Passage

         This portion takes place after Shayla has been attacked by the boy in the forest (see Hide and Seek) and is sent away to Allark by her father. On the way home, she is taken captive by the boy and put on a ship bound for the eastern continent of Tishnei.
         The passage over the sea was long for Shayla who had never been on a voyage. Her anxiety mixed with her sea-sickness so that oftentimes the only way she could fight off vomiting was by closing her eyes and breathing shallow, short breaths.
         Her mother continued to comfort her. Even though it seemed that there was no hope. They were sealed below deck in the dank, damp ship. Lidia huddled with them for most of the journey. She would stare at the wall of the brig without seeming to fear or feel either way for their fate.
         Shayla felt like a child in light of their reactions to captivity. She had expected that her mother would be amazing. She always was. But Lidia’s despondence was unnerving. It was almost as if she had retreated into herself. But that wasn’t it either. When guards brought food or when her mother talked with her. She acted as normally as Shayla had ever seen her.
         Shayla tried not being afraid, but there was too much going on. She had been through too much to take much more. Shayla thought that her mother must know that, she always knew when Shayla was hurting no matter how much Shayla attempted to hide it.
         Through snatches of conversation, they were able to track their progress across the sea. The boy seemed to be in charge of the whole crew, who seemed to fear him. When they came below deck they would mutter to themselves or speak in hushed tones among themselves. For the most part, they wondered how they might desert the ship entirely once they reached land. Shayla privately thought that she didn’t blame them. The boy was horrible.
         “It’s unnatural.” One of the men had said. “No child should act like him. This whole voyage is cursed.” The man had glanced nervously toward the women who were once again huddled together. “It’s not worth the money. I heard what he’s planning to do with them. It’s not right. The youngest one’s still a child…”
         “You’d better watch your mouth. Don’t forget why you signed on. It’s not just the money. When Euron is returned to its rightful leadership we will all have titles and privilege.”
         “Is that really all you care about? This is wrong! You know–”
         “I know that my family was in the court of Euron. Now, I am the son of a textile worker. I have fought for everything I have. I want what is mine! I want to provide for my family.”
         “But this girl, the queen, they are both of noble blood as well. This is not the way.”
         “I’m not discussing this any–” He stopped short at a sound from the shadowed corner. Both men tensed as they watched. Shayla couldn’t help herself as her head turned in the direction of the sound.
         Her breath quickened as the horribly familiar laugh floated quietly across the room. She noticed that the man who had defended the boy’s actions stood perfectly still, without fear. The other man, however, visibly quaked at the sight of him. How strange it was that such a small being could both terrify and soothe. Shayla herself was also trembling and clutched convulsively at her mother’s arms that encircled her protectively.
         Her eyes were shut, but the cries of the man as he died were piercing. Nothing could have kept out that sound. His cries faded and Shayla, trembling, chanced a look at the stairs where the men had been. The loyal one was dragging the other up the stairs. There was blood all over them both. Shayla couldn’t help it. She sobbed and her mother held her more tightly.
         Shayla looked up at her mother’s face and saw that she was looking a the door of their cell. Wonderingly, Shayla looked and shrank back as she met the intense stare of the boy. He eyed her with a sort of vicious curiosity, as if he were contemplating plucking the wings off of a fly.
         “You leave her alone.” Her mother said quietly. His eyes flashed to her face and he grinned maliciously.
         “I do as I please.”
         Her eyebrow rose slightly. “That much is plain. However, you are not the only person with power. And you are not the first to think you can do as you please.”
         His grin did not falter. “Talk all you want. I will have her eventually.” Shayla felt Lidia twitch next to her and tense. Her body was rigid in defiance, and her hand moved to her own wrist and began digging at her flesh. Lidia gasped and her hand trembled, the movement slowed, but blood had already begun to trickle down her palm to her fingertips.
         “Lidia! No!” Shayla grabbed at her hand and pulled it back, so it would no longer harm her. The boy chuckled.
         “You have a strong mind, Lidia. I’m interested to see how long it lasts.” His eyes flashed back to Shayla. “We are very close now to the last scene. I’m excited to see how it pans out. It is too bad that I can’t watch the whole act, but it would be detrimental to my health and I have much more work to do.” He laughed again as Shayla’s mother hissed at him.
         Then he was gone, leaving Shayla to wonder at what deviousness he had planned for them. Shayla felt her mother’s grip on her loosen as Lidia, her breath ragged mopped at her wrist with her gown. The marks were deep and one in particular was bleeding freely. The women’s eyes met. “I think I nicked a vein.” Shayla’s mother began ripping pieces from her dress and pressing them to the wound. Then, with a long tearing sound, she pulled a strip off that she used to tightly secure the bandages. They were already starting to turn red. Shayla’s mother had Lidia raise her arm over her head then she settled her back against the wall.
         Shayla leaned her head down into her mother’s lap and attempted to hold herself together as her mother’s soft, cool hands began to stroke her hair and face. “I don’t understand, Mother. Why is he doing this?” Her eyes burned from her tears.
