A Pirate’s Life for Tea (Tomes & Tea #2)

16. Kianthe

Chapter sixteen

Kianthe

B obbie was eerily quiet, and Kianthe hated it.

To be fair, the constable usually chose silence. Riding with her was boring unless Kianthe could prod her into some kind of ridiculous debate. But as they sailed up the Nacean, leaving Koll, her possessions, and her career behind, Bobbie was stoic enough to creep Kianthe out.

She didn’t cry. She didn’t shout. She responded with one-word answers and otherwise stood at the edge of their commandeered boat, staring at everything—and absolutely nothing.

“When you watch the river like that, it makes me think you’re going to leap in,” Kianthe said, just to break the silence.

Bobbie turned a scowl her way, the first sign of dispute. But just as quickly, it fell away, and she slumped against the railing. “I’d prefer some time alone.”

“Tough to accomplish that when we’re stuck on this boat together,” Kianthe replied.

The former constable sighed, turning her back on Kianthe.

They sailed on. Night slipped into day, and they made good time. Kianthe coaxed the wind to maintain speed, a spell that required minimal effort on her part, and spent the rest of the time brainstorming how to fix Bobbie’s mood. She came up empty over and over, and eventually drifted to sleep right there on deck.

Luckily, the wind was smart enough to work without her input, and Kianthe jolted awake to a totally different section of the river. It was late morning now, almost midday, and instantly, she knew something was wrong.

For one, the boom that woke her up sounded suspiciously like a cannon.

“What’s happened?” She wrenched herself upright, blinking in the bright sunlight. The wind immediately swept around her, a flurry of magic that carried its complaints at being slashed to hells by a careening metal ball.

“Cannon fire,” Bobbie said sharply. This was the most animated she’d been since she lost her job, and Kianthe desperately wished it was under better circumstances. The woman leapt to the front of the boat, leaning over the railing as she scanned the river for its source. “You don’t think Arlon attacked her, do you?”

“Based on recent events, nothing would surprise me anymore.” Kianthe leaned over the railing on the boat’s side, her fingers drifting in the water. Magic spread along the river’s ley line; further upstream, the water circled around a ship desperately trying to turn away from four—no, five—attackers.

Horror spiked through Kianthe’s chest. “I left her alone for one day .” And with a sharp tug of magic, their boat snapped forward, wind whistling against the sails as the elements themselves shoved her towards Reyna.

They weren’t far. Another cannon echoed and Bobbie flinched as screams pierced the air. More shouts accompanied it—an army of them, it sounded like—and they curved the river bend into what looked like an all-out war.

Or rather, bullying. One ship with no defenses and… Kianthe counted five adults on board, maybe six? Meanwhile, five of the diarn’s best ships seemed intent on sailing it down. Two were armed with cannons, and one was already in position, taking aim at the pirate ship’s two masts.

“He’s going to kill her,” Bobbie exclaimed, horror seeping into her voice.

“That’s what I was trying to tell you.” Kianthe didn’t wait for Bobbie to comprehend the situation. Every moment those cannons were aimed at Serina’s ship was another moment Reyna could be killed. “Hold on!”

And she wrenched the river up , encouraging it to drench, to consume. For once, the water could pretend it was fire, eating through its enemy. It soaked the ship, washed its constables overboard, and the vessel itself tipped onto its side.

The river sucked its sails down, and the entire thing tilted under, cannons directed at the sun itself now. The Nacean greedily devoured it, a bit too excited for Kianthe’s preference. She sent a wave of soothing magic after it, and the ley line pulsed with her command.

The river pouted, but calmed.

It still left one ship with cannons, but that wasn’t a big concern—not when a dozen constables were swinging onto the pirate ship. It seemed remarkably risky with Serina’s ship turning the way it was, and a few constables overshot, landing hard in the river and sweeping downstream before they could fight it.

But several did reach the deck. And there was Reyna, sword glinting in the sunlight, facing off as the first line of defense.

Of fucking course.

“For the Stone’s sake, Rain,” Kianthe grumbled, and yanked their little boat alongside it. She pulled the wood out in strategic divots, creating a ladder straight up the side of Serina’s ship . The new name caught her attention—the Knot for Sail —but Kianthe didn’t have time to laugh at it.

She lunged up the makeshift ladder, dimly aware that Bobbie was following, and thumped on deck to find a sword in her face.

“Stand down and you won’t be killed,” the constable snarled.

“Cute.” Kianthe grabbed the air in his lungs, but then a sword clanged against his and a boot connected with his knee. He buckled, and Reyna moved swiftly in front of Kianthe, slamming her sword’s pommel onto his skull.

The constable dropped like a stone.

“Don’t threaten my fiancée,” she told his dazed form.

Kianthe raised an eyebrow. “That was sexy as hells.”

