34. Chapter Thirty-Four

"They can"t be gone," a female voice said, waking Rahmi from his stupor. "The Mark of Malice? Gone?"

Rahmi"s eyes cracked open, and his vision blurred as he struggled to focus against the pounding headache that radiated down the back of his neck. He blinked at the ceiling, where a golden light was dancing against the wood. Where was he? He groaned, lifting his head from the hard floor beneath him to take a look around.

He was in a cell, that was for sure. He recognized the iron bars and the locks on each door. Though this set of cells was smaller than the ones on his ship, the room was a touch wider. It smelled cleaner, too. Newer. The stench of mildew and boggy, stale water hadn"t yet penetrated the ship"s depths. He blinked again, widening his eyes despite the threat of his head bursting. It couldn"t do that, could it? He had never been knocked out before.

"I"m so sorry, my love," a male voice answered, the gentleness of it damn near devastating. "It took on two more firings from the guns. It sunk soon after."

"Elodie and Shirin?"

The male voice didn"t answer, but a soft sob followed.

Rahmi groaned again as he pushed himself up. He hooked his elbows around his bent knees, shaking his head one final time to rid himself of the fogginess that had settled over his mind. He swallowed, looking around again. Reshef was in the cell across from his own, his eyes bright despite the dim lantern light. Somehow, in a few hours, the boyish charm had hardened into something that Rahmi couldn"t quite put his finger on. And he certainly didn"t have the clarity to figure it out.

Glancing to his left, Rahmi spotted Kalia with her back against the keel. Water dripped from above, landing in a puddle that had begun to form at her feet. The Mark of Malice had left her share of scars. That much could be said for her.

"Alaric?" Rahmi whispered, his voice hoarse against the dryness of his throat. "Thomas? Searles?"

Reshef lifted his head, surprise noted on his face. "Captain, you"re awake."

"Despite my better judgment." Rahmi lifted his hand to probe at the sore lump on his temple. "How long was I out?"

Reshef shrugged. "Long enough to know that I"m starving and no one has brought us a single moldy piece of bread yet." He leaned a shoulder against the crossbar with an irritated huff. "I would even take Doc"s fish stew."

Over the whoosh of the water that rushed past them just on the other side of the keel, Rahmi heard Kalia shuffle closer to him. There was a clang of metal against metal, and Rahmi looked over just in time to see Kalia wrap her hand around one of the iron bars that split their cells. Black stone cuffs were locked around her wrists, the heavy chains resting on her lap.

"It"s obsidian," Reshef went on, presumably at the knitted brow as Rahmi locked his gaze on the cuffs. "The stone blocks the use of magic and absorbs it right on up."

Kalia sent him a shaky smile. "I couldn"t get into your mind to see what you were thinking, even if I wanted to." She swallowed, lifting her free hand to showcase the cuff in better light. "They popped these on the moment I was on their ship, though it was already too late for a few of them. I was cut off from my power immediately."

From the pleading, hopeful stare she sent him, Rahmi knew she was determining how he would respond. He looked away from her. His ship and crew were gone, and all that was left was her. And for how long? Newfound rage threatened to burn him alive and he clenched his jaw to bite back the scathing response he was itching to hurdle at her.

Rahmi wanted her to feel his pain, betrayal, and every ounce of his anger. He caught sight of her out of the corner of his eye, and a sudden pressure in his chest held him back. He felt exposed, filleted to the very bone. He was desperate to hit something, that primal urge roaring to life inside of him.

"You don"t want to know what I"m thinking," Rahmi said instead, reveling briefly in how her smile slipped from her mouth. Then he was filled with a vast well of shame because who does that to the person they love?

But Kalia had. She had twisted him around her finger so tightly that there wasn"t a way to disentangle him from her. And when Captain Nasir Al-Mahdi inevitably tore her apart, it was going to shred him, too. Rahmi only hoped that the pain would end him, though he knew that it wouldn"t.

"What of the rest of the crew?" Rahmi asked, returning his attention to Reshef. "Did anyone make it out alive?"

Reshef slowly shook his head, his eyes only brightening. "None that I saw, though I followed our fake djinn as soon as I saw her being dragged aboard this ship." There was a creak as hollowed footsteps crossed the deck above them. "Truly, Kalia, your propensity for being nabbed has been a never-ending thorn in my side."

Kalia huffed an involuntary laugh, though it sobered when Rahmi glared back at her.

"Wright Thackeray was in my ear promising to assist me with finding the Luminaria, and this whole time, he knew that you were no help to us?" Rahmi shot at her. Kalia"s head dipped to her chest as though she withered under his stare. It was oil on the fire of his anger. "You, of all of them? The talks we had and the honesty I was forced to come to terms with. Honesty that you forced me to come to terms with. Why?"

Kalia"s lower lip curved into her mouth with the sharp inhale she took in. "Wright promised to get me off the ship, but I didn"t agree to it, Rahmi. I swear it. He wanted to destroy the gemstone when we got to the island."

