A Perverted Path to Victory

Tinvel

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Still laying on his belly, Tinvel shuffled through the soft sand in order to collect his journals. They were a varied bunch, with the oldest of them being made of thick, yellow parchment, the standard of Old Tulian, while the newest were shiningly white pieces of thin-pressed pulp. He grabbed the few he thought most relevant, then uncomfortably wiggled back to Chona.

She’d retreated into her tent under the Sunrise’s left wing by the time he’d gathered his supplies. She held the tent flap open for him with her tail as he squirmed to join her.

“So,” he began, flipping open to the early pages, “I think the first question we should ask is how possible it is for microscopic electrical pulses to exist. If you look here, under examples, all of Professor Brown’s electrical demonstrations involved currents powerful enough to be visible to the naked eye. Even the ‘static charge’ of rubbing wool against wool is visible if you look close enough.”

“It is?” Chona looked at her fingers. “I’ve got fur, Tinvel. I’ve been metal-stung way more times than you have, and I never noticed a light or anything.”

He shrugged. “I haven’t ever noticed anything either, but that’s what the Professor said.” He cocked his head. “Hey, since we now know lightning is the same phenomenon as stinging metal, have you tried using your Magesight to investigate smaller electric charges? What about those ‘batteries’ some of the mundane students at the University are working on? Do you think those would be a useful spell reagent?”

“Focus, Tin,” she admonished, tapping the page. “Microscopic shocks. Can they exist? If they can, are they able to set off emcotton rounds by interaction with its aura alone? We might have stumbled on something big here. I really doubt the Artificer’s Union is going to want enchanted guns going off anytime someone rubs their hands on their pants.”

“Right, right, sorry.”

Together, they delved into their respective notes. The depth of their references relative to the other was predictable. Chona had pages and pages of long, verbose descriptions, jotting out her thoughts in complete, elegant sentences. While her handwriting was atrocious, she didn’t seem capable of summarizing a single shred of her thoughts. Tinvel had noticed pretty much every full-blooded Mage took notes like that.

In comparison, Tinvel’s notes were more comprehensive, better structured, and less helpful to an uninformed reader by far. Bullet points ran up and down the pages, paragraphs were pushed to the side in little boxes, and colored lines connected thoughts which sprawled outward as the remaining room on a page was eaten away by palm-smeared sketches. There was far more raw information available, but only if it was being read by someone who thought and wrote exactly like Tinvel did. Anyone else would have been completely lost.

The night darkened as they traded sources back and forth. As the sounds of work faded outside, the many sailors dropping into tents and bedrolls, their voices dipped lower and lower, their heads coming closer and closer as they whispered ideas back and forth. A single light crystal balanced on a wing spar was all they had to read by, a three-foot circle that their hushed gestures cast bouncing shadows across.

When Tinvel began to blink back the crust in his eyes, the late hour finally struck him. Chona was speaking of her experience analyzing the magical energies of griffon feathers– they’d lost their original topic hours ago– but was frequently interrupting herself with a yawn. She was leaning hard against Tinvel’s shoulder, warm fur soft on his skin.

When did I stop freaking out at us being up close like this?

It had happened sometime in the last few weeks, but he couldn’t remember any specific moment. It had just happened. They’d slipped back into their comfortable old routine, bumping and brushing shoulders with all the friendliness of months before. Moreso, even.

So why can’t I stop being so nervous about getting even closer?

Tinvel watched Chona talk. Her fingernail was tracing lines on the sketch she’d made of the griffon feather, happily whispering about the arguments for or against the creature’s magic being soul-innate or a product of its body. Her tired smile was intimately familiar, a slight curl to her lips crinkling her brown eyes. While it was true that vanara faces weren’t as flexible as a human’s, Tinvel had abandoned the common claim that vanara were less expressive. After watching her so closely for so many hours, he’d learned Chona could show her every emotion with eyes and eyebrows alone. Considering her tail, which was more often used to emphatically flail alongside her many rants than for any kind of physical work, he could read her emotions better than he could any human. Most of the time.

…they had kissed eight times.

Tinvel knew the exact count. How could he not? Each one had sent his heart racing so fast it hurt, his body tingling from fingertip to toe with nervous energy. He hadn’t gotten used to it. He didn’t think Chona had, either. It had been weeks since their first kiss, but none of their repeats had managed to feel normal. It was always a delicate, hesitant thing, both of them glancing at each other’s eyes, down at their lips, then away again, slowly moving closer and closer, breathing a little bit harder with every closed inch, until suddenly one of them– almost always Chona, if he was honest with himself– would dart forward, pressing their lips together. It never lasted longer than a second or two.

Eight kisses had been enough for Tinvel to learn that he would really, really like a kiss to last longer.

“Hello? Command to Tinvel?”

He jerked, blinking his eyes rapidly. Chona was looking straight at him, a smirk on her face.

“Wandering off a bit there?” She asked.

“A bit,” he admitted, rubbing his eyes. “Sorry. What were you saying?”

“Nothing important, really. Just kinda talking.” She looked away. “It’s pretty nice, you know. To not be in the dorms.”

Tinvel snorted. “If you say so. Personally, I like having a real bed.”

Chona, still looking away, rolled her eyes. “I was talking about getting to stay up like this. Talking to each other.”

“Oh.” For some reason, Tinvel’s next swallow hurt his throat a little bit. “Yeah, I guess it is nice. Usually, we’re talking about some project or whatever, huh?”

“Yeah.”

From behind them, he heard Chona’s tail thump against the Sunrises’s lower wing. He turned onto his side slightly so he could glance back, and found it raised high, waving left to right, almost like a catfolk’s tail. Its furry tip was just barely brushing the plane’s underside. He turned back to Chona.

“I guess we could-”

Her hand found his jaw, pulling him toward her. Their lips met.

Tinvel’s heart leapt into his throat as he felt warmth press against his lips. He closed his eyes instinctively, like he always did, but opened them a moment later, expecting the kiss to break.

Instead, Chona leaned in. The pressure between them grew, and he heard her sigh through her nose.

Tinvel didn’t know what to do. He froze. He could send his plane through a spiraling death-dive with a griffon, but this was something he didn’t know how to do. His arms locked up, his shoulders raising defensively, even as his mind was swamped by just how nice Chona’s lips felt.

The hand on his jaw remained, gently keeping him framed in front of her face, but it was soon joined by a second hand, this one thrown over his shoulders.

Chona gently pushed down, forcing his shoulders to relax. That same arm then wrapped around his back, elbow bent over his collarbone, fingernails idly scratching at his upper back.

He melted into the kiss. Tension fled his body all at once, its flight heralded by a groan he couldn’t quite suppress.

Against his lips, he felt Chona smile.

She rolled into him, pressing their bodies together. He soon found himself on his back, Chona’s entire body laying atop him. She tilted her head to find a better angle for her kiss, the hand on his jaw moving up, into his hair, fingers running along his scalp in a way that made him shiver.

Tinvel only remembered that he had hands when the tip of Chona’s tail wrapped itself around his wrist, dragging his limp limb up into the air. She dropped it onto her back, just below the edge of her chest wrap.

