“I take it that you found the missing skull,” Lt. Guerin remarked, walking up with her rifle resting over one arm. Her face and uniform, like Captain Tancrède’s, were covered with dark stains from the smoke and powder of battle.
“It might be more accurate to say that it found me, Lieutenant,” I replied, looking up. The skull on my shoulder shifted to hover over my head again as more bale tendrils slithered up my neck to touch my throat and ears. Guerin raised an eyebrow.
“I think it likes you,” she remarked. “Are all Chevachèchen spirits so … touchy-feely?”
“I couldn’t say.” I struggled to match her nonchalant tone, wondering if she’d shoot me if I appeared to pose any danger to the ship. “This is the first one I’ve met. It does seem a little attached.”
*** *** is not *** ***, Nje murmured in my ears.
“She is my friend,” I replied in Chevachèchen, just as quietly. Our long conversations in my cabin had taught me that as long as Nje’s tendrils were around my throat, I barely needed to vocalize for it to “hear” me.
“And is it a business relationship, or romantic?” Guerin spoke as if half the ship’s crew wasn’t racing around us to lower the boats while the other half fought to assess and repair the damage our ship had sustained. We seemed, the two of us, to be a quiet oasis in the middle of madness. “The latter might break a few hearts among the crew.”
I gave a short, incredulous laugh.
“I’m fairly certain this is all business,” I said, “although I’m not quite sure what it’s getting out of the partnership.”
“Proximity to pain, I’d imagine. Although I wouldn’t mention that to our crew. The whole horse-skull statement is quite formidable enough.”
“I’ll attempt to determine whether the skull’s presence is negotiable.”
“On the other hand,” the lieutenant continued lightly, “what you might say to the crew — or perhaps I’ll say it for you — is that this does indeed show that our evil empire-building sentinel in residence is, indeed, favored by the local gods.”
I winced at the term.
“I don’t know if it’s a god. It may be more of a spirit.”
“Tsk, don’t be ethnocentric, Sentinel. There’s no difference between a god and a spirit around here.”
“The Reverence considers that heresy,” I warned, although her words had struck me. Could Nje be feeding off all this pain and death in some way? It wasn’t physically stalking the injured or dying, the way regular transients did, and the sailors’ deaths didn’t seem to be dismissing it. In fact, now that I thought about it, Nje had actually nullified my pain. I reached up to touch my wounded shoulder, twisting my head. The bale-armor obligingly slid aside to reveal torn fabric and freshly scarred flesh.
“How did —?” I glanced up and saw Guerin watching me. I gave a humorless laugh and dropped my hand. The bale slid back. “Never mind.”
God? Spirit? The one thing I was sure of was that transients didn’t heal wounds.
“Is that … comfortable?” Guerin asked, eyebrows rising. “I assume it’s bale, from the glow?”
“It’s bale, and I feel like I’m covered in rotting seaweed.”
Her lips twitched.
“I must say, the ensemble gives you a most uncommon appearance, Saint-Cloud. I’m not certain the Admiralty will approve.”
“The captain certainly doesn’t.” I thought of Cutter’s alarmed expression as he’d looked up from the wreckage in the water, and Cornelli’s flinch. I must look every bit the godless monster Lt. Pyke had accused me of being that day we fought the Damme Boy. “I regret the discomfort my appearance must be causing everyone.”
“I was once required to spend a very long evening in a most ridiculous green satin ball gown,” Guerin mused. “Sometimes the demands of duty subject officers to the most awkward situations.”
“I’ve never been comfortable in ball gowns,” I said, striving to keep my tone as light as hers. “I think I prefer my seaweed.”
“I would have as well, Sentinel, I would have as well.”
I took a deep breath, unaccountably grateful for the marine’s nonchalance.
“How is the ship?”
“The rudder is damaged and, as you are aware, the hull breached. We are run aground on an uncharted reef; it seems likely that the Steadfast lured us here with intention. Master Caraby is livid and the captain is concerned.”
