Soulwoven: Exile

Chapter One

~1~

One hundred days before the destruction of Nutharion City

The black rocks rose.

The black rocks fell.

The black rocks rose.

The black rocks fell.

“It’s not working,” Cole muttered into his sleeves.

He leaned on the railing of an old Aleani fishing vessel. The sea frothed and heaved. A wide, taut sail snapped and creaked over his head. In front of him, a series of flat rocks bobbed in the waves.

His stomach tumbled and rolled and dropped until he could barely pick out which direction was up anymore.

“Just hang in there,” Dil said. Her hand rubbed slow, gentle circles on his back.

His stomach tried to throw up, but there was nothing in it. He dug his fingernails into the railing and grimaced.

The fit passed, and he let his head slump again.

“I thought they said we’d see land by now.”

“They did.” Dil’s fingers continued their circling. “It’s out beyond the rocks, hidden in the fog.”

Cole raised his head. There was a heavy bank of clouds beyond the flat-topped rocks. He couldn’t see anything inside it other than spots of lighter and darker gray.

“Ugh,” he said.

He put his back against the rail and slid down until he reached the deck. Aleani sailors bustled in front of him in flashes of blue and brown and white. He shut his eyes and pressed his fingers against his temples.

“Do you want some water?” Dil asked.

He nodded, and her feet danced away.

The Aleani had sent a ship, but it hadn’t exactly been what he was hoping for.

The Skellup was maybe forty feet long and ten wide. It was crewed by seven tanned, bearded fishermen from some town in the Aleani borderlands that Cole had never heard of. The ship seemed seaworthy, but it was slow, the area belowdecks was crammed and stank of fish, and there almost always seemed to be somebody working its bilge pump.

Only the captain spoke any Eldanian. When Quay asked why the Skellup had been sent to find them, the red-capped Aleani had spit over the side of the ship and muttered about crimes and judgment.

Cole wondered what sort of welcome they’d get when they reached Du Fenlan.

The wind raced over his neck, and he shivered.

He felt squashed and adrift, as if all the months of pent-up change that had started with Litnig’s dream were crashing down on him all at once. He no longer had a mother, no longer had a home, no longer had the thieves who’d been his adopted family for so long.

All he had left was Litnig, Dil, and Quay, and Litnig was changing too. There were times that Cole looked in his eyes and couldn’t find the brother he’d grown up with.

Those times scared him.

A lot.

Thunder grumbled in the northern sky. Cole felt a storm coming, even over his pulsing nausea. The air was getting heavier. The wind ripped like a wild beast out of the endless ocean.

Dil’s footsteps returned.

“Here,” she said.

Cole took a cup of water from her and sipped it. He hadn’t been able to keep more than the thinnest broth down at sea, and his body was starting to feel weak and jittery.