Rain tapped on the sailcloth, which Sulme had fixed as our cover. To keep from getting wet, we y on the raised boards at the front of the boat. It was tight fit, but I welcomed the additional warmth from the man's proximity. Summer was still a distant dream.

  Thunder beat Her hunting drum, and Her twin the Lightning surged across the sable veil of the sky. The storm was uncommonly furious for the season.

  "Have the Tamsi called the sky itself to track us?" I asked, with brittle jest in my voice.

  "They wouldn't dare. Besides, two dim-natured mortals such as us pass under the sight of the kindly gods."

  "True. My old friend Mulkava troubles me more." A shiver crept up my spine. "I thought he would recognise me for sure."

  Sulme chuckled. "There's little risk of that. Umu has obfuscated your soul along with your body. In flesh you appear to be a pretty young woman, and in the deeper mirage, you don't seem more than a weak-willed dulrd."

  "Oh, a pretty dulrd. Is that why you suddenly find me fetching?"

  "No. I know you better than to be fooled."

  For a moment I had sunk into my fancy, until the man had to remind me again of who I was.

  "You know," I spoke between my teeth. "I find myself mad at yo-- at my own emotions."

  "Talking about those feelings might ease them." The calmness of Sulme's voice emphasised, how petty I was.

  A growl reverberated in the back of my throat. "Alright! Might as well. I find my current state, in spite of its feebleness, much too comfortable. "

  In fact, at times I had been strangely at ease, as if the worm gnawing at my soul was gone, instead of the other way around.

  "You mean..."

  "Yes!" I snapped, even though I couldn't have known what the Nilkoan had thought.

  We remained silent together, while the storm raged through the heavens.

  "You are, who you are," Sulme said. "Who can see inside the spirit and tell its true form? Maybe you... Maybe Umu's influence is bringing out your own inner nature."

  "This my inner nature... I'd be an abom--" I caught the word in my mouth and swallowed its hateful taste.

  "Many have thought me one," Sulme said. "I'm fortunate that it didn't stop you from wanting to kiss me."

  At worst he was fascinatingly atypical. As a man, he was everything one needed to be.

  Me, on the other hand... My mouth wavered. I couldn't speak. Instead, I pushed against the powerful torso of the sailor-soldier. He was a stark rock for me to cling on to. A heavy arm wrapped around me. To my credit, I let out no pitiful sounds, even if tears warmed my cheeks.

  "Aren't the herbs helping?" Sulme asked. "For the pain, I mean."

  The overwhelming self-pity cleared, and I brought myself back into awareness of my body. I ached all over, but it was far from the agony of the previous nights.

  "Odd," I said. "My joints hurt barely at all."

  "Then I'm gd." Sulme's rge hand brushed my spine. The skin of there crawled.

  "My frame must be mostly finished," I said.

  "Is that good or bad?" Sulme's tightening embrace expined his own opinion clearly enough.

  "Possibly both." I slowed my breathing to make sure I remained calm. "Were I not able to trust you with my life, I would be terribly afraid."

  Sulme kissed my forehead, taking a liberty, of which I wasn't going to compin about at the moment.

  "If it helps, I'm not entirely reassured either," he said. "When I saw the emerging change after the fire, I decided to steel my mind, so we could avoid this awkwardness. Just so you know, I failed."

  I snorted. "I am awed by your strained admission of affection."

  The man ughed and pressed my back to pull me against him. His faint manly smell was mixed with the fresh scent of the ke. So close to him, I could truly appreciate his size, which protected me from the foul weather and everything else.

  I snaked my hand inside his shirt. My fingers didn't sink deep into the boulder that was his torso. The implied strength tensed my tendons.

  "Are you pent up?" Sulme whispered. "Enough to find me attractive?"

  I must have pouted, but luckily he couldn't have seen my face in the dark. I moved my hand up to the rge thews connected to his shoulder bones.

  "Do not grow overly proud," I said. "Physically, you have nothing a healthy horse cks."

  I turned around and let Sulme hug me from behind. After some wiggling, I curled into a snug position to calm down and let sleep take me.

  A ray of light irritated my closed eyes. I woke up from a confusing dream of blending flesh. Though my back was a bit stiff, I experienced a refreshing ck of discomfort for the first time in weeks.

  Sulme was up, mending a frayed edge of the sail. When he was ready, we ate a cold breakfast before pushing the boat back to the ke.

  The wind mustered only a tired sigh after the night-long storm. Sulme wondered out loud, if we'd have to use the oars. I wasn't quite up to rowing, because the joints of my fingers and toes still ached. I might have grown irritable, if I was forced to exert myself. However, the sail still swelled, and we could enjoy the sight of the wooded hills and endless kes without much effort.

  "That's the old Kauku fort." Sulme pointed at a wooden tower and the remains of a palisade on a barren hill. "We are in Isso."

  More farmnd, ringed with dense thickets of young birch and willow, began to poke between the primordial forests. Most of the human dwellings consisted of dispersed and rough cottages. On their walls, painted sigils warded the inhabitants from the wrath of spirits. The rger vilges had risen on top of the low hills, where the houses often created a fortified circle to guard them from the greed of men.

  The midday sun burned with unseasonal heat, which caused a rexing ssitude to seize my body. I leaned back and guided the boat through half-closed eyes.

  "Fog," Sulme said. "How peculiar."

  In front of us between two isnds stood a hazy wall. I shuddered from instinctive fear, before I realised the sizzling sound.

