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  I hadn’t slept at all the night before. After two hours of staring at the ceiling, I’d given up, and spent the rest of the dark watch pacing to and fro on deck, grunting every time Regon tried to make conversation. Brittle with fatigue, I was even less inclined to put up with nonsense than usual.

  Darren saw and turned apologetic. “You have to deal with a lot of bullshit from me, don’t you?”

  “It’s an occupational hazard for slave girls. Are you done arguing with me about this?”

  “I suppose, but . . .”

  “What?”

  “Ariadne’s not going to be excited about this plan, any more than I am. There could be some pushback.”

  “Yeah? Give me ten minutes.”

  It took five. When we began our conversation, Ariadne was annoyed, argumentative, and spoiling for a fight. By the time we finished, she was hushed, penitent, and kept saying things like, “Well, you would know best.”

  Near the end, she pointed out rather meekly that she didn’t have anything to wear. That wasn’t a real problem, though. All sailors know how to sew; if they didn’t, their clothes would break down into useless salt-crusted rags in a few months. So, although pirates may be rowdy and smelly and drunk half the time, they’re exactly the people you need if you want a bunch of tailoring done in a hurry.

  We had bales of cloth down in the hold: fine white linen and black silk for trading, and some deep purple velvet we’d been saving to make Spinner a surprise for his birthday. It was all sacrificed to the cause. Ariadne described the latest dress styles and Spinner sketched them on a scrap of canvas, adding a few flourishes of his own. Regon and I cut and fitted linen for drawers, shifts, and petticoats, and turned it over to the sailors for sewing. At one point, we had the whole crew of the Banshee sitting cross-legged around the quarterdeck, heads bent, tongues protruding with effort, as they stitched away busily at Ariadne’s underwear. Darren, the only person on board ship who couldn’t sew for toffee, stomped around the deck making suggestions which we all pretended were helpful.

  Spinner basted the seams of Ariadne’s gown, while Ariadne embroidered lacy, intricate swoops around the bodice and I handled fiddly bits like hems and buttonholes. We finished the thing off by stitching a row of tiny grey seed pearls all along the neckline.

  The result was not a typical ball gown. It was beautifully cut and sewn, but it clung in places that court attire was not supposed to cling and left things exposed to view which nobles were not used to seeing. When Ariadne first tried it on, her eyes went big as dinner plates. She told the crew she loved it. That may have been true, or it may just have been diplomatic. She was, after all, standing in a ring of heavily-armed pirates at the time, all of whom had just dedicated days and days to her lingerie.

  At that point, the sailors turned their attention to Darren. She had been announcing to anyone who would listen, and most of the people who wouldn’t, that she didn’t need no stinking court clothes. She would go to Torasan Isle in her ordinary working gear, and if her family didn’t like it, well, they could go pound sand. She kept repeating this in an increasingly loud and panicky tone when the crew converged around her. Regon and Latoya muttered soothingly into Darren’s ears as they yanked her arms up, and Spinner whipped a knotted measuring string around her chest.

  Darren’s court clothes turned out even better than Ariadne’s. The black doublet, with its trimming of silver fox fur, was luxurious and stern all at once. There were loose trousers and heavy boots to go with it instead of hose and pointed shoes. The combination gave Darren an almost military air, instead of the butterfly look of most courtiers. Dressed that way, in the Torasan colours, she seemed like a woman with the strength of a whole kingdom behind her, and I could not fucking cope.

  I stuck it out for a whole five seconds, while Darren inspected the crisp new sleeves of her doublet. Then I stormed down to the bilges of the ship, stuffed my fist in my mouth, and screamed until my lungs burned.

  It was Latoya who found me. She’d spent the past week watching Ariadne flounce around the deck in silk and velvet and pearls while we were getting her dress fitted, so she knew how I was feeling. I tried to push past Latoya, to find somewhere else where I could go on being miserable without interruption, but she clapped one strong hand on my shoulder, hauled me back, and caught me up in a businesslike embrace.

  I struggled for a couple of seconds, but then gave in to it. The coarse wool of her sailor’s shirt was rough against my face and smelt reassuringly of salt.

  Have you ever been hugged by someone about four times your size? I can recommend it. Being surrounded by that much solid warmth and concern makes the world suddenly seem a lot more manageable.

  After I’d gotten my head back together, I muttered, “My sister is a moron if she leaves you.”

  Latoya shrugged, practically lifting me off the deck in the process. “Maybe. But there’s been a lot of stupid going around lately.”

  AND THEN TIME started to slip. One minute, we were all huddled around maps in the captain’s cabin, as Darren and Regon argued about the best route to Torasan Isle during rainy season. The next minute, so it seemed, the Isle was a green humpback on the horizon.

  The sun was out, for once, when we made port, and the coast was thronged with people. They cheered as the Banshee and the Sod Off swung into harbour, scarlet sails billowing. When we docked, burly stevedores ran forwards to catch the hawsers.

