10. Chapter Ten

Kalia didn"t know what roused her first— the scent of old fish and wet rope, the sound of the rigging clinking together and the unfurled sails, or how she had been unceremoniously dumped onto the deck. She blinked, groaning as she lifted her hand to the back of her head, finally prodding at the lump that had grown there.

What happened? Why was she cold to the bone? And why was she not wearing shoes?

It all came flooding back in a jolt that shot pain through her tender head: the bordello, the pirates, the attack. Rage simmered in Kalia's belly as she swept her eyes along the puddles of water that filled the crevices between the wooden planks before finally taking in the dozens of worn leather boots circling the deck.She had watched men in the bordello long enough to know that the owners of those boots were currently studying every inch of her. The feeling of exposure that only came from nakedness brimmed over. She subtly swiped her hand along her side to ensure she was still dressed, only satisfied when she felt the satin cloth still intact beneath her palm.

Kalia curled her fingers into fists, slowly pushing herself to a wobbly stand. Her hand reached out to grasp the side of the…ship. Lifting her head, she scanned the crowd of unfamiliar faces, each dirtier than the next, before finally sweeping her gaze to the horizon in confirmation.She was indeed on a ship—the city"s sprawling coast spread before her. The view was almost pretty.

At least they were still in the harbor, and the crown"s navy had yet to be deployed. Though, for how long Kalia wasn"t sure. The palace glittered from its perch on the hill in the distance, the white dome still bright despite the night sky. The king had certainly ensured his opulence could be felt from every angle and light. Plumes of smoke rose from the left side of the city just beyond the port, and there was an unmistakable orange glow of fire that illuminated the underside of the haze.

The bordello. She wondered how many of the ladies had made it out. A weight sunk in her chest when she thought of what little she had been able to pilfer from the madam. The beginnings of her second stash were hidden in a hollowed leg of her bedframe. By now, it would certainly be molten copper in the blaze.

Kalia steeled her expression into fearless disdain and turned to face the crew. They regarded her with wary excitement, their eyes roving her face, her breasts, and the high slit in her dress. She tempered back the instinct to tug it together, not wanting to draw even more attention. Their foul stares, reminiscent of Cranford Reed staring from his place near the hearth, kindled a rage inside her.

She hated pirates.

Kalia rolled her shoulders and tapped into her mind, ready to send her magic flinging in every direction. Maybe she would drown them, much like she had threatened Alaric. Force them to jump into the sea or hold their breath until they were blue in the face. Perhaps hang themselves from the masts with the coils of rope that littered the deck.The men were always the easiest to toy with—their minds unfiltered and simple. These ones certainly wouldn"t be any different.

Her power crackled beneath her skull, surfacing in her mind for merely a heartbeat before it winked into nothing. What? Her panic built. Fuck. Her pulse rattled down to her fingertips, something she focused on instead of succumbing to the fact that she was utterly defenseless. She reached for it again and again, each time coming up short. It had been nearly ten years since she had burned through her magic, always careful not to reach the bottom of that well.

She shouldn"t have goaded Alaric like she did.

A chuckle started near the front of the crowd, and it morphed as it caught on until it became a blazing inferno of humiliation. Roars of laughter cut into her, deeply splicing against the hardened exterior she had built for herself. Kalia felt like a trapped animal that had been cornered in a cage by a fire, and she did the only thing she thought of doing.

Pivoting toward the nearest set of ropes, Kalia hauled herself onto the gunnel, her bare toes wrapping around the edge of it. She knew what men like them did to women like her. And she would rather jump from the ship to face the frigid, dirty water of the bay than find out exactly what the crew had planned.

There was a barking order that Kalia couldn"t quite make out, but the crew immediately fell silent. Her dress whipped in the sea breeze, forming the curve of her hips, and she tightened her grip on the rope when the ship dipped with a wave. She glanced over her shoulder, doubling back when she realized the crowd had split into two.Their faces downturned away from the gap, and they each busied themselves with scrubbing the deck, working the sails, or hurrying to the ship"s underbelly.

A man walked up the newly formed path, his steps a casual arrogance against the deck.Kalia narrowed her gaze on him. He was handsome enough, she supposed, with tanned skin and brown, oval eyes that reminded her of Sha"Hadra. She knew of a woman or two who would do many questionable things just to get lost in the depths of him. In any other circumstance, she may have been one of them. Locks of his dark hair were pulled up in a bun near the back of his head. He looked up at her, his scrutinizing stare boring into her.

