Among Thieves

by M. J. Kuhn

  “Whoever you are working with, Miss Grayson, do they know what you are?” He smiled coldly, showing off tiny, brown-rimmed teeth. “Think of all the proper Adept that had to die to create this poor imitation,” he said. He tightened his right hand into a fist, and Ryia’s breaths reduced to whining gasps. “What would they do to you if they did? If your little secret got out, do you really think I would be the only one hunting you?” He tightened his fist even more. On the ground, Ryia’s face began to purple. “This is mercy, Miss Grayson. A quick death at my hand is far kinder than what someone more curious might do.”

  Fear and amazement and a dozen other emotions swirled through Evelyn’s mind as she watched from the cover of the immaculately trimmed shrub. Ryia, the infamous Butcher of Carrowwick, the woman who had tossed two Disciples aside like rag dolls back in Dresdell, was completely powerless here.

  The Guildmaster raised his other hand, and Ryia rose, stiff, from the ground. The Butcher’s neck muscles spasmed frantically, eyes wild. She was about to die, and she knew it.

  “Goodbye, Miss Grayson,” the Guildmaster said. He drew one hand back, as though preparing to stab forward with an invisible sword.

  “Stop!” Without thinking, Evelyn sprang out into the courtyard. Ryia’s bulging eyes clouded with confusion as they met hers. Shit. Now they were just both going to die. Well, she wasn’t going to go down without a fight, at least. She pulled Ryia’s axe from her belt and flung it toward the Guildmaster.

  The axe flipped end over end, heading straight for her target. But in the end, it betrayed her. The weapon skidded to a halt inches from the Guildmaster’s pallid flesh, then sped away, straight toward Ryia’s throat.

  Evelyn tried to lunge forward—to do what, she wasn’t sure—but her legs were suddenly frozen in place, anchored to the ground by the Guildmaster’s power. Unexpected emotion clawed up her throat as she prepared to watch the Butcher die.

  Ryia gritted her teeth. The muscles in her arms flexed and convulsed until she finally tore one free of the Guildmaster’s invisible grasp with a feral growl. She threw her newly free hand in front of her, glaring at the axe. The weapon wobbled on its trajectory, then fell to the dirt beside her.

  The Guildmaster smiled. “Who might this be?” He beckoned forward with one finger, and Evelyn began to slide across the ground against her will, dragged toward him on an invisible string.

  Evelyn watched as he shifted his weight. There was a glint of silver at the waist of the Guildmaster’s robes, tucked beneath the fluid silk. He held his left hand back out toward Ryia, squeezing his fist tight. Ryia gasped again, but Evelyn caught another glimpse of the thing tucked in the Guildmaster’s belt. It was another one of Ryia’s axes. The one she had given Ivan this morning. The Guildmaster must have picked it up in the arena.

  “Ryia!” Evelyn shouted.

  “Ryia?” the Guildmaster asked. “Is that your name, or Miss Grayson’s newest title?”

  Evelyn thrashed against the Guildmaster’s invisible bonds, but nothing happened. She met Ryia’s eye, then stared meaningfully at the Guildmaster’s waist. The Butcher had a strong connection to those axes of hers… but what ruddy good did that do anyone when both of them were frozen? They were nothing more than a pair of puppets on the Guildmaster’s magical strings. He could probably kill them both with a snap of his fingers if he wanted to.

  “No matter. Soon it will—” The Guildmaster broke off mid-sentence, confused as a low crack rumbled through the air. His eyes flicked toward the deep purple sky as multicolored sparks rained down toward the sea to the east.

  It only broke his focus for an instant, but an instant was all Ryia needed. The tendons in her neck looked tight enough to snap as she wrenched her arms forward, crooking her hands into rigid talons. Still suspended a few inches above the ground, she yanked back with one hand. The axe flew from the Guildmaster’s belt, flinging itself up toward his thick neck.

  Evelyn swore she saw fear in the Guildmaster’s eyes as he looked down from the sky. He pushed back with his own power, redirecting the axe, but he was too late. The blade slashed him across the face, releasing a gout of deep red blood. He staggered backward, and Ryia ground her teeth, reeling the axe into her waiting palm.

  In shock, the Guildmaster raised a hand to his face. Then he deflated, collapsing to the grass. Evelyn sagged forward, and Ryia fell to the ground as the invisible ties holding them in place evaporated.

