Page 47 of Tempest

“You need to keep count of your own ships, sir,” Cat shot back. “I will find Kane.”

“And how do you propose you do that, Lady Rose?” Osprin mused, folding his arms across his chest. His sleeve shifted, showing a flash of bronzed wrist. Not the skin of a lord but the skin of sailor.

A sailor of a different sea, Cat reminded herself. For all his experience, he is still fresh to these waters. His strength is in numbers, not wisdom.

“You do not know what this place was, what the Lyrian Sea became in the years since the Empire left. It might be fading now with your triumphant return, but it is not gone,” she warned. She straightened, trying to look regal and resolute. “I ran a business here for many years and kept it afloat through perilous days. I have friends in every port from Little Talon to Longdawn. I know what to ask, how to talk, and when to listen.”

She braced herself for more of Carley’s laughter or Fell’s sneer, but neither man moved. Fell only stared, his expression unreadable again, his scrutiny too sharp for Cat’s liking.

“Better still, I do not wear a uniform of the Empire,” she continued steadily. “I am just the Widow Rose, a barmaid. Another civilian fleeing the changing tide, looking for safe harbor.”

It was an obvious, if risky, plan—but well worth the gamble.

To take whatever gold she might wring out of Osprin, to set out with a smile and promise she would never keep. To be gone before he even realized she never intended to come back, and leave Valerian whatever small chance he still had.

“And what do you ask in return, Lady Rose?” Osprin wondered.

She set her jaw. “What I was promised. A chest of gold and a strong wind. I want to be rid of this place,” she spat, her disdain all too obvious.

The governor sneered. “But the Empire has returned, the colonies reclaimed for the Meridian. Your perilous years are over, Lady Rose. There is no reason for you to leave your home ever again.”

There are a thousand reasons, she wanted to scream, remembering every hurricane, every sweltering heat wave, every sickness, all strung across the canyon between empire and anarchy. But most of all she remembered a pair of eyes, the color of a tempest.

“This is not my home,” she bit out.

Not anymore.

Next to her, Fell’s fingers curled, one hand balled into a fist, his knuckles turning white. Out of frustration or anger, Cat could not say.

Osprin shifted his attention, one hand on his chin. “You know the Lyrian Sea better than most of my officers, Captain Fell. Your patrols and your intelligence were integral to the reclamation. And you served here long before Archenport fell and the pirates took hold. You’ve seen this place for what it was, and what it must become,” he said, scratching at a sheen of rough, gray stubble. “What say you to this plan? Does Lady Rose speak truthfully?”

Cat’s chest tightened. Not because of the ghostly noose still looming but Jasper Fell’s forever-shifting machinations.

She read the delight plainly on Fell’s face. He gave a roll of his shoulders, taking his time to answer, drawing out her discomfort.

“Lady Rose is a woman of many friends, yes,” Fell said, shooting her a smug look sidelong. He drew out the words, letting his true meaning linger. “And . . .”

Cat’s skin crawled and she braced for a killing blow, for whatever secrets Fell might lay bare.

“She does not lie.”

Confusion washed over Cat. She could only blink as Fell continued his performance.

He faced the governor with a shallow bow, sweeping back his hat. To anyone else, he looked the picture of a loyal officer, dedicated to Crown and Empire. Cat knew better than to believe it.

But what else could he be after?

“If you will not send a fleet to hunt Valerian Kane, you should send Lady Rose,” Fell concluded. For once, his expression was stoic and determined, his brow set in a stern, dark line.

Whatever he wanted, Cat hardly cared. I will send him my thanks when I escape, from wherever I end up.

But he was not finished.

“And you should send me, of course,” he added, smiling to show two rows of even, white teeth.

Living in the Lyrian, Cat saw sharks all the time. She watched one now, his jaws wide, his eyes black. He smelled blood in the water, and he circled closer.

Hidden in her skirts, Cat’s hand rounded into a fist.