A Sea Change
Part Two
They struck another village later that afternoon, and the scene repeated itself almost exactly. By evening, they could hear the celebration of drumbeats and song along the coast of Crest Point. The crew ate a meal of seared fish and crab at dusk, then dropped the anchor again to pass the night. Quicksilver crawled into her hammock, and the gentle rocking motion of the ship soon lulled her to sleep. Soon she was soaring through the astral plane, her soul seeking out the lodestar of the Palace, and her future lifemate within.
“Oy! ‘Silver! Wake up!”
Quicksilver tipped out of the hammock and fell on her face on the floor. “Damn it, ‘Strife,” she moaned as she got to her feet.
“Can’t sleep away the whole day. On your feet. We’re almost at the trolls.”
Quicksilver cursed under her breath. He seemed to have a gift for waking her up at the best part of the dream.
Yawning, she followed Loosestrife up on deck. Her cousin Skelter was scanning the coastline with a spyglass. They were sailing north-west around the point, always keeping about two miles out to sea. “Too many reefs close in,” Goldcinder explained as he manned the wheel. “Easier out here.”
Quicksilver spotted boats on the water in the distance. Islanders? No, there were no elves living on the mainland – save for the Wolfriders, days away. And as they drew nearer, she realized the shapes were too big to be elves. Humans? No... too squat. Strange shapes, great lumps topped with fan-like pyramids.
They were almost upon them when she realized what they were.
Trolls. Trolls in giant sun hats, fishing in tiny rowboats.
The fisher-trolls barely glanced up as the ship sailed into their waters. Loosestrife bounded into the rigging to shout out to the closest boat that passed by. “’Oy, Frogwart! Any luck?”
The troll grunted loudly and Loosestrife laughed.
They sailed on, past the fishing boats that dotted the clearstone seas, and soon Quicksilver caught a glimpse of a large dock on the coastline. “Are those the trolls?” she squeaked excitedly.
“No, little pip. That’s a dock,” Goldcinder explained.
“Shut it. You know what I mean!”
Treefrog blew the shell-trumpet again, and gloomy trolls seemed to appear out of the mossy shadows. Soon five of them waited on the dock, ready to assist the elves.
“Ever seen a troll so glad to see an elf?” Loosestrife whispered in her ear.
“They’re happy?” she asked. “They hardly look it.”
“They’re out here in the sun. Trust me, ‘Silver. They’re overjoyed.”
They docked at the little pier and cast their mooring lines ashore. The trolls gamely helped tie up the lines and settled the little gangplank into the grooves in the wood.
“Well, come on!” the troll at the bottom of the gangplank growled. “If you’re here to trade, then let’s go. King Hammerhand is waiting for you.”
“Let go, lads,” Loosestrife said. “Mind the cargo.”
The crew of thirty streamed off the ship, bearing the plunder from the village. When Quicksilver voiced worry that someone should stay with the ship, Loosestrife threw his head back and laughed with a chortle too big for his slight frame.
“What, you think a troll would steal it?”
“What’s that?” the troll asked.
“Nevermind, Snail. This one’s just a pip. Newcomer, you understand.”
“Who’s she? She don’t look like a fin-wrist.”
“Oy! Watch it! This is my sister’s pip, Quicksilver. She’s come to see what it is we do.”
“Besides theft of troll-gold?”
“Oh, hush. We keep your king in fine boodle. Lead on.”
Snail led them to the door in the rocks. Quicksilver’s sharp eyes took in everything. The trolls seemed to match her father’s descriptions. Big, unwieldy, and surly. Yet for all their grumbling, she sensed they were genuinely pleased to see the elves.
After an eternity on the move, winding through tunnels every bit as complex and remarkable as the homes of Greymung and Picknose, they arrived at the throne chamber of King Hammerhand.
“Ahoy, Bunny!” Loosestrife announced jauntily.
