“Absolutely not. And she knows it.”
“So it sounds like she’ll be with us a bit longer.”
Kane doubted that. He knew she considered taking their reconnaissance raft when all of this was over. If she took the safer northwestern route, she might make it. As long as she could survive a few days at sea, she’d make it back to Tarth.
“How has the breaking-and-entering plan been going?” Asher was seemingly determined to break his brooding silence.
“Worse,” he grumbled.
Asher nodded slowly. “What happens if you don’t make it in on time?”
“We will.” There was no other option.
“And the index? Any luck with that?”
Kane’s mood soured further. Not only was he trying to break into a powerfully protected library, but once he was in, Kane needed to know where that blasted map was. Without some kind of roadmap, he could be stuck searching for days among the stacks. Unfortunately, the information he had was coded in some infernal smugglers’ script that Kane had yet to parse out.
“It will work, Asher,” Kane answered, his tone dangerously final.
“Captain, we’re nearly back,” one of the newer members informed him. Kane nodded and brushed him away. His fury had cooled, and he was ready to give the ship proper time to recover. At least he had two highly capable professionals who could take care of his vessel. He just hoped they would get along.
Chapter
Twenty
By the time Erinna disembarked, her body was sore and aching from a day’s worth of labor. She squeezed the muscles in her shoulder to ease the throbbing. Her feet dragged across loose stone and dirt on her way back to camp.
A few of the pirates nodded in acknowledgment as she trudged along the path. It seemed nearly breaking herself to keep a ship from drowning earned her some modicum of respect.
The camp was filled with dull laughter and conversation when she returned. The new bars around the door mocked the earlier failure. Erinna scowled at the iron.
Sleep would be pointless, she realized, returning to her hut. No matter how tired her body was, her mind raced. Would they make it in before Haru and her academy entourage arrived? What would happen if they didn’t? Erinna sighed, stepping lightly over Inez’s sleeping form to grab her bag.
There was a small cup of tea nestled on the floor near her pillow. Inez must have prepared it while she was gone.
Erinna felt the strong walls she had built around herself start to crumble. The walls that kept everyone at a distance.
She stopped and gently drew the comforter up over Inez’s slender shoulders. If Erinna had done anything right, it was getting Inez out of Tarth and away from the king and academy. Kane had been true to his word, and the pirates were far better company than what waited for her back at home. She was starting to trust them more and more. To an extent.
Erinna made a note to keep that to herself. She feared how large Kane’s ego would grow if she told him as much.
She returned to the courtyard with a new project in hand, scanning the area for a private corner. Empty crates and barrels sat near the crumbled archways that used to hold entryway gates. It would be the best place, Erinna surmised, and she trudged over, pulling her arms around her body for warmth.
The soft glow of firelight barely crept to her area of solitude. Most of the illumination came from a waning moon above. It would suffice. She perched on a wooden crate and made quick work of the latch. If she weren’t so tired, Erinna would have tried to make a show. Paint herself in normalcy, pretend she needed more light to read the contents. But exhaustion worked its way into indifference.
These pirates wouldn’t care about her uncanny night vision. They weren’t Tarthan, she reminded herself, but she still struggled to find solace.
Letters and old pictures poured into her lap. One ripped piece of parchment contained a name—Ronan Wymark. Something pinged her sense of familiarity. She’d heard that name before, but the memory of the source escaped her. A royal wax seal with no letter lay crumbling in her lap. Erinna threw it back into the box. The more she rifled through the contents, the more frustrated she became. What in all the gods’ graces was so important about a ragtag assortment of…stuff?
On another piece of paper was a constellation. She pulled up her sleeve, heart racing as she compared it to the mark on herarm. There were some similarities, but not enough for Erinna to consider it meaningful. Still…she folded the paper and placed it back into the box.
What the hell was he planning to do? Was he even planning? Erinna eyed a hand-drawn map. She recognized the style; it was clearly the work of her father in his more adventurous youth. An X hovered in an area just off the coast of the Great North.
“What the fuck were you looking into?” she groaned. Everything about it was strange and entirely unhelpful.
“You’ll strain your eyes with this little light.”
Erinna swallowed a cry and scrambled to put the contents back into the box—safe from prying eyes. The last person she wanted to share with was the Minor Apprentice.
