WindLegends Saga 9: WindRetriever (51 page)

"Are you all right?" Sybelle asked, coming to him, not quite daring to touch him as he stood staring back at her, his eyes blank.

"Aye," he answered and turned his back on her. He walked to the garden and sank down on the floor once more. Drawing his legs up, he encircled them with his arms and laid his head on his knees.

Sybelle surveyed the destruction of his room and felt a tight band of fear squeeze her heart.

What could have made him do this, she wondered? Her gaze went back to him and she shuddered for he was lost to the bewildered questions and looks around him.

"McGregor?" she questioned. "Why did you do this?"

"I don't know," he said helplessly. His voice was like that of a small child.

The Kensetti woman looked at Chaim. "What could have caused this?" she asked.

Chaim shook his head. "Anger, Your Grace. Irrational anger." He looked at the destroyed room and shook his head. "A great deal of irrational anger."

Or spite, Sybelle asked herself? She could not put such behavior past the Serenian. He was not in control of his life and the only authority he had was over the furnishings in his chambers.

Here, she thought, was a man who had always been emotionally tough, physically strong, mentally alert and spiritually intact, reduced to submitting to a mere woman's whims and desires.

He could not lash out at her as he had the room, so instead, he had demolished what he could get his hands on. In protest, she wondered? As a substitute for her?

"I'm sorry," he muttered, his head still down. "I'll clean it up."

"No," Sybelle said quietly. "The servants will see to it."

"The fight's been knocked out of him," Chaim said softly. "I doubt he'll give you any more trouble, milady."

Sybelle blanched. That was not what she wanted. She didn't want him meek and humbled.

Obedient, yes, but not spirit-broken. Submissive? Yes, that, too, but not crushed as he was at that moment.

Had she done this to him, she asked herself? Yes, she supposed she had. The answer was there to see in his bowed shoulders and hanging head. What she had done to him was unpardonable and it tore at a heart already beginning to regret her part in helping to destroy what he had once been.

"Can I get you anything?' she asked, aching to take him in her arms and hold him.

"No, thank you," he said politely.

"Your Grace?" Chaim asked quietly, taking her arm. He motioned toward the door and reluctantly she followed him, clutching the servant's hand with her own.

"Should we leave him like that?" she asked, looking back over her shoulder.

"Yes," Chaim answered firmly. His eyes met one of the guard's and a silent order was passed, acknowledged with a curt nod, and would be acted upon.

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Conar spent the rest of the night huddled on the floor, staring blindly into the dark.

Charlotte Boyett-Compo WINDRETRIEVER 228

Legion jumped as the fog horn bellowed once more and the thought of Conar's first encounter with the warning sound flitted through his mind. Somehow he thought his little brother would have been just as disconcerted as he was, if not more so.

Teal, still in his bunk and sick as a dog ever since they had set sail four weeks earlier, had sent word that he wanted to see Legion, but A'Lex was in no hurry to go below. The smell of du Mer's puke was still hovering about the cabin despite the cabin boy's best efforts to remove it.

Legion would rather stay on deck, marveling at how close they had come to the jagged rocks when the Ravenwind had ran the gauntlet between them earlier that morning.

"Once we leave the Sinisters," Holm had explained to Legion, "there won't be nothing but fog and crags."

"Crags?" Legion had questioned.

"Rocks," Paegan laughed. "Rocks like you've never seen before, my friend."

And Legion hadn't. Despite his fear that the sleek black ship would hit one of those deadly-looking monoliths, he had not been able to tear himself away from watching the ship's progress through them. He had been fascinated, wondering who had dared navigate these waters the first time through to plot a sea lane through such dangerous formations.

"They called themselves the Viks," Misha explained in answer to Legion's question.

"Ancient relatives of the Chales." He'd smiled. "Fierce seamen, they were, and plunderers without equal. Many an Outer Kingdom lady lost her virtue to them red-haired warriors!"

