I chose my words carefully. ‘The Fool does. He makes a plan that puts finding her first. I am happy to follow it.’ That was a lie. I added, ‘It does not interfere with my own plans to take the lives of those who took her from me.’
And so we parted. I returned to my hammock, but could not find sleep again.
Day after long day, the horizon did not change. Water was all I could see when I went to sleep at the end of my watch, and when I arose to my duties. The weather held fine and grew warmer. We all browned in the sun except for Lady Amber, who remained a very pale gold, darker than the Fool had been but much lighter than Lord Golden. Once, the Fool had told me that it was believed that as White Prophets succeeded in their tasks, they would shed skin and become darker. He had become paler, and I wondered if it meant that the Servants had thwarted him in his goals. Lady Amber did what tasks she could, from scrubbing the turnips and potatoes to splicing lines. She ungloved her silver fingers for that task, and the rope seemed to obey and merge where she directed it. It reminded me uncomfortably of Verity smoothing the stone of his dragon, and I avoided watching her at that task.
Amber spent more time with Paragon than either of our captains would have preferred. Paragon welcomed her, and often Kennitsson and Boy-O joined her when she played music for him. Motley also spent a great deal of time with Paragon. Between my duties and Amber’s time with the ship, I saw little of the Fool and I had little opportunity to worry about how aloof she had become.
Our progress was slow. The currents of the ocean did not favour us. The weather was kind but the winds were inconstant. On some days the wind slept and the canvas hung nearly limp. Sometimes, looking at the endless water, I wondered if we moved at all. The farther south we went, the warmer the days grew. Summer was upon us and light lingered long in the evenings.
One such a day I retired early to my bunk and closed my eyes. I was both weary and bored, but sleep eluded me. I tried to do as my wolf had taught me: centre myself in the now and refuse to worry about the future or dwell on the past. It had never been easy for me, and that afternoon was no exception. As I lay still, hoping for sleep to find me, a whisper of Skill came to me.
I sat up straight, startled, and lost the contact. No, no, lie down, be very still, breathe slow and deep, and wait. Wait. It was like watching a game trail from up in a tree. Wait.
I took slow deep breaths and tried to stay balanced on the knife’s edge between sleep and wakefulness. I ventured into the Skill-current. It seemed weaker, almost elusive.
