The bartender played his part well. Many mages took oaths to minimize magic use, but Alinean mages took it further than anyone and suppressed their abilities entirely. They said it was out of respect for the spirits. Alineans also had more mages than anyone else and simply couldn’t risk the backlash. Earthquakes and eruptions had already damaged the Alinean Islands enough. They’d tried to institute a similar policy in the Dunelands, which were just as fragile in different ways: low to the ground and close to the water. The policy hadn’t taken, though, especially after the ministers took over, and now the sight of magic made most Alineans grit their teeth.
So no one would question the bartender’s rant. Amara cringed, anyway. You just—you didn’t talk back to your betters. Not to ministers, not to marshals. How hadn’t they already whipped out their batons?
At least Amara could pass off her wincing as illness. She took a wobbly step toward the bartender. Her knees stung with sped-up healing, signaling Nolan’s return. No matter how much she hated that Nolan was in her mind, she could use his presence. She directed her thoughts at him, telling him what had happened. Stick around.
In the distance, a captain blew a whistle and shouted. A fraction of a second later, a collective no punctuated the sound of a crate smashing to the stones. The marshals ignored the accident. One grabbed Amara’s shoulder. “You match the description of someone we’re looking for. Immer, was it?” He watched her mouth.
Just answer. Easy.
Past the marshal, she saw movement—people staring at the crashed cargo, others ignoring it and continuing to work, and, more importantly, the ship’s captain and Cilla heading toward the boat at a fast clip. Amara stepped back. The harbor spell would react to Cilla’s curse; this time, the curse might be the one to go awry instead. She didn’t get the chance to warn her. Cilla walked safely past the boundary that had lit up earlier and that now sat on cracked cobblestones as a burned-out, wiggly line of ashes.
At least that was a stroke of luck: Amara must have knocked the spell out completely.
In a deceptively mild voice, another marshal said, “This ward was supposed to check for mages’ ink, like a minister’s or servant’s tattoo.” Or a princess’s. “Is there any reason you’re not talking, Immer?”
The bartender tsked impatiently. “Yes. Her stomach. The healers don’t know what’s wrong with her. Besides, you know Elig. Pathetic snowhounds. Too dumb to ask for water if their hair’s on fire.”
“She’s not all Elig, though.” One marshal eyed her hair, her skin. Northerners never realized just how many clans lived in the Elig south—they figured the only real Elig had pale hair and pale skin and pale eyes. Not like Amara, dulled down in every aspect. Light enough to be recognizable, too dark to be genuine.
“Just check her neck already,” the first marshal snapped, and he stepped forward. Another pair of marshals took off in Cilla’s direction, and, oh, how had Amara been so stupid to think they could leave the island so easily?
Amara breathed deeply. Protect Cilla. A trip like any other. She lowered one shoulder, letting the bag of supplies the bartender had given her drop. She caught the strap before it crashed to the stones and swung it against the nearest marshal’s shins.
His grip on her shoulder faltered. She tore loose and sprinted toward the ships. The marshals’ legs were longer, stronger. She heard their boots hit the stones behind her. If she could reach the water, she stood a chance. Either way, the distraction worked. The marshals near Cilla spun back toward Amara. Just a few steps—
A grunt came from behind her. A second later, pain exploded in the back of her head. A baton. Her vision blackened. She went flying to the stones, hitting them chin-first. Her momentum sent her rolling to the edge. Her vision swam, spikes of light stabbing through the dark. She urged her body to roll farther. She felt the edges of the stones in her back—saw the blurred outline of a marshal’s glove—and sucked in a breath before dropping over the edge of the dock.
The noise of the world abruptly died. The water drew her in whole, filling her nose and mouth. Just like before. At least this time her body didn’t panic. Her head felt like it’d split in two, but the pain ebbed. Nolan was sticking around as he’d said he would.
She waited another second or two, trying to stay calm. She closed off her lungs. She didn’t need to breathe. No matter how much her body told her she needed to breathe, she didn’t, she couldn’t, not yet.
Then she kicked. She’d gotten disoriented, but the harbor wall and the ship’s hulls were easy reference points. As she swam, she kept her eyes squinted, the dark of the water obscuring everything beyond a footlength or two. Underneath that ship. Around the pillars of the pier. Avoid the crags of wood. Swim past the anchors. Tear the waterweeds from her face.
Three ships farther, her lungs felt as if they’d pop. She went up for a quick breath. This close to the wall, no one saw her. Shouts came from behind her, where she’d dropped into the water.
She ducked back under. The calm came more easily this time. Her head no longer hurt. No one grabbed fistfuls of hair and forced her still. It was just her. And Nolan.
Amara swam toward the last ship and went to the aft, as far away from the harbor wall as possible. She came up for air a second time. The world rolled back in, voices and shouts, carts racketing along uneven stones, rope fenders thudding against the wood of the docks.
Cilla’s whisper-shout cut through all of it. “Amara!” A silhouette ran toward her, just the bobbing of her head along the ship’s railing.
Cilla was aboard safely. Amara’s distraction had worked. She brought her hands out of the water, relying on her kicking feet to keep her afloat. “You were waiting?” she asked awkwardly.
Cilla leaned over the railing. Even with the sky turning the murky gray of morning, it had to be hard to see Amara in the water. “I’ll get rope,” Cilla signed back.
“No. They might check the ships for me.” Amara tried to make her signs bigger, easier to see in the dark. “I’ll cling to the hull. Pull me up when you’ve left the harbor.” The lights on the boat allowed her to see traces of Cilla’s face, enough to notice her hesitance.
“Be safe,” Cilla signed.
Amara sucked in another breath and dove.
23
Nolan!”
Nolan started awake. His chair rolled away from his desk. His arms flailed, knocking his pen to the floor, the notebook dropping facedown after it.
“Are you OK? Are you—” Pat jumped at him, pressing her face into the crook between his shoulder and neck. Her arms squeezed him. Her lips moved against him, mumbling something he couldn’t hear. Her face was wet.
Nolan started to sign, then stifled his movements. He was back on Earth. He needed to speak Spanish, English. Anything but servant signs.
“Patli?” he said carefully. He rested one hand on her shoulder but didn’t push her off. “What’s going on?”
She yanked her head back. Her eyes were red, her face tear-stained. “I was two seconds away from calling 911, you idiot! You wouldn’t wake up. I was—I was shouting and—I thought you were having a seizure—”
“No. I was sleeping.” He swallowed a lump in his throat. The world dawned on him, both his own and Amara’s. Shit. The ship was taking off with her still clinging to the hull. Her head was above water, but waves battered her, seeping into her lungs. He needed to get back.