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The Road Chosen
Sorasa
She awoke to voices up on deck, stirring in the narrow bed as Dom loomed in the doorway. The little cabin window was less dark than she remembered, the first haze of dawn creeping through the little window. With a jolt, Sorasa realized she slept far more hours than she planned.I am truly exhausted, she thought, yawning as she stood. She stepped into her leather breeches and worn boots but left on the stolen shirt. Then she threw her ruined jacket over it, the shoulder seams barely holding together.
There was a plate of dried meat and cheese set on the floor next to the bed. The meat was old and tough, but she forced it down with the tasteless cheese. After so many days of hunger, she would happily eat anything in her vicinity.
“What are they saying?” Sorasa asked around a mouthful of cheese.
Dom glowered over her, clad as she was in breeches and a similar white shirt. If he managed to sleep, she could not tell.
“We match,” Sorasa muttered, disgusted.
He sneered back at her.
“There’s very little I can do about that at the moment,” he snapped.Then he glanced overhead. “The wind and the current are pushing us toward the rest of the ships that escaped the harbor. We’re spotting more every hour. Traders, mostly.”
Sorasa slowed a little, relieved.
“Good,” she said. “We’re faster than any trader on the water.”
While Sorasa felt dirty and rumpled, Dom looked clean. His blond hair had been combed out, braided over each ear again, with his golden beard trimmed. Quietly, Sorasa seethed, shoving her ragged hair behind her ears. She wished for a comb but saw none in the cabin.
“Maybe we should shave your head,” she muttered, eyeing his scalp.
Dom blanched, disgusted and confused. “Excuse me?”
“You’re on wanted posters all over the realm. We should do anything we can to make you less recognizable.”
“I refuse,” he said curtly, green eyes flaring.
Then the ceiling overhead thumped as boots ran across the ship deck. Sorasa counted three pairs of feet at least, heading for the starboard side of theTempestborn.
She brushed by Dom without thought, making for the stairs outside the cabin. Silent as he was, she knew the Elder followed. He was too easy to predict after so many long months. At the top of the cramped staircase, Sorasa even pressed aside, letting Dom go first so he would not pull her back himself.
He shouldered up to the door, pressing it open a few inches to glimpse the main deck of theTempestborn. Sorasa peered under his arm, close as she could be without laying herself against the immortal brute.
They were out of sight of land, far enough into Mirror Bay as to leave the smoke of Ascal behind entirely. But to the east, the dawn broke in a harsh pink line. While Taristan was miles away, they were not beyond the corruption of his demon god.
Her eyes lashed the line where sky met sea, noting the black dots of other ships. One was closer than the rest, its prow pointed directly at theTempestborn. A pit formed in Sorasa’s stomach, filled with equal parts dread and wretched hope.
At the stern, a scrap of red wavered in the wind, dancing alongside Meliz’s false flag.
Carefully, Sorasa mussed her hair, letting it fall around her ears to brush the tops of her shoulders, hiding her tattoos. She laced up the collar of the shirt tightly to cover any more exposed skin before striding out onto the open deck, indistinguishable from the other members of the crew. Only her Amhara dagger would have marked her as anything else, and it was gone now, melted to nothing.
Meliz and a few other members of the crew stood at the starboard railing, eyeing the Madrentine galley with furrowed brows. In the stronger light, Sorasa took in the sight of the formidable captain again. While Corayne favored her father’s looks, she had her mother in her too. In the keen flash of her eyes, the deep black of her hair. In the way she always seemed to face the blowing wind.
The resemblance made Sorasa’s heart ache in a way she did not understand, and deeply disliked.
Out on the waves, the other ship kept up its approach, the dawn lifting behind it. Unlike theTempestborn, it was clearly a merchant vessel, well funded with a fresh coat of paint and new sails. Built for coastal trade, with a flatter hull to navigate shallows and rivers. At the top of its mast, a flag hung limp. Sorasa squinted at it.
“What do you see?” she muttered, digging an elbow into Dom’s ribs.
Above her, his eyes widened with shock.
“A black wing on bronze.”
Her own mouth opened, jaw hanging slack.