Tinvel was overwhelmed. But he wasn’t stupid.

He lifted his other arm to join the first, squeezing her into a hug. His fingers dug into her fur, reaching the skin, nails scratching back and forth.

It was Chona’s turn to groan into his lips.

Oh, Tinvel thought, his head filling with a dizzy glee, no wonder she smiled.

They lay together like that for a time. All her body’s weight resting against him, one hand tangled in his hair, the other wrapped around his shoulders. His hands fell down to her waist, just the very tops of her hips, as if he were helping her keep her balance.

Eventually, maybe thirty seconds later, maybe a minute, Chona broke the kiss. He could feel their lips trying to stick together as she pulled back with a tiny pop.

He didn’t open his eyes right away. He wasn’t sure if he could, or even wanted to, as if the spell of the moment might be broken. In the silence beneath their plane, a part of him was already wondering if he’d done something wrong, if he’d not been active enough, if she shouldn’t have had to guide him into every touch and motion.

It was only when he felt her warm breath falling down onto his face that he finally dared to open his eyes.

A sloppy grin met his gaze. Chona was licking her lips, her pupils dark and wide as she gazed down on him. Her hand was still in his hair. He felt her grip tighten a touch when their eyes met.

They were both breathing hard. They both licked their lips again, staring at one another.

“I… liked that,” Tinvel managed. The air in the tent felt hot and stuffy. Hard to breathe.

“Yeah.” She twisted up a bit of his hair, wrapping it around one of her fingers. “That was… nice.”

His hands tightened slightly on her hips. “Was it… did I do alright?”

He knew Chona had kissed other people before. He didn’t remember how he knew that, just that he did. She’d probably used it to insult him long before they even considered each other friends.

Her smile grew. “It was a kiss, Tinvel. Just a little peck on the lips.”

“It didn’t feel like any of the other kisses, that’s for sure,” he chuckled. From where she rested on his chest, his laughter shook her body.

“No,” she agreed. She licked her lips yet again. “But it’s not the hardest way to kiss. You’re…” her voice cracked slightly. She cleared her throat. “You’re....” Her whispering grew even quieter, and she looked away as she spoke her next sentence. “You’re cute enough that you can’t really screw it up. I liked it, too.”

The rush in Tinvel’s head turned to a swirl.

She called me cute?

Chona had complimented him before. She’d called him smart, or clever, or had said he had a good idea. When they got in arguments with someone else she’d go even further, if only to insult her target by comparing them to him. But this was the first time he could remember that she’d complimented his appearance.

She called me cute.

With fingers tangled in his hair and her taste on his lips, she’d called him cute.

“I can…” Chona swallowed hard. “...teach you how to kiss the other way, too? Not that I’m very good, but…” He felt her tense up. “I’d like to.”

Tinvel almost wished she’d just kept going. He didn’t know what to say to that. But she was holding onto him tighter, now.

She’s nervous, too.

“Sure,” he said, trying to think of the right words to say. “Just be a bit nicer to me than you were to the rookies, yeah?”

“Okay. Okay.” She took a deep breath. “And, uh, just to let you know. I’ve never actually kissed a guy before.”

If Tinvel was supposed to respond to that, she didn’t give him a chance. She pushed up off the ground slightly, resting her arms into the sand on either side of his head, while her legs spread outward, so that…

So that…

So that the center of her hips came to rest against his waist.

Chona swooped down to swallow his hiss of surprise, head tilting to lock her lips against his. She rested all her weight on him, just barely supporting herself with her knees as both her hands crept up his head and into his hair, keeping his head pinned in place.

She pressed harder. Harder everywhere. He felt her smashing against his lips, hungry, needy. A tongue swiped against him, startling him, and she adjusted herself slightly, sliding back–

“O-oh!” She chirped, pulling her face just far enough away to speak. “Oh, yeah. I forgot. You’re a guy.” She lifted her hips slightly, slid backward, then sat back down. The pressure dragged an undignified noise out of Tinvel. She laughed quietly. “Sorry. I wasn’t thinking about, uh, that. So I guess just… let me know if it gets, um, uncomfortable?”

Her head moved forward, resuming the kiss long before Tinvel would have gathered the coherency to explain that Chona’s hips pressing against his crotch was very literally the farthest thing from uncomfortable he’d known in his entire life.

He was totally overwhelmed. As Chona’s tongue slipped up against his lips once more, pressing between, he felt her hips settle more and more firmly over his, shoving herself up against a part of his body that, the other times they’d kissed, he’d made an exceptional effort not to think about.

The hands cupping his head lifted him up slightly, pressing his face into hers. He could feel her thumbs tracing lines through the hair over his temples, not with any intent, but as if she wanted to make sure she memorized each part of him she could touch. When her tongue pressed more insistently against his lips, Tinvel finally opened his mouth, deepening the kiss.

Chona moved forward slowly, luxuriously, testing and teasing at the very front of his mouth. He tried to respond, tried to think of what other people had described when they talked about kissing, but he was too distracted.

Chona was, after all, wearing just her usual sarong.

He couldn’t believe how warm she felt. There was nothing between them save his cloth breaches and the thin whatever-it-was she kept hidden beneath that short little dress. The space between her legs was like a fire on a cool night, a rich heat radiating deeply into his body. She wasn’t moving an inch, completely still, but just the knowledge that she was sitting on top of him was scattering his thoughts in firework bursts. With every flick of her tongue, every caress of her hands, he had to fight the urge to writhe beneath her, some animal instinct he’d never known he had demanding that he add friction to the teasing, welcoming warmth.

If Chona thought little of his weak, distracted attempts at meeting her kiss, she didn’t show it. He could hear the little breaths she took through her nose coming faster and faster, rising with the intensity of the way she licked and lapped at him. Her tongue danced against his, darting forward and pulling back, running along his mouth every which way. He didn’t know if Chona could be considered a good kisser, or if it was even impossible to define such a thing, but he knew that he was loving every moment of it.

Slowly, steadily, as the daze of disbelief began to fade, he tried to return the favor. He met her kiss right back, moving his hands up from her hips and to her ribs, mindlessly rubbing up along her sides. She shivered under his touch, rewarding him with a nipping bite at his lower lip.

And still he could feel how warm she was. The sensation was an enchanting spiral, threatening to draw every last drop of his focus into a single point on his body. When she pulled back to gasp a quick breath, it had her adjusting her hips by just the slightest of degrees, a motion that had him failing to swallow a groan, turning the noise into a quiet growl in the back of his throat.

At that sound, Chona’s eyes opened even wider. Her purposefully cocky grin lost a bit of its bravado, replaced by an expression almost as headily-dazed as Tinvel felt.

“O-oh,” she whispered, fascinated, almost as if she were speaking to herself.

With two fistfuls of his hair, she dove back down, smashing her lips into his. Their teeth clacked painfully together, but she didn’t care, because her tongue was back in his mouth an instant later. Her chest was heaving, and she pulled Tinvel up even further, herself downward, until her breasts were pressing against his chest, her head tilted to help her hungrily devour his every breath.

