by Julia Knight
So was he. This was going to be fun. He’d make sure of that—fun if it killed him.
* * *
Holden paced the deck of the Glass Dagger, trying not to fret about Ilsa and keeping a keen eye on the new crew. The men settled in well enough, old hands all of them by the look of it. The leggy woman, Gilda, had caused something of a stir amongst the Remorian crew. They weren’t used to women on board, especially not women who flirted outrageously with every man with a pulse and kept the top two buttons of her bright shirt open for a fine view. Of a sudden, every man was on deck, watching as she helped with the rigging, deftly jumping from yard to yard, winking and blowing kisses to anyone near her. The way they’d all sagged when she’d left to find Ilsa was an education.
He kept an eye on Tallia too, but she’d slid into the crew like she was born to it, with no ripple or disturbance. She didn’t flirt outrageously or dress provocatively, not for a rack anyway. Her breeches were practical and not over-snug, her purple shirt fitting but not overflowing. She had a sort of enthusiastic elegance about her and her bells were never silent. The crew had made her one of their own immediately, liking her eagerness to help, her bright enthusiasm and her no-nonsense approach.
She was sitting cross-legged on the rear deck now, sorting a pile of frayed rope, seeing what could be salvaged. Holden watched her and pondered on how she’d known his name, why she made Van Gast’s little-magics itch. Holden didn’t understand those magics but he respected them. They were what had made Van Gast so impossible to catch, why everything had played out the way it had. Made him the rack to beat.
Every now and again, Tallia would look up at him and smile, tuck her dark hair behind her ear and then duck her head again. Holden found he was waiting for those smiles, that they made him want to smile just looking at them. So uncomplicated, not like with Ilsa where he was floundering in deep water with no notion how to swim.
Van Gast sauntered along Mucking Lane. He looked odd, with his hair tied back tight from his head and the few other details he’d changed that made him look like someone else so that Holden had to look twice to recognize him. He couldn’t suppress the swagger though, or the sheer vitality.
Tallia stood at the rail next to Holden. He hadn’t noticed her move. She stared with fascination at Van Gast. “So it is his ship then? His crew? I’m sailing with Van Gast?” She clapped her hands and bounced on the balls of her feet.
“You don’t sound surprised.” Holden was startled at the somber tone of his voice, the hint of accusation. The faintest twinge of jealousy.
Her sunny, open face closed in and Holden almost regretted the words. Except the Yelen were after Van Gast, and Holden wouldn’t be spared either, if it were true about the mages. He’d been a trusted lieutenant of theirs once. They didn’t forget betrayal like that. His only hope was that no word had got out, come back to them. Holden didn’t trust to hope. He didn’t trust the sudden look on Tallia’s face either, swiftly soothed away with a smile. A sly look, a glance that wondered about Holden.
“Everyone’s heard of Van Gast. Most racks would give a leg to serve on his crew, make the money he makes,” she said. “Why should I be any different? Just a shame it’s not on the Ghost.”
All of which seemed logical enough, only Tallia seemed nervous, a dark restiveness giving an edge to her eagerness.
“Do you think I could meet him? Why’s he here, anyway, when half the city is after him? Any man in those inns would turn him in for half the amount the Yelen are offering. It must be something big. Some huge twist he’s on, I bet.”
Too eager, too keen. Holden remembered how she’d taken hold of him, almost pushed him to take her on. At the time it had seemed like simple enthusiasm, and maybe Holden’s fragile new ego had savored how a woman seemed to actually like him. A refreshing change from Ilsa’s bewildered coldness, though that thought brought a wash of guilt. Now Tallia’s eagerness seemed more like calculation. She’d known who he was before he’d said, knew Van Gast even though Holden had been pushed to recognize him straightaway. And she was far too interested in Van Gast for his liking.
Her hand was on his arm again, a soft, familiar gesture that made Holden sweat. With nerves, with want, with guilt. Despite her inquisitiveness—or maybe because of it—she seemed uncomplicated, easy to be with. He didn’t have to sit and wonder “how do I do this?” as he did with Ilsa. He didn’t have to think he’d failed somehow. Her smile came ready and often, and made him smile in return, something he thought he might have forgotten how to do. But still— “Not today.”