“But the pirates sailed away.”
“They sailed away, but that doesn’t mean they’ll stay away.” Guerin glanced around the busy deck, then up at the sky, her eyes narrowed. “We’ll see.”
“Is that why you’re here? To keep watch for them?”
“I’ll be doing that, but mostly I’m here to keep you awake and alert until the carpenters get our hole patched.”
“And shoot me if I go balemad.”
Guerin smirked.
“All those crew members whispering prayers to Mazarin Saint-Cloud around us would throw me overboard, Sentinel. And while I can swim, I don’t care to take my chances with the sharks.”
“They’re not really….” I stared at her, aghast, and she winked.
“So, seeing as we’re going to be here a while,” she said, cheekily changing the subject, “we might as well get know each other better. Have you any interest in firearms?”
Guerin and I chatted on and off over the next several hours, interrupted whenever she was called away or I was required to adjust my balewalls. I was amazed again by the speed with which the crew pulled the damaged Chaser back into some semblance of order, repairing lines, replacing sheets, sewing shrouds for the bodies and, of course, methodically patching the hole in our hull. The ship was an organized, largely self-sufficient community, operating with a brisk efficiency that reminded me of a well-run estate.
As I was allowed to release another call, I paused to touch the long, heavy skull resting on my shoulder.
“Nje,” I murmured, “thank you for your help. Would you please stop covering me in bale now?” I made the request in Empyrian so as to phrase it more politely than I could in Chevachèchen. The transient had, after all, done everything I’d asked of it without complaint, and had healed my shoulder, as well.
I do not *** ** *** the skull if *** *** battle ***.
I felt a familiar twinge of frustration at my own failure to understand.
“Then could you … could you put yourself someplace where you won’t be so visible?” I switched to Chevachèchen. “Can you hide? Stay and hide?”
Nje burst into a long argument in Chevachèchen, of which I could understand too little to grasp the reason for its objection.
“Please,” I said, resorting to a pidgin mixture of the two languages, with considerably more Empyrian than Chevachèchen. “Please hide, so I can work without frightening the rest of the crew. You don’t understand … if you scare them, they make me send you away. Throw you into the ocean or banish you across the Line.”
To my surprise, that last sentence caught in my throat. I didn’t want to send Nje away. The creature was a mystery that I wanted to unravel.
“Please,” I repeated, in Chevachèchen.
I stay and hide, Nje consented at last, in Empyrian. The skull clattered to the ground as bale retracted beneath my clothes. I gasped at the warm, slimy sensation of bale pressing against my bare flesh.
“No! In my pocket!” I protested, squirming with discomfort. “Pocket!” I jammed a hand into my pocket, hoping that the gesture would convey what the Empyrian word might not. Nje obediently slid around, letting much of the bale it used to … create itself … slip across the Line as it poured itself into a more compact bundle in my pocket. So … it called bale to create a body for itself? Then what size was it, really? And what did its real self look like?
Two slender tendrils of bale remained, coiling up the inside of my right sleeve, one looped against the base of my throat and the other slipping beneath my hair to coil around one ear and rest gently inside. I tugged at my shirt collar and leaned over to pick up the horse skull.
Lt. Guerin arched an eyebrow.
“Are you sure it’s a business relationship, Sentinel?” she asked.
“Translation problems.” I gave her an uncomfortable look, wondering what she was thinking. “But … maybe now the crew will be more comfortable.”
“You don’t look nearly as frightening, anyway.” She reached out and touched the bloody shirt over my shoulder. “You were wounded?”
“A splinter. It seems to have been … repaired.”
“Useful. Can it heal others?”
“I don’t know. The process wasn’t painless, if that matters.”
“Hmm. Something to investigate. In the meantime, shall we go below to see if the ship’s carpenter has any more need of your assistance?”
The situation below decks was grim. I summoned a ball of balelight to better illuminate the damage for the repair crew and the hands fell silent, casting me wary looks before returning to their work.
