into the sky.
I had only the briefest impression of a feminine shape with dark grey skin and storm-cloud hair. The creature’s long aetheric tail shimmered bright against the darkness in shifting, iridescent colours, trailing behind her as though she were a bird of paradise. Her song floated in her wake, tingling at my scalp and racing down my spine to the tips of my waterlogged toes.
A sylph, I realised, through the growing haze in my mind. A large choir of them had congregated around our ship, threading their haunting voices together in unified song. They danced around the ship, darting in and out of reach to brush past the sailors on board. Most of them had swarmed the main deck, where the greatest concentration of sailors was currently visible.
Though I’d heard endless stories about sylphs, I’d never actually seen one until now. They were wild faeries, normally said to haunt the very edges of Avalon, where terrestrial winds escaped into Arcadia.
Then again, where else would Arcadia leak into our world, if not within Tiirdan’s Fury?
Dimly, I became aware that some of the crew had let go of their handholds to wander towards the railings. A few people reached overboard in dull wonder, trying to snatch at the shimmering tails that passed them. But their fingers passed harmlessly through those aether-tinged feathers; the sylphs were every bit as ephemeral as the rest of the clouds that surrounded us.
I hadn’t realised I’d let go of my own handhold until a sharp, sudden scream snapped me out of my reverie. A body tumbled past me from above, slamming into the deck below. One of my crew—I couldn’t tell who—had climbed up to the topgallant in an attempt to reach a passing sylph… and then taken a blind, ill-advised leap.
The rest of the crew had barely noticed.
A distant panic lent me just enough clarity to fumble for the bell on the quarterdeck. I rang it weakly, desperately hoping it might disrupt the fey singing that choked the air around us. A few people stirred in confusion, as though trying to remember a word that was just on the tip of their tongue. The bell’s clanging drowned out the hum in my own head, though, clearing the cobwebs from my thoughts.
I forced myself to speak past the thickness in my throat, choking out a plea. “Syrene,” I rasped. “Please.”
The faerie at our helm had melted away entirely now, in order to avoid the swooping sylphs; the wheel moved on its own.
“We… are… busy,” Syrene’s voice murmured tightly in my head.
The wind had only seemed to die away beneath that music, I realised. It was still physically present, screaming against the ship and chapping at my face. Syrene had no attention available to spare—she was using every bit of it just to keep the Rose intact against the Fury.
But there was at least one figure staggering purposefully across the main deck.
Evie’s blue sash was a weak splash of colour, compared to those mesmerising aether-tails. But there was something deeply comforting in the sight—a familiarity that sank in just past the haze.
His expression was steady. His lips were moving. And though I couldn’t hear the words, I knew the prayer he was murmuring to himself. It was the very first prayer he had ever uttered with sincerity. He had repeated it almost every day that I had known him, as the crew joined him to greet the sunrise.
“I give you that which is most precious to me,” I whispered along with him, “that you may offer it to others in turn; for mercy may be given a hundred times, and never is it any lessened in the giving.”
It didn’t matter, for the moment, that I’d lost my faith in the Seelie. The warmth of Evie’s steady, earnest routines grounded me back in the present.
Even as I watched, our halcyon closed his hand around Little’s arm, turning his husband to face him. Their eyes met—and the light of awareness sparked in Little’s face. His brow furrowed, and he turned his head to take in the reality of the situation.
Little’s eyes fixed upon the man who’d jumped from the topgallant. His eyes cleared, and he whistled sharply in an attempt to demand the crew’s attention. One or two people stirred from their stupor, frowning.
Evie stumbled over to each of them, still murmuring familiar prayers. Though the first woman was still standing, he clasped her hand in his as though preparing to draw her up to her feet. The simple, recognisable gesture made her blink, refocussing on Evie with a bit more clarity behind her eyes.
Evie nodded at her meaningfully. Somehow, I wasn’t at all surprised when she turned to the man beside her and clasped his hand in turn, moving her lips in a mirrored prayer.
Slowly—agonisingly—that small island of stability spread across the deck, like one of Evie’s morning affirmations.
It wasn’t going to be enough. I already knew that. But the sight sparked a renewed strength within me, nevertheless. My mind rallied, and I started searching for answers.
We needed to drive off the sylphs… but nothing we had could harm the wind.
My gaze fixed on the wheel, still turning on its own—and somehow, the answer struggled up to the surface of my consciousness.
Many things may harm us, Syrene had told me, but only aether burns our spirit.
