“But—it couldn’t have been me,” she sputtered. “I—” She grasped around, searching for the facts. The blood. There wasn’t enough blood. And she’d heard someone up here before her. “Look at my dress. Whoever stabbed him would have been soaked in blood. His pumping heart would have sprayed it all over the killer. Not to mention that at five foot four, I’d have a hell of a time tying him to a mast.”
Lir looked over the blue fabric of her dress. “Right.” Apart from the crimson smudges, there wasn’t much of a splatter.
“I know it wasn’t you, either.” The rope cut into her arms.
“And how do you know that?”
She closed her eyes, winding back the clock in her mind. “I woke up, and I’d heard something on the deck. Moaning. But I heard your breathing next door. And then when I climbed the stairs, I heard footsteps on the deck. Obviously not Berold’s.”
He stared at her.
“Are you going to let me out of these ropes?”
He rubbed his chin. “I’ve stabbed a man before, and you’re right about the blood.”
“See? It wasn’t me. What do you mean you’ve stabbed a man before? Is that what all the knives are for?”
“Sometimes people try to take things from us. I like to be prepared.” He pulled another, clean knife from a scabbard in the back of his trousers, and she flinched. He slipped it under the rope, cutting through the binds. “Take off your dress, clean your hands on the fabric, and give it to me. I’ll burn it.”
She rubbed at the skin on her arms where the rope had chafed it. “What?”
“If anyone sees you, they’ll think you did it. Your blood-spatter defense won’t convince them. You can’t admit you came up here at all. When you wake up tomorrow, pretend you know nothing.”
“Fine.” She crossed her arms. “You want me to take off my dress now?”
“This is no time for modesty.”
She pulled it off, and the humid ocean breeze whispered over her skin. Using the dress’s fabric, she cleaned the blood off her hands as best she could. She shoved the blood-stained dress at Lir, watching as he rushed to the ship’s edge, whispering a spell. The fabric erupted into flames, fluttering into the sky like a burning moth. It soared away from the ship, a dwindling orange flame.
He turned to her. “Get downstairs. Quietly.”
But she’d already frozen at the sound of footsteps approaching on the stairwell. “Someone’s coming from the cabins,” she whispered.
“Go!”
She closed her eyes, whispering the transformation spell, and her bones snapped down to size, skin stretching into leathery wings. She soared high above the ship, watching for a moment as Marlowe stepped onto the deck to find Lir standing with his bloodied knife by Berold’s corpse.
32
Celia
The Throcknells were coming. Her father’s army amassed just outside Dogtown’s veil, and the only thing keeping them from bursting through and slaughtering everyone was the whim of a bunch of pirates. As soon as the Picaroons decided on another Dogtown raid, Celia and her friends would be put to the rack. And Oswald thought they had some kind of chance. He really doesn’t know what my father is like.
At least they had the teleportation spell. Tobias didn’t want to use it, because they had nowhere else to go. In order to use the spell, you had to think of a person you knew, which mostly limited them to the US or Maremount; they were trapped between Purgators and Throcknells. She knew at least one girl in France, but it wasn’t like France was out of reach for a magical army.
A towel in her hand, she trudged down the hall to the washroom. There was a tub there, and she could bring hot water from the fireplace to bathe herself. She was still haunted by the memory of finding a half-eaten squirrel in her hand, and felt like she could never take enough baths to wash away that horror.
She pushed open the door, and her jaw dropped as she caught sight of Oswald, chest deep in a soapy bath. A few suds dotted the stone floor around the tub, and chinks of sunlight glared off his tan shoulders. He was leaner than Tobias, but his arms and shoulders were muscled like an athlete’s.
He smirked. “Unless you’re getting in with me, do you mind leaving me to bathe in peace?”
She blinked. “Sorry.” Her cheeks burning, she turned, heading for the door, but his voice stopped her.
“Celia.”
“Yes?” She didn’t turn to face him. Her cheeks were on fire.
“Meet me by Foxberry Field in ten minutes. You still don’t know how to land a punch.”
She fixed her eyes on the floor. “I don’t need to land a punch. I can turn into a lion.”
“You won’t always have magic to help you. I didn’t have it in the Iron Tower.”
“Fine.” She rushed out, slamming the door behind her.