Yoedian Arl

((Fallen Angel: As a writer (or amateur hack, whichever you prefer) I have to say there is nothing more wonderful than a well thought out review. You definitely made my day. Thank you so very much! Hopefully it continues to be of interest for you. I like this story very much, myself. It’s one of my favorites and it’s always neat to have someone else like it too!
Haywire: Because you’re just awesome and kind and wonderful - thank you! ))

Chapter 5: The Stowaway!

I did not go directly to Heero that morning. Instead I traversed the calm deck of that ship, eyes watching for the captain, afraid of his moods, as changeable as the winds in this sea we crossed. But for the moment, all was calm.

Cook showed himself to be surprised to see me. I received a cuff for asking if anyone had been looking after the prisoner. But then he informed me in his broken tongue that he’d sent one of the boys down to care for the man that very morning and I knew better than to leave the sick room of a dying man.

In no way was Heero dying but I came to suspect that morning, that perhaps Cook was perhaps more on my side than I’d previously thought. I had known many sea faring men who came through our city and our family home. They were coarse men, even the most gentlemanly of them had signs of wear and tear about the edges. They brought the outer air with them like a mantle, cool and free. And I often dreamed of following them onto a cross ocean voyage. The travels I undertook to go to New Hartlin were romanticized by what I thought it would be to live my life by the sea, not just by her fruits.

How long ago that voyage felt now! Here, my hair shorn and my face burned brown by the sun, fingers callused from the work and bruised from the ropes just a few nights before. I was not the same man I had been when I’d made my way to Therese’s arms. And far different still, from the man who had desired to make his home in the depths of the ocean’s bosom, to lie with his beloved in the depths.

I no longer wished for death, leaving Cook’s realm. I feared the ship and the captain more than anything, but that fear was a distant rumbling, not taking over my life or my being as it might have only a few weeks before. Rather, I looked forward to the adventure, the difficulties, the living that was to be had in the day after this - and all those after. It seemed I was freed from constraints I hadn’t even been aware existed and to this day, I am not entirely sure I can put to words the sensation. Suffice it to say, I came alive during that voyage and once brought out of the darkness of my previous life, I could never go back.

I knew then, that Chang was not going to be fed what I would give him. But I could not take on that duty until I was done with Heero, or until he was well enough. Thus I left it to Cook and whomever he chose, and returned to the babe’s book.

Heero made little sense that day. I was aware of time passing only in the shifting of shadows and the cyclical return of fever dreams, one after the other with lulls between.

With one of those lulls upon me, I went above board to get more water, having used up the small supply I had gotten the night before for his brow. But in the midst of heaving the top off of the barrel, a hand caught my arm.

It was but a hand, yet in the coolness of the ocean wind, it remained cool as well and for a moment it reminded me of the fingertips on my lids, the kiss. Ah! The pain of the memory so close, then wriggling away like something silver and alive.

Looking up I found myself captured by the single green light staring down out of that equally tanned face. He was beautiful, every time I saw him he was beautiful. I felt the need to go to my knees and beg his forgiveness, whatever it was I had done. To beg to hear him, to plead for him to do something, show me some favor. If one could beg favor of something as bright and beautiful as a mid autumn sunset, that is.

He took the lid from me and replaced it, then beckoned for me to follow him. His every motion had the smoothness of the ocean about us, rolling and golden. I could see the interplay of muscle and the adjustments needed to keep his spine straight at his lower back. His shirt tied about his waist, I had at my eye’s disposal the broad expanse of his skin and it left me feeling as if I were in the presence of something far more elemental than air or light or breath. I needed that sight, the nearness of it to keep me sane.

But where had that thought come from? I shook myself free of the strangeness of my thoughts, brushing off instincts that were not mine, could not be mine. I do not know where I picked up such thoughts, but someone had strong feelings for this Adonis.

He led me to the side of the ship and there, showed me where a bucket was kept, tied to one of the rails. I knew this bucket and I shook my head.

"No, I do not have time to clean the deck.."

His half smile took my breath away. Amused, that one eye turned and he lowered the bucket over the side of the deck and then brought it back up a moment after. Indicating my bowl, I held it out and allowed him to pour some into the basin. Then he threw the rest overboard and pointed to the bowl.

"We are running low on potable water." He spoke so low I had to lean forward to catch the tune and in doing so, found myself staring up at him, finding his lips making sounds my brain did not wish to make sense of so that I might remain this near for longer.

"Ah," I felt stupid with his presence.

"Use the bucket except when you must drink," he ordered and I would have done anything for him. He smelt wonderful, but I could not place it. It was not sweet, not particularly human even. It was clean, and it was gone before I could even catalogue it into my mind.

He was gone.

I stared after him, my hands clenched around the bowl and then with a slight blush, took myself back to Heero’s side.

