Two-World Traders (progression fantasy)

Bertrand's entire body stiffened with terror as his feet propelled him forward. Amara had told her doting lover that ice skating was just like walking, only easier. "Once you get going, an inch of effort will take you ten feet," she had said, adding that he would quickly "get used to it." Trepidation had shattered his internal clock, but he wagered it had been half an hour since he first stepped, slipped, and fell upon the frozen Laurel Canal.

"Why do tailbones even exist?" he had whined after his third fall in as many minutes. "Their only apparent function is pain delivery."

Bertrand was not convinced he was getting better at this—despite Amara's encouraging claims to the contrary—but he supposed he was at least growing more adept at not falling. The trick was one Bertrand often utilized in moments of stress, relying on his penchant for risk aversion. The rules were simple. Do not move a limb that does not require moving. Keep your arms out like a seagull in a stiff breeze. Stay close to Amara.

"Look at you," she said, soaring ahead of him, turning around, and then skating—he couldn't believe it—backward without a care in the world. "I never would have guessed this was your first time."

"You do not need to keep humoring me, darling."

"I simply see you as you are," she said, "as I always do."

Lifting his gaze from his feet, Bertrand found her again. She was a subject in a portrait. As for the landscape behind her, the scenic Laurel Canal wound through Adelbury like an unwrapped ribbon, lamplight reflecting off its shallow, icy surface. The couple skated under arched stone bridges and cautiously around groups of fellow skaters, all of whom were considerably better at this than Bertrand. He could not help but think that Elias would have picked up the skill immediately, effortlessly skating circles around him. "Just like walking, only easier," he would have repeated. His best friend had always been good on his feet—unnaturally so—but Bertrand believed that a man's virtues were a limited resource, and he had merely invested all of his elsewhere.

He explained this to Amara. "You've chosen to spend your evenings with a charming wordsmith, my love. You would not ask a bird to swim or a fish to fly."

She chuckled through her nose, her high cheekbones rounding, her white winter cloak billowing like an opened umbrella as she spun herself in a tight circle on a single skate. "I know well the man to which I've tethered myself," she said, slowing. "I'll try not to pull the string too taut." She skated past him with a sudden burst of speed.

Bertrand tried to keep up with her. And for the briefest of moments, he began to believe that maybe, just maybe, he was finally getting a feel for this sport. He propelled himself forward with one foot, then flew a little faster with the other, now keeping up with the canal's more seasoned skaters, catching up with the woman ahead of him who could have disappeared a thousand times by now, sliding her sharp, silver skate across his soft, beating heart along the way. Or so he too often told himself.

Alas, Bertrand was neither a swimming bird nor a flying fish. He was a large, blond man balancing himself upon a pair of knife blades, the frigid air blasting his scarlet cheeks and numb ears as he zoomed hopefully and hopelessly toward his spinning instructor with the speed of a galloping horse. He yelled after her. "I think I'm starting to—"

He bumped shoulders with a woman skating in the opposite direction. She lost her footing first, blade kicking dangerously in the air as she tumbled. Bertrand yelled a curt apology as his feet began dancing of their own accord. Not so much a seagull in a stiff breeze, he soon resembled a windmill, arms spinning wildly, trying desperately to keep his balance.

He punched a child in the face.

It probably needn't be mentioned that Bertrand Fairweather was not the sort of man who punched children in the face, for sport or otherwise, but he punched this one pretty hard. The small boy was sliding on his back like a sleigh, mitts over his mouth, when Bertrand saw Amara and another woman skating after him.

And then he saw stars, figuratively and literally. His shoulders took the worst of it, but he couldn't entirely stop the back of his skull from hitting ice. And thus Bertrand learned that there were, in fact, worse places to land than on one's tailbone. Snow-covered branches framed the night sky as he took a moment to appreciate his new view.

* * *

"You're being unusually quiet." Amara seated herself on an Azirian rug next to Bertrand, pushing their bottoms together in front of the stone fireplace she'd lit a few minutes earlier to keep them warm, though it was still mostly kindling. She had brought over a blanket.

"It's fair to say this evening hasn't gone as I imagined." He was holding a melting snowball against his scalp, cold water drizzling down his forearm. "I know how much you love this city. And while I'm accustomed to making a fool of myself, punching an innocent child…" He repositioned the snowball. "Don't tell the others. Spare me that."

"The boy is fine," she consoled him. "Honestly, you look worse."

"Thanks."

"Oh, come off it. You've battled pirates, you big bastard."

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

"If you're suggesting the small boy I knocked halfway across the canal was an easier adversary, you're not wrong," he said.

"I simply mean you've endured real peril, the likes of which I never have." Amara pressed her heart and kissed his shoulder. "A bit of embarrassment should pale in comparison."

"Embarrassment is an entirely different emotion. Trust me. I've met many a sailor who would sooner eat the black than stand up to their own mother."

Amara chuckled as she added a larger log to the fire before returning to her disgruntled lover and the wool blanket they shared. As they sat silently together, only the calm crackling and occasional sharp pop and burning wood formed a faint melody. The single-story house—or cottage, as Amara liked to call it—was so quiet compared to anywhere within the city limits of Sailor's Rise. In the summer months, crickets would have lulled them to sleep, she told him, while other times the wind howled and the house creaked, rain pattering the glass. But the snow made no sound.

