Chapter Six
The soft amber glow of the lanterns casts a warm blanket of light over the faces of my family and friends, who are spread out across the deck of the Starchaser.
Above, the shimmering tapestry of stars twinkles, cutting through the dark wall of fog near the edge of the Dire, the legends of the past looking down on us as we’re rocked by the cradle of the Western Sea.
“Someone should wake him up,” Jack says, shoveling another bite of stew into his mouth. I follow his gaze to the center of our gathering, where Charlie leans against the mainmast, hugging his mop, drool leaking down his chin.
Lewis shakes his head. “Tried that once. I’m lucky to be alive.”
Eliza sits next to me, perched on a crate near the taffrail, our faces misted by the spray of the waves. We’re far enough from the others that no one hears her whisper, “So?”
I poke at a lump of mushy potato with my spoon, avoiding her knowing gaze as she peers at me from behind a curtain of dark hair. “So what?”
Her frown is sympathetic. “I saw you today. After you left the brig.”
I sigh, my chest tight. After I left Will and Titus in the brig, I hurried to lock myself in the captain’s quarters and remained there until Margaret nearly broke down the doors and dragged me onto the deck for a late supper with the crew.
“I’m fine,” I say, smashing the potato with the back of the spoon. “Gabriel insisted I get some rest.”
Eliza nods slowly. “Ah, I see,” she says, and for a moment, I think she’s content to believe me, but—“It’s just that I was there, you know,” she adds, turning toward me. “I heard what Titus said in the dungeons.”
My stomach twists. “And?”
Eliza lifts her brows in a meddling expression that reminds me of her brothers. “And,” she continues, “I know he gave you that coat.”
“That’s hardly a secret,” I say. “And it’s just a coat.”
“Just a coat,” she echoes, still nodding.
“He proposed to me.” I don’t know if I say it to convince her, but after the admission passes my lips, a weight lifts from my shoulders.
Eliza tries—and fails—to hide the surprise that sparks in her hazel eyes. “Titus?”
My heart skips a beat. “No,” I say, and it’s my turn to blush. “Will.”
“Oh.”
“I didn’t say yes.”
Her eyes widen. “Oh?”
I wince. “I didn’t say no, either.”
“Oh!” Eliza covers her mouth with both hands. “Well, that’s certainly…”
“Selfish?”
She shakes her head vigorously, her voice gentle yet firm. “I was going to say difficult.”
Tears prick my eyes, and I blink furiously, desperate to dispel them before anyone takes notice of our hushed conversation. “He told me he loved me,” I whisper.
Eliza’s brow creases, her mouth pressed tight. “And you didn’t say it back,” she murmurs. “So you don’t, then?”
“Don’t what?”
“Love him.”
I hesitate, pulling my bottom lip between my teeth. “I don’t know. I never thought I’d fall in love.”
“Me either,” she says, cutting a glance at Lewis across the way, caught up in a lively debate with Jack and Henry. There’s a long stretch of silence, and then—“Aster, if he’s telling the truth…”
I know she means Titus—know she’s talking about what he said in the dungeons, about Will romancing me even though he knew how Titus felt. “He’s not,” I say. “He was just trying to drive Will and me apart—because of the compulsion.”
She smiles, but it’s tinged with sadness. “You shouldn’t feel guilty,” she whispers. “I saw the two of you together, at Castle Grim. Even if Titus was compelled, the way he looked at you… I wouldn’t blame you if you felt something for him.”
“I don’t.” I drop the spoon, and it clatters against the bowl. A cool breeze ripples the sails of the Starchaser, but a bead of sweat forms at the nape of my neck. “Feel guilty, I mean. Nothing happened between us.”
Eliza nods again. “Of course,” she says, placing her hand over mine, prompting me to meet her gaze. “I’ve known Billie a long time, and I know he means what he says.… But you deserve to be loved with actions, not just words.”
I open my mouth, unsure of what I’m supposed to say, when the low, sweet timbre of music sweeps across the deck. At once, all conversation halts, and we look toward the helm, where Rook drapes himself over the railing, cradling a fiddle.
“Oh, how I’ve missed you!” Rook sighs, blowing a kiss at the old, scuffed instrument.
Gabriel, propped casually on the steps that lead to the helm, drags his hands over his face.
“Well?” Rook peers down at our small group, clears his throat. “Any requests?”
Margaret, Lewis, and Henry all stare up at Rook, their jaws slack, eyes narrowed in suspicion.
“Do you know the one about the princess and the thief?” Jack shouts, his face bright.
Rook points at Jack with his bow. “A fine choice, my dear fellow!”
Margaret, Lewis, and Henry all turn to look at Jack as Rook begins to play a jaunty tune.