He turned away from her disappointment, feeling oddly disappointed himself. There, coming up the gangplank, was the reason he shouldn’t be talking to Tallia this way, thinking of her that way.
His gaze sharpened as Gilda and Ilsa came aboard, talking animatedly.
Ilsa picked her elegant way onto the deck, her chestnut hair swinging between her shoulder blades. She wore a dress, something new. Not the gray Remorian shift-like dresses he was used to seeing her in, shapeless and bland, but something fitted in pale green silk. It did something to her, lit her up like a lamp, made her copper-bronze skin glow in the sun. Half the crew stopped to stare, and a pair of whistles made Ilsa blush, but she looked happy, something Holden had thought was drained away from her.
For a breathless moment Holden thought that maybe he loved her, not just because he’d been told to, bonded to. Loved her, was happy that she was happy, even if it wasn’t him who had made her so. Yet he couldn’t be sure, because he’d been told to love her by the Master and though he was dead, still, maybe it was that.
Van Gast came back on deck and Ilsa ran toward him, laughing, saying something Holden couldn’t catch. Van Gast swung her round and admired her, or maybe the dress. Ilsa laughed again, a flush on her cheeks making her delicate features light up. She went to kiss him—maybe on the cheek, maybe not—but Van dodged with ease and held her firmly away.
Ridiculous, to be envious. Van Gast had no interest in Ilsa, in any woman other than Josie—that was half the problem, was why they were here when Estovan was the last place any of them should be. Van Gast was helping Ilsa, as he’d helped Holden and the rest of the crew, in coming to terms with freedom, with choices. He pretended it was a burden, that they were beyond help, but Holden thought it had helped him as much as them.
“Is that Van Gast’s lover then?” Tallia asked.
Ah yes, the difference between lovers and a tumble. Van Gast had tried to explain this peculiar way the racks had, but Holden couldn’t quite grasp it. It was simple, Van Gast had said. You might not see your lover from one month to the next if you were on different ships, or they lived in port. Tumbles were how they dealt with it. A tumble was just who you ended up in bed with, a lover was who you loved, and you loved your lover and no other.
Every rack tumbled, or so Van Gast said—though it seemed he didn’t, only pretended to for his reputation. That had been why he’d hacked off Holden’s wrist. He’d said it was to rid Holden of the bond. But it was for jealousy, because Josie had lied, implied that she loved Holden so that he’d stop chasing Van Gast. She’d lied to save him, and Holden hadn’t been the only one who’d believed it.
“I heard he had a lover,” Tallia said, her voice oddly strained. “But I didn’t believe it. That man’s never going to be pinned down to one thing, one person, if half of what I’ve heard about him is true. Tumbles all over the place, yes, more than most racks put together. But a lover?”
Holden’s voice almost failed him, odd emotions he had no name for strangling his throat. “No, that’s not Josie. That’s my wife.”
He shouldn’t have said that, let Josie’s name out, but Tallia didn’t seem to have heard him. She’d find out soon enough anyway from the rest of the crew, who gossiped like fishwives when they thought Holden wasn’t listening. Tallia watched Ilsa with interest and a narrowing of her eyes that Holden didn’t like.
Ilsa kissed Van Gast soundly on the cheek before he could
dodge it, laughed up at him with stars in her eyes and ran down the steps to her and Holden’s quarters, her wide grin a twist in Holden’s heart. Van Gast might have no interest in Ilsa, but that didn’t mean Ilsa had no interest in Van Gast. Holden didn’t know what was in her head, or her heart. Not anymore.
Yet Holden had been doing just the same, hadn’t he? He ignored Tallia’s smile, ignored the way she tried to squeeze his fingers, and shook her hand off his arm. “You should get back to the ropes.”
He left her there and headed for his quarters, for an Ilsa he didn’t know anymore, a happy one with a blast of freedom in her smile and a look for Van Gast that she’d never spared for Holden. He’d lost Josie to Van Gast already, and he was resigned to that. He had no intention of losing Ilsa to him as well.