Bertrand could hear his own breathing, still coming out in small sighs. "I apologize," he said. "Things went awry tonight, but I needn't pile onto the problem. The evening isn't ruined unless I choose to ruin it. And you are unfathomably lovely. And so very tolerant."

"I am where I want to be," she replied. "I've been so busy with the new shop, I'm grateful for a few days away, and there is no one I would rather spend them with."

Amara was referring to her company's recently opened second location. The Shoemaker's Soul now served Hightowners of distinguished taste on opposite ends of the city, at least above a certain dividing line (a future Lowtown location seemed less likely). Despite the singular noun in its name, The Shoemaker's Soul employed a number of shoemakers, though Amara had a heavy hand in designing said footwear. While she employed the best tradespeople in the city, it was her reputation that imbued their products with added value, and they were certainly valuable. Bertrand could technically afford the shoes and boots they sold, but even he would have scoffed at the price tag had Amara not gifted him a new pair for every occasion.

"Fuck it." The silence-breaking obscenity was Bertrand's. "I will never find the perfect time nor the perfect words."

Amara lifted her head from his shoulder to meet his gaze, confused and then a little less so. He had left himself no escape.

"I love you beyond all measure, and I believe myself to be the luckiest of men." Bertrand was turning into a tomato. "If there is one thing I can promise you, it is that I shall never, ever forget this."

He unbuttoned a small pocket in his breeches and retrieved from it a small, velvet box. He opened the box and took out a ring, pinching the intricate item between his fingers. The golden band was affixed with a large, amber sapphire, Amara's favorite color. His hand was shaking so much that he dropped the ring, which also happened to be the most expensive personal asset he had ever acquired. "Shit."

Amara retrieved it for him. "It's beautiful," she said, smiling, holding the ring between them. "Are you going to ask the question now?"

"Will you marry me?" His voice trembled.

"Is that it?" She peered back at him through a circle of gold. "No big speech? I know you, Bertrand. I know you prepared more than a four-word proposal."

"As I said, they are silly words. Imperfect. Inadequate."

"And how long did you spend crafting these silly words before discarding them all in the time it took you to sigh? A month? I do not wish to hear your words simply because of what they say about me. I wish to hear them because they come from you."

Bertrand had spent more than a single month toiling and editing and telling his oval mirror why it should spend the rest of its reflective life with him.

"Speak, and I shall accept your ring—and your proposal." Amara sounded as if she were striking a business deal.

"No matter how bad it is?" Bertrand sought clarification. He had learned from Briley the importance of technical details when it came to negotiating agreements. "If I said, I don't know, you're a stupid fish, and that was the whole speech, you'll still marry me?"

"Absolutely," she insisted with a straight face, "but why a fish?"

"I don't know. I'm nervous."

"Don't be. Surely, you have it all written down, tucked in another pocket of yours. It needn't be a performance, my love."

Bertrand shook his head. "I have a good memory, and… I've reread it a few times."

"A few times" was, in this case, the understatement of the evening.

"Very well," he conceded. Her terms were acceptable, and so he cleared his throat and started with a recollection.

"You may recall a night like this one last year," he said. "I hadn't punched a child then, but I had… performed below my expectations. A business deal had fallen through, and I felt personally responsible, that if only I had been better prepared—my point being, I was in a sour mood. And just like tonight, you pieced my confidence back together. I had felt like less of a man when I arrived home, and yet by the time I went to bed that night, I felt like more of one. Not because you had warped my reality, but because you revealed to me another layer of it. Your unconditional affection was worth far more than any contract.

"I fell deeper in love with you that night, and strangely this surprised me. I had believed love was a destination one arrives at only once. I hadn't realized it went any deeper, that I could love you even more."

Bertrand met Amara's eyes briefly, anxiously, as if seeking permission to keep going. Permission was granted.

"My favorite book growing up was The Underground Travels of Mars Maru," he continued, chuckling shyly. "There are finer novels, to be sure, but this one always takes me home. It's about a man who decides he's going to find out what lies far beneath our feet. And so, with the help of a steam-powered digging machine, he tunnels into the earth, deeper and deeper, until he comes crashing out the ceiling of a colossal cavern. He discovers much more than he bargained for: an entire civilization of cave people, cut off from the surface."

Amara crossed her legs, gifting him her complete attention, looking like a child first hearing this fantastical tale. He could tell she was entertained, if nothing else.

"He settles down for a while, almost marries the chief's daughter, but he soon grows restless again," Bertrand said. "What if he dug even deeper? The cave people tell them there is nothing below their network of caves except solid rock, that their world is the real world, the last surface. He's heard this story before. He decides to dig.

"The next ceiling he crashes through is that of an underground ocean. His vessel sinks as an airship-sized whale bumps against him, as enormous jellyfish illuminate yet another world that wasn't supposed to exist. He hits the ocean floor, and with no way back and water spilling into his digger, he digs some more—and accidentally floods a bioluminescent jungle full of cat people. The novel takes some strange turns."

Amara laughed at that more than Bertrand was expecting. Her giggle was contagious. He had to gather himself for the final act.

"I've recently found myself relating to this audacious protagonist of my youth," he said. "Before you, Amara, I had only ever seen the world from its highest surface. You have shown me caves and oceans and jungles whose existence I had not even considered. I've traveled all across the Great Continent and seen nothing so stunning as the depths of my own love."