“We can’t outrun that. This is just a dumb little cog!” Aden kicked the railing, cursing. He pulled at his hair moving away. “No, no, no! You know what they’ll do to me!” he looked at Vel, then froze. “Nevermind, nothing quite so bad as they’d do to you, but still!” He turned, throwing his hands up.

  Vel narrowed her eyes, looking back at the ship, the three sails so . . . tempting.

  “And if I burned their sails?” Vel asked.

  “What?” Aden whipped back to her.

  “Burn their sails?”

  He blinked. “What are you standin’ there fer, get to it!”

  Jumping, Vel ran towards the back of the ship, climbing the steep stairs to the raised deck. She moved to the railing, knowing full well that she could be shot by an arrow probably at any second. No, focus, she thought, staring down the looming sails as the ship sped towards them. She’d only get one shot, one true shot. After the first fireball, she imagined that someone would have the power to prevent another, and she wasn’t willing to take that risk.

  So, she waited. The ship grew closer. Closer. It creaked on the water, and she could hear the shouts of men, archers now lining up on the prow. Their bows weren’t loaded yet, but as the space between her and them shifted, so did arrows in their bows.

  Now! Raising a hand, Vel unleashed not one, not two, but a volley of four fireballs in quick succession, feeling as if a blanket of heat was ripped from her blood as the cold stung from the inside.

  [Fireball level 56]

  The first ball of fire slammed into the front sail, its embers not catching, but when the second one followed, it bolstered the flames. They caught. A smile came to Vel’s face, which grew when the third fireball expanded the flames, most of the archers turning from their perch to deal with the new problem.

  Satisfied for the moment, Vel turned, then felt something hard rip into her lower back. Her form jerked forward, a sharp pain burning through her stomach. She caught the railing and gasped as her form toppled down the steep stairs. When she landed, the pain ripped further, and she finally looked down, finding the tip and the long shaft of an arrow sticking out through her gut.

  Her stomach dropped at the sight, and she swallowed bile that threatened to escape her. She reached a hand towards the shaft, but recoiled as soon as her fingers made contact, the smallest movement sending a sharpness through her form like wildfire, even her hands tingling.

  “Holy . . .” she gritted her teeth, closing her eyes.

  “Keep steering!” Aden called, his light footsteps creaking across the planks and shaking Vel, as if she wasn’t doing enough of that on her own already. He knelt down beside her, muttering a string of curses she didn’t bother to listen to, in one part due to the fact that it was disrespectful, and another part because there was an avenging arrow in her avenging abdomen!

  “Can you f-fix it?” Vel stuttered, head lifted as she watched her own crimson blood stain her clothes.

  “Is that some sort of joke?” Aden asked, grabbing the shaft of the arrow with both hands, sending a spike of pain through Vel’s back, stomach, and just about everything else. She closed her eyes as he snapped the shaft in half. “I’m the best damn healer you’ll ever meet, or at least I’m gonna be,” Sandy huffed, grabbing Vel’s shoulder.

  She grunted, clenching her teeth as he turned her. Without warning, the healer pulled on the arrow from the back side, Velmira’s stomach churning and lurching as pain sputtered from her mouth in a high howl.

  [Tough Hide level 58]

  “I’m going to be sick,” Vel said, trembling and gasping when she felt her insides collapsing to fill the hole inside her, only to spill out, she was sure. She didn’t dare open her eyes to look, fearing nausea would win out.

  “Don’t puke,” Sandy said, then added “please” as an afterthought. That turned Vel’s groan into a chuckle━she suspected that perhaps Amalia had been teaching him some manners.

  Much as she’d felt before, the pain lessened, gradually extinguishing until at last, everything save for the blood on the deck seemed to be in its proper place. Vel looked down at her stomach, Aden laying her back down. It was like the wound was never there to begin with, which was already better than some of the handiwork she’d seen from [healers] at the temple.

  Aden moved from Vel to Sigurd, who sat on the floor, giving him about as much warning as he did her when dealing with the arrow.

