I landed and strolled over to the group, doing my best to look embarrassed. “I’m sorry, my lord,” I apologized in my humblest voice. “I... had to use the privy.”
Lord Loudrum, who oversaw the others while they scrubbed the deck, narrowed his glittering green eyes. “Privy. Right. Go scrub the decks.” He jerked his head over to the other deckhands. “You’re too scrawny to help anywhere else. Grab a bucket and get to work.”
Before I could ask where the buckets or rags were, the lord stalked away, his lean form and willowy, tawny wings vanishing among the sailors working this deck. I craned my head around, trying to figure out how many decks we had to scrub. To my relief, more deckhands worked on other disks of clouds, which meant I probably wouldn’t have to clean all of them.
“You look confused,” a girl near my age said.
She held a bucket and offered an enormous, friendly grin. When I inhaled her blood-scent, the barest hint of flavor came to me: sweet, fresh summer grains and pine nuts. She wore a tattered brown shirt, which was so dirty it might have once been green, and a pair of linen trousers that reached her ribcage. Her sandy hair was tied back, but choppy strands framed her freckled face. The ashy wings of a mourning dove fanned opened and closed behind her.
“Oh, hello.” I glanced at the pail in her hand. “Where do I find the buckets and the rags so I can help out?”
“You can share with me. There’s a spare rag in my bucket.”
She gestured toward the edge of the platform, and we crouched down on our hands and knees. I folded my wings and fished a rag out of the murky water, wrung it out, wadded it up, and did as my companion—scrubbing forward then backward in long, straight lines.
“I’m Frendyl,” I said.
“My name’s Jaecrel, but my friends call me Jae.” She cast me another large grin. “Where are you from?”
“Drüssyevoi.”
“So you’re new, then, huh?”
I shrugged a shoulder. “Just joined this morning. How about you?”
She scooted down and continued to scrub. “I’m from Jaemyvyk myself,” she said, her voice carrying well across the deck even though we worked only a few yards apart. Her wings flexed open and closed as she moved. “I’ve been with the crew for a few months now.”
We fell into companionable silence as we worked, though Jae occasionally jumped to her feet to fetch fresh water. The monotony of the chore soon became all I could focus on, and when I realized the movement began lulling me into sleepiness, I shook my head.
“Looks like it’s time for a break,” Jae said, flashing me a smile.
“How did you end up on the ship?” I asked her. The two of us walked over and sat on the edge of the platform. I dangled my legs in the open air and leaned back on my hands with a smile. The wind up here was so fresh, so wonderful, so free. The constant floating felt quite odd, as the ship would move up and then sink before the casters forced it higher. From what I could tell, they were trying to mimic birdlike flight by using the rise-and-fall motion to save energy.
“Captain Krune caught me trying to steal food over in Jaemyvyk,” Jae said. “He asked me to join his crew, said I’d get three squares a day, a place to sleep, and I’d even earn some money.”
“He’s a good man.”
Jae bobbed her head and broke off a heel of stale bread she retrieved from inside her shirt. “He is. You’re related to him, aren’t you?”
I chuckled. “Is my blood that obvious?”
“It’s not just the blood.” She paused and stretched her arms while she chewed. “Your eyes and wings, mostly. You two have the same of both.” She stared at me for a few moments and then ducked her gaze away, as if realizing how long she’d been gawking. “Anyone can tell you’re a Krune. So tell me, why’re you here, then?”
“Captain Melroc took me on as his apprentice.”
“That seems... odd. He’s a captain; you’re the son of a lord, right?”
“Yeah. My father is high lord of Drüssyevoi.”
“So... shouldn’t you be back home, ordering people around?”
The way she said it was so blunt and cold that I bit back a frown. “I guess I could be, but I wanted to see the world.”
“Why?”
“Because I want to be a knight someday.”
“Sounds interesting.” She stood and stretched her wings and arms. “We should probably get back to work.”
Part of me wanted to flop over and groan, but I pushed the urge aside. If I was going to be a knight one day, I needed to do all in my power to find and capture the amüli Loudrum had freed.
“Is there anyone else new on the ship?” I asked Jae.
She shook her head. “Nope. Just you.”
I sank back to my aching knees and pulled the rag from the bucket of milky water. Back and forth, back and forth, scoot back, dip the rag, and again, scrub back and forth.
When the sun began to sink and the sailors called out for the last of their supplies from the deck, I slowly pulled myself to my feet, hoping the plan I’d formulated about Loudrum would work. I’d been on my hands and knees all day, and my back was stiff. My kneecaps stung, and my shins ached as though I’d walked the ‘Combs fifteen times over. Soon, I’d need to clean out Uncle Melroc’s chambers. I just hoped I’d have enough energy left for that.
Jae sat on a sealed barrel full of clean water. Thump, thump, thump—her heels kicked against the side of the barrel, matching the beat of my Center. “Are you going to stick with us deckhands tomorrow?”
“I think so.”
“You’re going to hurt in the morning. Anyone who just starts out hurts for a while. It’s okay, though. Trust me. You’ll build muscles, then you’ll be fine.” She rolled her left arm, and I caught sight of her blita—the black-and-white tattoo every amüli was given at birth—on her left shoulder. Like my own, hers had a large black swirl, but minute differences set ours apart. Her black swirl aimed upward, while mine hooked downward and met up with a white one.
“Is every day like this?”
