Page 8

T he night sky stretched across the horizon, an endless tapestry of stars reflecting in the dark waters below. I stood alone at the ship's rail, my fingers gripping the weathered wood as Captain Yisra's vessel cut through the waves. The wind caught my copper hair, making it dance across my face as I stared out at the boundless sea. My stomach lurched with the ship's movement, a queasy reminder that the open ocean and I had never been friends. I swallowed hard, determined to master the seasickness that had plagued me since we'd left the land.

My last voyage had been so different.

Then, I had been chained to a bench in an elven longboat during a violent storm, a heavy collar chafing my neck raw as I huddled among other captured humans. I remembered the terror that had consumed me as waves rose like mountains around us, how I'd clung to Ruith with white-knuckled terror, sobbing soundlessly as the primal fear took hold. The humiliation of vomiting over the side while he held me there, the sailors' snickers until Ruith silenced them. Later, how I'd instinctively caught him when a wave nearly threw him overboard, though I'd had every reason to let him drown.

Now I stood on the main deck of a proper ship, the salt breeze cleansing my lungs, dressed in fine clothing bearing the blue of House Starfall. The vessel sailed at my command, its crew and the twenty Broken Blades aboard subject to my orders.

Something about the open water made memories surface. My hand moved unconsciously to the back of my neck where the collar had once been. The skin there was still sensitive, slightly rougher than the rest. Just as the scars on my back still pulled when I stretched certain ways.

"Reminiscing, Lord Consort? Or still trying to find your sea legs?" Captain Yisra's weathered voice broke through my thoughts.

I hadn't heard her approach. She moved with the ship's rhythm as only someone born to the waves could do, utterly unaffected by the constant rolling motion that had turned my insides to liquid.

"Just thinking about journeys," I replied, not turning from the dark waters. "And trying to keep my last meal where it belongs. It seems the sea and I are still not friends."

She joined me at the rail, her salt-whitened hair pulled back in a practical braid. Unlike other elven captains, she wore no ornate jewelry or fine fabrics, only sturdy clothes designed for work rather than appearance.

"Some things never change," she observed wryly. "Were you this green during your first crossing?"

I managed a weak smile, remembering how pathetic I must have appeared, cowering in the boat, clinging to Ruith like a child. "Worse. Much worse. The storm didn't help. I was certain we would all drown."

"This won't be your last sea voyage," she said simply, eyes scanning the horizon with professional assessment. "Whether this mission succeeds or fails, the tide always brings us back to where we belong eventually. You might as well make peace with the waves."

I glanced at her profile, struck by the certainty in her voice. "You sound like you speak from experience."

"Five decades at sea teaches you the patterns of life, Lord Consort." She shrugged, the gesture somehow more eloquent than any courtier's carefully practiced movements. "You're not the first to go from chains to command, though perhaps the first to rise so high so quickly."

The casual mention of my past might have offended me once. Now I found her directness refreshing.

We stood in companionable silence for a moment, the creaking of the ship and the splash of waves the only sounds. A memory surfaced—Ruith teaching me to identify the constellations from Calibarra's highest tower, his voice soft in my ear as he guided my hand to trace the patterns in the sky. I found myself searching for those same stars now, a small comfort in their constancy.

"Your guard sleeps," Yisra observed, nodding toward the hatch that led to where the Broken Blades had been quartered. "All but the night watch. They trust this ship."

"They trust you," I corrected. "Ruith speaks highly of your loyalty to House Starfall."

The captain's weathered face remained impassive, but something softened around her eyes. "I serve those worth serving. Your king has proven himself such, despite his youth."

"And what of his consort?" I asked, curious about her assessment. Few were brave enough to speak plainly to me anymore.

Yisra studied me. "You're an unknown quantity, Lord Consort. A human in an elvish court. Former slave now giving orders to elven warriors." She shrugged again. "Some find it... unsettling."

"And you?"

"I find results more important than origins," she replied. "Why are you really going to face your brother?" she asked suddenly, her gaze still fixed on the horizon. "The diplomatic reasons are clear enough, but there's more to it. I can see it in your eyes when you look toward Homeshore."

I considered deflecting the question, falling back on the carefully constructed reasons we'd discussed in the war council. Instead, I found myself answering honestly.

"To prove something," I admitted. "To myself. To Ruith. That I'm truly healed from what Michail did to me. That I can face him as an equal now, not as the broken thing he made me."

