“I might be from Oparium, but my heart was never there.” Eira kept calm, thinking of what was to come next. Adela would demand the books, and there was nothing she could really do to stop her from getting them. But they were also the only bargaining chip she had with the pirate queen. She couldn’t just…hand them over.
“And where is your heart?” Fen asked.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Eira gave him a sharp look that only elicited laughter. But he didn’t press further. So that counted for something. She used the silence for continuing to think of her next moves.
“Oi, Pine!” Fen called with a wave of his hand, drawing over the other pirate that had disembarked with them. “They made it back.”
“Pine?” Eira couldn’t help but blurt.
“A lot of the crew have interesting names,” Ducot said. “Many of us didn’t have families. Or, if we did, we don’t want to remember or honor them with the names given by them.”
“Right…” Eira looked over her shoulder at the mention of family. There wasn’t any time to make it into the coliseum, what was left of it. What had happened to her parents? The unknown was a deep-rooted pain. Just when she had thought things were improving with her uncle, and when there could be a path toward peace with her parents, it was all ripped from her. Another thing Ulvarth had stolen.
“You gave them extra time,” Pine grumbled as they started into the muck of the riverbank toward where the vessel was still waiting.
“I did no such thing.” Fen raised his fingertips to his chest, as if he were scandalized by the mere suggestion.
“Ducot was always your favorite.”
“Well, can you blame him? Fen has exceptional taste.” Ducot preened.
“Fen has all the taste of a blind man,” Pine said.
“Exactly, that’s why we get along so well.” Ducot waved his hand in front of his face with an over-the-top smile. The three laughed.
Their conversation betrayed deep familiarity. These were bonds that were as established, if not more so, as the ones Eira had with her friends. Ducot had been telling the truth…he was a pirate through and through. These were his allies, friends, and, based on what he’d told her, family. She imagined they’d known him since he was a boy, or even younger than that.
When the water was up to her chest, Eira situated the bag onto her shoulders and head to keep the old, delicate journals dry. She looped the strap down under her armpits and then around her arm, securing it in place. It wasn’t particularly comfortable, but it wasn’t choking her and the journals weren’t damaged.
“Would you like me to hold that?” Fen offered as he was halfway up the ladder. He stretched out a hand. “Here, pass it up.”
“No, I have it.” Eira started up next, making it a point to show him as much. If she had her magic still, she would’ve just walked on ice across to the vessel. Perhaps not doing so would give her away? Eira took the ladder one rung at a time. She couldn’t spend time worrying about things she couldn’t change, just how she would manage them henceforth.
“You gave them an extra ten minutes,” Adela echoed Pine, speaking to Fen, as they emerged onto the deck. She sat on a wooden folding chair, leather suspended between the two sidesfor her comfort. Even though it was of simple make, with her perched upon it, the chair looked as though it were a throne.
“I figured ten minutes was better than not getting your journals back,” Fen replied.
“The Pillars attacked just as we were leaving; that’s what held us up,” Ducot explained.
Adela hummed, eyeing Eira as she undid the bag strap from around her arms, situating it once more on her shoulder. “That bag looks awfully full for just some journals.”
“I grabbed a few other things, for my friends and me.” Eira didn’t see the point in hiding it. “It took no extra time.”
“Well then, let’s see them.” Adela placed both hands on the top of her cane, leaning forward slightly, her knees spreading to the sides.
Eira shifted the bag, but instead of walking farther, she stepped back and thrust it out over the railing. The other pirates moved toward her but Adela stopped them with a slow raise of her hand. The pirate queen tipped her head to the side, inspecting Eira.
“Tell me, what is it you’re hoping to accomplish, little Eira?” Her words were like the biting frost creeping across the deck around Adela’s feet, stealing all warmth from the air.
“These journals are pretty old, aren’t they? I imagine a bit of water would ruin the parchment and ink. You’d lose all of your records.”
“I’ve done just fine without them so far.” Adela lowered her hand back down to her cane. She had a slight smile curling the edges of her lips.
“True. But you wanted them badly enough that you wasted time—you lingered here on Meru”—which Eira now knew was significant, thanks to Ducot—“to allow me to go and get them for you. Even if you don’tneedthem…no one is above being a sentimental fool, not even you.”
“You call me a fool?” Adela stood.
“Don’t come closer.” Eira held out her other hand to one of the pirates who tried to shuffle toward her, hoping that the idea of her having magic could function, at least somewhat, as a plausible threat. “I will drop it.”