Legion glanced up to the wheel and saw Holm staring out through the line of crags. The man was an able captain and it was to his honor that the Tzar had had handed over to him the navigational charts which would bring the Ravenwind through the crags. Months earlier, when the crew of the ex-prison ship had sailed along behind an Outer Kingdom barkentine to find Conar, Holm had had to rely on the First Mate of the Anna Katrine to navigate the Ravenwind through the gauntlet. Now, Holm and his crew could come and go at will. Thanks to the faith and respect and honor given to the men of the Wind Force by the Steffensburg family.

"Land ho!"

Legion craned his neck to look up at the crow's nest and saw the lookout pointing off the starboard beam. Carefully skirting a coil of hemp, A'Lex made his way to the other rail and joined Marsh Edan. Marsh sighed with relief and Legion slapped him on the back.

"I'm not a damned sailor," Marsh complained.

"You've made this trip before," Legion reminded him. "Doesn't it get any better for you?"

Marsh looked green around the gills.

"I'm not as bad off as du Mer," the Boreas Master-at-Arms growled, "but I'm not at ease until my feet are on solid ground." He spat over the rail. "Dry ground!"

Legion laughed and drew in a long breath of the salt air. "I swear I can smell that land," he said as he exhaled. "Smells like cinnamon."

"Humpf," Marsh grunted. It smelled like dead fish to him.

"We're going to run on in to Odess, Legion," Holm called out to him. "Probably spend the night and take on a few supplies before going on to Basaraba."

"How far is that?" Legion asked.

"Half a day's sail," Mr. Tarnes, the Ravenwind's First Mate answered as he took the wheel Charlotte Boyett-Compo WINDRETRIEVER 229

from the captain. "Up at first light, in the pog harbor by early afternoon or better." He hawked a gob of spittle over the side. "If'n the wind be with us, I reckon."

"It will be," Meggie told him. She squinted up at the brilliant blue sky with its fleecy patches of clouds. "The rain will hold off 'till we get to that godforsaken place."

"Monsoons will be setting in soon," Misha prophesied. "It's best we get to the Inner Kingdom before they do."

Legion turned from the rail and decided he had put off seeing du Mer as long as he dared.

He nodded at Thom and Belvoir, who were playing a game of chess on a makeshift table on the aft deck, and went below, smiled at Sentian as they passed in the companionway.

"Ching-Ching is with him," Sentian called over his shoulder. "Be prepared, A'Lex!"

Legion didn't bother knocking on the cabin door but went on in. He saw the little Chrystallusian man glance at him, angrily Legion thought, then turn back to the helpless ball of humanity lying in Holm's bunk.

"You are not dying, du Mer," Ching-Ching snapped as he poured a spoonful of dark amber liquid into a spoon. "Sit up and take this or I might decide to kill you and be done with it."

"Have pity," Teal gasped. The smell of the potion had reached his nostrils and he was becoming ill again. "I can't ...."

"Yes, you can!" Ching-Ching shot back in an authoritative voice that sounded as though it were losing all patience. "And you
will
!"

Legion walked to the bunk and reached down to help du Mer to a sitting position. "Up we go," he said merrily.

"A'Lex! Have pity!" Teal gagged. The ship was spinning around him and his belly felt as though it would come up through his mouth.

"I've always pitied you, Teal," Legion answered. "Now, take the medicine like a good little boy."

Ching-Ching bent over and forced the spoon of bitter liquid between Teal's gaping lips. A tiny smile tugged at the man's monkey face as Teal's wrinkled up with immediate disgust.

Teal gagged again, slapped a hand over his mouth and fell back to the mattress, his lids squeezed tightly shut.

"Such a baby," Legion chuckled.

"Worse than the little bird at taking medicine," Ching-Ching grumbled. He laid the spoon aside and folded his arms over his thin chest. "We should have left him in Boreas."

"No," Teal said weakly. It had been over two and a half years since he had seen Conar and there were things the two of them needed to talk about. Joannie MacCorkingdale was at the top of the list. "I'll be all right."

"We have repeatedly told you so, gypsy," Ching-Ching scoffed. He looked over at Legion, then scrunched his bony shoulders up toward his oversized ears. "
Now
, he listens when we are only minutes from land."

