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didn’t answer. Addie reappeared and set down a bowl of stew and a cup of milk. As much I didn’t want to admit it, the smell of the stew made my mouth water and my stomach rumble. I really did need to eat.
    I picked up the bowl and took a long sip. Kolur nodded approvingly. “Told you.”
    “When are we going home?”
    There was a pause. Voices hummed around us, all speaking that strange, foreign dialect.
    “You that excited to be back in the village?”
    “No. I’m just curious.” I gulped down my stew. It was delicious, the meat tender and falling apart, the broth flavored by herbs like the ones Mama grew in her garden.
    “A couple days’ time, most like.” He stared down at his own stew as he spoke. “We’ll get started repairing the boat tomorrow. There was a bit of damage, mostly magical. Frida should be able to take care of it.”
    “Not you? Since you can cast redirection charms now?”
    “That was a fluke.” Kolur took a drink of ale.
    I kept eating my stew. A couple days’ time on an island I only knew from the carvings on Papa’s map. It was a sort of adventure, like the ones Mama used to have. Hanging around the Skalirin docks wasn’t exactly the same as sailing a pirate ship through Empire waters, the way I used to pretend when I was a little girl, but it was as close as I was likely to come.
    Still, doubt niggled at me. As excited as I was to see beyond the shores of Kjora, I couldn’t shake the discomfort that something was wrong. Kolur couldn’t do magic beyond the same few charms everyone can do, and it was strange that Kolur, who aside from his friendship with Mama was one of the most conventional Kjorans in the village, would have a friend on another island.
    That his friend was a witch, well, that was even stranger. Exciting, too. But mostly strange. And I didn’t know why.
    Kolur set down his ale and leaned back on the bench. Something in his expression was off – not wrong, exactly, but different , the way the wind had felt as it blew through the town. It gave me the same sort of chill. He looked across the table at Frida and I followed his gaze, peering at her over my soup bowl. She stared back at me with eyes like oceans. They were just as unpredictable.

CHAPTER 3
     
    As it turned out, the repairs were even more minor than Kolur had suggested, and by the next afternoon the Penelope was fit to sail again. I hardly had to do anything at all, mostly just hand Frida foul-smelling powders and unguents as she made her way around the ship, casting unfamiliar spells. It was the closest I’d ever come to apprenticing as a wizard, and it was a disappointment to learn that it didn’t feel all that different from apprenticing as a fisherman.
    I could sense Frida’s power crackling against my own, but there was a restraint to it. She wasn’t showing me everything she could do. Every time I handed her something – some ground-up shells, a bit of dried seaweed – that magic would arc between us and then fizzle away, and I wondered what she was keeping from me. All her spells were sea-magic, something I was familiar with but hadn’t really seen, and it was frustrating to sense her power but not be able to fully experience it.
    I wondered if proper witch’s apprenticeships were this frustrating.
    Kolur watched the repairs from his usual place up at the helm, eating dried wildflower seeds. When I asked about them, he said they were a Skalirin specialty.
    “How do you know about Skalirin specialties?” I said. “Are you telling me you’ve been off Kjora before?”
    “I’m a fisherman,” he said.
    “That doesn’t answer my question. My Papa’s a fisherman and he’s never sailed out of Kjoran waters.”
    Kolur just ignored me, though. “Here, try one.” He handed me a wildflower seed. It was a small, dark dot in my palm. I glared down at it, angry with Kolur for keeping secrets.
    “You wanted adventure,” he said.
    I wanted answers, too. Still, I tossed the seed into my mouth,