The Fork-Tongue Charmers (13 page)

“No, it's so we don't
sink
.” Abby pointed to the pool of water at their feet. “Bail.”

Shivering, wet, and miserable, Rye tried to empty the bottom of the longboat as quickly as possible. Lottie did the same, but only managed to deposit buckets of frigid water into Rye's boots. Squinting at the beach, Rye saw that one of the other longboats had left the shore and was close behind them, and the remaining freebooters were just pushing the last boat into the surf. The
Slumgullion
loomed closer now, rocking in the turbulent sea as they rowed toward it. Its sails sagged and its hull was pockmarked. It seemed to Rye that the ship had seen better days.

Rye looked down the coastline, where Drowning's jagged silhouette rose like thorny branches. Plumes of black smoke rose from the Shambles, growing ever more distant. What would become of it? The village was prickly—but it was still her home. She wondered when, if ever, she might see it again.

Her spirits only darkened when she realized she hadn't even gotten a chance to say a proper good-bye to Folly and Quinn. She hoped Harmless and Bramble would see them home safely. She could still hear the
echoes of her best friends' voices.

“Rye! Rye!”

Rye shook her head, as if bees were buzzing in her ears.

“Rye!”

But it wasn't a memory, it was Folly's actual voice.

“Rye! Over here!”

Rye looked to the other longboat, where a soggy mop of white-blond hair dripped over Folly's smiling face. Folly waved frantically from the bow. Quinn was there too, looking more green than pleased.

“Dent!” Abby yelled. “What are you doing with them?”

“Gray said to get the children,” the Captain called back, incredulously.

“Not all of them!”

“Well, next time he should be a little more specific,” he huffed.

That put a smile on Rye's face for the first time all day.

“M
y father's going to be furious,” Quinn said with a grimace, then hugged the side of the ship and deposited what was left of his breakfast into the churning sea.

“Quinn,” Folly scolded, peering over the bow. “You almost got sick on that sea turtle.”

“Gray will get word to Angus,” Abby reassured. “Your parents too, Folly.”

Folly shrugged. “It will probably be days before they even notice I'm gone.”

“How long
will
we be gone?” Rye asked.

Abby glanced over at Folly and Quinn, then gave Rye a slight shake of her head. That meant she didn't know either.

Rye stared up at the patched canvas sails as the
Slumgullion
now bobbed and lurched over open water. The freebooter flag snapped in the breeze—emerald green with three soaring white gulls silhouetted in the corner. She examined the deck's worm-riddled timbers.

“Don't let her looks fool you,” Captain Dent said, joining them at the rails. “The
Slumgullion
may look like a barn-dwelling nag, but she's swift as a filly when she needs to be.”

The Captain fumbled through his breast pocket and retrieved several walnuts. He placed two side by side in his hand, closed it into a fist, and punched it into his other palm. When he unclenched his fist the shells were cracked, exposing the nuts inside. He handed them to Quinn.

“You look a little green around the gills, lad. These will help.”

Quinn carefully nibbled them with his front teeth.

“If that doesn't work, we'll try dipping you in the drink. Cold water does wonders for greenies like you.”

Quinn handed the rest of the nuts back to Dent and rushed for the ship's rails again.

Dent shrugged, took an unshelled walnut and wiggled it into the vacant hollow of his missing eye socket. He flashed a jagged smile that made him look like the carved-pumpkin head of a Wirry Scare.

Folly giggled. Rye cringed. Dent leaned forward, slapped the back of his own head, and the walnut fell out into his awaiting hand.

“You can eat that one,” Rye said.

“You should wear a patch over that,” Abby said dryly. “You'll scare the women and children.”

“Eye patches? You've read too many fairy tales, Mrs. O'Chanter,” Dent protested. “There's no place for vanity at sea.”

Rye would have liked to hear more about the Captain, but he became noticeably alarmed at the sight of a large brown pelican perched on a boom overhead.

“Be gone!” he yelled and shook a fist. “I'll deliver you to the cook, you floppy-necked devil!”

Abby just shook her head. “Smugglers,” she muttered.

Rye watched the Captain chase the large bird around the deck. She only hoped this voyage wouldn't fall victim to the special brand of luck Harmless had told her about.

