Chapter 15: The Airship, the Assassin, and the Absolutely Awkward Apology
The skyship Hollow Dream looked like it was held together with equal parts magic, twine, and wishful thinking. Painted bright purple with gold trim that had definitely seen better centuries, it bobbed in the air like a drunken whale. Elliott squinted up at it and muttered, "We're really going to fly that?"
Marlow patted the side of the hull. "She's reliable. In the same way a raccoon in a trench coat can technically run a bakery."
"...That's not comforting," Dorian said flatly.
But the ship was their only way across the Stormglass Expanse—a violent, magical sky canyon that gleamed with ever-changing lightning and winds sharp enough to skin dragons. So up they went.
The crew was just as sketchy as the ship. The captain, a grizzled woman named Commander Frix, had a voice like gravel and a laugh like a thunderclap. She greeted them with, "Rules are simple. Don't touch the steering crystal. Don't feed the storm gulls. And if someone goes overboard, don't yell about it. You'll spook the clouds."
"...Spook the clouds?" Elliott echoed.
"They hold grudges."
As the Hollow Dream sailed into the churning skies, the party tried to relax. Tried.
Elliott found himself alone on the observation deck, the wind tugging at his hair and cloak. The relic hummed under his shirt. It had been doing that more often lately, as if sensing something coming. Or maybe something watching.
Behind him, footsteps. He turned to see Elric, hands in his robes, expression unusually... not sarcastic.
"You all right?" Elliott asked.
"No," Elric said. "But I realized I was kind of a prat in the Illusion City. So here's a thing I don't say lightly: I'm sorry. For the hex. And the mocking. And the... you know, potion incident."
Elliott blinked. "Is this a trick?"
"I said I don't say it lightly."
A beat passed. Then Elliott smiled. "Thanks."
"Good. Because I might need you to save me if I fall off this thing. I made eye contact with a storm gull and I think I offended it."
That night, as the ship drifted between stars and lightning, things went sideways.
A scream. A thud. The sound of someone being too sneaky in an area clearly labeled "No Sneaking After Dark."
Elliott burst into the cargo hold to find Seraphine mid-duel with a masked assassin, blades flashing. Dorian tackled the intruder a second later, shouting something about "no honor in interrupting someone's midnight snack."
It turned out the assassin had been hired by a shadowy figure known only as The Collector, who wanted the relic—and Elliott's head. Preferably not attached to the same body.
They fended off the attack, but not without injury. The assassin poisoned Seraphine with a dart. Marlow stabilized her, muttering curses in six languages, one of which might've been made-up.
Elliott sat beside Seraphine as she slept off the antidote. "Why does it always feel like we're just barely surviving?"
Marlow didn't look up from her runes. "Because we are. That's what being chosen means. You survive. Even when you shouldn't."
The relic pulsed again—harder this time. A single, whispered word brushed across Elliott's mind: "Soon."
He didn't sleep that night.