  Evelyn doubted the wound had been fatal, but that axe blade had been absolutely drenched in dormire’s blood. The sleeping drug was highly effective, even against poison-immune Kinetics.

  Evelyn shook out her newly freed arms, running the last few steps to where Ryia lay, collapsed on the ground.

  “Are you okay?”

  The Butcher’s chest heaved as Evelyn rolled her over. Ryia was in bad shape. Her eyes were puffy and swollen. Blood dripped from both nostrils and down the side of her shaven head. She looked so fragile, lying there. So vulnerable. The illusion didn’t last long. Evelyn ducked back as Ryia bolted upright, aiming an exhausted punch at her shoulder.

  “Attacking the Guildmaster? Are you insane? What the fuck did you do that for?”

  Evelyn opened her mouth, then shut it again. She didn’t have an answer. It would have been easier to run—smarter to run. But in that moment she had known she couldn’t leave the Butcher behind. Even now she felt it, the pull toward the mercenary. A mix of fascination, sympathy, and something stronger.

  Ryia pushed herself to her feet, walking to stand over the Guildmaster’s prone, unconscious form. She hefted her axe. “Do you know how long I have been waiting for this?” she asked no one in particular, holding the bit to his throat.

  The bushes to Evelyn’s right rustled. Before she even had the chance to look, her hands were snared again, this time by thick, robed arms. Shit. The Guildmaster might be out cold, but this courtyard was still crawling with Disciples. Hundreds of the strongest Kinetics and Sensers in Thamorr. Evelyn grunted, her skirts tearing as she wrenched herself around to meet her captor’s steady gaze.

  “To me!” he called, summoning his fellow Kinetics. “I’ve got one of them!” He pulled his scimitar free of its scabbard, preparing to whip it across Evelyn’s throat.

  “Duck left!” Ryia rasped.

  Evelyn didn’t question the order, diving immediately to the left. Something small and silver whistled over her shoulder as she crashed to the ground.

  An instant later, the Disciple fell to the grass beside her, blood pooling around the axe bit embedded in his neck.

  “Run, you idiot!” Ryia shouted, darting past her. She grabbed the second axe from where Evelyn had thrown it and took off running again, heading straight for the courtyard wall. “They’ll be all over us in seconds.”

  “But the Guildmaster—” Evelyn said.

  “No time. Let’s go.”

  Evelyn pulled the axe from the Disciple at her feet, tucking it into her skirt. Her dyed hair flew free of its braid, frizzing into chaotic ringlets as she sprinted to catch up with the Butcher.

  “Go where?” she asked.

  “Still working on that.”

  “Brilliant,” Evelyn griped.

  “I’ve been waiting to kill that son of a bitch for a long time. Don’t make me regret saving your ass instead.”

  Evelyn opened her mouth to retort, but nothing came out.

  “Shit,” Ryia muttered, dragging them behind a half wall as another set of Kinetics marched past. “They’re everywhere. We need a—” Her eyes glimmered as another flash split the dusk, another crackling boom ringing out over the island. Evelyn’s stomach flipped as a grin spread across Ryia’s face. “That brilliant Borean son of a bitch.”

  “What?” Evelyn asked, struggling to keep up with her unnatural pace.

  “We’re getting off this island.”

  “How?” The docks were no doubt locked down by now, crawling with nearly as many Disciples as the courtyard, and the only other way off the isla
nd was a steep drop off the towering cliff on the far side of the courtyard walls surrounding them. If the fall didn’t kill them, the drowning certainly would.

  “This way,” Ryia said, pelting toward the eastern wall of the courtyard. “Can you climb these?” she asked, pointing at the skinny vines snaking up the wall.

  Great. So the Butcher had chosen the cliff, then.

  “Are you mental?”

  “Generally speaking.”

  “The only thing on the far side of that wall is a hundred-foot drop-off into the—” Ryia streaked past her, scuttling up the wall. “—ocean,” she finished lamely.

  Letting out an exasperated breath, she grabbed hold of the vines, pulling herself up as quickly as her rope-burned hands would allow.

  She panted as she reached the top of the wall, looking out at the place where the seemingly endless ocean met the darkened sky. The Butcher just stood there, staring down at the Luminous Sea. Then she said, “Do you trust me, Captain?”

