Shell Game Page 4

  “Did her family know?” I asked. “About the two of them?”

  “You could hardly have missed it, the way they looked at each other. But her father, her older brothers . . . they could pretend, you understand? They could pretend not to see. Few times she tried to tell them and they cut her off before she spoke three words. Gave her the if-you-know-what’s-good-for-you speech. Well, the writing was on the wall, the choice she had to make. And she made it. Middle of a state dinner, with nobles from all over Kila tittering at the tables, she called Jess up to dance. Then kissed her full in front of her father’s throne.”

  I pumped an arm in the air. “All right!”

  Teek sighed. “Then she went straight to her room, she and Jess, and they grabbed what they could, knowing they only had as much time as it would take for the ink to dry on the banishment scroll. They were ’bout halfway done when the soldiers came and threw them out the front gate. She was left with almost nothing. The clothes on her back and a bag of copper.”

  “Then what?”

  “Ah, well, then, the captain went to the dockmaster, and she’d done a good turn once for his son, so he wasn’t too quick to desert her. There wasn’t much he could do, but the captain managed to talk him out of an old trading ship, a wreck of a thing lying on the beach.” Teek glanced around at the ancient deck. “She and Jess patched it as best they could, and then together they sailed it away from the islands. They came safe to Jess’s valley, and there the captain retired from the sea. Helped Jess make honey.”

  “That’s nice,” I said fondly, pleased with the happy ending, before I realized . . . “Hey, wait. What happened?”

  Teek put down his coil of yarn and propped his chin on his doubled-up knees. He followed a gull with his eyes as it screeched its way along the bottom of the horizon. “Land soon,” he commented.

  “Teek, tell me what happened next, or for the love of sweet mandarins I will tie your thumbs in a knot.”

  Teek’s face stayed impassive as he stared out to sea. I was taking a breath, ready to make a new and better threat, when the voice spoke right beside my ear. “I left her.”

  My head spun. Darren was crouching beside me, her jaw tight.

  “Is that all you wanted to know?” she said. “Fine. I left her. That’s the end of the story.”

  Teek gave me a pleading, warning look. I ignored him. “But why?”

  Darren didn’t answer. She stood and contemplated the sky, with what appeared to be loathing. “Teek, relieve the helmsman,” she said eventually. “And if any overpowering need to tell stories should strike you while you’re back there, let me know so that I can whack it out of you.”

  Teek hurried to the helm, bowing his head as he went past Darren. I didn’t blame him. She was properly angry this time. It hummed off of her in hot red waves.

  I pulled myself up, so that I didn’t have to crane my neck to look Darren in the face. “I made him tell me.”

  “Oh, I know.” Her voice was dark and icy. I pressed on anyway.

  “You have to realize, you’re a pirate queen now. A public figure. Your life is going to be an open book. If you can’t—”

  “Shut up.” She spat out the words like they were poisonous. “You damn idiot kid.” She raised her voice, roaring to the whole crew, “Land bloody ho, you stupid bastards!”

  Sure enough, there was a green fuzz along the horizon. Trees.

  She gave me one of her quick angry looks. “Shut up and sit down and don’t get in the way. Or if you think you’re a slave, find something useful to do. Either way, stop distracting my men.”

  I studied her back as she stalked off. It was rigid with fury. I had touched a nerve. About bloody time.

  “She doesn’t mean it,” Regon told me, apologetically, as he reached over me to make a rope fast.

  “She does mean it,” I said, flopping back down into my comfortable position. “But that’s all right. I was being obnoxious.”

  “Oh, it’s not you. She’s always like this when we’re going into this harbour.”

  “Why?”

  “You’ll see.”

  I SOON FOUND out why Teek had been summoned to the helm. The ship was heading into a long inlet with high cliffs on either side. The water was studded with rocks and shoals, jagged points carving up the surface into a thousand broken mirrors. It looked like a sunken graveyard, and any half-sane person would have backed gently out and sailed the other way. Darren’s fingers, rattling irritably on the railings, betrayed her nervousness, and even Regon looked a bit uncomfortable. But Teek was stone-faced, almost bored, and his hand was sure on the tiller as he wove the ship between spiky chunks of granite. I still found Teek sort of dull compared to Regon—and Darren of course—but there was no denying that he had his uses.

  The cliffs gave way to shores of soft sand as we neared the inlet’s end. Forest surrounded us on three sides—oak, aspen, and alder. This was waste land, empty, untenanted. Yet—I blinked—there on the coast was a dock, roughly built from large logs to which the bark still clung. It was big enough for one fairly small ship to lie at anchor, that big and no bigger.

  I put two and two together. Darren was the only one who used this harbour. The dock had been built for her to use.

  And yet someone knew she was coming. Beyond the dock, I could make out tents pitched in the shelter of the trees, and ox wagons, and smoke from cooking fires. Someone here was ready for her.