“Sentinel.” The ship’s carpenter, Mr. Roder, hesitated and then approached, wiping his forehead on one grubby sleeve. He gave the skull cradled in my arms a sidelong look and then fixed his eyes on my face. “Can you make your patch permanent?”
“No. I don’t have the power to fix bale.”
“Didn’t think so. Had to ask.” He turned. “Well, keeping the water out of the hold makes patching a sight easier, but it’ll be touch-and-go unless we can get off this reef without tearing her open again. Don’t suppose you can raise the ship off the rocks for us?”
“I can’t create balehooks floating down from the sky to lift us up, if that’s what you mean.”
“Psh.” Roder waved away the frivolous idea. “Does bale float? Could we use it to lift the hull off the rocks while keeping the ship upright?”
“I don’t think it can float, per se….” I frowned as I grasped the carpenter’s meaning. “But as long as it has a solid foundation under it, I might be able to construct a wall or a series of walls under the ship to push the hull upward. Would that help?”
“Aye, it would. We can’t simply haul the ship off the rocks without doing more damage, and the master tells us high tide ain’t until dawn, which is a long time to be trapped with pirates lurking about.”
“You think they’ll return?” I asked. The hands’ work paused, waiting for the carpenter’s response, and Lt. Guerin gave a dissatisfied grunt. I realized I shouldn’t have asked. Roder, however, seemed oblivious.
“Well, Sentinel, I figure they have a fair chance of slipping within firing range under cover of darkness,” he said. “We’ve limited ability to bring our guns to bear as long as we’re trapped. We can keep watch and try to hold them at bay, but it’d be a sight easier if we were mobile again. Or maybe you could surround the whole reef with a ring of fire?”
“I don’t think I have the skill for that. And there was a sentinel on the Shrike.” I looked at Guerin. “I was surprised they didn’t destroy us before fleeing.”
“Pirates’d rather loot than destroy,” Roder said before she could say anything. “Long as we’re trapped, they can come back in their own good time and pick us over. That’s why we need to get off this reef.”
I ran a hand over my face, feeling exhausted, but nodded. Everybody else was just as tired as I was, and I’d done less physical labor than any of them.
“If someone can take me out on one of those boats,” I said, “I can get a better look at how the ship is sitting on the reef.”
“Good.” Mr. Roder gave a sharp nod. “Missus Kai’s got the larboard watch lightening the ship’s load, but if you ask her for one of the boats, I’m sure she’ll oblige.”
“All right,” I said, turning back to the carpenter. “I’ll go at once.”
Procuring a boat and rowers took about half an hour, during which time I was allowed to peel back the remaining bale patch bit by bit while the carpenters monitored their wooden patch for leaks. The repair job held. Relieved of the mental strain, I perched on one of the deck cannon’s carriages, the horse skull sitting in my lap and a cup of strong tea warming my hands. Lt. Guerin had left to take reports from her marines, although she never let me completely out of her sight.
I’d caught glimpses of Cadet Cutter several times in the last few hours and was pleased to see he seemed little the worse for wear. I supposed he might be as intimidated by me as the rest of the crew, but that didn’t matter, as long as he was alive.
Sighing, I turned my gaze out to the water. The sun was low on the horizon, washing the waves and wood in shades of crimson that looked unpleasantly like blood.
“Sentinel Saint-Cloud.” The captain’s voice startled me out of my reverie. I leaped to attention, the horse’s skull tumbling off my lap and clattering onto the deck. I balanced my teacup in one hand and saluted with the other.
“At ease,” Tancrède said, glancing down at the skull. He placed his shoe on it and rolled it until it was sitting upright. I hoped Nje didn’t take offense. “I understand you may be able to raise the Chaser off this reef.”
“Yes, sir.” I set the teacup down on the gun carriage and remained standing. Tancrède gave me a sour look.
“Will you be calling upon the services of your … familiar spirit again?”
“If the operation requires more bale than I can call, requesting its help may be unavoidable.”
