Death's Mistress

CHAPTER 10

Seagulls wheeled overhead, following the Wavewalker under sunny skies. Fascinated, Nathan joined the sailors crowding the ship’s rails, excitedly pointing down at the strange drifting infestation that surrounded them on the open seas.

Hundreds of thousands of jellyfish floated on the surface like soap bubbles, each one as large as an ox’s head, throbbing like jellied brain tissue. The mindless translucent creatures posed no threat that Nathan could see as the Wavewalker cruised along and nudged them aside. Some of the jellyfish splattered against the hull boards and left a glutinous film, but the rest simply bobbed out of the way.

Captain Eli stood on deck, cautious. “Steady onward. If it was a sea serpent or a kraken, I’d be worried, but those jellyfish are just a nuisance.”

Bannon stared in wonder. He turned to his mentor, flushed. “I never saw the likes of these on Chiriya, but other kinds of jellyfish would drift close to shore in the quiet coves … where a boy and his friend might go swimming. They sting!” He let out a wistful sigh, dreaming of home. “Ian and I had our own special lagoon where there were tide pools. The water was just right for wading, but we didn’t see the jellyfish. We both got terribly stung once. My leg swelled up like a week-old pig carcass, and Ian was even worse. We could barely walk home. My father was angry because I couldn’t work in the cabbage fields for days afterward.”

The young man’s expression darkened, and then, like clouds parting, he smiled again. “We all had a good laugh about it.” He blew air between his lips. “And those jellyfish were only the size of my fist.” He leaned far out over the side to get a better look. “I’ll bet a sting from one of those things would kill you—probably five times over!”

“Being killed once would be sufficient.” Nathan liked the young man. Bannon Farmer seemed earnest and determined, perhaps a bit too innocent—but Nathan didn’t mind innocence. The wizard had written his own tales for young boys like Bannon, The Adventures of Bonnie Day and countless other stories carried far and wide on the mouths and lute strings of minstrels. Right now, Nathan saw no reason not to take the young man under his wing.

Out in the open air, Nicci stood aloof, away from the sailors. Her thick blond hair blew in the breezes, and her blue eyes pierced the distance. The tight-fitting black dress embraced her breasts and accentuated her curves. Cinched tight at the waist, the flowing skirt angled down to her right knee. On board, she’d decided to forgo her black travel leggings and high boots. She looked beautiful in the way a pristine work of art was beautiful, to be admired and appreciated, but definitely not to be touched.

Bannon occasionally looked at her with the wrong kind of sparkle in his eyes. Not lust, but infatuation. Nathan would have to watch that, lest it become a problem later on. The young man had no idea what he would be getting into.

Now, Bannon lowered his voice to an odd whisper as he asked Nathan, “Is it true she was really called Death’s Mistress?”

Nathan smiled. “Dear boy, our Nicci was one of the most feared women in Jagang’s Imperial Order. She has the blood of thousands on her hands.”

“Thousands?” Bannon swallowed.

The wizard waved his hand. “More like tens of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands.” He nodded. “Yes. I would suppose that’s more accurate. Hundreds of thousands.”

Although Nicci stood presumably out of earshot, Nathan saw her lips quirk in a thin smile. He continued in a stage whisper, “She was also a Sister of the Dark, served the Keeper for years before she served Jagang the dream walker.” He glanced around, noting that some of the other sailors were listening as well, and they muttered uneasily. While Bannon seemed in awe of Nicci’s past, the others were fearful and superstitious.

Nathan didn’t mind. Fear generated respect. “But that was before Nicci joined Lord Rahl, saw the light, became one of the staunchest fighters for freedom. Did I tell you she stopped Richard’s heart and sent him to the underworld?”

“She—she killed him?”

“Only for a time. She sent him to the Keeper so he could rescue the spirit of his beloved Kahlan. But that’s another story.” He clapped the young man on the shoulder. “And on a long voyage, we’ll have plenty of time for tales. No need to tell them all now.”

