Chapter 40 Parting
The port town of Sono.
In a lonely corner of the wharf, a warehouse with a discolored tin roof stood silently. Rain pipes rusted by the relentless sea breeze dangled from the eaves. With each gust of wind, the pipes knocked together in a mournful rattle. The sea looked dead, the color of an old bruise. The smell of brine swept through the mostly deserted streets. Even though Sono was a port town, there was no hustle and bustle there. The people who walked the winding streets did so with a sluggish gait.
Sono couldn’t keep up with the changing times. Too late did it think to attract the sea merchants that prospered with the development of the sailship. Too late did it establish itself as a dependable land route for merchants. Once a fishing town, Sono also lacked the know-how to process goods the northern and southern continents wanted. Those who tried to trade soon realized that the same warehouses they used for holding fish couldn’t be used for cloth and furniture. The antiques sold to sailship merchants required delicate handling, but the thick-fingered fishermen of Sono simply lacked the skill needed to ensure safe handling. In desperation, they looked for ways they could accept goods at their port and then ship them to other towns for restoration and resale—they held meetings and formed committees that bickered into the late hours of night. Unfortunately for Sono, sailship merchants have a keen nose for incompetence, and they soon took their business to brighter ports.
The working men of Sono were not true seafarers, after all. They were merely fishermen. When industry clouded the waters and they saw they could no longer make their living off the sea, they cut their lines and left town. Those who remained clung to their ever-thinning purses as the economy of Sono sputtered and stalled.
Yet, as time passed, and the industrial and shipping ports of Hataya and Dakla saw their fortunes peak, the USN government began to regulate and control the shipping business in the busier towns. Ironically, fortune smiled upon the little port of Sono. In the wake of regulation, there were many sailship merchants without the wherewithal to get official permits for trade. These were men of little means and even less influence with the government. With courage and eagerness, these businessmen brought their own special kind of industry to Sono.
Smuggling.
Within a few years, the black market became a vital source of income for the town. Officially, no one knew about it, yet those looking for alternate, non-government-regulated sea routes found friends in Sono. Smuggling was the only means left for the people of Sono to keep their town alive. The business carried the promise of added value too: here there were thrills one couldn’t find in other towns by other means.
The warehouses that stood shoulder to shoulder facing the sea looked like itinerant workers trawling for employment. One of these warehouses bore a clenched-fist icon—the trademark of a small shipping company. The office on the second floor was drenched with the stench of sea and mold, and the warped window frames gave it a rather shabby look. But not a single employee cared a whit about the appearance of their office space. The old ankha man who ran the company lived on a ship moored in the harbor. This saved him the money it would take to buy or rent other lodgings. Plus, he could maintain the ship himself, thus saving even more money.
No employees or customers ever came to the office. It was simply a holding tank for anyone who desired secret passage to the northern continent. Since newcomers to Sono attracted a lot of attention, the captain had to accept the fact that it was safer to keep his clients locked away and out of sight. He didn’t want Highlanders sniffing around his business.
It wasn’t such a burden, in any case. Ships could make the passage northward only three or four times a year. It was not as though he had to hide someone year-round. Usually, the time between when clients arrived and when they left was only a few nights—four or five at the most. As soon as the starseers gave word that weather was favorable, he would cram his clients into the bottom of his sailship, and head out. After that, he would never have to see them again.
But this latest customer proved a bit more trouble.
He was a young man, and he was in an incredible hurry. He kept saying he wanted to go to the north, the tone of his voice almost threatening. He wanted to leave that very night, even though he had arrived several days before any ship could hope to make the crossing. In the end, the captain had lost his temper with the man.
The ships can’t go if the winds don’t blow, he shouted. Even when the time was right, they had to go out in such a way as to not catch the attention of the watchful branch. If those conditions weren’t satisfactory, said the captain, the man was welcome to go elsewhere. At that, the man flew into a rage and kicked a chair against the wall. When he tried to leave the warehouse, he fell down the stairs. It wasn’t that his foot slipped—he had simply collapsed. In his excitement, he seemed to have gotten dizzy and then simply passed out.
