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“There’s anothership—aliving ship.” Demery pointed northeast into the gloom, between us and the darkest part of the twilight sky.
Benedict drew his spyglass and surveyed the new vessel as Demery and Olsa conferred in Usti, too quick for me to follow. Finally, Ben passed the glass to me. I took it without thanks and looked through.
A huge, three-masted shadow slipped through an open section of sea to the northeast. I touched the Other, and sure enough, Lirr’s strange opalescent light appeared between the blue glow of numerous ghistings, hazed in grey. I could not pick out Mary, though.
“Lirr is there.” I lowered the glass. I nearly asked Olsa what the grey haze meant, but stopped short when I noticed that her eyes also had a grey hedge to them too, trickling into brown irises like smoke. They reminded meof…Mary’s.
I looked at Demery, then Athe, and even the old woman. They all looked at me now, and in their eyes I saw the same grey infiltration.
Grey-tainted lights in the Other. Pirates and a Stormsinger with smoke-edged eyes. I did not need my Sooth’s senses to realize there was more to these two phenomena than I understood.
Benedict stepped in, though I could not decide whether he had sensed my sudden tension or was just impatient. “Now we retreat to Ellas and prepare an assault.”
Demery scratched his short beard and looked at the old woman. “Crow?”
“We’re ready,” she said.
Athe nodded, and I saw her hand drop to a pistol at her belt.
“Good.” Demery turned on Benedict at the same time as Athe drew her pistol and leveled it at my brother’s head. “Let’s get you secured in the hold, young man. Then we’re off to find the Fleetbreaker.”
AN EXCERPT FROM:
A HISTORY OF GHISTLORE AND THE BLESSED; THOSE BOUND TO THE SECOND WORLD AND THE POWER THEREIN
GHISEAU AND HIGH MARINERSmay be identified by two means, other than the direct manifestation of their ghisting counterparts. Firstly, a pale halo about the iris, often so subtle as to be disregarded. Secondly, a Sooth may perceive an aura about their bodies within the Other or from the edge of that Other realm. Sooths studied in Adjacent identification may also note other visible alterations around the various mages and mage-adjacent of ourworld—corruptions,mutations and blessings detailed in this work’s companion volume,A DEFINITIVE STUDY OF THE BLESSED; MAGES AND MAGE-CRAFT OF THE MEREISH ISLES.
FORTY
Plots and Pardons
MARY
Istood in the shelter of a ghisten oak asHarpy’s longboat ground ashore at the foot of a gentle rise, from arctic sea to sleeping Wold. I was subdued, my mind still heavy with the revelations I’d had under the larch.
I was still myself. I felt thesame—flexingfingers, breathinglungs—yetI knew everything had irrevocably changed. It was as if I’d woken from a dream in which I’d been convinced I was already awake. My eyes were open. The shackles unlocked.
My mother waited closer to the water, some dozen paces between us. Hair escaped her fraying braid below her cap, grey-streaked locks fluttering in the wind. Her cheeks, perpetually red with cold, curved with a welcoming smile as she saluted.
Pirates leapt out to secure the little vessel on the icy rocks and a group of seven individuals broke away, trudging through the snow to where my mother waited.
Samuel looked up at me as he went. He was bundled in eclectic cold-weather gear and looked his usual sleep-deprived self, but as our gazes met, the corner of his lips tugged in relief.
Despite myself, mine did too. I might have lingering doubts as to Samuel’s qualities, but I was glad he’d survived the Stormwall. Not only that, but the way he smiled at me now, relieved and hesitant, thawed me to the tips of my toes.
Grinning so wide I thought his face might crack, Demery cupped my mother’s head in a hand and bumped his forehead into hers, a gesture so familiar that I gaped.
“Sister.” His voice drifted towards me. “We haven’t much time, but it’s good to see you.”
My mother transformed as she grinned back, eyes brimming with happiness, and she folded into his arms. Over her head Demery caught my eye and his smile became a little grimmer, his gaze one of shared understanding and solidarity. Did he see the changes in her too, despite her smile?
“Brother,” Anne said when they parted again. “Where’s Lirr?”
“Close, but Olsa says he’ll have to come on foot from his position,” Demery answered.
Olsa and Illya, the Usti Sooth and Voyager I’d met back in Hesten, had settled in behind the captain. My mother broke away and nodded to the Uknaras with familiarity. They knew one another. Other members of Bretton’s surviving crew?
Demery, meanwhile, called to me. “Hello, Mary.”