“Is it dangerous?” He looked down at the skull.
“I don’t believe Nje poses any danger to me or to the ship,” I said, cautiously. “However, my ability to communicate with it is still limited.”
“What does it want in return for its service?”
“I don’t know.” I drew in a resolute breath. “But if you give me time, I’ll find out.”
“Well. The Imperial Navy demands only the service of your mind and your body; your soul is your own to dispose of as you like.” Tancrède fixed me with a sharp gaze. “However, you would be wise to treat that thing with caution. If I suspect you’re going balemad or otherwise acting against the best interests of this ship, the Imperial Navy, or the Empire itself, I will have you shot. Do you understand me?”
I licked my lips.
“Yes, sir. I understand.”
“Very well. We will revisit this matter once my ship is out of danger.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Carry on, then.” Tancrède walked off without a second look. I bent down and picked up the skull, resting a hand on the rough, weather-worn bone.
“What do you want from me, Nje?” I whispered in Chevachèchen. The tendril around my ears shifted slightly.
I want *** *** you.
“Say more?”
The transient’s explanation was, as I’d anticipated, too obscure to understand. I poked through the wreckage for scraps and worked on constructing a crude knapsack out of rope and sailcloth until Missus Kai called me over to tell me that my boat was ready.
Securing the skull in its sack, I slung it over a shoulder and climbed down to the small jollyboat. The middie who’d relayed the carpenter’s orders to me earlier that day waited there with several sailors.
“Cadet Cornelli,” I said, carefully taking a seat.
“Sentinel,” she replied, showing more self-possession than she had earlier. Lt. Guerin climbed nimbly down after me, her rifle slung over her back.
“I’m sorry you’re obliged to watch over me like this,” I remarked as she sat next to me. She gave me an amiable elbow in the ribs.
“Beats hauling lines,” she said. “Shift over.”
At Cadet Cornelli’s command, the rowers pushed away from the ship. A line of the Chaser’s boats already bobbed in the water behind the ship, connected to it by heavy cable, all hands ready to try towing it off the reef if I managed to lift it out of danger.
“The captain is concerned about the Steadfast and Shrike,” Guerin continued, glancing out to the horizon. “If you could call one of your balelights to illuminate the area, that would be useful to those of us on watch as well as to yourself.”
“Of course.” I sent out a call, replacing the fading reds of sunset with the sickly, pale glow of balelight floating above us.
“Thank you.”
As we moved away from the Chaser’s hull, I sank another balelight into the water, gingerly leaning over the side of the boat and shifting the light back and forth until I could dimly make out the reef formation beneath us.
“Can you do anything?” Cornelli asked, standing on the opposite side of the boat to counterbalance me.
“I think so,” I said, trying to gauge the height of the supports I’d need to create. I’d never tried anything like this before; in Cislunar, my work had been more administrative than constructive. I’d been using my talents more often and in more varied ways over my last two months with the Navy than I ever had before.
“Sail ho!”
The lookout’s cry rang out over the water. Guerin stood, showing impeccable balance as she turned and unslung her rifle. The sailors grabbed their oars and Cornelli squinted out in the same direction as Guerin, straining to see beyond the limits of my balelight.
“Who is it?” I asked, my heart pounding. “Is it the Shrike?”
“If you can lift the ship, Saint-Cloud,” Guerin said tersely, “now would be a good time.”
“Nje!” I called. The transient slipped out of my pocket and surrounded me with bale. Behind me, the sailors hissed and shifted, and Cornelli snapped at them to be still.
I am here, it vibrated against my ears.
“Take my calls, please.”
The two balelights were lifted from me with the same ease as before. I edged back to the side of the boat and concentrated, pulling bale across the Line to construct walls that fit into the uneven nooks and crannies of the reef and rose upward to touch the hull of the ship. Two calls, three, then four.
