From Whence You Came Read Online Free PDF

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    â€œRise and speed, sweet to our need.” There was a skill to speaking decantations without swallowing the spellwine; Bradhai did it without hesitation. “Carry us hence, south and east: go.”
    The sails overhead snapped and belled, as more wind rose to join them, jumping the ladysong like a stone skipped from a child’s hand, driving it ahead of the serpent even now rising in their wake.
    â€œAhead, Captain! Forward a th’ bow and down!”
    â€œWasher’s piss,” the Captain swore, and started shouting commands to the other sailors already in motion.
    â€œWhat is happening?” Bradhai looked around, bewildered. “I did as you asked, I filled the sails.”
    â€œYou did,” Hernán agreed, clearly just as mystified. 
    â€œThe other one swung around,” the Captain said, in between shouting commands, the man in front of him hauling hard on the wheel. Bradhai felt the ladysong swing under him like a hard-reined horse. “They’re trying to drive us somewhere.”
    â€œThat’s impossible.” Hernán was certain of that, it seemed.
    â€œDon’t tell me, Shipsmaster; tell them !”
    â€œSta’board and down!”
    Unable to help himself, Bradhai jumped down from the aft deck and, dodging sailors who cursed him without stopping, he went to the railing, and looked over. There was nothing that he could see, and he wondered if the ship’s eyes had been mistaken – and then the water changed color, darkened. He realized that from that distance above, the eyes had been able to see far further down, predicting the –
    The beast burst from the water, and Bradhai stumbled back, soaked with the sea brine. He did not think, he could not think, but his mouth flooded with vin -tinged saliva, and he swallowed, muttering what he’d meant to be a prayer to Sin Washer, but instead came out as a command:
    â€œFirst Vine, defend us. First Vine, protect us.”
    And the magic within him rose to the words, driven by the vin magica in his mouth, and the magica within him, shoving the beast away with a blast of wind, sharp with the scent of land and sun, anathema to such a creature of the briny depths.
    It let out a sound that was neither shriek nor scream nor bellow, swung its great head around as though looking for the source of the magic, then shuddered and sank below the waters as swiftly as it had arrived.
    â€œGone, Captain! They’re all gone!”
    Bradhai stumbled back a pace or two, until his back was against something solid. He had used blood-magic. In public, in the presence of outsiders, he had called on the magica within every Vineart. The extension of a Vineart’s Sense, the ability to use magic without drawing on the vin, was not something for outsiders to know. Had anyone noticed? His heart raced more from this new fear than aftermath of the serpent-driven danger. 
    No. No one had noticed. They were all too busy thanking the silent gods that the beasts had left them unmolested. No one had seen what he had done –
    â€œVineart!”
    He turned, uneasy, and saw Hernán standing at the upper rail, expression unreadable.
    Hernán  had seen something . But all the Shipsmaster said was, “Come with me.”
    The Captain’s quarters were cramped, and sparsely decorated. Despite the nautical design of the bunk, and the table that was bolted to the wall, Bradhai felt strangely at home. That comfort did not last long.
    â€œYou drove them off.”
    â€œI? I filled the sails with wind as you asked.”
    â€œNo.” Hernán shook his head. “I saw you. You did something, although I don’t know what and the beasts gave up. What did you do?”
    â€œShipsmaster.” Bradhai put on his best placating voice, the one he’d learned as a slave, sharing space with so many others who were not always of good temperament. “I had no spellwine to hand; I decanted no