by Bianca D’Arc
The girl giggled, and he noticed Rivka was looking at him strangely. Perhaps she hadn’t thought he could unbend enough to be kind to a little girl. He’d hoped to put her more at ease, and it looked like it had worked.
“Papa said to listen for the name Fisk and remember all we heard. Well, the meal was over, and the men were leaving, but three were the last out of the room. One said something about Fisk, and the other two quickly hushed him, saying that he knew better than to use the master’s name. They’d all been drinking heavily, you see. Papa says three flagons of ale will loosen just about any tongue—and brain, too.” She giggled at what must have been an oft-repeated saying in her family. “The man scoffed at his friends, saying it didn’t matter, anyway, because the master was already far from here and the rest of them would keep pursuit at bay, chasing ghosts for days and days.”
Liam nodded. This meshed well with what he’d been able to learn. The girl had little more to tell them, but Rivka questioned her until she had a good description of each of the men who had been in the room. Liam listened with half an ear while his mind examined the facts, as he knew them.
When Rivka told Min she could go, the little girl came over to Liam, her palm open with the coin still in it, offering it back to him. He stifled his surprise and smiled at the girl.
“It is yours, Min,” he told her. “My gift to you for your service.”
Min’s eyes lit up as her little hand closed over the heavy silver coin. “Thank you, sir!”
She practically bounced out of the room, so great was her joy. Liam thought she was happier with the image of the virkin than the silver itself. Trinkets were important to children at that age, he recalled. He used to send all sorts of things home for Livia while he was on his travels.
“That was well done,” Rivka told him as she joined him at the table. Min had left the room, closing the door behind herself.
“It’s not hard to be kind to a child,” he said, a bit put out that she might’ve thought he’d be curt or mean to the little one.
Rivka said nothing as they both sat down at the table. They ate quietly for a while, hungry from their labors, apparently. Liam thought through what Min had told them and how it meshed with what he’d been able to learn. Once he had it straight in his mind, he spoke.
“My people say Fisk’s crew has split into many smaller groups,” he told her.
Rivka looked up, surprise in her gaze. “That jives with what Min told us—if that group was one of the smaller components of his crew.”
“I believe it was. Fisk is taking the page North, but he’s confusing his trail so we won’t know who to follow.” Liam could have cursed but refrained.
“Unless all these groups going out over land are just a decoy and Fisk doubled back to the coast,” Rivka said, adding complexity to an already complex situation.
“Lord Skelaroth should be able to tell us more about that possibility,” Liam replied, reaching into his pocket for a scroll of parchment he’d received from the manager of his Tipolir warehouse. “My people have narrowed the search. They followed as many groups from Fisk’s crew as they could and eliminated many of the false trails from consideration, but we simply didn’t have enough agents to chase down all of them. Still, this helps considerably. According to my people, there are three strong possibilities left for the route Fisk may have taken.”
He unrolled the small scroll and placed it down in the spot Rivka hastily cleared on the table between them. She paused to examine the map on the scroll in detail before speaking again.
“I can get the Jinn to help with this,” Rivka said after a few moments, looking up to meet his gaze. Her green eyes flashed in the soft glow of the lamps that lit the small room. “But first, I’ll go aloft and see what I can before morning. We should consult with Skelaroth, as well, before we pick a direction.”
They had arranged to meet at the pier where Liam’s ship was docked at midnight to consult with the sea dragon lord. That left Rivka a few hours after dinner to do her own aerial reconnaissance. Not that she didn’t trust Skelaroth’s instincts, but he was a sea dragon, unused to flying over land, and he might not be familiar enough with the way things looked on land from above to know exactly what he was seeing. She wanted to check the possible trails for herself.
Where Skelaroth’s expertise would come in handy was in examining the shoreline. If Fisk had doubled back and gone back out to sea to put ashore somewhere else, Skelaroth would be their best shot at following such a trail. But Rivka’s instincts were telling her that Fisk wouldn’t have abandoned to ship and dispersed his crew, unless he were planning to make a run for it over land.