“Don’t call me that!” the troll snapped, slamming his fist on the arm of his throne. Quicksilver stifled a chortle of laughter. She could see instantly why the great King Hammerhand had earned himself the nickname.
He was quite plump for a troll – not fat, exactly, but soft, with grey-green skin smooth where it should be sculpted with muscle and sinew. His blond hair was fluffed and shone with gold dust. His beard did not grow down to the ground like other trolls’, but fanned out about his chin. This wasn’t a hardened warrior like the King Guttlekraw of legend and sending pictures. This wasn’t even a schemer like the infamous Picknose. This was a troll dandy, through and through.
At the King’s side was a troll maiden, all pendulous breasts and enormous hips, decked in gold. Quicksilver had always been told that troll females were treated like mere possessions, and forced to sit on the floor at their mates’ side. But this one sat in a throne of similar size, softened by cushions and wraps of rabbit skins.
“Quicksilver... meet the illustrious King Bunny, terror of Crest Point,” Loosestrife introduced her. “Bunny – this is my sister’s pip, Quicksilver. She’s come to join us in... paying homage to Your... Trollness.”
“Damn you, elf – show some respect for a king!”
“Bunny, sweeting, let’s see what they have,” his consort murmured in his ear.
Instantly the troll melted. “You’re right, my Bauble. All right, elves! Out with it! What do you have?”
Loosestrife gestured to Spider, one of the pirate maidens, and she laid out a basket of seashell necklaces. Bauble sprang up to inspect the treasure. “Oooh... very nice.”
“Let me see...” Bunny held up one string of shells. “I don’t know, elf. They’re pretty big.”
“You know it’s not the season for tidewinks.”
“Still... these scuttlewinks... they’re so big we could almost string them ourselves.”
Bauble slapped his ample belly. “Don’t be silly. With your fat hands – you’d crush a conch shell, let alone a scuttlewink.”
“Hmm... how much?”
“Oh, five nuggets ought to cover it.”
“You’re a thief, elf.”
“Come on, Bunny. You don’t want to seem miserly in front of your fine queen, do you? What’s five gold nuggets to a king like you?”
He sighed. “How many strings?”
“Twenty-five. Now that’s five strings a nugget. You want a better price, you go out and talk to the humans yourself.”
Bunny heaved a sigh. “Four.”
“Four? What do you think I am, a pip from the Southern Coves?”
“Fine. Five. Snail – pay them.”
Snail grudgingly doled out five glittering nuggets of gold, each the size of a capnut. “I thank you,” Loosestrife smiled. “Next...”
Skelter and Treefrog laid out the four painted staffs and the spear Loosestrife had stolen from the warrior. “Genuine male power wands,” Loosestrife announced. “Including the longstaff of their shaman.”
Bunny’s eyes lit up and his thick purple tongue wet his thick lips.
**“Male power wands?”** Quicksilver asked.
**King Bunny feels you can never have too much... potency,** Loosestrife sent back. **I hear his bedroom is decorated with them.**
**But they’re just stupid sticks and paint.**
**Never underestimate the power of suggestion. King or no, Bunny never stood a chance with Bauble there until we starting selling these “power wands.”**
Bunny eagerly paid the set price – one elfin-sized sword and one spool of solid gold wire for each “power wand.” Quicksilver struggled to conceal her smile. Loosestrife shot her a warning glare. **I swear, queer this deal and you can swim home to Savin!**
Next the pirates sold the wooden carvings. The trolls gladly handed over one precious gemstone for each of the ugly things. Next went the woven mats, each fetching a dozen arrowheads. Just when Quicksilver was beginning to think there was nothing the pirates weren’t ashamed to sell and the trolls weren’t too stupid to buy, Loosestrife ordered the big clay jar brought out.
All the trolls in attendance leaned forward expectantly. Bunny and Bauble licked their lips.
Loosestrife beckoned Bunny closer, and the troll king staggered forward, entranced. Loosestrife lifted the lid and the smell that rose up instantly brought tears to his eyes. Bunny breathed in deep and smacked his lips loudly.
