Water & Storm Country (25 page)

And I’m left as alone and muddled as the
puddles forming in depressions on the decks. I just let the water
dampen my hair, stream down my face, soak through my clothes.
Because my world’s been turned upside down. A bride from ice
country? Something my father has to tell me about my mother’s
death? When did the sky become the ocean and the ocean the sky?
When did the sands from storm country pour onto our decks and the
saltwater and fishes become the beach? When did I become so
stupid?

And then she’s there, watching me, clinging
to the mast, as drenched as I am. She motions to The Mermaid’s
Daughter and I turn to look. The solitary boat is being hauled
aboard, along with its contents: the bags of dried seaweed.

I nod and turn away from her, because I feel
a presence nearby. Hobbs is behind me, looking at her, and then at
me. “I’m all over you,” he says.

I push past him, back to my cabin.

W
ith Passion
nibbling grass around the trunk below me, I watch the Soakers from
a branch high above. Many men come ashore, moving off into the
woods a safe distance from me, presumably to gather food and water.
A couple men scoop seaweed into bags. The stuff they trade to ice
country for the children. Don’t they know what we’ve done to the
Icers? That we’ve killed the Icer King?

A few blue-clad men mill about on the ships.
Officers, giving orders. Two stand out, because they’re keeping so
still, next to each other. From a distance, they are but two blue
lines, one somewhat taller than the other. They appear to be
watching the seaweed gatherers.

Eventually, however, when the seaweed boat is
returning to the ship and the rain has begun to fall, the two blue
men split apart. The way the small one walks reminds me so much of
the boy I almost killed.

You have to decide…

My father’s words run over and over in my
head as I climb down, never touching the ground as I climb onto
Passion’s back. Never has a choice been easier, I realize as we
gallop back to the camp.

I’ll kill that Soaker boy if it’s the last
thing I do.

~~~

Our tent—no,
my
tent—despite its
relatively small size, seems enormous with only me in it. I stretch
out onto my back and extend my arms and legs as far as I can in
each direction, but there’s still so much empty space. Space
usually filled by…

I can’t be here. Not tonight. Or at least not
until I’m so exhausted that the moment I slip inside my feet
collapse beneath me and I fall asleep before I even hit the
ground.

I leave with that goal in mind, wearing my
Rider’s robe, pulling the hood over my head against the wind and
the rain, which comes in waves.

The night is quiet, save for the rain patter
and occasional murmured conversations of the border guards. I
consider going to the stables, but I won’t begrudge Passion her
rest, not after our long run across storm country.

To my surprise, a ridiculous thought springs
to mind. I picture myself sneaking into Remy’s tent, waking him up,
forcing him out to keep me company. A girl with less pride might
take the thought seriously, but I cast it away before it can so
much as dig a single root into my head.

Instead, I make for the edge of camp. I pass
by two border guards, who are sitting and smoking pipes. They stand
quickly, open their mouths as if to refuse me exit from the camp,
but then close them even quicker when they realize I’m a Rider.
Privileged to come and go as I please.

I ignore them as I stride away.

With an occasional burst of moonlight through
the clouds, and from memory, I guide myself into the forest,
relying on outstretched arms and cautious feet to avoid colliding
with anything dangerous.

Thankfully, the place I’m looking for isn’t
too far in, and I know I’m close when I hear the unceasing gurgle
of the creek I drank from earlier that day. When I slide my back
down the trunk of the tree, I’m not surprised to find the ground
dry beneath me.

My father died here today.

“Father…” I say aloud, because I’m tired of
hearing only wind and rain.

Yes,
he answers, on the wind. I know
it’s not really him, but I can still hear his voice.

And then:
I love you, Sadie.

“I love you, Papa. I’m scared without
you.”

You are strong. Stronger than even your
mother was.

“I’m not.” Am I?

Your choice and your choice alone…

“What does it mean, Papa?”

It will change
everything
…

“What will? What?”

The voice deepens, darkens, and it’s not
Father’s voice anymore, but something that lurks, that tears at
flesh and gnaws at bone and enjoys the sound of screaming.
You
mussst kill the onesss who dessstroyed your family.

“The Soakers?” I ask the night.

Yesss. But not only. Ssstab and ssslice.

“The Icers?” I say, feeling the wood close in
around me.

Yesss. Cut and crusssh.

“Who are you?”

I am vengeance and retribution.

“What? No? Papa says—”

I am life and death.

“You’re not…you’re—”

I am you!

And with a final burst of wind the tree
shakes, spraying droplets of water from its leaves, marring the
previously untouched circle of dry earth. The heaviness lifts from
my shoulders, the clouds part, and the moon shines, shines, shines,
full and bright, surrounded by twinkling stars on a night that’s as
perfect as my father was.

The forest is evil.
As usual, Father
was right. Are all the stories true then? That there’s something
that lives in the forest, some Evil that preys on the weak, the
brokenhearted, filling their minds and souls with dark thoughts.
And if so, has it entered me?

Screams shatter the night, and they’re as
real as the rough bark of the tree behind me. Death has
arrived.