“Thank you, dear.” Reyna spun towards another approaching constable, slashing his leg. The wound certainly wasn’t shallow, and he swallowed a strangled cry as he crashed to the deck. Her boot connected with his nose, shattering it in a spray of blood. It was vicious and somehow beautiful, how she moved with such deadly grace. “We have to get—”

“Serina!” Bobbie exclaimed.

“Right,” Reyna replied.

On the upper deck, the pirate had been thrown to the ground by another constable. He pressed a sword into her back, his boot applying pressure to a bandage on her arm. Serina yelped, thrashing under his hold, but he just dug the sword in further and snarled something to her.

More constables had cornered three of Serina’s crew and a couple extras were venturing below deck with swords and nasty expressions.

Bobbie only had eyes for Serina. She leapt past Kianthe, scaling the staircase to the upper deck and tackling the constable threatening the pirate. He raised his sword just in time, slicing down so the blade bit deep into Bobbie’s shoulder. She yelped as he withdrew, but instead of retreating, she grabbed his hand and dug her nails in until he released his hold on the bloodied weapon. Newly armed, she slashed and jabbed to force him back—too far back, so far he accidentally toppled over the railing. Bobbie barely acknowledged the splash as he hit the cold water.

Reyna, meanwhile, was fighting her own battle. She moved swiftly across the deck, cutting through constables and leaving stains of crimson in her wake.

“Key,” she shouted, “the cannons.”

How she’d noticed that, Kianthe would never know, but she was right: the second armed ship was aiming their cannons at the masts. They were a lot closer—if they fired now, this fight would end badly.

Thoroughly done with their drama, Kianthe wrenched another wave over the enemy ship. It didn’t manage to capsize this one, but the water assured her it would soak anything combustible.

That took care of that problem, but none of it addressed the constant stream of constables leaping onto their ship. Kianthe ignited her palms and shooed the fire onto the very flammable cloth of the enemy sails. It didn’t take much prodding. Fire was the most gluttonous element, and it had just been gifted a feast and full permission to eat.

Shouts of anger turned to cries of panic as ropes were chewed to ash. Constables mid-swing crashed into the water around them, and two of the ships veered towards shore before the unnatural flames could devour their hulls.

It left one enemy ship circling, its sails alight—although they seemed to decide the constables on the Knot for Sail were more important to retrieve than fleeing for shore. Satisfied, Kianthe turned back to the fight, only to realize that Bobbie wasn’t faring well.

Her fighting was decent, actually. She didn’t move with Reyna’s grace—the smooth motions of a lifetime wielding a sword—but the ex-constable clearly practiced footwork, and she was fueled by something far more dangerous than a typical work ethic.

Despite that, blood soaked the front of her shirt, the wound on her shoulder clearly much deeper than Kianthe thought. And although Bobbie had sent her first opponent flying into the water, another constable thundered up the steps—one that resembled an angry seagull, one Kianthe had met before.

Tyal.

And he looked furious .

Bobbie staggered in front of Serina, readying her sword.

Serina didn’t seem pleased by that. She said something (scathing, if her expression was anything to go by) and tried to pull Bobbie back—but Tyal seized the opportunity and lunged. Bobbie wrenched Serina away and met his blade, but wasn’t prepared when he slashed sideways. The blade bit into her ribs, and her cry echoed.

“I have to help Bobbie,” Kianthe called to Reyna.

Her fiancée was already moving over several fallen constables. In a true miracle—or a testament to Reyna’s incredible skill—none of them seemed to be dead. Most were unconscious, and a few were curled around painful injuries. Kianthe counted seven… no, eight. Stone and Stars, Reyna was a force, and it was both terrifying and incredible.

“I’m going below deck; there are children down there. Stop that fight!” Reyna tossed a sword to one of the newly freed pirate crew, then strode towards the staircase leading below deck.

“One constable coming right up.” Kianthe rolled up her sleeves, which proved difficult with the large cloak she wore. Meanwhile, Reyna vanished into the darkness, her bloodied sword gleaming in the firelight below. Stone help anyone who got in her way.

At the helm, Tyal was showing no mercy. He slashed and hacked, moving with vicious grace until he pinned Bobbie against the deck’s railing. “Traitor,” he growled. “I knew you were helping the pirate.”

“I wasn’t,” Bobbie snarled, gasping for breath. Her skin, normally the shade of charred bark, was dangerously pale. Sweat gleamed along her brow, and her black uniform was obviously slick with blood, shining in the sunlight. A sharp clang rang through the air as she blocked his sword, grunting against his strength.

Kianthe called the wind—but before she could forcibly separate them, Serina did something very, very stupid.

She lunged at Tyal, and they both went crashing to the deck.