“Now that’s a vintage!”
“Isn’t it?” Loosestrife grinned, hastily replacing the lid.
“We’ll take it all. Equal weight in gold–” he reached from the jar, but Loosestrife pushed his hand away gently.
“No tricks, elf! That’s the deal – always has been.”
“Oh, I know,” Loosestrife purred. “But this ladask has been aged to such perfection...” he opened the lid again, and Bunny’s mouth watered at the pungent smell. Again Loosestrife snapped the lid closed. “This isn’t your ordinary ladask, old friend. It takes time to bring out this level of flavour. Just think of it – plain old silversails out of the water – but six moons of loving care and you have the sweetest ladask your tongue will ever taste.”
**What in Timmain’s name is that filth?** Quicksilver asked any pirate who would answer.
**Fish soaked in salt water and wood ash until it becomes a thick mush,** Goldcinder answered.
**And you eat that?** she stammered.
**Hell, no! We have noses same as you. But the trolls can’t get enough of it.**
“I think...” Loosestrife continued smoothly, “that when you consider the fine quality of this,” he patted the jar, “delicacy, the price should be equal weight in gold of the ladask – and the container.”
“Thief!”
“You’ll never find a better vintage.”
“I won’t pay.”
“Fine. Take it back, boys.”
“Wait!” Bunny intervened. “Wait...” he twiddled his thumbs nervously. He looked at Bauble, then at Snail and his other subjects. He hemmed and hawed and scratched his little beard. “Let... let me smell it again.”
Loosestrife obligingly lifted the lid, and Bunny breathed in the fetid aroma.
“Ahhh.... deal!” Bunny held out his hand.
“A pleasure doing business with you, my friend.” Loosestrife clapped his hand in agreement, and the sale was sealed.
“Masterful, Bunny dumpling,” Bauble purred, stroking his beard.
“A feast!” Bunny called, sweeping his hand out. “To celebrate our successful negotiations!”
The New Land trolls knew how to welcome guests, Quicksilver thought as she sat down at the long table. All manner of troll delicacies were piled up around them, from stuffed mushrooms to seafood stew to more noxious concoctions involving grubs and slugs. While the elves helped themselves with their hands, the trolls ate with pairs of little polished sticks that they clicked and flourished between their chubby fingers.
When King Bunny found out that Quicksilver’s father was a veteran of negotiations with his distant troll kin, he insisted she sit near his throne and tell him all about the Old Land trolls. Quicksilver tried her best to remember everything her elders had told her.
“So tell me, lass, how do we stack up against our kin in the Farland?” Bunny asked.
“Well, I think my father would agree that they weren’t half so gracious hosts as you,” she said as she helped herself to another stuffed mushroom.
“But they understood the importance of trade with you wisps, right?”
“Well... yes... and no.”
Bunny laughed. “And did your kin swindle them as much as the Cap’n does us?”
“Not nearly,” Quicksilver replied honestly, and while Loosestrife stiffened in his seat, Bunny only laughed and clapped her on the back so far she nearly fell face first into her food. But when he pressed her for more details and Quicksilver explained that the Wolfriders had traded woodslore and fine pelts with the trolls for weapons and jewellery, Bunny laughed again. “They didn’t have any good human trinkets? No trophies? Just furs? Bah! Your trolls don’t sound very bright if they gave up good metal for nothing more than some herbs and furs.”
“Well, they didn’t have anything as fine as ladask in the Homeland,” Quicksilver said smoothly.
“Poor slugs,” Bunny lamented. He dipped into the pot of stew to pluck out a shrimp with his chopsticks.
As the meal reached its conclusion, two troll servants came out with a platter of the finest delicacy for their king and his queen. Now the ladask was exposed, a jiggling mass of cream-coloured goo that bore no resemblance to anything as natural as meat. Quicksilver stiffened in her seat and tried not to breathe too deeply.
Bunny and Bauble dug in with their chopsticks and smacked their lips in approval. “What flavour, what texture!” Bunny raved.
