Chapter 10
It wasn’t long before the distance between the Marawati and the burning abode of criminals had grown vast. Other vessels were fleeing, too, but none were as fast as we were.
The sails now full, I waited until the smoke was a blur on the horizon and the other ships the size of insects before I finally rose from my captain’s bench.
Or at least attempted to. My knee let out a painful protest, a wave of dizziness sweeping over me. I cursed under my breath, reaching for my head.
“Everything all right?” Tinbu asked, climbing up to join me.
I attempted to steady myself on the railing, only to draw back at an unpleasant sting. Angry blisters had erupted across my left palm, painful to the touch. Odd. But God only knew what had been in the fiery waters of Sarilaglag last night.
“I’m fine, God be praised,” I muttered. “Too old to crash through a window, swim the length of a town, haul a poisoner through a swamp, and then sit on a cramped bench the entire night, but I wasn’t torn apart by a mob of my oldest enemies so I shall try not to complain.”
Tinbu shuddered. “You frighten me at times. And that is saying something, considering my own schemes.”
I ran some clean water over my hand and bandaged it. “Would you take command? I’d like to check on Dalila.”
“Of course.”
Jabril was leaving as I approached the galley. He met my gaze. “Your companion is as . . .” He seemed to fight for a polite word. “Spirited,” he decided, “as the rest of the crew claims.”
“Forgive me. I would have given you more warning if the situation had permitted it. She is awake, then?” I asked.
“Awake and alert enough to have threatened my life multiple times. She refused to answer any questions and wants nothing to do with ‘a bone-breaking quack,’ but she did take a good amount of broth and vinegar water and seems stronger. I would give her time.”
I clapped his shoulder. “God bless you.” Then I stepped inside the galley.
The galley was dim compared to the bright sun of early morning, hazy stars dancing across my vision. Dalila hadn’t been left alone. Majed was across from her, sitting on the chest of supplies she kept on the Marawati and holding a waterskin.
“. . . I will get off your kit after you drink more water,” he bargained. “You want to run some blasted experiment? Then get yourself better first. You are paler than the underbelly of a fish. Jabril said—”
“I do not care what that man said.” Dalila clutched a tattered cloak around her narrow shoulders, swaying and shivering like an angry cobra. “And you will get off that chest if you know what’s good for you.”
“Ah, you are feeling better,” I greeted. “God be praised.” I motioned for Majed to move; Dalila’s passion was her work and if going through her kit reassured her, peace on the Marawati would be reestablished sooner.
Ignoring us both, Dalila dragged the chest closer and threw it open. Hunching over the supplies like some sort of jealous ghoul, she rooted through the contents before finally plucking out a gnarled yellow root and a curved cutting tool.
Majed gave her a bewildered look. “Is that for some sort of remedy? Are you ill?”
She began dicing the root with fervor. “It isn’t your concern.”
“It is if we need proper medication,” I argued. “We are about to head into the deep. If you—”
“I’m fine,” Dalila snapped. “At least I would be if you would all just leave me alone!” She slammed down the knife, but she was trembling too hard to control the movement and nearly sliced her thumb off. Majed moved to help, and the glare she aimed froze him where he stood.
Oh, for the love of God. I knew this woman had issues with vulnerability but . . . “Dalila, we just want to help,” I said gently.
“You should never have come after me.” She placed her hands on either side of the root, clearly struggling to control her expression. “My feud with the Banu Sasan wasn’t your concern.”
“It’s what we do for family,” Majed countered. “And that’s what we are.”
Dalila scoffed. “No, we’re not. Do not pretend that we are anything like the families you all clearly hate to leave behind, your children and your lovers and your cages of obligation.
We’re a group of old murderers and thieves, held together by sentiment and nostalgia.
And you should not have come for me,” she insisted again.
“You only got yourselves involved in an old quarrel that had no reason to entangle you.”
I couldn’t help but bristle at hearing her call Marjana a “cage of obligation” and noticed Majed do the same.
Was that what she really thought of our children?
