Liao had never ridden a ship before. He wished he never had. It wasn’t the waters that would drown you; it was the thin wooden hull separating you from the bottomless sea that was an ever present source of torment. The floor’s neverending movements bobbed and sunk Liao’s gut. He retched into his bucket, this time just spit and sour bile.

Gasping, the prince looked up from his cot to see Renshu meditating on the floor, seemingly comfortable. No, that was the wrong word. The monk was knotted wood, tough and unbending. Comfort wasn’t something the Shadai Order was known for. He was a man of self assurance rather than reassurance, silent unless Liao asked a question, of which he was growing too weak to even say a word.

A dull ache had returned to spread through Liao’s head and body, like pinpricks in his veins, blooming through his blood. Each hour, he felt its hold strengthen, and weaken him in turn. The ship’s motions heightened his daze. Besides a candle puddling over an iron plate, there was only the dark, the hull creaking with the sea’s weight, and Liao softly dying. He could feel his body deaden, like blood leaving a limb, numb past feeling.

One hour, or one day, Liao couldn’t tell, Renshu wasn’t sitting there. He was too weak to open the door, to even feel self pity for his uselessness. He was a ball of strung up fear winding itself in knots, over and over again until he broke somewhere.

Someone opened the door. It was the captain. The room smelled of sweat, piss and shit. He looked down at Liao with his brimmed hat, shadowing his face. Liao imagined him frowning with disgust.

“I see the blackfever has taken you,” he said. “Don’t be afraid, prince. You’re not going to die from this malady.” The man took a ladle of water from a bucket, bringing it to Liao’s dry lips. He drank slowly.

“Where,” he croaked, “is Renshu?”

The captain said, “Your monk asked where we were going. He didn’t like the answer.”

“Where,” Liao said, more of a demand than a question.

The man smiled. “Cadria, of course. The King has plans for you.”

Liao reached for him, wheezing. The captain left the room, leaving him to the creaking quiet.

*

A haze blanketed Liao, smothering his senses in its numbness. Liquid fell into his mouth, bittersweet, tasting like the antidote Renshu had given him. He'd choked in some of its contents, gurgling for breath.

He was still lying in his cot; a scruffy faced man and the captain stood over him.

“Ral’s mercy, he stinks,” the man said, rubbing his limp mustache. “Why have you brought me here, Captain Hagos?”

“Will he live, Doctor?” Hagos asked.

The doctor pressed one bony forefinger to Liao’s neck, and cut away his shirt with a twin-bladed instrument. “The black lotus extract hasn’t reached his heart yet, but the paleroot brew isn’t pure enough of a dosage. He needs the real thing, and it only grows in Qeita.”

“How long does he have?”

“It’s hard to say, but given the rate it’s spreading, a few days at most.”

Liao groaned, anger giving him enough strength to speak. “Why are you doing this?”

The doctor turned to Hagos. “I can dilute some more paleroot, though it will only slow down the poison. You must bring him back to Qeita if you want him alive.”

“Oh, he’ll live,” Hagos said, his eyes glinting black in the dim candlelight. “The King wishes it. Would you go against the King’s wishes, Doctor?”

“Of course not,” the man snapped. “There is no cure on this ship or several hundred miles from here, you’ve made sure of that.”

“Keep him alive, and the rest will follow.”

Liao lunged for the doctor, who cringed away. The captain punched the prince in the gut, his breath driven out from the blow. He gripped Hagos’ matted shirt, trying to stand, instead convulsing to the floor.

“It’s time you joined your friend, Qeitan,” Hagos said, dragging him up.

The doctor opened the door for them, leading out to the ship’s hold. Barrels and rope hammocks outlined in the light of the few lanterns fixed to the walls. Faint sunlight fell over wooden steps, following up to the ship’s deck. To the other side, a man stood in front of a barred prison. With a key, he jangled the rusted door open. Renshu stared back at Liao, his hands and feet shackled within thick metal padlocks.

Hagos shoved Liao inside. He stumbled and fell, scraping his face against the floorboards. The door screeched shut. The captain and the doctor left them, only the guard standing watch.

Liao rested his back against the iron bars, digging into his spine.

He looked at the monk, who was still sitting cross legged. “How did they keep you here?”

“Poison darts,” Renshu said, not even opening his eyes. “The Cadric Inquisition uses such weapons well. Save your strength, and lessen your breathing. You’ll live longer.”

“How?” Liao asked.

“Follow what I do.”

Too weary to argue, Liao sat down and closed his eyes. He remembered his Trial, thirteen years ago, when the sages had tested him as a Seer. He’d inhaled and exhaled the scentless Jade Incense. Now, he smelled sweat, salt, and overpowering all: rusted metal, like blood in the air.

Liao willed himself to slow his breathing. At the very least, his vision didn’t show him dying in a cell. There was a calming certainty in that knowing, yet a deeper unease of his fate beyond this ship. The Oracle once said that fate was never a straight line, always changing and confounding the wisest Seers. Perhaps there was hope in her words.

He gasped. A vision was coming. It was always the same sensation, his head feeling like a storm of ice melting to boiling water that rushed throughout his body. With shaking breaths, Liao fought to keep himself still and quiet, squeezing his eyes shut until tears formed from the pressure.

*

His mother was surrounded by more than a dozen immortals: purple, orange, turquoise eyes glittering in the dark hall. She held the polearm she’d wrested from an imperial guard. Whipping her arm back with supernatural speed, she hurled it at a purple eyed man. Its blade snapped and shattered over his amethyst-like armor.

He rushed forward with such strength and speed the red marble beneath his feet cracked, the Empress caught in his path. The other immortals leapt back to avoid them. A crash sounding like crushing stone reached the end of the hall, the man holding Liao’s mother, his forearm wedged against her neck, holding her between a wall.

Cracks fissured along her face, like she was made of stone.

“I’m sorry it’s come to this, Fei,” the man said.

The Empress hissed, “End it, you self-righteous bastard.”

“You shouldn’t have married him,” the man whispered. “Perhaps you would have lived if you chose me.”

His armored forearm continued to crush her head, despite both of her hands trying to push back his pressure. The stone wall split behind her. Green eyes bright with terror, Liao’s mother screamed, until her face shattered like fallen porcelain, the lower half of her jaw crumbling into fragments, then dust.

*

Liao opened his eyes, the smell of salt and sweat and rust returning.

He contemplated his memory of her. Before she had become an immortal, the day when he’d become a Seer, his mother had been kind and gentle, in her quiet way. She’d shown him the yearly festivals beyond the Imperial District with his sister.

Do you see the people? she’d said, motioning to the crowds cheering at their appearance. They’re like you. Each and every one of them, an integral part of the Dynasty. Without them, there is nothing. They don’t follow you. You follow them. A true Emperor, or Empress, follows the people’s wish. You are their hand, and you must be strong to protect them. Meet your strength with their love, and that is the heart of the Dynasty.

Even after she’d become an immortal, flesh turned to stone, she still felt, and had shown her love for him in the end.

Liso closed his eyes, tears escaping.