Karadra's Shipwreck

The Ship - Chapter 16

Alone until late at night, Arsik ruminated over his long conversation with Sentrik. He leaned on the railing and gazed at the unknown world around him. The ship was moving forward at great speed, crossing over waves that faded after it in infinite, identical circles.

His whole life seemed like a joke. He thought he’d seen everything during his years at sea, but there was so much right under his nose. He thought he knew women, but now felt more inexperienced than ever. He thought he knew himself and hadn’t even known someone else dwelled inside him. He knew nothing.

He decided his old life wasn’t worth much. After all, if things had turned out a little differently, he would be working for Golderim Veyr right now, a Saraport archpirate who made people’s lives horrible for his own gain. Arsik would have become one of them. He would have started talking like them and acting like them and feeling like them until, in the end, he would have been fully assimilated into their group.

When he’d been pondering on all that the evening before his execution, these facts hadn’t seemed like a bad idea. There were opportunities there –wealth, entertainment, action, violence, adventure– and he had been ready to embrace it all in order to save his life. Now, though, he had discovered how it felt to save your soul, and that was entirely different and much more valuable.

His thoughts from before disgusted him. How could he have sold himself so cheap? He was ashamed, ashamed of himself, ashamed of what she might think of him.

The force of the wind intensified to a dangerous degree and the ship was now rocking from side to side. Arthax came to the deck occasionally, to glance sharply at the black horizon. He never spoke a word, but his nostrils flared with anger and that was enough.

The sword he’d been gifted by the captain was sheathed in Arsik’s belt. It’d been a long time since he’d wielded a sword, but its size and weight weren’t a challenge. He wondered how it would be, fighting against God killers, ancient mages in the depths of hell. Who would see a hero in Arsik’s eyes? What hope did all of them have? Them, with their miraculous powers – if they indeed possessed such powers; what could they achieve against the doom that broke the world?

Arsik had vowed not to die at sea. Now, he simply hoped not to die, period.

Hastily, he headed to Maestra’s room. There was so much to be discussed, countless questions swirling in his head. He climbed down the stairs below deck and walked past the cabins. He had hoped to find her in his room but when he got there, through the ajar door he saw the place exactly as he’d left it.

He moved on and knocked lightly on her door. No answer. He knocked louder and waited. “Maestra?”

Silence.

“Maestra?” he raised his voice.

He thought about opening anyway, but hesitated. It didn’t feel right, so he left and started searching other parts of the ship.

In the dining hall ‒which was never used during the summer‒ was a long table of carved wood, an oval-shaped mirror over it and plates and jugs all around, dusty and abandoned to their fate. On the wall was mounted a magnificent spear. Arsik trailed his fingers across its length: six feet of almost pure steel, a wrought weapon with an edge that looked like an anchor split in half. “Windcarver” read a golden inscription below it. Arsik blew the dust off it.

After leaving the dining hall, he still couldn’t find her anywhere and returned to the deck. Nothing. Only Arthax was there, sitting at the table, eating his dinner with hearty appetite.

“Have you seen Maestra?” Arsik asked, concerned.

Arthax kept chewing.

“This isn’t a joke, Arthax. I’m looking for her.”

Arthax stopped, juices running down his naked flesh. “Did you lose her?”

Arsik couldn’t face the underlying message in his words right then. He hurried back downstairs, stood outside her door, reached out with his fist but didn’t knock. Eventually, he returned to his room, sat down on his bed and waited for a few seconds. Then he got up again, went to the deck, passed by Arthax and grabbed a bottle of rum. Arthax’s eyes followed him.

Arsik went back to his room, shut the door and started drinking.

***

He woke up in the morning with a heavy head. Not due to some kind of injury – this time, the rum was at fault. His body felt parched, his stomach a dry sponge.

Rising, he took the first –and hardest– steps of the day. Outside the porthole, dawn appeared through a thick grey veil. Unnatural darkness hovered over the horizon, insistent and ominous. The ship was at the moment traveling through a chain of reefs and black rocks.

We are all alone out here.

Arsik exited to the deck and vomited the horrible sensation that’d been torturing him since the previous night. Once again, he’d fallen victim to the traps he set to himself.

Karadra sat alone at an empty table covered by a white cloth. When he approached her, she turned his way as if she knew all along that he would come and smiled at him. Only a few black strands of hair survived on her head. Her eyes bespoke of her suffering.

She gifted him a numb half-smile. Her body was ill – it seemed to be gradually caving in. Blue veins ran under her skin, thin, feeble streams that became more visible on her hairless skull.

Arsik couldn’t help a grimace. “How are you?”

She shrugged. Arsik leaned towards her and laced his fingers.