"I promised to get you off the ship!" Rahmi bellowed, finally losing his temper. She shrunk back from him, but it didn"t deter him this time. "I told you that I would do everything to get you back to the continent as long as you helped me. And you took that deal knowing there wasn"t a way forward!"

"I hoped we would get there, but the Luminaria was just a myth! Or—or I could do something with my powers," Kalia retorted. "Rahmi, please, I might still be able to help you. I still have magic. You"ve felt it. Wright—"

"If that man is lucky, Samael took him beyond where I can reach him," Rahmi growled, pushing as far away from her cell as the small space let him. He couldn"t stand to be near her, couldn"t stand to feel the gaping hole that had been blown through his heart. "Because if I find him, I"m ripping him apart with my bare hands. And then I"m giving him directly to Liddros."

Just like the rest of his crew. Rahmi knew with absolute certainty that Liddros would take them given the chance, especially if it were to save his skin. Regardless of how this ended, his time was ticking to a close unless he came across a new ship.

Rahmi glanced down at the markings that had taken up residence on his skin, each dark swirl matching the souls he had taken aboard The Mark of Malice. Despite the light from the candle, which was quickly dimming as the wax shortened, he saw that each mark was still intact.

A cruel joke? Possibly. Liddros had always been one to toy with his captains, frequently leaving subliminal messages carved in stone and sending them on a wild chase that only ended when he saw it fit to be ended—the boredom of an immortal being. But Rahmi glanced down at his markings again and couldn"t help the glimmer of hope that flared in his chest.

"Rahmi," Kalia said softly, but he only shook his head.

"They"re gone, Kalia," Rahmi responded, not lifting his eyes away from the markings. "The ship, the crew, all of it. Gone. The three of us remain, and had you been honest with me in the beginning as I was with you, things may be different now."

"A lover"s quarrel?" The voice made Kalia and Rahmi start, and he shifted his gaze from his forearm to the door, where Nasir was flanked by two men, each holding a coil of rope. "I would have thought you two would have been enjoying your final moments together." His pointed chin jutted toward Kalia"s cell, and the two men entered the brig, one of them grabbing the iron keys from the far wall.

"One of my men found these in your office," Nasir went on, tucking a hand into his pocket to pull up a folded stack of parchment—the coordinates from the NightWatcher.

Kalia tried to scoot as far back as possible, but her shoulders hit the wall in record time. "No, no, no," she pleaded as the men bent down to grab her under each arm, hauling her to her feet. She kicked and thrashed but was ultimately no match for the bulk of the men that tied her up.

The sight of her in chains and tied with even more rope was like being pierced with a dull knife. Rahmi shot to his feet just as she was marched out of her cell, pressing his face against the cool iron bars to better look at Nasir.

"She"s not a djinn," Rahmi said quickly, hoping the sudden confession would buy them time. "She told me herself. She"ll be no use to you."

Kalia"s shoulders stiffened, her back going ramrod straight as the two men paused at the door. Nasir cocked his head to the side, staring down at Kalia with a hint of amusement. For a fleeting moment, Rahmi thought Nasir was considering it. He even took a series of steps around Kalia, his clunking footsteps coming to a halt just out of reach in front of Rami"s cell.

"Do you expect me to believe that?" Nasir asked. "You can"t possibly think I would fall for that, not after I told you my plans for her." He leaned in just enough that Rahmi saw Reshef glaring at the captain"s back. "I"ll be sure to bring you her head, captain. Maybe you can find a way for it to still suck your cock when it"s removed from her body."

Rami lunged, swiping his hand at Nasir and barely catching the mercenary captain"s tunic with the tips of his fingers. He didn"t know when he had started bellowing. He just knew that his throat was raw when Nasir turned on his heel and ordered Kalia to be taken away. The cell"s iron bars rattled with every violent thrust of his shoulder. Rahmi slammed into them. If he had pulled harder and pushed faster, he could have escaped this cell.

But Kalia was already gone, and the lantern had snuffed out— as though the universe knew that a light was already on its way to being extinguished.

Rahmi sat on the floor with his head in his hands. He had failed and done so miserably enough that Kalia would be dead by now. It hadn"t been long since the mercenary ship anchored, though time moved differently in the dark. He hadn"t warmed to the concept of being indecisive; it was one of the things he hated most, but when it came to Kalia…she broke and rebuilt something in him—revived a piece of him that had been dead for an eternity.

And now she was gone.

"What is the plan, captain?" Reshef asked, his voice splitting through the abyss like a crack of gunfire. Rahmi could have sworn he was playing with that stupid fucking necklace, the zing of stone against silver apparent even here. "How do we get her back?"

How could the man possibly ask him that? It was all boyish dreams to think they had a way out of this. "We don"t, Reshef," Rahmi responded. His voice sounded so tired and beaten down…even to his ears. He couldn"t imagine what it sounded like to others. "There is nothing we can do."

