They were well into the Shards and Dion saw more rocks that would challenge the Great Shard for its name. They poked like the tips of spears above the water, more of them on the side of the mainland than could be seen in the direction of the isle of Coros. The path they followed was clear, though, and there was a wide swathe of unbroken water to their left and right.
Dion’s heart had been racing, but now he felt calm. Xanthians had been using this passage for generations. They would make it safely through and then with a wind like this it would be plain sailing the rest of the way.
‘Wildren!’ Cob suddenly called.
Dion glanced back at his companion but the old man didn’t seem alarmed, merely pointing at some distant rocks, flat-topped and slightly angular to the sun.
Squinting, Dion finally saw them, half a dozen large man-sized shapes with their upper bodies out of the water, sunning themselves and evidently presenting no danger.
‘Oh,’ Dion said. ‘Only some merfolk.’
He looked for their scaled tails but the water was breaking on the rocks and he couldn’t make out much more than the silver hair and bare torsos of both males and females.
‘We should still keep an eye on them.’
Dion continued to watch the distant merfolk as the boat sailed past, heading for the Great Shard. ‘Hard to think that once they were eldren, little different from you and me.’
‘Eldren are nothing like you and me.’
The merfolk continued to ignore them. Dion thought about the times he’d felt primal rage or animal hunger overwhelm every other emotion. Was that what it felt like for an eldran when it turned wild? He vowed to ask his mother when he returned to Xanthos. Unlike some others, she could always be relied upon to discuss the eldren and their strange abilities with calm and reason.
An axe blade of black rock jutted out of the water ahead, as tall as the tip of the sailboat’s mast. He had seen the Spire of Kor from a distance before, but he’d never seen the Great Shard. He couldn’t believe how huge it was.
‘Left or right of the Great Shard?’ Dion asked.
‘The direction is simply: “Right at the Spire of Kor to the Great Shard. Follow the Coros cliffs, then left of the Twins.”’
‘I suppose that if we turn in the direction of the cliffs of Coros we will be left of the Great Shard?’ Dion asked hopefully.
‘Makes sense to me,’ Cob said. ‘This is going to take us across the wind. Are you ready?’
Cob pushed at the tiller, sending the vessel heeling as he turned it across the stiff breeze. The dark silhouette of the isle of Coros was a mile away, but with the wind now gusting and a new sail set the boat grew swifter with every passing moment. It rocked up and down on the waves, but despite the wind it was a fair day with no chance of a storm. Dion never experienced seasickness and he smiled, patting the boat’s gunwale as it met each wave head on.
Spray splashed his face, welcome and cooling in the growing heat of the day. The two men covered the next stretch in silence, crossing the channel to Coros in a surprisingly short amount of time before they changed tack again, following the cliffs. Dion kept an eye out for the Twins; he had no idea what they were supposed to look like.
‘There!’ He pointed.
The two waist-thick fingers of stone had initially appeared to be one, the distance between them barely six inches. They were tall and nestled together at the waist and the top, like two confidants sharing a secret.
‘Left of the Twins.’ Cob grinned. ‘Look how much room we’ve got. At least two hundred feet between the rocks and Coros.’
Dion whooped with him as they shot through and then they were free. They tacked one last time, and then it was clear sailing all the way to Phalesia.
8
It was late afternoon by the time Phalesia became more in Dion’s vision than just a landmass in the distance. He had never sailed from the southern tip of Coros, but both he and Cob were experienced at traveling by the sun and the currents, and when he entered the harbor and saw the Temple of Aldus on its tall summit, the highest point in the city, Dion felt a surge of pride at the successful transit.
He swept his gaze from left to right, comparing this city with his home. Phalesia was both wealthier and more populated than Xanthos, that was evident at a glance, but there was also a certain sophistication about Phalesia that Dion found it hard to put into words. The ceramics the city produced were artistic marvels, with pleasing shapes and stunning artwork no Xanthian potter could replicate. There were no less than four temples around the vibrant agora, and the other two huge civic buildings, the library and the lyceum, didn’t even exist in Xanthos.
His homeland could rise to this level and higher, Dion thought, if only Xanthos had Phalesia’s navy.