Wicked gods book one, p.37
Wicked Gods: Book One, page 37
Sweats gathered over the whole of me—that godsdamned coal stove is practically shriveling the air.
With narrow focus, I begin to wiggle my toes and attempt to flex my fingers. It's slow work, painful after being stuck in one position for so long, even on a soft bed. Pins and needles shred my hands. Impatience seeps through me, tangling in my stomach like a layer of thorns. This is taking forever. Who knows how long the Mad Queen’s dinner will last, how soon Rhyland and Sabre and whoever else went with will return. At that point hopes of escaping quickly dwindle from improbable to impossible.
I grit my teeth hard. Fucking move.
A drunk, head rushing sensation overtakes me when I manage to sit up. The bed sways precariously and I grip the edge of it, seething when the clarity settles in.
That fucking pirate. How dare he.
Nettled groans slip from my mouth as I fight my way onto unsteady legs and stagger around the cabin like a fawn fresh from its mother. Overhead, the lantern sways in time with the rocking of the harbored ship and I think I may vomit. Bile coats the rear of my throat but nothing comes up and after a moment of repetitive dry swallowing, I lumber over to a bucket of freshwater in the corner, heave it up by the rough frayed rope handle, and slosh it maliciously within the small coal stove.
The orange embers hiss out dying breaths. Steaming smoke billows around me and I wear it for a moment as a victory shroud. The pungent smell of smoldered flame burns in my nose and I wave a hand in front of my face, shooing it back and coughing.
Why was he keeping it so damn hot anyway?
“Good riddance.” The word comes out garbled and slurred, thick around the taste of smoke and lingering bile.
I toss the empty bucket aside and step toward the pile of spilled blankets, noting how my spasming muscles have quieted to slight quivers now. It’s easier to control my movements. I lower myself onto the foot of the swinging bed, watching the smoke clear. My chin drops into my open palm, propped at the elbow on my thigh, and I glare at the small stove.
Why was he tending to it so tediously? The question keeps butting against me like a cat seeking affection. The days have been sweltering, the nights frigid, but on a ship with limited resources it just wouldn’t make sense to keep it burning in the heat of the afternoons and evenings. Yet, he did without pause. Rhyland isn’t wasteful. There must be a reason.
I rise again, only to kneel a few steps from the stove so I can peek into the covered metal basin, slitted with an opening large enough to push coal chips through and maybe a hand, if it’s small.
Something within glints and my heart stutters a beat.
There’s no way…he wouldn’t leave it here, would he?
The metal stove is a far cry from cooled, but I shove my palm inside anyway, ignoring the burning pain that springs to life. I guess my skin is only immune to the everflame, not man made heat. My fingers graze ashes and clumps of rough coal until they bump something smooth, its edges cold to the touch. I grasp it and shimmy my hand back before wrenching it free.
A cool, clefted fragment of obsidian rests in my palm. Embedded within it, a brilliant sapphire that hums with raw energy. I've no idea which power this gem holds. The ruby in the piece from the cave had been as much a surprise to me as any, bolstering my magick the way it did. Feeding me life when I was near death. I need to be careful with this one; it could be anything. Destruction. Death. The gods are twisted creatures.
Tentatively, I pocket the shard then cast a look at the door. Who’s guarding it? Briggs? Reave? The grey haired twins? Whoever it is, Rhyland must be confident they can restrain me and the pirate is rarely wrong. Blunt force doesn’t seem the best option, or the most discrete. I drift to the window, shove the drapes aside and peer out over the water, deep cerulean giving way to dusk as the shadows begin to lay claim over it. In earnest, I try to get the lock unlatched and wrench the thing open but it doesn’t budge. Maybe sealed with a spell? Or maybe I’m just not strong enough. The glass could be pried from the frame. I’m sure something in here would work to do it, but then it would be a drop into the deep harbor. There’s a stale sort of hope that maybe, maybe my magick would kick in and save me from drowning again, but it’s a steep gamble. Worth Máma’s life? Absolutely. Yet my heart is still a savage beat within me at the idea.
