Well, she admitted with an inward sigh, no reasonable person could fault them for that. For her part, she was growing accustomed to the Furiádhin in this much only, that sometimes when she looked at them she saw men, not monsters. Yet they were just as terrifying in what remained of their humanity as in what they had become: Goezenou, that bottomless well of hunger and devouring need; Dyonas, fierce, brilliant, and utterly heartless; and Camhóinhann, the enigma, the riddle she had no wish to unravel.
They had eldritch powers, did Ouriána’s priests. They could do uncanny things. But the worst by far, in Winloki’s estimation, was an ability to inflict frenzy or paralysis, to compel the temple guards and acolytes to absolute obedience, without lifting a hand or saying a word.
With that thought, the wind suddenly felt colder and sharper; the Princess shivered and hugged the tattered brown cloak more closely around her. No one had seen fit to chastise her, but she felt the threat of it always. She countered that fear by resisting the priests in every way that she could, though her gestures of defiance had so far been met with perfect indifference. Sometimes she did sense strong passions moving between them, for which she was the apparent source—but it seemed that she roused those emotions merely by being, not by anything she did or said.
At sunset, the wind dropped, the sea turned a sullen red, and those who had visited the town returned.
“We looked at many boats,” said Rivanon, the chief acolyte, “and some were large enough and sound enough to suit our purpose, but none that the fishermen were willing to sell.”
Which means that they are going to steal somebody’s boat, Winloki thought bitterly, watching the men break up their temporary camp and prepare the horses for the short ride into town. It was not to be supposed that Camhóinhann and the rest would allow the wishes or the rights of mere fishermen to stand in their way.
By the time they reached the outskirts of the town, a huge lopsided moon hovered over the housetops, and the peaked roofs made long shadows on the ground. Winloki rode through the narrow, unpaved streets breathless and watchful. Bats squeaked, swooping overhead; a door slammed in another part of town; yet the way to the harbor seemed strangely quiet. No light leaked out between closed shutters or glowed behind windows made of glass or horn. Even a little tavern they passed—which ought to have been overflowing with business at this early hour—was as silent as a graveyard.
Winloki swung around in the saddle to accuse Dyonas. “What have you done to the people who live on these streets?”
“The people in these houses will sleep until morning,” he replied carelessly. The acolytes riding before and behind him were mere blots of darkness, but the robes of the priests had turned a deep wine-red.
“Why should we wish to harm them? They are less than nothing to us.”
Stung by the utter indifference in his quicksilver eyes, she could not resist challenging him. “Then why meddle with them at all? It can’t be that you fear these people.”
“If the whole town rose up against us they could not stop us. But were they to cause us any inconvenience—that would be their misfortune.”
The words she had been about to say froze in her throat. The image of Camhóinhann riding down Haakon and Arvi at Tirfang remained painfully clear in her mind; she knew that just as the Furiádhin had killed to take her, they would surely kill to keep her.
At last they came to the little harbor. In spite of her fears Winloki looked eagerly around her. Though she had no actual memories of sailing vessels, she dreamed of them often. Yet her first glimpse of the fishing boats brought a stab of disappointment. These shabby wooden tubs, with their weathered hulls and fishy odors, fell far short of her expectations—and the way they rose and dipped with every movement of the water made her stomach feel queasy.
After a brief inspection, Camhóinhann singled out one of the larger boats. She had two masts and was nearly as broad in the beam as she was long, but he seemed to think her seaworthy. Several of the men jumped lightly on board, where they began doing things with ropes and canvas that Winloki could in no wise understand. The rest unloaded the packhorses, unstrapping bedrolls, saddlebags, and knapsacks.
Through all this activity, Winloki sat with her hands clasped together under her cloak, struggling with a sickening panic.
I simply can’t do it, she told herself, terrified that once she left Skyrran soil she would never find her way back again. If they mean to kill me, let them do it here. With such thoughts running through her brain, when Marrec reached up to help her down from the saddle she instinctively thrust out both hands to stop him.
“Walk or be carried,” hissed a rough voice, and looking back over her shoulder, she saw Goezenou watching her with malign satisfaction. “Either way, you will go aboard.”
The idea of being touched by his snakeskin hands made Winloki physically ill. She plucked up her courage and slid down from the saddle—disdaining the young guard’s offered assistance—and stood on unsteady legs, willing them not to give way.
“You are robbing some family of their livelihood.” She tried to say it haughtily, but her voice wobbled and came out much smaller than she had intended.
“And enriching their neighbors,” said Dyonas, coming up beside her. “We have no time to become horse traders—it could be weeks before we found anyone with the price of so many fine horses in a town the size of this one. We will leave them behind, along with their saddles and bridles, for whoever finds them in the morning.”
At last everything was ready. Tents, food, and other supplies had been transferred from the horses to the boat, and Winloki had reached the point where she had no choice but to follow them on board.
Not like a coward and not like a prisoner, she decided, squaring her shoulders and lifting her chin. She accepted the offer of Efflam’s hand getting over the gunwales, allowed somebody else to guide her to a seat. The remaining men scrambled over the side after her and found places for themselves in the bottom of the boat.
Someone moved between her and the moonlight, and Winloki looked up to see Camhóinhann standing over her, with his white hair floating on the wind and his legs braced against the pitching and tossing of the boat. The light made a halo around his head.
“Where are we going?” she asked, over the frantic drumming of her heart. “Will we be sailing to Phaôrax?” She had little idea of geography, and only the vaguest notion of distances.
“No. The seas have lately become perilous, even for us. It would be folly to attempt a long voyage, and doubly so in a fishing boat.”
Folly however you look at it, Winloki thought. Yet she could see that the men were pleased and excited, as if they were quite at home in this preposterous vessel, as if the ocean might be something more to them than a watery wasteland.
Catching her eye, Marrec smiled encouragingly. “We are islanders all—and islanders know the sea like shepherds know sheep, or farmers the soil. Have no fear: we will take you safely across.”
As the boat slid silently away from the dock, the lights burning in distant parts of the town gradually receded until they were nothing more than yellow sparks shining in the dark. Long before they reached deep water, Winloki had already resigned herself to drowning. The way the boat groaned and protested, it sounded as if she were being battered to death by the waves. One moment a great billow would lift her up, up, up, under that tipsy moon. The next there was nothing beneath her but air, and the boat would drop, hitting the milky water with stunning force, sending up fountains of drenching spray. The sensation of falling was so unnerving, the Princess was convinced each time that the boat would be pitched with all on board into some deep abyss of the sea.