Salay broke through the Dougs and gestured to the rope and the barrel of water. “We got it, Tress. What now?”
“Tie one rope to the barrel,” Tress said, “and lower it carefully over the side to the spores.” She took a deep breath. “Then tie the other rope around me and do the same.”
Everyone in the group turned, pointedly, and stared at her.
Then Salay barked orders, and the crew saw it done. Ann personally lowered the barrel, while Fort and a few Dougs gingerly lowered Tress. She touched down, feeling again the soft scrunch of spores beneath her feet. Being so close to the Crimson, she felt as if she’d stumbled upon some mythological land where the ground had somehow rusted and the sky looked a strange cast of blue by contrast.
Spores ground against wood in a familiar sound as the barrel touched down beside her. Ann waved from above, and dozens of eyes followed Tress as she untied the barrel and rolled it up next to the hull of the ship.
Then she pried off the top—her hands trembling—and stared at the dark water. What she was about to do went against everything she’d ever been told.
“The rain is almost here, Tress!” Salay shouted from above. “Oh, moons. It’s coming!”
Tress could hear the crunching and clattering of the crimson spores as they grew in a frenzy. Like thousands of raised spears. Trembling, she reached into the pocket of her red coat and removed a spike, tipped with silver. With her other hand, she held the roseite cannonball.
Grab hold, she thought. Just grab. Don’t destroy the barrel. Out, then grab.
With the spike, she drilled a hole into the top of the sphere, revealing the green spores within. Then she dropped it into the barrel.
Vines exploded forth, thick as arms, spiraling around one another. A small charge of verdant could create enough vines to entangle a person—and she’d packed this with many, many times that. Tentacles surged out of the barrel and slammed against the ship. Drinking eagerly of the water, the vines continued to grow, thicker, stronger.
The twisting, fulminating mass shoved the Crow’s Song, tipping it and causing the crew to shout. Tress initially backed away, but no. No, she’d made this. She couldn’t run from it. She was part of it.
She pressed both hands against the still-growing vines, feeling the taut verdant—like sinew—undulate beneath her fingers. Up, she thought. Please, PLEASE.
UP.
The ship rocked further. Then it began to rise into the air. The mass of verdant vines reoriented and lifted, like a many-fingered hand. Without the seethe, the ocean surface was a sturdy enough footing, so long as the vines—having fully burst from the barrel—spread out.
The rising motion caught Tress, who was still tied around the chest by the rope. She spared a moment to hope that Fort wouldn’t let go of her, but kept most of her attention on the growing vines. For she could hear the rain getting closer, announcing itself with the sound of water pelting something hard: the snarls of crimson spines they created, then bathed.
I’ve talked to many a sailor, and this—across dozens of worlds—was their nightmare. The sound of the rain, the howl of the wind, and the embrace of the abyss. On Tress’s world, it’s not the water below that is the danger, but the water above. However, the nightmare is the same, born of the sure knowledge that the very thing you sail, the very thing that carries you and gives your life meaning, will someday try to kill you.
Twin streams of rain intersected at the Crow’s Song, washing the deck clean of dead spores, soaking the sailors—from the lowest cabin boy to the captain in her plumed hat. Nightmare manifest. A ship caught alone in a storm, rain making a thunder on the wood.
In every story, warning, and song, this meant death.
Except that day. On that ship.
Crow waited for the awful moment—waited for the spikes to shred her ship from all sides, impaling her crew, snapping boards. It never happened. She only felt the rain, hitting like a thousand tiny punches. The water was colder than she’d imagined.
Dougs crowded the side of the ship, and Crow pushed her way through, cursing for them to make room. What was going on? She’d seen Tress go over the side and had assumed she was running, though to where she had no idea. The ship had rocked, yes, but…
She didn’t understand until she looked down and found a colossal tree had grown under the ship. That was the only word to properly define it: a tree made of interweaving vines. A spreading finger-fan of vine-roots braced it, and vine-branches had latched onto the Crow’s Song.
The tree had lifted the ship some forty feet into the air—right above the thicket of spikes that had grown beneath. The spikes had pierced the trunk, but verdant vines were elastic. And besides, they had still been growing. If anything, the network of spikes helped stabilize the vines.
Hanging over the side of the ship, dangling from the rope that Fort held firm, was a shivering, soaking-wet girl, her face hidden behind a mess of damp hair.
It was then that, belatedly, the Dougs started cheering. I don’t blame their delayed reaction. They’d gone from certainly dead to very much alive, and that kind of existential whiplash requires a few heartbeats—thumping in your ears to tell you yes, this was real—to recover from.
“Help us pull her up, you louts!” Salay said, grabbing the rope with Fort. He stood with one foot against the rail, holding the rope with hands that—though crooked—were as solid as bricks. His quick thinking—hauling Tress up a few feet as the vines grew—had saved the girl’s life. As it was, the tips of the crimson spikes had touched her shoes.
Everyone helped haul Tress up, and doubtless many of them were thinking of how they’d done this once before—weeks ago when they’d first brought her on board. They cheered again as Fort lifted her gingerly onto the deck.
Crow watched it all, silent. She didn’t dare say anything in the face of such a remarkable salvation. Indeed, the vines didn’t appear to have harmed the ship at all. With the silver-edged axes, the Dougs would be able to loosen the vessel, then cut them free once the seethe returned and the tree sank. They’d practiced it as a way to escape being tangled up during a cannon battle.
So Crow wasn’t worried about the ship. Or about reaching the dragon, as the lair was very close now. She’d told everyone that their destination was two days away, as she didn’t want them to panic, thinking she’d take them into the sporefall itself. That wouldn’t be necessary.
Today, Crow’s fear was of a completely different breed. For though she had spent her entire life instilling fear in her crew so they would obey her, she knew there was another emotion that made people even more loyal. Unfortunately, it was an emotion she had never truly understood.
And if Crow had a nightmare, it was standing before her now. In the form of a small shivering girl who had somehow earned the love that Crow had never known.
THE MARTYR
A few hours later, Tress sat in the quartermaster’s office with Fort, Salay, and Ann—who conversed in hushed tones.
Tress said very little, instead holding a cup （her one with the butterfly） with tea from Fort’s personal store. It said a great deal that he hadn’t even mentioned a trade as he handed it to her. What Tress had done for them all had incurred a debt Fort feared he’d never pay off.