Eira sat, stunned, letting the words seep into her. “You…will?” she whispered.
“Don’t seem so surprised. You practically consigned your life to me. I think I came out with the better end of the deal.”
Still, it somehow felt like a victory. Every day Adela didn’t kill her was a triumph alone. But getting the pirate queen to agree to helping her get her magic back was something Eira never expected would be possible, despite Ducot’s initial optimism. Yet another bit of evidence that might suggest she was right—there was more to Adela and her than met the eye.
“It should be a relatively simple matter. We’ll first need to collect a vessel with your magic. It’ll take a while to get back to Solaris, unless you have one in Risen? Please don’t tell me we have to sail all the way back to Warich simply because you overlooked grabbing one.”
Eira’s racing heart stopped and sank right into the darkest pit of her stomach. Of course…a sorcerer’s channel could be blocked using a Waterrunner’s magic alone, or sometimes even just through extreme trauma. But to remove that block and open the channel once more for magic to flow easily, a vessel wasrequired. The slightest bit of magic would call to the sorcerer’s channel and restore the link to power.
The knowledge had been in the recesses of her mind. So far back that she hadn’t remembered it’d be a requisite for restoring her power. Had she just consigned herself over an impossible task? Perhaps that was why Adela had agreed so easily. She certainly had received the better end of the bargain and then some.
“I never made a vessel with my magic,” Eira confessed in a small voice.
Adela sighed heavily and pressed her fingertips into her temple. “The Tower of Sorcerers isstillnot having their students make vessels as a precaution?”
“I’ve never had it recommended to me.”
“The fools. I swear, I would run that Tower far better than any.”
The mention of running the Tower brought Eira’s uncle back to the forefront of her mind. Eira struggled to push him away, but the memory of him and the explosion fed on the hopelessness that was growing within her. The monsters of doubt and sorrow were warring to consume and control, feasting on what little hope she’d mustered.
Adela remained oblivious to Eira’s turmoil. Or didn’t care. Likely the latter, given how astute she was. “Very well, it will be done the hard way.”
“What?” Eira blinked, the statement jarring her from the negative spiral of everything feeling hopeless. “There’s a way to restore my magic without a vessel?”
“Child, with enough power and determination there is a way to doanything.” Adela smiled confidently, borderline arrogantly. But there was something inspirational about the expression. Eira wasn’t sure if she had ever met someone with so much blind faith in themselves. “Most sorcerers—most peopleare only limited because they believe what others tell them when they hear they cannot do something. Your mind will limit you well before your body, andthatis why it is the first thing others will try to control.”
The water flowing past the portholes distracted her. Eira’s thoughts drifted just as effortlessly. “I suppose I understand what you mean. I saw it in the Pillars.”
Adela leaned forward, holding out her hand expectantly. Eira didn’t immediately understand the pirate queen was waiting on her to take it. Trying to conceal her confusion and hesitation, Eira rested her fingertips lightly on Adela’s palm. The pirate queen grabbed her fingers and flipped over Eira’s hand without warning. She ran her frozen fingertips over the lines on Eira’s palm, filling them with frost that quickly thawed in the relative heat of the cabin.
“Tell me of your time with the Pillars.” It wasn’t phrased as a question. Nothing about Adela was that delicate, or tactful. But the demand wasn’t cold or harsh either.
“I was captured because I followed Ducot,” Eira admitted. Ducot had probably told Adela as much, but if he had, she didn’t say so. Adela remained focused on Eira’s hand, leaving her with nothing to do but speak. “Ferro, Ulvarth’s son, murdered my brother. He tried to kill me as well, but couldn’t…”
Eira told the pirate queen of the trials in Solaris. Of the night Marcus died. For a woman the legends painted as a ruthless killer—so deadly that even the utterance of her name would bring a curse—she was surprisingly easy to talk to. Perhaps it wasbecauseAdela had that reputation that there was no fear of judgment. If the woman pillaged and murdered for sport, what did Eira have to hide or be ashamed of?
“…and now I’m here.” Eira’s words were slightly raspy toward the end. Her throat sore. She must have spent at least an hour talking and Adela had done nothing but listen. “There aresome other details I overlooked. But I suspect you already know them through Ducot.”
“I prefer to get information from the source, whenever possible.” Adela reached for Eira’s other hand and began the process over again. This time, it was her hand made of ice holding Eira’s, sending a chill down her spine. “It’s little wonder you’ve handled my captivity so well.”
“I’ve known hunger, and darkness, and confinement. The Pillars taught me well in those respects.” Eira stared past the slow movements of Adela’s fingertip on her palm. “At least here I see the sun.”
Adela snorted. “Don’t give me an idea to take it from you.”
Eira quickly shifted the subject. “You said you weren’t working with the Pillars now, but…did you ever work with the Pillars?”
“Once,” Adela admitted with a tense expression. She rolled back her shoulders as if suddenly uncomfortable in her seat. “A man sought me out, interested in some goods from Carsovia. A dangerous job and I was a fool to take it with little information.”
“What did he want you to get?” Eira asked.
“Something not worth the cost, in the end.” She wore a grimace, her eyes clouding with an anger that wasn’t directed at Eira. “Once I realized who the man commissioning me was, and his affiliations with Meru, I severed all ties and went back north.”
“Why do you avoid Meru?”
Releasing her hand, Adela leaned back. She rested her hands on the armrests of her chair, tapping them almost restlessly. “I made a bargain with someone a long time ago. They demanded I cease sailing anywhere close to Solaris or Meru and I have kept my word ever since.”
“Who?”