This was a man who commanded control at all times and who reveled in it. He must be the captain. And this was the one whom she needed to bargain with? The thought made Kalia hate him even more than she hated his crew. She hadn"t bargained before, and she certainly wouldn"t start now.

A knowing smirk pulled on his lips as he rested his hand on the pommel of his cutlass, the blade still strapped to the belt at his hip. That casual arrogance made a second appearance in how his eyes gleamed when he took her in. It was the first time Kalia wondered if this was how it felt for two territorial predators to circle one another.

"Ruehi," the man amusedly drawled, his gaze snapping to connect with hers. "It"s time to come down from there."

Kalia scoffed, shaking her head. The movement shifted the hair cascading down her back. "There"s been a mistake. Your mongrels brought me onto your ship," she said, tilting her chin toward the men pretending to work behind him. They jeered at her, showing their yellowing, crooked teeth. "You"re going to take me back to shore— don"t come any closer."

The man halted his progression, and Kalia didn"t miss the agitated muscle that ticked in the corner of his jaw. Satisfaction swelled within her, something he didn"t seem to miss either.

"Captain Rahmi Abada," the man said, leaning a hip against the nearest stack of crates. "I"ve been looking for you, but you aren"t what I expected."

The clocktower near the city"s center let out a single gong that echoed across the bay. Kalia carefully pivoted on her toes, spinning to face the captain instead of staring over her shoulder. The tips of his fingers danced along the hilt, tracing the stitching of the leather. Another tell that he was unhappy with her bold disrespect. She was just pleased he caught on.

"Oh?" Kalia replied, quirking a brow. "I"ve never even heard of you. But considering you"re a pirate captain…" She paused, making a show of trailing her gaze down his tunic, narrowing on the groin of his breeches before dragging it back up again. "You"re exactly what I expected."

Rahmi took in a slow breath that forced his shoulders to rise and blew it back out. In his commanding silence, Kalia calculated her next move. Her well of magic was still too low, and she knew from past experiences that it would take days to fill back up. She could kill him, she supposed. At least she might be able to catch him off guard long enough that she could grab his cutlass. The crew might chop her to pieces, but that was still better than any alternative.

She swept her eyes toward Rahmi"s right, where Alaric had appeared at his elbow.

"You should speak to him with more consideration," Alaric snapped at her, and this time, she couldn"t help the lethal grin that stole from her mouth. "He"s the captain—"

"Does your captain always order his men to brothels?" Kalia purred, watching with sharp precision as his shoulders sagged just enough to be noticed. "Or was this a special occasion?"

From how a flush crept up the sides of Alaric"s neck and how Rahmi"s knuckles whitened when his fingers curled around the pommel of his cutlass, Kalia knew she had struck a nerve. An unknown, lying-right-hand-man nerve.

"He didn"t tell you where he found me?" Kalia went on, tsking her tongue against the roof of her mouth. "For shame, captain. A crew of men who hide things from you? That"s—"

"Hold your tongue, woman," Alaric interjected, the flush still crawling up the curves of his ears, but he had already shown his hand. Kalia"s return smile was knowing. Alaric glanced up at Rahmi. "Captain, I—"

"Quiet, Alaric," Rahmi managed to say through gritted teeth, and he appeared half-ready to run Alaric through with his cutlass right then.

Kalia pounced on the new development, wrestling away the control that Rahmi seemed to hold onto so tightly. "We can chalk this all up to a terrible misunderstanding. You can return me to the port, where I can find my way to the bordello and assist in rebuilding what your men burned to the ground." Alaric glared up at her, but she ignored him. "And, if the crown doesn"t arrest us all on our return, perhaps I can convince some ladies to service your men out of gratitude."

Rahmi remained silent, and Kalia took a moment to regard Alaric with a triumphant and vindictive smirk, challenging him to say anything. He only sneered back. She settled her lips into a tight line that she hoped conveyed forgiveness as the captain studied the port behind her. Blistering shouts sounded from the shore, and the muffled boots fell against the wooden gangway, splitting apart the fog that had begun to resettle on the bay.

The king"s navy was boarding the warship, and Kalia knew they were running out of time. Her impatience flared, burning the coolness of the night away from her bare flesh. She swallowed back the instinct to tap her foot or massage her temples, not wanting to show her frustration by fidgeting.

