Firebirds Soaring (46 page)

When she came up on deck, the crew was just finishing coiling down the last lines, and some were departing on leave, gear bags over their shoulders, lanterns swinging in their hands.

“I’ll stay, if you want to negotiate the cargo,” Risa said.

“What’s that in your fist?” Granny asked.

Risa had been holding the token in a tight grip. She snorted. “An invitation to make a fool of myself in his palace. As if I’d do that.”

Her heart constricted, and with a violent motion she flung the token over the rail into the darkness, where they heard it plunk into the sea.

Granny said, “Once upon a time there was a prince in my life. He made a similar invitation to me. But I was too proud to accept it. And so . . . and so time passed, and he married a princess. An excellent woman, I hear. And I, though eventually I had a family, I ended up married to my ship. An excellent ship, as you see.”

Risa regarded her grandmother in the light of the lamp on her table. They were alone now, the soft air still except for the distant cry of night birds.

Risa muttered, “He’ll marry that girl. She knows all the tricks to make sure of it.”

“Didn’t you hear him turn the courtship into a general party when he invited Lord Alored along? ” Granny chuckled. “See if that young redhead isn’t ‘in love’ with Nadav Savona’s pretty sister within the span of two days.”

“Oh, Granny, even if he doesn’t marry her, where would that leave me? If we did decide we—oh, I can’t even say it. I won’t give up the sea, and he shouldn’t give up being king, not with all that training. And I couldn’t bear a court filled with Jasalans.”

“There are all kinds of compromises people make,” Granny said. “Who says you’d have to live in a palace all year round? For that matter, who says their court is filled with Jasalans? Don’t you know what they once called the present queen? The Barefoot Countess. Still do. And she apparently likes it. I asked young Raec. He says she still runs around barefoot up in the mountains.”

Risa groaned. “But we hardly know one another.”

“Isn’t that why he invited you to visit? ” Granny asked with her customary astringency. “Or are you going to relive my mistake, because you insist on seeing titles instead of human beings? Did I really raise you that badly?”

“No,” Risa admitted. “But it’s a world I don’t know. I’ll make horrible mistakes.”

“Mistakes in manners can be survived. I refused to see that. I was too cowardly to try.” Granny paused. “If you do choose to go, you can carry a story. It might not be the time yet to tell it, but someday it should be told,” Granny said, and moved to the rail, where she stared off toward the twinkling lights of the village as they were lit one by one. “It’s not a happy story. But it is, perhaps, an important one.”

Risa swallowed hard in her aching throat.

“There was once a young, romantic prince we will call Lark. He wanted to do something heroic, and he heard about pirate problems ruining his country’s trade, so he joined a crew, lying about his experience. After all, he’d been trained in dueling the way nobles do, and ship work is easy to pick up, right? So there came a pirate attack in the night. This pirate crew used to sneak half the crew through the water and climb up to the deck to take a ship. So Lark rallied his friends, courageously leading them (like a prince should) in a charge on the pirates coming over the rail—when arrows hissed through the darkness from the pirate ship. One struck Lark in the hip, another my cousin in the shoulder. The other five of his friends, including my little brother, were all struck in the heart and died. Lark and my cousin fought on with the rest of us through the night, which made healing very difficult when at last we drove them off and could tend the wounded.”

Risa winced.

“Lark had not known anything about arrows, or about how pirates fight. So—though he had courage, though he meant only the best—he led his band straight into danger and death. He soon learned, and kept learning, and kept learning, until he became a formidable captain in his own right, but he never forgave himself for his actions of that night. I hear he still lives with the result of that wound, though he could afford the magic healers to fix it. He made sure his son was trained not to make the same”—Granny made a fist, bringing it down to the rail—“what
I
would call a horrible mistake.”

Risa let out her breath.

Granny moved slowly to her cabin and shut the door, leaving Risa standing at the rail, staring out.

She was still there when dawn began to blue the air, and a warm peachy color lit up the core. Then she dove off the rail, swimming down to the slanting sea floor, and the faint gleam of gold.

SHERWOOD SMITH
is the author of
Crown Duel
and
Court Duel
(published in one volume by Firebird as
Crown Duel
), three books about the intrepid Wren
(Wren to the Rescue, Wren’s Quest,
and
Wren’s War)
, and a trilogy set in the
Crown Duel
world:
Inda, The Fox,
and
King’s Shield
.

Smith began making books out of taped paper towels when she was six years old. When she was eight, she started writing about another world, though she soon switched to making comic books of her stories, which she found to be easier. Smith went to college, lived in Europe, came back to the United States to get her master’s in history, worked in Hollywood, got married, started a family, and became a teacher. Now retired, she writes full-time.

Her Web site is
www.sherwoodsmith.net
.

“Court Ship” was written for fans of
Crown Duel
, who wondered about the second generation after that story. It also answers some questions about events previous to that story.

LITTLE RED

S
even years of bad luck. That’s what I think as I drag the piece of broken mirror over my forearm. Just to the right of a long blue vein, tracing the thin scars that came before.

There’s no pain. That’s all on the inside. It won’t come out, no matter how much I bleed. No pain. But for a moment . . .

Relief.

For a moment.

Until Mr. L calls me again. “Hey, you, Little Red, come here.”

Calls
me
. Not any of the other girls. Maybe it’s because he likes my stubby red hair. Likes to twist his stubby old man fingers in it. And I can’t tell him no.

