Caprion's Wings (21 page)

He didn’t know for sure if his plan
would work. He didn’t know what the Matriarch might do or how
things might change in the coming weeks. But as long as Moss
remained on the island, he would keep a close watch over her. One
day he would fulfill his vow. Of that, he was certain.

And now, a special preview of
Ferran's
Map
, available Summer 2014!

(The Cat's Eye Chronicles,
Book 4)

by

T. L. Shreffler

The Dawn Seeker sailed upriver, long and
sturdy in the water, a three-masted schooner with billowing white
sails and over a dozen cabins. The ship traveled up the Little
Rain, a small tributary of the Crown’s Rush, headed inland from the
ocean. Early morning fog cast the world in gray, brooding light.
Tall trees loomed over the riverbanks, fading in and out of the
mist. The Little Rain traveled through flat marshland and dense
forest, lined by juniper thickets and bristling blackberry bushes.
The rainy season made the water deep and wide.

Sora dangled her legs over the crow’s nest.
She always took the dawn watch. She liked the tension in the forest
at daybreak, the birds twittering in excited song, the first hint
of silver light.

The crow’s nest of the Dawn Seeker sat high
upon the central mast, dozens of feet above the ground. At this
height, Sora could see Captain Silas’ crew stirring on deck through
the mist. The night-workers filed inside while fresh crewmen took
their stations, adjusting sails and manning the wheel, calling out
to one another, laughing. She could smell whiffs of fresh bread
drifting up from the galley. Her stomach let out a sudden, loud
complaint. She wanted nothing more than to climb down the ropes and
eat breakfast. She felt stiff and cold, her woolen cloak damp with
moisture from her three hour watch.

But I can’t leave yet,
she thought.
When Captain Silas first assigned her to the crow’s nest, he gave
her a long lecture about sailing upriver: the danger of opposing
currents, lightning, driftwood, debris, tree limbs and rocks in the
shallows. The ship’s safety relied on a good lookout…and so
breakfast would have to wait.

Her eyes drifted to a figure on the deck
below. At first glance, he appeared to be lying prostrate on the
wooden boards, but a closer look revealed a series of short, quick
press-ups. His hot breath misted the air. His hands were placed
evenly with his shoulders, palms flat against the deck, back
rigidly straight. She didn’t know how many presses a man could do
in one sitting; she had counted two-hundred and then lost track as
the fog thickened.

He trained every morning around this
time—the same as her watch—and ran through a strenuous routine of
exercises: twenty laps around the deck, a series of kicks and
jumps, then a long chain of attacks using daggers or swords. His
broad, powerful shoulders drew her eye far too easily. A myriad of
scars covered his back, visible even at this distance. She wondered
if he removed his shirt on purpose; if he knew how much it
distracted her.
No,
she thought.
He doesn’t want anything
to do with me.

She had hardly spoken to Crash since leaving
the Lost Isles. She didn’t know what to say to him. Not after what
happened.

“Hey!” a familiar voice drifted up to her,
and she glanced further down to the base of the mast. Burn, the
giant mercenary, swung himself easily onto the rigging and started
upward. His movements were startlingly graceful despite his massive
size. Within a half-minute, he stood on the ropes just beneath her
feet. “What are you doing up here, looking so gloomy?”

She tried to smile, but it felt false, fixed
in place. “Just tired,” she mumbled. It was half the truth.
Honestly, she had been out of sorts since leaving the Lost Isles,
and for more reasons than just Crash. Her eyes drifted to her left
hand, which lay curled in her lap.

Burn smiled gently, a strange expression on
his wide, square face. His teeth were as sharp as lion-fangs. His
long incisors jutted past his lower lip, a trait of the Wolfy race.
“Is the moisture bothering your wound?” he asked. “Perhaps Lori can
give you a soothing balm.”

Sora shook her head. “No, it’s healed.” It
wasn’t painful anymore. The scar remained from her battle with
Volcrian: a circular crater in the center of her palm, still pink
with freshly grown skin. But it seemed to go deeper than the flesh.
Since battling the mage, she hadn’t heard a whisper from her Cat’s
Eye necklace.