  “Do I trust you?” Evelyn asked. Her cheeks heated, and she averted her eyes. “Absolutely not.”

  Ryia nodded, rivulets of blood still coursing down the side of her head. “Probably for the best.”

  The Butcher latched on to Evelyn’s wrists without warning. Then she leapt off the edge of the cliff, dragging them both down into the crashing waves below.

  30

  RYIA

  The fall lasted only a few seconds. Short, sure, but long enough to be painfully aware that they might be her last few seconds. Especially if that firework hadn’t meant what she thought it meant.

  Her breath was squeezed from her lungs as she slammed into the unforgiving surface of the sea. She treaded water, fighting to keep her head up.

  “You all right there, Captain?” she called out. No response. “Evelyn?” Still nothing.

  Shit. The salt water burned and stung her wounds as she thrashed and spun. There. A pale shape lay faceup in the water some fifteen feet away, surrounded by rent silk and seeping black hair dye like blood.

  “Honestly, you’d think she’d never jumped off a cliff before,” Ryia grumbled, kicking toward her.

  She looped one arm around Evelyn’s middle. Ivan’s powder had washed off, leaving her face as scarred and freckled as it had been the first time she had seen her in the Bobbin Fort courtyard.

  “Captain…” Ryia shook her, but she just lay there, limp as a worm. Maybe that dark cloud spreading out from her wasn’t all dye.

  She tucked her left arm underneath Evelyn’s armpits, swimming with her right and struggling to keep both their heads above water. “If I lost my chance to slit that fucker’s throat just so you could die five minutes later, I’m going to be so pissed.”

  Ryia panted, tossing her head to keep the blood from dripping into her swollen eyes as she searched the darkening waters. “Any second now, Ivan.” If the waves didn’t get them, the sharks would. They probably looked like a feast at the moment.

  But then she heard it: the hollow slap of waves against wood.

  She wheeled around to see a tiny rowboat. And sitting on the bench, his blond hair plastered to his perfect fucking face, was Ivan Rezkoye.

  “Either I am brilliant, or you are a verdammte fool,” Ivan said, grabbing on to Evelyn’s shoulders and hauling her into the boat.

  “How do you figure?” Ryia asked, pushing Evelyn’s legs over the side one by one.

  “Either you caught my signal, or you were fool enough to jump off a cliff without knowing anyone would catch you at the bottom.” Ivan gestured toward Evelyn. “What is wrong with her?”

  “Not sure.” Ryia pulled herself aboard, kneeling by Evelyn’s still form and pressing an ear to her chest. There was still a heartbeat there, and her chest rose and fell with ragged breaths. “She’s still alive, though. Did Nash make it?”

  Ivan pointed south. There were already a number of ships dotting the horizon, but one mast stood several yards shorter than the rest. The Hardship. A grin started to creep up Ryia’s cheeks, but she stopped it in its tracks. What the hell did she have to be happy about?

  If your little secret got out, do you really think I would be the only one hunting you?

  The Guildmaster’s taunt echoed in her skull. She hated him. Even more than that, she hated that he was right. If the kingdoms of Thamorr discovered Adept could be made? That anyone could be given those powers if they were willing to pay the price?

  If that secret got out, a quick death would be merciful compared to the inevitable studies and experiments. The curious men who would cut her open just to see how she worked. Steal her blood, like the blood of all the Adept her father had killed in order to create her.

  She snuck a peek down at Evelyn, still unconscious at her feet. Now there was one more person who knew that damning secret—and Ryia hadn’t silenced her. In fact, she had saved Evelyn’s life instead.

  Why the hell had she done that?

  “Have you seen Tristan?” Ivan asked, looking up at the cliff top as the last threads of sunlight were swallowed by the night. “Nash said he was not in the dungeon.”

  “You’d have to ask Wyatt Asher—little bastard answers to him now.”

  Ivan’s lips tightened. “And the Quill?”

  “Gone.”

  The word stung like venom. She’d been so close, had her freedom at her fingertips, and somehow she’d let it slip right through.

  Ryia grabbed a second oar, dipping it into the water. “More on that later; for now let’s get the hell out of here, shall we?”

  She didn’t spare a single glance for the island as they wove their way south through the waves.

