21 Seagulls

EPILOGUE

In his cabin, the captain welcomed old Karil. The old man, grim as usual, sat, and with his body language, demanded the captain sat opposite him. Mascardi accepted the invitation eagerly.

“I see her in my sleep, captain,” he reminded him, with his eyes shining again with the sheen of sadness and anger. “Damn my seed, Mascardi, you promised…”

Mascardi raised a hand and interrupted him. “I’ve given you my word, Karil; that doesn’t change. We are already on the way. I don’t know what our destination is, and neither do you, but by Revedon and Theanivar, we will find her.”

Karil poured himself some rum and emptied his cup in one swig. “By the Mother and the Daughter and their heavy Veil,” he grunted. “All daughters must die.”

The sentence echoed heavily in Mascardi’s ears. He remembered Vario’s young girl, who fell into the swollen waves as if she were made of air. Sorrow weighed on his heart, but he raised his eyes to Karil.

“You have my word. It is a matter of a few days. All you have to do is wait and tell me all you see.”

“By the gods, you think I don’t know?” Karil scolded him. His body stood strong, his spine straight. A primal ferocity had reminded him how to stand.

“Know this, lad. I will be there in that battle. I will do whatever it takes.”

Mascardi was shocked. “Are you sure? I thought you’d never use magic again, only the mushrooms and the Cards.”

Karil poured himself another drink. He drank it more slowly, more calmly, maintaining some of his self-control.

“This is different. I don’t care about anything else, you understand?”

Mascardi nodded.

“Either way, if I don’t use necromancy where we’re going, all of you will die. And when I say all of you, I do mean all of you…”

Mascardi got up and made the round of the cabin like an imprisoned seagull. He looked at the old man again and again, but Karil’s eyes remained focused on the rum. He knew things. He’d seen them, and whatever he saw, came to pass. How many horrors lay ahead? The call of the gods.

Mascardi blew a breath out of his nostrils like a bull, sat for a while longer and they drank together. Afterwards, he thought of the woman on the ship, the open sea, and the gold. He smiled, got up and left.