Hope and Red by Jon Skovron Page A

as tourniquets if the warrior were seriously wounded.
    When Hope had discovered the armor on the first morning, she hadn’t immediately understood that it was hers. After all, only a true brother of the order was allowed to don the black armor. It was something that she had assumed, even in the deepest part of her training, would always be beyond her reach. Yet here was the smallest armor she had ever seen. She remembered a night when the grandteacher had taken careful measurements of her. He had not given a reason, and it would have been presumptuous of her to ask. He must have cut and bound the armor himself, since the tanner would have been suspicious of the size. The grandteacher must have also oiled and polished it himself. She held it up to the sun and watched admiringly as the light gleamed off the black creases. She imagined him working the polish slowly into the leather with his wrinkled old hands, just for her.
    She wished she hadn’t left him there to be murdered by his own brothers, promises and duty be damned. But of course now it was too late. And she had sworn not to take vengeance on them, so she did not even have that comfort. She hugged the armor to her chest and swore that she would wear it with honor in his name. It was all she had.
    Hope pulled off her soft monk’s robes and stuffed them into the sack with the food. She paused a moment, staring at the water. Another cluster of bubbles rose to the surface. She wondered what made them. A gust of wind blew past, chilling her skin beneath her thin undergarments. She shivered and pulled on the black leather armor. It fit perfectly.
    She was ready for battle.
    Or so she thought at the time. It was now a day later, and she was lost and alone. She had one of the greatest blades ever forged and some of the finest armor ever crafted by one of the wisest men who ever lived. But in this battle, there was no one to fight but the sea.
    What now? Hope didn’t know where she was going. And that was true not just in terms of navigating this stretch of water. She could just as easily have asked What now? of her whole life. Hurlo had told her she must endure. But why?
    There was one reason she knew. Somewhere out there was a man who had murdered her parents and her village. She would have vengeance on that man. But she didn’t know who he was, only that he was a biomancer. Now she was on her own in a world she knew almost nothing about other than what she had read in books. How could she possibly find one man?
    As she stared at the horizon, she realized there was something out there. At first, it was little more than a black dot and she thought it might be a small island. But it grew rapidly larger, and she understood that it was moving toward her. Before long, she could make out the details of a merchant ship. Sails billowed from the two tall masts, and the sun gleamed wetly from the feminine figurehead on the bow. She caught a flash near the top of the front mast and realized someone had a spyglass trained on her. There were faint shouts as the sailors called to each other. The sails went slack and the ship slowed as it neared her.
    A tall man with a broad blue hat and a wool sea coat leaned over the rail. What little of his face could be seen behind his curly black and gray beard was a darker brown than she had ever seen.
    “Ahoy!” he called. “I’m Captain Carmichael, and this is my ship. Maritime law expects any captain registered under imperial trade to assist a ship in distress. Do you require assistance?”
    “I’m lost,” she called up. “Can you point me in the direction of the nearest port?”
    “Aye, but in a vessel like that it’s many days off.”
    “Many? I only have rations for another day or so.”
    Another sailor with a long mustache said something to the captain that she couldn’t hear. The captain turned to him, regarding him without expression. Then he turned back to her.
    “I could spare you some rations,” he said. “But you’re