On the Isle of Sound and Wonder (37 page)

No,
she thought,
I was so close. I almost fixed it.
Darkness crept in at the edges of her vision, overwhelming her. For a second, she thought she smelled something burning, then a powerful wind knocked her down. A bright light ahead of her chased the blackness away from her sight.

Mira shook her head to clear her vision and found herself on her back, blinking up at the most gorgeous woman she could possibly have imagined.

“By the gods!” breathed Torsione.

“She’s beautiful,” whispered the king.

She wore a plain ivory gown like the Greccians did in ancient times, her black hair in tangled, sweeping locks adorned with flowers and vines. Unnaturally tall and willowy, the woman’s skin was warm brown with mossy green undertones. Her eyes were bright, polished gold, lined with dark kohl, and her expression was that of the housecat who has captured the last mouse. Dread clenched Mira’s stomach, but then the woman smiled, and she felt a warmth spread throughout her body.

 “
Well done, storm-child
.” The woman’s voice was like water in a marble fountain, resonant and clear. “
The sins of the father are paid for, the monster is absolved his crime, and the imp will face a punishment greater than his own revenge
.” She shifted slightly to look back over her shoulder at where the tiger, Karaburan, and Dante were scattered on the sand. Mira sat up quickly, and found that Aurael was no longer a massive silvery snake, but a twitching, goblin-faced imp suspended in the air. He looked nothing like the handsome, smooth-cheeked boy he’d been to Mira, his features uglier, more twisted. He whined and panted, hanging above Dante’s fallen form.

“Who are you?” Mira winced, her body tender from the fall. She looked around to find the other men sprawled all over the ground around her, with Ferran off to her left, trying to get his bearings again after the fall.

 “
A gambler
,” said the woman, and laughed as if she had made a joke. “
My lord husband often places bets on the losing pony, and when he does, I am the one to collect. It’s especially true when the loser is one of my husband’s little lackeys. Isn’t that right, Aurael
?” She reached for him, and the spirit soared to her hand, jabbering and snarling. The woman held him aloft and peered at him as a fisherman examines his catch.
“Oh, would you have words with me, imp? Very well, speak.”

There was a faint popping sound and Aurael groaned, snapping his jaws in frustration. “Please, my queen, I can explain . . .”

“
You can always explain
,” she tutted at him. “
But that does not mean anyone will believe you. That is your real tragedy, Aurael. Your tongue is so silver that even your truths are falsehoods
.”

“Please,” Aurael begged. “Don’t be hasty, Your Highness!”

Mira held up a hand to her brow, her head still echoing with the strange burst of power. “You’re a queen?” she prompted. “I don’t understand. You’re a spirit, too?”

The tall woman looked at her and smiled a little. It was a beautiful smile, but a dangerous one.
“Among other things, storm-child. I have many names, as do we all, in our lifetimes. If you will excuse me, I shall remove this imp from this awful little island and leave you all to your utterly confusing mortal moralities, or whatever else it is you do in your short little lives.”

“Wait!” squawked Aurael.

“Wait!” cried Mira, putting up one hand. The queen looked at her in mild surprise. Mira hesitated, unsure how to properly address the faerie queen. “Please, Your Majesty. I ask you for your assistance.”

“Do you? Very well, I will hear your request
.” She seemed utterly amused at the concept of demands from a mortal child.

“I have several.” Mira held the queen’s gaze a moment, hoping that the faerie queen would know how badly she needed what she was going to ask for. She drew a deep breath before kneeling to the crumpled body of her father. Dante’s face was pale as the sand, his cheeks sallow. Mira’s insides went watery, and she took his limp hand in hers.
He’s gone. Aurael destroyed the book, and it’s too late to save him.
“Can you reverse death?”

The queen’s amusement left her like a bird from a windowsill.
“Only Death can reverse death, and she is not likely to do it anytime soon. I am sorry you have lost your father, child, but there is nothing more to be done for him.”

Mira drew a deep breath and let it out again, feeling tears prickle her eyes. The lords nearby exchanged wary, amazed looks. “I understand,” she replied, shakily. “And the tiger?”