Rivka left the tavern, promising to meet up with Liam, on his ship. She had things to do before she would see him again, and they were things he could not help with. Rivka found a dark alley that was big enough for her to change in and allowed the shift to come over her. She walked out of that alley in her dragon form, with only the Jinn tavern keeper as witness, and took to the sky.
She had always found flying an incredibly liberating experience. She loved taking to the air. But, somewhere in the back of her mind, she was all too aware that she’d left Liam behind on the ground. He could never follow her here. He could never be part of the world of the air that she loved so much. The thought saddened her, though why it should was a bit of a mystery.
Sure, she was attracted to the dashing sea captain, but that was no reason for her to feel this way. None of her past lovers had been black dragons. They couldn’t have flown with her either, and she’d never thought twice about it. She’d been courted once or twice by distantly related dragon shifters but had never felt attracted enough to them to take them up on anything they might have been offering.
It was incredibly rare that two dragon shifters teamed up, even for a temporary liaison. For one thing, they were all related to some degree. Sure, over the centuries, the bloodlines had veered away from each other, but ultimately, they all could trace their ancestry back to one of Dranneth the Wise’s offspring. Black dragons were rare, and most of the time, they mated with humans. The inheritance was strong, though, and most of their children turned out to be shapeshifters, which was why the number of black dragons in the Clan had been steadily increasing—slowly, to be sure, but still increasing—over the many years the Jinn had lived in self-imposed exile from what should always have been their homeland of Draconia.
So, it wasn’t abnormal for Rivka to be attracted to a human. What was strange was just how attracted she was to Liam O’Dare. The pull to him was strong. Very strong. And she’d never had thoughts about wanting to share the sky with any of her lovers. That was different and made her wonder just how deeply she was falling for a man who was still in love with his dead wife.
The reminder of Olivia O’Dare, paragon of womanhood and ghost that seemed never able to lay to rest, was downright depressing. Rivka knew all about Liam’s obsession with avenging his wife’s murder. Her investigation of the captain before she had ever approached him told her all she needed to know about his unfailing devotion to the petite lady who had been all things womanly and graceful.
So unlike Rivka, herself. She knew she could never compete with a female like that. Olivia had probably never known strife or conflict during her sheltered life. Not until the end, at least, Rivka thought grimly. How difficult must it have been for such a pampered lady to be accosted by pirate scum like Fisk? Poor Olivia must have been horrified. Rivka felt a great deal of sympathy for the woman she had never met.
By the same token, Rivka was a bit surprised to realize that she was jealous of the devotion Olivia had inspired. The love of a man like Liam O’Dare was something, Rivka was coming to realize, that was precious and true. He was a man of honor and integrity, and his love was real. It lasted, even beyond death. Yes, she was jealous of the bond he’d had with the lovely Olivia, and Rivka despaired of ever inspiring such deathless devotion from any man. Much less the handsome captain.
She could
not compete with a ghost. Especially one that was so unlike herself as to be laughable. Olivia had been dainty. Pretty and perfect. Accomplished in the womanly arts. Rivka was a warrior. The only time she sewed was to repair her armor or patch a hole. She wouldn’t know one end of an embroidery needle from the other, though she did have a mean set of throwing knives always up her sleeve. Olivia would have been scandalized.
Yet, Rivka felt a strange sort of kinship with the woman she had never met. Olivia had died much too young, but she’d had the steadfast love of a man Rivka herself admired. Olivia had been blessed in her marriage and the man who kept her memory alive and uppermost in his mind at all times. Rivka could almost be jealous of the way he had clung to his wife’s memory, but it broke her heart, in a way, to know that he’d loved his wife so deeply and lost her so brutally. It was tragic all the way around.
