Ma?l stood alone at the helm, admiring the dark ocean, the crest of the waves bathed in the silvery blue light of the moon. He felt a deep sense of calm, an almost meditative state. After all the wild emotions of the last twenty-four hours, his body was finally settling down, and for the first time in many years, he was truly at peace.

  Men belonged at sea. It was a simple truth his ancestors had known for centuries, but one he had foregone in favor of sitting behind a computer, hooked on small dopamine hits delivered continually by the pretty pixels on the screen.

  But the ocean, holding the helm and swaying softly to the melody of the waves below his feet… it was a different world, as if he had been isekaied—thrown in a whole new world of fantasy…. It had been less than a day, and he already had a most amazing woman by his side, sleeping just one deck below.

  I’m living the anime life, he thought with a chuckle.

  He had taken the first watch and sent Kaori to bed early. She was brave, but a sleepless night full of adrenaline had drained her and when the sun came down, she had almost fallen asleep on the couch. She still volunteered for the first watch, but he wouldn’t hear any of it.

  “The first watch’s man’s job, you see…” he had explained as he steered her to her cabin. The logic was dodgy, but it wasn’t up to discussion: He’d have picked her up and dumped her on her bed if needed, and so she relented.

  He was every bit as tired as she was, of course, but that was beside the point.

  Navigation remained easy all through the evening. He engaged the autopilot and went to get himself a coffee down below. There was something to be said for high-end coffee, and this was some of the best he’d ever tasted. He climbed back up with a thermos full of the dark stuff with a hint of sugar—a very generous hint—and laid down on the sun deck. Far from the bright city lights, the night sky revealed an entire galaxy of stars, each a tiny prick of light, countless millions of worlds laid above him, far beyond his reach and yet so familiar.

  He amused himself retracing the constellations and inventing new ones, and found pleasure in the fact he could easily check his heading just by looking at the big dipper, then finding Polaris. They were headed south, about 45° west, not the hardest direction to plot, but there was something deeply romantic in charting his course with the stars like the navigators of old, in spite of the fact that the ship was equipped with more electronics than he knew what to do with. Heck, even his phone had the exact GPS location and a compass, but he only used the phone to keep himself awake, with a buzz scheduled every 10 minutes. The watch stretched into the night. At 3 a.m., when Kaori came to replace him, he was waiting at the helm.

  “Ohayo, Kaori-san:” he said, handing her a folded blanket and a fresh batch of coffee. He gave her a side hug and headed down below without giving her a chance to react to the short but intimate contact. She’d have plenty of time to process it and he needed the sleep.

  When he climbed on deck the next morning, she had apparently processed it, for she was armed with a long wooden stick. A bokken, a wooden Katana. Ma?l watched in awe as she flowed between strikes and slashes, seamlessly gliding over the deck, basking in the soft glow of the rising sun. The sunrise had been particularly striking, the entire sky painted with fiery orange and red pastels and was almost entirely clear, save for a few fibrous bands of cirrus clouds floating high up toward the high seas.

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  Kaori finally noticed him and stopped, caught off guard. She hadn’t expected him to be up quite so early, and it was the first time she had a spectator to her morning katas. They were an intimate part of her, a unique routine that she had adapted over the years to suit her abilities and preferences, and one she had never shown anyone.

  She didn’t feel embarrassed however. The man was also a martial artist, he would understand. As they stood facing each other on the deck, they exchanged a bow instinctively.

  “Can you teach me?” Ma?l asked.

  Kaori glanced at him with an air of surprise. Men rarely looked up to female martial artists for instruction, unless they were trying to prove a point, or flirting, of course. Looking at him however, his sincerity was evident—the man had no artifice whatsoever, at least not when it came to martial arts. He was just fascinated.

  “It is not much, but if you wish to accompany me…” She handed him the hilt of her bokken. “Follow along.”

  Ma?l was about to protest, but Kaori assumed her pose, holding her open hands in lieu of the sword, and somehow, it felt as if she still had one, it just happened to be invisible. He copied her posture and followed her moves, watching first, then duplicating, a physical canon, an echo, her moves poetry and grace; his, a raging storm of controlled violence.

  As they progressed through the forms, their synchronization improved until he felt as if they were just a single sword, him striking down Kaori’s targets, her feeling the power he wielded on her behalf.

  It was glorious.

  After a quick breakfast and some more coffee, she resumed Ma?l’s instruction in the nautical arts. Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t cooperating, there was hardly any wind to be had and they were forced to switch over to the ship’s twin engines.

  Saving gas was best whenever possible, but they had a full tank, enough for several hundred miles and Kaori figured they had better cover some more distance now. Besides, the engines were faster than the sails and created a most welcome artificial breeze to counter the heat of the midday sun.

  Refueling would be tricky, but that would be an issue for later, if it came to that, she thought as she pushed the catamaran lazily across the long, large ocean waves. It made for a pleasant ride, the ship climbing slowly, almost majestically to the crest then smoothly descending afterwards. It had a nice rhythm to it and broke the monotony of an otherwise flat, oily sea.

  Eventually, she would have to face her dad and the media, but that could wait. Time was on her side. Oroshi might have some powerful contacts in the police, but he had fired several shots inside the hotel, there were CCTV cameras and plenty of detectives who could put two and two together. Given enough time to sort things out, the police would arrest Oroshi and she would be spared the need to confront him directly. As long as she stayed safely away for a couple of weeks, things would work out on their own.

  Let the world burn for a while, she thought. She had cleared her calendar for her wedding and the subsequent honeymoon, surely, she could borrow a few days of freedom…