Authors: Ysabeau S. Wilce
It’s funny. For as long as I can remember, I have wished I wasn’t a Fyrdraaca. If only I were someone else, I thought, I would be free of Poppy’s crazy drunkenness, and Mamma’s strict attention to duty and Idden’s stuck-upness. I wouldn’t be the Second Flora anymore, I’d be able to follow my own Will, express my own desires, chart my own course. I thought if I wasn’t a Fyrdraaca, I’d be free.
Thanks to the Working, I now realize that being a Fyrdraaca isn’t so horrible after all. My family may be full of wild craziness, but they are loyal to a fault, and will stick up for each other. Dealing with them all these years taught me a few things that turned out to be superhelpful. It’s like Nini Mo said,
They may be snapperheads, but they are
my
snapperheads.
I may not be a full Fyrdraaca by blood, but I sure am by temperament. And maybe that’s not such a bad thing.
I watch the Duquesa de Xipe Totec, who is a full Fyrdraaca by blood, but not by temperament, and I think how lucky I was to grow up with a family at all. Doña Ana, the Duquesa’s duenna, told me that the Duquesa was raised by the priestesses of Xochiquetzal. She lived in a barracks with forty other girls. Having recently spent some time in a Barracks, I would not have wanted to grow up in one.
When I was a kid, I had imagined that one day I would find Flora Primera, rescue her from the Birdies, and bring her home. Her disappearance was the shadow that loomed over our family, the reason Poppy drank, Mamma worked like a servitor, and Idden was sour. I was just a replacement for her, not nearly as good as the real thing. I had believed her return would make us all happy Later, I had realized that there was probably no point in looking for Flora Primera, that surely the Birdies had killed her, sacrificed her to one of their bloody gods. Otherwise, Mamma would have ransomed her, like she did Poppy, long ago. But they did not sacrifice her. Here she is, when I least expected her.
I’m sure La Bruja knew all along who the Duquesa really is, and that’s why she sent me to her. Devious, but obvious. I asked the Duquesa how she knew La Bruja and she said vaguely, “Oh, she rescued me from the Broncos long ago” and then she started in on what color petticoat she should wear, and I couldn’t get any more out of her on the subject. I couldn’t tell if she knew that La Bruja wasn’t La Bruja at all. I don’t dare ask.
I wonder if the Birdie Ambassador knows who the Duquesa really is, and that’s the true reason he asked me to escort her back to Califa. He was rubbing it in, showing Mamma his power.
I can take your child and make her mine.
Well, if he thought that, fike him, because she might act Birdie on the outside, but she’s a Fyrdraaca on the inside. She’ll always be. You can’t change that, no matter what. Blood will win out.
I’ve definitely learned
that
lesson.
Anyway, the summation. I’m supposed to consider what I would do differently next time. Fike! Maybe everything? If I had to do the Working all over again, I wouldn’t do it.
Dont look a gift mule in the mouth,
Nini Mo said. She was right. If I’d left well enough alone, Captain Oset would be alive. I never would have met Tharyn, or La Bruja, or found out what I could do in a pinch. But Captain Oset would still be alive. I thought I was so fiking clever, and so fiking in control, and so fiking sure of myself. Actually, I was none of those things and so Captain Oset is dead. Nothing I ever do will change that. I don’t know what else to say to that. I’m sorry, of course, horribly awfully terribly sorry. But that hardly does Captain Oset any good, does it?
Tharyn was really irked when I told him I wasn’t going to Porkopolis with him. I tried to explain why, but he wouldn’t listen. He just seized up into arrogant coldness, told me to have a nice trip, and stalked away. I didn’t chase after him, even though I wanted to, because, why bother? I had ditched him, and no explanation softens that.
Also, I was rather irked, too. Of course I want to go to Porkopolis; of course I want to join the Pacifica Express. But I have to go home first. I had poured my heart out to him, told him all my secret desires, and if, after all that, he couldn’t understand, well then, fike him. I have enough people in my life who don’t understand me. The last thing I need is one more.
We saw Tharyn on the boat to Barbacoa; he refused to speak to me and spent the trip huddled by the goat pens, staring out at the ocean and looking broody Flora Primera was quite taken with this broodiness and tried to sweet on him several times, but he gave her the high hat, too. That’s probably just as well. She is a married lady, even if she doesn’t act like it. She flirts with everyone, and they all think she is so darling, they smile and give her everything she wants. I can’t begrudge her too much; it must be small consolation for being married to the awful, raw Duque de Xipe Totec. She’s his third wife, Doña Ana told me, and not the Conde’s mother, which was quite a relief to me, as I hated like fike to think of Birdie blood entering the Fyrdraaca line, even if that line is only half mine. Also, the Conde is a brat and I don’t want to be the aunt of a brat.