The captain was at a loss. He could kick the man out on the street, but if word of suspicious behavior reached the local branch, they would surely come sniffing around. The smugglers had long since learned the art of buying the law’s favor. But there were some among the Highlanders who could not be bought, and, on occasion, the branch in Sono had to make some arrests to please the high chief in Arikita. One could never tell when a crackdown was coming. Caution was mandatory.
There was nothing to be done about it. The captain dragged the unconscious young man back into his office and put him on the thread-bare couch. The man had been carrying very few possessions. The only thing he clutched was a bundle of paper that he held in his arms like it was more important than life itself. He was terribly thin, and the clothes he wore were in rags. The sole of his one shoe was missing, and his foot was covered with blisters. There were cuts on his hands too, like a rope burns, making the captain wonder if he had been climbing some mountain somewhere.
Stranger still was that even before the young man had regained consciousness, another person came asking after him—this one a boy. He looked like an ankha starseer, or perhaps he was actually a sorcerer. He wore a long black robe that went down to his ankles, and he carried a staff topped with a heavylooking gem. Yet he was only eleven or twelve years old at the most. He, too, wanted to go north.
“You with him?” The captain asked.
The boy glanced at the pale face of the young man lying on the floor. “No, not with him. I merely knew that he was going north, and that if I followed him, I could go there as well.”
From the utter lack of concern in the boy’s voice, the captain concluded that he actually didn’t know the other man. When he had looked at him he hadn’t raised so much as an eyebrow. Pretty cold for such a young one, the captain thought.
But the boy who looked like a sorcerer said he had money. The captain, not being in the business of taking people at their word, took a down payment. He was about to ask how the boy had made the money when he thought better of it. On second thought, I don’t really want to know.
The youngster helped himself to the paper bundle the unconscious man had held so dearly. He nodded and smiled as he examined its contents.
“What’s that, then?” the captain asked.
“None of your business.”
“Hmph, you sure are a brazen lad, aren’t you.”
“I’m a customer.”
The contents of the package appeared to be some sort of diagram, but of what, the captain couldn’t say.
When, at last, the young man regained consciousness, he began speaking earnestly and in a hushed tone with the boy. The captain brought food and water up to the office and caught snatches of their conversation. It was mostly the boy who was speaking.
“I heard about you from the Precept-King…”
“The mirror will be broken for sure…”
“I don’t care what it is you want…”
No matter what he said, the boy always seemed aloof and uncaring—though the words he said made little sense. The young man seemed utterly cowed and unable to put up much of a defense. Before long he was bowing his head and begging the boy to join him on his journey northward. It turned out that the young man’s down payment to the captain had been the whole of his funds. He was going to take passage and leave me short half my income for the month.
Because of the unusual circumstances, the captain took great pains to keep his clients in the office and out of sight. Thankfully, the boy and the young man did not seem interested in venturing outside at all. This worked well for the captain, who didn’t fancy spending any more time with them than he had to. Whenever he did have to say something, the boy favored him with a look cold enough to freeze a man solid.
The oddness of the situation grew daily. As it happened, the boy seemed quite well-heeled for his age, and his staff surely had value. The captain, for his part, began having thoughts about stealing the staff and selling it for some extra money.
Of course, the captain kept his thoughts to himself. There could be no way the boy suspected anything. But once when he was bringing his clients their meal, the captain’s eyes drifted over to the staff leaning against the wall. Quite suddenly, one of the crude desks that sat in the office leaped from where it was standing, slid across the uneven floorboards, and slammed into the wall between the captain and the staff. No one had pushed it; it moved by itself. The captain was shocked.
Chuckling to himself, the boy sat on the tattered sofa, dangling his feet over one of the armrests. “Don’t get any ideas,” he said. Then, just as suddenly, the desk jumped back to where it had been before. A jar of ink and an old pen stand clattered to the floor.
