Talia didn’t answer.
Hanid gave her a quiet smile. “Don’t despair, Miss Dahl-Saida. She will be well again, I think.”
And then he bowed and left the cabin.
Talia hugged her knees to her chest and screwed her eyes shut. You took my father from me. You can’t have my mother, too.
You can’t have her.
You can’t.
The waves slapped against the side of the ship, and for a moment she thought she heard a thread of music curling out of the sea.
Chapter Seven
THE FEVER LATCHED TIGHT ONTO HER MOTHER, and wouldn’t let go.
One week. Two. She slept poorly; she woke frantic. Captain Oblaine’s opium supply dwindled—it was the only thing that made her easy again.
At the beginning of the third week, Talia got the Captain’s permission to bring her mother to his private quarters, a small chamber adjoining the great cabin. There, at least, she could sit in bed and look out the windows to the sea. Oblaine’s willingness to do so would have surprised Talia, if not for the marked pity in his eyes.
He felt sorry for the woman driven mad by her banishment.
He felt sorry for the girl clinging desperately to the idea that her mother would soon be perfectly well again. His pity made Talia angry, but she accepted it anyway.
Her mother was lucid, sometimes. She would wake in a quiet confusion, scoot up against her pillows and take Talia’s hands in hers. She’d say she was sorry for bringing this upon them, but they would build a new life together in Ryn, take care of each other. She would smile at Talia, and then her eyes would slide over to the windows, a wild panic seizing her.
“I need to watch the sea! I need to protect the ship! If I’m not watching she will come—she will break us—she will drag our souls into the depths and there will be no rest—”
“Hush, Mama,” Talia whispered, trying to soothe her even through her own fear. “All is well. There isn’t any danger. Don’t worry.”
But her mother wept and wouldn’t listen. Sometimes she wrested her way out of bed, stumbling through the Captain’s quarters and out onto the deck toward the rail, toward the sea. Once, she made it all the way, and Talia was terrified she meant to throw herself overboard. But she didn’t, she just stared into the water and crumpled to her knees. “She’s so angry,” she sobbed. “So angry.”
Hanid and Captain Oblaine both appeared at Talia’s elbow and helped half-carry her mother back to bed.
Her mother’s wrist didn’t heal. She was forever knocking it on something in her ravings, and Oblaine could do nothing but continue to bandage it, continue to knot a sling around her neck.
It was easiest when her mother slept. Those were the only times Talia left her side to wander listlessly about the deck, or climb up into the riggings and tuck herself against the main mast. She clung to the ropes and cried, shuddering in the icy wind. She ached with homesickness, and worry for her mother was eating her from the inside. She couldn’t fix her mother, couldn’t help her. She couldn’t do anything, and she hated it.
One night, when her mother had been ill an entire month, Talia left her sleeping quietly in the captain’s cabin and shimmied up the riggings to the crow’s nest, her favorite spot. She wrapped herself in the blanket she’d brought and stared out at the stars, burning white and cold in the vast sky. They seemed close enough to touch, as if she could step from the mast and pluck them like oranges from the heavens.
The moon rose, round and silver, from out of the sea, and her mind jumped back to the night of her arrest, moonlight flooding into the ballroom. For a moment, she let herself long for the life Eda had stolen from her.
Hanid was right: This was outside of her control. She could no more crown herself Empress of Enduena, or shake the shadows from her mother’s mind, than she could take a star from the sky. But that didn’t mean she was helpless, either.
Her mother would get better when they landed in Ryn—Talia just needed to get her away from the sea. And they didn’t have to stay with Eda’s wretched Baron, they could scrape out a living of their own. Talia would find work somewhere, make enough money to give her mother all the comforts she deserved. They didn’t need a grand life in Eddenahr to be happy.
The moon blurred a little before her eyes. My mother is still here, she told herself fiercely. That hasn’t changed.
She sensed movement below her and peered down to see a lantern bobbing on the deck. “Your mother is asking for you, Miss Dahl-Saida!” came Hanid’s voice.
She blinked the tears away and scrambled down in a hurry.
Her mother was sitting at the dining table in the great cabin, scribbling something on a piece of paper. She looked up and smiled. “There you are, dearest.”
Talia settled into the chair across from her. “You’re looking very well.”
Another smile. “I’m feeling much better.” Scritch scritch scratch went her pen. Moonlight poured in through the windows, illuminating her elegant handwriting.
“What are you doing?” Talia asked carefully.
“I’m transcribing the story my father told me when he took me to the seaside as a child. I just remembered it.” She beamed at her paper, and kept writing.
The moon rose a little higher over the sea, and Talia saw sweat glimmering on her mother’s brow. “Are you sure you wouldn’t like to lie down again?”
“When I’ve finished.” Scritch scritch scratch.
Talia wondered if she ought to go for Hanid or Captain Oblaine. “What’s the story about?”
“You’ll see. I’m so pleased I remembered! It explains everything.” She paused to dip her pen in an inkwell.
The ship rolled beneath them, and the lantern swung back and forth from its hook in the ceiling, creak creak, creak creak.
Talia watched in silence as her mother wrote three more sentences across the paper. Then she laid the pen down, and blew on the ink to dry it. Her smile reached her ears as she handed the page over to her daughter.
Talia’s eyes traveled across the words, so carefully and beautifully written.
“Well? Now do you understand?”
Talia bit her lip and met her mother’s gaze, forcing herself to smile. “I do. Thank you for writing it down for me.”
Her mother grinned, laughed, reached across the table to hug her. “I’d like to go on deck and watch for a while now.”
“The captain and I have been watching in turns so you can get some rest, Mama. Don’t worry, you can watch again soon.”
Her mother nodded. “I can’t watch all the time.”
“Of course not. No one could. Now let’s get you back to bed.”
She allowed Talia to help her up from the table, leaning on her with her good arm. Talia led her through the door to the captain’s bunk, and she climbed under the covers, pulling the blankets up to her chin.
“I’m glad you understand now,” she whispered, her eyes drifting shut.
“Me too, Mama.” Talia kissed her forehead and slipped back out of the cabin. The moon was directly overhead now, flooding the whole deck in silver.