Survivors: Book 4 Circles of Light series (31 page)

Gan had been watching
one of Kasmi’s officers signalling with the system of flags which
had greatly intrigued him early in their journey although he had
yet to learn their meanings. He too turned slowly, scanning the
ominous swell of the sea in every direction.

‘Where is Eternal
Star?’ he murmured.

They looked at each
other, Ren’s euphoric relief that the storm had ceased gone in the
realisation that perhaps Eternal Star was lost. A flurry of wings
brought Piper beside them. Her expression was solemn.

‘Kasmi is distraught,’
she told the two men. ‘His youngest brother was apprentice
shipmaster on Eternal Star.’

‘What happened?’ asked
Ren.

Feathers fluttered when
the gijan shrugged. ‘It was too dark to see anything at all. The
noise of the wind and the sea too loud to hear. But Culinth knew
when Eternal Star hit a reef. She cried out and Kasmi knew.’ She
shivered, mantling her wings about herself. ‘We think the crew
could not live long in the water.’

Ren peered more closely
in the early light. Piper seemed very young, the dark eyes shocked
by the recent events. He put an arm across her
shoulders.

‘Willow and Leaf are
all right?’ he asked.

Piper leaned against
him for a moment. ‘We were all bumped about in that little house.’
She extended an arm between her wings and displayed bruises
darkening the dappled skin from the back of her wrist to her
elbow.

Gan bent to examine the
arm. ‘Pallin will have something to soothe that. Are your siblings
bruised too?’

Piper managed a weak
smile. ‘Yes, but Navan’s got a cut head and his eye is swollen
shut. He fell against a corner of the chart table.’

‘Right. We’ll find
Pallin and see what help we can be to anyone who has taken
hurt.’

‘Pallin is with that
strange man – the cook.’ Piper shivered again. ‘They cut off a
man’s arm.’ She pointed towards the hatch to which they’d been
heading.

Ren caught her hands
giving them a little shake. ‘Go back to your siblings,’ he began
but he saw Taseen emerging shakily from the hatch behind the
gijan.

He touched the mage’s
mind and Taseen responded. ‘I know Ren. Let the gijan come to me.
I’ll keep them busy. You help where you’re needed more.’

Piper was already
turning towards the old man who held his hand out to
her.

‘I know you don’t like
to be close cramped,’ he said aloud. ‘But it is too cold and
unsteady for me up here. Come below and we’ll leave the hatch and
door open for your comfort. I believe I’ve remembered some riddles
to which you’ll never guess the answers.’

Ren watched Taseen
retreat below followed by Piper. Leaf and Willow landed at the
hatch as Piper’s head disappeared.

‘They use mind speech
between themselves – it’s obvious,’ Ren said to Gan. ‘But they have
so far refused to touch our minds.’

‘Except for the
Dragons,’ Gan corrected.

Ren frowned. ‘Hmm. And
I’m sure their minds are in fact very powerful, judging by the
shielding with which they’ve protected themselves.’

As Ren appeared likely
to stand clinging to the rail lost in abstract thought, Gan pulled
ungently at his arm. ‘Let’s see what we can do.’

They found Pallin and
the ship’s cook in one of the long cabins used by the crew. A boy
stood holding a lantern which gave them some precious light. The
man on the bunk died as Gan and Ren drew close and Pallin swore
long and hard. The cook was silent for once, drawing a rough
blanket over the man’s body. The boy with the lantern stepped back,
the light revealing a mangled arm tossed onto a heap of blood
soaked cloths. Pallin’s knees cracked as he straightened. He saw
Gan and Ren then and shook his head.

‘Couldn’t stop the
bleeding,’ he said. ‘Even before he took the arm right
off.’

He stumbled into Ren
when the ship tilted again. He looked back at the cook gathering up
various kitchen implements.

‘He’d make a damn good
man to have around in a fight.’

Ren stared at the
cleaver the cook was wiping clean of blood and then back at Pallin
in disbelief.