My gaze runs over the captain's quarters and the gears in my mind begin a careful turning. I need a plan, at least a loose one. Pacing seems like a good place to start. I allow myself a few moments, garnering my strength and balance back. Testing the taut muscle that cords my arms and legs. Stable enough, I decide. There’s a velvet sack in the corner that I imagine—like the teacups and fine mirror—was taken during one claim of spoils or another. Smooth and silky under my touch with threaded gold rope, the sack is a bit of a flashy eyesore, but it will work. I spill its contents on the desk—a handful of silver eyrir, a strung pearl necklace— and start working to refill it with a set of clothes from my trunk, balled tight. I don’t own much else but don’t hesitate to skim a few silver eyrir off the top I’m sure my husband won’t miss. He owes me a safe trip back to Helgate, afterall.
Now comes the trickiest part. Rowan. I can’t leave her again. I can’t run without her like I did those years ago from Blossom House. She’s coming with—tooth and nail. Iron and rose. I’ll claw my way over the ocean floor, drag myself onto the sand beach and slip back onto the ship. How I’ll evade the crew is a problem for later me. The me that somehow manages to survive the plunge and the seawater. After all that, if Rowan comes willingly, we can make for the city streets. Hide and then figure out a way to enter the games. No, I don’t have riches, but I’d wager the Mad Queen is a betting woman. That if I made a deal with her, a gamble with the crown piece I hold, she’ll let me participate.
Gods, it’s such a laughable, stupid plan. But it’s all I have. Rhyland lied, twisted and used me. His promise to help my móðir is likely more of the same bullshit. Sometimes, a woman has to take matters into her own hands.
An echo of doubt gilds the corners of my mind. Will Rowan choose me over Sabre? Is going back for her worth the risk when she might resist? It’s a dark, tepid thought.
Trust no one.
But fuck, I don’t care. I can’t leave her, I won’t. She came back for me on the cove. Took a beating, a bullet. Sacrificed her freedom and everything she’d worked for with the Sisters of Silence.
I lift the hand mirror, prepared to use the pointed silver handle as a means to crack the window, slowly, chip by chip, when two resounding thuds sound on the other side of the door. I freeze, and even the wild beat of my heart seems to cease.
There’s a heavy pause and then the burnished doorknob rattles quietly. I lower onto my knees. Drop the mirror and crawl for the bed, flinging myself back on it to lie as still as I was when Sabre hit me with her sigil spell. A faint clicking and the wood hinges creak. Someone steps inside, two sets of feet, one soft, one heavy. My eyes that were crammed shut fling open. The curiosity is too much but it’s quickly sated when someone hovers over me, her long red braid slipping off her shoulder to hang an inch or so above my nose.
“Vale?” Rowan whispers.
I sit up fast, head going woozy and dark for it, to blink at her in utter disbelief.
“Rowan?”
The figure behind her shifts. They’re both cloaked in heavy green capes with hoods deep enough to shadow most of their faces, but he pulls it back, revealing sandy brown hair and clear green eyes.
“Cyprian? What in the four realms is going on?”
Cyprian rushes forward and urges me to my feet. “There’s no time to explain, but I remember once I promised to help you. From the beginning, I didn’t agree with his plans for you. Once Rowan told me you’d been locked in here I knew we needed to act before he gets his hands on the Queen's crown piece. Before there’s no stopping him.” From his cloak pocket, he withdraws a small vile, uncorks it and presses it to my lips. “Drink this, it will help with the effects of Sabre’s rune casting.”
The bitter liquid washes over my tongue, acidic and tingling. I swallow it down with little choice in the matter.
Rowan smooths back some hair from my head, nodding along with Cyprian’s words, a look of fleeting pain crossing her face. “He’s right, Vale. Rhyland’s been using you this whole time. Sabre all but spelled it out for me. I—I thought I loved her, but she’s just as bad as he is. These gods, godlings—whatever—they don’t have the capacity to care about anything. Or anyone.”
I cringe at the fluttering, the awareness that spreads over the rune burned into my chest. She doesn’t know, of course. I haven’t told her what I am. Clearly Rhyland has kept the little detail to himself as well if Cyprian wasn’t informed.