The Duquesa is actually pretty silly, but in a cute way so it’s hard to hold that against her. She keeps mentioning that she’s the Warlady’s best friend and that the Warlady relies on her in all things, and she keeps dropping hints that the Warlady’s plans cannot succeed without her assistance, but I find that hard to believe. Perhaps the Warlady’s hairdressing plans need the Duquesa’s assistance, but I can hardly see her giving any useful political advice.
The Duquesa’s still calling me Madama Romney, and I haven’t dissuaded her of the name. I can’t tell if she knows her true heritage or not. She certainly acts like a Birdie, but she’s been with them since she was six, so I guess by now she wouldn’t know how to act any other way. The minute she sets foot on City soil, everyone is going to know who she really is if she doesn’t keep her face covered. Doña Ana keeps telling her to put her veil back on, but she refuses. I’m surprised someone hasn’t recognized her yet. It’s creepy how much she looks like Mamma, but then she giggles a very silly giggle that blows the resemblance. Mamma’s been a lot of things, but she’s never been silly.
When we got to Barbacoa, Cutaway met us at the dock, full of sweeping smiles and lavish Courtesies.
Oh, Your Grace, welcome to my little island,
she said,
and Madama Romney, how nice to see you again, I see your trip was a success! Congratulations!
No mention of the fact that she told me never to come back; I guess the Duquesa’s glory canceled out my sins. I would have loved nothing more than to flick my foot right into that supercilious smile, but I dared not, of course. It’s her island. Yet Haðraaðas have very long memories. She can bet her silver-handled scissors that I am not done with her yet.
Now we are installed in the fanciest suite in the Barbacoa Hotel. Flynn got his own room with his own valet, which he totally deserves after all he’s been through. This morning I got lost trying to find the bathroom—shades of Crackpot Hall and its shifting rooms, but here, everything is fancy and clean, not old and moldering. The towels are the size of bed sheets and thick as horse blankets. When Tharyn and I had stayed here before, our towels were average-sized and rather thin. Well, we weren’t Birdie aristocrats. I doubt if the Duquesa could have survived a smaller towel.
Oh, ayah, and guess what I found hanging in the closet of my room? My dispatch case. Completely intact, everything as I left it. And guess what was sitting on the bed?
Pig, as pink and inscrutable as ever. I have to say I like him much better as a plushy pig than as a mule. He’s much huggier and less prone to spitting.
Tharyn didn’t check in at the hotel; I don’t know where he’s staying. I guess he’s consoling his loss with vice somewhere, pouring vinegar on his open wound. What a snapperhead! Why did I let down my guard? I was so much happier when I hated him.
We came to Barbacoa because we couldn’t get a ship directly to the City. The Warlady has ordered the Gate closed, they say and Kulani warships gathered right outside. No one is sure when the Birdies will answer the new Warlady, or how, but waiting is making people nervous. No ships in Angeles were willing to leave port until they knew what was going on, but I did find a schooner heading to Barbacoa and got us passage on that. I figured that once in Barbacoa, we’d find someone to take us to the City Surely pirates would not worry about Birdie warships.
But we’ve been here a week now, with no luck. I hit every ship in the harbor and offered each a fantastic amount of money and no one would take us. Not too long ago I never wanted to think about seeing the City again. Now I can’t wait to get there. It’s very frustrating to be sitting here—even with giant plush towels—and know all the excitement is very far away.
But then, earlier today the weirdest thing happened. I’d gone down to the concierge to see if she’d had any luck getting us a ship north, but she hadn’t. There’s a new rumor now: that the Birdie Navy is on its way to force open the Gate. A fishing boat came in early this morning and said they’d talked to another fishing boat from Qeuca Bay and that this boat had seen the flotilla sailing up the coast. No one will leave the Barbacoa harbor until they know whether this rumor is true. Cowards! And they call themselves pirates and privateers! By the time the Birdie Navy got to Angeles, a fast schooner could be in the City already, and surely they would open the Gate once they knew who we were.