Chapter Six
Rillen sat in his chambers, the sultry night air thick with the scent of the trees below wafting up in a heady, sticky cloud to choke him with sweetness. The lamp behind him wavered in a snatch of breeze, flicked bronze shadows across the bare stucco walls, and then steadied as he read the note.
Have found Van Gast’s weakness, and his secret name—Andor. Will have him outside Herjan’s temple, tomorrow at sunset. I will be there to identify him.
Outside Herjan’s temple—how apt. Where Haban had kept his stall where he’d taken possession of the stolen diamond from Van Gast. Haban’s niece was doing very well so far. Rillen had to hope that Van Gast’s famous little-magics didn’t have the chance to save him. No, not hope, plan for it.
Van Gast’s secret name too—that was worth knowing, storing away for future use. A rack guarded their true name with their lives, thinking any who knew it knew them well enough to know all.
The door opened without any preamble, no knock or call. Rillen leaped to his feet, outraged and ready to berate whoever had startled him into dropping the note, sending his twisting plans awry in his head.
He stopped the instant he saw the mage in the doorway, hunched and monstrous on a platter of cushions held by two bonded slaves. Rillen’s mind went utterly blank for a heartbeat, except for one thought, clanging in his head like a death-bell. Kyr save me, he’s come to bond me.
The slaves brought the mage in, set him on the floor next to a low lounger and table where Rillen entertained visitors, or would if he had any he wished to entertain. The musty, dead smell of Remoria filled the room, overpowering even the cloying flowers floating up from the avenue, sticking in Rillen’s throat, twisting round his heart.
With all the casualness he could muster, Rillen sat on the lounger and faced the mage, but he couldn’t hide the subtle shake of his fingers. The slaves fussed over the mage a moment and then slid into the background, just furniture, for all the thought and emotion behind their eyes. Useful furniture, who did for the mage those things he could not, for fear of cracking crystals, losing power. Rillen studied the crystals rather than think about bonds, or why the mage was here, considered the eyes that hid in sparkling depths. The center mage, the one who led them. Bissan.
“Your father,” Bissan murmured, “intends to…not betray us, but to try to enslave us. To use us.”
The mage had brains behind those crystals then. Still, Rillen had best be cautious for now. “What makes you say so?”
The mage laughed, a little breath that whistled among the crags around his lips. “Not everyone but you is stupid, Rillen. We do not wish to be used, by anyone, and most especially not someone so…so limited as your father. We might be happy to ally, a true partnership. With the right person.”
Rillen tried to still the sudden burst of heartbeats, the swirl of new thoughts and plans that crushed into his head. Kyr’s mercy, if he had just one mage at his back, he could rule Estovan and the lands for leagues around. With three…he could control everything worth having.
Bissan watched him as these thoughts flashed across his mind like cannon shot, a vague smile flickering on his lips as though he knew what Rillen was thinking.
“Your father is foolish in this, though sharp in many other ways. He trades well, runs the city adequately. We require more than that, a man with flair. Who knows we can’t be enslaved.” Again, a hint of a smile, a subtle curve of a lip half-hidden. “It’s we who enslave. But not you, Rillen. We’ve learned that much. Unbonded men can go where we cannot, see what we cannot, yet. In return, we have much to offer you.”
“I see.” Rillen saw a lot possible that wasn’t before. The western coast at the mercy of Estovan, him at its head, his hands running with gold. Old Toady dead and Van Gast to blame for it, if his plans went well.
“I think—” the mage said. “No, I know that we want the same things. I’ll help you, Rillen, if you’ll help me.”
Rillen shut his eyes briefly to try to still the sudden thunder in his ears. “What help do you want?”
The mage shifted almost imperceptibly. A crystal flaked off by his chin and Rillen watched transfixed as it fell, see-sawing through the sultry air to land with a small blue spark on the tiles.
“You know more than you told your father. Tell me all you know, and I’ll help you kill him.”