Tinvel’s hands flew up to her shoulderblades, wrapping around her back, pulling her into a hug. He did everything he could to match her kiss, pressing back at her, drinking down the taste of her between his breathy inhalations.

Her patience was done. Chona’s tail slapped up onto Tinvel’s arm, fumbling against it for a moment until she managed to wrap the limb around his wrist. She all but shoved his hand around and forward, putting it on her breast.

Tinvel’s back turned into an arch. The padded softness of her chest rested against his hand, a hard little nub rubbing against the center of his palm. Driven by instinct and elation, he squeezed.

For the first time, Chona failed to bite back a groan.

Good fucking gods.

Like a man possessed, Tinvel kept pressing inward. Kneading, touching, pinching. He didn’t know what to do, not at first, but he could hear what made more of those little noises slip between his and Chona’s locked lips, and he knew he wanted more of that. More, more, more. His hand slipped low, abandoning her breast for exactly as long as it took for him to find the edge of her wrap, then slide up and beneath it.

Chona moaned as she felt his bare skin slide against her.

It was the most beautiful noise he’d ever heard.

Their kiss fell apart. It became sloppy and uncoordinated, a distant secondary concern to the way Tinvel was pawing at her chest, and the way that his attentions had her hips jerking against his, little spasms that she may or may not have been trying to stop.

It was so good. The world was a good place. With his girlfriend’s chest under his palm and her crotch over his waist, Tinvel found himself convinced the world was, if it allowed for all of this, the most beautiful gift the gods could ever have given mankind. Everyone who complained that the gods should be doing more to better mortal lives were just plain ignorant. Clearly they hadn’t felt a pretty girl grinding against their crotch. If they had, they would understand.

“Hey!” A gruff voice shouted. “Some folk might appreciate the shadow puppets, but I’m betting y’all will wanna cover up that light over there!”

Tinvel and Chona froze. Completely immobilized. At a torturous, glacial pace, he turned his head left.

Backlit by crystal light, his and Chona’s shadows were starkly outlined against the tarp. With all the sharp definition of a stained glass window, Tinvel could see his body, Chona crouched over him, his hand blatantly grabbing at her chest. Chona’s hands were cupping his head, and her tail, he only now noticed, was squeezing so tightly around one of his legs that it was starting to go numb. Their faces were pressed together, chests heaving hard.

Alerted to the spectacle, the laughter of sailors began to rise.

“Well I’ll be damned! Lookit that!”

“Been too fuckin’ long since we hit port…”

“He’s got a good grip on it, don’t he?”

“Let the girl breathe, boy!”

“She’s tryna take his fuckin’ leg home with her!”

Chona turned to look at him. The whites of her eyes were wide, wide, wide. She turned that gaze, slowly, toward the crystal.

Tinvel’s Magesight tingled. He braced himself.

With a sound like a cracking gunshot, the crystal detonated. A whuff was forced from his lungs as Chona shoved herself off him in the darkness, only for a new light to spark up — one that was orange and flickering.

“Chona!” He hissed, grabbing her leg.

“Lemme fucking go-!”

“Chona, please-!”

Like a rabid dog, she was crawling on all fours toward the edge of the tent, her hands wreathed in boiling flame. The laughter outside the tent turned to scattered yelps and shouts as the flame-lit wraith dragged its upper half into the open air. Tinvel dug his knees into the sand, trying to drag her away.

“Don’t start a fire Chona, please, please.”

“I’m gonna fucking kill them all-”

“No you’re not, no you’re not, come on, it’s fine, it’s fine, they’re just joking-”

“I’m gonna cauterize their fucking cunts inside out!”

In the distance, offered from the panting breath of a woman clearly running for dear life, came a cry of, “I’m sorry!”

Whether it was her better senses getting to her or the satisfaction of an entire ship’s worth of sailors scrambling in a panic to escape her wrath, the flames engulfing Chona’s hands began to fade. Tinvel had to use all his strength to drag her back beneath the Sunrise’s wing, her limbs digging trenches in the sand.

When she was finally back inside, Chona looked at him for the briefest of moments. Vanara couldn’t blush, but if they could, he felt certain she’d be the reddest person he’d ever seen. All at once, the anger seemed to flee her body. She dove head-first into her bedroll, grabbing her pillow and shoving it over her head.

“Oh my fucking gods,” she all but screamed.

“It’s oka-”

“No!” She snapped. “Nope! No, sorry Tin, but nope. Not okay. Absolutely not okay.” She shoved deeper into her bedroll. “Oh my gods. Fuckin’ Talavan wipe their minds, please, fucking hells. Oh my gods.”

“I’m just… uh…” He reached out, trying to pat her on the back.

Her tail whipped his hand aside. “Nope. Nope. Nope.” She curled up. “Time for bed, Tin. Time to go to sleep, and then we’re never talking about that again. Never ever ever.”

Maybe it was because he wanted her to feel better. Maybe it was because he was still drunk on endorphins. Or maybe what had just happened was responsible for the first flare of a confidence totally alien to Tinvel’s life up to that point. Whatever the reason for it, Tinvel didn’t leave without one last quiet comment.

“I don’t know if we’ll be talking about it,” he muttered, resting a hand on Chona’s leg, “but I promise you, I’m not gonna stop thinking about that kiss for a long, long time.”

The whine that was muffled by Chona’s bedroll could have meant a million things. She didn’t say anything else. Tinvel turned around and crawled back towards his side of their little shelter.

That night, Tinvel fell asleep with the world’s dumbest smile on his face.

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Chona

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She still wasn’t feeling right. She hadn’t been feeling right all night, and the morning hadn’t helped any. Even fifteen hundred feet over the ocean waves, keen eyes scanning the horizon line, Chona’s mind couldn’t quite escape the horror of the night prior.

When the sun rose and the camp came to life, no one had mentioned it. Not a single sailor, pilot, or officer. Absolutely everyone pretended that nothing had happened, almost as if Talavan really had answered her prayer to erase their memories of the whole affair.

She knew he hadn’t, though. She knew they were thinking about it. In some ways, that silence was worse. At least if they tried to joke about it, she could have retaliated.

Unfortunately, their desire to not get burned alive had kept their mouths sewn shut. Chona had stewed in awful silence, trying everything in her power to maintain a sense of decorum.

Whatever that meant at this point.

My boob hurts.

Tinvel had really made the most of that handful he’d grabbed. To be honest, Chona had enjoyed it, too. In the moment, complaining about a bit of rough handling had been the furthest thing from her mind. In hindsight, however, she was going to have to make sure that he took at least a slightly gentler approach next… time…

Next time?

She shouldn’t be so certain about there being a next time. The first time hadn’t gone so well. Sure, Tinvel’s lips had tasted like berries and got her drunk like wine, and sure, his fingers had felt like a fine ivory comb, sending shivers down her spine as they brushed through her fur, but that didn’t mean she’d already decided he was going to get a second chance. Just because she’d barely been able to control her hips from sliding down that bulge in his pants in a way that made them both gasp, and then she’d had to change her undergarments before going to bed didn’t… mean…

Chona sighed.

