Beneath the Thirteen Moons (6 page)

“Feel better now?” Korl asked, as if his healing were responsible for the sudden lack of tension in her shoulders.

Mahri nodded, locked gazes with her monk-fish. She’d always thought of him as her pet, albeit a particularly sensitive one, the way he seemed to respond to her needs and desires. Yet the black wall—she knew Jaja had done it, had not just sensed her thoughts but read them as clearly as if she’d spoken aloud. And had the Power to block them for her.

Too many questions festered in her mind. Monk-fish chose their masters, not the other way around and although not particularly rare, their companionship was much sought after. Why had he chosen her? He’d called her a spirit-friend, what did that mean? She couldn’t deny that she’d read his thoughts until he’d created that wall, couldn’t deny that he read hers, even now. It frightened her, somehow, like he’d been spying on her. But to what purpose?

“It wasn’t a dream,” she murmured.

Jaja patted her face, nodded with slow deliberation and then climbed onto the triangle of wood on the bow, occasionally glancing back at her with forlorn looks of apology.

“What’s that?” asked Korl, pointing at the plankton that had risen to the surface thick as soup, their colorful radiance lighting the channel far through the trees.

Mahri rose to her feet. “Tiny, glowing sea creatures. A ribbon of light.”

“I don’t suppose there’s another monster lurking around to feed off it, right?”

She stared at him, afraid he knew about the narwhal, but his lips were curled into a smile and so she just laughed. “I hope not.” Their shoulders touched and he jerked away as if stung.

“It’s a little late,” said Mahri, “to be insulted by the touch of a water-rat.”

Korl shook his head. “It’s not that, it’s just… well, I think it’d be better if we just didn’t touch each other, that’s all.”

Mahri grinned.

He continued to stare in wonder at the glowing water. “The swamps aren’t what I’d imagined. They’re dangerous, yes. Certainly uncivilized. But beautiful, too.”

She felt an unreasonable surge of pride. He’d grown up in a palace, surrounded by the finest beauty that Power could fashion. She’d grown up on a boat; ignorant, poor, and for most of her life, powerless. Yet at this moment she felt their place in the world to be equal, that her advantages could somehow match his.

Mahri couldn’t help it. The Power thrummed inside of her, hammering to be free, only a trickle needed to keep her craft moving forward, the barest thread used to Seek familiar waters. She raised her hands, Saw into the glowing water, and Pushed.

Pillars of rainbow-hued water grew to staggering heights beside them and flanked their progression down the passage. Erupting fountains of light threw showers of glittering droplets, balls of color burst from the water
and exploded high above them, thin streams of mist curled in fanciful shapes through and between the sparks of lavender, ruby and emerald.

Korl crossed his arms over his chest and raised an eyebrow at her. “Not bad.”

Jaja hopped up and down, clapped his hands in delight. An occasional fish or crab would be thrown from the swirling water onto the deck and he’d investigate, munching with relish or throwing the catch overboard with disdain.

Mahri stalked the man, grabbed his hand when he tried to pull away, and flung it into the air with her own. A narwhal grew from the glowing mist of water, its mouth opened and the boat traveled into it, surrounded by colorful ribs. A sea flower waved its graceful, deadly, stingers at them. A phoenix burst from the water, its feathers gleaming scarlet fire that consumed it into a drizzle of rain. A skulker formed and opened its huge maw, closing onto the bow in a shower of exploding light.

She dropped his hand but he wouldn’t let go. His mouth, that full bottom lip, hung slightly open and when he pulled her against him she could feel the hammering in his chest. His skin sparkled with reflected light…

“You’re just like your swamp,” he breathed. “Beautiful—and dangerous.”

Her lips sought his of their own accord and he responded, but too tenderly, beyond a mere physical desire, and Mahri almost melted against that unexpected onslaught of affection. Then she froze in sudden terror. He pulled his lips from hers but still held her tightly. “What is it?”

“Look behind you.”

He glanced over his shoulder. “What?”

