Chapter 2: Silence the Ocean
The fog shrouding the sea surrounding the Red Iron felt like a living thing with icy, clammy fingers that caught at Maria's blouse and tore at the tendrils of her hair falling from the ragged scarf she’d used to tie it up. The sails hung above them, limp and damp, in no clear hurry to go anywhere. Maria frowned into the gray sky, shaking her head and looking back towards Dorian. Slowly, she raised her hands up and made a slow, twisting motion, mouthing the word without saying it. Problem?
“Clearly.” Dorian murmured. It took them less than a day to figure out a way around her newest command. Their careful, quiet method of her mouthing words and creating hand gestures for common things still needed fine tuning, but thank the depths, it worked. The only issue, of course, was making sure nobody saw them.
That thought made her look, paranoid, over her own shoulder. The nearest crew lazed on the deck, still drunk from the night before. Worthy hadn’t even shown himself yet, although Maria knew her reprieve was short. She tugged, thoughtlessly, at the ragged sleeves around her wrists. It wasn’t much, but it hid the marks from the rope, and she couldn’t bear Dorian’s silent fury and saccharine sympathy.
She turned her silent attention back to Dorian, watching him peer at the delicate instrument in his hand that she didn’t understand. She didn’t need anything like it, after all, she could feel the tides underneath her, pulling her north or south, towards land, or far away. She may be mute, but sometimes she felt as if these surfacers were completely deaf and blind.
This morning, however, she felt as land-dazed as they must every single day. This was clearly no normal fog hanging over their heads. It was as if the sky, the sea, and the wind had all fallen as silent as she’d been forced to be. The quiet eerie stillness of it made her uneasy. Dorian swung his eyes from the device to look at her. “Could you do something about it, if needed?”
Maria’s only answer was a simple shrug. She honestly didn’t know. If it was normal fog, all she needed to do was whistle and dispel it, but she swore she could taste magic in the air. The crackle and pop of power should have felt familiar, but it didn’t.
She wouldn’t be able to try until Worthy woke up anyway. He forbade her from magic without his specific permission, after she managed to find quite a few loopholes in his original set of commandments. Dorian sighed wearily.
“I suppose we shall see.” Dorian rolled up the map and placed it back within his coat with the odd instrument he used to calculate their position. Maria wrapped her arms around her torso, turning her attention back out to the shrouded sea. Over her shoulder, Dorian mumbled to himself about tides and ships.
He didn’t see the shape melting from the fog. Maria, in fact, wasn’t sure she saw it at first. Her eyes peered into the mist, frowning in concentration, until the dark shape began to solidify into a solid form.
She tried to shout for Dorian, but her voice died in her mouth. She choked on his name, panicking for a brief moment as she struggled to draw breath around it. When she caught her breath, gasping for air, she twisted to glare at the back of Dorian’s head. She slapped her palm off the banister, too loudly in her irritation. He turned to her, scowling, but his dark eyes slid over her shoulder and caught sight of the shape manifesting. He looked stunned for all of two seconds before his mind began to spin. He pierced her with a commanding gaze. “This could be our chance.”
The confusion in her gaze must have been clear, because Dorian simply grabbed her arm, eyes searing. “Listen to me. If this ship attacks, do only what you’re ordered to do. Try and stay low otherwise, yes?”