When’s the next time we’ll be alone? How hard is it to get a house in Tulian? There’s lots of empty ones, so it should be easy, right? But a bed is probably expensive…

“Any sightings?” Tinvel asked.

“No,” Chona reported. It was the truth. She hadn’t seen a damn thing.

She shook her head, trying to drag her head out of the clouds. An ironic thing to attempt at fifteen hundred meters.

“How’s the altimeter doing?” She asked. Maybe conversation, even conversation about Tinvel’s finicky artificery gadgets, would help her stay on task.

“Pretty consistent so far,” he said. “I still want to get Professor Garen to confirm our altitude readings, though. I’m not sure if we’ve got the gauge calibrated right for a given air pressure.”

“As long as it says zero when we’re at sea level, it should be fine, right?”

“Well, sort of,” Tinvel said, in that tone that said he had a lot more to say than she wanted to listen to. “It depends. We’re still not sure where the hypoxic ceiling is, and that’s something we need to make certain we’ve got figured out. It should be at three thousand meters, but I’m really not eager to get that high and see if we end up too air-sick to fly. But it’d be pretty ideal if we could have both an upper and lower bound, so I’ve been looking into making a limited-use form of compressed oxygen, but that all depends on whether or not I can get some of Professor Garen’s time to do the actual compression…”

Chona wasn’t sure if it had been a good idea to set Tinvel off on a rant, but it was at least keeping her thoughts away from less productive topics. The Tinvel in the tent last night and the Tinvel jabbering her ear off about pressures and valves hardly seemed like the same person. Or, at the very least, one was a lot more talkative than the other. Thankfully, his ranting helped keep her eyes open long enough to scan for their objective.

They were a half-hour into their flight, and only had about fifteen minutes left before they’d need to land on the open ocean and let their engine crystals feed off the central geode. Thankfully, it was a good day for flying a seaplane. They were weaving between light, fluffy clouds, mountains of floating water which were being pushed about by an uncommonly light breeze for the open ocean. The waves were more than smooth enough for an easy landing, even out of sight of land. The weak wind also meant that they’d taken their search pattern further north than planned, anticipating their rendezvous to not quite have made the distance originally estimated. Carrion Magecraft were fast, but even they relied on the wind to move.

Adjusting her flight goggles, Chona squinted at something in the distance. After briefly rubbing the glass with a handkerchief to confirm that she wasn’t staring at a speck of dust, she interrupted Tinvel’s impromptu lecture.

“Adjust your heading to about two o’clock, Tin. I think I see sails.”

“A trimarin hull?”

“Can’t tell from this far. It’s just a little dot.”

“Roger,” he said, swinging the Sunrise towards the indicated heading. Chona didn’t know where he’d picked up that phrase from. It had just become something he said while flying to acknowledge orders.

I’ll probably be saying it before too long, she thought with a sigh. It seemed like, no matter how hard she tried, Chona always ended up picking up Tinvel’s more obnoxious habits. She already knew far more about artificery than she’d ever intended to learn.

As the dot grew, Chona’s frayed attention span began to rebel once again. Those few minutes in the tent had been… unique. The girls in her village that she’d kissed weren’t anything like Tinvel, all soft and squishy and pliable under her. Tinvel’s lips had been rough. Firm. He’d kissed back in a way that no one else had.

That kind of attitude had done something for Chona. The two other girls she’d kissed had been fun, enjoyable, but they hadn’t stirred up half the heat she’d felt last night. She wasn’t sure why. She wanted to say that it had been the… stiffness… that she’d felt between her thighs, but she couldn’t even chalk it up to that. She’d had a knee up in there more than once, and she’d felt a lot better grinding on that than she had on Tinvel’s… yeah.

Even so, those hidden evenings out behind village barns had never left her feeling so hungry. That was the only word she could use to describe it: hunger. An ache deep in her gut, a craving for something more. She’d liked the idea of ‘more’ before, true, but she’d never wanted it like that. Never needed it like that.

It’s still the second month of the year, right? She asked herself, suddenly doubtful. If the first day of the third month had passed her by without realizing, that might explain something, but… No. She knew the date. Up north, it was still solidly in the middle of winter. Nowhere near spring. She really didn’t have the slightest excuse.

“How about now?” Tinvel asked.

Her head snapped up. “Huh?”

“The ship. Is it a Carrion Magecraft?”

Chona had to spend an embarrassing moment reacquainting herself with their surroundings, searching out the little dot she’d spotted before.

It wasn’t so little anymore. Now she could see the tall, proud sail sprouting from the center of its deck, a slice of handsome cloth that drove the ship over the seas. Though it was still blurry, after a moment of study, she could make out three distinct pieces. A large, central hull, one that barely grazed the waves, supported on either side by long poles. On either side of the ship, stabilizing floats bounced over the whitecaps.

“Yeah, that’s it,” Chona announced. “Want me to call in?”

“Go for it.”

Fishing the communication crystal out of her pocket, Chona cupped it to her mouth to muffle the wind noise. “TCA req 1.” She quickly switched the crystal to her ear.

“Command to TCA. Go ahead.”

Must not be a busy morning. She took a breath.

“TCA reporting contact spotted. We’ll be landing as planned in the next five minutes. If any orders are to be amended, now would be the time. Message over.”

“Command has good copy. At this time no order alterations have been put in for you. Message over.”

Chona was relieved. As great as it was, pilots and soldiers being in constant contact with their commanding officers could make for some complicated days.

They leisurely spiraled down on the Carrion Magecraft from fifteen hundred meters, with Tinvel leaving the engine on its ground-taxiing speed, so that they were more a glider than a proper warplane. Chona leaned her head out into the windstream, keeping an eye on the foreign ship.

As the details firmed themselves, Chona was struck by how unbelievably crowded the Carrion ship’s deck seemed. Compared to Tulian ships, even those stolen off Sporatos, it was teeming with shimmering, shifting silvery dots. Most didn’t seem to be doing any work in particular, sitting or standing in clumped groups, often claiming the portions of the deck which their more active comrades avoided. The ship itself, though recognizably a Skimmer, was also notably larger than she’d been told to expect of the same sort of Sporaton Magecraft. Looking over Tinvel’s shoulder to check their altitude, then doing a bit of math in her head to compare sizes, she thought it was an additional third larger than the Sporaton equivalent she’d been trained to recognize. Its sail seemed even more offsized, perhaps twice as large as she’d expected, almost as large as the great sheets which hung off the Waverake’s mainmast.

I guess it is the Carrion Navy. What else did I expect?

No matter how “simple” their task for the day was, Chona couldn’t shake the nerves that came with flying up to and landing next to a Carrion Magecraft. Chona was used to being the best mage around, save for Professor Garen. She didn’t know what kind of mage would be aboard a Carrion diplomat’s Magecraft, but the thing was a Skimmer— a fighter. Whoever it was, whatever they were capable of, it was a given that they could rip Chona to shreds. As Professor Garen had constantly warned her, she was a big fish in Tulian’s very small pond.

