Boyett-Compo, Charlotte - WindTales 02 (11 page)

complex moves of swordplay from Weir; but in the end, he surprised even himself when he won a rather

lengthy duel with Saur.

Jarl Stevens taught him some rather lethal tricks with daggers, and Neevens, despite his obvious fear of

the man, had provided some handy tips on how to use a whip to good advantage.

His training under Patrick Kasella took on an entirely different tone after that fateful morning. The martial

arts that Paddy had been trying to teach him in an offhand way, afraid to put too much on Syn-Jern,

escalated at a rapid pace after that. Within another month's time, Syn-Jern was as proficient, if not more

so, than Kasella, himself.

The men who trained him clapped him on the back, complimented his learning, but Syn-Jern Sorn had

no idea what the others felt about him. Despite the new awareness of his abilities, he still had a poor

self-image of himself. And he thought others saw him in the same way. To add to his impression was

Genevieve Saur's constant belittling and contemptuous looks aimed his way.

“You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear!” was one of her favorite epitaphs each time Syn-Jern

tried something new and inevitably failed the first time around. That he continued to try until he had the

lesson down pat, didn't change Genny's opinion of him, or his of himself.

“I'm not a quick learner,” he sighed to Paddy one evening.

“Maybe not, but you do learn, Syn-Jern. That's what counts."

“Maybe the reason he doesn't learn all that fast is because he's dimwitted. Did that ever occur to you,

Patrick?” Genny had taunted.

It was the first time since Syn-Jern's arrival at Montyne Cay that any of them had seen tears in his eyes.

Genny's thoughtless words lashed out at the man's fragile self-pride and knocked it to the ground. No

one there could know that his own mother had often made the same remark about him in his hearing.

Syn-Jern looked over at her with such a look of longing; both Weir and Patrick were stunned by the

obvious emotions crossing their new friend's face. When he pushed back his chair and fled the table,

neither man could look at the other.

“Could he be falling in love with her!” Patrick asked in an astonished voice later that evening as the two

men had walked along the beach.

“He'd do better to embrace a Viper than love our Genny,” Weir snarled, his anger at his sister having

formed a red haze of fury around his vision. “The man's never had a woman ever speak to him with

kindness! I could wring Genevieve's neck!"

Patrick recognized the danger behind Genny's actions. “And she's hurting him just like his mother did!"

“Damn her!” Weir spat, kicking at the sand. “I've talked to that little bitch until I'm blue in the face, and I

can't make her understand what he must be feeling! I've forgiven him for being Giles Sorn's son; why the

hell can't she?"

“He doesn't need anyone tearing him down, Weir; he desperately needs someone to build him up.

Genny can ruin everything with the wrong words."

But when Patrick had tried talking to Genny, he'd gotten no further than her brother had.

“Suck up to him all you want, Patrick Kasella! He's my enemy and he always will be! Take the fool to

Chrystallus, if you want. Leave him there for all I care; but don't expect me to lick his boots like you and

Weir do!” Her anger was like a glowing ember threatening to erupt into a full-fledged forest fire. She

flicked her gaze over him. “You know, I never realized it before, but the two of you could pass for

brothers.” She sniffed with disdain. “More's the pity for you, Kasella, for looking like the bastard."

“Why the hell can't you understand?” Patrick shouted. “He needs our help, damn it, and all you can do is

insult him! He had nothing to do with what happened to your father. Weir knows that; why can't you see

it?"

“I'm not a fool like my brother!” she snapped, slamming the door behind her exit.

* * * *

Preparing to sail within the next few days, the Wind Lass had a full compliment of crew.

Tarnes had been correct: Weir turned away more men than he would have needed to man two ships.

There was even a waiting list of sailors who were more than eager to set off for Chrystallus with Syn-Jern

Sorn, just in case a man got ill or for some reason changed his mind about going.

