Hidden Island Chapter 29, part 2 of 3

Hidden Island
Chapter 29, part 2 of 3

"We'll talk about all this once you have it sorted out. I'm going to check for more damage,"

Chance said. He pushed through the crowd in the doorway and checked the surrounding alcoves and windows.

"Can one of you go get Cerise?" Caine asked the cluster of faces jockeying for position in the doorway.

"I am already here," a lightly accented, exasperated voice came from behind the crowd.

"Move, you bunch of hens."

The group of onlookers shifted and let the brothel's resident apothecary through. Cerise looked disheveled and tired. Her sheer red robe was all but completely transparent, but despite her pinched expression and near nudity, she still stood proudly like a queen among commoners. She and Caine looked at each other with momentary surprise. Cerise was the other person at Mary's for whom nudity wasn't typical. She carried a large doctor's bag in one hand, which she unceremoniously dumped onto one of the chairs as she pushed her way into the alcove. She rubbed her eyes to wake herself up. "Caine put some clothes on," she said tersely.

"Aw," a few male and female voices whined from the doorway.

Caine gave the doorway a flat look and picked up his pants from one of the other chairs. As Cerise opened her bag and started looking Tonya over, Caine turned around and stepped into his breeches. Janie brushed herself off, patting more plaster dust into the air.

"Is there anything I can do to help?" Janie asked Cerise.

"I will let you know. For now, stay out of the way," the apothecary said. Janie nodded gingerly and sat down, picking up the rest of Caine's clothes from the seat and putting them in her lap.

Her back hurt quite a bit, but she ignored it. She folded her hands in patient worry and watched Cerise work.

"Any wounds?" she asked Caine.

"None," he answered. "I think she's just passed out."

The apothecary used her thumb to open Tonya's eyelids and look at her eyes, then pushed her jaw down and opened her mouth. She checked Tonya's pulse and rolled her head back and forth gently. "I agree."

Caine took his shirt from Janie as Cerise pulled a small glass bottle with a cork stopper out of her bag. She worked the cork free and waved the bottle beneath Tonya's nose. The little witch arched her back and opened her eyes with a shocked gasp. Cerise smiled tightly and stopped her bottle. The gathered brothel workers in the doorway whispered and shuddered with excitement. "Much better. Try not to move yet. How do you feel?" Cerise asked, holding Tonya down with a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"Fine?" Tonya said, sounding uncertain about her answer and what was going on. She rubbed her nose and wrinkled it like she could rub away the smell of whatever Cerise kept in that jar.

"Are you sure? Take your time,' Cerise said gently.

Tonya thought momentarily, carefully moving her body to check for anything that hurt. "I'm sure." She sneezed. "What's all this dust?'

Cerise offered her a hand and helped her sit up. Tonya looked around at the devastation.

Broken shelves and bottles, cracked walls. "Damn, what happened?" she asked, her eyes wide.

"I was hoping you could tell us," Caine said, finishing pulling on his shirt. "What's the last thing you remember?"

"We were going at it," Tonya shrugged. There were a few mutters of surprise and encouragement from the doorway. Tonya smirked and gave them a victorious wink. "It was getting perfect. Felt like I was going to ex-," She paused and looked around the room, horror dawning as she realized that she was sitting in the exact center of the pattern of destruction
"explode." She bit her lip. "Did I...?" She didn't know how to finish her fearful thought.

"Evocation?" Janie asked.

"I don't know!" Tonya said, starting to panic. " Bella told me about it when she taught me why we use grounding circles, but I don't remember much about it. Did we do the circle wrong?"

"I don't know," Janie said. Her head was throbbing. She rubbed the goose egg on the back of her skull gingerly, letting out a slight hiss of pain as her fingers made contact.

Cerise eyed her. "Your turn, missy," she said firmly to Janie. "You two switch."

Tonya carefully slid off the table and her bare feet onto the floor, pushing broken jars and scattered debris around so she didn't accidentally step on any of it. Janie moved to the table where Tonya had just been. Cerise reminded her of the Master of Acolytes back at the Grand Temple, only more... commanding. Even wearing nothing but a sheer robe, her combination of regal bearing, businesslike bruskness, and matronly concern reminded Janie of many of the qualities she'd looked up to and tried to emulate when she was younger. Sitting on that table, Janie suddenly felt like a child again.

"What hurts?" Cerise asked.

"The back of my head, mostly," Janie answered. "Also, my neck. I think there are some scrapes on my back where I hit the wall."

Cerise walked around the table and looked her over. "Oh, yes, you have some cuts. It does not look too serious. Just some blood. Not from the wall, though." She eyed the shattered mirror and the glass all over the ground. "I'm going to need to check your wounds for glass shards. After that, ointment and bandages after a bath should be sufficient. Let me look at your head."

"Glass? The mirror?" Janie turned her body and neck a bit and let Cerise look closer at the swelling lump on the back of her head. The apothecary's fingers were gentle and probed down to the base of her skull and her neck.

"You're lucky for the plaster. If the wall had been stone here, you'd probably be dead," Cerise said with a matronly tone.

"Oh," Janie's eyes widened. "It didn't feel like I hit that hard."

