From the expressions on their faces, the marines agreed with me.
Tane’s and my thoughts ran seamlessly together.The Black Tide had Ess Noti provisions, worshipped a ghisting known to the Ess Noti, and had no reason to attack their own people other than under Mereish pressure.Just how that pressure had come and how willing the Black Tide were was unclear and, to some extent, didn’t matter.They, it seemed, would kill us if given the chance.
The young Stormsinger met my eyes, and through the melee of my emotions—elation, horror, confusion, determination—I suddenly, fiercely, wished I had jumped overboard and swam forHartwhen I had the chance.But at the same time, I was relieved I had not.
I raised my voice over the conflict.“I have a plan.And, I believe, some insight into the situation.”
“Then speak.”Elsher turned on me, giving up on the midshipman.
“The Black Tide Cult is killing Aeadine mages and, I suspect, sabotaging our ships,” I said, including everyone in the room.“The weapons they are using are tied to Mereish spies.They can resist sorcery, if they have the right talismans, and their musket balls can stifle our power if we are shot.”
“How?”the midshipman asked, sounding lost.His flask hung from his fingers now.
Anger flared through me, though I was not wholly surprised.“Your superiors should have told you this.You should have been warned.”
The midshipman’s face burned an even darker shade of crimson.He took a swig from his flask and wiped his mouth.“Why would the Black Tide betray us?They are… they are Aeadine.”
“But they worship Mereish sorceries,” Elsher stated.
I nodded.“They’ve a bastard kinship.Whatever their reasoning, this is the situation we are in.Now.”I glanced at the open balcony door and caught Elsher’s eye.“We need to regain control of the cyclones.”
The pair of us moved out onto the balcony, followed a breath later by the girl.We crowded against the rail as the winds came to us, laden with the stink of gunsmoke and fire and blood and burning tar and hemp.The thunder of cannons was constant, and flotsam thudded against the hull.I watched a body eddy past, face-down, and forced my gaze upwards.
Our view of the battle was stunted, choked with fog and comprised almost solely of the middle and rear lines of Aeadine ships—or what had been, and was now a scattering of a dozen burning hulks and desperately maneuvering vessels.I could not see my cyclones, and I felt only two remaining, far to the west.
“We are useless from here,” Elsher stated, craning around the stern of the ship.“We are as like to destroy our own vessels as theirs.”
“Then we hide!”the girl said.“That’s what they want, isn’t it?Maybe they’ll leave us alone.”
I glanced at her with growing irritation, but, before I could speak again, I heard the door to the cabin open and a male voice.
“Oh, thank the Saint,” Elsher muttered, and she and the girl hastened back into the cabin.
I froze, framed in the doorway.
“There is a Mereish vessel making to board us.Marines, above, now.”Lieutenant Adler was efficient and brusque, at ease in his command.His sword was sheathed, no pistols in sight.He did not look like a man who had come to assassinate three trapped mages, but…
Damn it all.How could I have forgotten Adler was here?Even in the chaos, I should have remembered, should have—
The soldiers started to leave.The midshipman fiddled with his hat in the doorway, asking some hushed and nervous question, clearly reluctant to leave the safety of the cabin.
“He’s Black Tide!”I shouted.The midshipman looked back at me, perplexed, but Adler shoved him into the hall, shut the door and flipped the latch.
Elsher shot me a startled look.
The corners of Adler’s mouth pulled up in what I supposed was a bracing smile.Somehow the contrast between his reluctant expression and the hand he laid on the hilt of his sword was all the more terrifying.
His hand was smeared with blood.
Behind him, someone started pounding on the door.
“I am to kill only those who threaten the Mereish Fleet,” he said, his voice low and calm.His eyes fixed on me, and, with his free hand, he fished a glass bottle from his coat.“So decide, witches.Are you a threat?Drink this, and your power will be suppressed for the remainder of the battle.Solace will not be able to use you, and you may live.Otherwise…” He drew his cutlass and tilted it, letting light flow down the blade.
The girl flinched forward, eyes fixed on the bottle, but Elsher shoved her forcefully back.
“We are the queen’s.”The older woman glared.As she did, the air in the cabin shifted, stirring our hair and clothing.“We live and die at her pleasure.”
“Speak for yourself,” I muttered.I threw out an open palm, hummed one low note, and closed my fingers.
