A neat feint leaves him open and I snap my blade to the delicate skin above his collarbone. He freezes, arms wide, flushing redder with every passing moment. “Leave it,” I say, as if he were a dog. “Let the ocean have you. There’d be more dignity.”
I give him my back, irritated but not surprised when I double back to find his arm flung high, ready to bring his sword down to cleave me in two.
I dive behind him, catching myself in a half-cartwheel, wincing at the ache in my spine as I come up, brandishing my bola like a whip. It’s a manoeuvre I’ve practiced a hundred times, more. The long end wraps his unbalanced ankle and Ipullwith the weight of my entire body until it slips, and his knee jars against the wood. Then, it’s nothing to press my blade to the back of his neck too.
“Do it again, and you’re dead.”
His brawny shoulders shake, and my face twists as I realise he’s laughing.
I step back, unsteady as seawater tugs at our feet again, but keep my blade lifted when he turns, his expression a tortured mix of amusement and pain.
“I knew I recognized you.”
I feel myself go still.
“You’reher. His daughter.”
The roar of the sea compounds with the blood in my ears. “What are you talking about?”
“The bola. I’ve seen it. Has to have been over a decade ago. There used to be a little village along the coast of Brackbay, just a speck on the mainland.” His grin widens impossibly more. “You ruined it.”
“The next words out of your mouth decide if you live or die.” I’m not sure if he hears me, but he doesn’t miss the way I lean in, just a hair, drawing his eyes back to the blade a handsbreadth from his face.
“It was you who killed them all,” he spits. “Snuck into a tired old manor, slit the throat of the lord and lady, the gardener, their only son and wife who’d come to visit while he was on leave. You ended a bloodline that night. It was Ivor that pulled your cowl back, just a little. And you—your eyes were empty, even as they set the manor ablaze. So young. Must have been born ruined, I thought. Yeah. Don’t you worry,Nisse.” The name, the memory, tears something vital away from me, but Reid just shakes his head in mock pity. “I won’t tell Rune. He’s had his chance.”
“You won’t?” Everything in me screams that I should kill him, that if Rune finds out, it’s over. The map. The keys. Hell, he might string me up like Reid has always wanted. Even if I managed to get away, it would ruin any chance I’d have of starting over. Without the treasure, I wouldn’t make it far, and it would only be a matter of time until someone found me. But something in me, something small and weak and soft, has enjoyed how little blood I’ve spilled these last few weeks. The same part that wonders if maybe Runewon’tspill myintestines into the sea the moment he finds out how much I lied to him.
Reid shakes his head again and I lower my blade by a fraction, wary. But when he speaks, the look in his eye promises death. “I’ll just have to let Ivor know where his daughter has gone. Who she’s fucking. And with his map in hand, no less. Tsk. Tsk.”
I blink, speaking before the words have fully processed. “Ivor would kill everyone on this ship.”
The man’s face shows no regret. “If they’relucky.”
A breath. I give myself a breath to come up with a reason to let him live.
And then I jab for his throat.
He drops at the last second, and the blade slices his cheek and splits his ear at the lobe. With a manic snarl, he heaves his blade towards me, but the attack hardly registers. I’m already spinning the bola in my left hand, ready to wrap his wrist. As expected, he pulls up and back, but I use the leverage to step into his guard, and sink the narrow blade between his ribs until I feel his lung pop.
He sucks in a wet shuddering breath as the ship rises on another wave, the horizon a mountain range of peaks and valleys. I loosen my hold and let him fall over the railing as we lean. He goes like a felled tree, his body stiff, legs flipping so he hits head first and disappears. The storm swallows him.
Another secret, another lie. One I can’t bring myself to feel sorry about.
On the main deck, a man screams. I sprint that way, slipping in puddles of feather-filled ooze andpatches of gore. The storm rocs that are left have retreated, waiting for easier scraps. Tavi and Rune hack away at the tendrils snaking across the ship. They’ve managed to dislodge the big one, but if any of them get enough purchase, it will crack the ship in half.
I duck away from the suckered tip of one appendage, spinning to swipe at it for good measure. Rune doesn’t look at me when I make it to him, my blade drawn and ready to meet the kraken’s blind attacks.
“Don’t slip,” he says, jaw set. “I don’t have time to rescue you at the moment.”
A NECKLACE LOST
25
RUNE
The violent storm tossesThe Gilded Hartthrough the waves like a leaf in the wind, her hull groaning in protest. The Sotor circle further out and I fear that the worst has only just begun. My eyes dart everywhere at once, taking in the chaos around me.
The crew shouts over the wind, some hauling ropes, others diving out of the way as storm rocs nose dive from the skies. Silver white hair flies across the deck as Tavi takes two rocs down with her blades.
