"Betimes." I glanced around. "Captain Oppius, forgive me, but why the merriment?"
"Marsilikos, lad!" A wide grin spread across his plump face. "We'll be forced to winter there, and every man of us with a fat purse thanks to your lady ambassadress' generosity." He rolled his eyes and kissed his fingers. "Have you seen the women there?"
"Ah." I smiled. "Yes."
"They look like…" The captain's voice trailed off and he stared at me for a moment, his lips pursed. "Don't really need to tell you, do I?"
"No," I said. "Not really. But do me a kindness and bid your men treat Naamah's Servants with the courtesy and respect they would accord their own mothers and sisters and daughters. In Terre d'Ange, they are."
"Oh, aye." Shrewdness surfaced in his gaze. "You needn't tell an old sailor, lad. We're a superstitious lot. I see to it that my boys give your Naamah her due. Patron-gifts and all. I know what's proper." He clapped a hand on my shoulder. "No fear, young prince! Your lady ambassadress knew what she was about when she chose the Aeolia and her captain."
I felt better hearing it, and better still observing Captain Oppius as he took command of the ship and ordered the anchor hoisted and the oarsmen to their posts. For all that he cut a comical figure, striding over the deck in a rolling waddle, it was clear he was an able commander, admired and respected by his men.
They obeyed his orders with alacrity. Men sang out in a steady rhythm as they bent their backs to the oars and the Aeolia's prow nosed toward open water. Although the sun was shining overhead, the water in the harbor of Ostia was grey and choppy.
Beyond the harbor, it looked worse.
And indeed, it was.
For the entire journey, the winds were blustery and capricious. The Aeolia was buffeted mercilessly. On a good day, we'd find the ship running before a strong tailwind, sails taut and straining, only to have the wind shift without warning. The sails would empty, slack and flapping, and the ship would wallow while Captain Oppius shouted orders at the wheel and his men raced around the deck and clambered in the rigging.
And then we would catch the wind once more, making headway until the wind changed again.
On a bad day…
On a bad day, the skies were dark with stormclouds that spat angry rain down on us, and the winds would lash the sea into churning waves. Far from cradling us tenderly on Ocean's bosom, the Aeolia rode the waves like an unbroken horse, bucking the crests, plunging into the troughs. On those days, there was no laughing, no singing. Only grim determination, rain-whipped sailors, and dogged Captain Oppius at the wheel. Whether or not we made progress, I couldn't have said. We stayed afloat, which was all that mattered on a bad day.
It was a long journey.
It was Phèdre's letter that kept me sane. I cracked it open and read it as soon as Ostia was out of sight. The whole first page was filled with accounts of the joyful reception the news of my homecoming had met. Despite the fact that it was weeks in the offing, Eugenie had begun turning the household upside down, plundering the markets in order to make my favorite dishes. Hugues had written some very bad poetry in celebration—she included a sample that made me laugh aloud—and Ti-Philippe had gotten roaring drunk in the Hall of Games and had to be carried home. Joscelin, she reported, had actually kissed everyone in sight and gone about grinning from ear to ear for an entire day, which had caused a number of people to ask if he had a touch of the fever.
And she reported on the reception at the Palace, assuring me that Ysandre and Drustan's gratitude was deep and genuine, and that they appreciated the difficulty of the decision. Alais, it seemed, had burst into tears of joy when she learned of it. I wondered what Sidonie had done, but Phèdre didn't say.
There was other news, most of it inconsequential. Court gossip, for the most part. My former friends among the young gentry had not been idle in the Game of Courtship. It might interest me to learn, Phèdre wrote, that Maslin de Lombelon was in disgrace after beating Raul L'Envers y Aragon very badly in a duel, which was believed to be over a slight Maslin had offered Colette Trente. The Captain of the Guard had reprimanded him and sent him away to winter in Camlach with the Unforgiven.
I must own, I smiled at that.
For all its length, it was a light letter, written with a glad heart. If there was bad news, it was nothing so serious that Phèdre didn't deem it could wait. I kept it close to me throughout the journey, a talisman of hope, reading it over and over, until I could almost hear Phèdre's voice reciting it in my head, humorous and wry and filled with affection.
At the end, she sent her greetings to Gilot and Eamonn, and then wrote simply, Come home safely, love. I will count the hours until you do.