The queen glanced at the tiger, eyebrows raising in surprise.
“Why blessed be,”
she murmured in astonishment.
“Corvina!”

Karaburan was sobbing piteously over the tiger’s blood-soaked face. He cowered as the queen’s eyes passed over him.

“Do not cry, witch-son,”
the queen said gently, waving a hand as though she were wafting perfume toward herself. The tiger’s fur shimmered and faded, and, for a moment, there was no tiger at all, but a dark-skinned woman covered in tattoos lying on the sand. Karaburan’s tears slowed in astonishment, and he gaped at the sight.
“Your mother served me well in her younger days,”
the queen told Karaburan. “
For that, I will shift her. Her spirit stayed here to guide you all in the body of this tiger . . . but now that body, too, has failed her. Her spirit is now part of the very island itself, so that she can be troubled no more, and can continue to watch over you.”

The queen beckoned, and the gleaming, rune-carved staff soared through the air to her hand. She broke it in half as neatly as a twig of driftwood, and Corvina’s body faded into a hazy sky-blue shape, which sank into the sand. The two halves of the staff gleamed blue, shimmering into dust, and the queen scattered it to the wind.

She looked at Mira with an arched brow. “
Well, storm-spawn? What else is on your shopping list of boons?”
she asked tersely.

“Can you repair a shipwreck?” Mira got to her feet with Ferran’s help, keeping her voice steady as she did so.

Someone made a noise of agreement behind her, and Mira saw the men nodding hopefully out of the corner of her eye.

“Our trunks,” murmured Bastiano. “All of our clothes, our food, our supplies.”

“The crew,” Ferran added, looking sad. “The servants. Oh! Gonzo!” He turned to Mira, eyes wide.

“I picked up all of the pieces,” she told him with a shake of her head. “I have no idea if he’s fixable.”

“Gonzo?” The king looked confused.

“Dante . . . he smashed him,” Ferran explained, and the king’s face fell. “I’m sorry.”

“But how is that possible? If the ship went down, he ought to have gone down, too.”

“I found the trunk he was in and brought it ashore,” Mira interjected. “He was already in pieces, but now he’s in shards, I’m afraid.”

 “His inventor is long dead,” Alanno sighed. “And Dante was the only other one who knew much about his anatomy, unfortunately.”

Mira looked at the queen, and the others turned to follow her gaze.

The queen eyed the men haughtily. “
Hm
,” she mused, as though bored by the very suggestion. “
That’s an awful lot of gears to piece back together, but I suppose I could make it work. As for the shipwreck . . . perhaps I could bring you something a little smaller? A smoke signaler
?”

“You’re joking, right? These men need passage home, not a slightly larger chance that a passing ship might pause to pick them up at an undetermined point in the future!” Mira leaned on Ferran and exhaled sharply in frustration. “Please. Anything you can do to help. Surely it is a small matter to someone as great as you, Highness?” she added.

“
You’ve got an awful lot of fire in you, storm-child,”
the queen said icily, and Mira held her breath, wincing inwardly. There was a considerable pause. “
All right, fine. There shall be a ship on your horizon much sooner than you think
.” She flapped one hand carelessly.

 “A working ship?” she ventured. The queen hesitated a half second, then smiled.

“
Of course. I’m not heartless, after all. It would not do to rescue you all from one shipwreck only to place you into another one.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty.” Mira bowed her head, exhaustion beginning to creep into her limbs.

The queen laughed a little snidely. “
Ah, mortals. So surprising. Sometimes they ask too much, sometimes too little. Well, I will give you one thing more for all your troubles, storm-child.
” She glided toward Mira and looked into her eyes. Mira felt the massive, ancient presence of the faerie queen, and tried not to let her uncertainty show. “
I will let you keep what’s yours,
” said the queen, and smiled again. She turned away, still holding the squirming, desperate Aurael aloft with one hand.

“What does that mean?” Mira frowned.

“My queen, please,” choked Aurael. “Queen Titanya, I beg you!”

“Your Highness,” Mira interrupted. “I don’t understand. There is nothing here that is mine to keep.”