I released the bell in front of me and threw my hands over my ears, staggering for the longhorn. Sylphsong wormed its way back into my hearing. I couldn’t bring myself to utter more prayers to the Benefactor at the moment; instead, I started humming the most offensive air shanty I knew as I fumbled for the proper channel with one hand. I accidentally alerted several wrong people before finally reaching the infirmary.
“Holloway speaking,” our physicker’s voice crackled over the line.
“Send Hawkins!” I shouted.
“What?” Holloway asked, sounding harried and perplexed. I greatly suspected that the chatterbox had still picked up the howling wind, even if those of us up above couldn’t hear it.
“Hawkins!” I reiterated, as loudly as I could. “Hawkins, Hawkins, Hawkins—”
The Rose turned sharply, ripping me away from the longhorn. I tumbled across the quarterdeck as the ship rolled, flailing for handholds as I went. Unfortunately, none presented themselves to me; I slammed into the railing instead, barely clinging to it as the deck slowly righted itself again.
I dragged myself back to my feet with a low groan, trying to catch the breath that had been knocked from my lungs.
A fluttering ephemeral figure crossed my eye-line. I stared, thunderstruck by the lovely aurora of colours that rippled before me. I reached for the shanty I’d been humming… but suddenly, I couldn’t remember the next line.
Someone was climbing up the stairs of the quarterdeck. That should have mattered to me, I suppose. I did turn my head for an instant to see Little urgently waving his hands at me in lovely, complicated gestures. I couldn’t quite remember what those meant, either.
The sylph’s sweet, wordless singing sank deep within me, calling to my most beloved memory.
Old aeronauts will tell you that sylphs like to lure unwary sailors to their doom with their womanly wiles. Given that I’d never been attracted to another mortal being in my life, I’d always assumed that I would be safe from the pouting, half-naked women described in those lurid stories.
But those stories are all very wrong—in case the aether-tails hadn’t already clued you in. Sylphsong isn’t limited to promising simple, carnal pleasures. The sound reaches deep inside of you, searching for the one thing you can’t deny. If you’re a sailor who does happen to like pouty, half-naked women, and you haven’t seen one in weeks, then I suppose that’s the sort of thing that you might happen to believe is waiting for you. But as I looked out over the railing, the song seized upon the only true love I had ever felt before.
I remembered a patch of perfect blue sky.
The sylph in front of me sang louder and more eagerly, as though aware that she’d snared me. The distant memory welled up within me, as fresh as the day I’d first experienced it. I wanted that horizon so badly I could cry. I wanted endless sky, as far as the eye could see. And there it was before me—all blue and beautiful, just waiting for me to grasp it.
I didn’t have to stop there. I could become part of it. I could fly like the sylphs, without even a deck beneath my feet.
I clambered onto the railing, as the wind whipped at my face. Something tangled at my feet, tugging at my back. I remembered the stormrig that still held me back, pinning me mercilessly to solid ground.
I unclipped the line.
Chamberlain. The name struck me just an instant later, as gravity—and poetic justice—yanked me over the edge of my ship. My stomach dropped. The wind’s howling kicked up around me again, as though it had never left. I remembered the captain of our marines on the HMS Caliban, tumbling into the air with that strange expression of terrified understanding on his face. I wondered if that same expression had appeared on my face as I began to fall.
You would think that a man in my position would reach for the railing. Any reasonable person would do that. And let me tell you, I am very tempted to pretend that I did. It would be far less embarrassing than the truth.
Instead, my panicked mind seized on a different detail entirely: Without the protection of our ship’s windshield, the storm had finally blown my hat right off my head.
In fact, I did not reach for the railing. I reached instinctively for the hat.
I’ve never claimed to be a reasonable man.
I barely had time to register the sight of Little’s horrified face staring down at me as I plunged into the storm below.
I screamed. It was a high, undignified sound. Terror raced through my veins as a whirling mass of glimmering sylvan figures streaked past me. Their song turned abruptly to raucous, bird-like laughter—as though they were children who’d just pulled a particularly clever prank.
Horrifying as it was, I suppose there are far less beautiful ways to die. My world became a riot of sound and colour, so disorienting that I couldn’t tell up from down. Each time one of those aether-tails brushed against me, I felt the breathless tingle of power against my skin.
Suddenly, something large and dark punched through the swirling colour—and crashed into me headlong.
Two powerful arms wrapped around me, holding tight. The person holding me jolted to an abrupt stop, nearly dropping me in the process. The wind swung us about like a pendulum on a string… but we didn’t fall any further.
Sylvan laughter now transformed into loud squawks of offence, as faeries darted away. Colour dissipated, and I saw the bleak, black sky around us once again.
