Chapter 41

Astorm churns at our backs, roughing up the waves and giving us a forward shove that has sped up our journey at a gut-spilling rate.

I like rolling waves of sand. Wet ones … not so much.

I only hope it’s not too rough for Gunthar and his small crew to make it out of the bay once Orlaith is free of the ceremony. And I hope like hell nobody raises the sea gate before they leave.

My thoughts turn to Baze and the cutting words he slashed at me before he left my room …

If anything happens to her, I’ll never forgive you. Or myself.

My stomach does another sickening churn.

He never met us at the docks, despite me sending him a sprite to inform him of our plans. Like he severed himself from the pack.

From me.

In the end, it was probably a good thing, since every man was checked for burns by a flock of Gray Guards before being allowed to board the ships loaded with enough reserves to last a few months at sea. Not that we’ll need it all.

Precautions.

The crewmen also stacked the hulls with ‘empty’ barrels containing the loved ones of every sailor who boarded one of the seven whaling ships now trailing us through the howling, moon-soaked night, the lids cracked off the moment we set sail.

Every Ocruth warrior Rhordyn and Cindra smuggled into the city over the past number of weeks is dressed in blue, weapons concealed, demeanor calm as they work the deck to the booming tune of the distant storm, casting glances ahead. A sea of stony faces betraying none of the nerves I’m certain they’re all feeling.

Kolden’s note spoke of a guarded outpost that usually boasts up to ten soldiers overseeing the building of the ships, but I’ll believe that when I see it.

The only definites in this world are the ones you forge for yourself.

Cutting through dense, bucking waves, we veer around the edge of a mounded island clothed in thick brush and numerous palm trees, visible beneath the bold moonlight.

I frown, wiping a splash of seawater off my face. “This can’t be right,” I mutter, Cindra stepping up beside me. “I was expecting crops of cedar.” I scuff my boot against the floorboards. “That’s what his ships are built from …”

“Hmm.” She holds onto the mast as we tip down the face of a smaller wave, the waters finally calming now that we’re sailing around the island’s protected side. “Perhaps they’re outsourcing the timber for the ships?”

“Good point … unless they have their own plantations farther around. Either way, I’d like to know we’re on the right track. Perhaps check with Rowell?”

If we’ve been given the wrong coordinates, we’re screwed.

Cindra nods, disappearing toward the back of the ship.

With the fierce wind easing, the boat has slowed, and the men hurry to tighten the sails as we navigate the dark coastline at a smooth pace. We coast around a rocky outcrop, relief surging through me when the island practically yawns—boasting its gaping maw. The sheltered bay is larger than Parith, cut with a steep stone backdrop.

Ship hulls line the shore in various stages of construction, suspended in massive wooden cradles.

I scan the wide waterfront lit by flaming torches placed in intervals around the bay. About thirty-five blue-sailed ships pock the water.

Not nearly as many as I was thinking.

Shit ...

We’ll be down on numbers, and I won’t get the privilege of sinking any remaining ships as a silent screw you to Cainon.

I look behind, making sure Cindra’s waving the flag for the others to hold back while we cut through the water toward a thick, stubby pier jutting from just beyond the point, the end illuminated by twin torches.

Seven armed men stalk toward us.

“This is going to be interesting,” Cindra murmurs at my side as Rowell drifts the ship against the dock, somebody else throwing down a rope to one of the waiting guards—each of them looking up at us with pinched brows, glazed eyes, and flushed cheeks.

One of them hiccups.

“I think they’re drunk.”

“Any excuse for a bender,” Cindra muses, and I hum in acknowledgement, tucking a string of oily black hair behind my ear—my fiery locks slathered in a mix of coal dust and lard that makes me smell like the rotten mop below deck. Messy, but necessary.

Drunken guards mean they’re less likely to see through my disguise.

The crewmen lower the gangplank, and I’m the first across it.

One of the soldiers squints at me a little too hard, like he’s picking apart my sooty disguise. I smell the alcohol on his breath before he says, “Who the hell are”—hiccup—“you?”

Relief fills me.

The man at the front with a barreling chest and heavy lines at the corners of his flint-blue eyes lifts his hand without looking back at the man, a quiet command for him to shut it. “What’s the meaning of this?” he barks, nose scrunching as he leers up and down my body, then does the same to Cindra.

My skin crawls.

I pull a squashed scroll from the beeswaxed pocket of my cloak, thankful to see no water has seeped through from our sodden journey.

I hand it over, and he unravels the parchment, frowning as he reads it. “The High Mistress’s dowry, aye? No cunt is worth that many ships.”