  * * *

  IT DIDN’T take them long to reach the cog, anchored in the shallows off the coast of a small Brillish island. Ivan caught the tow line as Nash threw it toward them.

  “What’s wrong with the captain?” she asked, eyeing Evelyn’s limp form on the bottom of the boat.

  “Knocked out,” Ryia said. “She’ll bounce back.” She hoped that was true. Why did she hope that was true? A living, conscious Evelyn could spill her darkest secret.… What was wrong with her?

  Nash nodded, then peered back at the boat again. “No sign of Tristan?”

  “Oh, we had more than a sign of him.” Ryia pointed back toward the Guildmaster’s island with her chin. “You can thank him and Tana Rafferty for that bullshit.”

  “He’s with Asher now?” Nash grimaced, helping Ivan onto the deck. “I was afraid of that.”

  “You saw this coming… how, exactly?” Ryia said, rolling her eyes.

  “Never really trusted the son of a bitch.”

  “And you are normally very trusting of con men?” Ivan asked, grabbing Evelyn’s still-unconscious form as Ryia hefted her up.

  “That’s just it, though,” Nash said, laying Evelyn out on the deck and reaching back to help Ryia aboard. “He never really felt like a real con man, did he? Something was always a little off.”

  The Saint of Soaps, they’d called him. He had washed up in Carrowwick surrounded by filthy freebooters, but he had looked like he had just stepped out of a Gildesh bathhouse.

  A frail cough interrupted Ryia’s line of thought. Her stomach flipped as she turned to see Evelyn stirring, a callused hand reaching up to cradle her sopping head.

  “Good to see I didn’t drag a corpse all this way,” Ryia said.

  “I’m not dead yet.” Evelyn touched her forehead, examining the blood on her fingers. “Not for your lack of trying, obviously.” She blinked blankly for a few seconds, then suddenly pushed herself up to her elbows. Panic rose in Ryia’s chest, but all Evelyn said was, “Tristan! He—”

  “Is a traitor, yes, we know this already,” Ivan interrupted. Evelyn tried to start talking again, but Ivan held up a hand. “What we do not know is how a vretch like Tana Rafferty managed to get the best of both of you.” He looked between them, arms folded. “Well?”

  Ryia avoided Evelyn’s eye in the silence that followed. Why hadn’t
she just let her die? She’d had so many chances.

  “You said it yourself. Tristan was a bloody traitor,” Evelyn finally said.

  “Rafferty got the jump on you?” Nash asked. “Both of you?”

  Ryia narrowed her eyes at Evelyn. Why was she covering for her?

  “Rub it in all you want, Nash. Rafferty’s a quick little gutter rat. Nimble,” Ryia said, forcing a wink at Ivan and belting on her axes. “Almost makes you wonder what she’s like at certain other activities.…”

  Ivan looked exasperated, and Nash thrust a hand out.

  “You’re not getting off that easy here.”

  “What’s your problem?”

  “What’s my problem?” Nash asked. “My problem is that Ivan and I almost got killed. Everyone on this job almost got killed, and I think you knew that was going to happen.”

  Ryia let out a bark of laughter, stomach sinking at the accusation. “You think I’m with Wyatt Asher? I thought you knew me better than that.”

  Nash reached out, grabbing Ryia’s chin as she moved to turn away. “Wyatt Asher? No, I think you’re in much deeper shit than that. Would you care to explain yourself?”

  Ryia cast a pointed glare at Nash’s hand, still pinning her chin in place. “Would you care to calm the hell down?” This was a far cry from the we’re all a team—we have to save Tristan bullshit from last night. How quickly things turned.

  “Explanation. Now.”

  Ryia ducked out of the smuggler’s grasp, pulling one of the large hatchets from her back and leveling it at Nash’s throat. “I usually only explain myself one way. I don’t think you’d enjoy it.”

  “Quit fucking around,” Nash said without flinching. “Why does the Guildmaster know who you are?”

  Ryia’s weapon dropped to her side. She felt like she’d been clubbed across the temples. How would Nash know about her history with the Guildmaster? “What?”

  Ivan pursed his lips. “He recognized your axe.” He shared a look with Nash that told Ryia the pair had already discussed this. Stupidly, that felt like a betrayal. “You know what this Quill does. You know why it is worth a verdammte fortune.”