‘He did his best. He
knew all the bits of that poor lad’s arm – muscles, blood tubes. He
tried getting them back together before he took the arm
off.’

Gan nodded. As Captain
of the Lady Emla’s Guards he’d seen fighting in the Sapphrean
ganger wars as well as more recently in the Domain of Asat. Ren had
never been among men screaming with pain from unspeakable injuries
from which they took too long to die. The cook suddenly gabbled
something in the direction of the boy. The lad thrust the lantern
into Gan’s hand and shot down the cabin to the ladder.

The cook put the
severed arm under the blanket covering the corpse and got to his
feet. He said something, in a muted tone barely recognisable from
one whose usual method of communicating was by scream and bellow.
Then he shrugged and followed the boy up to the deck, Pallin at his
heels. Gan raised the lantern and extinguished the flame. He
motioned Ren ahead of him to the ladder.

The sky had brightened
to a dull pewter, low clouds still hurtling over the ship. They
found men and women working on the fallen mast, freeing ropes and
clearing rolled sail cloth. A still figure lay against a raised
hatch, wrapped in a blanket, only the bare feet visible. Other crew
members squatted nearby. Ren and Gan went across to help the two
men who were bandaging their injured colleagues. One man looked up
with a smile of gratitude as Gan reached into the basket of
remedies and took out a roll of clean linen.

There were a couple of
broken bones, many sprained wrists and ankles, bruises and
contusions and a few minor cuts and gashes. The worst was a woman
who had several long splinters embedded in her back: she had been
close to the mast as it split. She was shocked, her skin waxen and
cold. Her lips were bloody where she’d bitten them against the
pain. Gan beckoned one of the other men over, spreading his hands
in the universal gesture of helplessness as he looked at the
woman’s back. The man nodded and gave a shout across the
deck.

The cook appeared,
instantly dropping to his knees beside the woman. He touched the
area where three thick splinters protruded with a gentle finger and
sat back on his heels when the woman went rigid. The boy who’d held
the lantern in the cabin below stood nearby and the cook gave him a
quiet order. Within moments the boy returned from his errand
holding two flasks out to the cook.

Gently, he raised the
woman’s head, pouring liquid from one flask into her mouth. He
recapped the flask and sat, his hand rhythmically stroking her face
and brow. Slowly, her eyes closed and the cook reached for the
second flask. He poured a little liquid over her back and bent to
extract the first splinter. The ship rolled and shuddered and the
cook bellowed. A crewman leaped to his side, bracing himself
against the injured woman to keep her as still as possible. Gan
also knelt, lending his strength to the crewman’s in an attempt to
keep her immobile. Gan swallowed when the first splinter
emerged.

It was long: what
damage had it done inside her body? He wished suddenly that Tika
was here; he had a feeling this poor woman was going to need more
help than the cook could provide. He was peripherally aware that
Ren had joined them when he saw a pair of hands gently close around
the woman’s head. At least Ren could keep her asleep while the
splinters were removed. The cook’s fingers moved with an
astonishing sensitivity as he located places where splinters were
embedded that had snapped off below the flesh.

Red blood covered the
woman’s back, the cook’s hands, Gan’s trousers, and Gan was
reminded of Tika again. Only she had been covered in the lavender
blood of the gijan. Sitting on the wet swaying deck in the middle
of the great sea, Gan prayed to the stars that Tika and Farn had
found shelter from the storm and were safe.

Chapter
Eighteen

The Dragons waited
through the day until at last Seela mind spoke the gijan. Her eyes
whirred mauve and silver as she heard how the storm had caught the
ships still among the infamous reefs. Tika and the others watched
the great purple Dragon, making no attempt to hear her
communication with the gijan but sensing Seela’s agitation.
Eventually the tenseness of Seela’s body relaxed and she settled
more naturally on their small refuge.

‘The storm makes it
difficult to focus,’ she told them. Her prismed eyes flashed again.
‘They lost one of their ships on the reef – the one called Eternal
Star.’

‘The one with the brown
wings,’ said Farn.

