CROW FOLLOWED TRESS OUT. It wasn’t until the ship was safely away from port—on a heading that would take them straight into the Crimson Sea—that Tress was allowed to go belowdecks.
Trapped. She was trapped on this ship.
They were sailing toward an insane sea where rain fell unpredictably. And if they survived, she would be sold into slavery to a dragon.
Had she really thought she had the upper hand? Had she really thought she could rescue Charlie?
Her? Of all people?
The worst part was, he would probably never know what had happened to her. He’d rot alone in the Sorceress’s prison. And if by some miracle he did get free, he’d find that she’d left the Rock—but her ship had been destroyed by deadrunners.
She drifted down the steps, then down the hallway. Dougs laughed and worked behind her, thumping on the steps to the hold. But she felt alone. Like she was choking at dinner, and nobody could see. Or maybe nobody cared.
She fled to her room as tears threatened to boil free. She doubted that bawling your eyes out was an appropriate pirate activity, so she was glad she was able to get the door shut before she fully lost control.
“Whoa,” Huck said. He scampered up onto the footboard of the bed. “Hey, Tress. What’s wrong? What happened?”
“I…I…” She shook her head and gasped for breath, unable to speak. It was all suddenly too much. People are like stomachs, you know. They can process some of what you feed them, but stuff in too much too fast, and eventually it’s going to come right back up.
“What did they do to you, Tress?” Huck asked. “I’ll get them back. I promise you. I’ll bite ’em on the toes.”
“On…the toes?” she asked through the tears, imagining the ridiculous sight.
“Yup,” he said. “It’s a very noble thing to attempt, as the toes are the third most stinky part on a human’s body. I’d do it anyway, for you.”
Tress settled down on the bed, staring up at the ceiling as tears crawled down her cheeks.
“Tress?” Huck said. “Really. What happened?”
“Nothing happened,” she whispered. “And nobody did anything to me. I’m to blame. For all of this. The captain plans to trade me to the dragon of the Crimson Sea—I’m to be payment for a healing.
“I knew I was in over my head, so why should I be surprised? Why wouldn’t I end up trapped on a ship captained by a demon, sailing straight toward my own doom? It’s what I deserve.”
She put the heels of her palms to her eyes, rubbing them. Then she felt a distinct bite on her left big toe.
“Hey!” she said, sitting up and looking toward the foot of the bed, where Huck sat.
“Sorry,” he said. “But I did promise to bite the person who was responsible for you crying. Also…um, no offense…but yuck.”
She flopped back down. “Don’t make me laugh,” she said. “I might shatter like a cold glass dropped in hot water.”
He scrambled along the bed, up next to the pillow, watching her tears. Those were quieter now, but still persistent, like the pain itself.
“I…went ashore,” Huck said. “I hid in one of the bales of cloth the Dougs hauled out, then made my escape while Fort was selling them. He’s good, by the way. I’ve never seen someone haggle like that man. And beyond that, the town was really interesting. Maybe you’d like to hear about it?”
She shrugged.
“When I’m feeling bad, it’s nice to think about something else,” Huck said, wringing his paws. “So let me know if I’m helping, or if you want me to be quiet. Sometimes it’s better if people—and rats—are quiet. I know that. At least, someone told me that once.
“Anyway, I watched Fort haggle, but I was too far away to read his words. I just know he got way more for those bales of cloth than he should have, considering the buyer must have known they were hot. Oh! And afterward he went to meet with a group of Deaf people living on the island. There were a bunch of them, and Fort smiled a lot and used his hands to talk, instead of the board. I wonder if the other islands have groups like that and I never noticed.
“Anyway, the city didn’t fly the royal flag. Isn’t that interesting? I know we’re at the border of the Emerald Sea, but still. The king has always made it seem like there aren’t any rogue islands. And we just landed on one! I expected a lot of peg legs and eye patches, but the people seemed…normal.”
