Despite a wealth of natural magic, and years of rigorous study alongside the Aven Essen, Kell didn’t know everything there was to know about spells. He knew that, but it was still disconcerting to be surrounded by so much evidence in support of the fact. In Maris’s market, Kell didn’t even recognize half the objects, let alone the enchantments woven through them. When the spellwork was written on an object’s surface, he could usually make it out, but most of the talismans bore nothing but a design, a flourish. Now and then he could feel their intent, not a specific purpose so much as a general sense, but that was all.
He could tell the Feras Stras was a place where most people came with an object in mind, a goal, and the longer he wandered without one, the more he began to feel lost.
Which was likely why he found the room of knives so comforting. It was the kind of place Lila would gravitate to; the smallest weapon was no longer than his palm, the largest greater than the spread of his arms.
He knew Maris didn’t deal in ordinary weapons, but as he squinted at the spellwork shorthand carved into the hilts and blades—every magician had their own dialect—he was still taken aback by the variety.
Swords to cut wounds that would not heal.
Knives to bleed truth instead of blood.
Weapons that channeled power, or stole it, or killed with a single stroke, or— A low whistle behind him as Alucard appeared at the entrance.
“Picking out a gift?” asked the captain.
“No.”
“Good, then take this.” He dropped a ring into Kell’s hand.
Kell frowned. “I’m flattered, but I think you’re asking the wrong brother.”
An exasperated sound escaped the man’s throat. “I don’t know what it does, but it’s … like you. And I don’t mean pompous and infuriating. The magic surrounding that ring—it’s Antari.”
Kell straightened. “Are you sure?” He squinted at the band. It bore no seals, no obvious spellwork, but the metal hummed faintly against his skin, resonating. Up close, the silver was grooved, not in patterns but in rings. Tentatively, Kell slipped it onto his finger. Nothing happened—not that anything would, of course, since the ship was warded. He let the band slide back off into his palm.
“If you want it, buy it yourself,” he said, handing it to Alucard. But the captain shied away.
“I can’t,” he said. “There’s something else I need.”
“What could you possibly need?”
Alucard looked purposefully away. “Time is wasting, Kell. Just take it.”
Kell sighed and lifted the ring again, holding it between both hands and turning it slowly in search of markings or clues. And then, the strangest thing happened. He pulled gently, and part of the ring came away in his hand.
“Just perfect,” said Alucard, looking around, “now you’ve gone and broken it.”
But Kell didn’t think he had. Instead of holding two broken pieces of one ring, he was now holding two rings, the original somehow unchanged, as if it hadn’t given up half of itself to make the second, which was an exact replica of its brother. The two bands both thrummed in his hands, singing against his skin. Whatever they were, they were strong.
And Kell knew they’d need every drop of strength they could muster.
“Come on,” he said, sliding both rings into his pocket. “Let’s go see Maris.”
*
They found Lila still standing outside the woman’s door. Kell could tell it had taken a feat of self-restraint for her to stay put, with so many treasures strewn across the ship. She fidgeted, hands in the pockets of her coat.
“Well?” asked Alucard. “Did you get it?”
She shook her head. “Not yet.”
“Why not?”
“I’m saving the best for last.”
“Lila,” chided Kell, “we only have one chance—”
“Yes,” she said, straightening. “So I guess you’ll have to trust me.”
Kell shifted his weight. He wanted to trust her. He didn’t, but he wanted to. For the moment, it would have to be enough.
At last, she flashed a small, sharp smile. “Hey, want to make a bet?”
“No,” said Kell and Alucard at the same time.
Lila shrugged, but when he held the door for her, she didn’t follow.
“Trust,” she said again, leaning on the rail as if she had nowhere else to be. Alucard cleared his throat, and Maris was waiting, and finally Kell had no choice but to leave Lila there, staring hungrily out at the market.
Inside, Maris was sitting at her desk, paging through the ledger. They stood there, silently waiting for her to look up at them. She didn’t.
“Go on, then,” she said, turning the page.
Alucard went first. He stepped forward and produced, of all things, a mirror.
“You’ve got to be joking,” growled Kell, but Maris only smiled.
“Captain Emery, you always have had a knack for finding rare and precious things.”
“How do you think I found you?”
“Flattery is no payment here.”
The sapphire above Alucard’s eye winked. “And yet, like coin, it never hurts.”
“Ah,” she countered, “but like coin, I have no interest in it, either.” She put down the ledger and held one hand out, across the table, but to the side, her fingers drifting toward a large sphere in a stand beside the desk. At first, Kell had taken the object for a globe, its surface raised and dented with impressions that could have been land and sea. But now he saw that it was something else entirely.
“Five years,” she said.
Alucard let out a small, audible gasp, as if he’d taken a blow to the ribs. “Two.”
Maris steepled her fingers. “Do I look like the kind of person who haggles?”
The captain swallowed. “No, Maris.”
“You’re young enough to bear the cost.”
“Four.”
“Alucard,” she warned.
“A lot can be done with a year,” he countered. “And I have already lost three.”
She sighed. “Very well. Four.”
Kell still didn’t understand, not until Alucard set the mirror on the desk’s edge and went to the sphere. Not until he placed his hands in the grooves on either side as the dial turned, ticking up from zero to four.
“Do we have a deal?” she asked.
“Yes,” answered Alucard, bowing his head.
Maris reach out and pulled a lever on the sphere’s stand, and Kell watched in horror as a shudder wracked the captain’s body, shoulders hunched against the strain. And then it was done. The device let go, or he did, and the captain took up his bounty and retreated, cradling the mirror against his chest.
His face had altered slightly, the hollows in his cheeks deepening, the faintest creases showing at the corners of his eyes. He’d aged a fraction.
Four years.
Kell’s attention snapped back to the sphere. It was, like the Inheritor around Maris’s neck, like so many things here, a forbidden kind of magic. Transferring power, transferring life, these things contradicted nature, they— “And you, princeling?” said Maris, her pale eyes dancing in her dark face.
Kell tore his gaze from the sphere and dug the rings from his coat pocket, and came up with one instead of two. He froze, afraid he’d somehow dropped the second, or worse, that the coat had eaten it the way it sometimes did with coins, but Maris didn’t seem concerned.
“Ah,” she said as he placed the object on the desk, “Antari binding rings. Alucard, your little talent is quite a nuisance sometimes.”
“How do they work?” asked Kell.
“Do I look like a set of instructions?” She sat back. “Those have been sitting in my market for a very long time. Fickle things, they take a certain touch, and you could say that touch has all but died off, though between my boat and yours, you’ve managed quite a collection.” Shock rattled through him. Kell started to speak, but she waved a hand. “The third Antari means nothing to me. My interests are bounded by this ship. But as for your purchase.” She steepled her fingers. “Three.”
Three years.
It could have been more.
But it could have been less.
“My life is not my own,” he said slowly.
Maris raised a brow, the small gesture causing the wrinkles to multiply like cracks across her face. “That is your problem, not mine.”
Alucard had gone silent behind him, his eyes open but vacant, as if his mind were somewhere else.
“What good is this to you,” pressed Kell, “if no one else can use it?”
“Ah, but you can use it,” she countered, “and therein lies its worth.”
“If I refuse, we both end up empty-handed. As you said, Maris, I am a dying breed.”