Jack shrugs as he gets to his feet, setting his bowl of stew aside. He bends slightly at the waist, offering his hand to Margaret. “May I have this dance?”
The smile that lights my sister’s face could rival the sun as she threads her fingers through Jack’s, and the two of them begin to whirl about the deck.
It isn’t long before Lewis approaches Eliza, a rosy hue to his cheeks, and asks her to dance.
I’m about to stand, to make my way back to the captain’s quarters, when Diana plops down beside me on the crate where Eliza sat moments before.
She cuts a glance at the untouched bowl of stew in my lap with her wide, disarming eyes. “Finished?”
I pass the bowl to her, ignoring the hollow feeling in my gut that has very little to do with hunger and everything to do with… everything else.
“He’s harmless,” Diana says, pointing at Rook with the spoon. “For a pirate.”
“And you?”
Diana’s lip curls, the hint of a smirk. “You got the best of me, didn’t you?”
“Not sure that counts.”
“It counts.” Diana pops a potato into her mouth. “Everyone seems nice,” she says through a mouthful of food. “Except for him.”
She jabs her spoon in Henry’s direction, her eyes narrowing as she watches him from afar, and I note his sour expression, his hard eyes as he watches Margaret and Jack.
“He’s harmless,” I say. “For a Nightweaver.”
She grins, scrunching her nose. “Fair.”
As Rook continues to play, I’m surprised that the silence between us is comfortable, and when Diana finishes my portion of stew, she takes up Eliza’s half-eaten bowl, and my gut twists when I think about how, for the past few weeks, Diana has been a prisoner of the Eerie—and it wasn’t the first time, either.
“I’m sorry about your leg,” I say quietly, remembering the night my rescue was traded for her return. If we had come only a few hours sooner, would they have spared her limb?
Her brow quirks. “What about it?”
“Well, it’s—er—missing.”
She gasps, making a show of looking all around the deck.
“Where is it?” She laughs then, nudging me with her elbow like we’d known each other forever—like we were friends.
“It’s not your fault. If Will hadn’t shown up when he did, I might not be alive today,” she says.
“He told me it was your idea to make the trade.”
“If I had known…” If I had known what? We made the trade as soon as we could. It just wasn’t soon enough.
She waves dismissively. “How would you have known?” She shrugs. “Besides, it was worth it to see Will shred those Bloodknights to pieces the day he came to collect me.”
My gut twists. “He… what?”
She nods, talking around another mouthful of food when she clarifies cheerfully, “With his bare hands.”
“But how?” I ask. “Wouldn’t someone have seen him?”
She lifts a shoulder, bites into a carrot. “Anyone who did ended up dead,” she says, chewing thoughtfully. “He pinned the whole thing on Captain Shade’s ‘bloodthirsty followers.’ It was brilliant, really.”
I swallow around a lump in my throat. I think of how I would have felt if I were the one to find Diana. Would that voice that calls out to me in the heat of battle demand I do just what Will did?
Damn the voice—damn it all. I would have made them bleed.
But if what Will had done to those Bloodknights makes him a killer… maybe Titus is right—maybe we’re all the same. And I can’t help but feel a swell of affection for Will when I think of him carrying Diana from the dungeon where she’d been held, his eyes glowing gold, hands steeped in blood.
“Made it myself,” Diana says, patting her prosthetic leg, and I realize I must have missed what she said moments before.
She sets the bowl of stew aside as she angles toward me, the light of the lanterns turning her blond hair a deep shade of orange.
“I’ve been playing around with a few ideas to make it more functional—different kinds of enchantments—”
“Enchantments?” I blink. “You’re a Sorceress?”
“You’re surprised?”
“You don’t look like a Sorceress.”
She barks another laugh. The abrupt cackle reminds me of Titus, and suddenly I’m struck by their resemblance. In another life, Diana could have been his sister. I suppose, in some ways, she is. She and Rook and Gabriel—they act just like siblings.
My heart sinks at the realization. Titus’s crew was a family—his family. Now only a few of them are alive, and again I wonder if, when Titus is cured of his compulsion… will he be able to forgive himself for the things he was forced to do?
I turn toward her, the sound of Rook’s music fading beneath the sound of my own heartbeat. “Is that how you knew about the compulsion?”
She nods. “I felt the cord break,” she says, and her gaze turns dark, as if there were mysteries swirling just below the surface of her playful, nonchalant demeanor.
“The strings that make up the fabric of our world—the Manan… if you have the sight, you can see each strand. Centuries ago, our magic as humans was infinitely more powerful than that of the Nightweavers and the Underlings alike, but when we were cursed, our sight turned… foggy.”