She crouched and ran damp black sand through her fingers. The island was lush and new, judging by the volcanic sulfur smell tingeing the breeze. It was too small and too far off to be of any strategic value to Ixia, but she enjoyed knowing an unknowable place. Still, this was one of her side adventures that might prove useful to someone other than herself—her fickle kingdom and increasingly-sick-of-her-shit mother, the queen, specifically.
They watched as the body was carried past them, suspended in a dark tarp, and on board a dinghy that would bear it to the ships.
“Qorrea!” Commander Hurand called, motioning toward the little boat.
Yemaya glanced at Nova, who shook her head almost violently. “Next one.”
“We’ll grab the next one,” Yemaya called back. “Come on, you big baby. I’ve got maybe twenty minutes before I’m summoned again. Chaperone me up this rock so I can get one last view of the coast.”
She had tried picking up her father’s journaling habit after his death. It didn’t take, but her sketching skills were passable and practicing gave her peace.
“Did you draw that guy? Or… what was left of him?”
“I’m not tasteless. I did think about it, though.”
They headed toward the northern end, Nova gesturing to the idle soldiers on the beach to stand down. A tall cliff face was sheer on one side but appeared to be gradual on the other, and Yemaya thought it would be an ideal vantage point to get what she could of the island in the little time she had. She paused as they angled upward, contorting herself on small, slick spots of dark rock to get shots of interesting tree formations or glimpses of rodents hiding in coves and crags.
“How did you get here?” she muttered cheerfully to a tawny mouse standing frozen in the grass. She stood to continue the climb but stopped when she noticed the small smile on Nova’s face.
“What is it? I sit in something?” Yemaya asked.
“No, I just like when you like things.”
Yemaya rolled her eyes.
“Really,” Nova continued. “You take your job so seriously, which is great, but your whole lifeisthe job.”
“I’ve had to be ready for it every day for eight years,” Yemi sighed, hoisting herself over a fallen tree.
“You’re right. I just appreciate the moments you forget about it sometimes.”
“Are you bored? You’re sentimental today.”
“Yemi, I’mso bored,” Nova groaned at the sky. “So bored. I have never liked boat days, I never will like boat days, and I think you know that.”
“Good thing for you that we’ll be trapped on the Rock soon enough, then.”
“You don’t have to be trapped in a palace the rest of your life. When you’re queen, you can change any tradition you want.”
“Tell that to the Kept. The people are barely fine with Mer blood on the throne. They’re not going to be excited about one of us picking it apart.”
“You going to let them marry you to a Drake, too?”
“The father or the daughter?”
“Excuse me?” Nova scoffed.
“Joking.I’m still fun.”
“What if we eloped?”
Yemi almost tripped. “Sorry?”
“The queen’s Day of Days is close. After that, we take off for a day or three on some fictional diplomatic whatever, do the thing, and spend the rest of the time in bed sampling pastries with my not having to worry that someone might be on their way to kill you.”
“Did you drink the seawater?”
“Wasn’t thirsty.”
