Page 75 of The Sun God's Prize
“Silly thing,” she laughs in a low, sultry voice.“Challenge a dragon, will you?”
I exchange a grin with Sheelan, whose shining eyes are wide, Aurous still chuckling to herself while the wind catches us, the current finally in our favor.
The return trip is much faster thanks to that detail, our small boat fleet, with the help of the flow of the water, and now I’m concerned about what lies ahead.
“We should make landfall before we reach the mouth of the Sun River,” I say.
But Sheelan disagrees, shaking her head.“We’ll be there at dark,” she tells me.“With luck, we’ll skim through the harbor and be around them and heading back upriver before anyone knows we’re even here.”She sounds hopeful, but I’m not counting on things going our way.
That’s simply not how my life has unfolded lately, and I’ll take nothing for granted.
She’s proven correct, though, the last light gone when we exit the narrow river’s tributary and emerge into the large harbor, the shining city aglow, oddly welcoming, peaceful, and unthreatening despite what would await us there.While my shoulder blades come together and the space between them prickles with concern, we drift past large vessels bearing the banner of the Sun God, no one seeming to pay any attention to our small boat while we make our way through the many ships and smaller craft like ours on our way to the opening to the main river that spills into the harbor.
I know that this river is the one that carried me most of the way south, and that if we follow it in reverse, we’ll end up in the Crescent Sea.But this small boat will not make that journey easy or fast, and though we’d be hard-pressed to man one of the speedy vessels the slaver captain Lhanin used to command—and that seem to dominate the harbor—we’re not going to make very good time in this tiny boat we’ve stolen.
“We need a better means of travel,” I say, thinking of horses, wishing, at least.I haven’t seen many since coming south, though I know they are here.Most people seem to favor the tall-shouldered, yellow-coated cattle, no doubt acclimatized to the humidity better than horses.
“Once we’re upriver,” Sheelan says, “we’ll steal a bigger boat, with a better sail.”She pats the tiller with one hand.“She’s been a good little friend to us, but I agree.A trip north in her will take far too long.”
We’re already approaching the river’s mouth, bypassing most of the ships that crowd the city’s main docks, not a single head turned in our direction.Could escape really be this easy?I glance at Aurous, who seems to have her head on a swivel, looking at everything with an open expression of joy and excitement.It makes me smile, too, distracting in her innocence, though I don’t begrudge her any enjoyment of seeing this place for the first time.While mine wasn’t so happy a reveal, her experience doesn’t have to be as dark.
In fact, if I can shelter her from darkness just a little while longer, I’m happy to do so.
Sheelan pulls off to a small dock when we’re out of the harbor, taking the cloak from me without a word, draping it over her head, and leaping out before I can stop her.She remains far more agile on the water than I am, so I’m still struggling to follow her, swearing under my breath at her boldness and lack of foresight, when she approaches the woman who stands at the far end, talking with another sailor.I’m about to go with her when Aurous stops me, nods.Sheelan seems to know what she’s doing, the sound of something clinking ending in the princess hurrying back to us, a little breathless but more excited than afraid.
“I’ve traded our boat,” she says, gesturing for us to exit it and join her on the dock.“We have passage on another as far as Lake Thestral.”She’s missing one of her gold bangles, and I know she’s sold it off for payment, but when I inhale to chastise her for risking it and herself, she waves off my protest.“We don’t have time for you to tell me I’m wrong, Remi,” she says.
Aurous laughs.I’m grumbling as I follow them down the dock, but I relent.For now.
There will be time later for that conversation.I’ll make sure of it.
We tuck together at the prow of the ship we board, the gruff, old captain saying nothing to us but to warn us to stay out of the way of his sailors.I’m happy to do so, accepting food and water from the young boy who brings it, and I’ve never been so relieved to chew into a strip of dried,kurriespiced meat in all my days.
“You seem far more comfortable with this way of life than you should,” I tell Sheelan as she nibbles her own jerky, settled against me, eyes heavy-lidded while Aurous leans over the rail, staring down into the bubbles the cutting prow stirs in the water.We’re making good time, if not the speed I am used to, again against the current, though the sails catch wind that drive us into the night.
“My father loved to come out into the world,” she says, “to pretend he was an ordinary person, to speak to the people and live as they did from time to time.When I was old enough, he brought me with him, and Theille, too.He said a ruler must know their subjects and their plights in order to lead them with compassion and understanding.”
I tuck her under my chin, holding her as she snuggles closer.“Your father was a wise man,” I say, cursing Hallick more now than ever.His very arrival denied this country of its destiny, just as his actions did of the Overkingdom he created.
“Was your mother?”Sheelan’s soft question stirs old feelings, too.
“My mother,” I say, “was bold as they named her.Skilled at war, loyal and driven.Ambitious to a fault.”I’ll make no excuses for her, even as lifelong pride reawakens.“She was flawed, Lan.As tainted by the magic of Neem as any.”Did my mother really deliver the spell that laid Aurous’s aunt low?I have to accept it, for now.“But I truly think she did her best for the people of Heald, had our country’s best interest in her heart with everything she did.”I sigh, sad all over again.“She made terrible decisions and mistakes we’re all paying for now.”Aurous has turned to listen, her amber eyes quiet and patient.“But was she wise?”I shake my head.“No.She was brilliant without wisdom, and stubborn without softness.My mother was a war queen, what life and choices made her.”
Sheelan looks up at me, one hand soft on my cheek.“You’re not her,” she says, as though knowing what I’m thinking.
“But I am,” I say, without regret.“I am what she made me.What her sister made me.”
“You are far more than that, Flame,” Aurous says, Sheelan nodding agreement.“You have surpassed your mother already, long ago, and you’re barely beginning.”
I blink the moisture that tries to blind me.“If you say so,” I tell her, Sheelan’s arms tightening around me.“All I can hope is that I, like my mother, do the best that I can for those who depend on me, but without the fatal ambition that killed her.”I’ve never spoken that truth out loud, not to Atlas or Zenthris.I don’t think I’ve even allowed myself to think it, not in this way.
Aurous slides forward, hugging me, Sheelan between us, the three of us snuggling together as I drape us in my cloak and close my eyes to the rocking of the ship, sighing into sleep.
We’re two more days on the water before the captain docks, leaving us on the shore of the lake at dawn.I’m happy to be on land, to stretch my legs and scent food on the breeze that’s not dried meat or the slurry of terribly madekurriethat barely passed as sustenance on board.
“We need to buy another ride,” Sheelan says, nodding down the dock toward a line of ships waiting, bobbing softly in the morning light.“I have two more bangles.”She grimaces.“I wish I’d worn more the night we fled.”
“I can make more, if we need,” Aurous says.
