Chapter 15 #3
In a moment of uncharacteristic chivalry, Silas wades to his shins in the freezing water, holding the boat steady so Lydia and I can climb in, then pushing it off and jumping in after us.
Lydia in front, then me in the middle, then Silas.
We don’t have a lantern; the only light comes from the thin sliver of a crescent moon half hidden by clouds, plus the lanterns that glow from most of the ship decks.
It’s eerie to be drifting in the dark with the bulks of ships all around us.
They groan and sigh like giant sleeping animals we have to tiptoe around not to wake.
The boat has an oar tucked away at the bottom, but when I reach for it, Silas stops me with a touch to the shoulder.
“No need,” he whispers. Instead, he bends down, reaching to dip his hand in the water.
I half turn in my seat to watch, fascinated and unnerved when I realize what he’s doing.
Weather magic, tide magic. Finfolk magic.
It’s subtle; I don’t think Lydia even notices from up front, her head on a swivel to make sure we stay unobserved.
It’s just the faint smell of petrichor and electricity on the breeze, and I feel the tide respond underneath us, gently and silently carrying us where we need to go.
We skirt the edge of the harbor, passing in and out of shadows cast by the ships, and approach the Heralder from the port side, the prow looming over us.
As we glide closer, Silas speaks quietly. “I told Ezra and Josephine this earlier, but if anything goes wrong—if we’re caught—you two should hide if you can, or say it was my idea. I found the prisoner, I tricked you into coming here.”
Lydia scoffs. “Why would we do that? You don’t have to be here. You’re the one helping us.”
“Helping me,” I correct. Freeing the prisoner is my task, my favor to the finfolk.
Lydia shoots me an irritated look and repeats, “Helping us.” My heart thaws out a little to hear her refer to us like that, as a unit. A team. Even if she says it with a glare.
“I appreciate that, but it just makes sense.” Silas speaks low and fast. Beyond him, out in the harbor just past the ends of the ships, a light winks into existence—a flame rising seemingly out of nothing.
“August knows I’m finfolk. Probably Mance too.
As far as they know, I’m the only one on the Heralder with any reason to help one of the fae. ”
Another flame joins the first, and this one burns bright green. They must be burning driftwood. Even though I know it’s just Ezra and Josephine’s handiwork—stacking kindling in old leaky boats, shoving them off and striking a match—it still sends a chill down my spine.
“And you two have access to information,” Silas goes on. “You can find out what their game is even if everyone’s keeping an eye on me. But if the Heralder men link you to the missing prisoner, they’ll go further to hide what they’re doing.”
“They’re already hiding it,” I point out.
“Case in point, we’re out here in the dead of night freezing our asses off,” Lydia mutters.
Silas meets my eyes. “They can always do worse.”
More flames spring up in the harbor, and finally someone notices.
I hear a shout from above, and footsteps as the two Heralder men keeping watch run to the stern.
Similar shouts rise up from watchmen around the harbor.
As Silas rises to standing, a repurposed whaling hook in his dripping hands, I look past him at the lights.
Several columns of flame in different colors dance on the water’s surface, red and orange but also blue and green and white.
Their hiss and crackle echo over the water.
The watchmen’s confused shouts mask the thud as Silas lands an expert throw over the side of the ship, the hook—meant to fasten itself in a Livyatan’s hide and hold the creature fast—serving just as well as a grappling hook on the railing.
Silas pulls himself up, the boat rocking gently as his weight vanishes from it, and a moment later the rope ladder drops for us.
I catch it before it can clatter against the Heralder’s hull, heart in my throat.
Lydia climbs up, then me. It was her idea to wrap the tools at our belts—each of us carries a cooper’s wrench, a crowbar, and a knife—in cloth so they don’t clink together.
The deck is empty; no one wanted to waste an opportunity to go ashore.
The watchmen at the far end are oblivious to us as we steal our way to the staircase leading belowdecks and creep carefully down, wary of the creaky floorboards, Silas ducking down so he doesn’t hit his head on the low ceiling.
At the bottom, he pauses and lights a match, looking out for any movement on the middle deck, before flashing a thumbs-up at us.
We go through the hallway toward the blubber room, but immediately I see what Lydia and Silas didn’t.
A light on in August’s cabin. I thought he was in bed at the inn, but a thin line of light glows beneath his closed door.