But there was no contempt in her voice, just pain, and I’d known Dalila long enough to recognize her instinct to run from emotion, to deny connection.
She had failed in her mission and been caught by the enemy she’d been hiding from for twenty years.
For the proudest and most private person I’d ever met .
. . I could not judge her state of mind.
“Majed, would you mind watching over things out there?” I asked, nodding to the door. “I want to work on setting a course.”
He sighed. “Yes, nakhudha.”
“You might as well go too,” Dalila said gruffly when he left, not looking at me.
I sat instead, stretching out and getting comfortable. “My knee and I are resting. Now. If you wish to lick your wounds in silence, I understand. But I need to know if you require a proper doctor. If we should put into port—”
“No.”
“Because there’s nothing to be done about your health or because you can treat yourself?”
She grunted in annoyance but finally gave me a real answer. “I can treat myself. They were giving me an elixir to keep me drowsy and complacent. This will clear it from my blood.”
I leaned back against the thatched panel. “See? Was that so hard?”
But Dalila had already returned to torturing the root, still refusing to meet my eyes. There was a flush in her cheeks. Illness, anger, shame . . . perhaps all three. “You can stop that, you know.”
“Stop what?”
“Being kind.” She kept slicing, her fingers a blur that made me nervous. “Majed told me, you know. Jamal was apparently quite the source of information. Your choice was the correct one, nakhudha, whereas all I’ve done is get Lab’s escapee killed and returned Raksh to your trail.”
I pressed my lips into a thin line. I hadn’t intended to voice the charge. My friend rarely erred—indeed, she was typically pulling the rest of us out of ill-conceived messes—and it was not the time to get into a fight. “Everyone makes mistakes, Dalila.”
“I don’t.”
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. “We are both of us too old to make such ludicrous claims. You made a mistake. That hardly deserves death at the hands of the Banu Sasan.”
“That is hardly the only crime I’ve committed.”
The words lay between us for a long moment, the question hanging in the air.
Finally because it felt more awkward to ignore it than inquire, I did so.
“Is what he said true about his brother?” When Dalila didn’t respond, I pressed.
“You can talk to me, my friend. It is you who said we were such back in Socotra, no? You delivered my child; you know my fears and my weaknesses. What is it that you are so worried that I will learn? I know you betrayed your guild. So what? Sasan seemed an asshole, I would probably betray him too.”
“No,” Dalila argued. “You wouldn’t have. Not if he was part of your crew. You may steal and lie to the rest of the world, but I know you, Amina, and you would not betray a member of your crew, not for a moment.”
It was its own unintended admission. “Then you’re telling me you did? Why?”
Dalila took a deep breath and just when I was convinced she was going to clam up again, she replied, all but exhaling the words. “Because I found one of the men responsible for what happened to my village.”
The confession took me aback. Sheikh Sasan had spoken of Dalila’s break with their guild as a personal betrayal—one that had gotten a great number of their brethren and his own brother killed.
But I had assumed it a criminal disagreement; perhaps they had been trying to force her into a truly abhorrent job or the brother had been pushy in his affections.
Revenge for the past tragedy she refused to discuss . . . that, I had not considered. “You did?”
“A police chief,” she said, her voice hollow.
“Not surprising, I suppose, they’re all corrupt bastards.
He was inquiring into our services, but it was going to be a complicated, delicate assignment—an expensive one.
One that required collateral.” She put the knife down.
“And among the treasures he brought were gold relics stolen from my church.”
My heart dropped. “Oh, Dalila.”
But Dalila didn’t look up, lost in the haze of memory.
“We’re not supposed to be a vengeful people.
It is forgiveness that our priests preach.
Forgiveness and mercy in the face of everything.
We are to pray for those who do us harm, even as they slay our bodies.
We tell stories of martyrs who went gladly to gladiatorial rings.
Martyrs who shed tears for their executioners.
Turn your cheek, they say. Love sinners as God loves you.
” She paused. “I have always failed in doing that.”