  The “someone” turned out to be a small woman with freckles across her nose and a searching, intent expression. Her hair was pulled back in a single dark braid and her hands rested in her pockets as she waited on the beach for the ship to moor. I looked back and forth between her and Darren, who was now leaning against the rails, her face sour and grim. They couldn’t have been much more different. Where Darren was long and lean, this other woman was short and sturdy; where Darren was tanned and tough, she was softer, her face winged with laughter lines. She was dressed in a tunic and trousers of brown russet wool—anyone could see she was a landsman—where every salt inch of Darren screamed of the sea. Yet there was the same strength in both of them, though, when their eyes finally met, it was Darren who looked away first.

  Regon was a short distance away, gulping from a flask. I reached to the full length of my chain and tugged on his shirt. “Is that Jess?”

  He finished swallowing, sighed, and offered the flask to me. I took a pull. What was inside tasted something like sour apples and something like tar. It made my lips tingle and I licked them again and again.

  “Not Jess,” he answered at last. “That’s Holly. Jess’s wife.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  HOLLY AND HER people had known that we were coming. Maybe they had a lookout posted to watch the inlet. However they did it, dinner was ready by the time we moored. A large cauldron waited at the far end of the dock, and the smells wafting out of it made the smallest children roll and squeal. More landsmen, dressed the same way as Holly, ducked into the tents and brought out wooden bowls and spoons. They lifted the children down from the side of Darren’s ship, one by one, escorted Klea and Aegle down the gangplank, and took them all off to be fed. They did it so matter-of-factly, it was plain that this was a well-oiled routine.

  Regon tried to unchain me so that I could go with the others, but I beat his hands away and we had a brief, whispered fight. We had to keep our voices low so we wouldn’t attract the attention of Darren, who was still prowling around like a wounded cat. In the end, he gave in, left me where I was, and tossed me a chunk of dried beef. Huddled by the mast, I nibbled it, listening to Darren and Holly. They were pacing up and down the dock as they talked, and I could hear the tension in Darren’s voice. She was making a mighty effort to be civil.

  “Only ten this time?” Holly was saying. “The war must be over.”

  “You know better,” Darren growled. “There are only ten because their village got shredded and I didn’t get there in time to help anyone else.”

  “I was ki
dding. Humour? Levity? Remember how that works? No? Well, there’s one good thing. Jess and I can find places for ten without too much trouble.”

  They wandered out of hearing range, and as I waited for them to come back, I wondered idly what kind of “places” Holly and Jess were finding for Kilan refugees. I’m a realist, or a cynic, whatever you want to call it, so my first theory was that the pair of them were making money hand over fist selling cheap labour to silver mines and brothels. But I found that I didn’t really believe that. There was something about Darren that made my inner cynic shut up and sit down, and Holly had the same kind of quality. Call it, I don’t know, soundness. Most people I had met in my life were like rotten logs, who crumbled into maggots and dust as soon as I rapped them. Darren had yet to crumble, though, no matter how hard I rapped, and I was beginning to suspect that she might be solid all the way down to the heartwood.

  The voices came nearer again. It was Holly talking. “You’ll want to load the supplies first, won’t you?”

  The beach next to the dock was lined with boxes and coils of rope, sides of beef and barrels of oil and wine and even chickens squawking their protests in wicker baskets. Darren and her crew ate surprisingly well while at sea. Now I knew why.

  “I’ve told Jess before,” Darren snapped. “She doesn’t need to do this. I’m not going to starve if she stops feeding me.”

  Holly didn’t seem insulted by Darren’s crust. “We know that you do important work. Is it so strange that we want to help you?”

  “You do enough. I’m not asking for anything else.”

  “Of course you’re not asking. You never do ask.”

  Their footsteps kept coming closer. Too late, I realized they were heading up the gangplank. I took one quick look around—there was nothing to hide behind, so I just stretched out in a casual sprawl. Then I plastered my most innocent expression over my face. Who, me? Eavesdropping?

  Darren stopped dead when she saw me. Then she gave a slow, measured sigh. “You just don’t give up, do you, kid?”

  “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, twitching my ankle so that the chain clinked on the deck.

  “It’s not what you think,” Darren said to Holly, whose posture had gone rigid all of a sudden. “I’ll explain later.”

  “In the meantime,” Holly said, a bit too calmly, “introduce us.”

  “What? Oh, right. Holly, this is—” She paused. “Well, I’ll be damned. Kid, what is your name?”

  I clinked the chain a little faster. “Really, captain. You should know the name of someone you’ve been sleeping with for a week.”

  I could almost see crystals of frost forming in Holly’s hazel eyes as she trained them on Darren.

  “Not what it sounds like,” Darren said frantically. “Let’s just sort out the cargo and I’ll explain.” Grabbing Holly’s arm, she hustled her back to the gangplank, but spared me a look over her shoulder. “I’ll deal with you later.”

  “Promises, promises,” I muttered, and settled in for a nap on the sunny deck.

  I WAS WOKEN by the tramp of boots on the deck beside me. Not sea-boots—there were hobnails clicking against the planks. Instinctively, I snapped my knees up to protect my stomach, but there was no need. The footsteps came to an abrupt halt beside me, and a soft hand touched my shoulder.

