Quentin continued to improve. He was awake much of the time, if only for short stretches, but he was still weak and unable to leave his bed. It would be weeks yet before he could stand, longer still before he could walk. He remembered almost nothing of what had happened in the Crake or anything of Grianne’s healing use of the wishsong. But Bek was there to explain it to him, to sit with him each day, gradually catching small glimpses of the familiar smile and quick wit, finding new reasons with each visit to feel encouraged.
Bek spent time with Grianne as well, speaking and singing to her, trying to find a way to reach her, and failing. She had locked herself away again. Nothing he tried would persuade her to respond. That she had come out the first time was mystifying, but that she would not come a second time was maddening. He could think of no reason for it, and his inability to solve the riddle of her became increasingly frustrating.
Nevertheless, he kept at it, refusing to give up, certain that somehow he would find a way to break through, convinced that Walker had spoken the truth in prophesying that one day his sister would come back to him.
He spent stolen time with Rue Meridian, hidden away from the rest of the company, lost in words and touchings meant only for each other. She loved him so hard that he thought each time it ended and they separated that he could not survive letting her go. He thought he was blessed in a way that most men could only dream about, and in the silence of his mind he thanked her for it a hundred times a day. She told him that he was healing her, that he was giving her back her life in a way she had not thought possible. She had been adrift, she said, lost in her Rover wanderings, cast away from anything that mattered beyond the day and the task at hand. That she had found salvation in him was astonishing to her. She confessed she had thought nothing of him in the beginning, that she saw him as only a boy. She thought it important that he was her friend first, and that her deeper love for him was built on that.
She told him that he was her anchor in life. He told her that she was a miracle.
They spent their passion and their wonder when the night was dark and the company mostly asleep, and if anyone saw what they were doing, no one admitted to it. Perhaps for those who suspected what was happening, there was a measure of joy to be found in what Bek shared with Rue, an affirmation of life that transcended even the worst misfortunes. Perhaps in that small, but precious joining of two wounded souls, there was hope to be found that others might heal, as well.
So the days passed, and the Jerle Shannara sailed on, drawing further away from Parkasia and closer to home. Voracious sea birds circled the remains of meals consumed by sleek predators, and schools of krill swam from the wide-stretched jaws of leviathans. Far away on the Prekkendorran, the Races still warred across a plain five miles wide and twenty miles long. Farther away still, creatures of old magic slumbered, cradled in the webbing of their restless dreams and unbreakable prison walls.
But in the skies above the Blue Divide, the troubles of other creatures and places were as distant as yesterday, and the world below remained a world apart.
But even worlds apart have a way of colliding. Eight weeks into their journey, with the Four Lands still a long way off, Redden Alt Mer’s fabled luck ran out. The sun was bright in the sky and the weather perfect. They were on course for Mephitic, where they hoped to use the Wing Riders to forage for fresh water and game while the airship stayed safely aloft. Alt Mer was at the helm, one of three on duty for the midday shift, with Britt Rill working the port draws and Jethen Amenades the starboard. The other members of the company were asleep below, save Rue Meridian, who was looking after Quentin and Grianne in the Captain’s quarters, and Ahren Elessedil, who was weaving lanyards in one of the starboard pontoon fighting stations.
Alt Mer had just taken a compass reading when the port midships draw gave way with a sharp, vibrating crack that caused him to duck instinctively. It whipped past his head, wrapping about the port aft draw and snapping it loose, as well. Instantly, the masts sagged toward the starboard rail, the weight of their sails dragging them down, breaking off metal stays and pieces of crossbars and spars as they did so. Responding to the loss of balance in the sails and failure of power in the port tubes, the airship skewed sharply left. Alt Mer cried out a warning as both Rill and Amenades raced to secure the loose draws, but before he could right the listing vessel, it lurched sharply, twisting downward, sending Rill flying helplessly along the port rail and Amenades over the side.
They were a thousand feet in the air when it happened; Amenades was a dead man the minute he disappeared into the void. There was no time to dwell on it, so Alt Mer’s hands were already flying over the controls as he shouted at Rill to grab something and hold fast. Without bothering to see if the other had done so, he cut power to all but the two forward parse tubes and put the ship into a steep downward glide. He heard the sound of heavy objects crashing into bulkheads and sliding along corridors, and a flurry of angry curses. As the airship finally righted itself, he opened the front end of the forward tubes, reversed power through the ports, and caught the backwash of the wind in the mainsail to bring up her nose.
Holding her steady against the tremors that rocked her, he eased her slowly into the ocean waters and shut her down.
Britt Rill staggered to his feet, Ahren Elessedil climbed from the fighting port, and all the rest poured out through the main hatchway and converged on Alt Mer. He shouted down their questions and exclamations and put them to work on the severed draws, broken stays and spars, and twisted masts. A quick survey under Spanner Frew’s sharp-tongued direction revealed that the damage was more extensive than Alt Mer had thought. The problem this time did not lie with something as complicated as missing diapson crystals, but with something more mundane. The aft mast was splintered so badly it could not be repaired and would have to be replaced. To do that they would have to land, cut down a suitable tree, and shape a new mast from the trunk.
The only forested island in the area was Mephitic.
Alt Mer was as unhappy as he could be on realizing what this meant, but there was no help for it. He dispatched the Wing Riders to retrieve the body of Jethen Amenades, then called the others together to tell them what they were going to have to do. No one said much in response. There wasn’t much of anything to say. Circumstances dictated a course of action they would all have preferred to avoid, but could do nothing about. The best they could do was to land far from the castle that housed the malignant spirit creature Bek and Truls Rohk had encountered and hope it could not reach beyond the walls of its keep.
They made what repairs they could, detaching the draws to the aft parse tubes and reducing their power by one-third. All of a sudden they were no longer the fastest airship in the skies, and if the Morgawr was tracking them, he would quickly catch up. The Wing Riders returned with Amenades, and they weighed him down and buried him at sea before setting out once more.
Setting a course for Mephitic, they limped along for all of that day and the two after, casting anxious glances over their shoulders at every opportunity. But the Morgawr did not appear, and their journey continued uninterrupted until at midday on the fourth day, land appeared on the horizon. It was the island they were seeking, its broad-backed shape instantly recognizable. Green with forests and grassy plains, it shimmered in a haze of damp heat like a jewel set in azure silk, deceptively tranquil and inviting.
From his position at the controls in the pilot box, Redden Alt Mer stared at it bleakly. “Let’s make this quick,” he muttered to himself, and pointed the horns of the Jerle Shannara landward.