“It’s heavenly,” Bauble dove it greedily for another piece. Quicksilver watched the stinking meat wriggling between her chopsticks and she fought back the urge to vomit.
“Oh, this is wonderful,” Bunny licked his chopsticks to catch every molecule of flavour. “You have to try this, Cap’n, it’s... beyond words.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t dream of it!” Loosestrife said smoothly. “Ladask is a king’s food, I wouldn’t deprive you of a single morsel of your bounty. It would be a breech of the honourable pact we’ve had for countless seasons if an elf showed the presumption to taste the king’s food – even at the king’s invitation. Besides... I fear the.. sublime richness of ladask could never be fully appreciated by our frail palates.”
“Wisps!” Bunny laughed, and happily ate Loosestrife’s share himself.
When the ladask was mercifully consumed and the smell had begun to dissipate, Bunny slapped Quicksilver hard on the back again and said: “You really must come visit us again, wisp. And bring your father. Or that wolf-queen the Cap’n’s always complaining about. Tell them to bring a nice gift or five – no furs, please. I’m sure you have something a little more... regal.”
Quicksilver smiled pleasantly, wondering what gift would impress the troll king. Perhaps a ringtail carcass left to age in the sun...
After bidding farewell to the trolls, the Lady Mura sailed south, heading down the western coastlines of the Islands bound for Farthest Isle – two days away if the wind was with them. The sun was setting off starboard when Quicksilver joined her uncles for the evening meal.
“Have you no shame?” Quicksilver asked Loosestrife as he set the plate of stir fried seafood in front of her. While the rest of the crew ate off wooden platters on the cargo hold floor, Loosestrife and Goldcinder dined from finely glazed ceramics on a hardwood table. Their private cabin held a bed heaped with the best cotton sheets and chests carved of the rarest blackwood.
“Don’t get me that Wolfrider arrogance,” Loosestrife scoffed. “This isn’t a pack. This is a ship. And I’ve earned the captain’s rank – and the comforts that go with it.”
“You didn’t earn anything!” Quicksilver blurted out. “You got to be captain because your father was the leader of Green Moon Bay!”
Loosestrife shrugged. “Your Line of Chiefs.”
“Blood of Chiefs,” Quicksilver corrected.
“Whatever,” Loosestrife sat down in his chair and propped his boots up on the table as he nursed his glass of wine. “Fact is, Mura’s Line has always made the best leaders. Don’t question it – just enjoy it.”
Quicksilver shook her head as she began to stir her food about, letting the steam rise from her plate.
“You’ve got responsibilities here, pip,” Loosestrife pointed out. “One of these days... we’ll need a new ship to sail out of here and I’ll be too old and too bored to bother with taking over a new Mura. And your cousins... well, let’s say I wouldn’t trust either of them with the captain’s table. Treefrog... he’s so damned good-natured he’d let those troll swindle us. And Skelter still can’t tell his ass from his elbow on the ship.”
“Well, don’t look at me. I’m no sailor.”
“Ah, you’re too young to know what you want to be,” Loosestrife dismissed affectionately. “That’s why you need a well-rounded education. Let you see everything your birthright offers.”
“I know what I want!” Quicksilver replied hotly, all adolescent defiance.
Loosestrife smiled, and the smile told her she was completely transparent. “Sure you do, pip. But there’s more to life than that, you know.”
Goldcinder almost choked on his wine as he bit back a laugh. “Such as?” he asked when he recovered himself.
Loosestrife shrugged. “Fun. Gold. Gettin’ drunk. You know...”
“Uh-huh,” Goldcinder smiled slyly.
“Oh, don’t give me that! You’re not exactly deep, you know.”
“Deeper than you,” he muttered around the rim of his glass.
Loosestrife kicked him under the table.
Quicksilver giggled. “I really don’t know why you two don’t spend more time with Pike and Skot.”
“Ah, they’re both barbarians,” Loosestrife said matter-of-fact.