"It will in a few hours," Cerise said. "Here." She pulled out another jar and a small cloth bag, then tapped a few pills from the jar to the bag. "These will help with the pain. Do not take more than three a day." She put the bag in Janie's hand, followed by a small earthenware pot.

"Smear this on your wounds. Use as much as you need. It will sting a bit."

"Oh fuck," Tonya gasped as she looked at Janie's back.

"What?" Janie asked, instinctively turning and craning her neck. A wave of pain and dizziness washed over her. She stopped and looked forward again, her eyes squeezed shut. Tonya cringed at Cerise's withering glare.

"It's just a lot of blood," Tonya said, trying to sound reassuring. "Probably looks worse than it is."

"Quite," Cerise agreed. "Help me take your top down." With a slightly embarrassed look towards Caine and the doorway, Janie tried to keep herself covered while pulling her bustier down around her waist to expose her back. She could feel the thin material wetly peeling free and sending scraping pain along the cuts. She hissed again and closed her eyes against the stinging.

"I'm sorry," Tonya said, taking Janie's hand. "I don't know how I screwed up so bad," The apprentice witch looked guilty and overwhelmed.

"I don't think it's your fault," Janie said, keeping her eyes closed and deliberately not shaking her head. "I think something else happened. We need to ask Bella."

"Bella!" Tonya exclaimed, whirling to face the mirror, registering it for the first time.

The carved frame hung cockeyed and empty. Shards of mirrored glass littered the floor. Tonya felt like she was going to be sick.

"What the hell was that?" Will called out. He was staring at the broken hand mirror in his grip.

As soon as he'd smashed it, something had happened. The crash of breaking glass was far louder than it should have been.

"Overload!" Bella called back. "The mirror shattered!"

"That's what you told me to do!" Will yelled over the waves and wind.

"Not your mirror! This mirror! Janie's mirror!" Bella called.

Will's heart sank. "What. Was it supposed to do that?"

"No!" Bella yelled. "There was a surge of power. It dumped through the mirror and into our circles. They were strong enough to redirect the energy, but the mirror couldn't contain it!"

As Will and Bella shouted back and forth to each other across the aftcastle, Danica jogged nimbly through the shattered shards of mirror, stepping over the faintly glowing lines drawn on the deck. She knew little about magic but knew enough not to step on things that glowed.

Can you two deal with this later? We've got borders to repel!"

"Did the hex work?" Will called.

"I think so!" Bella answered.

"So, are we done?" Will asked.

"I guess we have to be! Without the mirror as an energy source, there's not much I can do!" Bella shouted.

"You want to untie me then?" Will yelled.

"There's glass everywhere! I'm barefoot!" Bella called back.

"Oh, for the love of..." Will muttered. He drew his parrying dagger from his belt and started cutting the ropes that kept him secured to the chair.

"Lace is going to skin you for cutting her ropes," Danica said, hustling back through the remnants of the ritual carrying a large spotlight lantern. Will stared after her for a moment. She was wearing a thin undershirt that was soaked through and completely transparent. She watched the near-topless Danica rush past the naked Bella and shook his head, bemused.

There were usually fewer naked people during naval battles.

He finished cutting the ropes, sheathed his dagger, and stood up, leaving the chair anchored to the deck. He held his navigation desk under one arm and took a few steps to the mast to hold onto a rope for balance. The ship was rolling enough that he had to concentrate on his balance, but thankfully, they weren't in the open ocean. The reef and the island acted as water breaks, keeping the worst of the churning waves at bay. "Captain, is it safe to assume you aren't going to need any headings for a while?" he called out as he followed Danica to the helm.

"Aye!" Captain Vex answered over her shoulder. "Only way out is ahead, and we're blocked!

Getting rammed like that might crack our hull! We're going nowhere until we know if we're taking on water!"

"I'll go below and check!" Will said, handing the navigation desk to Bella. He put his hand on her shoulder to ensure he had her attention. "Get this to the captain's quarters and stay there until the fight ends."

Bella nodded, worry plain on her face. "I don't know what happened with the ritual."

"I'm sure you'll figure it out. Right now, we have more pressing things to worry about," Will said, trying to sound reassuring.

Bella took a deep breath. The fading light of the sigils and the rain sluicing down her body made the witch look like something otherworldly, but her scared expression was all too human. "Be careful," she said. Will nodded, squeezed her arm once, and then rushed down the stairs. Bella followed much more slowly, holding tight to the railing and going still each time the ship rolled in a new direction.

Danica clamped the lantern to the railing beside the helm and aimed the spotlight. In the faint light of the hand lanterns hanging from the masts, all they'd been able to see from the aftcastle were shadows and silhouettes punctuated by occasional reflections off clammy white skin. Screams of pain and anger filtered through the howling winds.

"By the gods," Danica whispered. Her lantern showed dozens of the gape-mouthed white figures stumbling awkwardly around on the foredeck, flailing with heavy limbs and vomiting forth those terrible spined tendrils toward the ship's defenders. At the center of the fight was Mister Reeve, standing a head above the swabs fighting with him; he laid about himself with a one-handed hooked weapon covered in tooth-like serrations. A half dozen crewmen already lay still or writhing on the deck, along with two of the pale invaders. A loud crack rang out as Mister Lynch took another shot with his longarm as soon as Danica had the spotlight up.