Anyway, so I went to the lobby bar to tell the Duquesa we were still stuck. I found her sitting on a velvet sofa, ringed by admirers vying to buy her drinks and popcorn snacks. I recognized some of these admirers from my previous visit to Barbacoa, and to a one they were a lot of murderous rum-gunning racketeers, slavers, and thieves. But they sure thought she was cute. And she was, too, with her fluttering fan and the little dimple in her chin when she smiles. Even I find it hard to resist her.
I extracted her from her rapscallion admirers and we went into one of the private saloons, where I broke the bad news. The Duquesa wasn’t happy. She said, “This is ridiculous. We have to get to Califa. We are running out of time.” She stamped her feet; she was wearing purple court shoes with tiny red heels and big silver buckles. They were the sweetest shoes I’d ever seen.
“I’m doing the best I can, Your Grace.”
The Duquesa snapped her fan open and shut, once, twice, irritated. All the sweetness had drained out of her face, and now, suddenly, she looked like Poppy. “La Bruja said I could trust you. She said you are on our side. You are not trying to hinder my passage, are you?”
“I want to get back to the City as much as you do, Your Grace,” I told her. “It’s not my fault that all the outlaws here are cowards.”
Before she could answer, a voice said, “I believe, madamas, that I may be able to help you.”
A settee stood with its back to us. While we were talking, Flynn had disappeared behind it. Now we turned and saw a vision rising from the settee’s depths, a vision in black and purple: purple frockcoat with black frogging; black weskit with purple embroidery; purple trunk hose worn over black cannions and stockings. The vision’s broad chest was bisected with a gold embossed leather buckler; he was well armed with both cutlass and pistol. Topping off this confectionary outfit—or bottoming it, I suppose—was a pair of red sparkly high-heeled boots, each toe tipped with a hissing snake’s head. The boots were hideous, but otherwise, he was absolutely the most glorious young man I had ever seen. Flynn was frisking ecstatically at his feet.
As the Duquesa and I stared slack-jawed, the Glorious Man bent low in a Courtesy: Abasing Myself Before Incomparable Beauty. The Duquesa’s fan snapped open again, and the dimple reappeared.
The Glorious Man said grandly, “Allow me to introduce myself. I am Udo Moxley Landaðon, captain of the
Pato de Oro.”
I had known an Udo Landaðon back at Sanctuary School, but that Udo was a silly flippergidget, and scrawny to boot. This man was none of those things, and most particularly not scrawny But he did seem strangely familiar. Flynn shived Captain Landaðon’s glorious leg and he bent down to scratch Flynn’s ears.
“You are the one they call El Calavera,” Flora Primera said. “The Rake. The pirate.”
“Pirate is a strong word, madama. I sail under a letter of marque signed by the Warlady herself. I believe that makes me a patriot, not a privateer,” Captain Landaðon answered. He said that he had overheard our conversation and wanted to offer his services. He would be delighted to take us to the City; in fact, he said, he had business there anyway, so it was no trouble, which gave him great sorrow, for he would like nothing more than to go to great trouble on the behalf of two such elegant and refined ladies.
I had to admit that even though Captain Landaðon was laying it on a bit thick, after Tharyn’s recent snootiness it was nice to meet someone with such exquisite manners. Of course, we accepted his kind offer and went with him to the bar, where we celebrated our newfound association with champagne. The Duquesa giggled and was charming, but Captain Landaðon kept looking at me sidelong, in a blush-making way that I didn’t mind at all. It somehow seemed as though I had always known him.
While we were sitting in the bar, Tharyn came in, but as soon as he saw me with Captain Landaðon and the Duquesa, he turned and stomped out again. This time I did run after him, but by the time I got to the lobby, he was gone.
So now we have passage to Califa. We are leaving as soon as the winds pick up, which Captain Landaðon—El Calavera—anticipates will be tomorrow. In two days, we could be home. I wonder if Pow is walking or talking yet. I wonder what Poppy will say when he sees the Duquesa. I wonder if Mamma is really going to ask me no questions. I hope Valefor isn’t too mad when he finds out I was the reason he was banished. I hope Idden will understand I’ve been places and done things, too, and will treat me accordingly. And I hope Mamma will understand that I am not the second Flora anymore.
Ayah, so—the weird thing that happened ... Meeting Captain Landaðon wasn’t the weird thing. The weird thing happened as we were leaving the bar. He walked us to the elevator and kissed the Duquesa’s hand, promised her he would send for her luggage first thing in the morning. Then he bent over my hand—who would have thought a kiss on the hand could be so tingly—and as he did so, I saw something crimson wiggling in the curls cascading down his shoulder. It took me a second to realize it was a tentacle waving at me.