Rivka pushed all that from her mind as she approached the first of the three trails out of the city that Liam’s agents had identified. It was time to work. No more time for foolish speculation about things that had been and things that would probably never be. Liam’s heart was claimed for all time by a woman who was no longer within reach. Rivka could never compete with that and didn’t begrudge him his memories in any case. It was clear the captain was still heartbroken. He mourned deeply and had turned that anguish into anger and a years-long vendetta that was—harsh as it was to even think—useful to Rivka in her own quest.
She could be a mercenary bitch, at times, but that was just the way things were. She’d accomplish her goal. Fulfill her quest. And she’d do whatever it took to make that happen, regardless of whoever’s feelings might get in the way. Such was the way of the warrior. The way she had chosen as a youngster. Though given her dual nature, there had never really been much choice about it. She had a dragon’s heart, and dragons had been built for war.
Liam went back to his ship and searched for any sign of Lord Skelaroth in the nearby waters. Unable to see much in the dark, he resorted to thinking hard toward the water, hoping to catch Skelaroth’s attention with his own inexpert attempts at silent communication. He scrunched up his eyes, closing them while he tried to recapture the feeling of the dragon’s words reverberating in his mind. Then, he sent out a tentative call.
“Hello?”
Liam waited. There was no answer, so after a few minutes, he tried again.
“Hello? Are you there?”
Liam opened his eyes at the sound of little claws scurrying over the deck. The virkin, Ella, had come to visit him. She looked inquisitive and alert, her little head tilting this way and that as she used her tiny wings to propel her to the deck rail right next to Liam. He put out his hand to her, and his touch was accepted as she butted her head into his palm.
He stroked her absently as he closed his eyes and tried again.
“Hello? Lord Skelaroth?”
“Helrow?”
Ella made a chirruping sound, and Liam’s eyes shot open. Had she…?
“Are you talking to me, little Ella?” He’d heard all sorts of tales about virkin in Elderland that said they could communicate, but he hadn’t understood how…until, perhaps, now.
“Helrow?” she repeated, in his mind as she stared up at him, big green eyes blinking innocently.
“Hello, little one!” Liam smiled, his heart full of wonder. Ella had been newly hatched when she’d attached herself to him. Perhaps she was old enough now, to speak in the way of her kind—or, at least, to try.
“‘M Ella,” she went on to say, proving she could do more than just try to mimic what he’d been thinking.
“Yes, I know. You’re Ella. And I’m Liam,” he replied quietly, glad of the dark and the sparse crew on deck at this time of night. He had a bit of privacy for this first conversation with his little companion.
“Leem,” she repeated happily, not quite getting the name, but he didn’t mind. He’d figured of all the things people called him, his given name might be easiest for this child who was clearly just learning to communicate.
“I see she has started to speak. Hello, Mistress Ella,” Lord Skelaroth’s voice came clear into Liam’s mind.
He turned his head and discovered the water dragon had raised his head to deck height not five feet from Liam while he’d been so preoccupied with the virkin.
“Helrow,” she replied shyly, looking at the giant sea dragon out of the corner of her eye.
“You don’t seem surprised to see her,” Liam said, turning his gaze to meet the sea dragon’s.
“Oh, I knew she was there. I did a thorough inspection of your ship before I ever contacted you.” Skelaroth sounded a bit smug to Liam’s mind.
“How? You can’t tell me you ever came aboard without anyone noticing,” Liam scoffed gently.
Skelaroth chuckled. “We sea dragons have developed other senses that the land dragons seemed to have forgotten. Or, perhaps, it’s just a case of those abilities not being applicable while out of the water. Regardless, I can sense things through the sound waves and other ripples to come to me in the ocean, about a great many things. For example, I could hear the scratching of Mistress Ella’s little talons—quite distinct from cat’s claws, if you know the difference—from within the hold of your ship. She is quite the accomplished huntress, for her age.”