Not that another thirty years of practice would change much.

As the Sunrise swept past the deck of the Magecraft at sail-height, Chona got an eyeful of the sailors on deck. Every single one of them, even the ones crawling up the masts and dangling from the ropes, wore armor and carried a sword. In the flash of a passing moment, she made eye contact with someone swinging their boots off the end of the sail’s wooden spar. That blurry face belonged to someone who was the peer of any Sporaton Knight. Maybe even their superior. The legends of the Carrion Navy were as vast as the territories their ships crossed. If a fraction’s fraction of those stories were true, Chona wouldn’t be protecting Tinvel here. They’d both be at the mercy of their host.

The reaction of the sailors to the sight of their first flying machine helped reassure her a bit. Most people from Tulian reacted to the sight of an aeroplane with loud cheering and jubilation, while those few unfamiliar ships they’d buzzed tended to either attempt to flee or, more rarely, toss arrows up at them. The Carrion reaction was a first for her: applause. She caught a brief glimpse of every man and woman aboard the ship clapping their hands in approval as the Sunrise darted past, as if they were watching the end of a well-performed play. She didn’t know what they meant by it, and she only caught the slightest glimpse of it.

Sea salt sprayed Chona as the Sunrise clipped the first wavetop, bouncing them back into the air. She leant back into her seat as they skidded to a splashing stop, taking deep, calming breaths.

“Alright.” Tinvel’s voice was strained as he bent to begin shutting down the Sunrise’s engine. “You’ve kept the heading consistent, right?”

Her eyes popped open. “That was supposed to be your job!”

“I know, and I did it, but I was hoping you’d kept an eye on it, too. Better safe than sorry, right?”

“Oh, I swear to the gods, Tin,” she growled. “Don’t scare me like that. No, I didn’t keep track of the heading.”

“Sorry,” he said in a very unapologetic tone. “I was just trying to reassure myself. I’m nervous about this.”

“Don’t be. We’re just here to show off Tulian’s fancy new toy, give them some directions, then head home. Easy as could be.”

“Easy,” he scoffed. “Sure. I’m sure lots of artificers have been allowed to see a Carrion Magecraft up close and left with their skull in one piece. Happens all the time.”

“Do they even know you’re an artificer?”

“Maybe?” He sat back up, unraveling his bedroll from beneath his seat. He tossed it over the Sunrise’s flight controls and instrument panel. “You got the same orders I did. Find the ship, point it towards the Tulian fleet, then make sure we don’t embarrass ourselves when we take off. Not much more to it than that.”

“Guess they didn’t want to give that much detail over the crystal network.”

“If that was their concern, they should have thought twice about giving us last-minute orders like this. They’re lucky I haven’t taken up half the network’s time asking Voth questions.”

Chona snorted in amusement, then reached down under her own seat, taking out her bedroll and using it to cover up the secondary controls that sat between her legs. A Tulian backseater hadn’t yet had a need to take control of the plane from their pilot, and the rear setup was accordingly less complicated, but she and Tinvel had both been in agreement: the less they allowed the Carrions to see of the Sunrise, the better. There was no way to hide the wings, tail, or propeller, the most important part of the plane’s functioning, but in the absence of clearer orders, they’d do what they could.

“How close are they?” Tinvel asked.

“Let me see. Looks like they’re about- Gods!”

Chona turned around just as the shadow of the Magecraft’s sail fell over the Sunrise, its bow breaking water no more than a hundred feet away. Anchor ropes had been tossed over the side already, yet Chona hadn’t heard a thing. The thick cords were slipping over their brass fittings in perfect, enchanted silence.

“What do you mean? Are they- Shit!” Tinvel jumped hard enough in his chair that Chona felt the bounce through the Sunrise’s frame. “We landed a quarter mile out! They have to be going, what, twenty knots?”

“Faster.”

A figure sprouted above the Magecraft’s shining bronze-capped bow, their hat held in one waving hand. “Ho, there! I’ve a suspicion you’re the Tulian vessel ‘Sunrise’, yes?”

“That would be us, yes!” Tinvel yelled. He had to twist uncomfortably in his seat to face the oncoming ship. “And you are the Carrion Magecraft Sovereign Oak?”

“The first and only!” The man called back, chipper as could be. He placed his hat back on his head. “Allow me the honor of sending a boat across to have you ferried aboard, Captain! Unless your vessel can conduct itself as adroitly upon the waves as it does in the skies?”

“A boat would be much appreciated!” Tinvel called back. She saw him shrink back as he watched the Magecraft loom closer. Under his breath, he added, “and a fuckin’ course change.”

The man at the prow made a sharp gesture as soon as Tinvel had accepted their offer, calling out orders in the Carrion language. The ship was so close by then that Chona could hear the thumping of boots as sailors reacted. It was still skimming across the waves, its sail somehow filled to bursting by the day’s dreary wind.

“Holy shit,” she breathed, “they’re gonna cut us in half!”

With a curse, Tinvel started to reach under his bedroll, trying to restart the engine. Chona knew it was too late, though. They were seconds away from a collision.

Apropos of nothing, the Magecraft abruptly stopped.

That was it.

It just stopped.

There was no rush of wind or ripple to the water. The anchor ropes didn’t suddenly pull taut, jerking the ship to a halt. With its sail still spread wide, its crew idling in the wooden spars, the ship unceremoniously ceased all forward movement. No one aboard reacted, not by bracing beforehand or stumbling afterward, and not even the ocean seemed aware of what had just happened. The bow wave that had been pushed before the ship fell lamely flat instead of rolling onward, leaving the Sunrise bobbing as contentedly as if there hadn’t been a multi-hundred-ton warship plowing through the waves a few dozen feet away.

“What in the hells…?” Tinvel muttered, mouth agape.

“I need to learn that spell,” she whispered.

“Was that even a spell? I didn’t feel anything get cast.”

“Neither did I.”

Just as abruptly as the ship’s halting, their interest was stolen by the boat appearing at the Magecraft’s railing. The thing was… obscene. Its prow was covered in leafing of bronze and gold intertwined, each twisting around the other as they alternated between making the symbols of Daylagon and Anatol, joining at the little ship’s front in an obscenely gaudy figurehead. Anatol, god of the skies and storms, was seated upon a bronze cloud, itself supported by the rising head of a golden serpent. The creature’s eyes were sapphires carved into the many-pointed star often used to represent Daylagon, like the god himself was staring out of the beast’s eyes. Not to be outdone, a crimson ruby glowed deep within the bronze cloud of Anatol, an etched gemstone twice the size of an eye.

Chona would guess that, if the materials used were genuine, that one boat probably cost more than all of Tulian’s aeroplanes combined.

The two sailors who were carrying the boat heaved it over the side without concern, letting it drop into the water with a great splash. They jumped in after it, beginning to row their way over to the Sunrise.

“Would it serve you best to have your craft lashed to us, sir and madam?" The same voice from before spoke. “Or would you prefer that my crew allow it to drift?”

“It shouldn’t cause it any harm to drift for a moment,” Tinvel called back. “But if the wind rises too much, we’ll want to be back aboard very quickly.”

