Rain peered to the south as the gloom deepened. She knelt on the deck, her arms thrown over the railing. Her mind was a muddle. She wanted to be with Draken, but she worried about her brothers and sisters.
Just as importantly, she worried what her family would think of her. Myrrima came and stroked her back.
“Are you having regrets?”
“I’ll miss my family,” Rain admitted. “But I fear that they won’t miss me—not after what I said in town.”
“You spoke the truth,” Myrrima said.
“Some people hate the truth,” Rain said, “and they hate those who tell it even more.”
“Not all truths are equally pretty,” Myrrima said. “Sometimes a truth is too hard for people to bear. Your mother will mourn Owen, but she will miss you, too.”
That brought tears to Rain’s eyes. She hoped that it was true.
“It’s my little brothers and sisters that I worry about the most,” Rain said. “They need someone to look after them. And they’ll always think of me as the sister who ran away.”
“Perhaps the future will bring you back together again, in brighter days,” Myrrima said.
Rain shook her head. She was going back to Mystarria, where there was most likely a price on her head. She was going to war, and she could not see that the future held any light for her at all. It was darker than the skies above.
Rain could hardly imagine how they would handle the ship with just four adults and a child. This looked to be a grueling journey.
“There is still time to go back home,” Myrrima said, “if that is what you truly want.”
Rain didn’t have any good choice here. Whether she stayed or went, she’d lose something she valued more than life itself.
She sat for a moment, twisting the ring on her finger. It was an old thing, passed down from her grandmother. The band was broad, of cheap silver, and the large stone in it was blood-red jasper. It was the only heirloom that she had from the family.
She shook her head. “You should have seen the looks they gave me when I left. I’ve never felt such hatred. And if I stay, it would just grow, until my aunt Della drove me out once and for all. It’s better that I leave.”
The whole crew fell silent. Aaath Ulber sat on the captain’s deck, manning the rudder. He had not slept in well over a day, and finally he began to snore wonderfully loud.
And in half an hour the wind came, rushing down the hills from the deserts of Landesfallen, fanning out above the cool water. It was not much of a breeze, but it filled the sails fitfully, so that they luffed for a moment; then the new wood of the timbers creaked as the ship began to ease forward.
Rain worried. They hadn’t had time to take on much in the way of supplies, and she didn’t know where the company might be able to take on more. If she understood correctly, islands that had once supported passing ships might well be underwater.
But Rain had more immediate concerns. The river channel was still filled with debris, and in the starlight whole trees could lie hidden beneath the ale-dark waters. So Draken and Rain each lit a little lantern, and she sat on the prow, her feet dangling near the waves, and helped guide the vessel.
Her efforts did little good, for often now they would scrape or bump against hidden obstacles.
Aaath Ulber came awake, and sat on the captain’s deck. He expertly steered the ship, pulling down on the shaft so that the rudder lifted and did not catch on hidden trees. He seemed to relish the touch of the rudder, the water gliding beneath him.
With a thoughtful expression Aaath Ulber made slowly for the sea.
Myrrima voiced the concern that Mayor Threngell would try to stop them, but Aaath Ulber said, “There’s little that they can do. Their little rafts can’t form much of a blockade. Even if a couple of them do get close enough so that they try to board, I’ll just throw them back in the water.”
They rode the waves for nearly thirty-six miles, until they rounded a wide bend. Here, two monolithic hills of stone created a narrow passage less than a quarter of a mile wide—the perfect spot for an ambush.
Ahead, guttering torches lit the water, a string of them billowing smoke. Men upon rafts held the strait.
At the sight of the ship, they gave a warning shout and stood upon their rafts, waving cudgels—knotty limbs pulled from the water.
“They don’t know who they’re dealing with!” Aaath Ulber growled, and he set course straight ahead—aiming to plow through the midst of them. But the channel ahead was filled with debris—dead trees and bits of houses, all thrust up from the water so thick that it looked like rugged ground, broken by rocks and ruin.
“Father,” Draken cried, “they’ve blockaded the river!”
Rain recognized what had happened. The townsmen had tied logs together and strung them across the narrow strait, forming a dam. And as the tide had retreated, the dam had collected tons of debris.
“Turn the ship!” Myrrima shouted, but it was too late. The ship rammed the debris, scraping against tree trunks and the roof of a house, then ground to a halt as completely as if it had struck a beach.
They sat there.
“Those clever little schemers,” Aaath Ulber muttered. “I thought they’d wear themselves out trying to catch us, but they came up with a better plan.”
“Prepare to be boarded!” Mayor Threngell called. “Lower your sails!”
Rain saw him, two hundred yards off, on the far side of the debris; he had a torch in one hand. He stood at the edge of his boat and peered about nervously, trying to figure out how to make his way across the flotsam.
Aaath Ulber chuckled at the man’s predicament. The mayor and his men didn’t have proper weapons, and crossing the logjam looked all but impossible.
Aaath Ulber got up from his seat, strode to the prow, and pulled his old war hammer from its sheath on his back. “Leave them to me,” he said, urging Rain and the others to retreat a pace so that he would have room to swing his weapon.
Rain heard Myrrima begin to pray under her breath, calling upon Water. Need drove her, and compassion.
She spoke to the Power that she served, whispering, “If indeed you want me to go to war, then I beg of you, open a path before us.”
Peace filled Rain like an ocean, and suddenly Myrrima stood, as if she had made up her mind what to do.
She went to the prow of the boat and raised her hands, summoning water into her service. Draken stood at her back, holding his lantern aloft, and Aaath Ulber stood at her right.
“Come the tempest, come the tide!” she shouted.
Nearby, the water began to swirl beside the boat, as if a huge hole had opened up in the ground and was draining the ocean away. Debris swirled in the vortex. It began to whirl faster and faster, and the sound of roaring water filled Rain’s ears, as if a mountain river thundered through rocks.
“Whoa!” Draken shouted; Sage cried, “Mother?”
It was obvious that neither child had ever seen Myrrima make such a display of power before.
The ship creaked and wobbled, and waves began to build, lifting the flotsam so that it swelled and bucked.
Then suddenly water spouted up from the vortex, twisting and rising into the air.
Myrrima reached out and grasped the column of water, taking it into her hand, so that a plume of water twisted a dozen feet in the air, whirling from her palm, as if it were a staff.
She pointed her watery staff toward the logjam in front of the ship and shouted, “Come the tide!”
Suddenly a rushing filled the air, and all around her the water began streaming seaward. Water from the sound leapt up and flowed over logs and bracken as if a river had suddenly flooded.
Mayor Threngell saw what Myrrima was doing; his eyes went wide. “Run!” he shouted to his men. “They’ve got a water wizard!”
In the logjam, debris strained toward the open sea, and strange groaning sounds and rumblings erupted. The enormous pressure of the rushing tide suddenly snapped ropes that held the dam in place.