* * *
Van Gast paced up and down on the violently green rug Guld had found to brighten his quarters on the Glass Dagger. Somehow it made Van Gast feel better. His mind was racing with possibilities, with questions he couldn’t answer with any surety. As always, it was almost impossible to know what Josie was thinking, what she was planning.
Josie was here for a little light robbery and revenge, Skrymir had said. Revenge against who? Him? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe she’d forgiven him, and maybe not. She’d seemed…different, but hers was the twistiest mind he’d ever known. She wasn’t planning revenge on him, she wanted his help. She’d said she’d wanted his help for a twist, a twist like he wouldn’t believe. He was sure that was the truth behind the game. If he knew where she’d berthed, where to find her, he’d have gone there quick as a hunting shark. Snuck into her quarters and persuaded her back into his bed, the way he did best.
But Guld had yet to find the old Ghost, Van’s ship that she’d stolen, and Van Gast’d had no more luck himself out on the streets. The ship wasn’t berthed in any of Josie’s usual places, and he’d heard no more than he already knew—she was in port. Other than that, she could be anywhere.
He stopped his pacing by the bed. She’d have found the Ghost’s real name by now, perhaps. Every rack ship had more than one name, like every rack. An outward name, and an inward one. For racks, only the most trusted ever got to know the inward name. For a ship, only the captain. Outwardly his old ship had been called Gast’s Ghost. Inwardly, it was something quite different, a name in this case etched behind the bed head.
Van Gast hadn’t quite got used to a different ship, not yet. The way the Glass Dagger moved to the swell, how far or fast he could push it, all its little quirks that made it seem as alive as any woman, and as unpredictable. But he’d made a start on its secret name, on turning this from a Remorian trader to a rack ship, through and through. He pulled away the bed head and got out his knife, thinking as he carved.
A little light robbery, and revenge. The excuse he’d given Holden for coming here—unbelieved—was that in the chaos they could earn good, hard cash. True enough, in and of itself. Racks could smell an opportunity from leagues away, and now they were swarming round Estovan.
But Josie wasn’t after just the small scams, he was pretty sure of that. Her twisty mind wouldn’t bother with them. Neither would he, usually. Something big, that was what she was after. Mind on a big twist, Skrymir had said, and she’d said much the same herself. The man who’d died at Bilsen was Yelen, and now Josie was going to twist his brother.
Which was madness. The Yelen ruled this city with a rod of iron and a bloody blade, at least within the city walls. Things were a bit more freeform in the delta, true, but because they allowed it, because they knew it was good for trade and the money dealt out here would, as often as not, end up in the coffers
of the licensed traders, one way or another.
The Yelen were the law here, and they kept that law with teeth and guards and guile. Even Van Gast didn’t pickpocket inside the city walls. He liked his hands where they were. The guards were implacable, keen-eyed and—acolytes of the god Oku to a man—utterly unbribable. The gods themselves couldn’t steal so much as a copper fish-head from the Yelen and live to tell about it. Even thinking about it was stupid.
Van Gast found he was grinning. Stupid, but thrilling. To be the rack who stole from the Yelen and lived. Or rather, one of the pair. Him and Josie—together no one could beat them, never had been able to, and that was what he had to show her, that apart they were nothing, together they were unstoppable.
He started on the next letter of the name, his hands moving on their own as he thought. How to get in? You had to get into the city, into the palace, and not be suspicious, not look like a rack. Josie had always had trouble with that, with her fair hair and those braids. Unmistakable. The city was hard enough for her to get into without being noticed, and getting into the palace would be a thousand times harder.
Van Gast though, Van Gast could blend in smooth as silk, something they’d used time and again in their scams. Shame all his gear was on the Ghost. He’d have to improvise. He leaped to his feet, almost laughing with the thrill of it. All of a sudden this was no longer about getting Josie back, getting his ship back, his life back. This was about him doing what he did best, and laughing while he did it. The stupid-but-exciting thing, always. He didn’t know quite how yet, but he was going to scam the Yelen until their teeth bled.
