Kushiel's Chosen

passed it on to a comrade. I heard Glaukos' words passed from mouth to mouth, and presently one of the other ships drew in shouting distance alongside us, and the tale of the D'Angeline hostage's hysteria was bantered back and forth across the waves.
    I noted that Kazan Atrabiades smiled grimly, and did not laugh.
    "I made the dose too strong," Glaukos said apologetically. "My apologies, my lady; I'm used to dosing full-grown men, you see. Ah, well, you're awake now, and no harm done. We'll be coming soon to harbor, after moonrise ... will you eat? 'Twill do you good, and we've food to spare; lamb and rice wrapped in grape leaves, if it's not gone off."
    "Yes," I said, watching Atrabiades. "Thank you, that's very kind. And water, if I may."
    Glaukos brought the food and I ate while he fussed over me like a nursemaid. The setting sun dowsed its flames in the west, leaving ruddy streaks to fade across the horizon. As darkness fell, our pace slackened not a whit; these Illyrians navigated by stars where visible, by touch and feel-mayhap even smell-where not. In the prow of each swift ship crouched an agile sailor with a lantern, cunningly wrought, that provided a bright spark of light by which they remained in communication.
    Later, I would learn, there was no pirate more feared along the Serenissiman coast than Kazan Atrabiades the Illyrian, for his seamanship, and the speed and maneuverability of his vessels, were legendary. He fought with ferocity and ruthlessness, and his men were trained to a precision a Camaeline drill team would have envied. He struck swiftly and fled swifter, and no one had ever caught him; in part because he sailed like a demon and in part due to the island-riddled coastline of Illyria, that boasted a dozen or more secret harbors. In eight years of pirating, he had lost only three ships.
    All of that and more I would discover to be true; then, I merely wondered distantly at the skill of the Illyrians and huddled drowsily against the forecastle, a worn blanket from Glaukos' stores over my shoulders to ward off any chill. My ordeal and the remnants of the drug had left me weary and drained, my mind as empty as a sounding drum, containing only the hollow echoes of the fearful visions I'd seen. Tomorrow, I told myself. Tomorrow, in the light of day, I will think anew, and find some way out of this predicament.
    I was dozing when the footsteps woke me, a deliberate tread unlike Glaukos' soft-footed approach, and I opened my eyes as Kazan Atrabiades hunkered down on his booted heels beside me, back braced against the forecastle. The moon had risen, and I could make him out by its faint light. It gentìed his fierce features, picking out a tear-shaped pearl eardrop that dangled from his left lobe, casting a silver sheen on his topknotted black hair that was as coarse and thick as a mountain pony's.
    All about us, the ship was quiet; four or five men manned the lines and rudder-bar, speaking in murmurs, while the rest caught naps where they might. The breeze was light, and our progress slow but steady, wavelets lapping along the hull. I sat silently, waiting for Atrabiades to speak.
    Presently, he did.
    "You cried out, you," he said without looking at me, low voice blending in with the sounds of the night-bound Ship. "When you awaked at sunset time. What did you see?"
    I hesitated, then told the truth. "A creature, my lord; or so I thought. Like unto a serpent, but winged, coiled in the mizzen. It raised its head and hissed at me.”
    "Yes." Atrabiades exhaled sharply. "With a tongue, like ..." He scowled, searching for the word in Caerdicci, failed to find it and thrust out three fingers, forked like a trident. "Like so?"
    "Yes!" I sat upright, wide-eyed and wide-awake. "That's it, exactly!"
    He nodded, mouth twisting wryly in the frame of his mustaches. "You do not need fear it, D'Angeline. This is what I come to tell you. The kríavbhog, it waits only for me. I am blood-cursed, I, Kazan Atrabiades. It will not harm you."
    I rubbed my hands over my eyes, as if to erase the sight. "But my lord, I saw it."
    "Yes." Atrabiades turned to look at me then, eyes glinting by moonlight. He wore a pearl eardrop in his right lobe, too; this one black, with a faint, iridescent glimmer. "You bear ... markings." He touched my blanket-shrouded shoulders, where my marque lay hidden. "I saw, today. I know what it means, I." I regarded him mutely; he responded with a fierce grin. "You think I am a, a barbarian, eh, who