Rahmi"s eyes darted from the shore, landing on Kalia"s face, and she held his intense gaze. From how he blinked, she was sure that didn"t happen as often as it should. She boarded her expression to an expectant understanding as though to say she wouldn"t cause any more trouble. And in a sudden and unnerving shift, his mouth tugged into a dazzling, heart-stopping grin.

"No," Rahmi said, pushing his hip from the crates to stand straight. He took three steps forward, stopping when he was in front of her, and his smile turned overly saccharine. "I think you"ll stay with me here on this ship."

Kalia"s eyes widened, and the fibers of the rope bit into her palm when she tightened her hand around it. With that one sentence, she felt the control eddying away from her, the bulk of it slinking into the void that was Rahmi-fucking-Abada. It was a game to him, she realized—a cat-and-mouse play that she wanted no part of.

"Why?" Kalia demanded through gritted teeth, her honeyed tone taking on something colder, more sinister. "What do you want from me?"

Rahmi took another step forward, and Kalia felt a second shift, one of a predator transforming into prey. And she was, unarguably, the prey. It was not a sensation she was fond of growing used to.

"Alaric, despite his flaws, told me what you did, how you broke into his mind. How you sunk so deeply into the memories that he saw you embedded in them. Interesting, that…talent."

Shit.Kalia remained still, focusing on the ship swaying beneath her. "I don"t know what you"re talking about," she replied instead. "The king and his guards heavily regulate the use of magic. Alaric must be mistaken."

Rahmi ignored her entirely, and that undeterred smile remained wholly plastered on his tanned face. "I require a djinn for a path I"ve set myself on. There are two options for you now. One…" He trailed off, and his hand slipped from his cutlass, resting uncomfortably close enough on the gunnel that she felt the heat of his pinky finger on the long edge of her foot. "You can come with me, help me with my endeavors. Or, two, I can turn you into the crown. Tell them you"re a magic-user and watch from my ship while they execute you on the hill."

Kalia"s first thought was to ask what in the name of the gods a djinn was, but she tempered back the question. There she was on a pirate ship surrounded by an armed crew led by an insane captain. She didn"t have the leverage, and if he found out, she wasn"t what he thought... Her eyes slid to his belt, where a dagger was tied alongside the cutlass. She ran her tongue over her bottom lip, tasting the brine of the bay, and she was unhappy to note how he tracked the motion with his eyes.

"Your men came into the bordello," Kalia finally said, fixing him with a deadly stare that promised retribution. "They stole from the madam. They killed her servants. And that is far worse than anything you could turn me into the crown for." She bent down, kneeling until she was at eye level with him. She couldn"t read him through his mask of impenetrable boredom. And, as someone who made a living on reading people, that thought snuck a feeling of uneasiness into her chest. "She"ll hunt you, and she"ll hunt me. There will never be an end to what she can do. I"m bought and paid for. It"s in your best interest to return me immediately."

Rahmi"s smile froze, and she almost laughed in the face of it. "You speak under the assumption," he said slowly, "that I haven"t counted every one of my sins. I keep them locked away, but I remember them every night." His hand reached upward, clamping around her arm. "I"ll be sure to remember this one, too."

Kalia reached down with her free hand and grasped the dagger she still had strapped to her thigh. In a move he hadn"t anticipated, she whipped out the blade and plunged it into his forearm. Blood splattered, the warm, sticky liquid leaking onto her hands. His fingers unfurled as he let out a grunt of surprise that turned into a low, mirthless chuckle, twisting her belly into knots.

"Oh, ruehi," Rahmi mumbled, as though the word were something he whispered into women"s ears at night, but Kalia was no longer listening.

Kalia stepped away from the ropes and turned back to face the shore. She wouldn"t stay on this ship, pretending to be this djinn in the hands of a man who would use her magic for gods knew what. But she wouldn"t return to the madam either. She would disappear, make a new name for herself, get back to Sha"Hadra, and buy an old shop at a fraction of the cost. It didn"t matter that she had no money. She would forge a path for herself. She had done it as a child. She would do it again.

There was a pull at her soul, a hooking probe that anchored her in place. Slamming her mind closed, she whirled around to see the captain staring at her, his eyes darkened and murderous. His hand was wrapped around her dagger"s hilt. He pulled it from his arm with one smooth tug, the blood running from his wrist and pooling on the deck beneath his boots.