“Of course! I’ll have rowers stand ready!”

Orders followed in the Carrion language, and a moment later, Chona had to bite back an incredulous laugh.

A second boat, as thickly ornamented as the first, splashed to the water. This time four rowers hopped in and took up positions, apparently standing ready to rush Tinvel and Chona back to the Sunrise if it became necessary.

Chona and Tinvel carefully unstrapped themselves from their seats, balancing carefully as they crawled out to stand on the Sunrise’s thin, rocking pontoons. Chona kept her tail around a pylon and hand near Tinvel’s back, ready to snag him if he fell.

It wasn’t necessary, thankfully. The Carrion rowers floated their boat close enough to the aeroplane that they didn’t even have to jump in order to board. Chona had to bite back another laugh when she saw that the seats were padded. Unable to resist the urge, she ran her hand along the purple cushion.

It’s silk. Gods above.

The passage back to the Magecraft took all of ten seconds. Though it wasn’t a tall enough ship to necessitate it, an entire rope ladder was nonetheless lowered on the Magecraft’s hull in order to help them board. Chona was about to jump across when Tinvel’s hand suddenly slapped into her stomach, pushing her back.

She looked up. The same man from before was standing near the railing, flanked on either side by two Carrion Marines. The elderly human man had a sun-crinkled smile beneath bushy white eyebrows and a thick mustache. He was dressed in a strange sort of black leather coat, one which drooped all the way to his ankles, but was kept open all the way from top to bottom. He wore a royal-blue officer’s uniform of a sharp, well-fit style, one that Chona instantly recognized must have been the inspiration for the Tulian Navy’s own dress uniform. Unlike any Tulian officer, however, the man’s chest glittered with gold buttons and shining threads, while his waist was wrapped in a thick, scaled-leather belt. Chona didn’t know what sort of animal had been killed for the thing, but it had once boasted scales at least three inches wide, growing maybe a quarter-inch thick. The man’s boots, meanwhile, were made of such unremarkably brown leather that Chona could only assume she wasn’t educated enough to understand what made them as special as the rest of his outfit.

The Marines at his side wore armor which visibly glowed with enchantments of a dizzying variety. They were tall and unflinching, their faces hidden behind an expressionless helmet, atop which sprouted the famous feathered brush of the Carrion Marines.

They held blacksteel spears. Not blacksteel-tipped spears. Just… blacksteel. Seven long feet of it.

The well-dressed man, noticing the way Tinvel had stopped Chona, nodded to him expectantly.

Straightening himself up, Tinvel asked in his most formal voice, “May we have your permission to come aboard, Captain?”

“Permission granted,” he replied, a smile spreading under his bushy mustache. “But if you’ll forgive me the vanity, I might inform you that my proper name and title is Admiral Whistling Ash.”

Oh, holy fuck.

Chona felt her knees get weak. A Carrion Admiral. A Carrion Admiral. That was… that was like a Duke, wasn’t it? No, more than that. The Carrion Admirals ruled the Carrion Navy. To be an Admiral in the Carrion Navy meant you were elected to your position by dozens of Magecraft Captains. This man had to have the direct electoral support of… Chona didn’t even know. A tenth of the entire Carrion Navy? She thought there were ten or so Admirals, but she might be wrong. She remembered something vague about the number changing from time to time, but she wasn’t sure.

It didn’t matter. The only person in a thousand miles who represented more power than the old man in front of her was the King of Sporatos, and even then, that might be doubtful. A High Admiral could call down a hundred Magecraft at a whisper, enough to devastate any coastal city in existence. If this man snapped his fingers, Tulian would be ashes within a week. To attack a single, lonely city-state, he probably wouldn’t even be required to consult the other Admirals beforehand.

Everything about the day had just changed. Chona had to look at everything around her in a different light. She wasn’t meeting a Magecraft captain, she was meeting a Carrion fucking Admiral. This wasn’t some casual little showing of Tulian aeroplanes to a minor diplomat. Without knowing it, she and Tinvel had been put in charge of representing the third and newest branch of the Tulian Military to the single most important person they’d ever meet— save for the Governess.

Ah, fuck! Chona’s heart was pounding. Fuck, fuck, FUCK! This is all politics, isn’t it? Shit, which Hell did I just walk into?

Chona wished she had a mirror to see how her own expression was doing. She watched Tinvel’s eyes widen in shock, his posture faltering, only for a bit of a spine to grow back up again, returning him to something barely more appropriate for a supposed military officer. She couldn’t tell how well she was faring, but she already suspected Tinvel was doing a better job than her. Her first instinct had been to leap into the boat and paddle back to the Sunrise.

“An… Admiral?” Tinvel spoke slowly and thickly, like a man trying to chew his way through speaking in the moments after taking a blow to the head. “We were… not… informed of…” He visibly swallowed, then straightened a little bit further. “I am Commander Tinvel of the Tulian Air Force. This is Chona, Mage-Commander of the Tulian Air Force. We are both ranking Pilots within the Air Force, but…”

Chona could see the uncertainty playing out on his face. What to say, what not to say, and how much to give away? Whatever either of them blurted out right now, even if it was an outright lie, would tell these people more than they wanted. The elderly Carrion Admiral would read two 19-year-olds like an open book. Chona was real, real glad that she hadn’t been the one to open her mouth first.

Tinvel made his decision.

“Though we appreciate the honor of your earlier form of address, Admiral Whistling Ash, I will also offer a humble clarification. We are not equal in rank to that of a Carrion Captain. Within the Tulian Military, the piloting of an aeroplane is not considered equivalent to the captaining of a ship. Our ranks might be best compared to…” Tinvel’s eyes searched until they landed on the Carrion Marines. “One of your Marine Maggiore,” he said, surprising Chona with the fluency that the foreign title slipped from him. “Much as a Maggiore might usually be in charge of only those on the ship they serve until it is time for larger forces to gather, Air Force Commanders are battlefield commanders who are in charge of the local forces— however large or small they may be. Theoretically, as we are the only ranking Commanders in the Air Force, we would command the entire Air Force were it to gather in one place, but that is unlikely. Even then, we are still beholden to General of the Air Voth, who is the ultimate authority in the Tulian Air Force.”

The old Carrion Admiral’s eyes twinkled, a smile crinkling his cracked face.

“Your clarification is understood and welcomed, Commander Tinvel. However, I would not worry yourself about further explanations; your Governess and her Steward explained much the same in the correspondence which led to this meeting. I’ve been looking forward to meeting the inventors of the aeroplane even more than I have been a demonstration of the mythical craft’s capabilities. ”

Heat, an indignant, burning rage, rushed up to Chona’s skull. They knew?

“You’re fucking kidding me-!”

She slapped both hands over her mouth, horrified.

The Admiral bent backward as he laughed, holding his stomach. “Oh, the temerity of youth! I’d been warned that the Champion of Amarat has encouraged an incorrigible familiarity amongst her military’s officers. It is good to see my sources proving their worth!”