“And you’re high-headed!”
Loosestrife screwed up his face quizzically. “If you mean ‘snob’ just say it, ‘Silver.”
Quicksilver could only shake her head again. Only her mother’s tribe could have come up with such a word.
“Come on, now,” Loosestrife teased. “You get a kick out of it, knowing you understand why a spyglass works and the rest of your pack doesn’t and doesn’t care to?”
Quicksilver refused to be baited, even as she felt that inborn Islander smugness tugging at her heart. “The Islander Way isn’t better than the Wolfrider Way,” she insisted patiently. “Just different.”
Loosestrife propped his feet back up on the table again. “Glass. Wheels. Milled wood.” He numbered his fingers. “Herblore. Rum.”
“We have dreamberries.”
“Ooh. Hallucinating berries. Good for you. Shall I go on? Tool boxes. Writing. Writing!”
“You stole that from the trolls.”
“We both stole it from the High Ones. But we never forgot about it!”
“Wolfriders have more magic.”
“So do the fin-wrists. You’re not convincing me.”
“Wolfriders have explored this world from one side of the Vastdeep Water to the other.”
“Luck. A set of mistakes and good fortune.”
“Wolfriders have the Palace!”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass about the Palace.”
“You will! When Suntop unlocks the last of its secrets and opens up every possibility on the face of this world and on other worlds too, you’ll care. When he breaks down the walls between the spirits and the living so you can stroll in and talk to Mura any day you like – then you’ll care. When the Palace makes everything here look old and primitive and an elf is judged by what he can build with his mind, not his hands–”
She was babbling with all the conviction of an adolescent. Loosestrife burst out laughing, and even Goldcinder chuckled. Her face fell as she saw all her rhetoric had only amused them.
“What?” Quicksilver demanded.
“Your Suntop,” Loosestrife laughed. “By Mura, you really are mad about him, aren’t you?”
Quicksilver blushed. “He’s my lifemate. My other half. We’ve both known that since I was a baby.”
“Well, I envy you,” Loosestrife saluted her with a toast. “Wish all our lives could be as easy as yours.”
She couldn’t shake the feeling that he was still mocking her. “We will Recognize. You’ll see.”
“Ah, you don’t need Recognition for a good love life, right ‘Cinder.”
“More trouble than it’s worth,” Goldcinder agreed.
“Males always say that,” Quicksilver dismissed. “Until it happens to them.”
“Bite your tongue,” Loosestrife snapped.
“Recognition’s just instinct,” Goldcinder said reasonably. “Like fish spawning. And if it’s anything more than that... well, that’s up to the elves, not the instinct.”
“I know that. I’m not a child.”
“Why are you even thinking about Recognition?” Loosestrife asked. “Just enjoy yourself. Have fun with him. You’re too young to be thinking about forever already.”
“I don’t need to think about it. He’s my lifemate, and I’m his.”
“Fine. So do what lifemates do. And write some sappy ‘howls’ about each other – or whatever the Wolfriders do whenever they’re not at it. Couple years down the line... you think you’re ready for it... swap soulnames. Pick your moment though. Trust me – the joining afterward – phenomenal!”
Quicksilver was aghast. “You treat it all so lightly.”
“Oh, don’t misunderstand me, pip. There’s nothing light about soulnames. Your soulname is yours. You want to share it with someone – you want to let down those walls so they can find it themselves – that’ll change your life forever. Don’t you do it just to rekindle the ol’ fire, and don’t you dare let it happen one night when you’re drunk and don’t know any better. But don’t ever forget that soulname is yours. Recognition – well, give us all around High One’s lifespan and we’ll figure out how to make it all by choice. But until then we’re stuck with it and for every perfect Recognition there’s usually one that just mangles some poor elf’s soul. But Recognition just instinct, like ‘Cinder said. Don’t ever let instinct rule your soul. And don’t think you can’t be happy – can’t be safe – with your lad unless you get Recognition’s approval.”
