Twenty-Six

TWENTY-SIX

The night sea stretched out around the Marigold like a black chasm, melting into a clear, dark sky.

Paj and Auster were gathered on the quarterdeck with bowls of stew clutched in their hands when I came up the steps from below. The silence crept over the ship, making the crush of the hull cutting through the water sound like whispers.

Hamish had been asleep in the crew’s cabin since the sun went down, and I wondered if it was because he was still undecided on what to do about the secret West was keeping. It would only be a matter of time before Hamish came clean.

The sound of Koy snoring lifted from the shadows at the bow. I could only see his crossed bare feet in the moonlight.

A shadow moved over the deck beside me, and I looked up to where Willa was perched high on the mainmast. She was settled in her sling, her head tipped back and looking at the stars.

I hesitated before I took hold of the pegs and climbed, rising up above the Marigold and into the rush of cold wind. It had the bite of frost in it, stinging as it slid over my skin.

Willa ignored me as I found a place to sit beside her. Her long, twisted, tawny locks were braided back from her face, making the cut of her slender face more severe.

“What do you want?” Her voice was hollow.

I wound my arm around the mast, leaning into it. “To say thank you.”

“For what?”

I followed her gaze up to the sky, where the clouds threaded together in wisps. “For coming to find me.” Emotion bent the words into different shapes.

If Willa noticed, I couldn’t tell. “A lot of good it did.”

“I didn’t ask him to do this. I was going to do it alone.”

“I don’t care, Fable,” she said. “You made all of this about you. The same as you’ve been doing all along.”

“What?” I sat up, leaning forward to look her in the eye.

“Since you first stepped foot on this ship, we’ve been doing what you want us to do. Actually, we were doing it before then, bleeding coin on our route to come to Jeval.”

“I never asked for that.”

“It doesn’t matter. West was never going to stop going to that island as long as you were there. And when you almost got yourself killed, we were on the hook, taking you across the Narrows to find Saint.”

“I—”

But she wasn’t going to let me get a word in. “When that fell apart, who came and scraped you off the floor of the tavern? Me. Who risked their necks taking you to Tempest Snare? All of us.”

“You weren’t doing me any favors with the Lark, Willa. If it weren’t for me, the Marigold would still be anchored in Ceros with no sails.”

“I wish she was!” she shouted.

It wasn’t until the moonlight caught her face again that I could see she was crying. And they weren’t the kind of tears that fell in anger. They were sad. Broken.

“If West had lost the Marigold, I would have been able to leave,” she choked. “But you saved it. And I thought again, once he was out from under Saint and he had you, that I was free. But we cross the Narrows to find you and you’re already making deals. Going your own way. Like it all meant nothing.”

My heart sank, realizing that in a way, she was right. I hadn’t considered the cost for Willa. Not once. She’d told me that she had finally found a way to leave the Marigold. That she’d found a way to be free. And I’d taken it away from her, whether I’d meant to or not.

“You didn’t tell him that you’re leaving, did you?” I asked.

“No.”

“Why not?”

She sniffed. “You don’t know what he was like before. When he was working for Saint. I thought once we were done with him, that the West I knew was back. But when you disappeared in Dern, he was that person again. He … he just vanished.”

“I heard about the ships. What happened?”

“It doesn’t matter. That’s not my brother. That’s what Saint made.” She wiped her cheek. “He was willing to leave everything in the Narrows to find you. He was willing to put you before the entire crew,” she said. “What else is he willing to do for you, Fable?”

I didn’t know what she wanted me to say. I understood it. In her eyes, I’d made West into the same thing my father had. And I could hear in Willa’s voice that she wished she’d never come to the tavern that night. That she’d never told me to ask the crew to take me on.

“He was wrong in forcing the crew to come to Yuri’s Constellation,” I said. “He was just afraid.”

“You’ve given him something to be afraid of.” She finally looked at me. Her eyes met mine, and I could see a thousand words she wasn’t saying in them.

It was the truth. And this was exactly why Saint lived by his rules and why he’d taught them to me.

Below, the door to the helmsman’s quarters opened, flooding lantern light onto the deck. West came out of the breezeway, and even from high up on the mast, I could see the exhausted look on his face.

“I need to talk to you,” he called up to us before looking up to the quarterdeck. “All of you.”

Willa studied her brother before she unfolded herself from her sling and climbed down. The crew gathered around the helm quietly, all shooting glances to one another as West tucked his hair behind his ear. He was nervous.

“I need to tell you something.”

They all waited.

“When Holland came to the docks, she took the deed to the Marigold.” He said it all in one breath.

“She what?” Paj’s voice didn’t sound like his own. It was desperate.

Tears were welling in Willa’s eyes again.

“She demanded the deed and I gave it to her.”

Auster grimaced, as if the words didn’t make sense. Beside him, Hamish stared at his boots.

“When we get to Sagsay Holm, we’ll get it back from her.”

“And then what?” Paj’s deep voice echoed.

“Then we go home,” West answered.

“Just like that? As if nothing happened?”

West was silent for a long time and they waited for his answer. When I was sure he would finally speak, he turned on his heel, headed back to his quarters.

The crew stared at each other.

“So, we work for Holland now?” The edge came into Willa’s voice.

“We don’t work for her.” I ran a hand over my face.

Auster cleared his throat awkwardly. “Sure sounds like we do.”

“We’ll get it back,” I said, desperate for them to believe me. “Holland wants me, not the Marigold.”

Hamish fidgeted with the thread unraveling at the hem of his vest. “I’m tired of getting caught up in your family’s business, Fable.”

“Me too,” I muttered.

I could hear it in Willa’s words. See it on each of their faces. They’d spent years being controlled by Saint, and now Holland held the most precious thing in the world to them—their home. I hadn’t saved them with the Lark. I’d trapped them. With me.