“. . . afraid your documents are out of order.”
“Those documents should be fine.”
“You don’t seem to have the new papers. No matter, we should be able to assist you in procuring them.”
Samson leaned forward with an agonizingly slow movement that the rest of them mirrored so they didn’t make a sound. When they were almost nose to nose, he whispered, “Those aren’t elvish customs.”
“How do you know?” Takako breathed in reply.
“Wrong accent. All wrong.”
“Are you sure?” Wayne asked.
Samson nearly loosened a braid with the furious nodding of his head. “I . . . I know the accent. I lived here before I—I—”
“We believe you.” Jo placed her hand on his. The man’s stuttering forced the volume of his voice to rise. Samson’s throat clenched as if he was trying to swallow down his anxiety.
“Now what?” Wayne asked.
“Nothing changes. The safest thing is still to wait here until—”
Takako was interrupted by the sounds of a struggle. The interior of the ship rumbled as the unmistakable sound of a body being slammed into something above reverberated down the walls.
“What? Who—” The man’s question was cut short by a gurgle, and another scream was suppressed.
One of the earlier voices of the “customs” officers finally spoke. “Search the ship. They’re smugglers. There’s a secret hold here somewhere. Find them.”
“Still safest to wait?” Wayne asked Takako sharply.
“Now what?” Samson began to pat around him, no doubt looking for something to occupy his hands. They came up to his chest, where he began to mess roughly with his own fingers, lacking a bauble to fidget with.
Without a word, Takako reached up to remove the tie from her hair, letting the dark, pin-straight strands fall around her shoulders. Careful not to startle him, she held the hair tie out in front of Samson’s hands, waiting for him to take it. Samson let out a soft breath, taking the hair tie eagerly, and began to fuss with it.
“Can we fight?” Wayne asked, again pitching his question to Takako.
“I can, but I can’t guarantee I can keep all of you safe,” she murmured, no doubt trying to calculate the odds in her head. “Sounds like there are four of them.”
Jo closed her eyes, trying to block out the panic surrounding her and the sounds of what were no doubt Pan’s men closing in on them. They’d followed her across the sea. Pan knew where they were. Or, perhaps, Pan’s influence was so wide she’d merely covered all of her bases in every port she could. Who knew what Pan knew, what she was capable of, how far she would go.
All Jo could focus on now was the feeling of the ship around her, and deal with the immediate threat of the four—Takako had been right—pursuing them.
Destroy them, her magic seemed to whisper. It was the same feeling she’d had in Yorkton. But these men were different; they weren’t like the chaotic, twisted version of a person. These were willing servants with only mere traces of Pan’s corruption. In theory, they weren’t beyond redemption.
Did she care? They’d sided with Pan. She should have no issues killing them on the spot and yet . . . something about giving into thoughtless murder felt like letting Pan win—like letting Oblivion win.
There also wasn’t time for her to have an ethical conundrum.
“I can break us a way out,” Jo said hastily, opening her eyes once more.
“Break us a way out?”
“Then they find us,” Wayne hissed.
“Not if I break enough in the process that we can slip away in the chaos that follows.”
“Can’t say I’m following, doll.”
A loud crack interrupted their conversation. The sound of wood splintering, breaking, and giving in was worse than an alarm clock on the first day of school. It grated against Jo’s magic, as if some part of her was upset that something had been broken and it wasn’t her doing.
