George and Jack sat on the floor near the bulkhead. Jack’s shoulders, rigid with tension, slumped forward. He hasn’t said a word since they boarded, but she had seen his eyes. A violent, furious thing stared at her through his irises. Something savage lived inside Jack, and he was using all of his power to hold it at bay. She wanted to tell him she knew exactly how he felt, but her instincts warned her that any stray word could tip the balance in that thing’s favor. She had treated changelings before, or rather she’d treated the changeling soldiers, the hardened, barely human killers who had come out of the crucible of the Adrianglian changeling academy. If Jack lost control now, in the hold, none of them would survive it.
George knew it, too. He sat next to his brother, hovering protectively over him. His eyes were clear with determination, his face sharpened with grief and anger. He felt betrayed, and he wanted revenge, and she didn’t blame him one bit.
Anger filled her too, and she held on to it, letting herself steep in it, solidifying her resolve. John Drayton, Éléonore’s long-lost son. Not so lost anymore. She pictured his smug smile. “Good-looking kids.” They are your children, you heartless bastard. It wasn’t enough their grandmother is dead, now you’re indirectly responsible for her murder. She wished she could strangle the swine, but he was upstairs. This one life she would’ve taken with pleasure. She glanced at the boys again. Yes, with pleasure.
Charlotte glanced out the narrow porthole, little more than an air vent. The ship had activated a cloaking device the moment they raised anchor. A dense cloud of magic-infused fog slid over the vessel, wrapping it like a blanket. The myriad tiny droplets of water that created the mist acted as countless minuscule mirrors, busily reflecting the ship’s surroundings. An outside observer wouldn’t see the ship. He might perhaps notice a smudge against the perfect line of water and sky. In bright daylight, this distortion would be quite obvious, but at night, with the mist rising from the water, the Intrepid Drayton was practically invisible. Unfortunately, from the inside, the reflective fog was opaque and all she saw now was a dense curtain of mist.
They must’ve been sailing for at least an hour or two. Time stretched here, inside the hold.
“I want out of this damn ship. How are we gonna get out of here?” a blond woman next to her murmured to Miko. “We can’t kill the sailors until we get to port, and if we kill them when we get there, there will be a commotion.”
The slender girl nodded at Charlotte. “She’s our key.”
The blond woman stared at her. “You don’t look like much.”
“Looks can be deceiving,” Charlotte told her.
“They better be.” The blond woman bared her teeth. “Because if they lead me out of this bucket in chains and into the slave pens, you’ll be the first I come after. You’ve got a skinny throat. Easy to cut.”
Charlotte’s magic stirred in response to the menace in the woman’s voice, bubbling to the surface. She kept it in check and stared back at the blond woman with disdain.
The woman yanked a knife from inside her rags.
Miko stepped in her way and hissed. “Don’t be stupid.”
“Did you see the way she looked at me? Like I’m gutter trash, and she’s the Marchesa of Louisiana. I’ll cut her throat!”
Miko moved and suddenly there were two slender blades in her hands. “You are gutter trash, Lynda. Jason has a plan. You f**k with his plan, you f**k with me.”
“You got a big mouth for such a dumb bitch. About time someone shut it for you.”
Lynda lunged forward. Miko spun, thrusting, and the woman crumpled to the boards, gurgling on her blood.
Miko turned, one arm held high, the other low, blood dripping from her knives, and surveyed the hold. “Anybody else want to f**k with the plan?”
Nobody volunteered.
Lynda writhed on the floor, hot, dark blood spreading around her on the wood. Charlotte let her magic lick at her. External jugular vein cut, internal jugular vein partially nicked, rapid blood loss, estimated time of death: two to three minutes. A familiar sense of obligation tugged at Charlotte, but this time it wasn’t backed by kindness, only habit.
“Do you want me to heal her?” Charlotte asked.
“No. One less psycho.”
“Then finish it. She’s suffering.”
Miko dropped down on one knee. The knife rose, plunged down, and Lynda stopped struggling.
The door swung open, revealing Richard. About time.
He motioned to her. Charlotte approached.
“We’re about to make landfall,” he whispered. “There are nineteen sailors on this boat.”
“What about the captain?” she asked, glancing at the boys.
Two pairs of eyes stared back at her, one of them glowing amber.
“He’s ours,” Jack said, his voice a ragged, inhuman growl. People backed away from him.
“Wait until I call you,” Richard said, and looked to her. “Sailors only.”
She raised her chin. “Very well. Let’s get this over with.”
Richard turned and climbed the ladder up to the deck. She followed. The ship sliced through the blue-green waters and the salty breeze, barely skimming the surface of the ocean, its grandiose sails spread wide. The dense barrier of magic fog surrounded it on all sides except for the prow, where the curtain parted. Orange and blue lights winked through the gap—their destination.
Sailors moved along the deck. Some sat, some talked quietly. Richard pulled her against the cabin and braced her with his big body, hiding her from the rest of the crew. She rested her hands on his leather-encased body, feeling the comforting strength of his muscular shoulders. It felt so intimate standing like this. It was almost an embrace. She knew she was reading too much into it, but she needed an embrace so badly.
Something brushed against her. She glanced down. The wolfripper hound leaned against her legs.
“How fast do you need them to die?” she whispered. She was so angry, and they were scum who ferried slaves and fed children to sharks. She would extinguish their lives.
“At the speed we’re going, we’ll dock in fifteen minutes. They’re about to light the colors,” he said. “The port is likely armed with cannons. They will send a challenge signal. We must send the proper reply, or they’ll consider us hostile. Once the reply is accepted, they’re yours. Kill them as quickly and quietly as you can.”
“Challenge!” someone called out.