Mahri let the water fall back into the channel with a sudden splash. She couldn’t be sure what scared her the most; that look on his face or the natives that watched them from the bank. “Don’t you see them?”

Korl turned, kept his arm around her waist. “I don’t see anything but the blackness of the trees.”

“But they’re standing right there!”

Natives lined the stream, watched them from no more than a stone’s throw away, and they wore clothes just like the speaker in her dream, and nodded in obvious pleasure at the couple on the boat. Jaja had turned his attention to them also, waving in their direction as they passed.

Mahri Pushed against the black wall surrounding her mind that she’d so welcomed earlier, until a bare crack split it open. And she could hear them like the barest of whispers.
Don’t see us, we’re not here, don’t notice us, look elsewhere…

Korl put his hands against her cheeks and turned her face to his. “Are you all right?”

“You can’t see them,” she choked, “because they don’t want you to. That’s why they live among us and we don’t even question their existence. Because they don’t want us to.”

His forehead crinkled and he frowned at her, the curls at the edges of his mouth now faint lines. “What’re you talking about?”

“Don’t you get it? They can manipulate our thoughts, make us see what they want.” Mahri poked his chest with her finger. “They’re making you fall in love with me.”

Korl gripped her shoulders. “Who?”

Mahri pointed at the line of fur-scaled bodies. “The natives, of course!”

Korl raised an eyebrow and one corner of his mouth tipped dangerously upward. “And why would the natives want me to fall in love with you?”

“Because,” said Mahri with exasperation, “They want me to help you rule.”

He threw back his head and howled with laughter. “You?” he sputtered, “Help me to…” More laughter choked him. “A water-rat?”

She pushed him away and he fell to the deck, holding his stomach, still howling idiotically. Mahri faced the line of watchers and shook her fist at them. “I can see your thoughts,” she yelled. “As easily as I can see you. I won’t be manipulated, do you hear me?” And she roiled the water and the boat shot past them with a spray that drenched those not quick enough to dart back.

Mahri plunged them through the maze of passages, hoping she sped towards her village but just wanting to get away from
them
. Her craft bucked and tipped, for she could still hear the Royal chuckling and didn’t care if he was thrown overboard or not. Jaja held on and whooped with delight, his fanned tail whipping like a banner, the fresh deluge of night rain not bothering him in the least.

They narrowly escaped two low-lying limbs when Korl pulled himself together enough to stagger to her side. “Water-rat,” he shouted into the wind. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have laughed at you.”

The Power sang in her limbs and Mahri spurred the boat faster. The bow soared upward and Korl grabbed her waist with his hands to keep from tumbling backwards. As angry as she felt, she still welcomed the warmth of his fingers and fought to lean back against him. It felt so incredibly
right
.

Natives, she thought. But she still held that wall of black around her mind, had repaired the chink she’d broken before. So they couldn’t be influencing her thoughts, making her feel this strange attachment to the man. But he had no such protection.

Korl tried again. “Mahri, listen. You’ve had so much root, it’s possible you’re hallucinating.”

“You can only See true with the zabba,” she shouted back.

“But you’re a Wilding, with no discipline. Isn’t it at least a possibility?”

“No.”

Branches and vines slapped into the boat and Mahri used her bone staff to fend them off. Jaja had hunkered down beneath the bow, kept shaking his head and trying to catch her eye.

“It’s all nonsense, Mahri. I’m not falling in love with you, okay?”

The boat slowed and she felt the sigh of his relief warm the top of her head. She turned in his hands and at that moment dawn broke, surrounding him in a cloud of soft golden light.

“Are you sure?” she demanded.

He put his palm over his heart. “I swear to you, I am absolutely not falling in love with you.”

“But I thought I saw—in your eyes…”

And she saw it again, as the sun touched those faceted orbs and lit them with fire. But he shuttered them, that mask of arrogance fell over those perfect features, and he shook his hair back from his face. “Maybe a little lust, water-rat. But that’s all.”

“T
HANK THE-THIRTEEN-MOONS,” BREATHED
M
AHRI
.