“Nje —”
All four calls were plucked from me; Nje was now maintaining six calls at once; the maximum any human sentinel had ever been able to hold. Ignoring its clammy grasp, I spun more bale out from the Line, weaving the underwater walls higher, unable to tell on the unsteady rowboat whether the ship’s hull was rising or not.
I heard the cannon roar moments before water splashed over me from the ball’s impact, just a few feet away.
“Hold steady,” the young cadet ordered, her eyes fixed on the horizon, in the same direction Lt. Guerin was facing.
“How many more calls can you hold, Nje?” I asked in Empyrian.
Three, it replied in Chevachèchen, and said more that I didn’t even try to understand. I handed off three more of the balewall extensions. By all rights, I should raise a balewall over the Chaser’s powder room, but I had no idea where it was from this angle on the water.
“Cadet, I believe I have raised the ship sufficiently for a tow,” I said at last, hoping it was true. She nodded, lifting her speaking-trumpet to convey the information. As she did, I turned to Lt. Guerin, who was steadying herself with one boot on our seat, both hands on her rifle as she scanned the water.
“Do you wish me to shield the Chaser or the cutters? I can’t do both.”
“Cornelli’s call, but likely the cutters,” she said, tersely.
I faintly heard Captan Tancrède snapping orders on the Chaser’s deck. Gun crews were returning to the cannon that were still functioning, bringing them to bear, and marines were taking their places wherever they could in the disarray of repairs.
I repeated my question when the cadet lowered her speaking-tube.
“Protect the cutters, Sentinel,” the young woman said, clearly struggling to hide her anxiety. “We must get the Chaser off the reef.”
I was afraid she’d say that. Bale was mutable, but it still had mass and weight and required grounding on a solid surface. My stomach twisted at the sight of so many active calls around me: nine held by Nje and one by myself, not to mention Nje’s own bale wrapped around me like some kind of eldritch glowing armor. I discerned two distant calls against the night’s darkness: Shrike’s sentinel was also at work. I wondered what that sentinel thought, seeing more calls here than one person could possibly hold. With luck, they would warn their captain that the Chaser was too dangerous to attack.
I glanced back at the towing line. The boats were beginning to move as the hands attempted to move the Chaser backward until she was safely clear of the rocks. What sails remained to be raised had been, but there was no breeze to fill them.
The Chaser returned fire: one shot. A warning to the pirates that we weren’t helpless.
“My ability to protect the cutters is limited,” I warned Cornelli. “They’re small, distant, and —”
“Do what you can, Sentinel,” she snapped. I swallowed the rest of my words. She was doing her job, and I must, as well. I spun the walls like arches from bow to stern, over the crews’ head. They would help deflect balls and shot, at least, and perhaps offer protection from another of the enemy sorcerer’s balefire storms. It was all I could do without hindering the oars.
“Ahoy, the Chaser! I would speak with the captain.” The speaker’s Chevachèchen accent was clear, despite its distortion through a speaking tube.
A moment later, I saw Captain Tancrède by the rail, holding a speaking-tube of his own. I wondered whether I should drop one of the walls protecting the cutter and shift it to protect him, instead.
“This is Captain Tancrède. Who are you?”
“Captain Lazare of the Steadfast. It seems you’re in distress, Captain Tancrède.”
“On the contrary, Captain Lazare, we have everything in hand and require no assistance.”
“Assistance is not exactly what I’m offering,” Lazare replied cheerfully. “However, if you surrender peacefully, I will offer quarter.”
The sailors tensed. I looked around, wondering what that meant.
“I have no intention of surrendering the Chaser to a pirate,” Tancrède said, flatly.
Silence from the other ship. I glanced at Cornelli and saw her standing at ease, though I was close enough to see that her knuckles were white where she gripped the speaking-tube. Lt. Guerin remained still, gazing out at the water with her rifle in hand.
A few seconds later, the enemy ship lit up with a gout of fire as a blast roared over the water — a ragged series of shots — one, two, three. Our jollyboat gave a horrendous shudder as one of the balls slammed into it, pulping one of our rowers and the wooden hull.