  “They’re gaining!” Amalia called from her position at the stern. She turned her head back, looking towards the ship behind them, barely even visible in the small slit in the planked railing.

  “I can try burning more━”

  “No!” Aden hissed, glaring. “Just because you have a healer now don’t mean y’all should go recklessly risking your lives. Use your damn brains for something else!”

  “Fine, Kid, what do you propose?” Sigurd growled, grunting as the arrow was finally freed from his shoulder.

  “I don’t know. I heal, figure it out.”

  “I thought you wanted more injuries to heal!”

  “I do!”

  “Then we might as well take a little risk,” Sigurd argued.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  “I can’t heal the retributin’ dead, ya sand-kissing arse!” Aden smacked Sigurd in the back of the head, and while the two argued, Vel took a deep breath, thinking.

  What can I do, what . . .? she thought, looking over her magic stats.

  [Skills]

  [Create Silk Rank 2 Level 36]

  [Dye Magic Rank 1 Level 6]

  [Fireball Rank 1 Level 56]

  [Rock Throw Rank 1 Level 40]

  [Sever Link Rank 1 Level 13]

  [Shadow Sneak Rank 1 Level 22]

  [Sticky Thread Rank 1 Level 61]

  [Water Beam Rank 1 Level 1]

  [Webshot Rank 1 Level 61]

  She grabbed at her hair, tugging it as she looked over the skills again and again. Useless! They all were so useless! Not unless she wanted to risk being shot again to burn more sails. They might kill me anyways, she reasoned. They would. No, they couldn’t risk me escaping again.

  An operatic voice pierced the air, and Vel looked at Amalia, leaning directly against the slit instead of attending to the stern. She sang, and . . . nothing. Vel moved to the stern, grabbing hold of the big lever as she watched Amalia strain against the wind. The singer’s voice died down, and she shook her head.

  “I can’t do anything until they’re closer. If my voice can’t reach them, it’s useless,” she said.

  “Then we wait,” Vel said, narrowing her eyes at the nearing three masted ship. “Can you knock out its biggest mast?” she asked.

  “Maybe? Breaking a lock was one thing, but a mast?” Amalia asked, furrowing her brow.

  “You don’t have to break the mast,” Aden said, and Vel turned back to him and Sigurd, both of them with their arms crossed. “You can break the hull. Sink the whole ship.”

  “What? No! That’s even more impossible! That’s like, solid, or something! Tight as a dish!”

  “And you need the sound to carry, don’t ya?” Aden asked. “Then you need to be a whale.”

  “Come again?” Amalia asked and Vel blinked.

  “Whales make these sing song notes to one another, in the water. Their voices travel faster. There won’t be any wind to block the sound.”

  “You mean to dump Amalia in the water?” Sigurd asked. “No. No, that’s a bad idea.”

  “You asked for ideas, and I just gave ya one. Use it or die, arsepants!”

  “I . . .” Amalia trailed, looking back towards the ship. Vel followed her eyes, the ship gaining faster. It was only a matter of minutes before they were entirely overtaken.

  “Our only other option is to try burning sails again, isn’t it?” Vel asked, seeing her handiwork on the front sail. It slowed the ship, but not enough. I wasted more time getting injured . . . she thought.

  “Fine, get me a rope,” Amalia huffed, Aden running to do so.

  “Amalia, what if you hit our hull?” Sigurd asked. “Aren’t you more likely to destroy it?”

  “My voice doesn’t blow up everything it touches,” Amalia rolled her eyes, crossing her arms and turning her back to him. “Now get me out of this dress.”

  “What?” Sigurd asked.

  Huffing, Vel shoved Sigurd aside, and worked her way through the buttons of Amalia’s green dress. “You act as if you’ve never seen a woman in her undergarments before,” she said.

  “I’ve seen one naked!” Sigurd pointed out.