The gemstone on top of the staff glowed: first red, then a light green, then blue, and finally amber.
Furiously mumbling a prayer to the Goddess under his breath, the captain fled the room. He really is a sorcerer. That really was magic. Oh, what have I gotten myself into?
Already it had been five days since these two strange clients had arrived.
Opening the door to the warehouse and going inside, the captain drew the security bar firmly shut behind him. This was his custom whenever he had clients. He began the climb up to the second-floor office.
Word had come at last. They would leave after sunset that night. To be honest, the captain was relieved. He wanted to get these two out of his office as soon as possible. On the other hand, the thought of spending two weeks at sea with the young sorcerer gave the captain indigestion. It may be high time for me to start looking for another profession.
He had made it to the first landing on the stairs when he heard someone yelp in pain. The captain froze. What was that? Whose voice was that? What is that little sorcerer up to now?
For a moment, he didn’t know what to do. Should he run upstairs to see what the problem was? Or should he run downstairs to safety? In that instant of indecision, he heard another sound, this time more like a sobbing sigh. Then there was a shout, and the tinted glass window of his office shattered. A moment later, the door itself swung outward, slamming into the wall. Shards of glass fell down the stairs, coming to rest at the captain’s feet.
The captain looked stunned. If a cold wind—impossibly cold—hadn’t blown down from the top of the staircase, he might have stood there forever. As it was, the brisk sting of the wind on his face brought him back to his senses. He began crawling up the stairs on all fours, brushing shards of glass off his face, out of his hair and whiskers.
“Wh-what in the name of chaos was that?!” he shouted, fearfully sticking his head through the office door. Then, he sneezed. A wind cold as ice was blasting against his face. It felt like his ears would freeze off.
The boy was standing against the wall. Something was curled up at his feet.
A lump of ice.
It was shaped like a person. The body was twisted, and the expression on his face was one of abject fear.
“What…is that?”
The boy shrugged. “Your customer.”
“Th-th-that young man?”
“Did you have another?”
Still on the floor, the captain crawled like an infant over to where the boy was standing. “What happened? Why did he freeze? Why is it so cold in here?” The captain looked up at the sorcerer, his eyes wide. “Did you do this? Y-you cast a spell on him, didn’t you?”
“Not I.” The boy sorcerer shook his head. “If I had to guess, I’d say it was judgment.”
“Judgment?”
“Yes, you know, the wrath of the heavens and all that. Looks like the Goddess finally passed judgment on Dela Rubesi and this one here tried to escape. Quite clearly, he failed.” The boy sorcerer turned with a whirl of his black cloak and picked up the bundle of papers from beside the frozen man’s pillow.
“You can’t take that…”
“Why not? It’s certainly not doing him any good now. But I may have some use for it.”
“Yeah, but that doesn’t belong to you, boy,” the captain said, deciding that perhaps this boy was just a boy after all, and in need of a scolding.
The black-haired sorcerer raised an eyebrow. “Nor to him,” he said, pointing the rolled bundle of papers at the block of ice on the floor. “He stole it from someone else. He didn’t write it himself, that’s for sure.” He shrugged. “So, when do we leave?”
For a second, the captain had no idea what he was talking about. “Leave? Ah, this evening. Leaving at night would be better, but there’ll be no moon in the sky, and it’s too dangerous to sail out in the dark. We’ll wait until the branch guards have finished their rounds, and set sail.”
“I see. More waiting. Great.”
The captain shivered, half from the cold, half from fear. “What do we do about this…ice?”
“Leave it. Ice melts.”
Melt? The captain recalled the young man’s face. He had last seen him that morning. “Won’t it, er, bleed?”
“I don’t think I’d worry about that, but if it bothers you, I can easily clean this up.”
The captain swallowed. His mouth was suddenly very dry. “What if the branch…finds out?”
“The branch? Oh, right, those Highlanders or some such rabble,” the boy sorcerer said, sounding not at all concerned.