They grappled for a brief moment before Tyal produced a short knife—why did everyone have hidden knives?—and drove it into the meat of Serina’s leg. It happened so fast, Kianthe barely had a chance to breathe.

Serina howled in pain.

“Serrie!” Bobbie lurched forward.

Without wasting more time, Kianthe wrenched the wood of the deck up, pinning Tyal’s torso in a tomb of his own making. Serina rolled away. Bobbie pointed her sword at his neck, as if daring him to make another move.

He couldn’t.

The fight was over.

For a long moment, everyone just gasped for breath. Bobbie’s sounded a bit more rasping than the others, but she was still standing—even though she left bloody footprints in her wake. Her sword’s tip trembled against Tyal’s neck. “Was this blockade your idea?”

Tyal scoffed, fumbling for his sword.

Bobbie kicked the blade out of the way. “Tyal! Good people might have died today. Did you order the blockade ?”

Her tone was vicious.

“I don’t give orders to a diarn.” Tyal spat blood on the deck, wrenching against the planks pinning him. “And I’m not the traitor here. Once I told him you were working with the pirate, Diarn Arlon took action all on his own.”

“She’s not working with me,” Serina hissed, grabbing Kianthe’s shoulder to steady herself. “And she didn’t ‘let me escape.’” Now the pirate captain reached for the knife embedded in her leg, but she couldn’t seem to convince herself to pull it out.

Probably for the best.

Kianthe propped Serina on the railing, then approached Tyal with the dangerous grace of a mage scorned. The air around her crackled. “I’m going to give you and your constables one chance to get off this ship. If you follow us, you’ll find out what it’s like to sail through a tidal wave. Is that clear?”

Tyal glowered at her. “The Mage of Ages, working with pirates now. The Council is going to be furious.”

“Oh, trust me. They’ve earned a visit. In fact, tell Arlon to expect me.” Kianthe released his wooden bindings, then knocked him over the ship’s railing in one smooth move. Instead of hitting the water, a burst of air swept between the ships, tossing him unceremoniously onto the neighboring brigantine. With another wave, she quelled the fire eating their sails.

“What about the others?” Serina gestured at the lower deck, where a few constables were staggering back to their feet.

There were probably ten left behind. Kianthe grumbled. “I can bundle them up in a tornado, but it might damage our own sails.”

“We’re pirates, right? Let’s make them walk the plank.” Serina gestured at a long wooden plank they could prop between the ships. “Just hold the ships close, Arcandor; they’re going to drift otherwise.”

It was a long process, hauling the constables up, quelling any lingering fighters, and then shoving them across a precarious wooden board between two massive ships. Bobbie stayed at the helm, tending her wounds while Serina’s crew handled the minutia. Reyna resurfaced with another pair of constables, shoving them unceremoniously onto the bloodstained deck.

“Your kids are safe, Pil,” she said.

The man she addressed, a silver-bearded sailor, chuckled. “My kids aren’t stupid. ‘Course they’re safe.”

And finally, finally , all the constables were gone. Two of the diarn’s ships had been capsized, carried downstream—two had constables desperately trying to extinguish flames as they anchored at shore—and Tyal’s ship drifted like a rejected lover in the currents, its sails burned to ash.

Tyal himself was left glowering on his own deck, but when he shouted something, his words were magically lost to the winds. As they sailed north, Kianthe flipped him off, to which Reyna heaved a sigh.

“Darling, you are the picture of professionalism.”

“No, love, that’s you,” Kianthe replied, pulling her into a fierce hug. Her nerves were buzzing after the fight, even though they’d had it well enough in hand. “Thanks for not killing anyone,” she whispered against Reyna’s sweat-slicked skin.

Her fiancée smiled, but the expression was pained. “Contrary to popular belief, I do not thrive on taking someone’s life.”

Shit. Kianthe scrambled to backtrack. “I didn’t mean—”

“Uh—” A panicked tone caught their attention.

Both Kianthe and Reyna glanced back at the upper deck and the helm, where the tall, lanky sailor had taken control of the massive wooden wheel. The burly woman—his wife, Reyna had helpfully informed Kianthe—was tending to Serina’s knife wound.

But Serina was the one who’d spoken, and her eyes were glued on Bobbie.

Bobbie, the ex-constable, who seemed to be attempting as much physical distance as possible from Serina and her crew.

Bobbie, who’d been hacked to bits and soaked with blood over the course of that fight.

Bobbie, who Kianthe had completely forgotten was acting faint before they sent Tyal’s constables packing.

It was like watching a shipwreck from the shoreline. They saw the exact moment Bobbie’s eyes fluttered. The exact moment her knees buckled. The exact moment they hit a wave, and instead of pitching towards the deck, she pitched backwards—right over the polished banister.

And Kianthe couldn’t even react before she hit the water.