Page 2 of Sonnets and Serpents (Casters and Crowns #2)

Water crashed over the gunwale and swept across the deck, swirling anything not tied down. Eliza caught a mouthful of the salty spray just as she emerged from belowdecks.

“Keep that hatch closed!” one of the sailors bellowed at her.

Sputtering, she swiped the water from her eyes and scrambled onto the deck, securing the hatch behind her. The blackened sky snarled with thunder, and clouds crackled lightning threats. Wind howled against the sails, making the entire ship a symphony of creaking fabric, wood, and ropes.

With the approaching storm, Eliza and the handful of other passengers on the merchant galley had been ordered belowdecks, which she’d been happy to obey—until she realized how terrifying it was to be locked in a little room, tossed madly about in the gloomy darkness.

She’d emptied her stomach into a bucket, then decided facing the storm head-on had to be better than this.

Now she wasn’t sure.

Tipping with the ship’s motion, she stumbled up the stairs to the quarterdeck, where she wrapped both arms around the railing and clung like a thistle to wool.

Nearby, the helmsman strained at the wheel and shouted an order lost in thunder.

Eliza had meant to help, but that seemed foolish now, surrounded as she was by full-grown men battling a storm.

She had no strength to haul on a rope or reef a sail, no ability to direct in the dark.

Everyone around her knew what they were doing while she was simply a bystander, far out of her depth.

Her stomach knotted, wondering if the same was true of her search for Henry.

Purple lightning split the world from sky to horizon, and a moment later, deafening thunder rattled her bones. Eliza whimpered, pressing her cheek to the railing and wishing she were back home, bundled beneath quilts, enjoying the pleasant crackle of flames in her hearth.

Another wave swirled around her ankles, trying to drag her away. She curled stubbornly into her position, and with a burst of defiance, she looked up at the storm. Rainwater dripped from her chin.

There was no going home. She would only go forward.

It seemed to take an eternity for the storm to blow itself out.

By the time the sky lightened to a grumbling gray and the rain retreated, Eliza felt like all her strength had been washed away.

She sank to the deck like a limp, tattered sail, every bit of her aching as she released her grip on the railing.

The helmsman cast her a glance. “Hoy! Still with us, girl? Should’ve stayed below.”

“I thought it would be better to see what was happening,” Eliza said weakly.

“You’re lucky this was just a baby storm—barely any legs at all.”

At her horrified expression, he laughed. Though he must have been exhausted from holding the ship steady against a storm, he never lifted a finger from the helm while the rest of the crew reset the ship.

It was a ten-day voyage from Loegria to Pravusat, and they’d already traveled most of the distance. Eliza prayed the next two days would not bring further storms.

Suddenly remembering, she gave a little cry of despair and fished a damp, sad book from her pocket.

The cover’s red fabric was threadbare at every corner, and the ridges of the spine had grown mushy, no longer sharply defined as they’d been when her sister, Aria, had gifted the book to her for her fourteenth birthday.

Three years of constant reading wore out even the sturdiest books.

But reading was one thing; she’d never subjected the book to salt water before.

With great care, she peeled the pages, relieved to find them dry except for the wrinkling edges. The words of familiar sonnets swirled before her eyes, comforting her heart in the wake of the storm.

And on the page of her favorite sonnet, a dried flower remained nestled and safe, tucked against the binding. A white snowdrop blossom.

Henry’s voice echoed in her mind, his nervous smile fixed in her memory. I just picked these along the path. Next time, I’ll get you real flowers.

No, she’d told him. They’re perfect. Just like you.

In two days, she would see him again. That thought was like the sunbeams breaking through the clouds.

A strange hush fell over the ship, lifting Eliza’s attention from her book. Though the sailors continued their work, they did so stiffly, and even the helmsman stood rigid, his jaw clenched. She followed his gaze to a crew member who seemed out of place with the rest.

Then she tensed as well.

The man moved like a ghost—silent and without touching another sailor—but the true eeriness came from the brand on his neck, an elongated S that warned what he was capable of.

Anywhere water had gathered on the deck, he made it vanish with a mere touch and a dim flash of light.

A Fluid Caster.

He disappeared belowdecks, and Eliza found the helmsman looking at her.

“You ever seen a Caster at work?” he asked grimly. “Most haven’t.”

Eliza shook her head. She closed her sonnet book with the instinct to protect it, and she resisted pulling it to her chest, since her shirt was still drenched from the storm.

“Handy to have a Fluid Caster out on the ocean, I’ll say that, and Ed’s never given us any trouble.” The helmsman’s expression grew dark, and his gaze fixed on the horizon. “But with all that Morton business, feels like we’d be better off if no one had ever heard of magic.”

Eliza’s mouth had grown dry, and though she struggled to keep a neutral expression, she couldn’t help but wince.

“That Morton business” that most people danced around was a curse laid on Eliza’s family by the Fluid Caster Clarissa Morton. It had started with Eliza’s older sister, Aria. For months, Aria had been unable to sleep at night, her strength sapping away. Then the same effect had passed to Eliza.

The exhaustion from the curse was bad enough, but her father’s response was worse. His need for control and his refusal to look weak drove him to turn the curse into a challenge. Whatever man of court was able to break it would be given the privilege of marrying Crown Princess Aria.

And then, presenting it as a prize for winning a royal tournament, he’d forced Henry to be the first challenger.

The shock still vibrated in Eliza’s chest. Her father had known she wanted to court Henry, but he didn’t care. He addressed her feelings in one clipped, dismissive answer:

“Eliza’s romantic whims are such that she’ll find a new boy within the week.”

