Chapter 10
A Dread Tide Rising, By Walt Shuler
Here’s the next installment of ADTR.
Previously: The Talon enjoyed the hospitality of the Thousand Islers during the Landing Day Ceremony.
Currently: A storm breaks over the Isles, Kye is plagued by bad dreams and visions, and Gorm introduces her to hatto.
A Dread Tide Rising is a serialized, pulp-flavored, epic fantasy novel set in the world of Thalrassa. It follows the Talon, a group of mercenaries, thieves, and smugglers, as they come face-to-face with an ancient enemy intent on the destruction of the Rakkian Empire.
New to ADTR? Catch up on all the chapters here. You can learn more about the members of the Talon here and explore Thalrassa-related lore here. The map of Thalrassa can be found here.
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Chapter 10
Wind ripped at the ship’s canvas, cracking the fabric like a whip.
True to Padraig’s prediction, the storm struck that night. Rain pelted the beach, sea, and deck, and hailstones struck with the force of a loosed arrow. The Talon took refuge in the galley. It was tight quarters, but they made the best of it.
Mac found himself a corner where he could wrap up in a blanket. Gorm and Wynne slept sitting propped against the cabin wall, within arm’s reach of one another, but never touching. Hax and Pax slept near the doorway in case of intruders, Kye supposed. Padraig, Callan, and Derro lay where they could, but saw little sleep. All of them regularly ventured out into the storm to check on Sparrowhawk and tend to their duties.
Kye propped herself in a corner diagonally across from Mac, but every time she closed her eyes, the priestess’s song echoed in her ears once more. When she finally did sleep, disquieting dreams plagued her. She was drifting on the sea, a sun-bleached fragment of wood all that kept her afloat. The sky above was leaden, the sea a deeper shade of gray.
She had no memory of how she had come to be here, no recollection of any events that preceded her current situation. In the way of dreams, it felt like she had always existed in this place, clutching a shattered piece of hull to her chest, trying not to let the swells swamp her.
Something broke the water mere feet ahead of her. Kye caught only a glimpse, but that was enough to tell it was no fish. Not even one of the leather-skinned leviathans in legend. In that brief flash, she had seen what looked like nothing more than a pallid human hand, fingers twisted like talons as they clawed at the sky before sinking once more beneath the surface. Whatever it was, it still lurked in wait, she knew.
Kye had a sudden image of that wrinkled claw grasping at her ankles, of some unknowable horror silently swimming up from the dark depths below. It was coming for her, the thing in the water. It sought her even now, blindly grasping and clawing. It would find her, and when it did, it would rip her beating heart from her chest and devour it.
Kye started awake, sweat dripping from her body, breath coming in ragged gasps. A glance around the cabin told her that the rest of the crew were sound asleep. At least she had not cried out.
After that, Kye found sleep elusive. Rather than lie there and listen to Gorm’s snores resonate through the small cabin, she decided to risk the storm’s wrath for some fresh air. Lithe as a cat despite the cramped quarters, she rolled to her feet and slipped through the door without so much as brushing one of her sleeping companions.
On the deck, the rain had slowed to a light patter, its earlier ferocity abated. The gale-like winds had died down, and now a cool breeze brought the scent of rich earth to her nostrils. Above, stars peeked out here and there from behind tattered streamers of storm clouds. In the far distance, lightning danced, marking the storm’s progress.
“Kinda beautiful, ain’t it?” a voice asked from the darkness.
Kye jumped almost out of her skin. She whirled and found Padraig striding toward her from the shadows at the stern of the boat. She’d never even sensed his presence. The man had been nothing but pleasant to her, but her time among the Faceless had taught her wariness. She nodded her agreement, keeping her distance as the helmsman stopped a few paces away.
Padraig slipped a hand into his pocket. Alert to any possible threat, Kye noticed the movement and pulled back farther. He could have anything in there. A dagger. Anything.
The helmsman withdrew his hand and brought out a small canvas bag, from which he pulled shredded leaves. These he packed into a pipe that he produced from seemingly nowhere. He lit a taper from one of the ship’s lanterns, then used it to light the pipe. Clouds of aromatic smoke billowed out, tugged by the fading wind, twisting over the vessel and twining around Kye. It was a heady, rich scent, one that took her back to days spent in one of Rakka’s many markets, filled with the sound of hawkers and buyers.
Padraig puffed on his pipe for a moment, the red glow from the bowl warming the contours of his bearded face. Neither said anything, content to let the moment be. Then the helmsman spoke. “If what you told Mac and the others is true,” he said, pointing the stem of his pipe at her, “you did the Sanean child no favors, you know that, right?”