Alone in my cabin, I traced those words with one fingertip. It made my heart ache to imagine how Phèdre must have felt when she received the letter I'd written in Lucca; how they all must have felt. The awkward postscript scrawled at the bottom. Thank you for the gift of my life. I almost wished I hadn't written it. And then I remembered Valpetra's javelin, cocked and aimed at my heart, and I was glad I had.
It had been a near thing.
On our last day at sea, it stormed. It grew calm, first, late in the afternoon. The Aeolia bobbed like a cork, going nowhere. Captain Oppius cast a grim eye toward the bruised, luminous sky and muttered to himself. His sailors went about lashing things down, striking the mainsails and hoisting the storm-sails.
"This is going to be ugly, your highness," he said soberly to me. "Once it hits, stay in your cabin and tell your men to keep to their berths."
I nodded. If he hadn't meant it, he'd have used my name. Oppius da Lippi hadn't been jesting about dice; we'd passed a fair number of hours together and my dwindling purse was lighter for it. "How ugly?"
He pursed his lips. "Ugly."
It was.
A right bitch of a storm, Eamonn would have called it. It came for us an hour before sunset. We watched it approach from the deck, Lady Denise's guards and I. A smudge of darkness on the southern horizon moving closer, lightning dancing on the waves. Stormclouds piling above us in layers, dispelling the strange, livid light. Sea-swells rising, the Aeolia bobbing ever higher. I glanced at Romuald, who stood beside me, his gaze fixed on the moving darkness. I remembered his kindness toward me on the barge.
"Are you all right?" I asked him, echoing him.
"Aye." His throat moved as he swallowed. "Don't much like the sea."
And then it hit, faster and harder than I could have reckoned, fierce and primal, all roaring darkness and water, splintered by lightning.
"Get down!" someone shouted. "Down!"
It was terrible and glorious, and I wanted to stay. I wanted to see, wanted to see it all. I'd heard tell of such storms, other storms. Storms the Master of the Straits had sent; the old one, before Hyacinthe took his place. The storm that drove Phèdre to Kriti on the ship of the blood-cursed pirate, Kazan Atrabiades. I wanted to see, to know.
And men might die if I did.
"Down!" I shouted, shoving Romuald before me. "Down!"
The ship lurched and wallowed, half-swamped. A wave washed the deck, water spilling into the open hatch. No time to find my cabin. Romuald and the other guards scrambled before me, and I scrambled after them. Above us, the hatch slammed closed. A single lantern swayed wildly, hanging from a hook, illuminating scared faces.
"Blessed Elua!" someone gulped. "We're all going to die.""The hell we are!" I grabbed the tin lantern, steadying it in both hands. Bilgewater sloshed around my ankles. "Right," I said to them, thinking of Gallus Tadius who had made us believe in the impossible. "You think this is bad? Listen, lads…"
I told them the end of the story, the story I had begun telling Lucius Tadius on the eve of battle and fallen asleep before completing. Rahab and his maelstrom, the bright mirror of the dark. The form that had risen at last in terrible, anguished brightness, the watery chains. How we had wept, had all wept at its beauty. Hyacinthe and his ragged voice, chanting charms in a forgotten tongue, pages of the lost Book of Raziel clutched in his arms.
Phèdre, dripping.
Phèdre, dripping and half-drowned, finding her feet.
Speaking the Name of God.
They knew the story. They were D'Angeline. But they'd never heard it from one who was there. I remembered the syllables of the Sacred Name, each one tolling in my head like a bell as it fell from Phèdre's tongue. I didn't remember what they were. I couldn't speak them, any more than I could give voice to the sun or the moon or the earth. But I had been there. I had heard them. I knew the shape of the word they formed, and the word was love.
I'd never doubted her in that moment.
Never.
"That's a good story, Prince Imriel," Romuald whispered when I finished.
"It's a true story," I said hoarsely. "And I swear, by Blessed Elua, I am not dying by water after it. Not here, not now, not like this. And neither are you."
For a mercy, I was right.
The storm passed and the Aeolia endured. We were bruised and battered, and one of the horses had suffered a badly wrenched foreleg after panicking, but we were alive. After checking on the Bastard, who eyed me with a look that suggested all of his misgivings had been more than justified, I went abovedeck to greet the dawn.