My expression must not look convinced enough because the young navigator persists. “There is more at work than you’re aware of. Movements, factions, people coming together and working against the tyranny of the gods. Ireus, Trine, the other families. They toy with us mere mortals like we’re nothing. Less than nothing. Now they want to spread Centurism across all the realms like a disease to make the god of gods more powerful than ever. Rhyland wants the crown so he can overthrow his mother and father to claim it all for himself. He won't use it to help you…if that's what you're hoping.”
Less than nothing. That part really stings. It was those exact words Rhyland used to describe how he felt about me when we first met. I’d been nothing to him, as inconsequential as soft wind. But we’d learned better, hadn’t we? What life without that wind would spell, even for gods. It almost killed us all on this ship.
Something sparks bright within me, a hope perhaps. A chance for a better world. Maybe something can be done. Maybe I can save Máma and somehow help take down the godly hierarchy that started all of this…if I can just fool the trickster god after getting Máma out of his clutches.
I hesitate only a moment before nodding, let Cyprian lift and support my weight.
Aizen and Archer are out cold on the deck. Nicklas and Toby too.
“What did you do to them?” I whisper as we pass.
The corner of Cyprian’s mouth pulls down in a grimace. “I swiped an elixir from Mattias’ surgery. Mixed it into the crew’s rum. They’ll be fine. Maybe a light headache when they wake.”
An eerie prickle bristles down my spine when we pass more of them, familiar faces out cold. The heaving of their chests—rise and fall and rise again—is a comfort, but leaving the Nightingale so vulnerable seems wrong somehow. The feeling isn’t enough to stop me though. Not when a chance at escape has practically hurled itself into my lap and with Rowan, too. Perhaps my bad luck is finally running out.
I can’t help but revel in the knowledge that the distance between us hadn’t meant much. That when it came to it, she would still protect me as I would her, even when it meant betraying Sabre. But when my foot lifts to step off the gangway onto the wide dock, an awful shock jolts my stomach. I turn my head and stare back at the Nightingale, the dark wood, her rolled sails. That magnificent avian figurehead.
A sort of fuck you to his father. Rhyland’s voice is there, an echo, a ghost, a dream lancing my thoughts. Piercing the very core of me. Can I really do this?
He went from my captor, to my husband, to my lover and now—my enemy? No. That isn’t the right word. A dark, relentless part of me refuses to write him off so quickly. It will take time to come to terms with everything. To sort through the lies and half truths and distinguish if any of it was real.
Salty wind blows at my back as if to urge me forward. Rowan’s turned, watching me with warm brown eyes and an offered hand. I take it and we trail after Cyprian, slipping into the shadows of the city.
Umbra, Staygia’s capital, is easily twice the size of Helgate. The outskirts are slum-ish, full of makeshift homes and dirty streets pocketed by filth and washed up driftwood. Cyprian doesn’t lead us toward the bronze gate at the heart, but rather to this poorer district surrounding the high wall.
“What’s the plan?” I ask breathlessly. We’ve been walking for ages into the night, avoiding the Mad Queen’s patrolling guard and straggler citizens drunk on spirits and their excitement for the coming games. Part of me wonders if Rhyland’s made it back yet to find the crew out cold, his quarters empty of a prisoner.
The crown piece is heavier in my pocket. I haven’t brought it up yet, wise enough to be weary of Cyprian. This could be a test of trust from the pirate god, in which case I’ve already failed epically.
“Just a bit further,” Cyprian murmurs over his broad shoulder.
We pause at the mouth of an alley that bridges one street to another, and he peers around the corner before motioning it’s safe to move ahead. The gritty walkway crunches beneath my boots. Our path is shadowed, lit only by pools of warm orange that drips from shop windows. We pass two taverns, an apothecary—the sickly scent of something sweet bleeding out from it.
“What exactly is a bit further?” A question that would have been better suited before I stepped off the ship with him, but time was of the essence.
Somewhat nervously, I reach up, fingers ghosting the rune still imprinted on the skin behind my ear before working to tame my wild hair into a tight twist so that the tendrils quit brushing my skin like the cold fingers of a dead man.