Throwing a bucket of icewater over her frustration with- with- with fucking everything about what was happening right now, Chona dropped her hands back to her waist and bowed lightly.

“I apologize, sir, ah, Admiral Whistling Ash,” she said, licking her lips. “I was taken by a, um, slight bit of shock regarding the…” she tried to match Tinvel’s suddenly-formal air. “Regarding the entirety of these circumstances, I suppose.”

The great leather cloak wrapping Admiral Whistling Ash made a swooshing noise as his hand came up to make a reassuring gesture.

“Think nothing of it, Madam Mage. Though those stuck upon the land oft assume otherwise, we Carrions are not so obsessed with station and status as their Kingdoms and Empires. I was born a weaver’s son, and I lived such a life until my twentieth year, when luck found me placed aboard my first ship.” His smile seemed so genuine. Nothing like the politician or general Chona would have expected him to act like. “As a matter of fact, I believe that means I’ve spent more years living the life of a commoner than you yet have, no?”

Tinvel made a choking noise. “She- the Governess- told you that much of us? Our ages and upbringings?”

“She did,” the Admiral confirmed. “And much more besides. Nearly all positive things, I assure you, and what little criticism she offered was delivered muffled by a silken blanket.” He chuckled. “It seems you two have caught something even more valuable than the eye of your people’s Governess: the fondness of her wife?”

For a moment, Chona’s mind whirled. She had met Steward Evie on very few occasions, and when she had, there was nothing in that woman’s gaze save cold calculation. Then her mind went further back. To the days before the Sporaton War, when she and Tinvel had been little more than bickering students. When one woman had frequently dropped by the university to teach all that she knew, offering gruff advice and providing them all with tools of extraordinary quality.

“...Hurlish?” She asked wonderingly.

“Indeed,” Admiral Whistling Ash nodded. “The woman insisted on penning a single letter herself, without allowing her wives to so much as censor a drop of ink. It was…” he coughed. “Brusque. But informative. I believe the Great Gunsmith said that if you two were ever to put aside your differences, you would accomplish shocking things.” Admiral Whistling Ash turned his attention to the Sunrise, its lone red wing reflecting strangely on the crystal colors of the Deepwaters, then back to Chona and Tinvel. “That was her word, verbatim. ‘Shocking’ things. At the time, word of your aeroplanes had not yet reached my ears, and I was concerned by her intent. Now that I have seen the fabled Flying Ship for myself?” His grin, just by the tiniest fraction, fell. His next words rumbled out of his chest, amused and disconcerted both. “Well. She was right. Shocking indeed.”

So many questions rose to Chona’s tongue that they ended up jamming at the exit of her mouth, pushing and shoving as they tried to burst into the open air. How long had the Governess and her wives been in contact with this Admiral? How long had they planned to send Tinvel and Chona to meet him? Was Voth aware? Why didn’t they give them these orders weeks ago so that they could prepare? How many Vanara had Whistling Ash met— enough to know she was practically nude right now? What was the purpose of keeping her and Tinvel in the dark? Who was he, that Sara trusted him with this information, and what was a Carrion Admiral going to do when he reached Tulian?

The only thing that became clear to her was why the entire Tulian Navy had sallied out to escort in a single diplomat’s ship. Chona had assumed it was more a training exercise than anything else, but obviously not. With hundreds of cannon-armed ships soon to surround the Admiral, he was about to be benefitting from quite possibly the most powerful honorguard to have ever existed.

But why? Who would attack a Carrion Admiral, and who could actually manage to succeed at it? Only another Carrion Admiral, right? Is a civil war brewing? Or is this just a political statement about growing Tulian naval power, or just something that navy types consider polite?

She looked around the ship with new interest, eyes darting from place to place, trying to drink in everything she could. The first thing she noticed was that the Carrion armor worn by all aboard was attached by leather straps, but rather than being tied into the armor, they hooked into the quick-release buckles Professor Brown had developed for aircraft seatbelts. None of these sailors would be dragged to their watery grave by weight of armor. Several of the Marine officers, distinguished by their feathered plumes, wore crylock pistols at their belt, which Chona instantly recognized as being of Tulian make, if only because they weren’t pieces of shit like every other attempt at foreign gunsmithing she’d seen. A number of Marines, maybe more than half, had swords with familiar stamps placed at the base of their blades, the mark of Tulian-exported weapons which used industrial processes to outperform any common blacksmith’s efforts at a fraction of the price.

The flagship and crew of a Carrion Admiral was covered in Tulian products. Practically drowning beneath them. Admiral Whistling Ash had spent a small fortune on Tulian equipment to decorate his personal flagship.

This wasn’t some simple trade meeting. The Carrions didn’t send Admirals to trade meetings. Hells, they didn’t send Admirals to war meetings. That was for intermediaries to deal with, crystal communications providing the safety of vast distance.

So what the hell had Sara gotten them involved with?

“If I may ask a question, Admiral?” Tinvel inquired, nodding his head. He’d clearly been captivated by something else than Chona.

“Oh, of course,” the man said, rolling up his sleeves. “I believe we both have much reason to be inquisitive about today’s events. I wouldn’t ask without expecting questions in turn.”

“Of course,” Tinvel said, as if that was obvious to him, which it definitely wasn’t. “I was just curious. You referred to Hurlish as the ‘Great Gunsmith,’ did you not? Is that a title that’s… common for her? Well-known?”

For the first time in their meeting, the Admiral seemed to not expect the question. He took a moment before answering.

“To a limited degree, yes, it is an appellation applied to Hurlish of Tulian. It first began among those who have personally viewed the weapons she creates. And it has become exceptionally common among those few who have seen her weapons fired.”

“I see,” Tinvel said, like that meant something to him. He took a step back. They still hadn’t left the side of the Magecraft. “I apologize for my oddity, it’s just that… I am aware of how few foreign artificers have survived touching the deck of a Carrion Magecraft. Until you explained that you knew who I was, I didn’t intend to reveal my chosen trade at all. Now that it is known, I wish to tread as lightly as possible.”

The sparkle in the Admiral’s eyes shifted, growing brighter. “A clever one you are, indeed. I was warned of that.”

By who? Chona silently asked. Sara, Hurlish, or your spies? Then, her mind shifted gears. Wait. Did he just get complimented by a Carrion Admiral?

Tinvel shook his head. “Not clever, sir. Just keenly aware of my mortality.”

“Ha!” The Admiral let out another of his many laughs. “You would be surprised how rare such a trait is amongst those your age, Commander Tinvel. Is that not right, Fallen Wave?”

The Admiral’s knuckles thumped companionably into the Marine guard to his right side, but where there should have been the clank of metal, there was only rustling. His fingers sunk through solid steel by several inches, disturbing its surface like water. An illusion.

The figure sighed tiredly. The steel shell of armor began to slip from their body like fresh paint in a rainstorm, colors mixing into nothingness at their feet.