The young man muttered in disappointment. “I’ve had a boring life, growing up as a farmboy on a sleepy island. No stories worth telling.”

“You got stung by a jellyfish once,” Nathan pointed out. “You must have other tales.”

The young man leaned back and pondered. Below in the water, the crowded jellyfish bumped against one another with muffled slurping sounds.

“Well, it might just have been my imagination,” Bannon said. “A person’s thoughts tend to run wild when drifting alone in a small boat in the fog.”

Nathan laughed. “Dear spirits, boy! Imagination is a critical part of a story. Tell your tale.”

Bannon pursed his lips. “Have you ever heard of the selka? A race that lives beneath the sea and watches the activities of people above? They observe our boats and ships from below, which are like wooden clouds floating high in their sky.”

“The selka?” Nathan frowned, drawing thumb and forefinger from his lips to his chin. “Sea people … ah yes. If memory serves—and my memory is as sharp as a finely honed dagger—the selka were created to be fighters in the ancient wizard wars. Humans altered by magic into another form, like the mriswith, or even the sliph. The selka were made to be an undersea army that could rise up and attack enemy ships.” He narrowed his eyes. “But they’re either extinct, or just legends.”

“I never heard that part of the story before,” Bannon said. “We just told tales about them on Chiriya. Sometimes the selka grant wishes.”

Nathan chuckled. “If I had a copper coin for every story about a mythical creature that grants wishes, I’d have so many coins that I could buy whatever I liked and have no need for wishes.”

“I … I don’t know about that either,” Bannon muttered. “It was just a story they told in the village. And there are times when you just want something to believe in.”

Nathan nodded solemnly, sorry he had teased the young man. “I’ve felt the same way myself.”

Bannon stared out to sea, seeming not to notice the jellyfish anymore. He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Just as there are times when an unhappy person needs to run away. I was foolish and young … too young to know that I was foolish.”

Perhaps too young for that still, Nathan thought, but kept his words to himself.

“I set off in a little fishing boat all alone, meaning to leave Chiriya forever. I didn’t have any friends on the island.”

“What about Ian? The one who was also stung by a jellyfish.”

“This was later. Ian was gone.” Bannon frowned. “I set off at dusk as the tide went out, and I knew the full moon would light my way throughout the night. I hoped to see the selka, but in my heart, I suspected they were just stories. I’d been told so many things that turned out to be untrue.” He looked sickened, but with obvious effort he restored his expression to a happy grin. “There’s always a chance, though. I rowed into the darkness as the stars came out overhead, and I kept rowing until my arms felt as if they would fall off. After that, I just drifted in the open water. For about an hour I could see the dark line of Chiriya Island, with the lights of hearth fires and lamps from the shoreline villages high above the beaches. Then they vanished into the distance, and I kept on rowing.”

“Where did you think you were going?” Nathan asked. “Just heading out into the open sea?”

Bannon shrugged. “I knew the Old World was out there, a continent filled with cities like Tanimura, Kherimus, Andaliyo—a whole continent! I figured if I simply went far enough, I was bound to bump into shore sooner or later.” He glanced away in embarrassment. “Growing up on an island did not give me a good grasp of large distances. I drifted all night, and when dawn came I saw only water—water in all directions. Like this.” He gestured over the side of Wavewalker.

“I didn’t have a compass or nearly enough supplies. I drifted on the open sea all day long under the baking sun, and I began to grow deeply worried. The heat of the day burned and blistered my skin, but the next night seemed colder than ever. And by the third day, I ran out of water and most of my food. I felt like such a fool. I saw no sign of land, had no idea which direction the Old World lay, or even how to find Chiriya again.

“I cried like a heartbroken child, and I’m not ashamed to admit it. I stood up in the wobbly fishing boat and shouted into the distance, hoping someone would hear. That made me feel even more foolish than crying.