I heard a metallic click at my back, followed by the hiss of a flare. Bright blue light erupted, illuminating the man who’d caught me.
“Sam?” I screamed incredulously. Shock quickly turned to manic relief. “Sam. You beautiful, magnificent bastard!”
Dimly, I realised that Little must have leapt overboard almost immediately after I’d jumped—there was no way he could have reached me otherwise. That idea was frankly intimidating. I wasn’t entirely certain I deserved such a reckless rescue.
Little rather had his hands full at the moment—he’d hooked me awkwardly onto his stormrig, but he clearly didn’t trust the equipment enough, given the arm he kept around my waist. His other hand still held up the emergency flare, signalling the crew above to start reeling us in like fish.
Little’s preoccupied hands were the only reason, I suspected, that I was not getting an infuriated lecture. For a man who’d just risked everything in order to save me, there was an awful lot of murder in his eyes as he glared down at me.
I believe we’ve safely established by now that I have no dignity. I wrapped my arms and legs around him, clinging like a terrified monkey as the sylphs returned to shriek at us with frustration. They were just as incapable of touching us as we were incapable of touching them, however—all we felt were a few breathless tingles of aether as they made their wordless anger known.
I nearly jumped out of my skin when several very real hands grabbed hold of me, hauling me over the railing. Little and I landed on the deck in a heap, wheezing for air. Terror gave way to debilitating relief, as I realised that I was going to live.
Evie landed atop us in short order, wrapping us both up into a desperate embrace. “You—both of you!” he managed. “Reckless, oblivious, foolish—”
“You know I take that as a compliment,” I mumbled weakly.
“Don’t you ever scare me like that again!” Evie said wildly.
Little cut off his husband with a firm kiss. Evie crumpled briefly, still hyperventilating against him.
Then, Little shoved to his feet and grasped me by the collar, hauling me up after him. Impossible fury raged in his eyes as he snatched my tricorne from my white-knuckled grip and proceeded to beat the ever-loving snot out of me with it.
“Little!” I wheezed, between pained yelps. “Will you… stop. Stop. Stop it! Stop it, that’s an order!”
He ignored me entirely, smacking the hat against the side of my head just hard enough to ring me like a bell. Finally, however, he shoved the hat at me and released it.
Really? he signed at me. Your hat? Your stupid, rusting hat?
I winced. “That’s fair,” I admitted. “Entirely fair.”
Little reached out and smacked his hand against the railing next to us. You grab this! he gesticulated at me. The railing! Not your rotting hat!
“Yes, absolutely,” I replied meekly. “I’ll work on that for next time.”
Evie carefully untangled me from Little’s stormrig, hooking me back up to my own line. As he did, Little hauled me forward into an unceremonious hug—perhaps a little more tightly than was strictly necessary. Our foreheads knocked together awkwardly. He was still shaking from the experience.
“Thank you, Sam,” I mumbled into his shoulder. “Thank you.”
Little nodded at me between laboured breaths. Very slowly, he forced himself to release me.
I looked down at the hat in my hand—and then back up at him. Very slowly and very sheepishly, I placed it back on top of my head. I’d hate to have gone through all of that trouble for nothing, after all.
The feeling of my hat back where it belonged helped me trick my addled wits back in order. I swept my gaze around the ship, trying to assess its current state.
There was at least a ragged semblance of order there now. The sylphs had been distracted by the spectacle of my tumble, I realised—but they were quickly forming up again. Their song began to trickle in, even more determined than before.
The cacophony of sylphs whirled back upon the ship, diving towards us in a wave. The first one swept onto the quarterdeck, fixing alien eyes upon me. I had no way to be certain—but I suspected that it was the sylph who had duped me the first time, looking to repeat her success.
An iridescent blur sped towards me.
A blinding flash of silver light erupted on the deck. A high shriek cut through the air; the sylphsong turned discordant and afraid.
I worked to clear the spots from my eyes… and saw that the sylphs had scattered on the wind. One wounded faerie lagged behind. Her beautiful aether-tail was nowhere to be seen; rather, her ghostly body wept a trail of sizzling, uneven aether where it once had been.
Miss Hawkins stood on the deck with her chin held deceptively high, ignoring her lingering pain. Her silver sword steamed in the rain, wavering like a mirage as it burned off faerie blood.
“You called for me, Captain?” she yelled over the storm.
Giddy bravado bubbled up from within me. “I just wanted your opinion on our friends’ impromptu performance!” I told her.
