Nineteen

NINETEEN

I laid awake listening to West’s breathing. It sounded like the waves lapping the shore of Jeval on warm days, rushing in and then dragging out.

I didn’t think I’d remember any of those things when I left Jeval—the color of the shallows, the stretch of the sky, or the sound of the water. Those four years had been so shadowed by the pain of losing my mother and the yearning for my father that it had consumed both light and dark. Until West. Until the day the Marigold showed up at the barrier islands, her strange winglike sails bowed in the wind. It took almost six months for me to believe that every time I saw it sail away wasn’t the last time. I had begun to trust West long before I realized it. But I wasn’t sure yet if he trusted me.

A flash of light ignited along the crack beneath the door, and I watched as it disappeared. Out the window, dawn was more than an hour away, leaving the sky black.

I slipped out of West’s heavy arms and sat up, listening. Azimuth House was silent, except for the sound of quiet footsteps on the staircase down the hall. My bare feet found the plush rug, and I stood, holding my skirts in my arms so they didn’t rustle. West was lost in a deep sleep, his face soft for the first time since I’d seen him at the gala.

The handle to the door creaked softly as I lifted it, opening the door. Clove was snoring against the wall, his legs crossed in front of him and the chest of coin under his arm.

The glow of a lantern was bobbing along the wall, and I peered over the bannister to see a head of silver hair below. Holland was wrapped in a satin robe, making her way down the corridor.

I looked back to the dark room before stepping over Clove’s legs and following the light. It washed over the floor before me as I took turn after turn in the dark, and when I reached the end of the corridor, it flickered out.

Ahead, a door was open.

I walked with silent steps, watching Holland’s shadow move over the marble, and the light hit my face as I peered through the crack. It was a wood-paneled room with one wall covered in overlapping maps, the others all set with mounted bronze candelabras. Holland stood in the corner, staring up at a painting that hung over the desk. My mother was wrapped in an emerald green dress fit with a violet gem brooch, her face aglow in the candlelight.

I pushed the door open and Holland’s gaze dropped to meet mine.

She lifted a finger, wiping the corner of her eye. “Good evening.”

“Almost morning now,” I answered, stepping inside.

Holland’s eyes fell down my wrinkled dress. “I come down here when I can’t sleep. No use in lying in bed when I can get some work done.”

But it didn’t look as if she was working. It looked as if Holland had come down to see Isolde.

She pulled a long match from a box on the desk and I watched as her hand floated over the tapers. When the last wick was lit, she blew out the match and I studied the illuminated maps pieced together on the far wall. They showed a detailed system of reefs, but this wasn’t just any chain of islands. I’d seen it before.

Yuri’s Constellation.

I took a step closer, reading notes written in blue ink along the margins of the diagrams. Different areas were crossed out, as if someone had methodically marked them. It was an active dive chart, like the ones my father would hang up in his helmsman’s quarters on the Lark. And that could mean only one thing.

Holland was still looking for the midnight.

Behind her, another large portrait of a man was hung in a gilded frame. He was handsome, with dark hair, gray eyes, and a proud set to his chin. But there was a kindness in his face. Something warm.

“Is that my grandfather?” I asked.

Holland smiled. “It is. Oskar.”

Oskar. The name seemed to fit the man in the portrait, but I was certain I’d never heard my mother speak it.

“He apprenticed as a gem sage with his father, but he’d given his heart to the stars. Against your great-grandfather’s wishes, Oskar took an apprenticeship as a celestial navigator.”

I guessed that’s where Azimuth House had gotten its name, as well as its design.

“He was the best of his time. There wasn’t a trader in the Unnamed Sea who didn’t revere his work, and nearly every navigator out on those waters was an apprentice of his at one time or another.” She smiled proudly. “But he taught Isolde the trade of a gem sage when he realized what she could do.”

The tradition of a gem sage was something that was passed down, and only to people who had the gift. My mother had seen early on that I had it. I wondered how long it had taken Oskar to see it in my mother.

I reached up, touching the edge of another portrait. It looked like the same man, but he was older. His white hair was cut short, curling around his ears.

“Odd that your mother never told you about him. They were quite close from the time she was a little girl.”

“She didn’t tell me a lot of things.”

“We have that in common.” Holland smiled sadly. “She was always a mystery to me. But Oskar … he understood her in a way I never could.”

