nautical

[aetheling]

Cymbeline doesn't really like boats, but they're the only way to get anywhere in a reasonable period of time, especially when "anywhere" isn't on the mainland. Today he is sailing to Vectis, to oversee the change of governorship; his father the king is needed for courtly matters back home and his mother the queen, despite being the source of his royal blood, declines to involve herself in affairs of state when she can avoid it. Zoyah takes more after Ranae than after Charles in this department. So, it falls to Cymbeline.

Walking on a boat is even more difficult than walking on land, and Cymbeline is no great shakes at the latter to begin with. Unfortunately, neither he nor Kerem, the court magician and Cymbeline's confidante, have been able to figure out how to apply the principles of practicable magic to alleviating princely clumsiness. So Cymbeline is clinging to the railing of the boat, watching the waves, trying to avoid having to walk anywhere.

Comments

[aetheling]

"I'll take that as a yes."

He has the afternoon free; in the evening he'll be doing some miscellaneous court tasks for his parents, but until then his time is his own, and he opts to spend it entirely on going through this book.

They are approaching the end of the book, and Kerem said he was pretty sure it was the only one in the library. Cymbeline supposes they can invent more signs.

[treasuresuntold]

Still, with just the signs in this book and a little imagination, it's possible to say a lot. And Jade is positively chatty in the name of practice. She talks about Cymbeline's house, about his family, about the clothes she borrowed from his sister; she questions him about the sorts of things he does with magic.

She does not volunteer any information about her life under the sea.

[aetheling]

He's happy to answer questions, confirm or deny or correct the grammar of her remarks about his life.

He has his own questions, though.

"Yes, I do have a sister. She has a brother, me. We are brother and sister. Do you have any brothers or sisters?"

[treasuresuntold]

I have brothers and sisters.

[aetheling]

"How many?" He produces the page of numbers in case she needs it.

[treasuresuntold]

She looks at the numbers and shrugs helplessly, moving her finger down the column past ten, past a hundred, then trailing it off the page.

[aetheling]

Cymbeline looks at her skeptically, and introduces several new orders of magnitude.

[treasuresuntold]

Jade shrugs again.

I don't know.

[aetheling]

"Do sea people - merfolk - have children differently?" he wonders. Something with eggs that could confuse the issue, he supposes...

[treasuresuntold]

Different?

[aetheling]

"There's me, there's Zoyah, one at a time, no others," says Cymbeline. "Same mother, same father, I am three years older than her. Are you more like - fish? Or something?" This seems like a rude question, but he doesn't know how to couch it delicately.

[treasuresuntold]

...Something occurs to her.

How many wives does your father have?

[aetheling]

"Just my mother."

[treasuresuntold]

Aha. The mystery is solved. Jade nods.

My father has more. My father is old. I have more sisters and more brothers. I don't know all my sisters. I don't know all my brothers.

[aetheling]

"Oh. How old is he? How old are you?" asks Cymbeline.

[treasuresuntold]

He is old old old old old. I am twelve years, she signs cheerfully.

She doesn't look twelve. She looks closer to his age than Zoyah's.

[aetheling]

He peers at her.

"Twelve? Really? I'm - I'm twenty-one," he says. "You don't look twelve to me."

[treasuresuntold]

She gives him a disbelieving look.

Twenty-one? You look like twelve.

[aetheling]

"Maybe that's a merfolk thing?" he suggests. "Zoyah is eighteen."

[treasuresuntold]

Zoyah looks like ten.

[aetheling]

"You look twenty or twenty-one to me," Cymbeline says. "If you were a human."

[treasuresuntold]

I am not a human.

[aetheling]

"Yes," he says, "I know. So merfolk grow differently than humans. How did your father get to be so very old? Do all merfolk get that old?"

[treasuresuntold]

She shakes her head.

My father is king.

[aetheling]

"...So you're a princess," says Cymbeline. "Like Zoyah."