  I blinked upwards. Holly crouched there, a bundle under one arm.

  “So let me get this straight,” she said. “You’re her hostage, right? Or her prisoner? Something along those lines?”

  “Yes,” I said, maybe a bit more defensively than necessary. “And if you’re here to try to talk me out of it, you might as well get lost. I’m having a hard enough time dealing with her insecurities. I don’t need you to get in on the act.”

  Holly smiled wryly. “To be frank, I think you deserve each other. No, I’m not here to talk you out of it. I just thought you would need a few things if you’re going to be on the ship much longer.”

  She placed her bundle on my lap. Blinking with confusion, I unfolded it. An old ivory comb and a small neat pocketknife sat at the centre. The bulk of it was clothes—a couple of linen shirts, a woollen overtunic, loose trousers, a warm cloak. All in shades of brown and deep cream and russet red; all well-made and sweet-smelling. Nothing like the rough, slapdash, oh-well-that’s-good-enough outfits that Darren and her crew wore.

  “They’re mine,” Holly said apologetically. “I didn’t have the time to make anything new. But you’re about my size. If you tell me just what you want, then I can run you up something of your own, and you can collect it the next time Darren’s ship comes in.”

  I found my voice at last. “Why are you doing this?”

  She held a shirt up against me, to check the fit. “I know a thing or two about Darren. And I’m not a complete novice when it comes to dealing with women, either. I know what you’re trying to do. It may work out or it may not, but nothing else has worked with her up to this point. By the way, do you have a name?”

  I never really know when a casual question is going to stir up the old dread inside me. This one did. My stomach twisted. “Not one that I want to keep.”

  She studied me. “What are you running from?”

  “Nothing,” I said automatically.

  Holly didn’t bother to tell me that I was lying. There was no need; we both knew it. She simply held my gaze.

  “I don’t want to talk about it now,” I whispered, in answer to her wordless invitation. “Thanks, but . . . I’m not ready. I don’t think I could get the words out.”

  “Well, all right.” She was reluctant to let the subject drop, I could tell, but as she re-folded the clothes into a neat stack, she contented herself with asking, “Darren’s treating you properly?”

  “You know Darren, you said. What do you think?”

  Holly smiled, but it was a little sad. “Darren’s noble to the bone. She’s got to try to get over that, or it’s always going to hold her back in life.”

  “I know. Oh, how well I know. Don’t worry, it’s on my to-do list.”

  “Well, then. Is there anything else I can get for you?”

  “No, I think I’m set. Actually, no. Wait.” I sat up straight as a thought struck me. “While we’re on the subject of names . . . do you think you could give me one of those?”

  Her eyebrows shot up. “Are you sure?”

  “Yep. You don’t need to agonize over it for hours. Just pick one. Something in your own language. I need something that doesn’t come from Kila. Something new.”

  This was sheer impulse, but it made sense to me. I hadn’t needed a name on Darren’s ship so far—there weren’t any other women chained to the mast, so no risk that I would be confused with anyone else—but the crewmen couldn’t keep calling me Hey You forever. Holly didn’t seem surprised in the least. It was the first time I encountered her ability to take strange things in stride, and I’ve often been grateful for it since.

  “How about ‘Lynn’?” she said after a few minutes’ thought.

  Lynn. I tasted it, assessing it. Not much of a name. Not much of an anything. It sounded brief, clipped, and empty. But maybe that was exactly what I needed. After all, I was shedding my entire identity so I could build a new one from the ground up. “Lynn” was a blank, unmarked name, a kind of cipher. Perfect for someone who was starting from scratch.

  “Lynn,” I said, trying it out loud. “Yes. That’s fine, that’ll do. Thanks. I’ll keep it. What does it mean, by the way?”

  Holly smiled again, a real smile this time. It showed little white teeth. “It means, ‘Kid.’”

  THE SHORE MADE Darren restless. She paced up and down endlessly while the supplies were being loaded, and though she didn’t yell at her crew, she kept making hurry-up noises under her breath. In spite of that, sundown was approaching by the time the men stowed and lashed the last barrel. Though Darren was plainly itching with the need to be gone, she was too much of a sailor to risk the rocky inlet in th
e dark. Grudgingly, she told the crew that they would spend the night in the little cove.

  Regon and Kash made up for the lost time by unshipping the rudder and scrubbing it clean of barnacles and dangling wisps of seaweed. As they worked, Darren stomped around and around them, giving lots of advice that they clearly didn’t need.

  “Talks a lot, doesn’t she?” Holly observed—we were watching from the ship. “Darren always has to manage everything. I think she believes that the sun won’t rise in the morning unless she’s there to supervise the process. Here, have some more cider.”

  “She’s a noble.” I shrugged, as she refilled my cup. “You’re not Kilan, so you might not understand. It’s how they’re taught to think of themselves. Blood is right and blood is rank . . .”