Entering the babe’s book, I noticed a sound coming from Heero’s room. More than likely he had begun to go into a fever dream while I was gone. They ranged from quiet to pitiful to dangerous. I begged the Sea that this would not be one of the more dangerous ones. Heero, even ill as he was, had an ability that frightened me and I was not sure I wished to know how he’d ever come to be so well versed in the use of his hands.

The bowl sloshed on my arm, wetting my sleeve as I pushed the door open and stopped, shocked. Heero was in the midst of such a dream, but he was not alone.

He was struggling, his eyes squeezed shut and panting in pain. I think those painful ones might have been some memory. He cried but so slightly and in such a high voice. He sounded like a child. And he clung, clung to the man who held him. To the captain.

For his part, the captain was someone I did not recognize. There, upon his heart shaped face was nothing in the way of danger. Rather he had something nearing peace in his eyes as he smoothed Heero’s hair and crooned to him. And looking up, I was surprised to find that his normally strangely blue eyes were almost violet, like a sea at the point of dusk, when the world is holding its breath.

"Ah, water. We needed that." He motioned for me to come closer. I obeyed for he was captain and I was still afraid of him. "Bring the cloth as well, won’t you?" and I wonder that he even knew I was there.

I watched him, taking a seat in case I was needed or in case he turned in his madness to murder or something equally insane. I sat with them for the better part of an hour until Heero’s dream tapered off and he settled into Duo’s arms with a sigh of sadness.

Then he looked up at me.

"You must forgive me for the other night," he began, his words strangely cultured - but then again, I reminded myself, he was a nobleman much as I was. "I was not myself, nor do I think I have been myself for many a month now."

"You have been under much… duress, ser," I whispered, afraid to break this tenuous quiet.

"Ah, yes," his smile, so bitter, it broke my heart. "Yes, I suppose I have been. And I doubt that shall change any time soon. I did want to assure you, however, that my interest in you is merely as a man of my crew and a possible slave to the markets if you should wish. I will not have you sold otherwise and will make you the same promise I’ve made every man on my ship. You are to remain with me only because you wish. And while you are with me, you will be afforded the same freedoms as any freeman would be. Except," and he gave a small chuckle, "for the fact you must remain here, in the babe’s book."

I did not ask him the reason for this but he must have read the question on my oh too easily read face.

"Theo asked that you be kept here for your own safety. While we are more than pleased to have a man of your… coloring," how careful he was not to name the luck I was purported to have carried with me! "… we also must be aware that you are beautiful and the men have not seen a bedmate, many of them, for months. It makes you a sore temptation."

"Ah.." I was to speak in single syllables for most of this voyage, I could see that now.

"Aye." He crept out from under Heero’s body and then dropped a lingering hand to the hot brow before turning to me. "You are a brave man, Yoedian Arl. For all that this most terrible of times has brought us to, we are glad to have you aboard. Now, if you will excuse me.." and he bowed himself out of the room and left me to my thoughts.

Strange. Passing strange. How was it that so much hatred, so much bitterness, so much overwhelming love could exist inside of one man? He was a conundrum in that he seemed to be able to pilot a ship, man a crew, and yet be filled to the brim with so much emotion that it was like being caught in a windstorm just to be near him! And now this side of him.

I could sense the love he felt for this creature he claimed to hate. But hadn’t he said it himself only the day before, how love and hate are kin?

I puzzled over him for long hours until evening when Theo came to give me a break. Night came on and with it, the quieting presence of my love’s kiss. I did not need it so terribly, yet I wanted to hear the sound of broken want in a throat I could not visualize. So I kept my eyes screwed shut and ran my arms around shoulders broad and strong, and pressed myself against a body I knew was there now. And I was rewarded with a swallowed cry of surprise and a hunger tainting the taking of my mouth. I felt some manner of power knowing that I could affect him this way. Felt it, and then succumbed to the quiet power he held over me.

- - - - - - - - -

The next morning I was woken by Theo again. A small sea anemone in a cup of brine waited for my eyes and I released it, hoping that it would live in it’s long drift to the sea floor. Then I asked Theo for a moment and went to see Cook about feeding Chang.

I was sore that morning. I’m sure from holding Heero in the midst of his thrashings and from that hour of tense fear and uncertainty when the captain was in the room. And somehow, with the soreness of my muscles, came an exhaustion which could not be simply slept away. Not in one regular night anyway.

I took my breakfast with me, telling Cook I’d eat it with Heero, but I had every reason to see that it went to Wufei. He was bound to be ill himself. We had taken on some water and he, chained as he was, would not have been able to warm himself by pulling his body in toward itself. I was unsure of how he’d fared.

He "felt" dull to me when I came down the ladder into the brig. Setting the plates to the side, I tilted my head and stared at him. Then deciding that he would fight me this day, I shrugged and readied myself.