“Yes, them. If they decide to search us, we won’t be able to leave. Get on their bad side, and things won’t be easy for either of us.”
“Don’t worry, I won’t leave a trace of my work,” the boy said with a grin that sent another chill down the captain’s spine. He gritted his teeth, regretting for what must have been the hundredth time taking on such a client.
Just then, something banged on the door downstairs hard enough that the captain feared the bar might fly off the latch. Someone was shouting from the street outside. “Captain! You up there? Open up! Branch chief wants to ask you some questions.”
The captain looked at his client. He could feel his stomach rise into his throat, but the boy seemed calm as ever. “It seems we have some visitors,” the boy said, standing. “Could your ship leave this moment if it had to?”
“A-aye, she’s ready for sea.”
“Then let’s leave.”
“But we won’t make it out of harbor with the branch following us.”
“You just worry about getting us to your ship. I’ll get us out to sea.” The boy sorcerer picked up his staff, and the gem on its tip flared brightly.
Wataru, Meena, and Kee Keema parted ways with Jozo in the forest along the border gate between Arikita and Bog. Jozo offered to take them all the way to Sono, and he even flew over the border once, but after they passed a few villages, they noticed they were causing quite a commotion on the ground. Dragons were rare creatures, but in industrialized Arikita, they had been largely relegated to the stuff of fairy tales. Jozo told them that the air in Arikita was the dirtiest of any place in the southern continent. Dragons tended to steer clear of the area, thus the general surprise at their passage.
With people already astir, the last thing they wanted was to cause any further trouble. Nor did Wataru want to involve Jozo in problems not his own. So they turned back, allowed Jozo to return to the Isle of Dragon, and made their way to the border on foot. Once at the border’s gatehouse, they decided not to share their experiences at Dela Rubesi. Instead, they talked about the warehouse in Sono. A karulakin messenger was dispatched to the branch office. Wataru, Meena, and Kee Keema set off after him.
When they arrived at the branch in Sono, everyone had already left for the warehouse. The only ones left behind were a director and a communications officer. The sailship company bearing the mark of the yellow fist was a small operation run by an old ankha sea captain, who apparently had been involved in several smuggling operations. Wataru was relieved to hear they were on the right track, but he caught Kee Keema scowling out of the corner of his eye.
“What’s wrong?” he asked quietly.
“I’ve got a feeling that the branch here has been letting this smuggling stuff slide for while,” the waterkin whispered back.
Wataru had heard of similar things happening in the real world. Sometimes it made more sense for the police to cooperate with crime than try to stamp it out. “Still,” he assured Kee Keema, “they’re doing everything they can to stop it now—high chief’s orders and all.”
“I suppose you’re right.”
It wasn’t long before one of the Highlanders who had gone to the warehouse came running back. The captain wasn’t there, he reported. Still, there were signs that people had been living in the second-floor office, and something else…
“It’s a little hard to believe, but there’s someone up there, frozen. Or rather, it’s like a lump of ice in the shape of a person.”
The three exchanged glances. Meena gasped. “The fugitive…”
So he hadn’t been able to escape the punishment of Dela Rubesi. The Goddess’s wrath had found him all the way here in Sono. But if she could do that, why would she go to the trouble of appearing before the chiefs to tell them to capture the fugitive?
Wataru frowned. “Was anything unusual found in the office? Something like a blueprint—it might be a bundle of papers, or a tube.”
“Well, it was kind of messy up there. Most of the Highlanders went down to the harbor. We don’t know where the captain is, so we needed to check out his sailship.”
“Then we’ll go to the warehouse and check it out. Is that okay?” Wataru asked, turning to the chief.
“It’s fine by me.”
Before the chief could finish, the entire branch building shook. The building itself was a simple structure of wooden planks topped by a tin roof and was quite old. The first jolt made the rafters squeak. The second and third rattled the windows out of their frames and sent shock waves through the floorboards, making it difficult to stand.
“What’s going on?!”