If that was true, then why hadn’t she ever told me about him? The only explanation I could think of was that maybe she didn’t want to risk anyone knowing she was the daughter of the most powerful people in the Unnamed Sea. That would bring its own kind of trouble. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that the reason my mother hadn’t told me about Holland was because she didn’t want to be found. That maybe, Isolde had been afraid of her.

“I didn’t know she had a daughter until I got a message from Zola. I didn’t believe him, but then…” She drew a breath. “Then I saw you.”

I looked again to the portrait of my mother, measuring myself against it. It was like looking in a mirror, except that there was something gentle about her. Something untouched. Her eyes seemed to follow me about the room, never leaving me.

“Did she tell you where she got your name?” Holland said, breaking me from the thought.

“No. She didn’t.”

“Fable’s Skerry,” she said, walking back to the desk. She moved a pile of books, revealing a map of the Bastian coast painted onto the desktop. She ran a finger along the jagged edge of the land, dragging it into the water to what looked like a tiny island. “This was her hiding place when she wanted to get away from me.” She laughed, but it was faintly bitter. “The lighthouse on Fable’s Skerry.”

“A lighthouse?”

She nodded. “She was no more than eight or nine when she started disappearing for entire days. Then she’d reappear out of nowhere as if nothing had happened. It took almost two years for us to figure out where she was going.”

My chest felt tight, making my heart skip. I didn’t like that this woman, a stranger, knew so much about my mother. I didn’t like that she knew more than I did.

“How did she die?” Holland said suddenly, and the look in her eye turned apprehensive. As if she’d had to summon up the courage to ask.

“Storm,” I said. “She drowned in Tempest Snare.”

Holland blinked, letting out the breath she’d been holding. “I see.” There was a long silence before she spoke again. “I lost track of Isolde for years after she left Zola’s crew. I didn’t hear that she’d died on the Lark until a year ago.”

“That’s why you want Saint?”

“It’s one reason,” she corrected.

I didn’t know what she knew about Saint and Isolde, but there’d been a stone in my stomach since that morning, when she’d said his name. If Holland wanted Saint dead, it was likely that she’d get what she wanted. And that thought made me feel as if I were sinking, no air in my lungs, watching the surface light pull farther away above me.

West had made it clear that Saint would have to fend for himself, but even if she didn’t kill him, Saint would die before he let her take his trade. It didn’t matter what had happened four years ago, or that night on the Lark. It didn’t matter what had happened the day he left me on Jeval. The moment he handed me that map of the Snare, or the morning I fleeced him with my mother’s necklace. Everything focused in clear, crisp colors.

Saint was a bastard, but he was mine. He belonged to me. And even more unbelievable, I really did love him.

“I changed my mind.” I spoke before I could think better of it.

Holland arched an eyebrow as she looked up at me. “Reconsidering my offer?”

I bit down on my lip, the vision of Saint at his desk resurfacing. The hazy, dim light. The glass of rye in his hand. The smell of pipe smoke as he looked over his ledgers. I took a step toward her. “I want to make a deal.”

She leaned closer, smirking. “I’m listening.”

“I wasn’t lying when I said that Isolde never told me about the midnight. But I know you’re still looking for it.” I glanced up to the maps. “And I know I can find it.”

That made her quiet. There was a sudden stillness in her, pulling the shadows from the room into her eyes. “I’ve had crews looking for that cache for years. What makes you think you can find it?”

“Dredging isn’t the only thing my mother taught me.”

She didn’t look the least bit surprised. “So, you are a gem sage. I was wondering about that.”

“You could have just asked.”

She half-laughed. “I suppose you’re right.” She stood from the chair, coming around the corner of the desk. “You said you want to make a deal. What do you want from me?”

“Your word.” I met her eyes. “If I find the midnight for you, you leave Saint alone.”

That seemed to catch her off guard. Her eyes narrowed. “Why? What business do you have with him?”

“I owe him,” I said. “That’s all.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I don’t care if you believe me.”

Her mouth twisted up on one side as she tapped a finger on the desk.

“I don’t want your empire, but I will find the midnight. When I do, I’ll have your word that you won’t touch Saint. Or his trade.” I held out my hand between us.

Holland stared at it, thinking. I could see her sizing me up, trying to see what I was made of. “I think perhaps Saint is more to you than I realized. I think he was more to Isolde than I realized.”

She wasn’t stupid. She was putting it together. She knew that Saint was Isolde’s helmsman, but she didn’t know he was her lover. And I wasn’t going to tell her she was right.

“Do we have a deal or not?” I lifted my hand between us.

She took it, smiling so that the candlelight flashed in her eyes. “We have a deal.”