Gripping the sonnet book, her hands trembled. The gray clouds still pressed too heavy and low for comfort, as if threatening to unleash another storm at any moment. She longed to see the sun.

“Do you know where you’re going, girl?” the helmsman asked.

Eliza tensed. The sailor’s tone wasn’t threatening, but her senses prickled with danger all the same.

He sounded too . . . interested. She’d given a false name while booking passage, and the last thing she wanted was anyone looking too closely at “Jenny,” who was the same age and height as a certain runaway princess.

She should have stayed belowdecks.

The helmsman didn’t wait for her answer. “If you’re that pale after seeing one Fluid Caster, you’ll have a hard time in Pravusat. Whole country’s infested with magic. No laws, no restrictions.”

Magic. That was still his focus. Eliza held back a sigh of relief.

“I’ll be careful.” With stiff movements, she forced herself to her feet, swaying on the deck.

“Careful don’t mean much against shapeshifters,” he muttered darkly.

Eliza gripped the railing. Unsure what else to say, she began the descent down to the main deck, her joints aching.

She couldn’t allow herself to think of what dangers waited in Pravusat; they didn’t matter. When Henry had failed the king’s challenge, her father had banished him, leaving Eliza with a choice.

She could stay at home, where everything was falling apart, or she could seize her one chance at happiness and love.

Eliza’s romantic whims.

Her father’s words burrowed inside her like a parasite, eating away at her confidence. In his eyes, she was nothing but a collection of frivolous impulses. Like a flitting butterfly blown by light breezes, unable to settle on a flower.

She’d sworn to prove him wrong. She’d sworn to prove her devotion to Henry.

If she could choose to live in exile with him, an entire ocean away from home, without the aid or resources offered to a princess, it would mean she wasn’t all whims. It would prove she had substance, that she could be trusted, that she meant something.

Whatever dangers Pravusat held, she would brave them all for Henry’s sake.

The entire ship buzzed with the call from the crow’s nest: “Land ahoy!”

Avoiding the rushing sailors, Eliza pressed herself to the gunwale along with several other curious passengers, watching the sandy stretch in the distance grow closer and clearer.

Pravusat was almost ten times the size of Loegria, or so her geography tutor had told her, but unlike her homeland, it was more desert flatland than green countryside and mountains.

A nervous excitement built in Eliza’s chest, and even when the other passengers retreated to gather their belongings or prepare to dock, she remained at the railing, watching the harbor grow to encompass them.

She’d brought only one bag from home, filled with as much silver as she dared carry, a spare change of clothes, a nightgown, and a hairbrush.

Plus the sonnet book in her pocket. Most of what she loved at home—like her sister—couldn’t fit in a bag, so she’d been forced to leave it.

Now her entire world rested on a strap on her shoulder and a hope in her heart.

Henry, I’m here.

The ship anchored, and the crew lowered a gangplank, wasting no time in unloading the boxes of woolen fabric that served as the merchant ship’s livelihood.

Eliza seized the first opening to rush down onto the docks, laughing as her steps wavered drunkenly after the voyage.

She chose to think of it as a dance she couldn’t help participating in.

Ahead of her, the port city of Izili stretched in a gently rising landscape, full of strange colors and architecture she never saw at home.

Around her, the docks echoed with the chatter of sailors and the creak of masts and rigging swaying in the ocean’s cradle.

Eliza grabbed the first dockworker she could find and asked for news of The Unbroken Duke, the ship Henry had sailed on.

Which was when she remembered one big problem: She was in Pravusat, and she did not speak Pravish.

As a princess, she’d received instruction in foreign government and languages, but she’d daydreamed through many of the lessons and snuck poetry books into the rest. She’d always assumed Aria was the only one who actually needed to know such things.

Eliza was never going to wear a crown or meet with ambassadors.

She was certainly never going to visit a country all the way across the sea.

No matter—she could ask for help.

She returned to the Loegrian crew of her own ship, searching until she found a crew member who claimed confidence in Pravish. He took her to the dockmaster and translated her request.

The dockmaster was a compact man with greedy little eyes, striding around with a logbook and a jingling purse. He recorded their ship’s arrival and took his docking fee before even gracing Eliza’s search with an acknowledgment. Then he demanded an inquiry fee for any information on docking.

“You can barter it down,” the Loegrian sailor told her. “Pravish people are all about arguing.”

Eliza didn’t have the patience for that. She shoved a few silver coins at the dockmaster, and his eyes lit up with glee. He consulted his log, quickly speaking a few words.

The Loegrian sailor’s face turned grim.

“What is it?” Eliza lifted on tiptoe, peering at a book she couldn’t read. “Has it been delayed?”

She didn’t know much about sailing, but she’d heard the palace tailor complain about the ocean’s unpredictability when a shipment of silk for the queen had been delayed an entire week.

Henry should have arrived several days ago, but if he’d been delayed, she would take a room at the closest inn and wait.

The dockmaster spoke in broken Loegrian, closing his logbook with a sense of finality. “Sad, very sad. Ship sink.”

Sink.

The harbor sounds grew louder around her as she became aware of the ocean’s insistent pulse, washing in and out, slapping against the hulls of ships and the posts of the winding docks. White gulls cried out from above.

Slowly, Eliza rocked back on her heels. She looked at her translator, waiting to hear what she was clearly misunderstanding.

The sailor shook his head. “There was a shipwreck. I’m sorry. Whoever you’re looking for is gone.”