Wataru thought it was an earthquake. But Meena corrected him. “Tornado!” she screamed as she looked out the window.
Everyone ran outside. Meena was right. It was a tornado, and not just one; several twisting columns of air, one hundred feet high, rose all around the town. And they were moving in the same direction. Coming together. The simple, decrepit buildings in their path were shattered and smashed, scattered far and wide. The tornadoes pressed on. Toward the sea.
“That way’s the harbor, right?” Wataru shouted over the roar of the wind, pointing in the direction they were headed.
“Yeah,” the branch chief shouted back. “Those twisters’ll rip our sailships apart!”
In Wataru’s mind he replayed the scene at Triankha Hospital. The cyclone there had snatched up all those believers, leveled the thick-growing sula woods, and whisked Wataru all the way off to the Swamp of Grief on the far side of the continent. Mitsuru had done that with his wind magic.
Mitsuru’s at the harbor.
“I have to go!” Wataru shouted. Behind him, the branch building collapsed in a pile of rubble.
Running down the twisting streets of Sono toward the harbor, Wataru watched roofs ripped off warehouse homes and wooden pilings tossed and splintered. Windows broke, and rain gutters were twisted and ripped away. Things were falling and breaking everywhere. People ran out of their homes, hands over their heads, trying to escape. An old lady watched, astonished as her laundry was torn out of her hands, clothesline and all. Wataru saw her mouthing the words “My apron,” over and over. Dogs and cats were whipped into the air. Trees too. Wataru saw an oven slide up into one of the whirling vortexes.
Still the tornadoes advanced, and Wataru, Kee Keema, and Meena ran after them. Wherever the tornadoes had passed, people stood in shock and silence. As the three drew nearer to the tornadoes, the twirling winds buffeted them. Undaunted, Kee Keema forged onward, picking up a wooden door that had blown from somewhere along the way. He used it as a shield to block flying objects.
“Hang on to me!” Kee Keema shouted over the wind. Wataru hunched down, clinging to Kee Keema’s waist with both hands and putting his head against the waterkin’s broad back. Meena did the same, wrapping her tail around Wataru’s torso for good measure.
They were only a street away from the harbor now. They could see the quays from the road.
And then the wind stopped. Everything that had been lifted into the air suddenly came plummeting down. Wataru and his friends looked up into the sky over the harbor.
The tornadoes—ten in all—were floating over the sea. They were gathered near a single sailship, tied to one of the wharfs. They were no longer exactly tornadoes, either. Each of them had become like a round ball of wind, bobbing in the air, slowly rising and falling.
The harbor was perfectly calm. The sailship surrounded by the windspheres was an old craft with a leaning mast. The mark of the yellow fist on its side was almost completely worn away. Practically everything on the ship was rusted. Its sails were down, and only the mainmast stood, like a sickly tree stripped of all its leaves. Still, the ancient-looking craft sat calmly on the water, rocking gently with the slow movement of the waves. The other ships in the water sailed nearby with their sails hanging limp from the masts, as though nothing had happened.
Wataru and Meena started running toward the ships. A second later, Kee Keema tossed aside his wooden door and joined them.
The wooden quay was ancient, with yawning gaps between the boards. Wataru caught glimpses of the water below. Sticking his foot through a rotted plank, he came to an abrupt stop.
“Mitsuru!” he shouted, wringing the last ounce of strength out of his body.
The back door of the captain’s cabin opened, and a small male figure walked out toward the stern. He was wearing a sorcerer’s black robe.
Mitsuru.
In one hand he held his staff. His other hand gripped the gunwale. His expression showed half surprise and half amusement. “Oh, it’s you.”
Wataru could hear the waves lapping against the quay. Seabirds that had flown away from the tornadoes in fright were slowly beginning to circle back to shore.
“What are you doing here?”
“That’s my line!” Wataru shouted back. He caught a glimpse of someone moving behind Mitsuru in the cabin. That must be the old captain.