‘All the crew were
lost. There are many on the remaining ships who were hurt a little
and one ship is damaged. Leaf said they are going south east to try
to get out of the storm’s reach but once they are in quieter waters
they will have to make repairs before they can
continue.’

‘What of the injured?’
Tika asked. ‘Gan? Taseen?’

‘They are unharmed.
Leaf was upset about a man having his arm cut off. She said he
died. There is a woman – Leaf thinks there are pieces of wood
inside her but the child is confused and upset. She wants to return
to us.’

Tika glanced at
Maressa. The air mage was already trying to locate the ships
through the mind signatures of those she knew on board Spiral Star.
She sat cross legged against Brin’s chest, her eyes unfocused for
some time.

‘The weather is
disturbed and distorted over a large area,’ she told them finally.
She frowned. ‘Culinth is blocked to me – I don’t understand why.
Ren said they are all shaken but unhurt.’

‘Should we go back and
try to get Ren and the others off the ship?’ Tika
queried.

Maressa shook her head.
‘Ren said Culinth thinks the storm may well swing back and hit them
from another quarter. It would be too great a risk.’ She looked at
Seela. ‘Are the gijan coming to us?’

Seela rattled her great
wings against her back. ‘They are. They would not listen to me.
They were very afraid on the ship – felt trapped as badly as before
their wings erupted.’ She turned her head to stare to the west. ‘It
is morning where the ships are: the gijan will not reach here until
darkness covers us again.’

Farn and Storm both
shifted in alarm.

‘What if the weather
turns bad again?’ asked Storm. ‘Will they be able to find us in the
dark if the rain comes?’

‘I’ll watch for them,’
Maressa offered, settling more comfortable against Brin.

Khosa abandoned Tika’s
lap and squirmed between Maressa and Brin for better warmth and
protection from the wind. She slitted her eyes at Tika who had to
smile. The Kephi truly detested and loathed being wet and yet she
hadn’t complained once through that dreadful night despite being
nearly drowned. Storm must have picked up Tika’s sympathetic
thought.

‘The water is quiet
enough for me to find fish,’ he suggested.

Concern again emanated
from Seela.

‘Be very careful then,’
she said. ‘Hunger will not bother us yet so there is no need for
you to fish.’

‘But a little warm food
would do us some good,’ Sket pointed out.

Seela considered his
words. ‘You are right. I forget that humans need to feed so
often.’

‘They only have such
tiny stomachs,’ Brin agreed.

Farn ambled down the
small beach with Sket to collect the fish Storm brought while Seela
breathed fire onto the pile of pebbles they’d used to warm
themselves earlier.

‘What do you make of
the Bound Ones Leaf told us of?’ Tika asked, watching Sket clean
the first fish.

‘They are not in my
memories.’ Brin turned his head enquiringly towards
Seela.

She sneezed, smoke
wisping from her nostrils. ‘There is no memory of them in my mind
either, nor do I know of the Ancient Elders.’

‘Did Leaf tell us
exactly what Taseen said? And is there a reason the gijan will not
mind speak any except you?’

‘Indeed she told you
what Taseen said correctly,’ Khosa confirmed. ‘But these gijan are
untrained and will remain so unless there is even one single Elder
left to instruct them.’

Tika frowned, digging a
hole in the sand with a shard of flint. ‘You said Namolos wanted
them brought to him – does he know how they must be
taught?’

Khosa was silent for so
long Tika craned around Brin’s chest to see if perhaps the Kephi
slept only to meet turquoise eyes. Khosa’s mind tone was quiet,
almost uncertain.

‘I know only what I
have been told when Namolos walked my dreams.’

‘Only what he chooses
you to know then?’

‘Yes.’ Khosa’s repy was
the faintest thread of thought.

Tika tried to follow
her own line of reasoning. ‘And Namolos has not spoken to you or
walked in your dreams?’ she asked Seela and Brin.

‘We know only what Grek
has told us of him,’ Seela confirmed. ‘But Star Singer spoke warmly
of him and I don’t believe he would lie.’