Three Dark Crowns (Three Dark Crowns #1) - Kendare Blake Page 0,52

into the trees to keep them from seeing her and her from seeing them. The sight of poor Luca pressed against the window would break her heart.

When she is deep in the woods, she stops and listens. Only one carriage passes. Probably a rickety wagon headed for Indrid Down, perhaps carrying a load of wool, or sheep’s milk and cheese. Not long ago she smelled sheep fields and guessed that she was passing through Waring and its many farms.

But she is not certain where she is. She has studied maps since she was a child, but the island looks much smaller on paper, and she has not seen a sign since passing one for North Cumberland early this morning. By now, with the sun setting, she must be at least as far as Trignor. Perhaps even Linwood. Another few days and she will have to skirt the boundary of Indrid Down.

Where they will catch you, you silly girl, Luca says in her head.

Mirabella brushes black hair out of her eyes. Somewhere to the east, thunder rumbles. Tired as she is, she does not even know if she is the one who called it, but she craves it all the same and turns farther from the road to follow the scent of the storm.

She walks faster as the cliffs and open sky call. Above the trees, rich black clouds roll in until she can no longer tell what time of day it is or whether it has crossed into night.

She breaks through the tree line. For a moment, she fears that she has somehow walked in a wide circle. The cliffs she stands on are so like the Blackway of home. But it is not the Blackway. A flash of lightning shows the cliff face in white and pale gold, softer stuff than her beloved black basalt.

“A little more,” she says to the wind, and it races around her and squeezes. It blows the ruined cloak back off her shoulders.

Mirabella steps to the cliff edge above the sea. Lightning illuminates the water in greens and blues. There must be a path down. She wants to wade out and be soaked to the waist.

The only way she finds is steep and lined with wet rocks. It is treacherous, but she takes her time, delighting in the wind and rain. Tomorrow, the people who live here will speak of this as a Shannon Storm, named for the queen whose mural decorates the largest portion of Rolanth Temple. They will talk about it over breakfast tables. It will damage roofs and leave downed trees to clear. People will sing the song of Shannon and tell of how she could summon hurricanes and send them out like pigeons on errand.

They are only tall tales, perhaps. One day, they will call great fires a Mirabella Flame and say that she could scorch the sun. Or they would have, had she not run away to disappear.

Mirabella looks out to the sea and takes down the hood of her cloak, so the rain can slick her hair. Then the lightning flashes, and she sees a boat topple down.

“No.”

The craft is small and the waves rough. Perhaps the storm tore it out from its slip. No one could be unlucky enough to be caught in the middle of such a monster, in a boat as tiny as that.

The boat rolls itself and rights again. The sail has come loose and blows, wet and flapping. It has not been abandoned or dragged unmanned out to sea. One lone sailor clings hopelessly to the mast.

Mirabella looks in all directions, but there is no one down the beach, no town, no glow of friendly fires. She screams for help back toward the road, but it is too far.

The boat will roll again, and fail to come upright. It will sink down deep and be tossed in the restless currents until there is nothing left.

Mirabella holds up her palm. She cannot stand there and do nothing as the sailor drowns. Even though she is weary and water has always been her most difficult element.

“Use the wind,” she says to herself, but she has never used the wind to move anything but her own body or a few small belongings. Luca’s scarf or Sara’s hat.

Mirabella studies the water. She can try to push the boat back out, far enough into the sea perhaps, that it might escape the storm.

Or she can try to bring it in.

Either choice is risky. She could shatter the boat