Chapter 7 River #2
with you if he thought it would keep him alive.”
“I would never let people believe I lived my life with permanently soiled undergarments,” Dougal protested.
“Look at that. I’ve already found his limit,” River said, oddly proud of herself.
“We need more time,” Galwell insisted.
River looked to Queen Thessia. How strange it was to be in such a small room with the literal ruler of her realm. If only
River’s parents could see her, discussing soiled undergarments with royalty. And they said River would never amount to anything!
“You’re the queen,” River said. “What do you think we should do?”
“Set him off to sea,” Queen Thessia instructed.
River wanted to pump her fist in celebration, but she suspected it would be uncouth. “That works for me,” she said instead,
squeezing her lips together to fight back a smile.
“We will load his boat with food and supplies,” Queen Thessia added. River’s fist of joy loosened. “But we will keep him tied
up.”
The fist tightened again.
“We will do this during the dead of night,” the queen continued. “Until then, he can remain tied up here under Galwell’s supervision.
He won’t escape, but we know Galwell will not prematurely harm him, either. And perhaps, Mr. Farkenstomp, you will be able
to convince Galwell that you do not soil your undergarments forty times a day. But you will never convince me.”
Much was made of Queen Thessia’s friendly disposition and the benevolence of her rule. Even in the face of not one but two
assassins and her ex-lover—which, why was she in Galwell’s cabin, again?—she had stayed levelheaded. Everyone knew the queen to be kind,
but River never would have expected that Queen Thessia would be so . . . fun.
However, the queen was also a bit naive if she believed a man at the skill level of Dougal Farkenstomp would perish under
these circumstances. This survival challenge was the exact kind of thing a Deathrose Guild member would find enjoyable.
The queen excused herself, climbing up the ladder and leaving River, Galwell, and Dougal alone in the cabin.
Galwell looked at River with such a surprising generosity of spirit, his eyes friendly instead of angry.
His smile honest instead of cold. In that moment, River realized she couldn’t do it.
She could not kill Galwell, no matter how much it ruined her reputation.
He was too nice, too sincere. He’d helped her without reason.
He didn’t deserve it.
The problem was the solution, River realized. If she found out who in the guild was giving out these bad orders, poisoning
the minds of members who’d been around as long as Dougal had, perhaps it would be enough to not just get back in their good
graces but to take over Dougal’s position altogether. Surely the leader of the Deathrose Guild would be horrified by the way
he was behaving. He didn’t deserve to do elaborate jobs such as this one, going deep undercover and captaining a ship. It
was the kind of job that would be perfect for a woman like River, who had never been tied down to one place for very long.
Let her go live someone else’s life for months at a time. The Ghosts knew she didn’t have her own to live.
She needed to figure out what the ever-living fuck was going on with the Deathrose Guild, and she needed to do it quickly, so that no more innocent people were harmed.
“In the interest of full transparency, I did board this ship to see about killing you. But I don’t think I’ll be doing that
anymore,” River said to Galwell.
He pressed a hand to his heart. “That means a lot.”
“I don’t suppose you have room down here for one more, then?” she asked him.
“As much as I would love to provide you with lodgings, I’m afraid that Dougal will already take up what little space I have
to offer in this cabin.”
River burned with embarrassment. Why did she make such an ask in the first place?
It wasn’t like her. None of this was like her.
She’d slept in countless supply closets before, her head resting on an overturned mop bucket or a stack of discarded rags.
She could do it again. Perhaps the discomfort would set her mind straight.
River climbed up the same ladder Thessia had just used, ignoring all of the kind suggestions Galwell called out regarding
alternative sleeping arrangements. When she made it to the crew deck, she breathed a sigh of relief so deep that she could
almost taste the Sweetwater Sea on her tongue. If only she could rest here, surrounded by nothing but the cool air and the
gentle mist of rocking water. Maybe she’d finally sleep through the night.
She headed toward the ship’s railing, prepared to spend her evening watching the pink-tinged sky transform to inky black.
As long as she was on this ship, she was safe from the consequences of her actions. That gave her more peace than any good
night’s rest ever would.
“My queen, you’re injured.”
River whipped her head around, searching for the source of the voice. It couldn’t belong to whom she thought it did. Surely
not.