  "That's not fog!" I pulled the steering oar as strongly as I dared, but the boat was slow to alter its course.

  As the mist closed in, the sound of boiling water swelled into roar. Sulme turned to me. Terror warped his face.

  I began to recite staves against the wrath of fire, but it wouldn't be enough. I might withstand the heat, but Sulme wouldn't.

  "Get down!" I took a bnket and tackled the Nilkoan to the bottom of the boat.

  The man didn't resist, as I y on top of him and pulled the bnket to cover us.

  Air warmed, as if the sauna around us had caught fire. I closed my eyes and sung to keep the worst of the heat outside the bnket and to channel any remaining into me. Sulme joined the desperate song, even if he stumbled over the words.

  The skin of my back was scorched. My voice turned into a whine, yet did not entirely falter.

  Before pain could overwhelm me, the boiling wrath dwindled. I caught my wavering breath and pulled the bnket from us. The spirit of underwater fire had swum past.

  Below me Sulme was alright if a bit stupefied. It would have been a shame, if such an amiable face had been cooked into a death mask. I darted my head to give him a tiny kiss. Before he could react, I cmbered from top of him and rushed to the aft.

  "Fix the sail!" I shouted. "We need to get going, before that giant turns around."

  Sulme recovered from his stupor and pulled the sail taut again. Our boat jerked forward with the swirling air currents.

  I gnced behind us, but the wall of steam didn't change direction. We were safe for the moment.

  My back stung to the point of itching agony, but I kept the discomfort out of my mien. Sulme shouldn't think that I had been more than inconvenienced. He might end up assuming he owed me.

  The lofty towers of Attisa clustered like bck fungi, with the fiery Sun lingering behind them.

  In the water between the sprawling piers, the masts of sunken ships formed a leafless forest. Most of the vessels in dock weren't under the water however. The harbour was almost as busy as that of the capital, even if none of the ships were tall sea traders. Fortunately for us, Mulkava's galley was nowhere to be seen.

  Among the handsome townhouses of the waterfront, a few imposing stone structures lingered from an earlier age. The bleak, if well-preserved, architecture didn't invite human habitation. Under the callous gaze of the immemorial towers, kefolk and mongers of all sorts crowded the harbour market.

  We dropped the anchor in middle of the ke to prepare our equipment in peace.

  "What's the pn?" Sulme asked.

  "We will y low and take the feel of the nd, until I find the leverage necessary to push the Issoans back into the fight." I took my witchlock pistol and began to clean it.

  Sulme frowned. "Weapons are sure to attract attention."

  "Yes, but attention in itself is not lethal. Being under-armed tends to be."

  The Nilkoan sighed, but didn't argue further. He attached his long knife to his belt, along with his bow case and thin dagger. Despite so much strapped on him, the tall man did not seem encumbered.

  After loading the pistol, I pced it in its embroidered holster. With the tingling excitement of meeting an old friend, I unravelled my Kkki from the roll of sailcloth.

  "Are you really going to carry a sword of war to town?" Sulme asked.

  I smirked. "Of course." I took Kkki out of its scabbard and admired the smoky steel. Fell blessings of Luiheki himself had allowed the bde be forged elegantly narrow without compromising its rigidity or risking brittleness. My sword was long, perhaps too long, enough to reach my waist from the ground. Yet wielded in two hands, even my diminished muscles handled its weight.

  Sulme watched, as I did a swift test of sword-grips. He said: "Such a weapon is rather incongruous on a dy."

  With tiny motions of my hands, I shifted Kkki's piercing tip to under Sulme's jaw.

  "This 'dy' is a bit different from the rest."

  Sulme's smiled and grabbed my bde. He held it strong enough not to cut his hand, as he moved Kkki aside. I was careful not to slice his palm, as I retrieved Kkki back to me and returned the weapon in its scabbard. The edge might not have been particurly sharp, but iron had its hunger.

  As we dragged the boat into the sands below the crumpled stone pier, a tall woman in an abundant gown with a floppy hat hurried to us. She had vivid orange eyes, likely from Nangoan heritage. In her hand was a clerk's symbol of office: a well-worn wax tablet.

  "Good evening!" she shouted. "On the behalf of the Harbour Guild of Attisa, be most welcome. Now, you two don't seem local."

  "No," I agreed.

  "Would you like to pay your fee for resting you boat here?" the clerk asked.

  "What does that entail?" Sulme lifted the trunk holding his armour. "The boat seems secure enough as it is."

  "Oh, we make sure nobody appropriates your sail, drills a hole in the bottom of your boat and pushes it into the ke."

  I scowled. "How much?"

  "A good portrait of the good Prince in good silver."

  Sulme handed the coin to the clerk.

  After a long look at the silver, she smiled at the Nilkoan and curtsied. "Thank you."

  I nodded at the sunken boats and ships. "Is that your doing?"

  The clerk shook her head. "They have been there since the old city fell. Their wood does not rot, and anyone who tries to dive for salvage never resurfaces."

  "Does the harbour have a good pce to stay for the night?" Sulme asked.

  "If you have no kith or kin here, then there's always the old temple, which houses pilgrims for a donation." The clerk pointed towards a round many-storied house with a tall pointy roof. "This time of the year the establishment is vacant enough to offer reasonable prices. But don't expect any food beyond boiled beans, eggs and cheese."

  "What about the drink?" I asked. "Do they serve anything worth quaffing?"

  "The beer is great at the temple, but not worth the price. Save your money, and buy liquor from the market, I say."