Kyosti spent most of the voyage sick belowdecks. He, Anglorae, and Sanji huddled in their blankets for the tumultuous and treacherous trip, green-faced and wretched. John abandoned them almost immediately to run around in the sun and wind, only coming down to bring them water and food.
“What a traitor,” Anglorae griped. “I should have left him in Mardoo.”
It stormed frequently, and Kyosti got to experience the skyhigh waves personally. There was a rumor that someone had seen another Hither-Blissery, but of course no one stayed above-deck during these storms, not even the crew.
On a rare calm day, John slung Anglorae over his shoulder and took her upstairs. As her protests faded down the swaying corridors, Sanji slapped Kyosti’s shoulder.
“Hey, don’t you think we should join them?” she asked, her voice hoarse and weak.
Kyosti grimaced. “I think you’ll have to carry me too.”
Somehow they got outside, and the first whiff of clean sea air after weeks in the dank below-decks was like heaven. To his surprise, Kyosti even reveled in the feeling of the sun on his skin. He still felt sick, but Sanji’s hand clutching his arm and the fresh wind on his face raised his spirits.
“If only the whole trip could be like this,” Sanji muttered in his ear.
Kyosti didn’t know how big the ship was, but he knew there were about a hundred people aboard, counting the crew. Many of them were from Sorn Iorn, speaking both Chith and the Sorn or Mardoo dialects. He also heard a few languages he didn’t recognize.
As usual, Sanji kept up a running dialogue for his benefit. “...what a colorful man, maybe Leonella? Hmm, I don’t recognize the language. He’s wearing all the colors of the rainbow, very eye-catching. Oh, what a beautiful baby! I wonder if she feels as sick as we do. Her parents look Maynan. Ahaha, you would be furious to see the suns sewn into their clothing…”
A murmur overtook the crowd above-deck; around them, everyone lowered their voices and whispered.
Kyosti copied them. “What is it? What’s happening?”
“Hmmm,” Sanji said. “I’m not sure...they’re looking at something in the north. Is it another ship? I can’t see what they’re looking at---”
“Kyosti!”
Anglorae’s voice cut through the stillness, loud and frantic. Before Kyosti had fully turned in her direction, her arms were wrapped firmly around his waist and she was dragging him backward. “Anglorae!” he protested. John reached them too and picked both Kyosti and Anglorae up bodily, hauling them away. Sanji gave a cry of protest. The other passengers laughed mockingly.
“Look at them hiding away,” Kyosti heard one of them say, loud enough to hear over his protests. “They don’t know a god when they see it.”
The cool shade and sour smell of belowdecks fell over them again, and John finally set him and Anglorae down. She didn’t let go of Kyosti’s waist, though, clutching him like he was a raft keeping her afloat, her whole body trembling.
Kyosti hugged her back instinctively. “What is it?” he whispered.
“I saw it,” she answered. “An Eagle from the north. It’s still far away, but I got a good look at it.”
So that was what everyone had glimpsed. Anglorae, with her Seer powers, would have seen the Eagle up close and personal, but it must be a big one for everyone else to have seen already.
“Is it coming here?” he asked.
She nodded. “It saw the ship. It’s coming ever closer…” She tugged his arm. “Let’s go lower.”
Kyosti hesitated. “Alright, but….I want to see it,” he confessed.
Anglorae tensed up, then relaxed. “I’ll tell you what it looks like, but please let’s go lower!”
A couple hours later, the Eagle landed on the top of the mast. The whole boat shuddered under its weight, and the passengers, their common sense returning, fled to their rooms. The crew cowered in the nooks and crannies, heads bowed so the Eagle couldn’t look them in the eye. It was larger than a house, and the mast creaked, threatening to break and destroy the whole voyage. Its body, covered in thousands of tiny mirrors, reflected the sunlight in all directions. Instead of a beak and black eyes like other eagles, a human face with no expression peered out from the mirrors, turning this way and that, waiting for someone to look into its flat blue eyes.
Kyosti had heard Windfeller Eagles described many times, so Anglorae’s blow-by-blow was no surprise to him. She had fallen asleep by the time John and Sanji came into their room, her arms still wrapped around his middle. They huddled up on either side.
“I didn’t think how horrible it must be for a southerner to see an Eagle,” Sanji confessed quietly, stroking Anglorae’s hair. “What would happen if it saw you?”
“I don’t know, but I’ve heard stories,” Kyosti answered, deliberately vague. “Aren’t you scared of them too? You’ve already looked one in the eye.”
Sanji hmmed. “It wasn’t really scary. I was young, and I thought it was pretty. Afterward, of course...that was horrible. But when it happened, I wasn’t scared. My parents and the---well, they took me to one of the eyries on the islands by Bridget. They made it sound like it would be such an adventure.”
None of them said anymore. John and Sanji fell asleep with their heads on Kyosti’s shoulders, but he stayed awake for a long time, thinking of mirrors, suns, traitors, and stories.
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Photo by Rachel McDermott on Unsplash
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