Another white form crashed to the deck like a puppet with its strings cut.

"Keep that light on them!" Lynch called out, not bothering to look behind him at where the light was coming from as he reloaded. In the time it took Lynch to ready his next shot, another crewman went down screaming, speared in the leg by a spiked tentacle, and dragged backward into the clutches of a corpse-white thing that had once been a man. Three more white forms from the ruined ship speared on the Kestrel's deck fell to their bow.

"This isn't good, Captain," Danica said warily.

"Nae," Captain Vex agreed grimly. "We gotta get the Kestrel free. Colin, can you keep the helm steady?

"Should be easy, we're not moving," Colin nodded. His puffy face slurred his speech. Danica had yet to see much of the big man lately. The whole side of his head was a solid mass of swollen bruises. That bouncer in the brothel had nearly crippled their helmsman. Hopefully, now that they had a doctor aboard, he'd heal faster, but they had to survive the night first.

"Danica, I'll take the light. You get the hooks and get us free," Belita ordered.

"Aye," Danica passed the spotlight handle to her captain and descended the stairs.

Bella stumbled through the door to the captain's quarters into screaming horror. Two of the crew were on the bed, and one was on the ground. One had a severely broken arm. Another crewman was holding his gaze and talking him through the pain. The two on the bed were bleeding badly. Jack was keeping pressure on a leg wound and telling the bleeding woman to bite down on a leather-wrapped chunk of wood so they could set a tourniquet. Doctor Kalfou and Quinn were fighting a shuddering man who had a large gash in his throat. Quinn was holding the man's head and arms steady while the doctor knelt at the bedside and tried to staunch the bleeding. It seemed to be going well for a moment. Quinn's impressive strength was enough to hold the thrashing man still, but then he suddenly spasmed so hard that his collarbone broke with a wet crack.

Bella found herself leaning against the wall, clutching the navigation table to her body like it would protect her.

The man with the neck wound thrashed one more time and went still. The doctor's face went grim, and she bit off a curse in a tongue Bella didn't know. She put her fingers against the unruined side of his neck and shook her head. After a moment, she stood up. "Get him off the bed," she said grimly.

Quinn hefted the limp man like a sack of potatoes and disappeared into the washroom.

"Is he..." Bella trailed off.

Doctor Kalfou looked up, noticing her for the first time. "Yes," she said firmly. "Get dressed.

Come help."

Bella nodded mechanically, looking around for something to wear. She suddenly couldn't remember where her clothes were, and she couldn't think. She stared at her bag in the corner.

Her mind wasn't clear enough to recognize it for what it was.

Jack looked up at her, then back to the belt she was tightening around the bleeding leg. Then she did a double-take back to Bella. "Dammit." She cinched the belt down one last time, ignoring the stifled scream of pain from her patient. "Take over," she said to the doctor. She quickly tied off the tourniquet and stood up to let Doctor Kalfou in.

Jack looked at what Bella was staring blankly at, grabbed Bella's clothing bag from the corner, and quickly crossed the room. She gently pulled the forgotten navigation desk out of Bella's hands and replaced it with the bag. "Bella," she said gently.

Bella stared at the bag in her hands, breathing shallow and rapid.

"Bella, look at me," Jack said insistently.

Bella looked up, meeting Jack's eyes. Recognition came a moment later. She just stared.

"Bella, get dressed," Jack said gently and firmly, "Just focus on that. Ignore everything else."

Bella nodded. "Get dressed," she repeated. Her eyes snapped down to her bag, which she opened quickly. All her movements were jerky and uncoordinated as if each was a separate action requiring individual acts of will. Her hands shook, but she found a skirt and blouse and pulled them on. When she finished tying the cord of her dress, she looked up, a bit more coherent in her eyes.

"You all right?" Jack asked.

"No, not really," Bella said, finding her voice after a moment. She was quiet and much less self-assured than she usually was.

The door crashed open, and a sailor dragged another man across the threshold, trailing a smear of blood behind them. Bella flinched at the noise like she expected to be struck. Doctor Kalfou looked up from setting the broken arm of the sailor on the floor. "Get him on the bed,' she said. Quinn took over from the sailor doing the dragging and hefted the unconscious man by his belt and the front of his shirt. Another gunshot echoed from outside. The bag fell out of Bella's hands as she covered her ears.

"Bella," Jack said, trying to get the witch's attention before she became lost inside herself again. This time, Bella has yet to respond. She just stared at the trail of blood on the ground and trembled, wincing at every cry of pain. Jack exhaled, weighing the situation in her mind.

Then she tipped Bella's chin up and kissed her.

Bella's eyes fluttered and went wide. Her whole body shook for a moment, then she threw her arms around Jack's neck and kissed her back, frantic and desperate like she was drowning and Jack was air. When the kiss finally broke, Bella stared in surprise and wonder, her mouth slightly open. She was still shaking slightly.


To be continued