Quicksilver considered his words at length. When she spoke next, her voice betrayed her lingering fears. “But... what if he Recognizes someone else?”
“What if?” Loosestrife asks. “Won’t say it couldn’t happen. Look at Gale. Thought he’d have a life with your Aunt Evergreen – then she Recognized Treefrog’s father... High Ones guard him,” he added piously. “Took another Recognition for Evergreen and Gale to get back on course – and a lot of time and more patience than either of them really had. But they were meant to be. And now they are. If it’s meant to be, it sorts itself out.” Here he cast a glance at Goldcinder that could only be described as naked adoration. Quicksilver lowered her eyes so he would think she had seen his sudden vulnerability.
He mistook it for resistance. “Look. Does he love you, this lad of yours?”
“Yes.”
“You think he’d play around while you’re stranded on the high seas?”
“Never!”
“Then relax. Contrary to what any weepy maidens might have told you, there is nothing shallow about kindling the fires.”
Quicksilver blushed again, and she looked away abruptly before her eyes could betray her. She was not fast enough. Loosestrife looked at her askance.
“You... you have done it... haven’t you?”
Quicksilver bit her lip. Loosestrife burst out laughing again.
Goldcinder slapped his arm, hard. Loosestrife struggled to appear contrite. “Ah... ‘Silver...” he sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. “What are you waiting for? High Ones, it’s not like you’re a baby. When I was your age–”
“You were twenty-four and don’t you deny it!” Goldcinder blurted out.
“I was twenty-three!” Loosestrife flung back.
“Don’t let him get to you,” Goldcinder told Quicksilver. “If you’re not ready, then you’re not – and your lad’s an ass if he’s too impatient to wait.”
“Oh, no, it’s not him!” Quicksilver said quickly. “He’s... he’s always said he’d follow my lead in all things. And it’s not that I’m worried that he’ll look somewhere else if I don’t....” she sighed miserably. “It’s not that at all.”
“Then what?”
“I... I’m a nervous little cub,” she admitted. “I... I can never make up my mind. One moment I’m burning for him... the next I’m so confused.”
“About what?” Loosestrife asked.
“I don’t know. We’re so happy together the way we’ve been. It’s not that we don’t... do things...” she managed to stammer. “I can’t even begin to describe what it’s like to ‘go out’ together. And we... well, we’ve been in the dreamberry patch more than once. But... joining.... what if it doesn’t work out?”
“What do you mean ‘if it doesn’t work out?’”
“Things could go wrong! We might not be well-matched after all. We... one of us goes too fast... one of us doesn’t go fast enough... I don’t know. We’ve... we’ve been waiting our whole lives... what if we stumble while we’re trying to rush things... and we make a complete mess of everything?”
“Mm, ‘cause one lousy joining is the sure killer of true love,” Loosestrife muttered. Goldcinder cuffed him again.
“What if we don’t Recognize?” Quicksilver continued. “What if... sometimes I feel we’re so close – I can almost hear his soulname. What if we’re supposed to wait – and if we don’t – then it’ll never happen.”
“You’re overthinking,” Loosestrife said, reaching for more stir-fry.
“I can’t help it!”
Goldcinder touched her arm gently. “Trust me. When you’re ready, you’ll know. That little voice in the back of your head will let you know. Just listen to it. The best way to mess things up is not to listen to it.”
The ship turned for the southern seas, bound for Farthest Isle. Loosestrife boasted that when the winds were kind, the Mura could make the journey in less than an eight-of-days. But the winds disappeared, and as Quicksilver lay sleepless in her hammock, she could not feel the familiar creak of the ship’s timbers.
“The wind’s your best friend when it’s reliable,” Goldcinder had told her. “The rest of the time, it swoons and dances back and forth like a maiden in love.”
There was a feeling she understood. Her stomach seemed to be fluttering up and down every time she thought of Suntop.