It was the most personal thing I’d ever heard Dalila confess of her faith; of the Christians of whom she was fiercely protective. “I believe God understands the failings of the believers He created more than those who preach His words,” I returned.
“Well, I dream of nothing but suffering for those who hurt me,” Dalila continued. “There were times I yearned for it like air, like a hunger I could never sate. If presented with the chance . . . I would do anything to attain such vengeance.” She finally met my eyes. “Do you understand?”
Goose bumps prickled over my skin. “You would betray your guild.”
Her dark gaze didn’t waver, but then my bad knee chose that terribly vulnerable moment to spasm. I jumped at the pain and Dalila started.
“Sorry,” I muttered, shifting my position and my weapons belt so I could sit more comfortably. “My damn knee—”
“When did you get that blade back?”
The question was so sudden that it took me by surprise. “Which one?” I asked, gesturing to the three knives currently strapped to my person.
“Your meteor blade,” Dalila clarified, her voice sharp. She didn’t bother pointing out that my question had been, in retrospect, stupid. Only one of my blades had gone “missing,” after all, stolen by the woman before me. “When did you get it back?”
“Raksh threw it at my face when he accused me of sending you after him.” Distaste flooded my mouth at the thought of my husband. “I should have buried it in his chest.”
Dalila was not to be deterred. “At the meetinghouse?”
“Yes. Obviously. But we needn’t talk about him right now.” Dalila had finally seemed close to discussing the tragedy that haunted her early years. “You were saying . . .”
But I had already lost her. Dalila’s gaze darted about like a panicked goat, flickering from the meteor blade to my face to the floor before finally settling on her trunk of supplies.
“I need to speak to Hamid,” she said, bizarrely referencing our cook. “And Jabril. It is imperative that I rebuild my kit.”
“Your kit?” I repeated. “What does that have to do with anything? You were telling me about the police chief, the one who hired your guild—”
Dalila flinched. “It doesn’t matter. Not now.”
But the abrupt change in subject alarmed me, as did the hint of genuine fear in her voice. “Why?” I demanded. “Please, my friend, if you need treatment, we can turn around. Go back to Baghdad, to hell with this spindle.”
She seemed to hesitate. “What did you say Jamal called this place? Lab’s kingdom?”
Now I really feared my companion was losing her mind. Not even Dalila was this focused on a mission. But I answered her, trying to keep our conversation going. “The White City? Some palace of magic and miracles and almost certainly murderous supernatural beasts.”
“Miracles.” Her voice was strained, her face even paler. “I suppose we shall see. But for now . . .” Her expression hardened, as though a mask had slipped over her features. “I would like to be allowed to lick my wounds in private.”
I paused, tempted to insist upon staying. To insist she at least explain whatever odd shift in behavior had just taken over her. But that had been the Mistress of Poisons responding and I knew there would be no arguing with her—if anything, doing so would only make her further retreat.
Trying to respect what was clearly a dismissal, I rose to my feet. “Please let me know if I can do anything.” But then I let her be, returning to my captain’s bench.
Tinbu and Majed were already there, setting the rudders. “Do you think she’ll be okay?” Tinbu asked.
I sighed. “God willing. How are we?”
“Setting off into the heart of the ocean as directed,” Majed replied. “This is the course I came up with after comparing the last known locations of several missing vessels. After that, I suppose we pray your magical inkling takes over.”
“For once, I would like a plan that doesn’t entirely rely on luck,” I grumbled.
Tinbu frowned, shading his eyes. “There is one thing. A ship. It might be a coincidence, another of Sarilaglag’s escapees, but it’s come and gone on the horizon a couple times, as though heading in a similar direction.”
“Then let us make even more haste. If it continues to pursue, we’ll consider our options.
” I didn’t truly believe any of the vessels fleeing Sarilaglag were capable of catching me at sea—not even the pirate princes of Kish had been that fast and as I’ve said, the criminal metropolis attracted those bandits who preferred to drop anchor for years.
“But for now . . . I do believe we have a spindle to steal.”