“Kindred, I know losing the Marchess hurt. She—”
“I’m doing this,” Kindred said, feeling a strange thrill at the sound of her voice, which rang out stronger than she had ever heard it. “This is where my wind is blowing, and I have to let it take me.”
She was doing this, and that gave every thought weight and significance in a way none ever had before. Her feet were already on the path; all that remained was the stepping.
“I’ve been paying attention in my work with Seraph, and I think I can build a fire to control a dive without too many bones. There’s enough of the plants I’ll need in Seraph’s stores to do it, and even if he won’t give them to me, I’ll just take them.” Everyone is a pirate, Sarah had said, and apparently, she was right. “I can make this work; I know it.”
Kindred waited for a moment, waiting to say the thing that was hardest.
“And even if you won’t come with me, I’m going to do this.” A breath. “But I still hope you will.”
Silence fell between them, and Kindred watched Ragged Sarah’s eyes, noticing again how green they were, how much they called to mind the forever of the Sea. Kindred’s fear was gone, and in its place she found a strange peace. This was her path, and though it would be difficult and treacherous and filled with unknowns, it was hers, and that made all the difference.
Listen for me in the grasses and listen for me below.
She felt closer to her grandmother now than she ever had. She remembered all of those days spent sailing their tiny path of the Forever Sea, crewing her grandmother’s ship, listening to her give orders, her smile as big as the world when it appeared, her frown like the most terrible storm, capable of rending sails and slashing hopes.
And yet Kindred thought of the image of her grandmother in the Forest, the one she had nearly left the path for—this was the picture she held in her mind, as if somehow seeing her grandmother underneath it all, floating in darkness and yet smiling just a little, as if that were somehow truer to who the Marchess had always been.
“You’re absolutely serious, aren’t you?” Ragged Sarah asked, and Kindred nodded. She really was.
Sarah squinted at her before breaking into one of her smiles that made Kindred feel it in the soles of her feet.
“Then fuck it. I’m going too.”
Before Sarah could say anything else, before she could pull Kindred into an embrace or take the lead some other way, Kindred moved forward and kissed her, hard, her lips dry and Sarah’s lips dry and yet who cared?
“When? When should we go?” Kindred asked, caught in the web of her excitement.
“I . . .” Sarah said, trailing off. “I just need some time to get ready. But soon. We’ll tell the captain at least before we go, right?”
“Absolutely,” Kindred said.
They were going, the two of them, going to find a new forever.
Soon.
* * *
And so, life began to take a strange and new shape for Kindred. She stole what time she could around her work with Seraph to spend time among the grass boats, sketching them out so Sarah could see how they worked. She grew comfortable in the bare space inside the grassy shells, grew familiar with the way the sails extended and folded up when she pulled on this grass rope or that one.
During the day, she would follow Seraph around, working on a hearthfire together or working in parallel on two near each other. Seraph would talk, and Kindred would half-listen, her thoughts mostly on her boat, on the Sea, on the terrifying thrill of what was to come.
Kindred was surprised to see other members of the Hanged Council frequenting the Gone Ways. As the days passed, she saw all of them, some even appearing a few times a day, passing through the space and walking among the guards, who seemed to perpetually fulfill the role of simply existing.
Seraph had told her once that they needed this many guards to protect the hearthfires and the water stores.
The Word was the most common presence down there, but no matter how hard she tried to follow their movements, Kindred was never able to see exactly where they moved through the plant wall.
And then there were the shrieks, which continued, one or two a day, always frightening.
“What are the other levels below this one like? The fragments, I mean, the ones you mentioned before,” Kindred asked one day as they worked.
Seraph tipped his head from side to side, thinking.
“I’ve only ever seen a tiny bit. No one really goes down there anymore,” he said. “The whole thing is just rough fragments slowly falling away into the Sea.”
“But what were they used for? Back when they were whole, I mean.”
“Homes, I think, though of course, that was when our population was much greater. Probably food collection too—easier to capture bugs and harvest plants when you’re that far down, I suspect.”
He spoke without much conviction, and it was clear he didn’t find the question particularly interesting.
When Kindred had asked him where the steps were, he had shrugged and gestured vaguely toward one of the areas of the seemingly monolithic wall of prairie plants.
But Kindred had learned something about monoliths in the days since her grandmother disappeared.
“The prairie holds worlds,” she whispered to herself one day, her hand working deep in the sludgy viscosity of a hearthfire, her eyes tracking The Word and Ebb-La-Kem as they walked together among the guards, offering a few words here or there.
But Kindred lost track of them as they wandered farther and farther out. She was kneeling beside the hearthfire, trying to peer between the legs of the guards standing nearby, all of them pointless, she thought. Obstructions. Distractions.
“Good! I think we’re making real progress,” Seraph said, cutting into her stultifying fear. Kindred took the opportunity to stand and look after the councillors, but they were already gone into whatever back room existed. Or perhaps they had taken the stairs, wherever they were, and even now stood farther below the Sea than Kindred and Seraph.
“It’s getting late,” Seraph said, “but why don’t we squeeze just a few more in. I have some new theories about tensile strength in aged grass and thrice-root twists that may prove fruitful for us. And you only have a half-span left here! I need to get all the help from you I can while you’re still here!”
The thought was a jarring one for Kindred. Amid all the twisting plans: the captain’s, the speculations about the Council’s, and her own, Kindred had forgotten about their sham deal—fifty days of work and the reward of a ship, fully stocked, ready to make the long voyage to the Mainland.
Seraph, she realized, must be the only one on the Council who actually believed that fifty-day nonsense, the only one innocent and trusting enough to think such a thing would happen, was ever going to happen.