Page 93 of Rears & Vices

Where is he?

“I will take her,” Vitaliy said softly.

Everard turned round as Alarie rocked forward and exclaimed, “Pardon?”

René, too, squawked with indignation. There was no anger there, however: only surprise, disbelief.

“Do not be ridiculous, mon frère,” Alarie began, “she has barely a skeleton crew⁠—”

“Port-au-Prince may not even receive her,” René said.

“I will write ahead to Pétion,” Vitaliy said calmly, meaning the president of Haïti.

Alarie tried again. “I had thought ourselves of an agreement, Vee!”

What agreement? Everard wondered. Vitaliy waved sharply, cutting at the air.

“The Sévère is untouched. Nothing has changed.”

Alarie scowled, straight brows contorting. “You cannot leave her again. Your men will be adrift. They expect you to lead so? You are their king!”

René cleared her throat. “We are taking the San Telmo into the fleet, Vee?” She bit her lip. “I am unsure for the resources…”

Of course she wasn’t sure. It had never been her intention to stay with the fleet, but to break out with her own command⁠—

“For a little while,” Vitaliy confirmed. “After the junta, I will take her on the Gulf Stream and put out to sell her somewhere in the States. Charleston. New Bern. New York. We will not need too much.”

Silence. No reaction from either party, or Stephan, who had busied himself in sewing one of his dead patients into their hammock.

“Then who will take the Sévère in your stead, Vee?” René asked, twirling the feather pen once more. The matelot? she left thankfully unsaid.

Dark-blue eyes moved from where they’d been watching the weather deck to Everard’s own. Vitaliy’s face was otherwise impassive, but his chin rose slightly.

Everard blinked in surprise. He knew that look. That look had begun the whole thing.

Take it. Take what I’ve offered.

Everard raised a brow. Really?

Vitaliy’s expression was somber and steady. He nodded once. Another gift. A ship this time—truly.

Everard’s heart leapt as he considered it—as he seriously considered it.

He knew Vitaliy wanted someone he could trust to lead his beautiful flagship, someone he knew without a doubt hadn’t tried to orchestrate this very end. Everard fit those requirements. And traditionally, it was what was done between matelots who prized together.

More ironclad than tradition: the rights of the matelot were written already into their articles, their word of law; if Vitaliy was absent, Everard could stand in his place for a time. None of the crew would question his appointment, ex-Navy or no.

They could spur an election, of course, but it probably wouldn’t come to that in such a short timeframe. Everard’s leadership had never sparked mutiny before. And it wasn’t as though he hadn’t fought for the pirates with his own hands; he’d received many an indigo-banded shove and handshake after the battle. He was well on his way to earning as much of the crew’s respect as he’d ever had as a Navy captain, if not more.

Blackhand could become something more than a taunt. Something more than a comma-bracketed designation attached to V. Varfolomey. Anderson de Anglada could become more than a struck-through name in a black book.

It was possible. It would work. It was a sensible, natural decision.

But…

Taking the Sévère would mean putting a pause—if not a potential total end, if things went sideways—to what had just begun again between them. Everard quite liked what had begun again. Furthermore, he wanted whatever it was to be more than just property and trade and sex and battle.

He wanted... partnership. Companionship. Trust. Maybe something else, too. Rainy nights in the doublewide cot. Sunsets in the shrouds. To see the colorwork appear on the pair of socks Vitaliy had just cast on, for he suspected they might be meant for him. What use was ambition, compared to that?