“For a price.”
“How much?”
“I don’t want your money. I want a Cadence-forged dirk,” the fisherman said. “I would like a dagger to cut through anything: ropes, nets, scales … my rival’s good fortune.”
Jack wasn’t surprised by his request for an enchanted blade. Such things could only be forged on Cadence, but they were created with a steep price.
“Yes, I can arrange that for you,” Jack said after only a moment of doubt. In the back of his mind, he thought of his mother’s dirk with its silver hilt, and how she kept it sheathed at her side, although Jack had never once seen her use it. But he knew the dagger was enchanted; the glamour was evident when one didn’t look directly upon the weapon. It cast a slight haze, as though firelight had been hammered into the steel.
There was no telling how much his mother had paid Una Carlow to forge it for her. Or how much Una had, in turn, suffered for rendering the blade.
He held out his hand. The fisherman shook it.
“Very well,” the man said. “We’ll leave at daybreak.” He went to shut the door again, but Jack refused to remove his foot.
“We must go now,” he said. “While it’s dark. This is the safest time to make the crossing.”
The fisherman’s eyes bugged. “Are you daft? I wouldn’t cross those waters at night if you paid me a hundred enchanted dirks!”
“You must trust me on this,” Jack answered. “Ravens may carry messages to the lairds by day, and the trade cog may glide on the first of the season, but the best time to cross is at night, when the ocean reflects the moon and the stars.”
When the spirits of the water are easily appeased, Jack added inwardly.
The fisherman gaped. Jack waited—he would stand here all night and all of the next day if he had to—and the fisherman must have sensed it. He relented.
“Very well. For two Cadence dirks, I will carry you across the water tonight. Meet me by my boat in a few minutes. It’s that one, in the berth on the far right.”
Jack glanced over his shoulder to look at the darkened quay. Weak moonlight gleamed on the hulls and masts, and he found the fisherman’s boat, a modest vessel that had once been his father’s. The very boat that had originally carried Jack in his first crossing.
He stepped down the stoop, and the door latched behind him. He momentarily wondered if the fisherman was fooling him, agreeing to simply get Jack off his porch, but Jack walked briskly to the quay in good faith, the wind nearly pushing him down as he strode over the damp road.
He lifted his eyes to the darkness. There was a wavering trail of celestial light on the ocean, the silver path the fisherman needed to follow to reach Cadence. A sickle moon hung in the sky like a smile, surrounded by freckles of stars. It would have been ideal if the moon was full, but Jack couldn’t afford to wait for it to wax.
He didn’t know why his laird had summoned him home, but he sensed it wasn’t for a joyous reunion.
It felt as if he had waited an hour before he saw a firefly of lantern light approaching. The fisherman walked hunched against the wind, a waxed overmantle shielding him, his face trapped in a scowl.
“You had better be good to your word, bard,” he said. “I want two Cadence dirks for all of this trouble.”
“Yes, well, you know where to find me if I’m not,” Jack said, brusquely.
The fisherman glared at him, one eye bigger than the other. Then, conceding, he nodded at his boat, saying, “Climb aboard.”
And Jack took his first step off the mainland.
The ocean was rough at first.
Jack gripped the boat’s gunwale, his stomach churning as the vessel rose and fell in a precarious dance. The waves rolled, but the brawny fisherman cut through them, rowing the two of them farther out to sea. He followed the trail of moonlight as Jack suggested, and soon the ocean became gentler. The wind continued to howl, but it was still the wind of the mainland, carrying nothing but cold salt in its breath.
Jack glanced over his shoulder, watching the lanterns of Woe turn to tiny flecks of light, his eyes smarting, and he knew they were about to enter the isle’s waters. He could sense it as if Cadence had a gaze, finding him in the darkness, fixating on him.
“A body washed to shore a month ago,” the fisherman said, breaking Jack’s reverie. “Gave us all a bit of fright in Woe.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“A Breccan, by the woad tattoos on his bloated skin. His blue plaid arrived shortly after him.” The man paused in his speech, but he continued to row, the paddles dipping into the water in a mesmerizing rhythm. “A slit throat. I suppose it was the work of one of your clansmen, who then dumped the misfortunate soul in the ocean. To let us clean up the mess when the tides brought the corpse to our shores.”
Jack was silent as he stared at the fisherman, but a shiver chased his bones. Even after all these years away, the sound of his enemy’s name sent a spear of dread through him.
“Perhaps one of his own did it to him,” Jack said. “The Breccans are known for their bloodthirsty ways.”
The fisherman chuckled. “Should I dare to believe a Tamerlaine is unbiased?”
Jack could have told him stories of raids. How the Breccans often crossed the clan line and stole from the Tamerlaines during the winter months. They plundered and wounded; they pillaged without remorse, and Jack felt his hatred rise like smoke as he remembered being a young boy riddled by the fear of them.
“How did the feud begin, bard?” the fisherman pressed on. “Do any of you even remember why you hate each other, or do you simply follow the path your ancestors set for you?”
Jack sighed. He just wanted a swift, quiet passage over the water. But he knew the story. It was an old, blood-soaked saga that shifted like the constellations, depending on who did the retelling—the east or the west, the Tamerlaines or the Breccans.
He mulled over it. The current of the water gentled, and the hiss of the wind fell to a coaxing whisper. Even the moon hung lower, keen for him to share the legend. The fisherman sensed it as well. He was quiet, rowing at a slower pace, waiting for Jack to give the story breath.
“Before the clans, there were the folk,” Jack began. “The earth, the air, the water, and the fire. They gave life and balance to Cadence. But soon the spirits grew lonely and weary of hearing their own voices, of seeing their own faces. The northern wind blew a ship off course and it crashed on the rocks of the isle. Amid the flotsam was a fierce and arrogant clan, the Breccans, who had been seeking a new land to claim.
“Not long after that, the southern wind blew a ship off course, and it found the isle. They were the Tamerlaine clan, and they too established a home on Cadence. The island was balanced between them, with the Breccans in the west and the Tamerlaines in the east. And the spirits blessed the work of their hands.
“In the beginning, it was peaceful. But soon, the two clans began to have more and more altercations and scuffles with each other, until whispers of war began to haunt the air. Joan Tamerlaine, the Laird of the East, hoped she could stave off conflict by uniting the isle as one. She would agree to marriage with the Breccan laird as long as peace was upheld and empathy was encouraged between the clans, in spite of their differences. When Fingal Breccan beheld her beauty, he decided that he, too, wanted harmony. ‘Come and be my wife,’ he said, ‘and let our two clans join as one.’