“It is, isn’t it?” I said. “AndIdid it. This wayward woman. Me.”
“Gavriel says the chimeric leans in to wylde magik,” she said. “You have that gift because of my instruction.”
“I got this gift because theEndorathilblew theDawn Watchout from under my boots.”
“Magik isn’t diminished in conflict,” she said. “It’s when Archaics rise.”
“And here you are in the Court of Sand,” I said. “Who did you have to kill? Did you use poison or your bone hairpins?”
She smiled and sat back, played with her goblet for a moment.
“It’s fate that you sail with a mirrormage,” she said. “Perhaps you are more like your father than you know.”
That was a cannonball to my gut. I stared at her.
“Oh, you knew it, daughter,” she said, lifting the wine to her painted lips. “Your father was a mirrormage like your captain.”
My father was a mirrormage.
“He wanted to take you with him, but I said no.”
Of course I knew. It made perfect sense. My father was the bear.
“The forest is no place for a wayward child.”
The bear with pinecones and honey.
All the things I’d tried to forget.
I rose to my feet.
“Permission to leave?” I asked the captain.
His gold-flecked eyes flashed, and he cocked his head like a bird.
“Too much wine,” I blurted.
“To the pit with you, then,” he said. “Mr. Fahr and I shall accompany.”
“No, please,” I protested. “I just need air.”
“Can’t let you set the ship on fire, Blue,” said Fahr, and I cursed him for that and for everything that had ever happened in my miserable life.
They both left their chairs.
Suns. Moons. Just let me leap into the sea.
“We shall return presently,” said Thanavar. “Mr. Oakum, the table is yours.”
“Quartermaster’s privilege,” said Smoke. “I have the table, the conn, the wheels, and the rum.”
Even the ironmages laughed at that.
I hated them right now. I hated Thanavar. I hated Fahr and my mother and my father the bear and everyone that hadconspired to belittle me for themselves. With a heavy heart, I followed the captain and mate out of the great cabin and into the companionway.
Thanavar spun around, and I almost bumped into him in the dark.
“Are you, in fact, drunk, Aro’el?”