What emerged was a woman in the unmistakable garb of a mage. She wore robes of such a deep, rich blue that Chona felt certain even the cost of the dye would have struck her silent, much less the rest of the garment. Her entire form was wrapped in wards, enchantments, and the shimmering haze of so many spells that they hung thickly in the air. Chona’s nose was first filled with the scent of an impending storm, then drowned by sea salt, then the ashes of a fire. The fur on half her body stood on end, but not the right or left half. A dividing line at some thirty degrees of rotation prickled so heavily the itching almost hurt, then fell back down without warning.

An archmage.

Chona reacted without thought. She peered through her Magesight.

It was a mistake. Not because of the archmage, no.

Because she was on a Carrion Magecraft.

The two wooden planks supporting her feet held more desires between them than a thousand yards of the open ocean. Scattered whispers of what they were and wanted rippled up her feet, calves, and thighs, leaping high off her skin to find the momentum with which they plunged deeply into her exposed gut.

They want to stand. They want to hold. They were built to become more, and they have been growing, growing, growing, but they aren’t satisfied. They won’t ever be. They’re proud of that. They are that which moves and carries, who lighten the burden and shield their crew. They seek the challenge of flame and lightning, scoff at the scraping of ice, and yearn to repel the fetid waves which so rarely dare to slosh across their form. They welcome the nails in their skin with the devotion of loving mothers, rejoicing in the iron binding to the motion of their fellows who hold strong all around them. The bliss of an endless, singing harmony, a thousand-thousand less-than-souls joined to a single, endless purpose.

They want to show her more. They want to drag her into them, to have her sink to her knees and press her cheek to the deck, so she may show them all they are. Won’t she come see? It has been so long since they were spun by hands such as her, and they have so much they all are, and they are all different, have become so much more, and they want her to know. They want to show her how pleased she should be for their work. They can tell her the whispers of the fingers which carved them, the sweat which sunk into their fibers. Won’t she add to their chorus? Won’t she come and witness the labors of their kin?

Reality returned with a painful pop! at Chona’s jaw, jerking her drooping head upward. A finger lay beneath her furred chin, long and pointed, the archmage holding her face level so that she could look into Chona’s eyes.

“You,” the archmage announced, “would have made a fine hunter of Sirens.”

A wisp of smoke drifted up between Chona’s eyes, drifting away. The numbness of electric shock still reverberated in her jaw. She stumbled back, trying to open her mouth, but all that resulted from the motion was pain spearing her from temple to temple.

Two planks.

That’s all they’d been.

Two wooden planks.

“H-how?” Chona managed to ask. “I didn’t do… much…”

“You touched our ship’s soul without falling. You show promise. After a few years of training, I would have placed you at the forefront of a Magecraft during the Purges. Oh, if we were still in the days of impressment, I would have—”

“Archmage!” The Admiral barked. “You will moderate your words, else I’ll have you put on report. Am I understood?”

The woman blinked. Slowly, her features began to filter into Chona’s awareness, the disconnect between eye and mind resolving itself. She had white hair, dreadfully pale skin, irises tinged lightly pink, and pointed ears.

Pointed?

“I understand, Admiral. I apologize.” She waved a hand, and the pain in Chona’s head vanished. The Archmage smiled at her. “I see that The Tiger of Salacia has found himself capable students, even in his isolation. It is good to see. Tell him that I wish him luck.”

Chona’s mouth was dry as she nodded.

“And I apologize as well,” Admiral Whistling Ash said. “It has been too long since I’ve allowed those with Talavan’s Gift to come aboard a Magecraft. I should have prepared you.”

“Tin,” Chona said, grabbing hold of his sleeve. “Don’t. Don’t look at it, okay?”

He started. “I wasn’t going to-”

“Just don’t. Not right now, okay?”

He looked at her, concerned. “Alright. I won’t. Are you okay?”

“Yes. Just… overwhelmed.” She looked at the Admiral. “How many people made this ship?”

“Counting only those with the Gift, several hundred, Madam Mage. It was a personal project of mine and Archmage Fallen Wave for several years.” He gave a deep, tired sigh. “Completed less than a year ago, in fact. Right as your people’s Waverake was nearing completion. A bitter irony.” He shook himself, straightening. “Once again, I apologize for my lapse. Shall we continue our discussion elsewhere? Room below is dreadfully sparse, but I can have comforts brought above deck.”

Tinvel perked up. “Absolutely! We’d love to-”

He stopped, glancing at Chona from the corner of his eyes. The archmage had swatted away her pain, but some part of her still felt a touch ill.

Tinvel’s expression shifted. “Actually, I have a better idea. Would you like to see the Sunrise in flight? We can begin showing you the heading to our fleet, and you can get a sense of what we can really do.”

The gray-haired Admiral had a remarkably childish expression on his face at hearing the offer.

“A proper demonstration, you say? To see what your craft can do when it really has the wind in its sails?”

Tinvel grinned. “We make our own wind, Admiral. But yes, something like that. I’ve also been rather curious to see how our ship might perform against a Magecraft, seeing as we’re likely to face a Sporaton one in the coming days. Do you think you could have your crew watch us do a few mock attack runs, and ask them afterwards to report how effectively they think they could defend the ship from us? Not, of course, the Archmage,” Tinvel added with a chuckle. “I’m pretty sure she could deal with us well enough. I’m more interested in arrows and javelins sent skyward by Irregulars.”

“A joint military exercise, then,” the Admiral said, rubbing his jaw thoughtfully. “It is not without its political implications, you know. A Carrion Admiral and two Commanders of the Tulian Air Force training together presents a certain message to the wider world, as I’m sure you can imagine.”

“I’ll leave that angle of the decision to your expertise, Admiral.”

Barely a second passed before the Admiral spat out a dismissive “Bah!” and waved them on. “If my fellows don’t like it, I’ll ask yourselves and the crew to keep quiet about it. I see no harm in it, and I’m more than eager to see such a magnificent work of artificery in action. I will brief my crew while you prepare to…” He pursed his lips, looking amused. “...set sail? That’s not quite right, is it? How do you refer to the lifting of your vessel, this aeroplane?”

“Simply enough, Admiral. We call it ‘taking off.’ That’s all.”

“Then I look forward to seeing the Sunrise taking off, Commander Tinvel.” He nodded respectfully at Tinvel, then turned to Chona. “And to seeing your work as well, Commander Chona. You’ve impressed an Archmage today; that such a mage lives in Tulian will be something I tell many others.”

“There’s no need for that,” Chona said weakly. “I didn’t achieve much at all. Just-”

“Respectfully, Madam Mage, I trust Archmage Fallen Wave’s appraisal of your skill even more than your own. Now!” He turned and began speaking loudly in the Carrion language, causing his sailors to stir. She saw many of them taking out and stringing bows, others running below to grab barrels full of javelins.

While the deck burst into motion, she and Tinvel took to the Carrion boat waiting for them. As she settled onto the silken seats, Tinvel beside her, she let her weight fall onto his shoulder.

“Thank you,” she murmured.

“You’re welcome,” he whispered back. “Promise to explain, later?”

“Yeah.”

Despite the warm air, Chona shivered.

For months now, she’d known that they were in over their heads. Professor Garen had told her that over and over and over.

It had taken two planks of a Carrion Magecraft to actually convince her of it.

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