  Amalia gasped, dropping her dress as Vel finished with the final button, then spun so fast that Vel stumbled away, blinking at the finger the ex-priestess pointed. “Heretic!” she accused.

  Wait, does she not know? Vel thought, a slow realization coming to her as she realized Amalia had never been present when Sigurd spoke of his deceased wife.

  “I━”

  “Not another word out of you,” Amalia snapped, cutting Sigurd off and allowing Aden to help tie a rope around her waist. She glared until the knot was fastened, then ran to the railing. Vel about thought the woman in white bloomers and undershirt was going to jump straight into the water at the speed she went, but Amalia paused, hesitating.

  Vel placed her hands on the stern, more to grip something as the encroaching behemoth of a ship neared. If this didn’t work . . . It was over.

  A small splash sounded, and Vel closed her eyes, part of her habitually wanting to pray, but to who? She opened her eyes back up, facing down a monstrosity of wood and sails that she herself wasn’t fighting. All she could do was stare as it crept closer, waiting. Her heart bobbed in anticipation with every wave, and she gripped the rough wood tighter, almost like it was her only lifeline.

  “Please, aim true,” Vel whispered.

  By now, she could hear the shouting of the men on the enemy ship, clear as day, and the moaning of its timbers, defying the sea to stay afloat.

  Come on! Vel’s chest tightened, and she swallowed, twisting her hands over the stern.

  She inched closer to the slit, almost big enough for her whole head to fight through. Then the water trembled. Waves dispersed, ripples cutting through them like a blade from the ship ahead, and a sound trembled the entire deck beneath Vel’s feet, deep and resonant beneath the water.

  The enemy ship tilted, the screams music to Vel’s ears as it went, slowing down. A smile came to her face, and she moved away from the slit, still gripping the stern, and looked to where Sigurd was pulling a drenched Amalia up onto the deck.

  A cackle escaped the singer, who shook her head, dropping to her knees. “How does retribution feel!” she laughed, then shivered.

  “Don’t celebrate yet,” Aden said, then ran to the stern, pushing Vel away as he took hold of it and shifted the cog’s course. “That ship is big; we could be dragged down with it if we don’t make enough distance,” he said.

  “That’s a thing?” Vel asked.

  “Duh.”

  “So what do we do?”

  “Hope.”

  Of course, because life couldn’t just be easy. She moved away from under the . . . “What is this thing called?” Vel asked, pausing and pointing to the small deck above her head.

  “Aftcastle,” Aden said, then pointed to a smaller, but similar one at the front of the ship, “forecastle.”

  Moving away from the aftcastle, Vel made her way to Sigurd and Amalia, who were mid argument.

  “━it? A prostitute?” Amalia asked, narrowing her eyes.

  “Over my dead body,” Sigurd huffed, bending over the railing to look at the ship behind them.

  “Then why did you see a naked woman?”

  “I don’t have to explain myself to you,” Sigurd said.

  “Because what? You’re ashamed?” Amalia pressured.

  “Maybe━” Vel tried.

  “Because my wife is dead,” Sigurd sneered, Amalia freezing. He moved past the singer, climbing the stairs to the aftcastle.

  The singer’s jaw dropped, and she stared for a long moment. “I didn’t . . . He never . . .” she groaned. “Ugh!” Amalia huffed, throwing her hands up. She pushed wet locks from her face, then stood, and made her way after Sigurd.

  Vel turned away, moving to the railing. We’re tired, she thought, we just need a break. Looking back at the ship behind them, it was now on its side, still turning and sinking. It took time for the ship to sink completely, and by the time it did, their little cog head made enough headway, leaving behind specks of rowboats in the water.

  Turning her head to look ahead, Vel took in a deep breath, feeling a soft wind against her face. They were going to Ymril; to Edard. Just a matter of time, she thought, opening her eyes to look out over the horizon. It sparkled in the approaching glow of twilight.

  “Hey,” she said, realizing something. She looked back at where Aden steered the ship. “How do we know we’re going the right way?”