Silas and Lydia are both past the hall and into the blubber room; it would do no good to say something out loud.
I make myself keep moving past my fiancé’s door as Silas disappears down the second staircase into the hold, then Lydia.
I’m almost there too when the door creaks open and his voice floats out, soft and surprised.
“Annie?”
I freeze just as I’m about to step down the first stair, time slowing down to a molasses crawl. Below me on the staircase, Lydia freezes too, her frightened face turning up to mine, a pale oval floating in the pitch-darkness of the hold.
Behind me, I hear August walk toward me. “What are you doing?” His voice is conversational, surprised, not angry.
I don’t think he saw Lydia or Silas pass by. But if I speak to her, if I gesture to her, he’ll know they’re there. If I run down to the hold and hide, August will come looking and find all three of us.
My mind spins, a new plan taking shape like clay on a wheel. They don’t need me to free the prisoner. Lydia has her wrench and crowbar and knife; Silas has magic. He can get Lydia back to the inn if they escape notice. I know he’ll keep her safe.
And I have tools too. Not ones I ever wanted to use like this. But tools perfectly suited to keeping August Hargreave’s attention on me.
All these thoughts whirl through my mind in the space of an instant, before I turn to August and smile.
August is backlit against the warm yellow glow coming from his cabin, so I can only see the outline of him. Not his expression, not his eyes.
“Looking for you,” I say, my voice coming out tinny, too bright. “You weren’t in your room at the inn.”
“Then what are you doing going into the hold?” His voice is almost gentle, with a trace of laughter flickering along its edges. Like a flame held to paper, the long second before it all goes up.
My face burns and my mouth is dry as I snatch my hand off the railing. “I’m not. Just pacing.”
I can’t stop myself from looking down the stairs just once more—and my stomach drops to see that Silas now stands beside Lydia, both of them staring up at me. Even at this distance, even though he stands in darkness, I can see the tension in him, his clenched fists, flat mouth, burning black eyes.
I blink and try to communicate everything I need with my eyes alone. Keep going. I’ll manage.
Then I move toward August, feeling as though I’ve lost every memory of ever walking before in my life. I don’t know how to move my limbs in a natural way. What they’re meant to feel like.
“Will you come in?” He stands aside, waiting for me to pass before following me into his room. The rest of the ship is silent.
Please let Lydia and Silas succeed, I think faintly as I turn into August’s cabin. Please let them make it out unnoticed. Please let the finfolk still see fit to count this as a favor, even if I don’t release the prisoner with my own hands.
The moment the door closes, August is on me, spinning me gently around with hands on my shoulders and pinning me against the door. My breath catches and my muscles stiffen in shock as he leans his body against mine, pressing me into place.
It’s a familiar move, and despite everything it starts the familiar trickles of heat through my insides.
He likes to do this, kiss me against closed doors.
Only he isn’t kissing me now. His blue, blue eyes search my face, close enough I can feel his breath on my parted lips.
His hands roam, tracing my jaw, my throat, my sides, fingertips questing at my waist like he’s searching for a button to unsnap.
I only realize what he’s after when my belt latch clicks free and it comes away in his hands—the belt, and all the tools on it.
He steps back slightly so we can both see them, the cloth wrappings doing little to disguise their purpose. He tilts his head, letting the silence stretch, waiting for an explanation.
I take a slow breath. I have to be very careful. August knows me—maybe not as well as I once thought, but he knows me. And I’ve always been a poor liar.
“I found the finfolk down there,” I say. “The prisoner.”
August doesn’t blink. “When?”
“After we killed the dolphin.” I pitch my voice as a whisper, knowing that otherwise it will shake. “I heard something in the walls.”
“Why did you come here tonight?” His voice is soft as silk. “Did you mean to let the prisoner go free?” When I stay silent, he laughs softly and flattens a hand on my chest, fingers spread wide. “That tender heart.”
“August.” I don’t breathe. But I can’t stop my heart, and I know he can feel it, how it flings itself into my ribs like a wild bird caught. “Why is he here?” I know the answer Ezra relayed to me—ensuring good sailing weather—but I want to hear August say it, I want to understand.
He drops his hand and steps backward, setting the tools carelessly on a side table and sitting on the bed, leaving space for me. “To give us fair skies,” he says simply.