I hadn't fully articulated these thoughts even to myself until that moment. The realization settled over me like the sea mist—cool and clarifying.

"And to prove to Ruith that his trust isn't misplaced," I continued. "That he was right to see more in me than just another slave. That I'm worthy of standing beside him not just in the safety of Calibarra, but in the most dangerous tasks as well."

Yisra nodded slowly. "Good reasons," she said. "Better than pretty diplomatic speeches about peace and cooperation."

"Those matter too," I insisted. "If there's any chance to avoid full-scale war—"

"There isn't," she cut me off, her tone matter-of-fact rather than cruel. "Not with zealots. I've seen their kind before. They don't stop until they're stopped ."

The bluntness of her assessment chilled me more than the winter air. "Then why support this mission at all?"

"Because sometimes we need to try peace before war, if only to know we did everything possible to avoid bloodshed." She turned to face me fully now. "And because sometimes facing our demons is necessary before we can truly defeat them."

I thought of the boys waiting back at Calibarra. Leif with his solemn eyes that had seen too much, Torsten with his boundless enthusiasm that somehow survived the horrors of slavery. They were why this mattered, why peace was worth pursuing, even if it seemed impossible. Their future demanded we try every avenue before committing fully to war.

"What worries you, Lord Consort?"

"Leif and Torsten," I confirmed. "They've suffered enough. I don't want them to grow up in a world at war."

"Children adapt," she said, though not unkindly. "I was nine when I first saw battle. Sailors raided our coastal village. My father died defending the docks." She touched a scar at her temple, barely visible in the moonlight. "I survived. Learned. Grew stronger. As will your boys."

"They're not my blood," I felt compelled to clarify.

"Blood means little compared to choice," she replied immediately. "Who feeds them? Who teaches them? Who wakes when their nightmares come?" She waved a dismissive hand. "That's parenthood, Lord Consort, regardless of whose seed spawned them."

I hadn't thought of it that way. Perhaps in the small daily acts of care, I was already becoming something akin to a father.

"Rest, Lord Consort," Yisra said, pushing away from the rail. "Tomorrow brings stronger winds, if my joints speak true. You'll need your strength for what lies ahead."

I nodded, recognizing the wisdom in her words. "Thank you, Captain. For the conversation. And the honesty."

She acknowledged this with a slight inclination of her head before turning away, her footsteps fading as she returned to her duties.

Alone again, I took one last look at the vast expanse of stars before heading below to my cabin, moving carefully to maintain my balance as the ship rolled beneath me. The massage Ruith had shown me on the first crossing helped somewhat, but my stomach still protested with each dip and sway. The cabin was small but comfortable, with a narrow berth built into the wall and a tiny desk bolted to the floor. A lantern swung gently with the ship's motion, casting warm light across the space and sending my shadow dancing in nauseating patterns that I tried my best to ignore.

On the desk lay the book I'd been reading earlier—a history of human-elven relations that Ruith had insisted I take with me. "Know the past to change the future," he'd said, pressing it into my hands before departure.

I picked it up, turning to where I'd marked my place, and something fluttered to the floor. Bending to retrieve it, I found a pressed plum blossom. It’d been perfectly preserved, its delicate petals still carrying a hint of their original color.

My throat tightened unexpectedly. The plum blossom, symbol of House Starfall. Ruith must have slipped it between the pages before giving me the book, a private message meant only for my eyes. It wasn't the first time he'd done this. He’d taken to leaving small tokens for me to find of late.

I brought the dried flower to my lips, the gesture feeling both foolish and necessary. How strange that this relationship, begun in the worst possible circumstances—master and slave, captor and captive—had transformed into something that sustained rather than diminished me.

Carefully, I placed the blossom back between the pages, a tangible reminder of Ruith's presence even as leagues separated us. I ran my fingers along the book's spine, remembering his hands as he'd given it to me, the weight of unsaid words between us. We'd come so far from those first days, when every interaction had been threaded with fear and resentment.

Settling onto the narrow berth, I listened to the rhythmic creaking of the ship around me. Tomorrow would bring us closer to Homeshore. Closer to Michail. Closer to whatever fate awaited me at my brother's hands. But tonight, I carried Ruith's silent message against my heart, a token of a love neither of us had sought but both had found.