"Oh, yes, indeed." Eneko smiled. "How are you feeling?"
"Um . . . tired." He was, suddenly. But he knew why, now; this leaping about from gull to gull was something that had all come out of his own reserves. "Can I draw on some other power to do this, next time?"
"Only at the risk of being noticed," Eneko warned. "You will make the gull look different to another mage if you start drawing on more power. Just as, if another mage was to try to scry the bird you were riding, he would notice you unless you take care to be very still and not draw attention to yourself."
"But could I scry, say, a bird over Cremona, and ride it?" he hazarded.
"Yes," Lopez said. "But if there was anything watching for you, it would find you. Your risk would be less, once you began riding the bird, but it would still be there."
Marco nodded. "But what about defending myself?" he asked, quietly.
"That will be the next lesson; I want you first to learn how to make yourself so inconspicuous when riding a bird or a beast that a mage will have to be very skilled to find you." Eneko softened his stern look with a little smile. "After all, the very best defense is not to need to defend yourself at all."
Chapter 22
The ships made their way, cautiously, under oars, the leadsman calling depths as ship by ship the first great spring fleet rowed around the sand-spit at the end of the Lido. In the deeper water of the Adriatic, something watched.
If the shaman had been in his own white sea he could have named many of the denizens of the cold deep and sunk all of the vessels above. Here the massive eellike creature that was his sea-form was restricted to watching. He was eighteen cubits long, but that was still not large enough to take on ships. As always his body-shape dictated his appetites. Ships were full of food that would be nice to suck dry.
He flicked his powerful tail, and began swimming southward. Best to see if the other fleet and army was well hidden.
This water was too warm. And the monk seals weren't worth eating.
* * *
The galley had a number of its berths taken by the Vinlanders that Kat had rushed over to see. Maria had watched them for a few days now, and she was fairly certain that the two men who looked like a pair of giant warriors were really nothing much more than boys, not much older than she was. They were very happy to be at sea, and she had the feeling that although they probably were quite fond of their sister, they were also just a little tired of having her fastened to them all the time. Back in Venice, no doubt, they'd been able to get out and about on their own, but here, they were forced into each others' company with no chance for privacy.
Maria came out to put the wicker crib on the deck. Other than the helmsman, the poop deck was empty except for the blond woman—who was dripping tears over the stern of the ship. It looked to Maria as if she might join them, to splash into the water amid the kitchen peelings the cook had just tossed there.
Maria bit her lip. She'd better go over and see what the matter was. After all, the Vinlanders were Kat's grandfather's business partners. And Alessia, looking like a particularly plump and pretty cherub, was fast asleep.
Maria walked over, quietly, moving easily with the rolling of the ship.
"What's wrong?" The Vinlander woman nearly fell overboard.
The woman sniffed, hastily scuffed a sleeve across her eyes, and turned to Maria with a fake smile plastered over a face that still had tear-streaks running down the cheeks. "Nothing. I thank you," she said. "I am well. Truly."
She looked as if she was going to dissolve into tears in the very next moment.
Fine. You and I are the only two women on this ship, young lady. And we're going to the same place. I think we had better be friends.
One thing she had noticed about the Vinlanders was that they seemed to be very direct, in a way that suited Maria's canaler sensibilities. So she decided to be direct, herself.
"No, you aren't well," She put an arm over the blonde's big shoulders. "I'm not blind," she continued, feeling a hundred years older than this poor young thing. "You can tell me what's wrong. I'm a friend of Kat's."
That earned her a look of puzzlement from the woman. "Katerina Montescue. I mean Katerina Valdosta."
"Ah. Ja." The girl sniffed again, and bit her lip—but a tear escaped anyway. "You were with the bride. In the beautiful crimson dress—you are the bride's friend, ja? Such a pretty girl, and such a fine husband. I did not recognize you in those clothes."
It was plain this meant a huge leap in status to the Vinlander, and thus in acceptability as a confidante. "You know them well, then?"
"Kat's my best friend," Maria said, and was a little surprised to realize that it was true. "And her husband is very, very good to my people in Venice." Any more would be too complicated to explain at one sitting. Maybe later.
"I know that your—" she searched her memory for the word that Erik used "—your clan is going to be trading partners with Kat's family, and I know that Kat wouldn't want to see you so unhappy if there was anything she could do to help. So, can I help?"
"I cannot see how," the girl replied mournfully.
"Well, why don't you just tell me about it?" Maria said, reasonably. "That can't do any harm, and it's better than crying here all alone over the turnip peelings."
The girl's face worked for a moment, as if she was trying to hold herself back, but it all came out in a rush, anyway. "I am so unhappy!" she wailed softly, in tones of such anguish that they imparted a sense of heartbreak to the banal words. "I will never see him again!"
For one, sharp-edged moment, Maria was tempted to join her in her tears, for the words called Benito's stricken face up in her own memory. I will never see him again—
But she was older than this poor child—in experience, if not years—and she held onto her composure.
The moment passed. Maria patted the blond woman's arm awkwardly. What the hell did you say to a cry of pain like that? She settled for: "There, there . . ."
Even this provoked another flood of sobbing. "He was such a nice man. The nicest we have met here in all Europe. And so tall, too." How could something that sounded so silly also sound as if the girl had lost her first and only true love?
Tall? Well, that counted out Benito. "Didn't he, I mean, couldn't you . . . ?" Maria floundered. She really didn't know how to deal with this. "What happened? Why won't you see him again?"
"I did not want to go. But Bjarni said Mama would never allow it. I know Mama would not be happy. But his eyes are such a beautiful blue-gray. And his chin is so . . . so square-cut and manly." She sniffed; and then, obviously overcome by the vision she'd conjured up, began to cry again.
"I cannot sleep for thinking about him!" she sobbed.
From the tone of her voice, that was nothing less than the truth, and a great deal less than she felt.
"Why won't your mama approve?" Maria ventured, cautiously. "Is he married or something?"