~~~

I charge through the forest, tripping on tree
roots and slapping away branches that lash at my face like whips.
Tonight there’s more evil afoot than what lurks in the forest.

Even from a distance, I’m surprised to find
the camp quiet and black. There are no Soakers brandishing torches
and swords, burning and killing. No one at all. What evil is
this?

As I approach the edge of the camp, voices
murmur from within. Tired voices. Surprised voices. The screams
woke my people.

Where are the guards, the border watchmen I
saw earlier? I freeze when I see them.

Two black lumps block my path between the
tents. One of them groans and rolls over, his stomach slick with
blood. The other’s not moving.

Gard appears behind the fallen guards, his
black robe thrown back from his face. A half-dozen other Riders
trail behind him. The war leader pulls up short when he sees me.
His eyes travel down to the guards, back to me. “Sadie?”

“They need help,” I say, my voice coming out
as croaky as a frog. “Hurry.”

“Healers!” Gard yells. “We need Healers!”

As the Riders spring into action, securing
the area, scouring it for intruders, for clues, making room for the
Healers, who arrive with bandages and herbs and steel in their
eyes, I wonder to myself:
Was it the Evil from the forest? Was
it me?

A heavy hand on my shoulder startles me away
from my thoughts. Gard looks down at me. “Sadie. What did you
see?”

