After the waves from the unleashed giant serpent drove them far from Iyomelka’s vessel, they saw no sign of pursuit for two days, but Saan was sure their calm would not last.
He stood on deck, looking out at the waves and the empty sea. Sitting on a crate next to him, Sen Sherufa wrote in the sympathetic journal with tight, painstaking penmanship. Whatever the Saedran woman marked on these pages at sea was mirrored on the magically twinned volume on the other side of the world. She frowned as she reached the torn bottom of the half page. “I need to be brief, Captain. I am almost to the end of the journal’s bound sheets, and our voyage may still last for many more months.”
“Maybe the rest of the journey will be uneventful,” Saan said in a joking voice, “if we can keep our distance from Iyomelka. Or maybe we’ll discover the Key to Creation sooner than we expect.”
Sherufa raised her eyebrows, gave a little snort, then wrote with even tinier letters, cramming words onto the torn paper.
Interrupting, Ystya ran up to them, flushed and obviously upset. “That priestess keeps teaching me the wrong things! Please tell her to leave me alone.”
Saan automatically folded her into his arms to protect her. Ystya had collapsed after liberating Bouras from his curse, but she recovered quickly. When he’d pressed her for explanations about the power she had exhibited, she wouldn’t discuss what she had done and seemed almost embarrassed by it. Nevertheless, he encouraged her, talked with her when he could, and hoped she would tell him more.
Now, before the young woman could explain herself, Sikara Fyiri barged up to them, equally incensed. “Captain, you must let me continue the girl’s instruction! She lived alone on that island for a long time, and her education is woefully lacking. How can she follow the Map if she doesn’t know what it is?”
Saan let out a sigh. They seemed like two sisters having a quarrel. “Ondun knows, I had to endure the sikaras’ schooling, year after year. Why won’t you listen to her lessons, Ystya?”
“Because she will not listen when I correct her,” the girl said simply.
Saan chuckled, imagining Fyiri’s expression when the impertinent young woman pointed out errors in the sikara’s doctrine. “Maybe you should learn from each other.”
Fyiri looked as if he had asked her to kiss a squid. “How can we engage in a debate if the girl doesn’t have a basic education? One must begin from a foundation of truth.”
“Why should I learn such things at all?” Ystya asked. “What do these old teachings of Urec matter to us now?”
Fyiri raised her hands in exasperation. “You see why she needs to be educated, Captain? If we don’t save this girl from her ignorance, she might be corrupted by evil. We all saw the great powers she wields.”
Sen Sherufa closed the twinned journal. “Captain, while I don’t often agree with the sikara, we should have guessed that Iyomelka’s daughter might possess remarkable skills like her mother’s. We should understand them—Ystya should understand them, if she does not.”
Saan was torn between his affection for the girl and the need to protect his ship, his crew, and his mission. “Whatever her magical abilities, I don’t doubt that Ystya will be a great help against other problems the Al-Orizin is sure to encounter.”
Fyiri remained adamant. “Knowing that she has such powers, Captain, we must make certain she does not fall prey to evil. That’s why she needs to be given the most careful instruction.”
Saan nodded and stood in front of the pale young woman, placing his hands on her shoulders. He glanced at the sikara. “You’re right, we wouldn’t want her to fall prey to evil. Ystya needs to be taught by someone we can trust.” Saan smiled and turned her toward the Saedran woman. “From now on, Sen Sherufa will continue her education.”
From the lookout nest, Yal Dolicar called, “Sea serpent, Captain! Off to port!” The sailors gathered to see the scaly shape atop the waves, but it did not rise up and attack them. In fact, it didn’t move at all.
Saan extended his spyglass and studied the silvery serpent drifting on the water. As waves lapped it, the body slowly rolled over like a log to display ivory-colored belly plates. The serpent was dead, its eyes glassy, its mouth open.
Curious, Saan ordered the Al-Orizin to sail closer. When they were near it, they could see that the monster’s carcass was covered with round welts. No one aboard had ever seen anything like it. From the deck high above, Grigovar glowered down at the floating serpent. Sen Sherufa was at a loss to explain the inflamed wounds. Sikara Fyiri muttered a prayer and made a warding gesture, though the men took little comfort from it.
Saan scanned the waters uneasily. “Keep a close watch.” The Al-Orizin continued across the open water.
Sitting on crates at the stern, Ystya listened as Sen Sherufa taught her about the geography of Uraba, sketching out maps of the Middlesea coast, the five soldanates, the Great Desert, and the recently discovered Nunghal lands beyond it.