“That night the moon was still bright, but a thick blanket of fog settled in—although it wasn’t a blanket, it was cold and clammy. I shivered, more miserable than ever. I couldn’t see anything around me—not that there was anything to see. The moon was just a gauzy glow overhead.”

His voice became a whisper. “On a foggy, silent night you can hear sounds from far away, and distances deceive you. I heard splashes that I thought were sharks, then it sounded like swimming … an eerie voice. I called out again for help. In my imagination I thought it might be the selka come to rescue me, but common sense told me it was just a distant whale, or even a sea serpent. I shouted and shouted, but I heard no answer. Maybe my voice startled whatever it was, and I listened to the silence, nothing but the lapping waves and another distant splash, something that might have been laughter, a giggle … but that couldn’t be true.

“I was so distraught, anxious, exhausted—not to mention hungry and thirsty—that I eventually collapsed during the darkest part of the night and fell into a deep sleep.”

Nathan smiled to encourage the young man. “You have the makings of a storyteller, my boy. You’ve got me intrigued. How did you ever get out of it?”

“I don’t know,” Bannon said. “I honestly don’t know.”

Nathan frowned. “Then you have to work on a better ending for your story.”

“Oh, there’s a good ending, sir. I woke up the next morning, and instead of the silence of the endless waves, I heard the rush of water against a shore, surf riding up on the shingle. I realized that my boat wasn’t rocking anymore. I stood up and nearly fell out. I had washed up on the shore of an island, a place I recognized! This was Chiriya, the same cove where Ian and I used to swim.”

“How did you get back there?”

The young man shrugged. “Sweet Sea Mother, I told you—I don’t know. Sometime during the night when I was unconscious from exhaustion, something had taken me back to our island, brought me safely to shore.”

“Are you sure the currents didn’t just circle you around to your starting point? In the fog, how would you ever know?” Nathan looked down his nose. “You’re not saying it was the selka who rescued you?”

Bannon seemed embarrassed. “I’m saying that I found myself safely back on shore, where I had started from, and I don’t know how. In all the vast ocean and all the islands in the sea, I had come back to the very place I called my home, the cove where I’d started from.” He paused for a long moment, then looked at the wizard and smiled in wonder. “And in the soft dirt of the shore, beside my boat—which had been dragged much farther up out of the water than even a high tide would have left it—I saw a footprint.”

“What kind of footprint?”

“It looked human … almost. But the toes were webbed, like a sea creature’s. I saw the faint impression of what looked like a fin’s edge and sharp points like claws, instead of human toenails.”

Nathan chuckled. “A fine story that is! And you said nothing had ever happened to you.”

“I suppose.…” Bannon did not sound convinced.

The jellyfish swarm showed no sign of abating. Egged on by his crewmates, the broad-shouldered Karl picked up a barb-tipped harpoon and tied a rope through the metal eye on the tail end of the shaft. As the others cheered and hooted, the veteran sailor leaned over the side and tossed the harpoon down to pop one of the jellyfish like a large ripe blister. The iron point pierced the membrane, bursting the gelatinous creature into a smoking puddle. As the residue drifted out among the other jellyfish, its companions scooted away from the remains like fleeing robber bugs.

With guffaws of laughter, the other sailors ran to get more harpoons, but when Karl pulled the harpoon back up by the rope, he grunted in amazement. “Look! Look at this.” The sharpened iron tip was smoking, and it began to droop as acid pitted and ate away the metal.

The other sailors stopped, poised to throw their harpoons as part of the game to pop the jellyfish. Curious, Karl extended a callused finger, but before he could touch the smoking iron tip, Nathan barked a warning. “Leave that alone, or you might lose a hand as well as a harpoon tip.”

Captain Eli scolded them all. “I told you to leave those jellyfish be! The sea has enough dangers for us. We don’t need to make any more.”

With a clatter, the other sailors lowered their harpoons, then sheepishly stowed them away.