“I’m crossing the sea in this sailship. We’re about to set sail,” Mitsuru said, his voice ringing clear over the water, even though he didn’t seem to be shouting.
“What, to the Northern Empire?”
Mitsuru didn’t answer. He was inspecting the balls of air floating above his head as one would examine a piece of machinery. The twisters that had so violently smashed their way through town just moments before were now tamed, floating in their translucent spheres, spinning in silence.
“Is there some other place I might go?” Mitsuru asked.
Wataru began to walk toward the sailship. One step, then another. Meena and Kee Keema started to follow him, but he waved them back. “Why are you going to the north?”
“Isn’t it obvious? That’s where my next gemstone is.”
In response, the gemstone atop the staff in Mitsuru’s hand begin to glimmer: first red, then green, blue, and finally, amber.
Four colors. He already has four colors.
Wataru realized all at once that his Brave’s Sword and Mitsuru’s staff collected gemstones quite differently. His sword added gemstones into the fixtures on its hilt. But Mitsuru’s staff seemed to absorb energy and power from the collected gemstones.
“Just one more,” Mitsuru said, looking at his staff. “And that’s in the north. That’s why I have to go.”
“And you were too busy to listen to what the Precept-King in Dela Rubesi had to say?”
Mitsuru’s dark eyes opened wide. “Oh, so you went to Dela Rubesi, then?”
“We did.”
“You’re too nice for your own good. I figured even you wouldn’t waste your time there.”
Wataru ignored the chiding tone in Mitsuru’s voice and stared back at him. “Dela Rubesi is gone. The Precept-King is dead.”
Mitsuru said nothing.
“The fugitive is dead too, frozen solid even while he lived. You know, don’t you?”
Mitsuru continued to remain silent, his hair blowing freely in the breeze. Wataru noticed that his hair was longer now than it had been when they met at the hospital.
“You were with the fugitive, weren’t you? You knew he was going north, so you used him to find passage, didn’t you?”
“He was a source of information,” Mitsuru said, simply. “And he did beg me. You know, he didn’t even have enough money to pay his own fare.”
“Where are the diagrams the fugitive was carrying?” Wataru asked, his eyes never leaving Mitsuru’s face.
Mitsuru laughed, his eyes narrowing. That was answer enough. Wataru faced the stern of the sailship and stretched out his hand. “Give them to me. Now.”
“Why?” Mitsuru shot back.
“If the Northern Empire gets its hands on those, all of the south will be in grave danger.”
Mitsuru’s smile widened. “You sure are funny sometimes.”
“I don’t see what’s funny about it.”
“What’s so dangerous about plans for a powered boat?”
Wataru was getting impatient. “What? You don’t know? You don’t understand? I have trouble believing that.”
“Sorry, I’m not really up on my current events.” Mitsuru yawned. “I hardly know anything about the south. I know even less about the north, save that’s where I have to go.” Mitsuru turned his eyes back toward the town of Sono—or what was left of it after his sorcery had reduced half the houses to rubble. “I didn’t come here to sightsee, Wataru. And I don’t have time to care what happens to the place. I’ve got my hands full trying to finish my journey.” He smiled. “But you—you sure have been taking a few detours. What’s with that wristband of yours? I noticed it the last time we met. That’s the mark of a Highlander, or something, isn’t it? Defenders of safety and peace in Vision? You sure have a lot of time on your hands.”
Mitsuru’s words stung far more than he had intended, and far more than Wataru had expected they might. He thought he knew why he was here, what he was doing. And yet the words still hurt.
“What do I care about the north or the south? Nothing. Think about it, Wataru. Take Arikita, for instance…” Mitsuru spread his arms on the stern of the boat like an orator giving a speech. “A town of mines and industry. Everything is done by manpower, quite primitive, if you ask me. But eventually, someone will discover mechanical power, I’m sure. It’s just a matter of time. Vision must advance, as our own world did. Why are you so scared of something that would help it along its way?”