She knew she only had to fall asleep and she would be with him again. But sleep was eluding her. She could struggle to force her spirit out of her waking body, but she hadn’t the energy.
She did not want him to see her like this.
“You’re too young to know what you want...” Loosestrife had said.
She knew what she wanted. She wanted Suntop to be hers. Forever. She wanted to be bound to him with all the force of Recognition. She could not bear the thought that he might one day look to someone else.
No gaudy enchantress they might stumble across – she knew Suntop better than that. But someone... grander than little Quicksilver. Someone who could understand just what Suntop saw in the Scroll of Colours, when all Quicksilver saw was flurries of light. Someone who as much akin to a High One as Suntop himself.
What had they in common, really? He was a magic-user of the highest level. One day he would surpass the legendary Savah in ability. She was the daughter of Skywise, to be certain, but she knew she would never learn to fly the Palace as her father could. She had no magic in her blood, no special gift. Perhaps the bond they felt between them was only wishful thinking. Hadn’t Dewshine and Scouter played at being lifemates before she Recognized Tyldak and he left the Wolfriders for Sorrow’s End?
Her head told her she was being ridiculous. But her heart continued to berate her, telling her in no uncertain terms how unworthy she was, how clumsy and foolish, how childish and how painfully ordinary. By the time she finally fell asleep, she was lost in a dreamless oblivion, a world away from the crystal Palace.
After thirteen days at sea, the call from the crow’s nest came. Skipper’s Rock had just been sighted. “Ah, we’re back on track,” Loosestrife said, rubbing his hands together. “Only another day to Farthest Isle now.”
But the winds still refused to cooperate, and the Mura could only catch intermittent gusts over the waves. Quicksilver picked at her seared fish skeptically. She was beginning to long for a good haunch of red meat.
Finally Farthest Isle came into view on the horizon. It was only a fifth the size of Green Moon Bay, little more than a pinnacle of rock jutting out of the treacherous waves. As the Mura neared, Quicksilver could make out the caves and burrows that made up its settlement. “Nothing made out of wood, you see,” Treefrog explained.
She could see why. There wasn’t a single tree on the island. The largest plants were thorny scrub bushes.
“It’s hardly even an island,” Goldcinder said. “Just the highest point of an old seamount.”
“Why did they settle here?” she asked. “There are lots of other islands around here. There are even islands further south.”
“Where?”
She gestured to the south, the flat horizon. “I know they’re down there. I’ve seen them on the maps.”
“Mm. A good eight-of-days away with the best of winds. And the wind’s more likely to blow you out to sea. The old epics say we tried to make a life on one of the Lost Islands – I think it was called... oy, Skelter!” Goldcinder turned and barked. “What’s your papa call the lost colony?”
“Redsand Bay!” Skelter bellowed down from the rigging.
“Yep, that’s the one. Trees and red powdered sand from the rocks. Good living for three or four small families. But it’s too cold that far south for the big fish. Too cold for our taste for that matter. And the currents make it damn near impossible to set up a good trade route. We all depend on each other to make a good life out here. No one island can last long without trade with the others.”
“But why Farthest Isle?”
“Look at those waves pounding the rocks. See all the blowholes and reefs? The bigger fish – the sharks and the daggerteeth – they can’t come into the shallows – the waves would knock them senseless against the rocks. So the little fish are safe in there. And the fishers get the best pickings. But that’s not all. The entire rock is pure obsidian – far sharper than your best brightmetal.”
“Blackstone,” Quicksilver whispered, using the Wolfrider name.
“We trade that all over the Islands – and with the trolls and humans too. And we keep the fishers and knappers here well stocked with wood in exchange.”
It wasn’t until low tide that the Mura could risk coming close to shore. Even then the ship had nowhere to dock. Instead the pirates put out their little boat and ferried trade goods back and forth from the island.