“It's like this, Cap'n,” one man explained as he stood before Weir and Patrick. “We all seen how he's

come along. We feel kinda like godparents to him, you know? There's been some of us who's taught him

a thing or two. Mind ya, he's got a long way to go
afore
he can be a real pirate like us.” The man puffed

out his scrawny chest. “But he's learning. You have to admire the lad, now, don't you, Cap'n?"

“He may have been sired by old Duke Sorn; but the lad ain't nothing like that jackanapes!” another

stated. “This boy's got heart! You see how he can climb that rigging?"

“And he be charmed, he be!” one of the Chalean sailors commented. “He be one of the Chosen! A man

ain't afeared to sail with the likes of him! Why we had a full-blasted gale headed our way when we

brought him aboard the Lass! Remember how the sea just went calm like all of a sudden?"

“That's cause he's a NightWind,” Neevens told anyone who'd listen. “They be charmed, that's a

certainty!"

It was true Syn-Jern had learned a lot from the pirates, but most of it he had already learned, and

forgotten, as a young man in the Storm Warrior Society of his homeland: riding, the essentials of

swordplay, the use of various weapons. In order to win his spurs, he had endured and done well enough

at a variety of events on the tournament grounds. But he'd never won an event and he'd always suspected

it was his father's influence, and money, that had eventually forced the judges to pass him when he was a

boy; and his own wealth and quasi-social position in young adulthood. It would have been an

embarrassment had he not been awarded his spurs.

Yet he had not learned the intricacies of knighthood. He had never learned how to use his sword with

finesse, how to think each move in advance. His horsemanship was fair to middling, but under the expert

tutelage of a Viragonian warrior, he came into his own on the back of a mighty gray stallion Weir gave

him just a few days after the incident at the training ground.

“Sometimes it's just having the right horse, or the right weapon, Syn-Jern,” the warrior said wisely. “If

the weapon doesn't fit your hand like it was molded there, you can't fight as well with it as you can with

one that feels like a natural extension of your own flesh."

“What are you going to call him?” Stevens asked, keeping well away from the mighty hooves that pawed

at the ground near Syn-Jern's feet.

Syn-Jern's eyes shone with love and admiration as he stroked the horse's withers. “His name is

Windchance,” he whispered. He looked at Stevens. “It was the chance of the wind that brought me here.

Without that storm that blew the Tamarind off course, I'd probably be back in the Labyrinth right now."

No one asked how he had escaped the penal colony and Syn-Jern did not volunteer the information; but

the men of Montyne Cay found the fact that he had escaped the hellhole of Tyber's Isle, to be one more

positive thing about the young man.

“You got to admire the lad, you do,” Stevens swore. “Like I always say: you can't keep a good man

down long!"

On the morning of the day they were to set sail for Chrystallus on the evening's tide, Syn-Jern set out on

his own away from the compound in search of the mysterious sound he kept hearing from the jungle. He

left the beach behind, walking deeper than he ever had before into the interior of Montyne Bay's inland.

Before long he was out of sight of the beachside village and entering a forest so thick and lush, he had to

fight his way through the foliage and undergrowth.

Pushing aside low-hanging branches of mango trees, he ducked under the rosy-red fruits and smiled as

the early morning dew fell silently on his naked back and shoulders. The day was humid, so thick it was

hard to breathe in the closeness amongst the foliage. Sweat dripped down his brow, ran from beneath his

arms, and he swatted at the insects that came to taste him. His booted feet crunched over fallen dried

palm fronds and squished tropical fruits that had partially splattered on the ground. The further he pushed

into the forest, the thicker the growth around him, but in the distance, he could hear what he had gone

there to find and so he struggled with the trees and shrubs and bushes, going deeper into the green-black

lushness of the tropical forest.

Genevieve Saur followed close behind.

When she saw him sneaking away from the compound, furtively looking about him to see if he was being

watched, the hair along her arms stirred.

“Just what the hell are you up to?” she'd whispered beneath her breath.

