Chapter 59: Ships Mage (1/2)

I’d thought when I climbed aboard the Carpathia’s decks that nothing could faze me after the horrors of the last few months. Captain Graves’ ploy to manipulate me had indeed rolled right off me like an oil-slick eel from a new fisherman’s hands. His offer to take me on as a ship mage – after having pulled me from the water and heard my own testimony against myself – didn’t leave me as nonplussed.

“Tell me,” I said, trying to understand things. “What do you mean by being the ship’s second mage?”

“Standard complement aboard a warship these days is two mages; either to fight, fuel the ship’s flood control, or communicate with other mages. We’re down one of ours. Would you consider taking up the vacant spot?”

“I might …” I said slowly.

“Good! Come meet Frederick, our mage in charge.” The Captain moved around his desk and led me down below, giving orders to Lieutenant Siebert on the way. Polis kept his sullen glare aimed at me, but didn’t say a word as he followed the Captain and me.

“So Domenic, does your air magic include any long-range communication spells?”

Ah, I saw why the man was so optimistic about taking me on. He’d lost one of his two mages: the one who could communicate with the rest of the fleet, no doubt. He was hoping that with me filling in the position, he could maintain communications with the other Captains without relying on simple visual signals.

“I’m afraid my air magic has been rather neglected. My spells in it are primarily movement buffs and utilizing the wind to fill sails.”

Graves was disappointed, but also curious about my gust spell so I didn’t lose all of his interest. He led me to the bilge, where a wizened man was holding the purple plane of a flood control spell at an angle, allowing crew to quickly move salvageable supplies to the next deck.

I could see the damage behind the flood barrier better than others, and I wasn’t impressed. The water could have been stopped earlier with wooden plugs, oakum, and a handful of people who knew what they were doing. I’d found that the navy didn’t go in for such simple measures, however, and instead used the flood barrier if they decided they needed to do anything. It had let me win fights easier – which I appreciated – but the professional sailor in me couldn’t help but be disgruntled at the amateur-ness of the practice.

“Frederick!” Graves called. “I have a mana user here!”

The wizened man turned, showing the sharp, caricatured features of a child’s sketched wizard. “Does he have practice maintaining a non-horizontal field?”

Graves turned to me. I shook my head, having never sailed on board a ship with my mana accessible before, except for the Death’s Consort which didn’t count because flooding was controlled by me. When it had previously been the slave ship Consort, Burdette didn’t have any such ship spell.

Frederick cursed when he saw my denial, and my opinion of the man went up at his ability to swear like a sailor. “Captain, I’m nearly tapped on mana. If you want me to maintain this field until help can get here, I’m going to have to shift it horizontal – no matter who or what is down here!”

“Hold it like that for five more minutes, man!” Graves said. “They’ve nearly got the last foodstuffs out!”

“This isn’t a workout where I just need to milk out my last points of stamina!” Frederick snapped. “When my mana’s gone it’s gone! No matter what we both want.”

As Graves prepared to say something else, I wordlessly reached into my bag and pulled out a mana potion, handing it to Frederick. His eyes lit up and he nodded to me in appreciation before popping the top off and chugging it.

“Ah,” he said with satisfaction. “Now we’ve got some time. Thanks, friend. Where’d you come from?”

“Dom here was fished from the waters,” Graves interjected for me. “He was a mercenary and we’re discussing his future.”

“That ought to be short. A mercenary for the snakes?”

“Yes,” Graves said, his tone clipped. “And our best shot of making it back to port, unless the fleet can spare a lot more mana potions. So be civil with him!”

Frederick looked me over and shrugged. “You’ve got a decent mana pool, I’ll give you that, lad. Air and water?”

“Yes, with a focus on water.”

“I’m light, fire, and air. Focus is on light.”

“Hang on,” I turned to Graves. “I thought you needed an air mage for communication?”

Frederick coughed. “I never learned the communication aspect of air magic, just the destructive parts.”

Destructive parts … like lightning. I hadn’t experimented with it any more since that night with the storm dragon, but I still wanted it!

“I would help you keep the flood barrier maintained if you teach me.”

“Teach you?” he scoffed. “I indebted myself for decades to learn what I know. Teach a mercenary who fought for the snakes? Ha!” he tossed the vial that had my mana potion back to me. “Thanks for the pick-me-up. I’m sure the Captain will reimburse you.”