“Karadra… What is this place we are going? Where is it?”

Karadra blinked slowly and opened her trembling lips. “I am taking us there, Arsik,” she said in a voice carried away by the wind. “When we arrive there, I will know. Trust me.”

And the truth was, he had trusted them, blindly, but Maestra had disappeared the previous day and Arsik felt the distance to her even now. Thoughts started sneaking into his head, fears and doubts.

“How are you?”

Her question startled him. “Me? I… am fine.”

He leaned back and wondered what the point of such questions was from someone who could read minds. He wondered what the point of any conversation with such a person would be. They would know everything before the thoughts even formed in his head. How inevitable would certain things be when living with such a person? How could the captain fall in love with a woman who lived this way?

The last thought escaped him before he could contain it. He raised his eyebrows, eyes bulging while waiting for her reaction. She smiled. “Do not worry, Arsik.”

“I… I am sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

“You do not need to apologize. I am used to it, you know.”

Arsik leaned forward again. “How is this working? How can you live knowing the thoughts of the people around you all the time? How doesn’t it destroy you, knowing what everyone thinks at any given moment? We all think stupid things all the time, things we do not want, ugly things, ridiculous things, even for those who…” He didn’t finish his sentence.

Karadra blinked again. “I am used to it… I was born this way.”

Her words astonished him. Her mind had never had peace. It was already impossible for a mind to stop thinking, but this was unheard of. Even if she did possess the discipline to put her thoughts in order, she had to face other people’s thoughts as well. Inconceivable.

“I can’t even imagine it,” he admitted honestly.

“I understand,” she said. “But consider that we have the power to control other people’s thoughts, consequently ours too, to some extent. It’s not as hopeless as you think.”

This troubled him. “Karadra…” His mouth gaped. “What exactly is a Lich?”

Karadra took a deep breath and coughed, covering her mouth with her hand. “Can I bring you anything?” Arsik offered but she shook her head. Her voice sounded hoarse.

“It is a name,” she said. “More like a title.” Arsik frowned. “The mages used it for a specific ritual.”

“What kind of ritual?”

“An immortality ritual.”

Arsik shivered again. It was way too early in the day for such talk. He looked around him nervously. “Immortality?”

Karadra nodded. “It is a way to transcend mortality. They bend the rules of their body and trick death. They acquire eternal life, but there is a price to pay for it.”

Arsik had never heard anything like this. He had never considered eternal life. His life already seemed too long, and he wasn’t even forty years old. “And what does that mean? That thing is now immortal? Then how…” He was fumbling in the dark for something tangible, something useful, to give him hope.

Karadra shook her head. “They surpass the boundaries of time, they trick certain processes, Arsik, but they do not become indestructible. They can meet their death. Through violence.”

Arsik was impressed by the way she uttered those words. A volcano hid inside her, seething, eager to be unleashed. Arsik couldn’t read minds, but he knew anger when he saw it. “How does it work then?”

Karadra grimaced. “The mage transports his soul elsewhere. He sacrifices his body in the name of eternal life and power and receives both in return.” Arsik gulped. “His body abandons him though. His skin rots and falls off – just like my hair,” she playfully dropped another strand to the floor. Arsik smiled at her with sympathy. “Their soul is stored in an object. They call it a talisman.”

Arsik narrowed his eyes. “A talisman? You mean they put their soul inside an actual object? Like a chair or a sword?”

Karadra nodded. “It’s usually something more resilient and well-hidden. As long as the object remains intact, the mage is practically invincible. Only through the destruction of the object can the mage know what we call true death.”

Arsik started thinking. This piece of information gave him new energy. He may not have the powers that the others had, but an object was something he could certainly find and break into pieces. He was a skilled thief and quick on his feet when he had to be.

“Interesting,” he muttered. “Do we have any clue about our target’s object?”

Karadra shook her head. Her strength seemed to be diminishing. “We don’t have a lot of advantages, Arsik.”

Her words brought his buried fears to the surface. A moment later, though, he pushed them aside again. “Karadra…” he said, and she looked at him. “Can you tell me anything about what I have inside me?”

Her gaze changed, turning inquisitive. She felt her pupils pierce his, seeing behind and through them. A moment later, she smiled at him. “The spirit is asleep, Arsik,” she startled him.

“Asleep? What do you mean, asleep?”

“It is peaceful these days or these hours. I don’t see it near the surface. Whatever you’ve been doing, it’s working. It’s calming you down,” she said, smiling.

Proud, he thought of Maestra. Balm. The word sprung up in his head. He wondered where he’d heard it, and when.

“How can I learn things about the spirit?”

Karadra moved, raising her heavy body and coming to him. She reached out to touch his cheek. Arsik, embarrassed, helped her.

