The unease she had felt since arriving on Bellum grew stronger.

Bellumers don’t even make any more!” added Foam. “In the old days – because they didn’t need a fleet – both the men and women of Bellum Island were makers. But they haven’t produced goods for generations. They merely consume what the rest of us make. If the other islands were to organise and refuse to trade, Bellum would starve!”

“They don’t make?” Storm stared at her uncle and Foam. How could an island’s people not create? Making was life.

“Oh, a few artisan-makers still work on Bellum,” replied Lake. “But most of the stalls are filled with goods from other islands.”

“But … what do the people do?”

“Survive as best they can,” Foam said. “The ordinary folk garden, hunt and fish to scrape a living. Those in town serve the Pact in some way, offering luxuries and distractions for the head families. They run taverns like this for the fleet men. And other things…”

“What other things?” Storm asked, but Foam blushed and looked into his cup of rice wine.

“Teanu gave me a message for you,” said Lake.

“A message? Why did she not tell me it herself?”

“It was for a time such as this. The Elder knew the Pact would try to seduce you. She knew they would offer you your gender back. She said, ‘Tell Storm to be patient and to trust me. All is possible given time and good fortune.’”

“That is all?”

“No. She said that you must let the Earth spirit guide you. She thinks you have a special connection to Earth because of Dain, that the Tortoise took you as its child because it foresaw your mother’s death.”

Storm heard again the Tortoise’s words: In choosing life you will find death, but if you turn to death, you and yours will die in turn.

Last year, in a moment of weakness, she had allowed herself to think of Nim, the Drowned One boy, as a human being instead of her mortal enemy. He had shipwrecked himself on Yanlin and been near to death when she found him. Instead of reporting him to the Elders, she had nursed the pirate boy back to health. And Nim had repaid her by helping his people attack Yanlin.

With a rising horror, Storm understood that the Tortoise had known that if she saved the Drowned One boy, her mother would die.

11

“Storm?”

Both men were watching her.