Kye relaxed; he only wanted to talk. She nodded. “So they told me.” She shrugged. “I’d do the same thing if I had to repeat the situation,” she said, expression defiant. To her surprise, Padraig laughed.
“Good for you, girl. Never let yourself second-guess doing what’s right. Your friend and her folks might be in rough waters now, but they’re probably a sight better off than being slaves to some Rakkan lordling.”
Kye nodded again, lips pressed tight together. A prodigious snore from the cabin spared her the need to continue the conversation. Wynne’s head poked through the doorway, followed by the rest of her body. The expression on her face promised no good to anyone who got too close.
“I think the big man’s snores might have landed him in hot water,” Padraig laughed before he faded back into the shadows in a cloud of pipe smoke.
Wynne’s eyes landed on Kye before she could make good her escape. “Can’t sleep either?” she asked. Wynne had missed Padraig and had assumed that Kye’s sleeplessness stemmed from the same source as her own.
Kye shook her head. “Bad dreams are all. They woke me before he really got started.” She giggled.
Wynne’s smile broadened, a hint of her perpetual good humor returning. “He’s awfully loud, isn’t he?” She laughed. “Once, we were camped on Longacre, and I swear I thought it was a bear! Just this huge roaring sound. Woke the nearby village. They came out with their spears, I swear to Mali!”
Kye laughed, imagining the look on Gorm’s face after being awoken by a dozen spears looking for a rogue bear. Another huge snore ripped through the night, echoing off the nearby mountain slopes.
“How do the others sleep through that?” she asked.
Wynne made herself a seat out of old sailcloth and netting. She glanced up at the stars, then replied. “Mac’s been on enough campaigns that he can sleep through anything, even war drums.” A snort told Kye what the woman thought of that particular ability. “Hax can sleep through an earthquake. Pax only pretends well. She’s probably awake and fuming about the need to share quarters with poor Gorm.”
About that time, a shadow darted from the cabin’s doorway, moving around behind toward the stern. The curses that trailed the figure made Kye blush. A moment later, Gorm’s bald head poked out of the doorway.
“What’s going on?” he asked, spotting the two women. “Something wrong?” Both Wynne and Kye burst into laughter. Confused, Gorm drew his head back where it belonged. Soon, his snores echoed across the water once more.
Sparrowhawk set sail shortly after dawn the next morning. Everything was cleaner, clearer, and quieter in the storm’s aftermath. The crew themselves were more silent than usual, going about their duties with a minimum of banter. Even the villagers were subdued.
“I guess everyone’s having a lie-in after last night’s festivities,” Mac said as the ship glided out of the harbor. No flotilla of laughing children accompanied them this time. Kye was up in the rigging, but his words carried to her.
As Sparrowhawk cleared the harbor, she turned for one last look. The morning sun lit everything in gold, and Kye felt her breath catch at the sight of those thatch-roofed huts gleaming in the morning light. For all of Rakka’s grandeur, she felt that she had never seen such simple, deep beauty. As the sun began to drive the chill from the air, Sparrowhawk turned her prow north-northwest. She continued to watch as the island dwindled in the distance.
Gorm came out on deck, stretching the kinks from his frame. Then he turned toward the rising sun, bowed at the waist, and began a series of slow movements. Kye watched from her place in the rigging, entranced by the slow, deliberate motions. She had seen him do the same each morning since departing Aeth, but it never failed to surprise her.
“You can come down,” Gorm said. How he knew she was there with his eyes closed and his back to her, Kye did not know. Still, she took advantage of his invitation and slipped out of the rigging and down to the deck.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“It’s called hatto,” he replied. She watched as he put his weight on his right leg, slightly bent his knee, and then bent at the waist, lifting his left leg backward and extending both arms behind him so that he seemed to be flying.
“What’s it for?”
“For? It’s not for anything. It simply is.”
She paused for a moment, thinking. Then, “But why do you do it?”
A slight smile crossed Gorm’s lips, then vanished. “Why do you breathe?”
“Well, life gets pretty hard if I don’t,” Kye said, laughing.
“Just so. Hatto is the same.”
Kye watched him change his stance, right arm descending to the deck, left leg still raised, and left arm straight above him in the air. How he failed to topple over with the rocking of the boat was a mystery.
“Can I try it?”
Gorm kept his leg rigid and bent at the waist, putting both hands on the deck and raising his left heel to the sky. “Of course,” he said. “But let me show you some of the more basic postures. You need to train your muscles first, or you’ll find yourself on your ass.”