It didn't take Rye long to discover that men at sea were an unusually supersitious lot. Women and children
were considered bad luck on a ship, but fortunately the crew seemed to warm to them quickly. They told stories of mermaids and leviathans, although Rye never spotted anything more interesting than a distant dolphin. Lottie was still smarting over the loss of Newtie and, at one point, a crewman let her climb the rigging to boost her spirits. Abby put an end to that before Rye got a turn. She tried to help out on deck, but found that a sailor's work involved a remarkable amount of rope to trip over or become tangled in. Eventually, the Captain put her to work chopping potatoes in the galley.

Time spent belowdecks was dark and noisy with the groans of the sea. It stunk of the unwashed hammocks of the
Slumgullion
's crew, but Dent had set Abby and the children up in private quarters. On their second day it rained, and Rye, Folly, and Quinn found themselves alone in the cramped space for the first time.

Rye removed one of her oversize boots to replace the damp straw with new padding. The stitching on the boots had become loose, and strips of leather flapped when she walked. She wiggled her toes, examining the black, crusty skin between them.

“I think I've got skunk foot,” she said with a frown.

“What do you expect?” Folly said. “You're always running around in those big, wet boots.”

“They itch,” Rye said, cringing. She scratched frantically at her feet and almost tore off an iron anklet charm
Harmless had given her.

“Don't do that,” Folly said. “It'll just spread. My mother makes a balm out of mushrooms whenever I get skunk foot. When we get to the island I'll see what I can find.”

Folly hardly ever wore shoes around the Dead Fish Inn. Rye figured if anyone knew how to cure skunk foot, she would.

Quinn spread out on the floor a worn nautical map that he'd borrowed from the freebooters. He was always reading or studying something—his cottage on Mud Puddle Lane was full of all sorts of books, even a banned one the three friends had come across and stashed under his bed. Quinn reached into his pocket and placed a little stickman next to the map as he sprawled on his stomach and pored over the map's markings. Rye recognized it as the Strategist's Sticks, a gift from Harmless, like Rye's anklet and Folly's Alchemist's Bone.

“Helps me concentrate,” he said, with a sheepish shrug. He ran a careful finger over the map's yellowed linen surface. “Here's Pest.”

“I heard . . .” Folly began.

Rye and Quinn exchanged glances. Folly's most outlandish stories always seemed to start that way.

“. . . that the tide washes gold grommets ashore every morning.”

Rye and Quinn looked at her as if a flock of pigeons had roosted on her head.

“From the shipwrecks,” she clarified.

“You heard that at the inn?” Quinn asked.

“Of course,” Folly said. She was always picking up snippets of conversation at the Dead Fish Inn. And they usually seemed to involve hidden treasures or beasts that might eat you.

“I don't know anything about golden tides,” a voice said with a chuckle. “Although with your ear for stories, you fit right in with my crew.”

It was Captain Dent, leaning against a timber.

“These waters
were
once stalked by sea rovers,” he went on. “The most notorious of them proclaimed himself the Sea Rover King and amassed a fortune raiding the real king's treasure galleons as they made their yearly runs from Drowning to O'There. The swabs prone to gossip will tell you the Sea Rover King's greatest treasure is still hidden somewhere on Pest.”

“Ow!” Quinn groaned.

Folly had smacked him on the shoulder. “See?” she said. “I told you there was treasure.”

“I'll just be happy if we find dry ground,” Quinn said, rubbing his arm. “And a souvenir to show my father. He's never left Drowning. I'll still be in for it when we get back, but at least he'll be impressed.”

“This is High Isle,” the Captain said, ignoring the children's jousting and pointing to the map. “Anything worth seeing on Pest can be found there. These,” he said, hovering his finger around a cluster of smaller dots, “are the Lower Isles. They are harsh and unforgiving islands. The most remote of them home to clans who dabble in dark currents. Hags whose dreams reveal the future . . . and drive them to madness.”

“More fish tales from bored sailors?” Rye asked.

“Perhaps,” Dent said grimly, “but I've never been inclined to sail there and find out.”

Rye exchanged nervous glances with Folly and Quinn.

“In any case,” the Captain said, returning to his usual good cheer, “could I please have my charts? Just to be sure we don't take a wrong turn.”

“Go on, Quinn,” Folly said quickly, giving him a nudge. “Give him back his maps.”

