Chapter 9 #2
The captain turned to Amaya and smirked, smug and victorious. “I respect the attempt, Sinclair. But you gave up your leverage too early.”
Something about the cocky twist of his lips pissed Amaya off. She sucked on her teeth, her patience teetering on the edge of collapse. She needed that photo. And she needed him to give it to her so he didn’t ruin it trying to figure out how a damn locket worked, because clearly, none of them knew.
A wild thought entered her mind.
It was reckless, and quite possibly stupid. But if Lexington wasn’t going to cooperate, she’d take matters into her own hands.
Just do it, Amaya. Do. It.
In one swift movement, Amaya dexterously reached into the Sky Lord’s pocket and caught the chain she knew would be there before leaping up to stand on the bench. She held it up and away from his reach.
“Amaya!” Will shouted, standing. “We had an agreement.” Admittedly, Amaya enjoyed a small amount of satisfaction at seeing his face turn red as he stood. His fists tightened at his sides, and she briefly wondered how much self-control he was employing to keep from grabbing her. And why he bothered.
“Relax, William. I’ll give it back,” she teased. Was teasing too much? The fire blazing in his eyes told her it was—he looked like he was about to make good on his threat to throw her overboard. But if that was the case, she’d damned herself already. So, she continued on with her plan.
Amaya clicked open the locket, revealing the stone and the photo. The blue jewel beautifully reflected the light, drawing everyone in with its incandescence.
“Nobody thought to check behind the picture?” Amaya slid her fingernail under the faded photo and plucked it out. She curled it into her palm and snuck it into her pocket, hoping they would focus on what the photo’s absence revealed. They did.
Three sets of numbers were engraved on the inside of the locket: solar bearing, moon trace, and elevation. When Amaya read them off, Edmund almost swooned.
“Those are coordinates!” He started scribbling the numbers down. “Read them again.”
Amaya complied, Edmund hanging on her every word. Once he’d written the numbers down, he pinpointed the location on a map tucked inside one of his books.
“That’s just a few miles east of Sorrento! On the cliffs. There’s a house there?”
She nodded. “Judging by those blueprints, maybe Pearce built it for her.” They were all speechless. Amaya shrugged. “You’re welcome.”
“Yes, yes. You’re a hero. Can I see that?” Edmund asked. Amaya glanced at Lexington, whose eyes still burned with irritation, but then nodded. She shifted her fingers on the pendant to hand it to the artificer, brushing her thumb against the iridescent stone.
Amaya had touched the jewel hundreds of times before, nearly every time she opened the locket to look at the photo. But this time . . . something happened.
The moment her fingers touched the stone, it burst with vivid blue light that enveloped everyone at the table.
Something stirred deep within Amaya’s soul at the sight, moving her to awestruck wonder. At the same time, her pulse sprang into a gallop.
“Um, that’s new,” she admitted. “It’s never done that before. Here, take it.”
She dropped the locket back into Lord Lexington’s outstretched hands. The light extinguished the second she released the necklace.
Corsair and Ridge had insisted the necklace did something. She didn’t know what had just happened, but that was definitely something.
“That’s never happened before,” she said again, in case they deemed her a liar. “I swear.”
She braced herself for Lexington to reprimand her, but he didn’t. He studied the open pendant with fresh interest, turning it over in his palm and sliding his thumb across the stone. Nothing happened.
“Hold on.” The Sky Lord stepped up on the bench with Amaya and took her hand. Instinctively, she drew back. Annoyance flashed across his features. “Amaya, I’m not going to hurt you. Trust me.”
Trust him? Trust him? She’d be mad to trust a pirate. But he left her no choice as he grasped her hand again.
His skin was rough compared to hers, calloused from years of combat.
Blackened veins creeped out from underneath his rolled-up sleeve, snaking across the inside of his wrist like a spiderweb and clustering around a long, black strip of metal embedded into his skin.
It sent a shiver crawling beneath Amaya’s skin. What kind of scar was that?
She attributed the sudden warm, twisty sensation in her stomach to anxiety—because labeling it as anything else would be insane.
Keeping a light grip on her wrist, Lexington brought Amaya’s fingers forward until they touched the stone. It lit up again, bathing them both in the scintillating blue light. It glimmered over their faces as if alive, undulating like waves in the ocean.
“Well, I’ll be damned . . .” Edmund muttered.
He was now standing on the opposite bench, peering at the glowing stone through his spectacles like it was the love of his life.
He reached for Amaya and Lexington’s wrists and separated their hands, the pendant remaining with the captain.
When Edmund brought them back together, the stone flared to life again.
Edmund pressed his own fingers to the stone and sighed in disappointment when nothing happened.
“She can activate the Skystone,” Edmund said. “Presumably, just her.”
Amaya had already come to that devastating conclusion, along with one more: they’d never let her go home now.
“What does it mean?” she whispered, meeting Lexington’s eyes. The azure rays danced across his face in hypnotizing waves.
“It means I have a lot of work to do,” Edmund said.
“And it means she’s got to stay,” Sebastian added.
Amaya deflated, the last scrap of hope leaving her as Lexington’s eyes flashed. He closed his fist around the pendant and pulled it away from Amaya, snapping the locket shut and extinguishing its light.
“CAPTAIN!” The tense silence at the table was broken by Mouse running into the mess, panicked. “Captain! Amaya escaped. I dunno where she . . . oh.” He noticed Amaya standing there and went pale.
The captain’s eyes darkened as he turned to the young crew member. Every person in the mess seemed to freeze. The only remaining sound was the constant, low hum of the ship’s engines.
“You,” Lexington said, taking three steps toward Mouse, “are a disgrace.”
“Yes, sir. I’m sorry, sir. It won’t happen again, I promise. It’s just, I was so tired from—”
“Save your excuses.” Amaya flinched at the bite in Lexington’s tone. “It won’t happen again, because you are relieved of—”
“Hey, no, it’s my fault.” Amaya hopped down from the bench and put herself between Mouse and the captain. “I shouldn’t have left the room. You can’t—”
She caught her mistake immediately, but it was too late.
Indignation flashed over Lexington’s sharp features. When he spoke again, his voice was low and ominous.
“I can’t what?”
Amaya didn’t respond. She wasn’t about to cower, but she wasn’t stupid enough to keep pushing, either. She still had no idea what this man was capable of.
His eyes lowered to her neckline, where she’d hidden her room key. Without warning, he grabbed the cord and yanked it off. A sharp pain pinched at the back of her neck as the cord snapped.
“Sebastian, take her back to the brig.”
So much for not pushing.
“The brig?” Amaya cried. “Because I took your precious Skystone for a second? I gave it back. Don’t blame me because you didn’t know where to look!”
She knew from listening to her father’s stories about his days as a general that snatching the necklace wasn’t the issue. Not really. It was that she’d undermined him in front of his men—twice—in very short succession.
And she wasn’t the slightest bit sorry.
Lexington broke eye contact and turned around, pushing both hands through his hair. He paused, giving Amaya hope he might see reason.
But no, of course not.
When he whirled back around, barely restrained rage distorted his handsome face. But he didn’t raise his voice, and that was almost scarier.
“I made you a guest on my ship, and in exchange, I asked you to stay out of trouble and remember where you are. That’s it. And you couldn’t even do that, could you?”
He closed the distance between them, edging into her space and towering over her. His sudden proximity made her feel small, but that only caused Amaya to lift her chin in defiance.
“Insubordination has consequences on this ship, Sinclair,” Lexington continued, a growl rumbling deep within his chest. “So, yes. You’re in the brig.”
Amaya gritted her teeth. “How long?”
“However long it takes for you to learn your place.”