As the sun climbed, Gorm instructed Kye in hatto. First, he had her stand with her legs hip-width apart, arms at her sides, palms facing out. “Stand strong, like a mountain thrust up from the ocean. Feel the connection with the ship beneath your feet,” he told her. “And through the ship, feel the sea, your pulse an echo of her rise and fall.”
Kye did as he instructed. It wasn’t hard to feel the ship, her decking slightly rough beneath Kye’s feet. If she concentrated, Kye imagined she could feel the grain of the individual planks. Beneath that, she did feel the swell and fall of the sea in time with the beating of her heart. Something tickled the edge of her awareness then, a sense of kinship with those waves, a connection with the deeps.
“Now, raise your arms above your head, palm to palm,” Gorm said, breaking the spell. “Shift your weight to your left leg, slowly, and then bring your right leg up and rest your right foot on your left leg, above the knee.” Kye tried that, but the movement of the ship made it difficult. She felt herself toppling forward and frantically windmilled her arms, but it was no use. Then Gorm’s strong hands caught her and set her back on the deck.
“It’s harder than it looks. The sea moves beneath, and you must learn to anticipate her motion. Fighting it will get you nowhere. Accept, embrace, and then move through it to the other side.”
Kye raised an eyebrow but said nothing. If a hulking mountain of a man could do this with grace, then surely she could do no less. She assumed the first pose and closed her eyes. Breathing out, she raised her hands and connected her palms above her head. She paused then, feeling the movement of the ship. Up and down, up and down. And then her awareness sank through the ship and into the sea beneath, the source of the ship’s motion.
She saw in her mind’s eye how the sea began to rise a split second before the motion was translated to the ship. Breathing in, she shifted her weight to her left leg and raised her right. She wobbled but did not fall. She took another breath and gently placed her right foot where Gorm indicated. The boat moved, but she moved with it, connected through the salt-worn wood to the rising and falling waves beneath.
Kye focused on the mental image of the sun-lit waters beneath the ship’s hull, visualizing the pattern of the waves on the surface, the gentle stillness of the deeps. It felt so real. She imagined striking out and swimming through the blue-green; she could almost feel the water move against her skin.
Enthralled, she dove further, the water darkening and cooling around her until suddenly she realized that the surface was a mere pinprick of light above her. Distantly, her waking mind shrieked a warning. How had she come here? How could she breathe? All around was chill, dark water. Something moved in the murk; something ancient and foul writhed just out of sight, but she could feel its cold, malevolent presence.
Panic flared, but she forced it down. This isn’t real. I’m still on the ship with Gorm and the others. Dimly, she could still feel the grain of Sparrowhawk’s decking under her feet. It’s all in my head, she thought. I can rise to the surface with nothing but a thought. At that, she did begin to rise, the pinprick above growing larger with each heartbeat. Then something wrapped around her ankle and calf, cold and rigid as metal, but slimy and supple at the same time. It pulled her back down into the depths. Kye fought, thrashing against the force, but it did no good.
Gorm’s words came back to her then. Fighting it will get you nowhere. Accept, embrace, and then move through it, he had said. She relaxed her mind and let the force drag her downward. As her resistance vanished, the pull diminished, too. As her heartbeat subsided, she felt the thing around her leg fall away. Calm, she thought to herself. And then the downward force was gone, and she was rising through the waters in her mind once more.
Suddenly, a massive yellow eye opened in front of her face. Larger than Sparrowhawk itself, it seemed big enough to engulf entire islands. The eye blinked once, slowly, and she could sense that it searched for her. Her heart raced as fear blossomed. Calm, she told herself. Accept, embrace, and move through. And then the monstrous eye was gone, and so was the water. Kye found herself lying on the deck, Gorm solicitously standing over her.
“You all right?”
Kye shook her head to clear the last of the waking dream. She nodded. “I’d like to try that again, though.”
Gorm gave her a speculative look and then shrugged. “As you will,” he said and then led her back through the poses. This time, Kye moved through them flawlessly, and when they were done, she had all but forgotten the yellow eye and the dark, fearful water.
Thanks for reading! I’m grateful that you’re here.
All caught up on ADTR? Why not explore some historical fiction?
The Hungry Gods tells the story of Danu and her coming of age in the late Bronze Age.
At the Edge of the World is set during Caesar’s first invasion of Britain in 55 BCE.
Or you can dig deeper into the world of Thalrassa and learn more about the folks who make up the Talon.
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Aw, a nice relaxing chapter with Kye. Wait, what the fuck is happening? What is that… oh no!
Very much loved the meditation on the waves. I felt like I was there with Kye, swimming into the depths.