ARC: The Wizard's Promise by Cassandra Rose Clarke Page B

overhead. My thoughts unwound from me, still conjuring up reasons for Kolur to sail us north with a trained wind-witch. Maybe he was cursed and finally found a cure. Maybe she was cursed, and he was the cure. It would be just like the story Mama had told me about Ananna – I used to pretend I was Ananna before she was a ship’s captain, travelling across the desert to cure the curse placed on Naji of the Jadorr’a. Maybe I was on the same sort of journey now.
    Something splashed in the water.
    I jumped back from the railing, startled. Or maybe this was about the Mists. I hadn’t considered that possibility. I hadn’t wanted to.
    Another splash. This time I realized it came with a shadow, one that moved differently from the others. I leaned over the railing, peering close, my heart racing. In truth, this didn’t seem like the Mists. They always came with omens, with mist and gray light. Maybe this was just a whale. Even though we were too far north, and too early in the season, to see one.
    Another splash. I grabbed one of the lanterns and dangled it over the water, trying to get a better look.
    There was something below the surface. Too small to be a whale and too thin to be a seal.
    I took a step back. Under other circumstances, I would have called for Kolur. But not tonight; I was still angry with him. I touched my bracelet instead.
    A head emerged from the water. A young man’s head, pale hair plastered to his skull, seawater running over his skin in rivulets.
    I shouted and dropped the lantern overboard, then immediately turned to Kolur, afraid I’d woken him – but he slept on.
    The lantern’s glow sank all the way down into the ocean’s depths. I cursed. I’d have to explain that eventually.
    “Oh,” said the young man. “You dropped something.”
    His voice was strange, melodious and reedy, like a flute. I was too scared to move. He swam alongside us, his face turned toward me. It was almost a human face, one with all the marks of beauty – sharp cheekbones and a long, thin nose and large, pale eyes. But that beauty was what made it unnerving. I’d seen handsome men before, and I’d seen exquisite women, and it wasn’t until this moment, in the shivering dark, that I realized every single one of them possessed some minor imperfection that let you know they were human. The more I looked at this young man, swimming like a dolphin alongside the boat, the more inhuman I found him.
    “What are–” I started in a fierce whisper.
    The young man dove beneath the waves.
    The wind surged. I clutched the railing so tightly that my knuckles turned white. My bracelet was freezing against my wrist. I waited for gray mist to curl off the water, for a gap to appear in the sky filled with unearthly light. I waited for danger.
    But nothing happened.
    Kolur slept on.
    The Penelope continued on her path to the north.
    The ocean was empty.

CHAPTER 4
     
    Three days passed and I didn’t see the boy again. I wasn’t frightened of him, exactly, but when I crept up on deck at night, I wasn’t certain I wanted to see him. I thought he might be part of the reason Kolur was sailing us north.
    After those three days, I decided not to keep myself locked in the cabin during the day. It was too much, being alone with my thoughts like that, with all my anger and frustration and confusion swirling around inside my head. I didn’t want to hide – I wanted answers. Besides, fuming in my cabin was even more boring than doing chores.
    When I finally wandered up on deck, nothing had changed: Frida still mapped out our path through the water. Kolur still steered at the wheel.
    “Decided to join us, huh?” Kolur grinned. It was colder now than it had been a few days ago, despite the sun shining up in the clouds. No heat charms burned on the deck. I thought about Mama’s garden back in Kjora, all the seeds tucked into the mud and waiting for the air to turn so they could punch their way up to the surface. Henrik and I had helped