All the sailors looked weary, but glad. No one had been lost. After a night of raging turmoil, the sea was almost tranquil. Captain Oppius was just handing over control of the ship's wheel when I emerged, and I greeted him with a deep bow.
"You are a master sailor, my lord," I said to him.
He gave me a tired grin. "That I am. Come here, lad. Have a look." Oppius led me to the prow of the ship. Cocking his head at the rising sun, he pointed directly in front of us. "Ought to catch sight of it in a bit."
I peered across the water. For a long moment, I saw nothing. Only the breeze ruffling the water into wavelets, tinged pink with the dawn, and a few raucous gulls soaring. Then the sun inched higher and I saw a distant spark of gold on the horizon, like a lit candle in a faraway window. The sailors erupted in cheers.
"Is that—?"
"Marsilikos," Oppius said. "The Dome of the Lady." He clapped me on the shoulder. "We'll be an hour or two yet. I'm off to catch a wink."
Our progress was slow, but I couldn't tear myself away. I stood in the prow and watched as the shoreline appeared, and the sprawling harbor city of Marsilikos. The gold glint resolved itself into the gilded Dome of the Lady, set high on the sloping hills.
Terre d'Ange.
Home.
I wished Gilot was here beside me to see it.
By the time we reached the mouth of the harbor, Oppius had reemerged, refreshed and cheerful. His men went to oars, singing once again. The harbor was mostly empty, only a handful of fishing vessels afloat. Oppius took the wheel and guided the Aeolia smoothly to the quai, and sailors leapt to the dock to secure her.
"Hey, Aeolia?" A figure in sea-blue livery approached, cupping his hands and shouting to the ship. By the gold braid and the crest on his doublet—Eisheth's gilded fish, the insignia of the Lady of Marsilikos—I guessed he was the harbor-master. A pair of men trailed behind him. "A little late in the season, aren't you? What's the urgent cargo?"
Oppius came up beside me and leaned over the railing. "Just this!" he shouted back in passable D'Angeline, pointing at me. "Says his name's Imriel."
The harbor-master drew nearer and shaded his eyes, peering up at me with a puzzled look. "Not…" His eyes widened. "Elua's Balls! Your highness?"
"Just Imriel," Oppius said affably. "He doesn't like to make a fuss."
"Oppius, you fat, prattling—" the harbor-master began in irritation.
I laughed. "Leave him be, messire. After last night's storm, I suspect we owe our lives to this fat, prattling, and most able ship's captain. I'm Imriel nó Montrève de la Courcel."
"On behalf of her grace Roxanne de Mereliot, the Lady of Marsilikos, well met and welcome home, your highness." He bowed, then straightened and elbowed one of his men, adding in a hiss. "Go tell her ladyship! Now!"
The man startled, then took off at a run.
Despite the difficulty of the crossing, I was glad it was late in the season and the harbor was quiet. Rumor flies swifter than an arrow in Terre d'Ange, and I didn't want an audience gathering to bear witness to my arrival.
As it was, I had my hands full with the Bastard. One look at dry land, and he charged down the ramp, as headstrong and determined as a Jebean rhinoceros. I clung to his lead-line and swore at him, dancing in an effort to avoid his stomping hooves.
"Nice horse," a good-natured voice offered.
Wrestling the Bastard into a semblance of control, I glanced up to see an escort had arrived. It was led by a man I guessed to be in his mid-thirties, with coal-black hair. He grinned and bowed, then extended his hand.
"Gerard de Mereliot," he said. "The Lady's son and Captain of her Guard."
I clasped his hand, keeping a wary eye on the Bastard. "Imriel."
"Don't I know it!" Gerard laughed. "Mother's nearly bursting. You know she counts Phèdre nó Delaunay among her most valued friends? We've been on the lookout for news, any news, for weeks now. I daresay the courier's already on his way. She…" He looked past me. "All. I'm sorry. A friend?"
I turned to see Romuald and the other guards hoisting the carrying-poles of Gilot's casket. "Yes," I said honestly. "Would that I'd been a better one to him." My eyes stung, and I rubbed them with the heel of my free hand. I'm done with weeping, I'd said to Gilot as we left the City of Elua. No more, do you hear me? "My apologies," I said now to Gerard de Mereliot. "It's been a… difficult… journey."