“I don’t know where this is going to put us out.” She feigned ignorance. He’d be suspicious if she knew too much. “We should stay low, make for good hiding the second we see it,” she whispered in his ear. Jax nodded as she pulled away and followed her into a crouched position.
Vi waved away her mote of flame as its light merged with the ambient light of the cave beyond. She stopped for a moment, allowing her eyes to adjust, only to find Jax staring back at her.
“Do you want a ‘we might be about to die’ kiss?”
Vi fought the urge to burst out laughing with the competing urge to vomit at the suggestion. “This is not the place where you die,” she whispered, cutting through his levity. “But this is the place where you will kill again.” Vi grabbed his hand tightly. “You have to fight. You must fight for yourself, fight to live.”Not just now, but through all the years to come.
Jax opened his mouth to speak and Vi silenced him with a finger. In him, she still saw the Jax who had raised her. But now she was the adult and he was the child in some ways.
“Just be quiet, and take the advice of a friend, Jax.” Vi moved again before he could say anything else.
The cavern narrowed to a chute and they crawled forward side by side. It opened into a large room, though their vision was obscured by boxes and crates. Vi recognized them as the same boxes she’d helped unload from theLady Blackdays ago.
“… their bodies recovered.” Vi recognized Henrietta’s voice. “None of you are to rest until their bloated corpses are here on a spike to warn the next captain who even thinks of challenging us.” So Dower would take the fall for Vi running after Joyce.
“Henrietta, they’ve surely been lost to the sea.” That was the voice of the woman who’d been on theLady Black,murmuring dissent before Joyce attacked.
“Silence! It was your incompetence that got us into this mess. I’ll hear none of it.”
“Henrietta is their leader,” Vi whispered to Jax. “You’ll know her by the scar over her right eye. Go for her first.” She’d never seen Henrietta in action, but suspected the woman was lethal. Anyone bold enough to use Adela’s name had to be.
Vi took a deep breath, steadying her hands. They trembled in excitement, anticipation. It had been years since she’d felt like she’d accomplished anything, and now everything was happening all at once.
She emerged from the narrow opening into a bowl-shaped cavern. Vi rushed over to a larger crate and scoped out the six talking. Jax joined her shortly after. At least he was keeping up. Though, judging from his expression, only barely.
Vi took his hand once more. Fire licked from her fingers to his, as though she could give him her strength. His breathing slowed and he nodded. Vi faced forward, ready to—
“Drop the boxes,” a booming voice shouted. Vi heard a groan from Jax. “You are under arrest by the will of the crown for smuggling, theft, murder… and many other horrible things.”
She’d always heard her father was “silver-tongued.” Clearly, that was a trait he’d inherited from Fiera. Because his brother was sorely lacking in eloquence.
Henrietta laughed. “Kill him.”
Vi didn’t waste a second longer, launching herself at the six smugglers. She’d told Jax to go for Henrietta. If he could handle that, she’d take on the other five.
Fire erupted around her hands as Vi swung, shooting a tendril of flame at one of the men still focused on Baldair and Erion. He screamed as the fire consumed him, though the sound was cut short as the fire was doused. Vi dodged backward, narrowly missing a spear of ice thrown.
She side-stepped, dodging another spear, and swept her foot across the ground. A wall of flame sheared off. The burnt man fumbled with his sword, determined to fight until his last breath. The woman shielded herself with a wall of ice that promptly became steam. Vi went for her—she was the more troublesome one.
With a flash of flame into the veil of steam, Vi stunned her, closing the gap. She grabbed for the sword the man was fumbling with, drawing it from the scabbard. Vi sliced his throat and swung for the Waterrunner. The woman had recovered, but her attention was elsewhere as she now engaged Erion Le’Dan.
The Waterrunner sunk a blade of ice into Erion’s side. Vi crossed the distance with a lunge and threw out her magic. “Juth starys,” Vi hissed under her breath—she wasn’t taking chances on the smuggler countering her attack. The woman erupted into white-hot flames.
“Up with you!” Vi shouted at Erion. He blinked, startled. The lot of them were young men, fresh to bloodshed. She’d have to keep pushing them, especially knowing what trials their futures held.
Jax needed her help next and Vi launched herself back into the fray. She moved around him, preempting his motions; she knew his openings and could cover his vulnerabilities now that she’d fought with him once before.
Among the four of them, they dispatched Henrietta and her crew easily. Vi surveyed the room, making sure no others were about to spring toward them, as Jax went to his comrades.
“Erion, you got one on your hip.”
“It’s not that bad,” Erion said bravely and pressed his hands into the wound.
“Nox, do you have any more potion?” Jax asked her. Vi shook her head. Lightspinning wasn’t an option now.
“I’ll burn it to stanch the bleeding.” Jax leaned forward, flames licking around his fingers.
“Nox? From theLady Black? The sailor who chased the smuggler?”