  We’d had warmer welcomes at the Freemarket, but that didn’t mean anything. The merchants at the Freemarket would hang up bunting and scatter flowers for a pack of wild wolves, as long as the wolves were prepared to pay for beer at a three hundred percent mark-up. This was something different.

  Darren tramped down from the quarterdeck, tugging at her doublet’s stiff new collar. “I keep thinking that I’m forgetting something.”

  “You forgot your knife, your pocket comb, your toothpick, your tinder-box, your coin purse, your spare stockings, and the secret brandy flask that you think I don’t know about. I packed them all for you, except for the brandy flask, because seriously, Mistress, you promised.”

  Darren grimaced. “I don’t like going into a dire situation without booze. You know that.”

  “I don’t like you having an ulcer the size of a manta ray. You know that.” I reached up and adjusted Darren’s collar, flexing the fabric between my fingers until it softened. “And let’s try to avoid a dire situation. Can we make that a goal?”

  “Look, I’m taking your sister, I’m taking Regon, I’m taking Corto, I’m taking money, and I’m taking a great big sword. I don’t know what I can do to make myself safer.”

  “Corto got sliced halfway to cat meat the other day and he’s still healing. You should probably take—”

  “I’m not taking Latoya. You’re the one who keeps saying that she needs time off. Besides, I want her with you while I’m away.”

  “I don’t need a minder.”

  “Lynn, you’re trembling.”

  A slanted shadow overhead, and the creaking of ropes: the crew was lowering the gangplank into place. A couple of the ropes were fraying, I noticed. Maybe I’d replace them while Darren was away. While Darren was away, while Darren was away . . . I stared at Darren’s crimson flag, rippling at the masthead far above: there was her emblem, the black storm-petrel, wings outstretched, which matched the tattoo on my own shoulder. That helped a little. I breathed.

  Darren slid two fingers under my chin and tilted my face up towards hers. “Tell me not to go, Lynn. That’s all you have to do. Say don’t or stay or . . . it doesn’t even have to be a word. Make a random vowel sound. Or just kick me.”

  Times like that, I wondered how Darren could have even a drop of blood in common with brutes like Alek and Stribos. I swallowed, over and over. My mouth was so dry that my voice came out as a rasp. “Promise me that you’ll listen to Ariadne.”

  “Well, I doubt that she’ll let me roll her up in a rug and forget about her.”

  Ir
ritation swelled in me, swamping the dread. “Darren, I mean it. I want her by your side every minute you’re on shore. And you had better not be all, ‘Leave it to me, little lady.’ You will listen to her and you will take her seriously or for the love of buggery I will sink your damn ship. Don’t smirk. I will do it. I will put your precious Banshee a full forty fathoms down, and you can figure out how to be a pirate in a floating chamber pot.”

  Darren lifted her hands, surrendering. “Fine. Fine. Although if I have her with me every moment, then . . .”

  Her voice died, and she flushed deep scarlet. “Lynn, if I keep Ariadne that close to me, then some people are going to think . . . well, they might think . . .”

  It was so like Darren to clue into a detail like this at the last possible moment. “They are all going to think that you are screwing her. Every person you meet, without exception, will think that you are screwing her. Why is that a problem?”

  “Why is that—Gods! It’s a problem because it’s not true!”

  “You know that, I know that. You really think I give a damn what anyone else believes?”

  With a final creak and a bang, the gangplank slid into place. Then came the sound of marching feet. Soldiers, a full dozen of them, each wearing the hawk’s-head surcoat of Darren’s house, tromped in formation across the harbour. An honour guard, here to bring a Lady of Torasan back home. I crushed my lower lip between my teeth to stop myself from screaming all the foul words I knew.

  I had meant to give Darren some last-minute good advice. The usual. Don’t get your feet wet. Scowl whenever you’re in public. If anyone accuses you of something, accuse them of something worse, and do it louder. But she’d heard all that from me before. If she hadn’t absorbed it by now, she wasn’t going to get it in the last thirty seconds before showtime.

  But now, with a jolt, I realized there was something I had completely forgotten to mention. “Quick, one more thing. While you’re there, don’t tell anyone about me.”

  “What?”

  “Promise. Don’t tell anybody that I exist.”

  “Why?”

  “Just promise me.”

  Two soldiers strode up the gangplank, which bounced under their booted feet. They saluted Regon, who seemed surprised but kind of flattered. I heard a few words being exchanged—Captain Valens and Captain Milo here to escort her ladyship to Lord Konrad—before I literally put my hands over my ears.

  Darren reached out for me at the same moment that I pulled back.

  “I’ll see you in two weeks,” I said.

  “Wait. Don’t you want to—?”

  “No. If I stay any longer, I’m just going to do something I’ll regret.”

  Ariadne swished up to us, enveloped in the billows of her new black gown. The night before, for the first time in half a year, she had put her hair in pin-curls. Now her face was framed by boinging blond ringlets. Her cheeks were rouged, her lips were reddened, her forehead was powdered, and I couldn’t take any more of this.

  “Take care of her,” I told Ariadne—quickly, before she could say anything. I was already backing away. “Two weeks. I’ll see you both.”

