Chapter Seventeen -

The Flameskimmer  pushed away from the pier with a smidge of effort from our cultivator hosts. The outer disciples used some oars to make distance between the ship and the docks, then Captain Ashmud unfurled just a bit of sail that caught the wind with a snap, and off we went.

“We’ve got the winds at our backs,” the captain said. “We’ll make good time if it keeps up. I don’t know if we’ll be able to make land overnight, but we’ll get to the opposite shore by morning.”

“Good good good,” Cinder said. She stood on the foredeck, right behind the ship’s prow where it was cutting through the ashy surface of the lake. “I don’t want to spend any more time on this lake than I need to.”

“You dislike the lake?” I asked.

The young woman nodded. “It’s... not a good environment for me or for my cultivation. I do not want to have such a glaring weakness, but I have no choice in the matter. These waters are not suitable for me to fight upon.”

“I see,” I said. “Do you measure everything on the scales of how easily you could fight upon it?”

Cinder tilted her head to the side slightly. “No, sometimes I measure things on the scale of how well I could fight it, other times on the scale of how well I could evade it. There are some cultivators that only measure things in relation to how easily they could defeat that thing. Those cultivators tend to die at their first meeting with a true adversary.”

“Ah, yes, that kind of person. I encountered my share of similar adventurers in my day. Young men and women who saw the world painted in shades tinted by ego and self-confidence. Strange colours those.”

Cinder nodded. “Here, the world is grey on grey, and it is always willing toyou kill you. It’s one of the more valuable lessons the sect has to teach.”

“The subtle art of running away?” I asked.

“I don’t know if it’s all that subtle, but yes.”

“Subtle or not, it is very valuable,” I said. “I might be quite a bit stronger than I once was, but even I have retreated from my fair number of kerfuffles.”

Cinder eyed me for a moment. “I find that hard to believe. You are... powerful.”

“I think that I’m undoubtedly well-versed in several magical arts and I’m a well-read scientist. That certainly gives me an edge. Add to that the undeath and millenia of experience and I suspect that I’d be a formidable foe for most. But I wasn’t always this way.”

Cinder nodded slowly. “Some of the elders of the sect have that same kind of humility. They are atare the height of their power now, even in their old age, but they still recall a time when their cultivation wasn’t as far ahead. They like to remind the rest of us about it.”

“That’s sensible. It’s a good reminder that even the greats were once beginners. It takes a lot of effort and thousands of mistakes before you reach a level where you are no longer making a fool of yourself. It’s commendable to remind others that you, yourself, were once awful at the things you are now great at.”

“I suppose so,” Cinder said. “And you were once awful yourself?”

“Of course! My interest in the arcane began... why, I was just a small child. But I, too, was unable to properly cast prestidigitation once. It took long laborious hours, years of work and practice, before I grew in skill and knowledge enough to call myself an expert. I think the only thing that set me apart at that time was that expertise was not enough for me. I wanted more than mere mastery. I wanted to be the perfect caster.”

“You strove for the heavens, and you reached them,” Cinder replied. “For all that you profess a dislike of cultivators at times, you--and no offence is meant by this--have certain traits in common.”

“Hmm, I suppose I might,” I replied.

The captain deployed all of the sail that he could, then he snapped at Char and Greyflake, setting the two of them to rowing even though we were still picking up speed. I suspected that part of the reason for that was to break up the surface of the lake. The oar’s churned up the ashen surface, allowing the ship to better cut through the muddy waters.

As we picked up some speed, the ship rose out of the water slightly. A clever trick with the sails acting as foils. It meant that we were soon skimming along the surface at a respectable speed. I leaned over the front of the ship to take a look at the prow, and discovered that it was quite thin, acting as a blade through the water, and it had small curved planks along its side that pushed the ship upwards as it moved.

That was some impressive engineering, moreso even than the complex system of oars, even if this part was entirely stationary.

“Ah! You’ve figured out our secret,” Captain Ashmud said as he ambled over. He was entirely comfortable on the swaying, bucking deck.

“Indeed. It’s some clever work. Is there an enchantment to lighten the ship as well?” I asked.

The captain grinned. “Aye! There is. That cost a fair deal as well. We had to have those lightened parts enchanted at the capital. It’s just the beams that make up the frame of the ship. The rest is unenchanted, for the most part. Still, those are some of the heaviest parts of the vessel. The mast is enchanted as well. It keeps our centre of weight a little lower.”

“Impressive,” I said. “How did you come up with all of this?”

“Lots of tiny models,” he said with confidence.

That was fair. Working at scale was often a fantastic way of experimenting on the effects of a larger-scale project.

I had a number of experiments that relied on that kind of trick. Once, I recreated an entire nation at one-hundredth of its original size within a mage tower. It took up an entire floor of the tower, and I needed catwalks to be able to traverse the scaled terrain without damaging it.

It had served as a fantastic testbed for the first undead officers I trained. A space for them to manoeuvre and give orders to simulated armies in order to get a feel for what a real engagement would be like.

“You mentioned that we would be arriving by morning?” I asked.

“That’s right,” he replied.

“In that case, I’ll retire for the evening. Thank you for your time, Captain, and yours as well, Miss Cinder.”

“It was a pleasure,” Cinder replied with a short bow. The captain was a little less formal, nodding to me before returning to his work.

I made my way down into the lower deck of the ship and discovered Alex folding some clothes up and placing it into a small chest fixed to the wall. “Are you putting things away so soon?” I asked. “We’ll only be aboard for a day.”

“Maybe, but during that day things will be in their place. And it’s hardly an imposition to pack up in a hurry when we leave. Besides, packing things is a good way to know what you have. It’s like a tiny spring cleaning.”

“I see,” I replied. I glanced around the room. Rem was cursing in a low murmur while stabbing her scythes into a cloth. She seemed quite annoyed at her inability to fold it. Mem, meanwhile, had her face pressed up against a small glass porthole. She jumped every time a wave splashed up against the glass, but was quick to approach it again.

I suspected that she was fishing for a view under the water.

Heh. Fishing!

“Did Daddy have a nice chat with Miss Cinder and Captain Ashmud?” Alex asked.

“I did,” I said. “You could hear it from here?”

Alex’s ears twitched. “Yes. I have great hearing for that kind of thing. A proper maid always listens, and always knows the latest gossip.”

I nodded. That only made sense. “And what do you think of said  latest gossip?”

Alex paused in the act of folding some pants. “Hmm. I think that Papa Bones is kind to share his wisdom, but I don’t know if these cultivators can appreciate it, even if knowing about their weakness makes them stronger.”

Rem scoffed. “That’s stupid. Being weak means you’re weak. That’s so simple even Mem gets it.”

“I do?” Mem asked.

“Shut up, Mem.”

“Okay.”

I rubbed my chin. How could I explain this?

Actually, I could explain it in depth and at great length. It would then be up to Rem to listen and learn. “Do you know what a power fantasy is?” I asked.

Rem tilted her head. “No?”

“Well then, let me explain. Don’t worry, this will only take a few hours.”

***