No one questioned her weak explanation. The captain recognized Chane's efforts and did not press the matter. The duchess merely walked away toward the ship.
They hurried to the same inn Chane used during Shade's extended search for the sea tunnel. Falling through the door, he'd collapsed into dormancy just barely before the sun rose. Wynn set aside trying to find him blood and fell into a deep sleep herself.
This evening, she'd awoken to see Chane crack open the little room's door. He wore his cloak, with the hood pulled up. She'd sat up quickly.
"Where are you going?"
"I need … to purchase a new shirt … and some things for myself."
Wynn knew better, and that he didn't like to discuss it, but she wouldn't let it pass.
"I can get you some blood," she said, as if it were nothing extraordinary. "There might be a cold room or slaughterhouse here … before the meat is taken up to market."
"No," he answered. "I will see to it myself. Meet me on the ship."
"Give me moment to dress, and I'll come with you."
He slipped out and shut the door.
"Chane, wait!"
By the time she'd reached the common room and stepped outside with Shade, he was gone.
Chane was in a bad state. She'd seen hunger in his face after they'd breached the sea tunnel's many gates. It had only worsened from there. He'd faced down the wraith more than once, exchanging injuries with it that no one else could see—that no one else would've survived. He'd done it all on one urn of goat's blood she'd bought in Bay-Side.
That act had caused him embarrassment, resentment, or maybe both.
Now he wanted to find a butcher and see to his need on his own. She understood and simply returned to the room and gathered their things. He would find her later. He always found her.
Now, aboard the ship, Shade padded out across the deck. As Wynn followed, she spotted Captain Tristan by the forward dockside rail. She thought he was looking at her but noticed his gaze was too high. Wynn followed it.
The duchess stood near the stern. By the slight turn of her shoulders, she was looking past the southern tip of the Isle of Wrêdelîd, and out to the open ocean.
Wynn leaned over the rail and scanned the shore for Chane, but the water-front was empty of any tall humans. Left with Shade for company, she couldn't help glancing toward the duchess. It wasn't a good idea, but she went aft, slowing cautiously in approach.
"May I join you?" she asked.
The duchess didn't answer or even turn. Wynn settled on a storage trunk to the port side. Reine wasn't wearing a cloak. Tendrils of chestnut hair quivered in the evening breeze, lashing across her profile and vacant expression.
"What happened to the prince?" Wynn asked suddenly.
Impertinent, especially for her hand in his loss, but she couldn't help it. She already knew too much, as far as the duchess and her people were concerned. Yet her reasoning, her guesses about the youngest Âreskynna, needed confirmation in some small way.
"He went home," Reine whispered.
It wasn't an answer, but Wynn waited.
"Have you ever wondered how I know your premin?" Reine asked.
The sudden change of topic confused Wynn at first. "The royals have always had close ties to the guild."
"Closer than you think," Reine said, spite creeping into her voice. "I asked her to look into a certain matter … what might be known rather than rumored … concerning my new family. The Âreskynna told me what they knew, but it wasn't enough … not nearly enough for me. I sought help from the guild."
Wynn shifted to the trunk's edge, her fingers clutching the edge of its lid.
"I learned nothing more than what the royal family told me," the duchess continued quietly. "Lady Tärtgyth, your premin, found only hints that a marriage was arranged between a ‘lord of the waves' and a forgotten female ancestor of King Hräthgar."
Wynn's mind was already filled with previous assumptions.
"You know that name?" the duchess asked.
"Yes … Hräthgar is attributed with uniting territorial factions in what later became the Numan Lands. Supposedly, he became the founder and first king of Malourné. It's said that event marked the beginning of the Common Era, as measured on our calendar from the Lhoin'na. But how far back was this ancestor who married a—"
"A lord of the waves?" Reine cut in. "What a veiled reference to a Dunidæ, even from history."
That quizzical reply, sharply edged, didn't need a response. Even Wynn had never understood where the name Âreskynna—the Kin of the Ocean Waves—had come from. Not until she'd seen Freädherich.
"No one knows when she, this ancestor, lived," Reine went on. "Perhaps even in the time of the sages' Forgotten History … during or before the war. I pity her, whoever she was, being used for such an alliance … and I hate her for the legacy she left to Frey."
Wynn understood the pity, but the hate would gain nothing.
"For all your learning, you couldn't understand such things," Reine added.
Oh, yes, Wynn could, though she wouldn't say so to this woman. She had lost three friends, each oppressed by a heritage they hadn't asked for. But she also wondered …
Why did the unique in this world always seem to suffer the most?
"But …" she began, struggling in hesitation. "But why Frey? Or do others of the royal family face this same affliction?"
Reine gripped the aft rail with both hands, taking long, hard breaths.
"They all suffer, but each generation, one is worse. That one feels it most … and can never be allowed to take the throne. Do you know of Hrädwyn, King Leofwin's sister?"
Wynn nodded. "Yes, she succumbed to illness when she was young."
"No!" Reine snapped. "She drowned herself … in that pool … after nine years of imprisonment."
Wynn looked to the open ocean, suddenly as chilled as she'd been upon emerging from the tunnel. All she could think of was a prince's desperate, pale features.
"Caught betwixt and between," Reine went on, "unsettled on land and longing for the sea, that sickness drives … that one … to greater desperation than the others. The tides began to change … him. I thought he had drowned that night, when he vanished from our boat. Something made him return to shore, where Hammer-Stag found him."
Wynn knew why in watching Reine—watching Frey's one reason to fight his heritage, his affliction … his taint, so much worse than Wynn's own.
"Cinder-Shard came to me soon after," Reine continued. "Even Frey's deceased aunt wasn't the first Âreskynna whom the Stonewalkers had taken in … though none before Frey had ever lived long enough to leave. But while alive, they were still necessary … to maintain a hold on some ancient blood-bound alliance! I stayed with Frey during the tides, especially the highest. I would've stayed always if my prolonged absence under the people's suspicions would not have cast further doubts upon the family. And each year, Frey's changes grew worse before they passed."
She finally turned, and Wynn fell victim to Reine's gaze.
"The terror of your wraith … and the Dunidæ's persistence … forced his change too far!"
Reine's voice broke. Though tears ran down her face, they didn't match the cold anger in her features.
Wynn sat silenced, her thoughts filled with memories of half-breeds. So rare, even unique, yet they'd all come into her life. All had appeared within this generation, after a millennium, and in these new days of history.
Magiere … half mortal, half vampire, some would say, though it wasn't accurate.
Leesil … half human, half elf, a wanderer outside of all peoples.
Chap … part Fay, though physically pure majay-hì, equally an outcast of eternity.