“Because those blueprints aren’t from here. They aren’t of this world,” Wataru replied without hesitation. “I’m sure you’re right, Mitsuru. I’m sure they’ll invent those things in time, but that time hasn’t come yet. Those blueprints are from the real world. It’s not right.”
“What’s not right about it? Wait, on second thought, I don’t really care. Let’s just say I need these blueprints. So, I can’t give them to you.”
“What could you possibly need them for?” Wataru said, his voice sounding whiny in his own ears.
“I’m going to offer a trade to the emperor, Gama Agrilius VII,” Mitsuru replied coolly. “You see, the last gemstone that I need just happens to be set in the Imperial Crown of the Northern Empire.”
Wataru felt the blood drain from his body. If he looked down, he fully expected to see his blood leaking through the rotting boards of the quay to mingle with the sea water below.
“An Imperial Crown! He won’t just give it to me if I ask nicely. That’s why I need something he’ll want so much that he’s willing to deal. To tell the truth, I had no idea what I’d do until the Precept-King in Dela Rubesi gave me a call. Too bad I won’t be able to return the favor.”
The friendship Wataru felt toward Mitsuru evaporated in a flash. In its place now burned a fierce anger. “Something he’ll want so much?”
“That’s right. The North is trying to invade the South. I know that much at least.”
“So to get your fifth gemstone, you’ll just sell the entire southern continent to the Empire? Do you even realize what you’re doing?!”
The chiding look melted from Mitsuru’s face, replaced by concern. “Mitani, are you okay?”
He’s really worried. Wataru had no idea why. What is he saying?
“You’re babbling, Wataru. Hallucinating.”
“I’m not.”
“You are. Have you forgotten why you came through the Porta Nectere? Was it to become a Highlander? Was it to make lots of friends and live here in Vision forever? I don’t think so.”
Wataru fell silent. His head swirled with things he wanted to say, but he couldn’t find the words for any of them.
“You came here to change your fate in the real world, Wataru. Vision isn’t for us. If we can’t change our fate and go home, then we’ve come all this way for nothing. You’ve forgotten the most important thing.”
Wataru was speechless.
Wataru remembered being scolded by his father once. He hadn’t agreed with something he said, and his father took the time to methodically destroy each of his arguments. You’re wrong, Wataru. You’re so wrong, you can’t even see it. You’ll just have to accept it.
“I haven’t forgotten what I’m here for,” he finally managed to say in a quiet voice. Mitsuru heard him. Or rather, he knew that was what Wataru was going to say.
“No, you have forgotten. You need to clear your head and give this some thought,” Mitsuru said with a sigh. Then he picked up his staff in his left hand. “Sorry, but I’m in a bit of a hurry. I can’t sit here waiting for you. Once the designs are delivered to the North, it will only be a matter of time before the invasion begins. Things are bad here now, but they’re going to get much worse before this is all over. Say, how many gemstones do you have? If riots—or war—come to the south, finding them won’t be so easy. You might want to get going.”
“It doesn’t matter. If you get to the Tower of Destiny before I do, it won’t matter if I’ve found the gemstones or not. The one left behind becomes the Half.”
Mitsuru had begun to walk away from the stern, but now he turned back, surprised. “The Half? What’s that?”
So there were some things Mitsuru didn’t know. Wataru was surprised, and at the same time pleased. “A sacrifice from the real world is required to remake the Great Barrier of Light,” Wataru said simply. He hadn’t bothered to go into all the detail, but it seemed that Mitsuru understood.
“I see,” he said curtly, nodding. His eyes were wide open.
For the space of a breath, there was silence. Seabirds cried in the distance.
Then Mitsuru continued, as calmly as before, “Then I must hurry all the more. It’s apparent that our best interests lie contrary to each other. Now it seems that there will be a winner and a loser in our little contest. We can’t both win, Wataru. That’s a stroke of bad luck, eh?”