“You want to go back home?” he asks. “Back to your grandmother’s? Back to the old sewing lady?” He’s read my file. He knows what I will say.

“No. Even you are better than that.” Then I don’t say anything else. I just go away for a bit in my mind and leave him my body.

 

The forest is dark but I know the way. I have been here before. There is a path soon, pebbly and worn. But my fingers and toes are like needles and pins. If I stay here, stray here too long, will I become one of them forever?

 

It’s morning now, and I’m back, looking for something sharp. Orderlies have cleaned up the mirror; I think Mr. L found the piece I had hidden under the mattress. It doesn’t matter—I can always find something. Paper clips stolen from the office, plastic silverware cracked just right, even a ragged fingernail can break the skin if you have the courage.

Alby faces the wall and traces imaginary coastlines on the white cement. She is dark and elfin, her hair shorn brutally close to her scalp except for one long tress that hangs behind her left ear. “Why do you wind him up like that?”

“Wind up who?” My voice is rough with disuse. Is it the next morning? Or have days passed? “And how?”

“Mr. L. The things you say to him . . .” Shuddering, Alby looks more wet terrier than girl. “If you’d just walk the line, I’m sure he’d leave you alone.”

Having no memory of speaking to Mr. L at all, I just shrug. “Walk the line. Walk the path. What’s the difference?”

“Promise? ”

“Okay.”

“Yeah, play the game, let them think you’re getting better.” Alby straightens up, picturing home, I figure. She’s got one to go back to. Wooden fence. Two-car garage. Mom and Dad and a bowl full of breakfast cereal. No Grandma making lemonade on a cold Sunday evening. No needles. No pins.

It’s my turn to shudder. “I don’t want to get better. They might send me home.”

Alby stares at me. She has no answer to that. I turn to the bed. Start picking at the mattress, wondering if there are still springs inside these old things. Alby faces the wall, her finger already winding a new path through the cracks. We all pass the time in our own way.

 

We get a new therapist the next day. We’re always getting new ones. They stay a few weeks, a few months, and then they’re gone.

This one wants us to write in journals. She gives us these beautifully bound books, cloth covers with flowers and bunnies and unicorns and things, to put our ugly secrets in.

“Mine has Rainbow Brite.” Alby is either excited or disgusted, I can’t tell which.

Joelle says, “They should be snot colored. They should be brown like . . .” She means shit. She never uses the word, though.

“I want you to start thinking beautiful thoughts, Joelle,” the therapist says. She has all our names memorized already. I think,
This one will only last two weeks. Long enough for us to ruin the covers. Long enough for Joelle to rub her brown stuff on the pages.

I put my hand on my own journal. It has these pretty little flowers all over. I will write down my thoughts. But they won’t be beautiful.

 

Okay, so it doesn’t rhyme and I can’t use it as a song, but it’s still true.

“What did you write, Red?” Alby asks.

Joelle has already left for the bathroom. I don’t look forward to the smell from her book.

“Beautiful thoughts.” I cover the poem with my hand. It
is
beautiful, I decide. Dark and beautiful, like I am when I dream.

“Little Red.” Mr. L stands in the doorway. “Excuse me, Ms. Augustine. I need to see that one.”

He points at me. I go away.

 

Four-footed and thick-furred, I stalk through a shadowy forest. My prey is just ahead of me—I can hear his ragged breathing, smell his terror-sweat. Long pink tongue to one side, I leap forward, galloping now. I burst through a flowering thornbush and catch sight of him: Mr. L, naked and covered in gray hair. I can smell his terror. Then I am on him, and my sharp teeth rip into his flesh. Bones crack and I taste marrow, sweet counterpoint to his salty blood.

 

I wake in the infirmary, arms and legs purple with fresh bruises.

“Jesus, Red,” Alby says. “He really worked you over this time, didn’t he?”

“I guess.” I don’t remember. Seems likely, though.

“Looks like you got him one too, though.”

“Oh, yeah?” I can hardly move, though I turn my head toward the sound of her voice.

Alby grins her pixie smile. “Yeah. Got a big bandage on his neck, he does.”

I lick my lips. Imagine I can taste blood. “Probably cut himself shaving.”

Her smile fading, Alby says, “Whatever you say, Red.”

I try to roll over, turn away from her, but something holds me down: leather straps at my ankles and wrists. One across my waist.

“Five-point locked leather,” Alby says, with some reverence. “You were really going crazy when they brought you in. Foaming at the mouth, even.”

I lay my head back down on the small, hard pillow. Close my eyes. Maybe I can get back to my dream.

 

Mr. L visits me in the dark room with the leather straps. He has no bandage on his neck, but there are scratches there. I know why. I have his skin under my fingernails. In my teeth.

“Little Rojo,” he says, almost lovingly, “you must learn control.”

I try to laugh but all that comes out is a choking cough. He wanders slowly behind me, his fingers trailing through my red hair, my cap of blood.

“You must learn to walk the path.” In front of me again, he glances up, at the television camera, the one that always watches. Puts his back to it.

“And will you be my teacher?” I say before spitting at him.

He looks down at me. Smiles. “If you let me.” Then he pats my cheek. Before he can touch me again, I go away.

 

The forest is cold that night and I stand on a forked road. One is the path of needles, one the path of pins. I don’t know which is which. Both are paths of pain.

I take the left.

I don’t know how far I travel—what is distance to me? I am a night’s walk from my den, a single leap from my next meal—but I am growing weary when the trap closes on my leg.