I sat on the bed in the Captain’s quarters, having stripped out of the dress and tugged the red pirate Coat Caleb had previously worn onto my shoulders. The book I had taken from the navigation room lay open in my lap, the words having become a tangled swirl, foggy and distorted from having read too long. My head fell back against the wall, my eyes closing while I recapped what I had read. Gaea had been an herbalist in her time as a mortal, had created medicines from the earth, caring for the people of her town until one day they turned on her. They exiled her to the forest, chasing her away and calling her a witch when she was destined to be far more than just a sorceress. She created a life for herself in those woods until an earth sprite found her there. The sprite would get to know the