When Saan approached them, Ystya glanced up, looking happy and engaged in the discussion. “I am learning about the world. It’s much larger than I thought.”
“Real cities are far more interesting than just dots on a map.” He took a seat beside her. “I’ll show it all to you when we get home. You should see the Olabar palace, and our harbor filled with hundreds of ships like this one.”
“Hundreds? And they all sail to different places?”
“There are sand coracles, too, in the south. Baskets borne aloft by giant balloons that fly back and forth across the desert each year.”
Ystya looked to Sen Sherufa to see if Saan was teasing her, but the Saedran nodded. “He’s telling the truth. And we’re discovering more places on this voyage.”
“I will show you everything,” Saan promised. “My father, Soldan-Shah Omra, commands all the soldans. He is rebuilding Ishalem, our holy city. My mother, his First Wife, will also tell you many stories. I have three sisters and two brothers—you’ll meet them, too.” He felt a pang of homesickness as he realized how long he had been gone. “I miss them all, but I’m partial to my little brother Omirr. He’ll be the next soldan-shah someday.”
Ystya stared out to sea, wearing a troubled expression. “I have brothers, too, though I’ve never met them: Joron, Aiden, and Urec. When I was a little girl on the island, my father told me about them, even showed me images. They went out to search for me.”
Saan brightened, hoping to ease the young woman’s sadness. “It’s a good thing they explored, since they found Tierra and Uraba. Urec planted golden ferns on his travels, because they reminded him of home. Do you think we’ll find golden ferns on Terravitae?”
“My father talked about them when I was very young.”
He stroked his chin. “In Olabar, it’s tradition for boys and girls to hunt the golden fern in the surrounding forests. It was one of my favorite holidays when I was younger. One year I went deep into the forest alone, and assassins chased me while I was hunting the fern.”
“Assassins?” Ystya blinked, again looked at Sen Sherufa for verification, who nodded. “But why would anyone want to kill you, Saan?”
Saan casually brushed aside her concerns. “Oh, I outwitted them easily enough by hiding deep inside a rotted log. When it was safe, I crawled out again…and there in the thick underbrush I discovered a single frond—a golden fern. It was supposed to bring luck to me, bless me in my life—and apparently it has.”
Ystya laughed, and he seized the opportunity to give her a quick kiss on the cheek, which made them both flush.
By afternoon, the sea around them was dotted with strange gelatinous shapes, like large floating bubbles. The forms had a grayish translucence, with the blurs of mysterious organs and tiny sparkling lights within. The crew first spotted one, then several, and finally the water was crowded with the silent creatures.
“It’s jellyfish!” Yal Dolicar said. “Jellyfish, each one the size of a fruit cart.”
Sen Sherufa peered down into the water at the beautiful, ethereal creatures. “Now we know what killed that sea serpent.”
A man bound to take ill-advised actions, Dolicar tossed a harpoon down at a giant jellyfish that brushed up against the hull. The spear burst the gelatinous hemisphere, and ooze splattered out as the jellyfish shriveled. Ichor splashed the Al-Orizin’s hull boards and left a dark and smoking stain that ate into the wood.
Reacting with alarm, Saan shouted, “Pour buckets of water down the side! Wash away that slime before it eats through the hull!”
As the men scurried to slosh off the acidic ooze, Saan gazed around them. The Al-Orizin cut through the water at a brisk pace, propelled by the breeze. As the jellyfish infestation grew thicker, he feared that if the bow crushed too many of the creatures, the corrosive body fluids might eat through the hull. “Trim the sails—we’d better move gently through this.”
The jellyfish made no aggressive moves, simply floated with the currents, drifted apart, then pulled together once more. Their body sacs seemed to store up sunlight during the day, and that night, as the ship sailed quietly onward, the swarm emitted a cold blue glow that lit the dark waters.
Ystya stood beside him, wearing a fascinated smile. Though the sailors remained uneasy, she seemed delighted with the phenomenon. “Another amazing thing you have shown me. Thank you, Saan—I don’t regret leaving my island to come with you.”
Even though Ystya didn’t seem at all nervous about the jellyfish, he put his arm around her. “We’ll be perfectly safe. Smooth sailing.”
The ship drifted along with the giant jellyfish for another full day without mishap. When the winds picked up and the water became choppier, the group of translucent creatures broke up and drifted apart.
As soon as Saan saw clear passage through the waters, he called, “Set all sails! Let’s get some distance from those things.”