Читать книгу A Jewel Bright Sea - Claire O'Dell - Страница 9

CHAPTER 2

She woke to the pitch-black of midnight and a vicious throbbing in her skull. Without thinking, she lunged upward, only to be caught by a pair of hands. Anna struggled, but those hands held her steady while someone else inserted a glass vial between her lips. A cold liquid, viscous and bitter, poured into her mouth. She spat it out and twisted away.

“Drink, you idiot child,” said a woman’s voice, low and rough. “Unless you like that headache of yours.”

She gripped Anna’s chin in one hand and forced the vial between her lips a second time. Against her will, Anna gulped down one mouthful, then another. Her vision cleared momentarily and she could make out a collection of shadows off to one side. She wanted to demand where she was, what had happened, but that proved too much of an effort. With a sigh, she dropped into sleep.

* * * *

She dreamed—a dream so vivid, she knew at once this was a memory of a past life.

She stood on the deck of a ship, one arm wrapped around the forward mast, her face lifted into the stiff breeze. Nothing but ocean around them, the waves rolling toward the horizon, great vast swells of indigo that glittered with sunlight and the foam of the ship’s passage. Six more ships followed, each with two masts, two prows, and a great deck in the center. West and west they sailed, the season growing colder, the stars shifting and changing with their passage, and if the gods were generous, if their prayers and visions held true, they would discover new lands over the horizon.

Anna knew this dream, this life. Knew this ship and this crew. Everyone dreamed such things, her father had explained when she woke in terror as a child. Like Blind Toc, who died and was reborn, so did all souls pass over the river of souls from one life to another.

And with each new life, her father said, we are free to make new choices. But remember, we are bound by those choices, life after life.

* * * *

The second time she woke, she saw patches of moonlight that seemed to roll and pitch along with the rest of her world. Her head ached, but not as much as before. Her gut felt sore and pinched. She groaned and tried to lever herself upright. Once again, hands firmly caught her by the shoulders and another vial was placed at her lips. She drank more of that soothing potion, which tasted of the familiar and the strange. She tried to thank the person, but they merely hushed her and laid a hand over her forehead, murmuring words of magic.

The aches unraveled from her bones and muscles. She sighed in relief.

“She’ll do, I think,” said a voice, the same one as before. “But you might want to take precautions.”