Ella seemed to understand the gist of what Skelaroth had said and preened a bit under his praise. “Hunt mouses,” she agreed. “Taste good. But even better when gone and eat with Leem.”
Liam deciphered her words to means that she enjoyed hunting whatever came aboard whenever they made port but liked, even more, when she had completed her task and took her meals with the captain. Liam would feed her tidbits from his own plate, along with a saucer of cut up meat that his cook prepared just for her. She was a favorite on the ship and well rewarded by the crew for her good work in keeping the place clear of pests.
This was all fascinating, but there was still work to do. Liam looked over at Skelaroth. “Have you any news, milord?”
“Several false trails have been laid upon the shoreline, but no one truly left by sea. All are within the city, or on their way out,” he reported. “I searched from above and below.”
This was good news, as far as Liam was concerned. “Lady Rivka is aloft, right now, checking three trails my people identified but could not follow. They already eliminated many of the false trails in the city and just beyond.”
“This is good,” Skelaroth said with satisfaction. “I was not aware of the extent of your resources in this city, Captain, though, of course, I knew you had connections here. This is even better than I had hoped.”
“I built my business with two goals in mind. First, to provide for my daughter’s future, though I suppose that is taken care of now that she is mated.” Liam shook his head, still not quite understanding Livia’s choices. “The second reason—and perhaps this was the most important—was to create a network of watchers to help me track Fisk. I have been working toward the day when I can finally bring him to justice for a very long time.” Liam’s eyes narrowed as cold anger rose. “I will have my revenge.”
CHAPTER SIX
Rivka walked down the long pier, headed for Liam’s ship. She could see the faint glimmer of dragon scale on the seaward side of the rail and could just make out Liam standing there, apparently talking with Lord Skelaroth. There was a smaller creature perched on the rail that became clearer, the closer Rivka got to the ship. Could it be the virkin Liam had mentioned? She was very curious to see one of those fabled foreign beasts for herself and was intrigued by how well the creature had hidden its presence from Rivka the few times she’d been aboard.
“Permission to come aboard?” she sent to Liam as she neared the gangplank. One of his men was on watch near the wide wooden plank that connected the lowest part of the main deck.
She saw him turn to look at the pier. A moment later, he called to the man on watch on the deck below, telling him to allow her passage. His crew had never seen her in
her human form. She could feel the crewman’s curiosity but ignored it, giving the young man a smile as she nimbly climbed aboard.
“Cap’n says to go up, ma’am,” the man told her politely, pointing to the short flight of stairs that led to the quarterdeck where she knew Liam waited. She thanked the man as she passed him.
What she found as she went up the stairs was as she expected. Skelaroth’s head was still at the far side of the rail, and the little virkin was perched on the rail while Liam stroked its neck and scratched around its wing-joints. It was a cute little thing, and its eyes opened curiously and blinked at her as Rivka moved closer.
“What news?” Liam asked, straight to business. Good. They didn’t have a lot of time for pleasantries.
“I’m sorry to have to say that each of those three paths your people identified are viable. Each leads out of the city, and I was able to follow the trails some distance into the countryside. A small group traveled swiftly on each of the three roadways. So quickly that I couldn’t catch up with any of them by air,” she told him, then turned to address the sea dragon. “Greetings, Lord Skelaroth. What have you observed?”
“Nothing by sea,” he told her immediately. “Many false trails, but nothing real. I believe Fisk left many of his crew behind in the city, with the express intent of delaying us and leading any pursuit astray.”
“Makes sense,” Liam said, tilting his head slightly as if considering the situation. “He split the men that could travel quickly into three groups and left the slower people here to cause trouble for anyone that might follow.”
“Then, our problem is to decide which of the three roads out of the city to take,” Skelaroth said to them all. “We know where Fisk is probably heading, ultimately, but I think it wiser to try to intercept him as far as possible from the Citadel. It is too risky to allow the page to go too far North. We have no idea how close he needs to be in order to use it.”