“The northern harbor. A man with a ship is waiting there. He can get us home,” Rowan offers, squeezing my arm. She gives me a quiet knowing look. Home to me has never been Helgate, but I do need the crown piece buried there. “Cyprian said he makes the journey from here to Ethirya often, and takes on passengers without asking too many questions.”
“That’s all well and good, but I can't leave yet,” I say.
Cyprian shushes us as two men stagger by, leaning into one another. When the way is clear, we move across an empty street toward a low scatter of buildings, their walls flat and rough. Less remarkable than the marble spread along the sprawling main harbor where everything was smoothed pillars and vaulting arches. Here the poorer harbor district, a maze of weathered brick and timber, speaks of hard labor and salt-laced winds, a world away from the palatial city center, a saccharine peel covering bruised fruit. Crooked shacks and stalls for fishmongers line the stone dotted pathways that vein out from the narrow street. The smell of yesterday’s catch gets caught in my nose and turns my stomach.
Cyprian finally speaks, now that we’re well away from the babble. “I assure you, Avalon, getting out of Staygia is in your best interest. Talon will hunt you the moment he realizes you’re gone, and if he finds you—” The navigator swallows. “There will be no quarter. No mercy.”
Don’t mistake my mercy for your strength.
I have to shake it off—the pirate’s words, the emotions grappling for a foothold inside of me, warring with each other. I believed I loved him, fiercely.
“I know you think he loves you.” Can he somehow glean my thoughts, read my mind? I turn my face away as he continues, “He’s a god. Deception has been his forte since he started toddling amongst the stars. He used your emotions to get exactly what he wanted, when he wanted. You were eating straight from his palm.”
A flicker of anger licks just below my sternum. I want to tell him he’s wrong, that he doesn’t know Rhyland at all, but how foolish would that be, when clearly I’m the one who’s been tricked yet again? “You don’t understand,;I don’t want to stay for him. I need to enter the games. I need to win the crown piece.”
They both stare at me as though I’ve sprouted wings and a trunk.
“You have nothing to enter with,” Cyprian says with a strained edge of impatience, like speaking to a child who just isn’t quite grasping the threat of danger that lurks at the edge of the wood. Who keeps waddling back for pretty stones and acorns.
Run, his eyes scream. Run, run, run.
And how did I not see it? How absolutely dangerous Rhyland is? As though I’ve been blind until this moment. Playing the gods's games—losing all the while.
My throat aches and my fingers twitch toward the coal-stove crown piece, but I don’t tug it free. Don’t drag it into the street light. Not yet.
“I—I’ll figure it out.”
Rowan shakes her head, the current of her long red hair damp with sweat that catches the glow. “Let’s secure passage before it’s too late. After that, we’ll see what can be done about getting you into the games.” She hesitates—soft lines form between her eyebrows. “Please?”
She knows I can’t deny her and perhaps I shouldn’t. Getting her out of here is a priority, even if I have to slip away after seeing her safely onto the returning ship.
“Alright, lead the way.”
They both seem satisfied enough. Cyprian takes up the head again. We pass the empty stalls, barrels leaking ripe fish guts, and keep walking to a section of the district that feels long abandoned. A shipyard, I realize, quite quickly when the hulking shadows take form. Half built structures are held up by strong wooden beams to keep them steady until they’re finished. Pine tar and pitch replace the rank smell of fish and salted oysters. A smaller harbor sits in the distance; a scatter of ships bobbing near docks on the inky tide.
At the center of the ring of skeletal ships, a lone warehouse rises in the dim light, planks of rotted wood and rusted iron holding it together, and I’m quite certain a stiff breeze could blow it over. The sign overhead hangs from a single chain, the other corroded and broke loose, reading: Salt Wind Shipping Co.: Finest ships this side of the Dread!
It’s almost pathetic compared to the grandeur of the main harbor. Cyprian pushes in the faded green door, fissured with chipping paint. Its hinges creak and groan so loud there’s little doubt whoever’s inside knows we are here now.
“Barlot!” Cyprian’s sudden shout into the silence makes me flinch.
I breathe in deep, clutching Rowan’s hand. Wood rot and dust perfume the air as we move further in behind Cyprian. Chains hang from the ceiling, dirt and a layer of dried salt coats the floor. It’s so dark I can’t see much of anything past that.