"How did you ...?" Legion stopped. This man had powers similar to Conar's and Meggie's and Occultus'. Even Chase had abilities that both puzzled and worried Legion. Why should he question how the Chrystallusian knew they were nearing land?

Ching-Ching grinned, showing twin rows of sharp little teeth. "I heard the lookout, A'Lex,"

he chuckled. "I'm not deaf!"

Chand Wynth peeked out from behind the barrels where he had been hiding for most of the journey. His food supply, and that small portion of edible stuffs that he had been able to pilfer Charlotte Boyett-Compo WINDRETRIEVER 230

from the ship's galley, had all but run out. He, too, had heard the man in the crow's nest alert the ship to landfall, and was relieved to know he wouldn't have to sneak out of hiding again to look for something to eat. Seeing Chase Montyne and Shalu Taborn walking along the deck together, Chand moved back among the lashed-down barrels and wedged himself, invisibly he hoped, behind a large crate. He could hear the men talking, though, and paid close attention to what was being said.

"He's going to be pissed," Chase remarked as he sat down on one of the barrels.

"Let him be," Shalu barked. "I did not want to leave his skinny white ass here in the first place!" The Necroman sat down beside Montyne with a grunt of anger. "He does not have authority over me!"

Chase laughed. "What are we going to say to him if Catherine's dream turns out to be nothing more than a case of something she ate?"

The black warrior screwed up his face and snarled. "I, too, had dreams of a black cloud hanging over him, Ionarian! As did Occultus. We were separated by thousands of miles. Does that sound like indigestion to you?"

Montyne's smile slipped away. "I had the same dream." As Shalu turned his head to look at him, he nodded. "Six nights in a row before I decided to come to Boreas." He tapped his heel on the planking. "Sabrina had been feeling uneasy, too."

Shalu snorted. "The woman is pregnant, Montyne! She is allowed to feel uneasy." He let his gaze wander down the blond, blue-eyed, handsome white man and snorted again. "Only the gods know what such a union between the two of you will produce." He turned his head away.

"Speckled children are most unnerving to look upon."

"Remind me of that when Kymmie and Wyn give you your first grandchild, Taborn," Chase answered dryly.

Shalu grunted.

Some small part of him rejoiced that Chase had found real happiness with the Lady Sabrina, Chand realized as he sat listening to his old friends. He had not known that the woman Montyne had wed upon his return to Ionary from the Inner Kingdom was of the same race as Shalu. Not that it mattered to Chand. He had been pleased with Wyn and Kym's wedding, the two were so obviously in love. If Chase was just as much in love, it didn't matter if the woman was a Diabolusian rat-trapper. He wished he could congratulate Chase, but no one must know he was on board the ship. Not if he was to do what he had come to this heathen land to do.

"We shall make damned sure we take him back with us this time," Shalu said in answer to a question Chase had put to him.

"Even if he doesn't want to go?" Chase quipped.

"It will not matter!" Shalu brayed. "We will manhandle him if necessary. Hog-tie him if he gives us any trouble."

"Too bad Bent isn't here," Chase said. "I remember a time when Conar was visiting me when Bent showed up and dragged him out to the ship, stark naked."

"Bent will be missed," Shalu said quietly, emotion crossing his dark face.

Chand's brows drew together. What had happened to Bent, he wondered? Had the giant man died? Been killed alongside Grice and Roget and the others?

He shook his head. No. Someone would have told him if Bent had been killed at Abbadon.

He couldn't even remember if the ex-executioner had been with the others at that vile place. He squeezed his eyes shut. There was so much he couldn't remember. So much that seemed to be lost to him forever.

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"Well, any way," Shalu was saying, his voice returning to its normal gruff, deep bass volume, "we will bring Conar back one way or another!"

Aye, Chand Wynth thought as he ground his teeth together. Sealed in a coffin if I have my way!

"It's this land," Occultus had said to her when Meggie mentioned the feeling. "It does strange things to a person." He was looking out at the stretch of dark along the horizon. "My powers will be useless once I set foot on that venomous shore."