Korl scowled. “It’s not very flattering, you know, when a water-rat’s grateful that a Royal
doesn’t
love her.”

She laughed, her face aglow, threw pole-strengthened arms around those broad shoulders and hugged him hard. To his credit he held the air in his lungs.

“No, it’s not that,” she laughed. “Although I’m relieved, but that doesn’t mean what I told you about the natives isn’t—oh, never mind. I’ve found the trail!”

Korl hadn’t released her from her hug. “What trail?”

His eyes were bottomless depths of… “Stop looking at me like that. I’ve found the way to the village, a hint of familiar water.” Mahri tried to wriggle out of his arms, gave up, and just turned to face the bow, his warm body pressed against her back. A small part of her marveled at his reluctance to let her go, how her own body tried to meld with his, despite the disparity of their minds and hearts.

She zealously followed that hint of the village, lost it once when it got overwhelmed with other water Patterns, but finally reached a channel that she recognized. “We’ve gone too far,” she murmured. “I’ll have to Push the water against its natural current.” She tried to open her pouch when strong fingers wrapped around her own and squeezed.

Mahri sighed. “Listen, Great Healer, you’ve already told me I’ve taken enough root that I won’t survive after we reach the village. So what’s the point in stopping now?”

“How much zabba have you got left? How much am I going to need to Heal your people?”

He’s got a point, thought Mahri. But we’re far from the village and to Push against the current takes a lot of Power. She Saw into his hands and took control of his muscles, made them release her fingers so she could dig into the fish-scale pouch. She pulled forth root and ate.

“Stubborn wench,” he growled into her ear. “Give me back my hands.”

“Bossy brute,” she flung back, shuddering from the bitter taste of the zabba. “I just did.”

“Then how come they’re running up the front of your vest, like they’ve a mind of their own?”

Mahri choked back a laugh and Pushed those wandering hands back down around her waist. Had she done that to his muscles unconsciously, or did Korl really have a sense of humor? “Stop it, I need to concentrate.” And she forced the water to do her will, made it go against the natural flow and felt the enormous drain of Power.

This is what Royals do all the time, she thought. Shape things to their will regardless of the natural order. No wonder they require so much zabbaroot.

The sun crawled higher into the sky and she armed sweat from her face. Korl had taken up permanent residence behind her, as if he thought she’d collapse at any second, and only tore himself away to bring her a drink. At noon he forced her to eat and Mahri kept it down by sheer force of will, the normally bland dried fish and
seaweed nut-cakes now too potent for her heightened taste buds.

She fought the current with the Power and her will, created wave after wave that flung them through the channels like porpoises arching above the water. They flattened to the deck several times to avoid low-lying tree limbs and Mahri spun the waves higher to flow over those they couldn’t squeeze under. The Power drained from within her at an alarming rate, but when she tried to ingest more zabba her throat tightened up and she gagged it out.

The rays of sun that filtered through the canopy had begun to fade when they reached a passage thickly webbed with vines. Afraid to drain any more of her root reserves, Mahri fought an opening through the curtain by physical strength alone using her bone staff, almost crying with the need to get them through, for the boat had slowed against that barricade of plants.

Korl laid a gentle hand on her arm and grasped the staff, his forehead wrinkled with concern. “You look awful.”

“Thanks.”

“I meant tired. Let me help.”

“No thanks.”

“What’re you trying to prove?” Korl’s face flushed with exasperation, his mouth turned down and his eyebrows lowered. “Much to my father’s regret, I consider myself a Healer first, prince second, and I’ll be drowned before I’ll watch someone kill herself, no matter what the reason.”

Mahri stared at him through eyes dreamy with fatigue. His anger didn’t bother her; if anything, it made her want to touch his brow to smooth away the lines, kiss his lips to take away the frown, caress the skin that flushed with such color. She sighed and lowered her
head, knowing not to argue while she looked at him. Her mind always seemed to turn to mush.

“I’ll atone for my sins in my own way,” she said.

His voice softened to that husky timbre and her heart skipped a beat. “What sins?”

