For the Sky (DISCONTINUED)

11 - A Much-Needed Pause

Silence coated the ocean practically in its entirety. The whole world seemed to hold its breath. Oskar told us that the voyage would be extended indefinitely until the wind picked up again. Each Uisge are capable of disrupting the weather like that, he said. He didn't say anything else to us, nor we to him. There was a veil of distrust that we couldn't break, fearing for the safety of the other side. There were a lot of questions that I didn't know the answer to and that I wanted an answer to so badly it made my whole head pound. The captain didn't even suggest for me to start up a breeze, the way he had before with a cheeky kelpie grin - in fact, when I offered to fly out again and push us in any direction that was needed, he cocked his head at an unnatural angle and told me that if I so much as preened my feathers in front of him, he'd tar me. I don't think anyone could even muster a smile. I couldn't.

I lay on my designated pile of straw next to Asger but I didn't reminisce of how we had done much the same in the back of some rickety gypsy cart when we were young and freshly picked from the carnage of my father's castle.

I don't know how many speechless days passed. I cursed myself for ever getting on a ship before praying to Cinth to let me keep Crocus's blessings with me even when I don't stand on his earth. That's what Frin had told me. Since the kelpies had no patron to pray to, they begged for Crocus to forgive them. I asked what she was to them then. She told me she didn't know.

I couldn't really recount what in the name of all that's good and great and awful in this world had sent me like a lunatic out the doors of the inn and after Asger in the dead of night with the wind howling and rain soaking my wings even through the sturdy cloak. I lulled myself to sleep each night by recounting the plan we had composed on that walk down the paved road to the wilderness of the North - how wild was it really, if it was paved? - it was a foolish plan in the least, that was at that present composed of characters vastly different from the ones that we had planned to meet. There really was no plan once a little kid became involved. He was not a part of our company, I kept reminding myself. We were just returning him to the sea.

And the sea took him back alright.

I can only assume that Aro took it the worst. I didn't even see him - only in glimpses, as he glided around the deck, almost entirely transparent - only the motion of his thin legs and the hover of his milky eyes still giving him away.

Frin seemed distraught for her own reasons. It was what I can only describe now as an existential crisis but then she just became distant. As distance as you can get when you share the same square-footage for days and days at a time.

And Asger. Crocus. What would I have done without him?

"Is this what it's going to be like to be queen?" I asked him.

"Yes," he answered. Cold. Truthful. It sounded like it hurt for him to speak.

"Then I don't know if I can do this," I said. I wanted to be truthful too, like him, but I could never muster the same amount of courage as he did in his voice. If the effort had pained him, then it would've killed me. "I can't imagine how my father had done this."

"I met your father once, you know," he confessed suddenly. "I don't know how he did what he did either."

"Did he talk to you?" I asked, perking my ears, my full interest suddenly taken for the first time in days.

"Well, I never got to say anything back, but he spoke to me," the stallion furrowed his brow, closed his eyes, and carefully continued. "I was very little. Maybe six or seven at best. Back then all I ever did was shovel coal and watch. Shovel coal, step the bellow, and then just trot on over and watch... your father made rounds around the different functions of the kingdom every now and again - he'd come by the forge a few more times as far as I recall. But that day he walked in, in all his regal glory - his huge wings folded behind his back, his head held high with that fancy crown on it... and he was looking for my master, I guess, but instead he found me, keeping things hot as best I could while old Glen took a leak.