He fashions a dress out of the bedsheet, and I slip into his uniform, pulling the jacket closed when his eyes are averted. Nestor grabs me, planting kisses on my collarbone. By Paranish, his lips are inches from the brand. If he sees that mark, it’s all over. I won’t be some nameless sailor. He won’t be able to overlook the cutlass. He’ll have to ask questions about where I’ve been for the last decade. Getting a good, no-strings fuck after months of a drought is never as simple as it seems. I push him against the wall and trace kisses down his body, dropping to my knees. I need to distract him and so I take him in my mouth. He moans, his fingers in my hair. And then he pulls my head back and the moans die in his throat.
His jacket has fallen open, revealing the brand on my chest: a line tattoo of a cresting wave and a sword. Nestor pushes me onto the bed, and I fall back, breeches round my ankles. He’s out into the main barracks before I can hide the mark and then there are hard hands all over my half-dressed form. By Paranish, I’m done for now. I swallow, trying to find my honeyed tongue.
‘Save your spittle, pirate. We’ll find out your true name and deeds soon enough.’
chapter two
ris
Biba is tryingto help again. She’s a small figure in her dark dress among the white sheep, the scant streaks of golden wool catching the light. I watch her from the open door of the barn, pausing my work at the loom. There’s a warm sun today, but a tickling breeze moves through the trees, bringing salt spray up from the coast.
‘Fetch, this way,’ Biba tells the dog, running after him as he does the real work of getting the sheep to their pen.
She runs up to me, panting, dog at her heels. ‘Look, this one has gold in it.’ She shows me a scrap of wool, which one of the sheep has shed. ‘Only the finest Spring Isle wool,’ she says in such a serious tone that I can’t help but laugh.
‘Even if it is to wipe that mewling maw.’
Her eyes go wide.
‘Aistra bless their birth,’ I mumble quickly.
There’s to be a baby at the Bastion, the only possible heir now that the king has passed. That will be my task for later: weaving this wool into a pattern fit for a royal blanket.
Biba stares at the wool, holding it up to the weak sunlight. She frowns. ‘Why is there so little?’
I sigh. ‘I don’t know, my love. But we must make do with what we have.’
I take a deep breath and survey the farm: the cottage at the top of the hill and the shed where we shelter the vegetable garden, and at the bottom of the hill the hardy orchard firmly away from the sheep’s pen. My ancestors built the farmstead from two robust golden sheep, impressing the royals with the lustre and quality of the work we produce. We’ve kept the home fires burning for generations. But some kind of sickness is taking hold, and everything I’ve tried has failed.
We switch positions, with Biba in the barn and me in the fields. The hours pass quickly as Biba cards the wool, brushing out the clumps and knots to create a soft, flat layer for the spinning wheel. I keep an eye on her from the field as I shear the sheep, the rhythm of my work lulling me into a focused trance. Fetch disturbs me every once in a while, for belly rubs. My body knows the way, years of daily toil. Biba’s about the age I was when I took on the trade. It took time to remember my father’s words, to find my own way of teaching her hands to hold steady. But I was nothing like her, nothing extraordinary.
I make my way back to the barn with the meagre basket, my mind already on the loom in the corner and the next months of labour. The queen is still early in her pregnancy, but a babe arrives whenever it sees fit. Hopefully we’ll be done before Magliyab festival. Biba is catching on fast, but teaching an apprentice means half the work gets done in double the time.
Fetch slinks in behind me, whining at Biba and sniffing at her pockets.
‘I’ve nothing for you,’ she says. He knows treats have been off the menu for months now, but I suppose he’s a hopeful dog. We all have a hunger in our eyes these days.
Biba is holding something small and furry in her arms. Fetch jumps onto his hind legs, trying to lick it.
‘Down, Fetch. Bad dog.’
He huffs and whines but gets back down on all fours.
I approach Biba and feel the marbled tufts under my fingers. An otter-cat. Stiff but still warm.
‘Where did you get this?’
‘In the field.’
I look over at the basket of carded wool. It’s not as thorough as if I had done it, but I can’t reprimand her for shirking her duties. There is so little of my time for her, and the guilt weighs heavy on me.
I examine the creature again – it’s not much more than fur and bones. ‘It probably starved. There’s not much food. Even the fisherfolk are bringing in smaller catches.’
Her shoes and dress are muddy, a tear where the hem has caught on something. I sigh and add it to my mental task list.
‘You must leave the dead in peace.’
She scrunches her face. ‘I don’t think it is dead.’
