Golden light spilled across a treasury fit for queens. No, not queens. Gods.
There were chests of gold, barrels of gems, and sacks of gilded weapons. Urns spilled coins across the lichen-covered decking. Trunks yawned, packed with so much wealth they could not be closed. There were figurines of humans, animals and Other-born beasts in every precious substance. There were goblets of silver, horse tack marked with emeralds, and a hundred other items I was too stunned to identify. Everywhere I tried to look, a new marvel dragged my attention elsewhere.
Widderow made a gleeful sound and picked up a long, slim box. She opened it to reveal an array of hairpins exactly the same as her signature carnelian pin, but these carved in other semiprecious stones. She ran her fingers over them lightly, and cast Demery a beaming grin. The man smiled back.
Behind me, Benedict picked up a silver plate and rubbed it with his sleeve, then stared at his own reflection.
“Bretton’s original hoard was farther north,” Anne said, watching as Mary picked up a jade disc and held it in her palm. The older woman had a new steadiness about her, though I still perceived a shadow behind her eyes. I had seen shadows like that before, in my own eyes, in the eyes of veterans and widows, and I suspected it would never fade.
She continued, “Lirr moved it here before we sailed back across the Stormwall. These three ships house the bulk of it, but there are more caches throughout the forest.”
“There’s…” Mary seemed at a loss, turning the jade piece over. She surveyed the hoard. “There’s so much.”
“There’s enough.” Olsa Uknara swiveled a satchel from the small of her back to her hip and opened it, then started selecting small, cut gems from a chest.
“Well, you can retire now,” Anne said to the captain. She scuffed meaningfully at a spilled sack of coins with a scrape and a jingle. “Still have your eye on Sunjai?”
“Mereish South Isles,” Demery said, picking up the half-moon headdress of some ancient priestess. Silver glittered and a fringe of dangling jewels clinked as he held it to Anne’s forehead, as if checking how it would look on the woman. “Lirr had the right of it, lying low down there. I’ll buy myself an island and live out my days as an eccentric lord. Maybe I’ll even marry? I’ll visit Hesten every so often, though, of course. Phira would have my head if I did not.”
Lowering the headdress, he narrowed his eyes at it. “I should bring her something, shouldn’t I? And the queen… Damn it.”
Anne smiled. It was the first time I had seen the expression on her face and it caught me off guard. She looked younger, less harrowed. More like Mary.
“You’re welcome to come,” Demery added, tucking the headdress under one arm. From his tone, I sensed that this was not the first time he had extended the invitation. “To the Isles.”
Anne’s smile faded a little and she glanced at her daughter. “We’ll see.”
“Will the ghisting remain here?” Fisher asked.
In perfect unison, Anne, Mary and Tane looked at her.
Fisher cleared her throat. “Will you remain here, Tane?”
“Wherever we go, we go together,” Mary said. “The new Mother Tree is already growing in her stead, and a new Mother Spirit within it. Tane is not bound here.”
Tane herself nodded silently, and I remembered the sapling growing where the bonfire had been. Where Mary ought to have died. The horror and the uncertainty of that memory turned my stomach and made my fingers clench. But it was over. Mary was safe and quite properly rich.
“Tane, do you not want to be free?” This question, to my shock, came from Benedict. He had lowered the silver plate, though it was still in his hand, and he looked directly at the ghisting.
The ghisting’s mouth curled up in a smile.
“Whatever circumstances brought us together, we’re one now. Freedom is a relative thing,” Mary concluded, closing her fingers around the jade disc. I saw the regret in her eyes, but she kept it from her voice. “As to where we’ll go… We can’t go home. Even if Mother and I weren’t both known Stormsingers, I fled the gallows. Maybe I can prove I’m not Abetha Bonning, but I’m not willing to risk it.”
Fisher settled in at my side and laced her arms across her chest. “The new captain of Hart will need a Stormsinger,” she whispered to me.
I looked at her sharply, reminded of what she had started to say outside.
“What are you saying?” I hissed back.
Fisher ignored me and looked at Demery. “Sir, you and I need to discuss the division of prizes.”
Demery gestured to the riches all around us. “Take your pick, Captain Fisher. What do you desire?”
Fisher smiled, sly and vulpine. “Well, I have my eye on a new ship.”
FORTY-EIGHT
The Woman with Two Souls
MARY
Shoulder to shoulder with my mother, I sang. The waterfall of cloud and snow that was the Stormwall parted before us, swirling and rushing over dark waves and drifting ice floes. Cold burned my cheeks and my eyes watered, but I sang with all the power in my bones.
Magic thrummed through me, Tane whispered in my blood, and high above us Harpy’s sails filled with ensorcelled wind.
Behind us came Hart and Nameless, wrapped in the shelter of our power. The waves buffeted us and chunks of ice thudded against our ghisting-strengthened hulls, but our course was steady. Under the Fleetbreaker’s care we’d be across the Wall in a matter of hours, and to Hesten in a day.
Despite weeks of rest and contemplation, the thought of reaching Hesten brought a wash of uncertainty. I faced so many decisions, though they all hinged upon the greatest, and most daunting choice of them all.
My mother intended to go south with Demery. He needed a singer, after all, and the decades of weariness behind my mother’s smile told me she needed rest. Like the rest of Lirr’s former prisoners, she might be free of her chains, but they had left their mark. I wanted that rest for her, that security away from the eyes of the Navy.
Grant would go with them, so Demery could guide him through his transition into ghiseau. In the weeks since his betrayal and near death, our relationship had gone from strained to reconciled. I’d nearly told Demery that the highwayman was a traitor several times, but seeing Grant so broken, so pale and close to death had softened me. His guilt and suffering were recompense enough.
For his part, the hope behind Grant’s eyes when he looked at me was gone, replaced with the knowledge that, after what he had done, little more than friendship could survive between us.
So, I would go south with Harpy too, wouldn’t I? I’d developed an affection for Demery and Athe and Old Crow. Grant was—or could be—a friend again, and I’d finally found my mother. Of course I would go with her. I would find a quiet life away from the constant threat and dangers of the Winter Sea, from people like Kaspin and Slader and Ellas, who would use my power for their own gain. And then…
What? I felt as though I’d only just left my village, just stepped foot into places like Tithe and Usti. Would I now close my eyes to the world and retire before my life had even begun?
My concentration wavered, and Tane’s voice brushed at the back of my mind.
We can make our own path, Mary.