Chapter 208: Eye of the Storm

“When you are in the eye of the storm, you are often not aware of the whiplash around you.”

Hugh Bonneville

Suddenly, Namir and I broke through the darkness into the sunlight. Looking up, I could see a clear sky above us, but we were surrounded on all sides by walls of ominous dark clouds whirling around the clear patch we had broken through into.

The eye of the storm.

On land, the centre of the eye might have been the calmest part of the storm with clear skies, no rain or wind, but out on the open Azimuth ocean, the eye of the storm was still just as deadly as the eyewall we had unwittingly broken through.

The winds no longer whipped past us, threatening to rip our sails and mast from the boat despite their runes and craftmanship. However, the stormy sea was hardly calm. In fact, the waves had only grown higher, and the mammoth mountains crashed into us from all directions. No longer driven in a single direction by the wind, they were wild and unpredictable.

“We’ve broken through into the eye of the storm,” I exclaimed, amazed as we rose another mountain.

“What?” Namir asked before we began to fall again.

“The centre of the storm,” I shouted, pressing up against the steady downward wind that tried to flatten us to our feet. We were firmly tied to stanchions to ensure we were not swept overboard by the waves or wind when we were swallowed by the hurricane-level storm.

“Sailing sucks.” He shouted before we hit the trough, the boat shuddering with the impact before we started climbing the next wave. It was hard to argue with him with the situation as it was. My skills were getting a serious workout as I attempted to keep us rising forward up the waves rather than getting turned and rolling. Magic was finally able to come into play again. With the steady downwind as opposed to the gale force it had been before, I was able to add wind in the direction I wanted and between that and the helm, I was able to keep us focused in the right direction to climb the waves rather than be rolled by them.

We were both soaked to the skin or sodden to the skin in Namir’s case. It could hardly have been particularly pleasant with both layers of fur wet. Aleera’s elvish embroidered clothing was getting a thorough workout repelling the water we had been lashed with from every direction. Still, with no rain falling right now, it was worth a little warmth to rid us of the chill.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

“It’s a little rough,” I laughed, touching my amulet to release a wave of heat and air to dry our clothes and ourselves out as we rode another wave up towards the sky. Beyond the very real fear of a catastrophic failure and capsizing, there was a thrill to the adrenaline rush of a rollercoaster we were riding.

“Don’t waste your mana on a little water.” Namir cautioned. However, he looked a lot happier to be dry rather than soaking wet. “We will probably need all of it if we are hoping to get out of this alive.”

“What’s the plan?” I asked as we began to fall again. It was difficult to have a clear conversation when we continued to be thrown between sea and sky, but at least the downward wind and lack of rain were consistent enough to allow it.

“We move north as planned.” He stated unaware of the change in our circumstances.

“I don’t know if that will work any longer,” I said worriedly. Despite his super senses, I could see more through my magic and my combination of skills than he could out on the open water.

“Why not?” he asked, already sensing a possible problem by the tone of my voice.

“I’m not exactly sure where we are any longer,” I explained.

“South of Wester Ponente, West of Little Wester.” He attempted to confirm.

“Maybe, maybe not. The storm was moving incredibly quickly, and now we are caught up in its centre. It was turning west when it caught us, but since then. . .” I hesitated to continue. Without the sun to judge our position by, surrounded by the walls of ominous clouds reaching for the heavens, we had been turned around again and again. However, I had skills to help me know where I had been even if I no longer knew where that was in relation to where I was exactly.

I pulled out my lodestone compass to try and explain. “We are already heading north far faster than expected.”

“How can you tell?” Namir asked, confused by the same problems any mortal would have had if they had been attempting to work out which direction we had been going in and where we were.

“The movement of the sea floor,” I answered. It would have been difficult to keep track of my position if I had only had a one-track mind, but I had four. They had done their best to keep track of our location during the chaos of a storm-tossed boat, but eventually, the skill had run out, and I was on my own again. Still, before they passed, they had updated my internal map of the seafloor to show the strange path we had taken.

The storm had caught soon after we had turned north from Little Wester, and while the outer winds of the hurricane had indeed driven us deeper west, they had also helped to power us further north as well.

The problem was that we had been driven far out of the area I had already mapped between the isles with my father. All I could tell was the directions we had been driven first westward beyond the abyss-like trench I had sensed the edge of before. The seafloor had dropped out of sight as it disappeared beyond the range of my senses. Then once the storm had caught us, I could see from the loadstone compass along with the occasional trench wall flashes that we were swiftly being sped northward by the center of the cyclone as it took us northward.

“That’s good, then?” He asked. It had been the plan, after all.

“Not exactly.” I winced. “I think we’ve already overshot Wester Ponente by a long shot,” I explained.

“Already?” he quizzed

“Yes, we’ve gone beyond the horizon and seem to be being dragged northward by current as much as by the storm,” I explained.

“This is why I hate sailing.” He shouted as we rose up into the sky again.

“The storm should wear itself out sooner or later,” I shouted back.

“Not if it is taking us where I think it is.” He worryingly replied.

“Where’s that?”

“The Sea of Storms.”