Alkimiya - A Fantasy Mystery Series

TWENTY~TWO - An Alchemic Mystery Box

James froze. The hand rubbing his beard paused near his ear. With the death of Levy Inglehart, he was now the acting captain. "Guess so." He sighed and sat up straighter. "Listen, most of the damage is to the stern and the navigation room. Even if—when—we manage to get off this island and somehow get past the wall and the rot, we will be bogged down with a boatload of other problems. For one, without a working readerboard or radio, we have no way of contacting the UDF."

"Yeah," said Tilde. "And without the main mast and sails, we can't control our direction. As for fixing the radio, I'll have a look at the readerboard. I'm fairly certain the wires are much too damaged but I won't know until they're dry."

Zenetra set her teacup down and hugged her midriff. The bruise across her stomach throbbed but she did not want to go to Healer Pilluck and ask for more cream. There were so few of them left and she knew what an alchemist needed. She told their little group as much. "Inspector Hatwig won't be able to do much of anything about the navigation room or the stern unless she has something to transmute into metal."

The hand rubbing James' beard moved to the wound on his forehead. He pressed the swollen skin gingerly. The glass had been cleared out of the cuts, and three stitches had been used to keep the deepest slice from being an open ravine on his face. "What would she need?"

"Paper."

James gave Zenetra a frown that clearly asked if she was being serious. "Okay," he sighed. "Why would she need paper?"

"To draw alchemic symbols on. She had a pen, too. A pen with silver ink. She used it to transmute her belt from fabric to metal and was about to do the same to mine when we hit that wall. She must have lost it."

"Silver ink?" asked Raoul.

"Mercury, I'd wager. I doubt that pen is still in the navigation room."

Carver nudged Zenetra with his elbow. "Cadet, you'd better check Inspector Hatwig's bags to see if she has another. You know what to look for."

"Sure."

James winced as he pressed the edges of his wound. He took his fingers away and examined them for blood. "And what good is this pen?"

Zenetra grimaced at the sight of James aggravating his wound. "If Inspector Hatwig has the pen, she won't need paper. She could just write the symbols directly onto something. It takes time to draw each rune, but it would have to be drawn on paper anyway. I suppose we could use sheets or blankets to make a canopy for the navigation room, and then Inspector Hatwig could turn that to metal. At the very least it would provide some shelter for the readerboard and dry out the wires." Zenetra reached across the table and grabbed James' hand before he could undo a stitch. "Leave it be."

James stilled. His hand yielded.

Zenetra retracted her own and cradled her teacup. The mess hall spiked with warmth.

"And the stern?" James' eyes flitted from his now empty hand to Zenetra's face. "What...um...what would she need in order to fix the stern?"

"Wood would be best." Zenetra went to take another sip of tea and found her cup empty. "We could search the island for trees. Cut them down into planks to fix the hull. It's easier for an alchemist to transmute something if they already have the shape and thickness they want. We could patch up the dents in the hull with mud. Make it smooth. Then Inspector Hatwig can transmute it to metal when she's able."

Tilde rested her chin in the palm of her hand. "That will take an awfully long time. There's a lot of dents and dings and holes all over the hull."

"It's not like we're going anywhere," said James.

"Oh." Tilde's dampened spirit returned. "That's true."