"I suppose you’ve been wondering if I’ve not been swept off deck with that storm. The truth of the matter is that I was sent up the ropes and things got rather confusing for a time.." I began to tell him the story though he showed no signs of being interested.

In the midst of the story, careful not to name Heero’s name to him as I did so, I forced his jaws open, pushing my breakfast, the eggs and the salted pork, the cup of water ration for him and my ration as well (I had discovered we were on rations due to a lost barrel of fresh water during the storm which had broken apart and spilled) thinking he may not have had enough, into his gullet. He chewed but it was a robotic motion and only if I’d pushed the food into his mouth.

Still, it took less time than it would have when I’d first begun. I finished the story and sat on the floor before him, picking up my bowl of gruel and began to choke it down. "So now I’m stuck with caring for this sailor because he’s taken ill. He most likely cracked a rib or two, or bruised them at best. And so I’m sorry it’s been so long. I hope they weren’t too harsh on you when they came down to feed you."

At a sharp reprimand of thought, a piercing sense of guilt emoting from him, I looked up and found his eyes on me, wide in horror. I could not understand it and looked around in a complete loss. "What?" I knew by then that he was aware of my intuitive abilities. But he only flicked his eyes down.

Looking down I realized that I held his bowl and I laughed. "Ah, this. Well, I’m sure you’ve been much worse off than myself for the past few days down here, so I thought it only fair you have my meal. You mustn’t get sick." And then in response to the spike of anger rushing out of him, the injustice, so to speak, I smiled benignly. "And no, I know you’re not doing any work. But your body is trying very hard to keep you warm. I would ask the captain to loosen your bonds some to make it easier to stay warm, but I’m afraid of him you see. I think he’s mad -"

The injustice was back and I could only ascertain that he was angry at me for speaking ill of the captain. I sighed then, finished my bowl in silence and then took my leave of him.

That day was much the same as the first. It differed only in that the captain did not come until the evening and he relieved me for dinner. I took my dinner to the first mate down below decks and found he put up quite a fight against me. He was determined that I should eat some of my dinner. But he needed it far more.

"If you fight like this… you’ll only need more… more food.. so stop.. struggling damn you!" I cried finally in exasperation. "Or I’ll be forced to chew your food for you, if you’re going to waste it by spitting it out like that!!"

That last got him and he took the food meekly but with a glare that matched Heero’s in it’s ferocity. Then I sat on the ground and caught my breath while forcing down that night’s bowl of gruel. It was awful stuff and left me famished. But it was necessary, I told myself.

After dinner I went back to the babe’s book, afraid that the captain had killed Heero in my absence. It would have been the best of times. And while he was not so calm as he had been the night before, he was still calm and tender. Heero, it seems, had been talking to Chang while he was dreaming this time. It did nothing for the captain’s mood and he snarled at me as he left. Muttering something about me smelling like gruel and needing a bath, before leaving.

Theo came to the rooms sometime after and I leaned back in the chair watching him as he went about cleaning up the latest mess of bedclothes that Heero had made in his last fit. I felt drained, quiet, and wanted terribly to go to the silence in my lover’s arms - but was unwilling yet. I had… had a question first.

"Theo?"

"Hrm? Aye ser.." he finished a corner and then went about wiping Heero’s brow with a cloth cooled in sea water.

"Tell me about the shell? The one left on my dresser."

Silence answered me and I waited trying to be patient. It was not fear I felt, but it was an uncomfortable sensation, as if one were too close to what one cannot possibly understand.

"Tis sommat too fine fer th’crew, y’understand," he ventured.

"Yes, I realize that. But I don’t think it’s from someone on the crew." Or at least, I was not sure if the man who came in to see me was from the crew. I had not brought my thinking that far. I had been too busy with other things to consider who my mysterious visitor could be or where he was from. Because of course he had to have been from the crew, right? Because otherwise, he’d have to be - to be -

"Some say that shells that delicate, were once gifts from th’sea. From th’sea folk."

I was confused. "But aren’t we the Sea Folk?"

"Y’ve heard o’the Oien Sa Marne, the True Sea People, haven’t yer?" He finished with Heero and pulled up a chair to sit across from me, watching me with a seaman’s unfathomable eyes.

"Yes, but only in stories. I’m from a farming island. Moon Arl. We tell tales of how we came from them, how they are the first and how we’re given the gifts of good storms at the right times, water when we need it and cool and dry when we do, so that we can harvest and not lose our crops. And how some of our people are directly tied to them, with a taste of the sea in them, so to speak."

"Yer speakin’ o’yerself." He nodded to me.

"Yes, the Yoedian Arl are one of the kinds. We also speak of those born with green eyes as being men and women of the sea, like Trowa.." I left off at that, turning up the word like a question because he was another I was intrigued by but did not know how to go about asking of him without seeming strange.

