Rewrite That Witch
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Chapter 953: The Invited Explorer

Two three-masted ships flying black and white flags were still unloading when Roland arrived at the harbor with his personal guard. City hall officials moved between the stacked wooden crates, occasionally breaking into sounds of undisguised enthusiasm.

“Your Majesty — it’s been too long!” Margaret came forward with a bow and a smile that didn’t try to conceal its warmth. “Forgive my appearance. Long skirts are impractical at sea.”

The man beside her bowed as well. “Your Majesty — Sander Flyingbird of Twin Dragon Island, at your service.” He winked. “Does the outfit suit the name?”

Roland had already noticed the outfit. It would have been impossible not to. Beneath the clothes of an ordinary Fjords sea merchant — bandana, soft leather shoes, plain coat — every surface was covered in bird-feather tassels. After the long voyage, most of the feathers had stiffened and lost their sheen; what remained clung to the fabric like the plumage of something shot out of the sky.

“I think you’ve been misidentified,” Roland said. He had known this man’s actual name since before Lightning joined his household. To him, “Sander Flyingbird” was a famous blue label on a package — one that made people’s hands itch before they’d even reached the seal. “Though your disguise may fool Ashes, I can promise it won’t survive Maggie. One step into the castle dressed like that, and she’ll have investigated you before you reach the end of the hall, Mr. Thunder.”

Thunder threw his head back and laughed. “A pity. I was rather proud of this one. Since I found a tailor willing to make it, several islands have picked up the style.”

The influence of a model. Roland suppressed the eye-roll. Still: the man was at least forty, and he brought this kind of enthusiasm to a temporary alias. That was probably a better explanation for why he was the foremost explorer of the Fjords than anything more heroic.

The letter had come before the expedition — Roland’s invitation, Thunder’s reply.

Now that the steel ship was finished it needed testing, and Roland’s feelings toward open water were those of someone who understood the gap between theory and the thing itself. The ship was extraordinary by local standards. It was also the first of its kind — no precedent, no accumulated practice, no body of knowledge about how steel hulls behaved in ocean conditions versus river conditions. The steam turbine had never been run under maritime stress. The mechanical systems that functioned cleanly on calm freshwater could be relied on to produce failures when subjected to something larger and angrier.

What troubled him most was simpler than any of that: he didn’t know how to sail a ship. When mechanical principles eluded him, the Dream World was available; seamanship was not that kind of problem. Before the era of electronic control, each vessel was its own negotiation — the captain had to know this hull, this engine, this crew, calibrated by practice rather than principle. There was no shortcut to that knowledge.

Thunder was the obvious answer. An experienced navigator and the commander of hundreds of competent sailors, his observations about how the ship actually behaved in real conditions would be worth more than anything Roland could calculate from first principles. The testing period would run two to three months; the data would inform the next ship’s design. And once the route was proven, it would generate revenue for Neverwinter that dwarfed the cost of any ship.

Since Thunder would be staying in Neverwinter during testing, the alias was practical. Roland had proposed it in the letter. Thunder had not merely accepted — he had submitted customizations.

“How did you manage to finish it so quickly?” Thunder asked, the feathered persona briefly dropped in favor of genuine curiosity. “At the Fjords, even with ideal materials and craftsmen, a ship this size would take years.”

“Steel processes faster than wood,” Roland said. “No preservative soaks, no drying time — only heat, and enough of it.” He shrugged. “It’s in the shipyard, south of Shallow Beach. We can go now if you’d like.”

Thunder’s face answered before he did.

“One question first.” Roland gestured at the crates still being tallied along the dock. “What are those for? The agreement was cost-of-production only.”

“Perfume and Chaos Drink revenues,” Margaret said smoothly. “We were making the trip regardless — it seemed sensible to deliver early and reduce the burden on the next shipment.”

“The contract date hasn’t passed.”

“Your instinct about Chaos Drinks proved correct, Your Majesty.” A slight smile. “They’ve become a status symbol at Chamber of Commerce feasts throughout the Fjords. Even second-hand bottles can fetch ten times the original price. People collect the less palatable variants purely for the association with the brand.” She folded her hands. “Distribution through professional channels was the right decision.”

Roland raised an eyebrow. He hadn’t expected market saturation at that speed.

“Your Majesty.” Nightingale’s voice arrived at his ear, pitched for him alone. “There’s a magical reaction in the crowd. One of them is a witch.”

He had already half-noticed the woman — standing some distance behind Margaret, most of her body shielded by a maid, one cheek just visible. The moment she registered that he was looking at her, she withdrew behind the maid completely, a startled animal disappearing into the undergrowth.

He recalled the letter. “Is that the witch you wrote about?”

Margaret followed his gaze and gave a small nod. “Yes, Your Majesty. That is Joan.”

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