“We’re pirates now,” Tress said, “and there’s not an eye patch among us. We’re normal too, I guess.”
“Kind of funny to think about, isn’t it?” Huck said. “That all the pirates in the world were once someone normal.” He fell silent, as if uncertain whether he should continue.
Tress, oddly, found that his talking was helping. She’d never been one for wanderlust, but she had dreamed of far-off places and their cups. That part of her genuinely wanted to hear about the island.
“You said the town was interesting,” she said, turning to look toward Huck. “Interesting how?”
“Oh!” he said. “They have a bell tower, Tress! I’ve always wanted to see a bell tower. I overheard some people talking, and they said it has fifty-three bells. What an odd number, don’t you think? I always thought a bell tower would have one bell. It’s not a bells tower.
“Well, I walked all the way around it and snuck a peek through the window, and they have ropes for ringing the bells! You pull on them and make sounds all through town. I doubt they’d let rats pull the ropes though. Even if we could.”
Tress smiled. A simple act, but only moments ago it had seemed as impossible as flying. Or as coming up with a rhyme for “bulb.” (No really. Try it.)
There was something endearing about the way Huck continued explaining his experiences on the island. He spoke of the most common things. A garden with flowers that smelled good. A pathway where all the cobbles fit together to make a spiral. A drinking fountain that you worked with a foot pedal.
The fact that he found these things interesting enough to talk about was in itself engaging. The topic mattered less than his enthusiasm. And so, Tress smiled. That didn’t banish her worries or her sorrow, but it did nudge those dour thoughts toward transforming into other less oppressive ones.
“…And then the girl got her brother wet,” Huck said, “by stomping on the pedal when he bent down to drink. Isn’t that delightful? Reminds me of being young. When I wasn’t on a pirate ship far from home.”
“You could go back,” Tress said. “If you want, Huck. You could leave. You should.”
“I can’t,” he said softly. “I can’t ever go back to my island, Tress. Because my home isn’t there anymore.”
That had the markings of tragedy, so Tress didn’t press him for details. Plus, she didn’t want to think about the fact that—in all likelihood—she wouldn’t ever be going home either.
“Does it seem like things were better when you were younger?” Huck asked. “Did life really make more sense then?”
“Yeah,” Tress whispered. “I remember…calm nights, watching the spores fall from the moon. Lukewarm cups of honey tea. The thrill of baking something new.”
“I remember not being afraid,” Huck said. “I remember waking each day to familiar scents. I remember thinking I understood how my life would go. Same as my parents’. Simple. Maybe not wonderful, but also not terrifying.”
“I don’t think things were really better though,” Tress said softly, still staring at the ceiling. “We just remember it that way because it’s comforting.”
“And because we couldn’t see the troubles,” Huck agreed. “Maybe we didn’t want to see them. When you’re young, there’s always someone else to deal with the problems.”
Tress nodded. Beyond that, memories have a way of changing on us. Souring or sweetening over time—like a brew we drink, then recreate later by taste, only getting the ingredients mostly right. You can’t taste a memory without tainting it with who you have become.
That inspires me. We each make our own lore, our own legends, every day. Our memories are our ballads, and if we tweak them a little with every performance…well, that’s all in the name of good drama. The past is boring anyway. We always pretend the ideals and culture of the past have aged like wine, but in truth, the ideas of the past tend to age more like biscuits. They simply get stale.
Tress thought through a few of her personal favorite ballads, which thrummed with honey, and love, and other sweet things.
She genuinely felt better. Moons, hearing about bell towers and water fountains had made her feel better. For some people, feeling better would have been an excuse to ignore the situation, but Tress preferred to weaponize her mood swings. So, ever pragmatic, she sat up on the bed and confronted her problems.
“I need a way to defend myself,” she whispered. “A way to defeat Crow before she sells me to the dragon.”
It was fortunate, then, that Tress’s room contained five different varieties of the most dangerous substance on the planet.