Wataru wasn’t sure what reaction he had expected. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t picture Mitsuru looking alarmed, let alone frightened. In the end, his reaction was quintessentially Mitsuru. Mitsuru had come to Vision and become stronger.
Wataru blinked back tears. He told himself he wasn’t sad. It’s the sea breeze. It’s the dust stirred up by the twisters.
“Wataru.”
Meena stood standing by his side. Kee Keema was there too.
“What you just said…is it true?” Meena asked, her voice trembling. Wataru nodded quietly.
“That’s ridiculous,” Kee Keema growled. His voice seemed tiny in comparison to his giant frame. “I don’t believe it. Not a word. I don’t believe the Goddess would ever choose you as a sacrifice!”
Wataru looked up into Kee Keema’s big face. He found comfort in those round, kind eyes.
“But you believe that someone from Vision must be sacrificed, don’t you? It’s the same thing.”
“It’s not the same!”
“It is. The only difference is that, in Vision, one is chosen from many, and from the real world, well, it’s just me and Mitsuru to choose from.”
Wataru grabbed Kee Keema’s arm. “The Elder in Sakawa, he knew this. He told me I shouldn’t stray from my course.”
Suddenly, it seemed like Kee Keema had shrunk a full size. “The Elder…” the big waterkin fell silent.
I’m sorry, Kee Keema.
“When did you know this? Why didn’t you tell us sooner? We’re your friends!”
“I know.”
“If we knew earlier, then me and Meena, well, we would have moved quicker, so you could meet the Goddess sooner…we want to help you.”
Kee Keema’s eyes were watering. Wataru felt his own eyes begin to tear up. He jerked his head back toward the sailship. “Mitsuru!”
“What is it now?”
“What would you do if I…” Even as he asked the question, Wataru knew the answer. Why do I do this to myself? “What if I said that I don’t care about peace in the south? What if I told you that I came here to get those blueprints just to stop you from getting your final gemstone? What then?”
“What then?”
“What would you do?”
Mitsuru replied without a moment’s hesitation, his voice clear and strong. “Then I would’ve faced you.” In battle. Mitsuru stared directly into Wataru’s eyes. “And I would’ve won. I’m stronger. We both know that.”
The strength was sapped from Wataru’s body. Meena, unable to restrain herself any longer, ran to his side for support. Addressing Mitsuru, she shouted, “You call yourself a friend? Do you even have a heart?”
Mitsuru stood smiling, both hands on his staff. He didn’t even look in Meena’s direction.
He lifted the gemstone-tipped staff above his head and began to chant. His voice was too low to be heard from where they stood, but the effect of his words soon became clear.
This spheres of wind hovering above the sea began to stir. They broke apart for a second before coming together as one. Soon they had transformed into a great cloak of wind, wrapping itself around the sailship. Gently, Mitsuru’s sailship rose from the surface of the sea. Riding on a platform of wind, it lifted into the air.
Wataru looked up and made eye contact with Mitsuru. “Goodbye,” he heard him say.
The cloak of wind around the ship undulated, then extended, becoming a tube that stretched out over the endless sea. The sailship carrying Mitsuru slid along it, disappearing into the distance.
Wataru watched it recede, becoming smaller, and finally disappearing where the sky and the sea became one.
He’s gone.
“They’re already out to sea,” Kee Keema said, stunned. “If they can ride like that, there’s no way we’ll catch them by sailship. Once they’re out on the open water, even if his magic runs out, they’ll have the wind in their sails to take them to the north.”
Meena grasped Wataru’s arm with a trembling hand.
—Goodbye.
Wataru had seen a light flash deep in Mitsuru’s eyes. It was a spark, he thought, that reflected an ongoing internal conflict. Despite what he said, Mitsuru was still grappling with a difficult moral dilemma. Would he do the right thing or continue pursuing his personal agenda?
Or maybe there wasn’t a light in his eyes at all. Maybe the conflict was in me—between the half of me that’s given up already, and the other half of me that wants to win. Who’s right? Me or Mitsuru?
So, Wataru thought, which is it?