"I don"t believe that," Reshef retorted, a stubbornness infiltrating every ounce of his tone. "I can"t believe you don"t have a plan—"

"What do you want from me?" Rahmi growled, lifting his head to glare daggers toward Reshef"s cell. "We are stuck here, locked in a fucking cage—" He kicked out a leg in frustration, the sole of his boot slamming against the door. "—All while the woman I love is out there, and she can"t even defend herself because of those gods-damned cuffs!"

A dim glow flared from Reshef"s cell, two small circles that gave a soft gold light. Rahmi blinked and the glow was gone, as though his over-active mind had imagined it.

But it was Reshef"s following words that had him furrowing his brow. "Such a human excuse." The two circles flared again, brighter this time, and Rahmi realized that the glow was coming directly from Reshef"s eyes. They illuminated the man"s handsome face, casting his high cheekbones and harsh jawline in sharp relief. "Obsidian is a funny little thing. The smallest amount can bring any magic-wielder to their knees, but if one learns how to navigate its composition…how to sneak minuscule amounts of magic through its minerals…"

A spark of fear pulsed against his throat at the sudden sinister tone, and that spark blazed to find a life of its own when the brig was washed in a bath of warm light—light that came directly from the candle that had been extinguished only seconds before. Rahmi"s wide-eyed stare flicked over to Reshef, who leaned casually against the cell doors.

Reshef picked at his cuticles as the lock of his door slid open with a loud click that echoed into the hallway. He pushed it open with a swipe of his hand, sauntering forward to stand in front of Rahmi"s cell. Gone were the na?ve charm, youthful smirks, and juvenile arrogance that only a man in their early twenties could have. In their place was a calculating stare filled with an ancient fury that cooled every vein in Rahmi"s body.

"I was hidden for centuries, imprisoned in this body with only a necklace to keep me safe. That is until that woman came around." Reshef crossed his arms over his chest. "She was so…determined to be alone. And that took me by surprise, if I were to be honest, considering the lengths she"ll go to protect those around her. I was desperate to know her and to understand the concept that made humans human. It"s funny. I had no interest in it until I watched her disarm a guard readying to slay a child in the market. I followed her after that, watched her, and studied her."

Reshef reached up and wrapped his hand around the silver chain of his necklace, yanking it from around his throat and tossing it into the corner of the brig. The room was filled with wicked power—fierce, biting, scrutinizing, and old—so very old.

"What are you?" Rahmi managed to croak through the magic that choked him, the phantom fog so dense that he struggled to breathe around it.

That boyish smirk pulled on Reshef"s lips once more, though there was an edge to it that hadn"t been there before. "Wickedness, captain. I"m anger, wickedness, and death, a god to you mortals. You can feel it. The difference between Kalia and I is how our magic works. He squatted down to eye-level with Rahmi. "I may not be able to pierce through that mind of yours, but I know what you must be thinking—"

Rahmi pushed himself to stand, a feat of sheer force with the swirl of Reshef"s power around him, and he staggered to the bars of his cell. "I think she doesn"t deserve what he"s going to do to her."

Reshef watched him for a long moment, the sharpness of his eyes boring into Rahmi"s very soul. It peeled him apart, layer by layer, but he never looked away. He never stood down from the djinn that was still crouched in front of him.

"Deserve," Reshef began, rolling around the word as though it were foreign on his tongue. "What do we deserve? Did you deserve to become captain? Did she deserve to be stripped from her homeland and brought to a brothel as a child? Did she deserve you to take her to task for lying to you all these months? Do you deserve the Luminaria?"

"Did you deserve for her to go in your place, knowing what will become of her?" Rahmi spat at him. What may have already become of her? They were wasting precious time that could be spent finding her.

Reshef looked delighted, his face opening with that arrogant charm Rahmi had come to know him by. "Now you"re getting it. But here"s the thing, captain." He stood, leaning a shoulder against the bars again. "In our short time together, Kalia taught me it isn"t about what we deserve. It all falls back on the simple principle that love is what unites us if only we freely open ourselves to it. It connects us in a way that pure entitlement for friendships and partners could only hope to. Kalia embodies love because she had to inspect and understand it before giving it away. And isn"t that the most beautiful thing of all? She chose to give it to you, not because you deserved it, but because she understood what that choice meant."

The door to the cell slid open, sending Rahmi stumbling forward. Reshef caught him with a ghostly hand around his upper arm, and a cutlass appeared in Rahmi"s fist. The metal glinted against the blazing light from the lantern, sending bright patches to dance against the ceiling.

"And Kalia is a Voyant, you ahl"ahmach. Don"t underestimate her. If she had truly wanted, she could have ripped your soul from your body before you had the chance to blink."

Ramhi couldn"t help but grin at Reshef using his native tongue to call him an asshole. He had been one. It wasn"t unfounded. "Where do you think she is?"

"There is only one place Nasir would have taken her. My people once called it the Cave of Wonders. And it"s where I planted the Luminaria over a thousand years ago."