She closed her eyes, concentrating. Twitches broke out on her face – a fluttering of eyelids as if she were having a nightmare. Her facial muscles moved in an unnatural rhythm.

Arsik felt nothing. A moment later, she was back, and they exchanged a look. “He is enraged, Arsik. He is asleep now, but he’s been through a lot. Too much. But he has also caused pain, vast, unimaginable pain, my poor soul.”

Arsik had frozen. Her last words weren’t addressed to him, but to the spirit inside him. Arsik waited.

“Arsik,” she said sharply, close to fainting now. “That man –or boy, because he never became a man– carries an enormous weight on his shoulders. A sin that nothing can ever wash away.” Arsik had paled. “What he did was unforgivable. The pain he left behind, just like the pain he carried inside him, will keep him a prisoner forever.”

He stood up disgusted, feeling violated in a way. He was shouldering something he neither wanted nor needed. He didn’t deserve carrying the burden of such a man. “Why did he come to me? I don’t want him”, he almost shouted. Karadra seemed exhausted as he kneeled next to her. “I know I am burdening you further, I know you feel others’ pain. I am sorry, I don’t want to make this harder for you… It’s just… I don’t know what to do.”

She gazed at him through old eyes. “We are what we are, Arsik. We do not know why we attract the things we attract. We simply carry our burden as best we can, for as long as we can.”

Arsik swallowed and nodded. Karadra frowned. “What is it?” he asked.

“There is something…”

“What?”

“Something worthwhile, a spark of kindness in his darkness. I can feel it.”

“What do you mean? What do you feel? You just told me that this guy did the worst thing you could possibly imagine, in a way.”

“Yes, but he was pushed to that point. He was a victim, for a long time, maybe even years.”

Arsik recoiled. “You are saying that his actions, however horrible they might have been, were justified?”

Karadra shrugged. “I don’t know if this is the right word, but there is something still hovering around him. A positive aura, as faint as a faraway star, but it’s there.”

“Do you feel it? Are you sure?”

Karadra shook her head. “I do not feel it; I hear it. It is a melody. The melody of a violin,” she smiled.

He jerked up again, flinching, mouth forming an ugly crack. “A violin? What violin? Maestra? What are you trying to say, woman?”

The words slipped out of his mouth clumsily. Panic surged in his body, rising to his forehead.

“Not Maestra, Arsik. It is someone else. Maestra is here, with us, alive.”

With that reassurance, Arsik sat back down, trying to calm himself.

“I can feel another person, a man, but the melody and the violin are the same.”

“The same?” he startled. “You mean it’s Maestra’s violin?”

“Yes.”

“How can that be? How is a dead spirit connected to Maestra’s violin?”

“I do not know, but there is a connection, Arsik. That violin is ancient, the magic around it powerful.”

Arsik thought of the peculiar instrument, remembered the melody and Maestra’s words and felt nostalgic over the recent past. He recalled the instrument’s black wood, the song spilling from its insides and, right after, he remembered the melody he’d heard in his oblivion, when he hung between life and death, when the man that called him “Host” had spoken to him for the first and only time. That was when he’d first listened to that melody. It’d been there, with them, hiding behind his words. Right before Maestra saved him, he had heard it, without a doubt. It’d been intense and alive and real and beautiful.

It'd been the last thing he would hear before he died.

“I’d heard it before,” he said, and Karadra nodded as if she’d already read his thoughts. He smiled at her, realizing she’d beat him to it. The subtle itch he felt on his skull whenever she read his thoughts, was there; an itch his fingernails couldn’t scratch.

“Karadra…” he said. “Maestra… Where is she?”

Karadra seemed puzzled. “In her room.”

Arsik felt awkward. “Yes, but I mean, what’s wrong with her? What is it? I was looking for her yesterday. I didn’t find her. She wasn’t answering the door.” He paused. “I want to see her.”

She smiled and shook her head. “Arsik… Maestra has her own story, and surely you must have understood that she carries her own burden as well.”

Arsik felt his heart pounding. “What is it though? What is her burden? I want to help her.”

Karadra’s eyes softened and she caressed his cheek, nearly collapsing by exhaustion. “I am certain she will tell you, Arsik. Give her time.”

That rubbed him the wrong way. “But we don’t have time! We have nothing!”

Upset, he rose to his feet. With her fingertips, Karadra touched her temples. Arsik looked across from them and saw Arthax, realizing their conversation had just ended. Did she summon him with her mind? He glanced at her. Did she just hear that?

The thought annoyed and electrified him. He left hastily, shooting a sharp glare at Arthax as he passed him by, and went downstairs.

He stood outside Maestra’s door. It was ajar now. He pushed it and went inside.