She resisted the urge to touch the small
green-tinted stone at her neck. The Cat’s Eye was more than just a
simple rock, but a magical artifact with its own form of
consciousness, sharing a psychic bond with her mind. It protected
her from magic, absorbing supernatural energy like a parasite, but
if she removed the necklace, its psychic bond would break. She
would fall into a coma or even die.
Most likely die
, she
amended. She had worn it for almost two years now and there was no
turning back.

Usually the stone murmured softly to her,
nudging her thoughts, responding to the world around them. Yet now
when she stretched out her mind and sought its presence, she felt a
muddy, dull quagmire at her fingertips. Wake up, she thought,
touching upon the internal bond.
Where are you?

Silence, like the billowing morning fog.

Her troubled frown deepened. She looked back
to Crash on the deck of the ship. He had finished his routine and
sat to stretch out his muscles, cooling down.

“Hmm,” Burn grunted deep in his throat. “Is
that
what’s on your mind? Quite a good view from up here.”
He winked at her.

Sora grimaced. “Very funny.” Then she
redirected her gaze to the forest.

“You should go speak to him,” Burn
suggested.

“Speak to Crash? Why?” she asked, feigning
ignorance.

Burn gave her a humorous look. “First, so I
can eat dinner with the both of you again. And,” he paused, “so you
can put your heart at ease. I know what happened between you two. I
saw you on the deck of the ship when we left the Isles,” he
admitted.

A tremor of horror ran down Sora’s spine.
“You…you what?”

“I saw you two speaking. And I saw….”

The kiss
. Oh that terrible, stupid
kiss! “It’s not what it looked like,” she cut him off, her cheeks
flushing. “There isn’t anything between us. I mean, there wasn’t
anything between us. I…uh,” she stuttered. “I don’t know. He’s a
hard person to understand. I think he just needs….”
What? Needs
what?

“Space?” Burn supplied. “A hearty breakfast?
Perhaps a knock upside the head?” His eyes twinkled merrily.

Sora scowled at him. “I don’t know and I
don’t care,” she huffed. Then she looked back to Crash.
I don’t
care about him at all
, she repeated firmly to herself.

Despite all they had been through together,
the dark assassin remained enigmatic and withdrawn. Sora had taken
to avoiding him after several failed attempts at small-talk. They
seemed to have fallen back to their old ways, when she had been a
high-handed noblewoman and he, a menacing assassin. Back when he
had discovered her Cat’s Eye necklace and kidnapped her. It had
been so easy to hate him then, to blame him for all her troubles.
He seemed the very embodiment of evil. But over time, they had
fought side-by-side, shared nights by the fire, learned to trust
and rely on each other, grown steadily closer…until the kiss.

Now everything remained the same—and yet so
horribly different.
I can’t,
he had said that night on the
ship as they sailed away from the Lost Isles.
I can’t be that
person for you.
He was an assassin, after all. Ruthless and
deadly, with a past she was just beginning to understand.

Now he kept a steady distance from her, as
though she were a bashful young girl infatuated with a charming
tutor. The thought made her at once furious and dismayed. She felt
she deserved more of an explanation, or at least an attempt at
normalcy. She glared at his dark figure on deck.
Cold
bastard,
she thought.

“Have you considered he’s just as bad at
this as you are?” Burn asked softly, breaking the silence. He
leaned back on the rigging, settling his weight on the ropes.

“Bad at what, exactly?” she hedged.

“Sharing his feelings.”

“Feelings?” she muttered. “The man doesn’t
know the meaning of the word. I told you, there’s nothing between
us.”

“And I’m a Harpy with no wings!” Burn
balked. “You’ve been circling around each other like two cats in a
box. It’s hard not to notice. Even the Dracians are talking.”

“The Dracians talk about everything.”

“Right,” Burn agreed, then gave her a
searching glance. “But have you heard what they’re saying?”

Sora paused at that. “What do you mean?”

Burn hesitated before explaining. “Tristan
thinks Crash hurt you…physically,” he said slowly. “Some sort of
wife-abuse, without the wife part.”

Sora’s face drained of color. “He said
that?” she asked.

“Yes, about twenty times over the past
week.”

Sora clenched her jaw.