She felt the coiled strength in his fingers as he laid them under her chin and raised it, focused his brilliant gaze on her and seemed to see into her soul.

“Brez and Tal’li, my lifemate and child, died of a plague.”

He sighed. “I see.”

“No, you don’t,” she snapped. “You still don’t get it. Just because I want to… just because I
want
you, doesn’t make you any less an enemy. I don’t need your help.”

His brows rose nearly up to his headband with surprise. “Without my help you’d be fish-monster food.”

“You saved me because you knew you needed me to get back home.”

“And Jaja?”

Mahri pulled away from the heat of his fingers beneath her chin. “I haven’t figured that out yet.” She turned and started smacking away the vines, cursing between each blow of her staff. Everything between her and Korl had gone terribly wrong. They’d had to rely on and take care of each other and it’d created some kind of responsibility between them that she’d never desired. Now that they neared the end of their destination she needed to break that confining tie. But she didn’t know how.

Mahri’s arms had begun to tremble when Korl gently pushed her aside and fought the plants with the paddle, not even bothering to argue about it. She felt the onset of withdrawal like the weight of a narwhal dropped on
her shoulders and sagged against the side of her boat. The root had almost wrung her dry, she could feel her very life force start to fade, and realized that Korl could be right. If the poison overwhelmed her immunity she might not survive this trip.

“Korl,” she whispered. He turned to her and without a word traded paddle for staff. Mahri let him take it. She felt so very tired. When he started to resume his attack on the vines she placed a trembling hand on his arm, even that slight contact making both of them jump from the chemistry it created. It made her words all the more confusing, yet none the less true.

“It’s not you, so much, that I despise. It’s what you represent.”

He flung back his hair, his face stiff with arrogant pride.

Mahri sighed. “You’re a Healer, like the one that had refused to help me save Brez and Tal’li. And a prince, who denies the people their right to knowledge. And worse, a Royal, so fearful of losing their Power that they not only control the root but destroy any that may match their in-bred tolerance to it.”

“And you,” he countered, his deep voice laced with contempt, “are an ignorant water-rat, a Wilding and a smuggler of zabba—the worst kind of criminal.”

“Aya. I am what you’ve made me.”

And he stared hard at her, those brilliant green eyes clouded with conflicting emotions, as if he’d never questioned himself before and it confused him.

At least now we’re even, thought Mahri.

He opened his mouth to speak when Jaja jumped on Mahri’s shoulder and chattered excitedly, pointing his
little scaled finger at the limbs above them. They both looked up into hundreds of pairs of soft, brown eyes peering down at them through the interlaced vines. Jaja grasped the nearest plant and scampered up it, his tail fanned wide. The humans watched with smiling fascination as Jaja embraced, then frolicked with his brethren, swinging from the vines, leaping into the water only to clamber up them again.

Then a heated discussion seemed to ensue, for the monk-fish surrounded Jaja and displayed their fanged teeth, shook fists at him, then nodded hundreds of tiny heads in reluctant acquiescence. Then the curtain of greenery parted before them like a slowly expanding tunnel, webbed hands pulling up each hanging vine.

Jaja swung on a vine back into the boat and settled on the bow, his chin in the air, and imperiously gestured at the humans to go forward with a curt wave of his hand.

Mahri met Korl’s gaze for an instant, their differences forgotten as the chemistry between them snapped in the air when they smiled at each other. The shallow dimple appeared in his cheek and her heart tripled its beat as she stared at him in open-mouthed fascination. That pale, smooth skin crinkled at the corners of those eyes, that narrow nose wrinkled at the bridge and that full bottom lip curved in a tempting smile. Golden-white hair tumbled over his headband and she pushed it off his brow with a trembling hand.

“Criminal or not,” he murmured, “you’re quite simply the most fascinating creature I’ve ever known.” And he captured her hand with his own, brought her fingers to his warm lips and kissed them.

He’d make a wonderful king, thought Mahri. With that charm his subjects would lay down their lives for him. And she wondered how much of his flattery had to do with his desire to return home. Did he think that she might fall in love with him and use it to control her? Did he actually confuse lust for love? She laughed and he smiled wider, flashing those even white teeth. Well, two can play at this game.