Theo’s brow drew down and centered as he thought of that. "Aye, the green eyes and Yoedian Arl. Children born with webbing in their toes, and the sensitives who can calm animals and hear men’s thoughts. I’ve come to wonder about Trowa as has many a man. But we’ve thought it to be good luck to have a man of the sea aboard."

"That would seem lucky to me," I agreed.

"Aye, t’would. But the gift. Th’shell. T’were said that th’sea folk, that is, the Oien Sa Marne, give such gifts to a man who is deigned to come to them. To die as it were, or to be drug into the waves with’em. Said also, ‘at it were fer a sailor what has luck and their eye on’im. Said also, it were a mark of a’man what has a lover of the sea.." and his eyes turned on mine so piercingly I could not help but blush.

"Seein’ as how it’s gotter be one o’them.." he paused meaningfully and I clasped my hands together nervously. "But ‘aving a lover amongst th’Oien Sa Marne i’nt sich a danger always. Could be sommat good. We’ll jes hafta see, won’t we?" and he chuckled low.

"You said.." I ventured, trying to get his mind off of my secret, "that you thought it was good luck to have Trowa aboard. Did you choose him purposefully? Or.. that is, did the captain choose him?" I realized then, that I was not only acting surpassingly rude, but far outside of my training and wondered how much of the sea was rubbing off on me.

A low laugh calmed the night and Theo nodded. "Aye, thought him to be a good luck charm but no. He was a stowaway, he was."

"A stowaway?" I was shocked. Stowaways are often thrown overboard many times, or dropped off at some unknown island unless the ship is close to the coast for sheer fact that the food supplies are best not given to an extra mouth. But then, Trowa was far from an extra mouth. It seemed he worked for ever bite he took. I should not have been so shocked then.

"Aye," Theo smiled. "Came up outta th’supplies ‘e did. Jes rose up an’walked th’deck to th’cap’n’s side. Silent as th’sea, an’ th’cap’n looks ‘im over. Sez, ‘Well? Cain’t ‘ave jes annyone take aboard. Yer willin’ ter earn yer keep?’ an Tro, ‘e jes gives his odd smile ‘e does. And thet is thet."

I smiled, confused but finding it amusing. "He was a slave? A runaway?" Trowa had the cut of a slave but no mark, now that I thought of it. No mark on his bare ankle or on his chest.

"Na, no slave, I don’t think." Theo mused to himself, "Leastwise, no tats on him."

"So I’ve seen.." and then I blushed again, caught once more in the all too knowing gaze of a sea dog who’s looked into more faces than I will ever see.

"Aye, s’pose yer have," he smiled. "But yes. Jes rose up, third day out off th’coast, acted like he owned th’place. Don’t speak much, didn’t then, don’t now. But what with the green eyes and his ability to man ropes as if they was his own fingers, his own bones, ‘e weren’t nothin’ we could manage without, eh?"

I nodded but found that my questions were only growing. I was hungry for details and details were not forthcoming. Nor would they be, I ascertained. Theo had told me what he felt was important. I had given him an insight into my feelings on the matter of the sailor in question, and to ask for more would only solidify my feelings for the man and create a possible sticking point.

For one, I did not even know if Trowa held interest in me. Nor was I going to be able to insert myself between he and whomever it was I had felt the last time I’d spoken with him. It was difficult to think, to recognize any thoughts when they were so close to my own. And I was sure they had to come from somewhere, someone near and someone strongly tied to Trowa, they had almost overtaken me. Yet being around him overtook me.

Perhaps it was foolish and the fact that Theo gave me no more information a blessing. I could not afford any foolish infatuations with sailors, least of all, when I may have been in the midst of a night time relationship (if one wished to call it that) with a creature which lived under the very waves we rode atop of.

It was all confusing and I was relieved to have the emotional drain that night be from my own torn heart rather than from those around me. Waking a short time after laying down and feeling the cool touch on my arm, the breath on my lips, the kiss and the scent of ocean in my nostrils, I found my own semblance of peace, even though I could not stop myself from wishing that I could see my lover and that he was gazing at me from a pair of green eyes.

[Chapter Six] The ex-First Mate finds his voice. And Quatre begins to worry about what it means to be the lover of a member of an ancient species.

- - - - - - -
- - - - - - -

((Hey those who’re managing to read still! A few notes that I’m hoping help assuage fears that I’m ignoring the gaps in curse and all that. If not, please let me know! I will do my utmost to make sure this remains enjoyable, just short of something drastic like selling off all I own and sequestering myself away. I can’t thank those of you enough, who are still reading after all of this! All of you are very appreciate.
As for the curse, I hadn’t intended for there to be an actual curse to begin with. Being that this is a sea story, I figured some nutsy interactions could be chalked up to being on a "cursed voyage" in that the voyage is not a good one and may prove to be deadly if their captain can’t pull it together. If they were smart, they would have mutinied a long time ago. ))