Kalia"s body lurched as those hooks ripped away, and a pained dizziness swept through her. Is this what it felt like when she used her magic on others? When she sent those guards into the recesses of their minds? She didn"t want to know more. She scampered to the edge of the gunnel and threw herself over the ship"s railing, readying for the bay"s water to swallow her whole.

Instead, a hand shot forward and caught her arm. Kalia fell against the hull, her body cracking loudly as she swung into the side of the ship. A scream erupted from her, the spikes of it embedding into her throat. The pain was both hot and cold, a burning mixed with the cool sheen of nausea cresting through her. She thought she was going to be sick. She was sure she would pass out again. It was a miracle her shoulder was still in place.

Kalia was hauled upward before she was rolled over the gunnel, and she slipped in the pool of the captain"s blood when her feet touched the deck.

"I said that you"re staying here," Rahmi seethed, spinning her around to face him again.

Kalia had done many fucked up things in her life. The stealing, the fighting, the luring men into the bordello…it was all more ethically and morally questionable than the next. But when she reeled her fist back and connected it with the captain"s nose, she knew this might have been the biggest mistake she had ever made.

Rahmi"s head jerked back as a new throbbing pain lanced through her knuckles, and she could hear his teeth grinding with how tightly he clenched his jaw.

But she was too mad to care, too angry at the captain before her to realize the grave she had dug for herself. They glowered at one another, and Kalia kept her glare trained on the captain"s. His eyes, she realized, weren"t a single layer of brown but the colors of wet rocks that shone in the morning sunlight on the bay"s shore. She could sense the tremble in his hands as they awaited her next move.

"Keep that look of satisfaction off your fucking face," Rahmi finally said, his breath ghosting over her face. "You"re still on my ship, and we"re sailing away." He seemed to suck any remaining light away from the stars, further reminding Kalia that he was nothing but a controlling void. And she was unwilling to be trapped in his gravity.

To his credit, Rahmi"s pinched lips and rigid stance conveyed that he thought the same of her.

Indeed, the city had shrunk since she had been hauled back aboard, and the wind that filled the newly unfurled sails nipped at her bare arms. One of the crew tried to step in, but from the corner of her eye, Kalia saw the rope in his hand. Absolutely not. A darkened rage flashed through her gaze, and Rahmi"s eyebrow quirked in reply to the sudden shift in her demeanor. He seemed to think it was amusing. Though he hadn"t seen the sailor yet, who was likely thinking he was helping the captain subdue the woman beating the shit out of him.

When the man had come close enough that she could feel the heat of his body, Rahmi"s eyes finally flicked over to him. But it was too late. Kalia thrust out her elbow, catching the sailor in the middle of his throat.

The man dropped, clutching his hand tightly against the bobbing column of his neck. His cough was harried and choked as he struggled to draw in breath. Alaric bent down to grasp the collar of the man"s tunic, pulling him to his feet before shoving him back into the crowd of pirates who had finally dropped the pretense of working.

"That"s enough of that," Rahmi said, reaching forward to pin her arms tightly to her side.

Kalia hated the feeling of being trapped, hated that it brought back flashes of memories that pried open her past with the ease of a crowbar to rotting wood. She couldn"t get the breaths in fast enough. The thoughts pelted her…drowned her, and made her flail against him. Her wriggling only made him wrap his arms around her. She received a faceful of freshly chopped cedar and dried rosemary, a stunning contradiction to the stained tunics and bloody puddles surrounding her.

Suddenly, Kalia was airborne. Her hips were slung over a broad shoulder, her hair threatening to dip in the bloody mixture of seawater filling the crevices of the wood. She spotted her footprint, and the smear from where she had slid was still painted against the deck.

"Let me down," she growled over her shoulder, grappling with his tunic. She managed to clutch the hilt of his cutlass long enough to draw it from its sheath merely an inch, but the blade was taken from her a heartbeat later.

"You"ve exhausted my measures of remaining pleasant," Rahmi retorted, his tone bordering a hiss.

An arm clenched the backs of her thighs. "Watch where you put your hands!" There was a rumbling chuckle as they moved, and Kalia began to pound her fists against his spine.

"I wouldn"t dream of it," Rahmi grunted just as Kalia dug her long, painted nails into the corded muscle of his back. "And you shouldn"t either." The tremble of his wicked laugh set every instinct of hers to stand on end.

Whatever piece of him that may have been considered redeemable immediately fell away.