“
That isn’t quite true
,” replied Titanya, still smiling. “
There are many things that are yours alone: your body, your mind, your soul, and more within you will find, in time. You have already used your power several times today, or have you forgotten already? Your father, too, had power within him, but it was his choice to use it for great ill. So this is my blessing on you, storm-child—that your power remain with you to grow as you see fit, and to bend to your will so long as your intent is pure
.”

Mira felt a ripple of bliss start somewhere in her chest and flutter outward to her fingertips and toes. She blinked rapidly, startled by the sudden flush of euphoria. “Thank you,” she said, curiously. It seemed a good blessing to have received, even though it had been accompanied by such a peculiar sensation.

“
I am sure you will use it wisely. Goodbye, mortal children
.” Titanya winked at the men. “
And as for you
,” she continued, looking now at Aurael. “
Now that you have served your sentence here, it is my duty to inform you that your punishment will continue at home. Poq cannot wait to get her hands on you. You’ve really got her goat this time, Aurael
.”

The airy spirit’s eyes went wide. “Poq? But that was two hundred years ago! That’s ancient history!”

“
Not for her,
it wasn’t
,” Titanya chuckled, and bopped Aurael on the nose.

“No,” he pleaded, thrashing in her grasp like a worm on a hook. “No, please, please my queen, not Poq, don’t send me to Poq, anything but that, anything but that, please!
Aaaauuuuugggghhh
!”

Titanya threw her head back, laughing as brightly as birdsong over Aurael’s scream, and, with another sudden great whirlwind, they were gone. Gulls began to cry in jarring tones somewhere out over the water, and there was a faint rumbling noise. Mira turned to look, and as she did, she saw the men follow suit.

An airship broke through the clouds, soaring toward the island, flying the king’s colors from the mainmast.

“My gods!” cried Bastiano, leaping up joyfully. “We’re saved, we’re all saved!” He and Torsione whooped and hollered with giddy laughter, exhausted relief flooding their features.

“Thank all of the gods for getting us out of this mess,” sighed Alanno, squeezing Ferran’s shoulders and smiling. “We’ll see your mother again, lad. She may not have even left Tunitz yet . . . we may beat her home still.”

“It’ll be good to go home,” agreed Ferran, his voice cracking. Tears shone in his eyes, Mira noticed, but still the prince smiled.

Mira turned back to look at her father’s body, and found that it had vanished. Panic gripped her and her knees buckled. She sat down clumsily, as though the floor had shifted to meet her, and saw that where he had lain now stood a great funeral pyre, burning a steady golden flame whose smoke rose high into the sky as a beacon for the ship that approached the island. Her panic dissolved into a deep, bone-jarring sob
.

He’s gone.
Her breath came short and painful in her chest, and although tears blurred her vision, they did not fall.
No,
she told herself,
he was gone long ago, and now it’s over. Oh, gods, it isn’t fair . . . 
Anguish surged within her and she slammed her fists down onto the sand, bright bluish-white light erupting from her and sparkling out across the beach before fading.

Karaburan lumbered toward her with a sober expression.

“We are both orphans now,” he said, his voice timid.

She nodded. “So we are. I suppose all children grow up to be orphans at some point in their lives,” Mira mused, watching the flames, dazed with exhaustion and grief. “Aurael was right. It is the way of life that children must bury their parents.”

“That doesn’t make it less sad,” replied Karaburan, and sat down in the sand at her side, just out of arm’s reach. They watched the pyre burn for some time in silence.

“Mira?” Ferran wandered closer to them, keeping his distance, as though he feared to interrupt the moment. His expression was hopeful as Mira turned to face him. “I know this is a huge . . . well, I understand that there’s a lot . . . Will you come back to Neapolis with us?”

The question shook her from her reflective reverie. Mira raised her eyebrows, her heart surging in her chest at the idea of leaving the island. Suddenly, the day’s tumultuous events seemed distant, and her mind raced as she considered the offer.

“Neapolis is your home, too. I mean, it should be. You were born there, you’re still a citizen. And . . . you shouldn’t stay here forever, not alone like this, now that your father’s gone. And besides, it’s what you wanted, isn’t it? To travel?” he added, his cheeks growing a little pink as he said it. His hands balled into fists at his sides, as if they weren’t sure what else they should be doing.