Vesper isn’t content with my silence though. She will not let me run from this. “What did youdo?!”
My jaw clenches. I can hardly see through the sudden burn of tears. “I saved myself.”
She screamed for me, Zephyra. Her last words—screaming my name. All while I was in the fucking dark because you ran.
Vesper laughs at that—a dry, defeated sound. And with it, her shoulders slump. Her head shakes. Closing her eyes, she drags a hand across her heartsick face before it hardens again, and she levels me with another glare. “And what a fantastic job, Zephyra. You seem really safe now, don’t you?”
As if to prove her point, the ship tips like a teapot. Too steep. Too fast. Vesper and I both cry out, fighting to steady ourselves against the near-violent turn. But my legs are slick with squid blood and ink, and my hands are damp from the moisture in the air. I can’t steady myself. The ship continues on its side, and I fall. Down.Down.
Right into the bars.
The electric current lights me up from the inside out. Boils the blood in my veins as I struggle to crawl away. As I struggle to doanything but spasm. Even as the ship rights itself, I can’t move. My muscles seize. Another cry mangles my throat. Vesper leaps to her feet, shooting closer, but she can’t touch the bars. She can’t free herself and pull me away. Instead, she screams, “Hey, assholes! If you want to kill us, there are easier ways!”
No one responds, and I can’t—I can’t—
“Zephyra, move,” she hisses.
For some reason, it’s enough. The command hardens my bones.Zephyra, move. Zephyra, move. Zephyra, move.I claw at the wooden floorboards. Slide away quickly, brutally, as splinters burrow into my skin. Vomit stings my mouth as my heart thunders. As my vision darkens and my head swims. I collapse in the middle of my cell and spew bile onto the floor.
Vesper hands clench into fists as she watches me. “FuckingTempest.”
I dry heave. “You… think—”
“Oh, I know. Tempest humans are the only ones in the world—aside from warlocks—who could possibly control the weather. And these people… they didn’t have wings.”
I try to breathe, to ground myself, to feel the damp wood beneath my body. No. These people had syringes. Nets.Lightning.Spitting the foul taste from my mouth, I glance up at her. “Tell me you don’t want to die here.”
She glares at the clouds above us. Still thundering. Crackling. “Of course I don’t want to die here.”
“Good.” I force myself to nod, tothink. I can’t bring Eos back on my own. I can’t promise Vesper the moon and stars like the sorcerer, and there is nothing I can say to heal her. I push upright, muscles still spasming, and hold her gaze. “We don’t need to be friends to get out of here, Vesper.”
Her attention snaps back to me. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying we escape. And whatever happens afterward…” I shrug coolly, as if guilt isn’t gnawing away at me. As if regret isn’t pummeling me in the goddess-damned ribs. “We’ve run enough jobs together. No one is better than you in a fight, and no one thinks as fast as I do. If there is a door—”
“There’s a way out,” she finishes with a sigh. “I remember.”
“So?”
“So I’m debating whether I trust you.” Vesper runs her fingers through her hair, brushing the lustrous silver from her shoulders before shaking her head again. Cursing. “Fine, but I’m still taking you to the sorcerer at the end of this, Zephyra. I’m getting my sister back. If we break out of this brig, I’m not letting you run off into the sunset. You owe me, and I’m going to collect.”
The scars along my body burn at her words. Panic claws at my throat, but I force it back down. Force myself to breathe, to focus. Vesper has no idea who she’s dealing with, but I do. “He won’t bring her back, Vesper. I swear to you—”
“I’m done with your promises,” Vesper says. “You’ve a tongue like a sea serpent.” She cracks her neck and rolls her shoulders then. Her eyes gleam brighter with anticipation now, reflecting the lightning from above. She bares her teeth in a hard smile. “But I’m not dying on this ship. We escape together, and then your ass is mine.”
Fuck, I think.
“Fine,” I agree.
And just as we did weeks ago, Vesper and I begin planning our next con.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
ARION
I am entirely uncertain as to whyIhave to carry this thing.” Gavriall huffs, descending to the ship’s lowest level as the stench of mildew and petrichor clings to our recently borrowed clothing. He raises a silver platter in his hands, the enchanted skull perched atop it happily chittering away.
“You will die, she will die, he will die—die, die.”