         Her mother looked down at her and, for the first time, Shayla saw that she was tired. Her face was drawn and looked much older as it carried her troubles.
         “I don’t think even he could answer that Shayla. He is driven by his need to destroy the good things of the world. But the reasons?” She sighed. “Most of the time we spend our lives as pawns of one thing or another. Perhaps it is another person, someone we respect. At other times we are simply the agents of fate. We do what we know without question because that is our nature. But then there are times where we make decisions against our core, we see the end of the road clearly, and we turn our backs on it. It is those people, ones who are loosed from self, ties to others, and even fate itself, that are truly dangerous.”
         Shayla waited, but her mother, it seemed, had finished what she wanted to say. “I still don’t understand.”
         “He is trying to fight what he is by becoming what he is not. I don’t expect that you will understand until you face it yourself.”
         “Me?” Shayla’s voice was a squeak.
         “Yes, Shayla. We must all decide, at some point, how we will react and by what standard we will measure those actions. It determines whether we will be brave, fearless and whether we will stand in the face of what seems inevitable.”
         “You are very brave.” Shayla said in a small voice. Her mother had always been the bravest person she knew, next to her father. Now it seemed as though those roles were in the wrong order. They were equals, her parents.
         “Thank you Shayla. I learned it from your father. We cannot always change our circumstances, but we can change how we react under them. I made my choice the moment I found out that I was pregnant with you. You will probably be faced with that choice as well, if you haven’t already.”
         “But how will I know? And what if I missed my chance?”
         “That is the thing about life. There is always a second chance. If you make a choice, the outcome will test you. It is then that you can either try again, or continue as you have done. Don’t fret my love. You will have a second chance.” She continued to stroke Shayla’s hair and they lapsed into silence.
         Her mother shifted once, to check on Lidia. Otherwise there was no respite from the darkness of the brig and no end to the rocking of the ship on the invisible swells. Shayla heard her stomach churn and she closed her eyes to concentrate of breathing steadily. She found that with her eyes closed she was able to block the strength of the sickness. The steadiness of her mother’s hands as they stroked her hair made her feel safer, though she was never unaware of the danger they faced.
         Shayla pulled her knees more tightly to her chest and allowed her mother to comfort her. She allowed the peace to wash over her mind and calm her thoughts. Her breathing steadied and soon, she was asleep.
         Their days passed in near total darkness. Shayla lost count somewhere in the twenties and after a short while, she stopped counting altogether. The lack of sunlight made such counting pointless anyway and she had rarely felt the passage of time less. Had it not been for the change in light when their captors brought them food she might never have even made it to the twenties at all. But as the voyage continued, their meals came more infrequently. Shayla’s stomach rumbled with hunger which even the meals, which also shrank in size, could not completely silence.
         It was probably better though, considering Shayla’s dislike of the sea, that her stomach was not full. The combination of sickness and anxiety made her weaker with each passing day. Shayla would lay, her head in her mother’s lap, and attempt to ignore the feeling of the boy’s eyes upon her.
         He seemed to visit her at regular intervals. He would go in stints of watching her for hours at a time and then he would be gone for long stretches of time. In the beginning, she was silently grateful for those times of solitude. She slept more soundly, often for hours at a time. But, inevitably, he would return to his vigil.
         The day he broke his silence was the day that Shayla refused food for the first time. Her sickness was now causing her to shiver violently and the food offered held no temptation for her. She closed her eyes at the sight of it and fought off retching. She lay, as still as possible, and only forced herself to breathe slowly.
         She heard footsteps softly approach her. A warm hand pressed against her forehead. She could feel her skin burning against the hand. She opened her eyes a fraction and saw, to her horror, that it was the boy crouching in front of her. His eyes stared at her intently. Instinctively, she looked for her mother.
         She found her near the door. Her body was frozen. Lidia was near her and was just as still. Her eyes returned to his face, the fear in them was unconcealed.
         “They are unharmed.” His soft voice floated to her ears. He cocked his head to one side and viewed her with curiosity again. “Aren’t you hungry?” He had removed his hand from her head and clasped both in front of him with his elbows on his knees.
         She shook her head. He tilted his head to the other side. “Interesting. You’re not feeling well.” She shook her head. “But it’s not just the sea now.” He put his hand against her forehead again. “You really are sick.” She nodded dumbly. The floor of the ship was rough against her cheek. He again removed his hand and stared for a little longer. Shayla shivered under his gaze.
         “Come with me.” He said it softly and she felt her limbs begin to move without her permission. She stood and felt the bile rise in her throat. He seemed to know and miraculously, the feeling stilled. He beckoned her forward, through the prison door and into the open room. As the doors clicked and locked again, her mother and Lidia stirred. “No!” The anguished cry of her mother came at her retreating back as she was lead up the stairs and into the fresh salty air. The hatch door slammed shut, silencing the cries from below.
         In spite of herself, she breathed deeply of the fresh air and the cool breeze seemed to cleanse her from the inside out. Her limbs, again, moved at the will of the boy and she followed him across the deck to the captain’s quarters. The deckhands averted their eyes as they passed.
