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Watch out for yourself first, little bird. No one else will.
Bunny’s rule rings hollow as we trudge back down the dirt path toward the dock. She’s not wrong. I have no intention of staying with the Cwn Annwn, and even if I did, I would balk at hurting Bowen, even indirectly. I can’t imagine Miles would let me stay aboard if he became captain; it’s far more likely that he would finish what he started the day I arrived and try to kill me. Out on the water with the entire crew at his back? I don’t stand a chance.
Damned if I flee, damned if I stay.
I’m so wrapped up in my dark thoughts that I don’t realize Bowen has stopped walking until I bounce off his back. “Hey!”
His power rises so fast, it feels like a hunting bird diving past me. I jump away, but he’s not focused on me. His attention is on the docks, and farther out to the bay. The bay that is currently empty.
“Where the fuck is my ship?”
CHAPTER 17
Bowen
“MILES TOOK IT.”
“What?” I spin to find Dia leaning against a tree, her ever-present joint perched between two fingers.
She exhales a cloud of smoke. “He got them to take a vote. He won handily, but couldn’t get them to agree to brand you a traitor. That will only hold until you do something foolish, though.” She eyes me. “Or more foolish.”
Her words hit me with the force of boulders. They took a vote. They took my fucking ship. I knew this was coming, but part of me never believed it would actually happen. I was voted in as captain after Ezra died during a particularly vicious storm; his declining health until that point and the fact he made a point to tell me he was proud of me before sending me below all add up to the fact he knew he wasn’t long for this world, and he chose the way he left it. I’ve made my peace with that in the intervening years, but he served as captain for my entire life in Threshold—and a good decade before we ever met. I honestly thought I’d do the same, leading the crew of the Hag until the sea finally took me into its embrace.
“It’s gone. Everything’s gone.” The world goes a bit hazy around me. “I’ve lost everything. They had no right.”
“You know better. They had every right. A captain is only a captain as long as he has his crew behind him. They lost faith.” She takes another long inhale.
Betrayal lays thick and cloying on the back of my tongue. I have to swallow hard several times to keep from gagging on it. I know I need to pivot, to plan on what I’m going to do next, but I can’t think. I can’t do anything but feel.
I’ve been this crew’s captain for years. I’ve guided them through good times and bad, and I’ve always—always—put the laws of the Cwn Annwn first. I have curbed their excesses and ensured they lived lives worthy of the name they bear. I have been fair and, if I’m unbending, it’s all for the cause. And it still wasn’t enough.
“What are you doing here?” I sound bitter and angry, but there’s no helping it. I am bitter and angry. “Why haven’t you sailed off to indulge in your every excess? That’s what Miles promised them, isn’t it? To let them take what they think they deserve instead of reminding them that we serve.”
“I’ve had my years of excess already. At my age, it all sounds like too much work.” Dia pushes off the tree and heads for the town. “Besides, that ship doesn’t feel like home with Miles at the helm. I expect a few people will jump crews within the next turning of the moon. Hard to say.”
My entire life is crumbling around me. I’m teetering on the edge of absolute ruin and there isn’t a damn thing I can do to stop it. Ever since I came to Threshold, emerging from the sea and into my new life, my entire identity has been wrapped up in the Crimson Hag. Starting as a cabin boy. Learning how to sail, how to navigate, how to lead, from Ezra, until I worked my way up to be quartermaster. I served in that position for years before his death and the vote that made me captain. “What the fuck do I do now?”
She sighs. “You’ll figure it out, boy. This time of year, it’ll be a week or two before a ship comes through that can ferry us back to Lyari, so might as well take the time to do some soul searching. You’ll be starting from the bottom on the next ship, just like you did on the Hag.” Then she’s gone, melting into the trees as if she was born to it instead of the waves.
A pit opens up inside me and threatens to suck me under. Start at the bottom. New ship. New crew. New captain. And who will take me on? Over the years, I’ve butted heads with more than a few captains, and I never bothered to keep my disapproval hidden, not when so many of them have fluid interpretations of what the laws mean. If I go back to Lyari, I might be able to find a position in the city, serving the Council …
But to spend all my time on dry land? To twist myself into knots playing at politics when there are people in need of saving? People I can actually help, instead of arguing circles just for the sake of power?
The thought of that being my future makes something inside me threaten to shrivel and die. “I just lost everything.”
“I’m sorry.”
I turn to Evelyn. It’s so tempting to blame her for this, but if her presence brought my problems to a head, they started well before her arrival. I’ve made my own choices. I can’t blame her for my actions. If I’d let the waves take her, maybe I would have stayed captain for another few months, a year even, but Miles was always going to make his move. Evelyn only expedited it. With every decision since meeting her, I’ve stood at a crossroads of law and heart. Every time, I’ve chosen heart.
I am in a mess of my own making. It doesn’t improve my mood to acknowledge that. “Let’s go. We’ll have to rent a room for the time being.” I pause, studying her guileless expression. “This doesn’t change your situation, Evelyn. If you flee, they will hunt you.”
“What’s the difference between you being stranded here and me being stranded … elsewhere?”
I give her the look that question deserves. “You know damn well the difference. Getting voted out of captaincy isn’t a crime. Reneging on your vows is. I am required to join up with the next crew we happen across, at least long enough to return to Lyari. If I choose not to stay with that crew, I’ll have to stay in the capital until I find a crew—or a job for the Council. Those are the only options. Not settling down on one of the other islands. Certainly not jumping through a portal to another realm. You have the same choices.”
“Seems like semantics to me.” But she falls into step beside me. “But I would kill for a good night’s sleep and a meal, so I’m not going to argue with you here. Maybe later. We’ll see what the night brings us.”
What it brings us is to the little inn nestled just off the road near the entrance of town. With darkness falling, the crowd down the main street has mostly dispersed, though there’s music and loud laughter coming from two separate bars. I stop and stare at the warm light shining through the windows. The people there seem happy.