Graves murmured something like ‘what did I say about civil?’ and ‘bloody mage conscripts’ as he grabbed my elbow and steered me away. He needn’t have feared me losing my temper at Frederick like I had at him, I wanted what Frederick knew too much and completely understood his reasoning. Why would he teach arcane secrets to someone who might be fighting with the enemy later?

I would find a way around his reticence, though.

Graves led me topside, where Siebert was giving orders on the sail configurations. The Carpathia was making its way to rejoin the rest of the fleet, making steady progress for all that her bilge was nearly half-filled with water. Once on the quarterdeck overlooking the wreckage we’d left behind, Graves motioned to Polis to give us some space and set to business with me.

“I showed you my hand when we went down there: I want you because Frederick can’t keep the flood barrier maintained by himself. When we meet up with the rest of the fleet we might be able to rotate mages out between us. If not, the most important ships will be prioritized. I know the Carpathia well, and she’s a good ship but not the strongest left – not as battered as she is now. It’s only because of the state’s investments in her that she’s doing as well as she is.

“Now, the admiral won’t care if my ship is sacrificed and my men redistributed to the other ships, but it would be a political black mark against me during the peak of this war. I don’t want to risk that. So, I’ve got a deal for you. You can agree to use your seamanship skills in exchange for a pardon – if you were on land you’d already be considered a mercenary prisoner anyway. But if you agree to fill my second mage position and keep the Carpathia afloat, I’ll give you a wage from my own pocket!”

I looked out at the sun setting on the horizon, pretending to consider it. I already knew what I wanted. “I’ve not much use for your gold, I’ll be frank with you.” My domain caught his twitch that indicated he’d been thinking silvers instead of gold. “But if you can convince Frederick to tutor me in air magic, I’ll do the work of mage and seaman both and not take a copper from you for it.” And no doubt come out far ahead financially even so, I’d paid even Marcus a hefty sum to tutor me, and the man had become a friend.

Captain Graves took his own time considering, but his reply was also a foregone conclusion. He had much more power over Frederick than me, and while I didn’t think he could legally force his mage to train anyone, I’m sure he had means of pressuring the man. “I’ll see what I can do. In the meantime, I expect you to be open with a full list of your current spells. That is non-negotiable.”

“Give me a pen and paper,” I said in response. Graves directed Polis to give me the supplies I needed for the list and to treat me as the 2nd ship’s mage in the interim.

“I’m a little rusty on naval ranks these days,” I said when Graves mentioned that part. “What exactly does 2nd ship’s mage mean?”

“It means we’re peers,” Polis growled. “But the mages don’t give or take orders on ship unless a war mage during battle, so don’t go thinking you can push me or anyone else around.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I said. It was nice that Polis’ misallocated racism wouldn’t be so problematic given that structure.

I made a list of my air spells on one side of the sheet of paper I was given, and the water spells on the other. At the bottom, I swore that those were all of those spells that I knew. The layout and wording was such that I felt comfortable swearing an enforceable oath on that without being caught with my deeper magics.

I felt like my plan was going along just fine; I’d secured passage on a ship that was heading back to port for repairs, no one was the wiser on my identity, and I even had a lead on progressing my air magic! I hadn’t felt this satisfied and hopeful since before Jones had punished me for letting the Essential go.

Fate is a funny thing. I was pinged from one end of the ocean to the other in a single day, picked up aboard a random naval ship – a human naval ship, at that – and was now recalling my time with the Essential. Naturally, fate decided to screw with me by dropping something I didn’t expect.

“Dom? Dom it is you! What in the world are you doing here?”

I recognized the flanging tones of the voice before I identified the speaker, and my heart skipped a beat. If I wasn’t naturally pale, I’m sure the loss of color in my cheeks would have been noticeable.

There was Cook, or rather Gerald, the mild-mannered Tarish that had worked for Captain Coe aboard the Essential on our last voyage. The Tarish man seemed happy and surprised to see me, which made me frantically run through timelines and lies in my head.

It was public knowledge that ‘Domenic Seaborn’ was Davy Jones’ lieutenant. It was also known – though not as widely – that I had gotten my curse after the ill-fated sinking of the Wind Runner. However, while I’d been on the Essential my name had only been Domenic, not ‘Seaborn’ and Gerald had left the Essential prior to learning about my embarking on the Wind Runner. Gerald had recognized me and called me ‘Dom’ which I’d often gone by, but that didn’t mean he had any idea I was Jones’ lieutenant.