Sleeping in a hammock took some getting used to, and by their third night, Rye still hadn't. She slipped out of their cabin while Folly, Quinn, and Lottie still dozed. Her mother's hammock was empty, but Rye knew where she might find her. She pulled on her coat, its elbow repaired by Abby with a green swatch made from the same heavy sailcloth as the freebooters' flag. She'd also sewn on custom loops so Rye could stow her cudgel
and spyglass across her back. Abby was bundled in a heavy blanket on deck, staring out at the stars. The sea was calm, the sky crystal clear.

“Mama,” Rye whispered.

Abby looked up, smiled, and lifted the folds of the blanket, making room. Rye curled up beside her and Abby wrapped her tight.

“When will we be at the Isle of Pest?” Rye asked.

“I've only made this journey once myself—going the other way,” Abby said. “But I think we'll be there soon.”

“How can you tell?”

“I can smell it,” Abby said.

Rye crunched up her nose. “It smells bad?”

Abby stared up at the stars again. “No, not bad at all. It smells earthy, like soil and wild grass. Lavender in the springtime. Spring comes early on Pest.”

Rye sniffed hard and shook her head. “I can't smell anything.”

“You will,” Abby said. “Soon enough.”

“What's it like?”

“It's beautiful, often breathtakingly so. But it's a time-hardened place—harsh around its edges.” Abby's eyes flickered at a distant memory. “It's seen its share of strife.”

Pest sounded a lot like her mother, Rye thought.

“Pest has been occupied by the soldiers of many noble houses over the years—each house claiming it
for the Shale. Each with varying degrees of success. Belongers—that's what islanders call themselves—are not a people to be quelled. But that hasn't stopped the Uninvited from trying.”

“The Uninvited?” Rye asked.

“Anyone who's not a Belonger.”

“Oh,” Rye said. She picked her fingernails nervously. “Is Pest rich with treasure?”

Abby smirked. “That sounds like something Folly might have heard.”

Rye shrugged. Sometimes it seemed her mother knew her friends as well as she did.

“Pest
is
rich with legends,” Abby went on. “But, no, I don't believe there's buried treasure on Pest. If there was, Dent or someone like him would have found it.”

Rye wondered what else might make Pest such a sought-after prize. “Is it an important port?”

Abby shook her head. “No, its reefs and shoals are far too treacherous.”

“Then why have the nobles fought so hard for it? Why not leave it alone?”

Abby sighed. “Because the Belongers say they can't have it. And sometimes, unfortunately, that's all it takes.”

Rye considered the enormous lengths men would go to in order to claim something out of their reach—regardless of whether they really needed it.

“I was just a girl the last time a noble house laid claim on Pest,” Abby said. “They stationed a constable in Wick, along with a small army of soldiers. They tried to impose their own laws on the Belongers. They weren't the same as the Laws of Longchance, but they were hardly any better.”

Rye's stomach turned at the thought of the Earl and his laws.

“One day, by chance, the wind brought a mysterious young man to Pest. A Luck Ugly. He approached my father and offered his assistance.”

“Harmless?” Rye asked.

Abby nodded. “Of course, your father's assistance always comes with a price. The bargain they struck was harsh, but it was one that had been accepted by generations of Belongers before them.”

“What was it?”

Abby stared out at the darkened sea. “Pest's freedom . . . in exchange for one of its sons.” Abby was quiet for a moment before continuing. “With the Luck Uglies' help, Pest was soon free once again.”

“But Harmless said he wouldn't be welcomed back. Why?”

Abby sighed. “It's complicated.”

Rye furrowed her brow. With Harmless, it always was.

“When he left, your father took not only a son of Pest but me as well,” Abby said, her eyes flickering at a memory. “I went willingly, of course.” She looked to Rye and gave her a tight smile. “But there are those who would say he claimed more than he was promised.”

It reminded Rye of Slinister's accusations—that Harmless had stolen away something he had cherished. She wanted to ask her mother about it but feared both the answer and her mother's reaction. She tried to push the unpleasant thought from her mind.

“Why have you never gone back home?” Rye asked.

“When I left Pest, I was just a young woman—still a girl, really. Your grandfather didn't think I was ready. He insisted your father was a terrible choice for me. I disagreed—strongly—in that special way that young women reserve for their parents. The war Waldron and I had on the day of my departure rivaled the fiercest battles Pest has ever seen. I said things—we both did—that have left scars to this day.”

Rye was silent for a long while as they both watched the sea.

“I'm nervous,” Rye said finally. “To meet . . . my grandfather. I know nothing of him.”