“No,” Sibba said, shaking her head. “She and I are both Hallowtide down to our bones.” She did not think her mother would protest. Sibba finally felt like a Fielding, like a Hallowtide, and Darcey would not begrudge her that.
Slinging her single pack over her shoulder, she kissed her friends goodbye and stepped into her ship. Her eyes spotted a familiar flash of golden-brown feathers and she lifted her arm, giving a shrill whistle. Aeris appeared over the heads of the gathered crowd, causing some men to duck and the children to giggle happily. The hawk alighted on Sibba's outstretched arm. Sibba deposited her on the deck and she tucked in her wings, settling in for the voyage ahead.
Men heaved the Hallowtide away from the dock and the rowers began to maneuver her down the Rata River, one man at the steering oar shouting orders that Sibba barely heard. There was the rush of wind in her ears, and the splash of water beneath her feet. It was bad luck to look back on a place to which she would never return, so she kept her eyes on Jary and Estrid and Ari. They quickly grew smaller until they were just distant specks against Ottar's main gate.
With one last wave to the figures on shore, Sibba turned and moved to the bow where she would be able to watch her graceful ship slice through the waters on its way to the ocean. There was a tightening in her chest, an ache that she recognized as the pulling tight of strings that connected her to people she loved. With time and distance, she would learn to live with the ache, even forget about it at times, but it would always be there, a reminder of her reason to return. She thought of Evenon then on the Malstrom, and his Crowheart girl, and hoped that he had returned to her. No matter how he had betrayed Sibba, he had also saved her. They had saved each other, and it wasn't unreasonable for her to wish him a happy ending. She was getting hers, after all.
The current was with them, and they reached the mouth of the river quickly. As the Hallowtide poured into the narrow strait that would take them to the sea, she caught sight of Ey Island. She hadn't thought about it much since leaving except to either miss it or curse its existence. It seemed so small, its greenery encroaching on narrow white beaches, the barest glimpse of a wooden wall through the trees. Her world was so much larger now, but that would always be the place where everything had changed.
Small fingers grasped her own, coaxing her gently out of her reverie. She looked over into Tola's sharp face, the wind whipping her red hair into a frenzy. Tola used her free hand to pull the strands out of her mouth.
“Is everything okay?” Sibba asked. Tola, who had never been on a boat in her life, had been hiding in the belly of the ship in an attempt to outsmart seasickness.
Tola shrugged in response. “It will be.” Sibba didn't know if she would ever get used to the vala's way of proclaiming things she couldn't possibly know as truths. How did she know everything would be okay? Anything could go wrong, anything at all, but Tola trusted in herself enough to believe that it wouldn't. And not just in herself, but in Sibba, too. That should have scared Sibba, but it was different with Tola. There was a connection between them, a spark that no amount of vala magic could extinguish. She didn't feel ashamed or scared of her feelings like she had with Estrid. Just like Tola, she accepted them and welcomed them and kept a secret seed of hope and fear that someday, the spark would burst into flames and consume them both.
The ship raced past Ey Island and Sibba was about to turn away when she saw movement, a rustle in the trees, a shifting of shadows in the midday light. She kept her eyes on the island until finally, a figure burst forth onto the beach.
“Look!” Tola called, squeezing Sibba's fingers and lifting one hand to point at the island.
A brown mare raced along the beach, her hooves kicking up puffs of fine sand as the boat glided along beside her in the distance. Sibba had thought that by abandoning the horse, she was leaving it to its death, but no. Gerd was plump and happy and free, her sides heaving beneath her shining coat. Sibba laughed, moving back along the starboard side to keep the horse in her sights for as long as she could. She climbed over rowers until she reached the back where she stood beside the man at the steering oar. He looked at her as if she had lost her mind as she hoisted herself up to stand on the railing, a hand shielding her eyes and her other hand gripping the rigging.
Gerd reached the end of the beach and threw back her head. The shrill sound of her whinny reached Sibba across the sea. For a second, it looked like there was someone on her back. Sibba caught a flash of yellow hair, a white hand raised in salutations. Her breath caught in her throat, and she opened her mouth to shout. Then she blinked and the illusion was gone.
The boat rounded the corner of the mainland and left Ey Island behind as it sliced through the waves, headed toward the Impassable Strait.
“Where to?” the steering oarsman asked. The other rowers looked at her expectantly, and even Tola watched from her spot at the bow.
Sibba's hand went to her hip and rested on the hilt of the crow sword, her half-cloak flapping around her shoulders in the salty breeze. In her mind, she saw the golden circlet and a distant land, a history and a family waiting to be discovered, and she smiled, turning her face toward the raging sea and lifting her hand to point westward.