She saw Queen Thessia first, her spelled-blond hair shining bright against the last dregs of sunlight. “Oh, no, it’s nothing
really,” the queen said, placing a protective hand over where Dougal had nicked her.
“Who did this?” asked another voice. It was King Hugh, though none of his well-known cheeriness colored his tone. “You’re
bleeding.”
“It’s fine,” Queen Thessia said to him, curt. Then she pasted on her most queenly expression as she told the other person,
“Let’s keep this off the record, shall we?”
Thessia grabbed King Hugh’s arm and stepped to the side, revealing what River already knew in her bones to be true.
Celine Hazelton was on this Ghosts-damned ship. She had her notebook in her hand, and she was putting back the quill she seemed to always keep tucked into her bun, no longer allowed to turn Thessia’s injury into the Mythria Spectator’s next great scandal.
Unfortunately, when Thessia and Hugh walked off, they chose to walk toward River. Which meant Celine looked right at her.
Celine gasped, tossing her body in front of her queen. “You’re in grave danger! That woman is an assassin!” She pointed at
River, who was in the middle of resting her forearms on the ship’s railing as she gazed thoughtfully at the water.
Thessia patted Celine’s hand. “I know. Now if you’ll excuse me, we really must be going.”
River overheard pieces of their low, impassioned conversation as the king and queen exited, King Hugh gently pressing Queen
Thessia for more explanation, and Queen Thessia refusing to give it.
To Celine, River let out a low chuckle. “Sold me out that quickly, huh?”
“Pathetic, right?” Celine said back, a biting reference to their conversation from the other night.
River squeezed her hands together so tightly her knuckles turned white. An apology formed in her mind. One she’d never give.
She’d done what was necessary. She couldn’t have attachments. Not in her line of work. It was far better to have Celine hate
her than to have Celine think she was someone capable of being saved.
Celine came up beside her, mimicking River’s posture by slinging her arms onto the ship’s railing, her notebook dangling precariously
over the rocking waves.
“Do you plan to interview me now?” River asked. “Not sure the readers of the Mythria Spectator will be very interested in what I have to say, unless they want my opinion on our realm’s obsession with domesticating wild
animals.”
Celine pulled that damned quill from her hair. “Are you for it or against it?” she asked, hand hovering over an empty notebook
page.
“Against it,” River said. “Their nature can’t be changed.”
Celine let out a low hmm, sounding more like a heart healer than a scribe with all the implications she managed to layer into the noise. She jotted
something down. When River peered over, making no effort to disguise the fact that she was attempting to read whatever Celine
had written, Celine snapped her notebook shut.
“Are you aware that the Deathrose Guild’s last three targets have been people with no known criminal record?” she asked.
“And here I thought I was finally getting my chance to advocate for lyricats.” River staged a yawn, if only to stop herself
from looking at Celine’s face for too long. She had her brows furrowed in concentration, and River quite liked when she got
serious in that way. Really, she liked every expression Celine made. On a purely objective level, Celine had a face made for
emoting. “You shouldn’t be poking around in the business of the Deathrose Guild. It’s dangerous.”
“I know you know that Galwell is on this ship,” Celine said, ignoring the comment.
“I think everyone knows Galwell is on this ship.”
“If you have no doubts about the validity of your assignment to kill him, why haven’t you done it yet?” Celine asked.
“Who says I haven’t?”
“Have you?”
They held eye contact for far longer than River should have allowed. It was just—the sunset was doing such wonderful things
with the planes of Celine’s face, bouncing light off her rosy cheeks, adding an extra sparkle to the warmth of the brown in
her eyes. It felt so risky to be near her, heart-stopping in the exact way River had gotten addicted to long ago. But this
was far better than walking across a tightrope or flipping through the air. Those moments were fleeting. Celine was steady.
For as long as they made eye contact, the sensation sustained itself.
“No,” River admitted. “And I don’t plan to.”
Celine broke their gaze to open her notebook again. Curse River’s honesty. She should have kept lying, kept forcing Celine
to probe her with questions, staring deeper and deeper into the limitless well of her eyes.
“Tell me what you know about the Deathrose Guild and how it operates,” Celine said. With one sentence, she’d shifted into
full scribe mode. Her voice even hit a different register.
“How about this? You let me stay in your room, and I tell you a little bit about the guild,” River bargained. She would not