         He opened the door for her and she entered, smelling the food that made her mouth water. He led her to his table and seated her at one of the two settings. She trembled again. “I’m going to release you. Behave.” He held her gaze and she felt her strength crumble and she collapsed against the tabletop. He muttered angrily under his breath. She felt her body stiffen again and she sat up. “I suppose that won’t work.” He served her from his portion. The food on her plate included roasted meat of some kind with vegetables and bread. He pushed the plate toward her and said, “Eat.”
         With jerky motions, she started cutting and eating the meat. The taste was ridiculously good after such a long absence from real food. But she was unable to savor it. He was controlling her movements. He pushed his drink toward her and she took a long draught of the wine. It spread warmly through her body. The churning in her stomach had lessened. She gasped for air when he allowed her to lower her hand. He gave her a moment and started again.
         “Please, I need a moment.” She gasped after the sixth cycle of this. He leaned her back and she felt his grip on her loosen, though it didn’t release entirely. He pulled the food back to himself and began to eat what she hadn’t been able to finish.
         Shayla attempted to slow her ragged breathing. She was completely confused by his actions. Why had he only now taken an interest in her health? “Wh-why are you doing this?” She managed to sound more in control of herself that she’d thought possible. He looked up quickly and caught her with that same curious stare.
         “I don’t want you dead, at least, not just yet.” He began to eat again until the plate was clean. Shayla found that the combination of the high backed chair and his unnatural hold had steadied her. She wasn’t even sure how much of it was from her and how much was from him. She remained still. Her stomach was calming down and she had hopes that the food she ate would remain inside of her. She was tired of throwing up and the latrine bucket they were forced to use was not the most comfortable place to put one’s face.
         Shayla remained silent, eyes closed. She refused to begin any sort of conversation with the boy. She wouldn’t have known what to ask anyway. She was quite certain that she wouldn’t understand his reasoning when it came to Tal’s death. She was also certain that her own death, however quickly it approached, would have some sort of insane logic behind it. She did not care to know it.
         The motion of the ship, in absence of the sickness that had plagued her, was soothing. The aching tiredness throughout her body, exacerbated by the boy forcing her groaning muscles to move, was more acute than she had ever known. She could not think of anything else except the warmth of the cabin and the food in her stomach. Her eyes, already closed, still burned with fever. And Shayla, in spite of her company, felt herself drifting toward sleep.
         When she next opened her eyes, she saw the wooden ceiling of the ship. She knew that she must still be in the cabin because it was much too bright. Someone was humming nearby and Shayla, expecting to hear a man’s voice, was startled at the sound of a woman in the cabin. Shayla scanned the room as best she could without sitting up and found the woman cleaning at the table where she had eaten however long before.
         The woman was young, perhaps in her mid teens, thin, and wore her hair very short on her smooth head. She held herself with a grace that was accentuated in her every move. She seemed to glide about her work and as she carried objects around, sometimes stacked precariously high, the idea of them falling seemed absurd. On one of her turns the girl noticed Shayla was awake and gave her a brilliant smile. Nodding her head in greeting, she made her way to the bed where Shayla lay.
         “Are you feeling better?” The girl asked. As she approached, Shayla was slightly distracted by her brilliantly green eyes. Her coppery skin was made to glow at their fierce depth.
         “I…” Shayla croaked. Her throat was very dry. The girl poured water from a heavy bottomed pitcher into a cup and held it to Shayla’s lips. Shayla drank it, though it tasted strange, like a mixture of salt and pickles. “Thank you.”
         The girl inclined her head again. “I have been set to watch over you while my mater is gone to his duties. You were sleeping so soundly that I decided to tidy up. He is very busy and not always able to organize.” She was looking thoughtfully at a bookcase on the other side of the bed.
         “What’s your name?”
         Her eyes snapped back to Shayla’s face. “Telámn.” Shayla made to give her introduction, but Telámn interrupted, “And you are Shayla of Sgornya Castle. “Shayla, surprised, merely nodded. “Everyone knows who you are. Well, everyone aboard this ship does.” She began to spread the blankets around Shayla, securing them around her as she lay in the bed.
         “Where is my mother and servant?” She felt ashamed of herself for not thinking of them sooner.
         “They remain in the hold Lady Shayla.”
         “How are they?”
         “I do not know. I am not allowed below deck.” She had walked to the bookshelves and began to straighten them, aligning the books and rearranging as she saw fit.
         Shayla threw back the covers and felt, for the first time, how cold the air in the cabin was compared to the bed. She shivered and felt a sweat break out on her forehead. As she weakly swung her legs around the bed and attempted to sit up she felt Telámn’s hands gently pressuring her back into the bed. “No. I can’t stay here. I have to be with my mother.” She struggled weakly against Telámn’s hands. As she did so, she realized that she could no longer see. It must have seemed strange to Telámn. Shayla had stopped struggling in shock. “I can’t see.” She lay back again and felt her mind go out.