She brought his fingers to her own lips, kissed them in turn, but closed her teeth over his index finger and held it there, firm but gentle, and watched his eyes widen with alarm. Mahri’s smile turned wicked and she closed her lips around the tip of his finger, to replace teeth with tongue. She sucked that part of him deep into her mouth, eased the pressure so that he started to pull out then sucked even harder, again and again, until his fascinated gaze began to smolder and he drew his lower body toward hers.

Two can play… but two also pay, thought Mahri as her lower half began to throb with the rhythm of her mouth. Jaja gave an impatient disgusted snort and she reluctantly released Korl, took back her staff, and began to pole by using the weight of her body to do it. She channeled the root left in her system to her own muscles, for although she could See she didn’t have enough Power to Push, and she’d have to get them to the village with what little strength she could glean from her own abused body.

She glanced back at Korl only once. He stood frozen, staring through the trees, hands fisted at his sides and trembling with suppressed fury, as if he fought for control of his own body and it wouldn’t, or couldn’t, submit.

They reached a channel that flowed in the right direction and Mahri flicked her wrist, partially retracting the bone, and leaned on the staff. The sea trees grew larger here, not the size of the city’s but their width at least ten times a man’s height. Krizm vines grew in abundance along this route and she plucked a swollen globe, drank the sweetened water, then shared with Jaja and Korl.

Dedos lurked within the foliage, mimicking the plants, and when Korl reached to pluck one of that animal’s globes she slapped his arm with her staff then poked at the one he’d chosen. It burst at the contact and the animal swarmed its vine-like arms around the globule, formed a hellish cage, and contracted shut. Sharp, thin tubes pierced the air, searching for its intended victim. A squeal of outrage, and the animal spread out again, dangling its own imitation bait among the krizms.

Korl flushed scarlet. “Thanks.”

Mahri shrugged. How many times could you save someone’s life, she wondered, and still not feel responsible for them?

“I guess I’m the ignorant one, after all,” he laughed in self-deprecation, then straightened those broad shoulders. “At least in the swamps.”

Mahri knew that they’d come from different worlds but only now realized what a wide gulf that was. “You’re as out of place here as I would be at court.”

He raised an eyebrow, as if picturing her in that very place. Then grinned.

Her little craft floated through the twilight.

When Mahri saw the village’s cluster of trees her knees buckled as if, now that she’d reached it, her will could support her no further. She slid gracefully to the
deck, her staff rattling against the wood, and gave in to the shakes that rippled through her body. She’d never been so tired in her life.

Korl poled them to a flat limb the village used as a dock, climbed from the boat and pulled Mahri out. They both stood for a moment, getting used to the absence of movement beneath their feet, Mahri trying to stop the quivering in her legs.

“Where is everyone?” she wondered aloud.

The skeleton of a boat under construction lay on a limb parallel to the one they stood on; the fire shell that melted the glue lay cold and abandoned. Various sea animal’s hides were stretched on racks but had only been scraped clean halfway. Shell utensils, woven baskets of laundry, tools, even toys were strewn haphazardly along the branch paths around and above them. All the signs of human habitation, but not the face of one person anywhere.

Mahri let her legs have their way and collapsed to the ground. “They can’t all be dead. The fever couldn’t have taken them so quickly!”

“Of course not.” The prince squatted down beside her. “They’re probably fishing or something.” He gathered Mahri in his arms and stood, looking around uncertainly. “Show me where your family’s house is and I’ll take you there.”

“Along this limb, over to the next one intersecting, then across the rope-bridge. You can see it from here.”

“Really,” Korl muttered, peering through the riot of leaves with a puzzled expression. But he followed her directions, stopped in astonishment when he stood before a piece of otter skin that resembled a door. What at first glance appeared to be a burl in the tree was actually a
cleverly crafted dwelling. Mahri watched him pick out the other homes in the surrounding trees, tucked in natural twists of the limbs, hidden in hollows and forked branches.