“Nothing,” I say. “I saw nothing.”

~~~

“What were you doing out so late?” Gard asks,
and despite his forced-light tone there’s a heavy weight behind his
question.

“I was…”
What? Talking to my dead father?
Discussing matters of vengeance and retribution and ssslicing and
ssslashing with the Evil in the forest, the Evil who claims to be
me?
“…uh.”

Thankfully, Gard’s wife hands me a hot cup of
some kind of herbal tea. “Thank you,” I say, cupping my hands
around the warm pot. She nods and busies herself with pouring tea
for Gard.

“Her father died today,” Remy says. “She was
probably having trouble sleeping.”

My head jerks around. Under Gard’s scrutiny,
I’d almost forgotten his son was still here, sitting silently in
the corner. When Gard had brought me in, our eyes had met, and for
a moment—just a bare, silent moment—I could tell we both had the
same memory: holding hands as they burned my father’s body.

“Yes,” I say nodding my thanks to Remy. “My
tent was so…empty.”

“And you saw nothing?” Gard asks. “You were
watching them die.” Heavy words, heavy tone.

“What? No! I mean, yes, but I had just
arrived, just found them…it’s not like I was standing there doing
nothing.”

“Hmm,” Gard says. Does he believe me? He has
to believe me! “Tell me everything.”

I only tell him what’s important to what
happened. How I passed them in the night, how I went to the forest
to think, how I heard the screams and came running, same as him.
Nothing more.

“Are they…
dead?
” I ask.
I am life
and death
.

“One was dead when we arrived. Sword wound
through the heart. He was probably the first to be attacked, too
surprised to defend himself; his sword was still in his scabbard.
The other was luckier, but not by much. He might’ve had time to
deflect the kill stroke—his blade was on the ground, spotted with
blood—which sent it through his gut. It’s deep and messy, but the
Healers still have a chance to save him.”

“They must!” I exclaim. Gard’s eyebrows jump
up, surprised at my sudden outburst. “Because he’ll be able to tell
us what…I mean,
who
did this to them.”

“I hope so, Sadie. I hope so. The Healers
have instructions to come to me as soon as his condition changes,
for better or for worse.”

“You’ll sleep here tonight,” Gard’s wife
says, handing me a blanket.

“No, I’m fine back in my—”

“You shouldn’t be alone,” she says. At the
edge of my vision I see Remy watching me.

“Just tonight,” I say.

Are they unwittingly inviting Evil into
their tent?

“We’ll see,” she says.

A sudden yawn captures the whole of my face
as weariness overcomes me. Can I sleep?

I stand and move to an area of empty space
furthest from where Remy sits, spreading out my blanket like a mat.
When I lie down I face away from him. I remember his hand curled
around mine, so warm, so rough, so
there
.

No sooner than I think of Remy, my thoughts
from before return, taking over my restless mind.
Am I evil?
Did I somehow let something loose in the forest, my anger and lust
for revenge unlocking a beast that’s been hidden for years? And if
so, how do I stop it?

You don’t
, the voice says.

Everything falls away.

T
he anchors go up
before I can speak to Admiral Jones again.

What did he want to tell me about my mother’s
death? Did he want to mock me, berate me, tear down any semblance
of foolish pride I’ve managed to muster over the short time I’ve
been a lieutenant? Remind me how I failed her, how I failed
him?

I have to know. I have to.

I have so many questions I feel like I’m
going to burst if I don’t talk to someone about them. But who?
Jade’s out of the question, at least until Hobbs goes back to The
Merman’s Daughter. I haven’t talked to Cain in what seems like
forever—he led the landing party in storm country today, so I
didn’t even have a chance to speak to him.

Someone knocks on my cabin door. Barney.

“May I come in, sir?” he says.

“Why not,” I say.

He bumbles in carrying a tray with a steaming
pot and several hard biscuits. “I thought you might like something
to nibble on before bed.”

Gratefully, I take the tray. It’s exactly
what I need. I pick up one of the biscuits, right away noticing
something strange. “Barney, why are there bite marks on this one?
Wait a minute,” I say, “all of them have bite marks!”

Barney clears his throat. “I had to, ahem,
check to make sure they weren’t poisoned.”

I stare at him and he shifts back and forth
uncomfortably. “
All
of them?” I say, laughing.

“I, um, I take my job very seriously.”

“I can see that. You know, you could have
broken off a piece from each one, rather than…biting directly into
them,” I point out.

“They don’t taste as good that way,” Barney
says, looking sheepish.

“Don’t they? You’re eating the same
thing.”

“Just the same, I prefer them the other
way.”

“Well, I suppose I should say thank you. Are
you sure it was necessary?”

“You never know, sir. You can never be too
careful these days.”

“
These
days? Has there been a threat
on my life?” I ask, crunching the corner of one of the biscuits, as
far away from Barney’s teeth marks as possible.

Barney shifts again, but then rests crookedly
on one foot. “Well, no, not directly. But ever since Webb went
missing, some of his friends have been stirring the pot, talking
about how suspicious it is that he was your biggest critic and then
disappeared. Some of them have noticed the time you’re spending
with…up on the mast.”

A question I’ve been meaning to ask for a
long time slips off my tongue. “Barney, why didn’t you tell the
truth about what the…what she did to me? With the scrub brush?”

“You mean how she knocked you flat out, sir?”
he says, smirking.

“I wouldn’t say she—”

“Whack! Right to the forehead, and you went
down like a sack o’—”

“Thank you, Barney, I get the picture. Why
didn’t you tell anyone?” I ask, breaking off another piece of
biscuit and popping it in my mouth.