Steps sounded on deck, and Jasta snarled and took off again, leaving Kell to snag a pair of caps from the hooks in the hall and pull one down over his copper hair. Holland couldn’t have heard Jasta’s warning through the floor, but the stomping must have said enough, because he was already on his feet when they arrived.
“I assume there’s a problem.” Lenos’s stomach cramped with worry at the sight of him free, but Kell just pushed the second cap into the Antari’s hands.
“Jasta?” called a new voice overhead.
Holland tugged the cap down, his black eye lost beneath the brim’s shadow as the captain nudged them both out of the cabin toward the window at the back of the ship. She threw it open, revealing a short ladder that plunged toward the water below.
“Go. Now. Come back in an hour or two.” Jasta was already turning away as one of the figures reached the stairs leading down into the hold. A pair of black boots came into sight and Lenos threw his narrow frame in front of the window.
Behind him, Kell climbed through.
He waited for the splash, but heard nothing but a rush of breath, an instant of silence, and then the muted thud of boots hitting dock. Lenos glanced over his shoulder to see Holland leap from the ladder and land in an elegant crouch beside Kell just before Rosenal’s sellswords came stomping into the hold.
“What’s this now?” said the woman when she saw Lenos, limbs spread across the opening. He managed an awkward smile.
“Just airing out the hold,” he said, turning to swing the window shut. The sellsword caught his wrist and shoved him aside.
“That so?” Lenos held his breath as she stuck her head out the window, scanning the water and the docks.
But when she drew back into the hold, he saw the answer in her bored expression and sagged with relief.
She’d seen nothing strange.
The Antari were gone.
V
Lila had a bad feeling about Rosenal.
She didn’t know if it was the port town itself that disturbed her, or the fact that they were being followed. Probably the latter.
At first, she thought it might be nothing, an echo of nerves from that close call back on the docks, but as she climbed the hill to the town, the certainty settled like a cloak around her shoulders, awareness scratching at her neck.
Lila had always been good at knowing when she wasn’t alone. People had a presence, a weight in the world. Lila had always been able to sense it, but now she wondered if maybe it was the magic in their blood she’d been hearing all along, ringing like a plucked string.
And by the time they reached the rise, Kell either sensed it, too, or he simply felt her tensing beside him.
“Do you think we’re being followed?” he asked.
“Probably,” offered Holland blandly. The sight of him loose, unchained, turned her stomach.
“I always assume I’m being followed,” she said with false cheer. “Why do you think I have so many knives?”
Kell’s brow furrowed. “You know, I honestly can’t tell if you’re joking.”
“Some towns have fog,” offered Alucard, “and some have bad feelings. Rosenal simply has a bit of both.”
Lila slid her arm free of Kell’s, senses pricking. The town overlooking the port was a tight nest of streets, squat buildings huddled against the icy wind. Sailors hurried from doorway to doorway, hoods and collars up against the cold. The town was riddled with alleys, the dregs of light thin and the shadows deep enough to swallow the places where a person might wait.
“Gives it a strange kind of charm,” continued the captain, “that sense of being watched …”
Her steps slowed before the mouth of a winding street, the familiar weight of a knife falling into her grip. The bad feeling was getting worse. Lila knew the way a heart raced when it was chasing someone, and the way it stuttered when it was being chased, and right now her heart felt less like predator and more like prey, and she didn’t like it. She squinted into the lidded dark of the alley but saw nothing.
The others were getting ahead of her, and Lila was just turning to catch up when she saw it. There, in the hollow where the road curved away—the shape of a man. The sheen of rotting teeth. A shadow wrapped around his throat. His lips were moving, and when the wind picked up it carried the broken edge of a melody.
A song she’d hummed a hundred times aboard the Spire.
How do you know when the Sarows is coming?
Lila shivered and took a step forward, drawing her fingertip along the oil-slicked edge of her knife.
Tyger, Tyger—
“Bard!”
Alucard’s voice cut through the air, scattering her senses. They were waiting, all of them, at the top of the road, and by the time Lila looked back at the alley, the road was empty. The shadow was gone.
*
Lila slumped back in the rickety old chair and folded her arms. Nearby a woman climbed into the lap of her companion, and three tables down a fight broke out, Sanct cards spilling onto the floor as a table overturned between the brawling men. The tavern was all stale liquor and jostling bodies and cluttered noise.
“Not the most savory lot,” observed Kell, sipping his drink.
“Not the worst, either,” said the captain, setting down a round of drinks and a heaping tray of food.
“Do you really plan to eat all that?” asked Lila.
“Not by myself, I don’t,” he said, nudging a bowl of stew her way. Her stomach growled and she took up the spoon, but focused her gaze on Holland.
He was sitting in the back of the booth, and Lila on the outside edge, as far from him as possible. She couldn’t shake the feeling he was watching her beneath that brimmed cap, even though every time she checked, his attention was leveled on the tavern behind her head. His fingers traced absent patterns in a pool of spilled ale, but his green eye twitched in concentration. It took her several long seconds to realize he was counting the bodies in the room.
“Nineteen,” she said coolly, and Alucard and Kell both looked at her as if she’d spoken out of turn, but Holland simply answered, “Twenty,” and despite herself, Lila swiveled in her seat. She did a swift count. He was right. She’d missed one of the men behind the bar. Dammit.
“If you have to use your eyes,” he added, “you’re doing it wrong.”
“So,” said Kell, frowning at Holland before turning toward Alucard. “What do you know about this floating market?”
Alucard took a swig of his ale. “Well, it’s been around about as long as its owner, Maris, which is to say a long damn time. There’s a running line that the same way magic never dies, it never really disappears, either. It just ends up in the Ferase Stras. It’s a bit of a legend among the seaborne—if there’s something you want, the Going Waters has it. For a price.”
“And what did you buy,” asked Lila, “the last time you were there?”
Alucard hesitated, lowering the glass. It always amazed her, the things he chose to guard.
“Isn’t it obvious?” said Kell. “He bought his sight.”
Alucard’s eyes narrowed. Lila’s widened. “Is that true?”
“No,” said her captain. “For your information, Master Kell, I’ve always had this gift.”
“Then what?” pressed Lila.
“I bought my father’s death.”
The table went still, a pocket of silence in the noisy room. Kell’s mouth hung open. Alucard’s clenched shut. Lila stared.
“That’s not possible,” murmured Kell.
“These are open waters,” said Alucard, pushing to his feet. “Anything is possible. And on that note … I’ve got an errand to run. I’ll meet you back at the ship.”
Lila frowned. There were a hundred shades between a truth and lie, and she knew them all. She could tell when someone was being dishonest, and when they were only saying one word for every three.
“Alucard,” she pressed. “What are you—”
He turned, hands in his pockets. “Oh, I forgot to mention—you’ll each need a token to enter the market. Something valuable.”
Kell set his cup down with a crack. “You could have told us this before we left London.”
“I could have,” said Alucard. “It must have slipped my mind. But don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll think of something. Perhaps Maris will settle for your coat.”
Kell’s knuckles were white on the handle of his cup as the captain strode away. By the time the door swung shut, Lila was already on her feet.