  I put my head down and headed for the forecastle, before the two of them could start with any pointless goodbyes. But I made the mistake of looking back just before I went down below. Darren and Ariadne were at the top of the gangplank, poised like a royal couple on a balcony. Somewhere on shore, a trumpet sounded a long, triumphant blast. Almost unconsciously, Darren offered Ariadne her arm, and Ariadne took it.

  Down the gangplank they went, but as the crowd swelled forward to claim them, my thoughts took a different turn. I had missed something. I had missed some microscopic but vital detail, something that had brushed against the surface of my mind for the briefest instant before melting away. I didn’t know this in a rational way, I just felt it as a sinking in my guts, as though I was watching something incredibly precious slipping away downstream.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The Lady Darren of the House of Torasan (Pirate Queen)

  WE WERE HALFWAY up the path to Torasan Keep when Ariadne’s elbow took me in the ribs, the blow so sharp and sudden that I made a noise like a cow being stabbed with a boat hook. (And yes, I know exactly what it sounds like when a cow gets stabbed with a boat hook, and no, you shouldn’t ask why.)

  “Was that necessary?” I choked.

  “Oh, don’t be such a baby. I nudged you about six times and you didn’t notice. I suppose you were too busy posing for your fans.”

  “I wasn’t posing, I was waving.”

  “I can wave and talk at the same time. Can’t you?”

  “I’m putting effort into it. This is quality waving that I’ve got going on.”

  The streets were lined, three deep, with cheering villagers. I wasn’t dim enough to believe that this was a spontaneous outpouring of patriotism. My brother’s troops must have come through town earlier in the day and explained to everyone what was expected of them. Hopefully, the explanation hadn’t involved any wooden clubs and bullwhips, but you could never be quite sure.

  It was depressing, but dammit, when people are cheering for you, you wave. Anything else just seems rude.

  “All right,” I told Ariadne, as I got back to waving. “You have my attention.”

  Ariadne, woman of many gifts, could talk while maintaining a beaming smile for the benefit of the crowd. She did it by kind of spitting the words out between clenched teeth. “What are we trying to accomplish here? What’s the goal?”

  “Goal? No real goal. We’re going to make nice with Konrad, I guess, and see what opportunities come up.”

  Ariadne’s blinding smile didn’t waver as she said, “You’re a total asshole, aren’t you?”

  I sighed. “Oh, what now?”

  “Why torture Lynn by coming here if you don’t have something concrete to gain? She was this close to breaking down when we left.”

  “I know.”

  “Really? You barely looked at her when we were leaving. You didn’t even touch her.”

  “She didn’t want me to.”

  “How could you tell?”

  “Couldn’t you? Lynn doesn’t like to be touched when she’s upset—”

  “Well, you could have done something to acknowledge her existence. A few words, would that have been out of the question? Would it have killed you to let loose with something wild like, I love you? Gods’ teeth, Darren, you don’t ever seem to say that.”

  I sighed. My waving hand was getting tired, so I switched to my left. “I’ve had a lot of women say that they loved me, but you know what? Lynn is the only one who’s ever been willing to polish my boots.”

  Ariadne snorted. “A lot of women? Seriously, Darren, a lot of women?”

  Lousy stupid perceptive princess. “Fine. Three women. Well . . . two and a half. My point still stands.”

  “Your point seems to be that you like women who do your chores.”

  I glared at her sidelong, to make sure that I was still talking to Ariadne, not Jess. “You know, I don’t owe you an explanation, but just so you don’t spend the next two weeks feeling superior, I’ll illustrate. A couple of years back, the Banshee hit a rock and took on a lot of water . . .”

  “Another victory for the pirate queen’s superior sense of direction?”

  “Fuck you, I wasn’t steering. Anyway, we were marooned for almost a week while Regon and Latoya rowed a longboat to the nearest town for planks and a shipwright, and it was raining the whole time. I mean steady, bucketing rain. If you stuck out your cupped palm, it was full in a few seconds. We were on this bare stretch of shore, and after two days, we were out of fuel, so no fires, not even for cooking. We ate groats and cold salt pork. Every stitch of cloth on board was sopping wet: blankets, shirts, stockings, everything. When you got up in the morning, you were chilly and soggy and when you crawled to your bunk at night, you were soaking. It was miserable.”

  “So?”

  The crowd thinned out. We ha
d almost reached the guard-towers that flanked the front entrance to the Keep. In minutes, we’d reach the bailey . . . and then, we’d have to confront my family. I’d faced a lot of horrors in my time, but this one, I felt, would top the lot. Patronizing and annoying as Ariadne’s interrogation was, I was almost glad that I had it to distract me.

  “So,” I said, “one morning I woke up and I was just so sick of it all. I could not face rolling out of my sodden bunk and squelching off in my wet boots to a freezing cold breakfast of maggot-ridden meat and icy water. I wanted to pretend to have the plague or something, so I could stay in bed for a week. But I’m the damn captain. So I crawled out from under my damp clammy blanket and I grabbed my clothes . . .”