Yugi met his gaze with the honest intensity of youthful inexperience. “You lost friends aboard that ship?”
“I did. Very good friends.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you.”
Silence between them for a moment. Gull cries sounded overhead and pierced the gentle luffing of a loose sail. Shadowed by the mainsail, Shang-Li looked up into the clear blue sky and saw the line of storm clouds had crept nearer despite the pilot’s efforts to outrun it in a parallel course.
Moonwhisper sat on a yardarm only a short distance away. The owl was nocturnal and didn’t enjoy the sun as much as Shang-Li did. Despite Shang-Li’s offer, Moonwhisper wouldn’t remain in the darkness of the hold. Shang-Li knew his animal companion sensed the unease that filled him and refused to be separated even aboard Swallow.
The owl’s territorial nature awakened with the arrival of the gulls. Feathers ruffling, Moonwhisper shifted on the yardarm and focused on the gulls gliding nearby. His keen talons scored the hardwood. When one of the birds darted too close, Moonwhisper unfurled his wings in warning.
Easy, my friend. Shang-Li slipped into the owl’s mind and reassured him. For all the adventures they had shared, for all the distance they were from Moonwhisper’s home, the raptor had remained stalwart.
“Do you think it happened like this?”
Shang-Li turned back to the young sailor and found him again studying the drawing of the Blue Lady confronting Grayling. “When I read Farsiak’s description of those events, that’s the image I formed in my mind.” It was also one he’d seen in his dreams, again and again. Now it almost felt as though he’d really been there.
Yugi was quiet for a moment and the sound of the gulls’ cries echoed around them. A few conversations from the crewmen on deck drifted up to reach them.
“Here, she looks very fierce,” the young sailor observed. Then he turned the page to one of the latest drawings Shang-Li had completed. “But here, she looks very beautiful.”
Shang-Li studied the drawing and stared into the silver eyes that held so much cold cruelty. She was beautiful, her skin like pale blue marble, and every inch of her feminine. Instead of simply sketching her in charcoal, he’d used chalks to add in the color. Her long hair fell past her shoulders in thick curls. Shells and pearls hung on a few of the ringlets. Dark blue and black armor barely protected her and served mainly to reveal enchanting her assets. A small buckler hung on her left wrist. A crest that resembled rain falling from a cloud lay in the center of it, but Shang-Li hadn’t been able to divine its nature.
“She is beautiful,” Shang-Li acknowledged. “But many of nature’s most dangerous things are. Oftentimes, beauty is just a lure for the unwary.”
“You got all of this from the description in that journal?”
Unease spun through Shang-Li. “Not all of it. Some of it comes merely from my imagination.” But some of it didn’t.
“Have you finished being petulant then?”
Recognizing his father’s voice immediately, Shang-Li curbed his irritation at his inability to find something meaningful in Farsiak’s journal. He didn’t bother glancing up from the snarled fishing nets he worked on. Stymied in his pursuit of information from the journal, unable to get past his father’s door and unwilling to seek him out to ask him questions, Shang-Li had turned to ship’s chores to occupy his busy mind. He had other books and other studies to attend to in his bag, but he found himself unable to focus on those things.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Shang-Li replied coolly.
His father stood nearby and easily balanced on the rolling ship’s deck. “You’re playing with ropes like a common sailor.”
“Perhaps it’s only because I’m being treated like a common sailor.”
His father sighed. “I see you haven’t given up your petulance.”
Shang-Li looked up at his father then. “I’m not one of your students, Father, to be dismissed so casually. I’m here now because you wish me to be, and so did the monastery council.”
His father shoved his hands into his opposing sleeves. His students would have quailed at that.
“At the monastery, you are taught to honor your elders. I find it shameful that I need to remind you.”
“I was also taught that a man should treat another equally when they share a duty.” Despite the easy way the words tumbled from his mouth, Shang-Li wished they were not discussing this. He felt angry at the way he always seemed the child before his father.
A hint of fire flashed through Kwan Yung’s hazel eyes. “You think I am treating you as less than an equal?”
For a moment Shang-Li considered denying the line of thought. But it was how he felt.
“Yes.”
“How am I doing that?”
Shang-Li lowered his voice so that hopefully not every sailor in the vicinity could overhear. Still, he had no doubt that the crew would learn of the encounter. And their tongues would wag.
“You took that paper after I discovered it.”
“Nor have I discussed my findings with you, have I?”
“No.” In truth, his father had obviously taken pains to stay away from him.
“You think I have shut you out, don’t you?”
“Haven’t you?”
His father sighed again but his features softened a little. For the first time Shang-Li noticed how tired his father appeared.
“I keep forgetting how long it’s been since you’ve done any original work at the monastery,” his father stated. “These… adventures you’re so enthralled with aren’t disciplined things.”
Shang-Li started to protest.
His father held up a hand and silenced him. “I would ask that you remember that you’re not dealing with one of those skilled amateurs you normally travel with. I am a trained researcher, and I work in a disciplined environment. If anything, I would have shown you disrespect by allowing you to watch me work.”
Immediately, embarrassment flushed through Shang-Li and chased away his anger. He had forgotten how two equals worked to solve a problem at the monastery. The monks didn’t work together. They worked independently, each assessing a manuscript or problem on their own, then coming together to present their thoughts and impressions for discussion.
Working together often tainted critical thinking. More was learned through independent research and discussions than through a joint conjecture at the beginning.
“I treated you as an equal,” his father said. “Otherwise I would have invited you to work with me.”
Shang-Li bowed his head in embarrassment. “I had forgotten.”
“Let us hope that you still retain some of the training we invested in you.”
Shang-Li knew that his father’s words were sharper then they needed to be, but he also felt deserving of his father’s ire.
“These books are very important, Shang-Li.”
“I know, Father. Liou’s books weren’t meant for anyone to read. There is too much dangerous knowledge written into those pages. I understand that.” Shang-Li thought about mentioning the dreams, but he wasn’t quite ready for that.
“I’ve left the paper in the cabin for you.” His father gestured over his shoulder. “I suggest you eat something as well. You need to keep up your strength. You can use the room if you’d like.”
“Thank you, but no. I’d prefer to work outside, by natural light, as long as I am able.”
His father nodded. “As you wish.” He turned and walked away. “We’ll talk again when you’re finished with your examinations of the document.”
As Shang-Li watched his father’s retreating back, sadness and angerboth of them new and oldwarred inside him. He didn’t know why they could find no peace between them. It wasn’t his elf heritage or the training that his mother had given him. There was just something between them that seemed insurmountable.