“Let’s go with them,” Treefrog said. But Quicksilver shook her head. She didn’t have enough confidence in her sea legs to try the journey. Even at low tide, the waves were vicious, and the boat’s crew had to row the little craft through several dangerous riptides to reach the black sand beach. So she stayed aboard ship, watching the Farthest Islanders emerging from their caves and cliffs to greet the pirates. They were all solidly built and extremely agile as they bounded over the rocks. Some of the younger elves moved across their island by use of long bamboo poles they used to vault over tidal pools – another trade item from the richer islands to the north.
“You can’t afford to be idle out here,” Loosestrife told her. “It’s a rough life. Not for me. But they like it out here – like the challenge of it.”
“We can’t all be as lazy as you,” Quicksilver teased.
“Lazy? I’d like you see you try to run the Mura for a day, pip!”
After an afternoon at Farthest Isle, the Mura turned northeast. “We’re bound for the Southern Coves now,” Loosestrife announced as he told on the bow, breezing in the salty spray. “Vantage Rock’s barely a day’s sail away.”
They reached Vantage Rock early the next morning. In contrast to Farthest Isle, it was a gently sloping table of green land surrounded by shallow reefs. As before, the Mura could not find a place to dock, but this time the gentle sandbanks and delicate corals were to blame. This time Quicksilver did ride in the boat, only to hop out in waist-deep water at the bidding of a half-dozen excited mer-elves.
The contrast to Farthest Isle was marked. These elves were taller, slim and soft-skinned. Many of them sported flesh-shaped adaptations such as fins on their legs. Life was easy at Vantage Rock. Shellfish farming and land-based agriculture were their staples. None of them were used to deep-sea fishing or hunting – there was no need. But as with Farthest Isles, their settlement was not composed of wooden huts, but of rocks caves and stone masonry.
“Why don’t they built huts like yours?” Quicksilver asked. “They have more than enough wood.”
“They’re on the east coast,” Loosestrife said cryptically. Quicksilver mulled it over for several moments before her eyes lit up with comprehension.
“The hurricanes.”
“Every summer, without fail. Green Moon Bay is protected by the other islands and Crest Point. Down here, there’s nothing to hold back the winds. It’s just easier to build in stone.”
They traded obsidian spearpoints and troll-gold for large seashells and wicker baskets filled with dried fruit. At sundown the mer-elves held a great feast of shellfish and elaborate vegetarian dishes on the tabletop of rock overlooking the main beach. A precious amount of their blast-rock powder was burned on the beach to create an fountain of colourful sparks. Quicksilver jumped at the bursts of light and the hissing, crackling sounds.
“You’re not used to it, are you?” Treefrog asked her. Quicksilver shook her head.
As the moons rose overhead, the party escalated, frantic drumbeats echoing over the island as the mer-elves rose to dance with all the grace of the athletic Sun Folk.
**Think little Sea Star is looking to you,** Loosestrife locksent. Quicksilver glanced over at the teenage redhead staring at her hopefully. Quicksilver lowered her eyes bashfully.
**Go for it,** Loosestrife prodded. **Dancing’s not the same as joining.**
**Close enough.** Quicksilver shook her head.
**Will you dance with me, at least.**
Quicksilver smiled, leaning forward to lace her hands around her ankles. **Not tonight, I don’t think.**
They stayed at Vantage Rock for another three days, sleeping off the rum hangovers and replenishing their stores of fish and fresh water. On the morning of the fourth day, Quicksilver awoke to find the Mura already pulling out to sea. Loosestrife greeted her sleepy scowl with a grin.
“Better get cleaned up, pip. We’re going to meet your old friends.”
“What?”
“Jewel Cove is the next port of call. And I’m sure Brill is just aching to see you again.”
Elfquest copyright 2014 Warp Graphics, Inc. Elfquest, its logos, characters, situations, all related indicia, and their distinctive likenesses are trademarks of Warp Graphics, Inc. All rights reserved. Some dialogue taken from Elfquest comics. All such dialogue copyright 2014 Warp Graphics, Inc. All rights reserved. Alternaverse characters and insanity copyright 2014 Jane Senese and Erin Roberts