Falling in behind him, she was surprised when he set off into the grove of fruit trees. As he made his way

deeper still into the stand of trees, she thought she'd found at last why he was there.

“You're going to meet someone, aren't you, Sorn?” Her lip curled. “Some whore from the village, no

doubt."

Genny had not believed her brother or Patrick's adamant and emphatic assurances that Syn-Jern Sorn

was not sleeping with one of the village women.

“He's a man, isn't he?” she scoffed. “No, let me rephrase that: he has the proper equipment, doesn't he?"

For a moment her quarry seemed to disappear in a black veil of foliage, but when Genny stumbled her

way across roots and fallen branches, she caught sight of him ahead of her where the growth was

beginning to thin out. So intent was she on following him and finding out just exactly what he was up to,

she didn't hear the sound that had been beckoning Syn-Jern Sorn since the day he had arrived at

Montyne Cay.

He wasn't really sure when he became aware of being followed. He hadn't heard anyone behind him, but

his sixth sense seemed to be coming alive the deeper into the forest he walked, and he could almost feel

an invisible set of eyes watching him. He hid behind a tree at one point, hoping to catch sight of his

pursuer, but he could see nothing moving among the mango trees and sweet shrubs.

“You know I'm following you, don't you, Sorn?” Genny thought aloud as she crouched under a wild hog

plum tree. She saw him looking her way and held her breath. When his vision swept away, she let the air

out of her lungs slowly, softly. She stayed in that one position, her thighs cramping her, until she saw him

shrug. “That's right,” she thought, a jealousy she did not understand making her livid with rage. “Go on.

Go meet your mistress, you son-of-a-bitch!"

He knew someone was there. He could almost smell them. But for some reason he found hard to

understand, he wasn't afraid. Whoever was trailing him didn't mean him any harm; he was sure of that.

He knew he would have sensed danger had it been following him. Making the decision to go on into the

sparser reaches of the forest, he turned his back on his bird dog and started the slight climb upward

toward the sound that had intrigued him for months.

“Where the hell are you going?” she thought as she clawed her way up a steep incline of black, rotted

and compacted leaves. Her booted toes dug into the soft ground covering and squished wetly. The smell

was musty and not all that pleasant and she wrinkled her nose with disgust as her right foot slipped and

she slid down on her knees into the muck.

Syn-Jern had just reached the top of the incline when he heard a soft explosion of salty language and

stopped dead still in his tracks. His head whipped around and he peered back down the rolling mound of

leaves, slippery bank and twisted, exposed roots. He couldn't see anyone, but took the one tailing him to

be a young boy for the voice had been high-pitched and not all that accustomed to using foul language.

He frowned. It must be one of the village boys who often seemed to stroll by him more often than was

necessary.

He made the decision to lose the boy on one of the many switchback paths that appeared to spiral

further upward. He slipped easily onto one of the paths for a few feet, doubled back and stepped

gingerly over a thick root that was protruding from the ground like a varicose vein on an old woman's leg.

He balanced his way across the root and then stepped silently onto another pathway. He picked up his

pace and hurried on; eager to find his way to the mysterious sound that beckoned him.

Genny stood up and dusted the rotting leaves and slime from her cords. Her mouth was twisted in a

hateful line of revulsion as black goo came away on her palms.

“Ugh!” she spat, wiping her hands on a nearby tree trunk. She scraped the fecund-smelling goo off her

hands, looked up the incline with a malevolent gleam of pure vengeance, and dug her toes into the slick

leaf compaction once more.

He was almost there. He could hear it clearly now. He cocked his blond head to one side. What could

cause such a sound, he thought? It wasn't a threatening sound, but a pleasant, calming sound and he

could hardly wait to see what could inspire such longing in him.

Reaching the top of the incline, Genny almost lost her balance and tumbled backward as she took her

last step. Cartwheeling her arms, crying out with more fury than frustration, she was able to stumble

forward, away from the precarious position in which she had almost been thrust. Her anger turned to