Miss Hawkins wrinkled her nose. “It’s a bit… shrill?” she offered.
I smirked. “No one likes a critic, Miss Hawkins!” I called back to her.
The crew stared at Hawkins. Several people inched back from her, intent on offering that sword a wide berth. Back on New Havenshire’s docks, Miss Hawkins had been too far away for most of them to make out that blade… but up close, there was absolutely no mistaking what it was.
I didn’t have time to discuss the matter with anyone. All I could do was assure people that she was worth trusting.
“Can you keep those things at bay?” I yelled at her.
Miss Hawkins flicked the silver sword into a wordless salute. I nodded sharply at her, and turned to address the rest of the crew. “Back to your posts!” I ordered. “Miss Hawkins has the sylphs!”
Sailors wearily scrambled to obey. We were, after all, still hurtling through the most terrifying storm in all of Avalon.
I glanced towards the wheel, still moving on its own. “Are we almost through, Syrene?” I spoke loudly, though I knew the faerie didn’t require me to do so.
“We have almost reached our destination, Captain,” Syrene’s voice murmured. As the sylphs cringed back from our ship, the wind’s howling picked up again… but I heard her response in my head, speaking with perfect clarity.
We pierced through the storm, into a stretch of calm, rainless sky. The air was colder here, though it was far less fierce; I shivered beneath my waterlogged clothing, trying to still the chatter of my teeth through willpower alone.
Black storm-clouds roiled at every possible horizon, hemming us in. Strange flashes of lightning crackled like sparks in the distance, as the ship drifted lazily upon the still air.
Down on the main deck, the blazing star that had been Miss Hawkins slowly sputtered out. She leaned wearily against one of the masts, wiping water from her face. Nearby, Syrene’s form melted back into view at the helm.
Syrene had often adapted her aesthetic to mirror our environs. I’d grown used to that. But nothing in the storm that raged around us could explain the visage that she wore now. A riot of budding flowers adorned her ankles, wrists, and fingers, coiled about her like jewellery. Long, emerald green grass bloomed across her body in a sinuous gown. A thick braid of autumn leaves cascaded down her back, in a riot of crimson and gold. Frost spiralled along the bark of her face in intricate patterns, condensing into an icy coronet across her brow.
I stared at her, slack-jawed, until my sluggish brain reminded me how speech worked.
“I th-thought you said we were almost through?” I stammered out. “We’re s-still in the Fury.”
Syrene locked the wheel into place, now stepping back from it. She turned her head to consider me. “No,” she corrected me calmly. “We said that we had almost reached our destination.”
Syrene glided to the rearmost section of the quarterdeck, moving with liquid grace. She settled herself there, still and quiet, staring out into the depths of the Fury. I stumbled over to join her, following her gaze… but I couldn’t see anything out there in the dark.
I did hear something.
There was a new cadence to the wind—a deep rise and fall that made me furrow my brow. The dark clouds shifted strangely, moving against the storm.
But they weren’t… precisely clouds, I began to realise. No. They were wings.
A massive form cut through the darkness, rising from those swirling depths. Even at our distance, I couldn’t comprehend its size. Instead, I caught bits and pieces: the flash of a huge golden eye; a tuft of oily black feathers; a storm-cloud curved into the shape of a talon.
The sight was appropriately humbling. That talon could have gripped the Iron Rose like a rabbit. It could have crushed us like an afterthought.
A yawning beak opened within those clouds. A thunderous cry split the air—and a bolt of lightning lanced towards us.
I dived instinctively for cover, throwing my arm up to shield my eyes… but nothing struck the Iron Rose. Instead, that blinding light faded, and my eyes began to adjust.
A tall humanoid figure perched upon the railing, clutching the wood with birdlike talons. His skin was such a deep black that I could barely make out his features—like the storm-clouds that surrounded us, there was something about him that drew in what little light there was. A cloak of cloud-like feathers spilled down his back, shimmering with impossible hues of green and gold. Amber bird-like eyes peered out from the darkness of his face, considering Syrene with uncanny gravitas.
Awed silence blanketed the deck. I became aware that several people had instinctively dropped to their knees, cowed by the very real presence of one of the Winds of Fortune.
I was already on the ground. That was probably for the best. Suddenly, I wasn’t entirely certain that my knees would hold me up.
Tension hummed on the air as Tiirdan and Syrene locked eyes.
And then—I swear on all that’s holy—the herald of Death Victorious bowed his head to our navigator.
“Greetings, Envoy,” Tiirdan addressed her, in a deceptively soft voice. “We are pleased to see you well.”