I bite my tongue so hard it bleeds, hand twitching to reach for my blade …

“First I’ve heard of this load of krah shit,” he grumbles, then hoicks a wad of spit at the pier.

Unsurprising.

“Be that as it may, it was prearranged. We’ve been instructed to escort as many ships as we can up the coast.”

Tension cuts the air as he looks up from the scroll, folding it; pocketing it. “You’ll have to wait until the morning. Once I can confirm with the High Master,” he says with a condescending lilt. “I’m sure you understand.”

I’m sure I don’t.

“Sir, these are direct orders from your new High Mistress.”

He spits a bubble of laughter. “She could be a cow’s udder for all I care. I answer to no female. Never have—never will. So you can either sleep on your ship and wait till morning; fuck right off back the way you came in that shit heap you sailed here in; or go inside that building down there”—he jerks his thumb over his shoulder—“get on your back, spread your thighs, and make yourself useful, you over-assuming cun—”

A whistling sound pierces the air and a warm splash kisses my cheek before the guard’s head slides clean off his shoulders, thudding to the ground by the tip of my boot.

His body quickly follows.

“I really fucking hate that word,” Cindra bites out, kicking his head over the edge of the pier. “Men like him are the sole reason I swore them off for good.”

The other men draw their swords, bellowing in confusion.

Rhordyn’s soldiers pack in behind us, the sound of their loosening weapons music to my ears.

“I’m just impressed you beat me to it,” I say, shoving my cloak off my shoulders and pulling my own sword free, whipping it through the air as another guard dives forward.

Cutting through his belly like butter.

Seems the disguise was unnecessary after all.

* * *

Dressed in blood and seawater, I watch wooden dinghies ferry crewmen, women, and children from the whaling ships we came here on, dispersing them evenly across our newly acquired fleet.

Cindra steps onto the pier and makes for where I’m standing amongst the blood of the men we slew. Having ditched her blue garb, she boasts her Ocruth gear that tailors to her fierce curves—her pale hair splashed as red as the bloodlust in her gray eyes.

“There’s a barge stacked full of glass blocks farther around the harbor,” she says, pointing across the busy bay. “As well as another boasting a curious red sail that’s stacked full of cedar.”

Interesting.

“I guess he’s trading glass for the logs he’s used to build his ships,” I muse, and she nods.

I knew Parith was receiving an abundance of glass-laden barges down the Norse, but I assumed it was being used in the thriving city—not traded off continent.

“I’m going to have a look around,” I murmur, stalking down the blood-soaked pier.

I pass a large wooden building at the end, built against the cliff. A dwelling we plowed through once we finished off the guards. It was mostly empty, apart from sleeping quarters, a shit ton of rum, and two young, black-haired, sparsely dressed females who appeared to be high on Candescence. Too high to do anything other than allow Cindra to lead them back to the ship where they could sober up.

Both of them bore bruises.

It didn’t sit well. Still doesn’t. There’s a rage toiling beneath my skin, and I’m not sure how to douse it.

The pier spills out onto a scooped shore that cushions the base of the cliff, taking me past piles of timber, wooden piers that jut out into the bay, and more looming ship hulls under construction.

Where are the builders?

I come to a jagged cleft in the cliff face, and realize I’m at the entrance to a cave, nose scrunching as I draw on a fetid blend of excrement and body odor.

Frowning, I pull a blazing torch from one of the holsters nailed to the wall and step into the shadowed interior, past wooden boxes overflowing with tools. The only sound is that of my footsteps as I ease deeper into the cave system, the rank smells thickening, until the stone wall gives way to metal bars.

Cells.

I look into their gloomy interiors, and my heart dives.

Droves of men, women, and even a few children are bundled together—filthy. Black and tawny garbs frayed at the hems, bearing holes the size of fists that betray the frail bodies beneath.

The refugees—the people who have been fleeing to Bahari with hope in their hearts that they were stepping into a safer existence …

He’s been using them as slaves.

“Fucking dog,” Cindra growls from behind me, and I almost leap out of my skin. I was so deep inside my head and aching heart I didn’t hear her approach.

“We need to find the keys,” I rasp, swallowing. Struggling to keep my upper lip from peeling back from my aching teeth. “Some might not want to come, since they came here to escape the Vruks, but we have to offer.”

I clear my throat, hating the emotion prickling the backs of my eyes. Hating that I failed so many of these people.

Some of my people.

They came to Cainon for refuge, and he put them in cages.

I’m going to kill him.