Burn reached out and patted her foot. “Don’t
take it too hard,” he said sympathetically. “The sailors are
getting restless. Not much for them to do but spread stories. Just
thought I would warn you, before you hear it from someone
else.”

Sora sighed. “It’s my own fault, I suppose,”
she muttered. Burn looked at her questioningly, but she shook her
head. “It’s not true, of course. But I might have confided a bit
too much in Tristan….” Her voice wandered off. After Crash’s
rejection, she had sunk into a depressed state. Tristan saw her
distress and swooped in, showering her in affection, all too
willing to take the assassin’s place. His attention had been
difficult to turn down. Tristan was handsome, charming and only a
year older than herself. He brought her seashells, played silly
games and tried to make her laugh. If she had been any other girl,
she might have fallen head-over-heels for him.

Then she confided in him, complaining about
Crash’s coldness. A petty thing to do, but there it was. Tristan
had been all too sympathetic, furious that the assassin would scorn
her.
You don’t need him,
the pirate had said.
Not when
you have a hot-blooded Dracian at your side.

And then he tried to kiss her. Twice.

Sora winced at the memory. The very touch of
Tristan’s lips against her cheek had brought a startling
revelation—she didn’t love him, and she never could. “He’s probably
jealous,” Sora said, realizing she had been quiet for some
time.

Burn raised an eyebrow. “Of course,” he
replied. “And perhaps a bit angry at you. Dracians are passionate
creatures. The rest of the crew half-believe Tristan’s story….”

Sora glared stubbornly. “It’s just gossip
and drunken speculation! Tristan should lay off his cups. The
Dracians can think what they like—I don’t care.”

Burn nodded. “Fair, but your mother hasn’t
known Crash for very long, and the Sixth Race carries a reputation.
Don’t be surprised if she asks you about what happened. Word will
reach her eventually. It’s a large boat—but not that large.”

Sora bit her lip and looked back down at the
assassin on deck. Crash seemed to be taking longer this morning
than usual, drawing out his stretches. She had the sudden, horrible
feeling that he could overhear them. He wasn’t human, after all.
Not entirely. Only a few weeks ago, she had learned the truth about
his race, that Crash was one of the Unnamed, a child of the Dark
God. He contained a demonic power she couldn’t begin to understand.
Did he know about the rumors? She felt a twinge of embarrassment.
What a mess….

“How do we stop this from getting out of
hand?” she asked, suddenly concerned. A few more weeks of travel
still separated them from the City of Crowns. What if the Dracians
became so worked up, they tried to throw the assassin overboard?
Goddess help them
, she thought.

“Go to the source, I suppose,” Burn said,
rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “I tried to speak to Tristan…but he
took offense, said I’d insulted his honor by calling him a liar.”
He let out a short bark of a laugh. “Dracians! Full of pride and
passion, and not a lick of sense! I think you’ll have to speak to
him.”

Sora nodded. She didn’t relish the thought.
Confronting Tristan about the assassin, perhaps in front of the
whole ship, sounded excruciating.

Burn swung easily up next to her, landing on
the crow’s nest. The wooden boards shuddered beneath his weight.
“Go down and get some breakfast. My turn to play lookout,” he said,
and tousled her hair fondly.

Sora nodded, suddenly reluctant to go. At
least up here she felt above it all, the Dracians’ gossip nothing
more than petty speculation. On deck, she would have to walk around
knowing what they all thought. How long had these rumors been
flying around? She thought back over the past week and began to
remember a few conspicuous moments: a flurry of murmurs every time
she passed Tristan’s table in the mess room; strange looks from
crewmen; a few nosy questions from her friend Joan. Her cheeks
flushed suddenly. Joan had asked pointedly about her experience
with men. The honest truth? She didn’t have any. Only that one
night with Crash on the Lost Isles, learning the fire of a kiss,
the addictive nature of a touch. She had no experience with
love—and
making
love, at least the thought of it, still left
her tongue-tied.

She bit her lip in distress. Perhaps the
rumors weren’t as well-hidden as she thought.

She sighed and climbed down the rigging,
wincing as her sore muscles flexed. The wind shifted abruptly,
blowing in her face, and she wrinkled her nose as an
afterthought.