by Heidi Heilig
“Who?”
“James Cook. The man who brought you here.”
She raised an eyebrow. “That’s a tall order.”
“It’s your only way out,” I told her; but that was the wrong tactic. “And I know Slate would consider it a great favor.”
“Oh, yeah? Why’s that?”
I hesitated—could I tell her? “A life for a life, you said.”
“You’re telling me Captain Slate’s life depends on this?”
“Not his,” I said. “Mine. And my mother’s.”
Gwen folded her arms and glared at me; behind the anger, pain shifted to regret. What kind of person was she, really? For a long time I thought she’d refuse, but then she waved me away toward my ship. “Get off my ship and send him over.”
I climbed down to the Temptation; my father met me at the rail. “Let’s get you out of the cold,” he said, trying to steer me toward the cabin, but I shrugged out of his grip.
“No time,” I told him, digging my fingers into the stiff pocket of my trousers. With difficulty, I slid the canteen free and handed it to Slate. “For James. Only a little at a time. Stop when he remembers arriving in Ker-Ys. Then send him over to the Fool.”
Slate took the bottle, but he hovered until Lin shooed him away. She held out my red cloak, settling it around my shoulders—I’d left it in the captain’s cabin for my trip to Greece. She’d brought the flask of mercury too. Lin inspected the claw marks on my arm and gently daubed them with the elixir. “What is that?” she said then. “In your pocket?”
I sighed; the throbbing pain in my arm was fading fast. “Kashmir gave it to me.”
“A strange gift,” she said, turning her attention to my bee sting.
“It’s what he had to give at the time.”
“You’ll have more time with him.”
She said it with such certainty—but was it only a made-up fortune? I looked up into her eyes; her expression was serious. “I know,” I said softly, hoping that could make it true.
Lin corked the flask of mercury and held it out to me. “You should take this with you too,” she said. “If he’s hurt, he’ll need it.”
I blinked at her. How had she guessed I might go to him? Then again, how could she imagine I wouldn’t? I gave her a wan smile and slipped the bottle into my pocket. Then I went to the rail to face Crowhurst.
He smiled when he saw me, but there was something behind it, an edge I hadn’t seen before. “How was Boeotia?”
“Enlightening.” A gust made my wet hair crackle; the wind was so cold, I was crowned in frost. “But you know that. You drank from the Mnemosyne.”
“Didn’t you?”
I looked at him then—at the glint in his eyes. “The price was too high for me. What did you sacrifice, Crowhurst? What have you lost?”
“Nothing!” he called back, a touch too loud. “I’ve won, Nixie.”
“You knew I could bring the water for Cook.”
“I knew you might,” he countered. “I also know you won’t leave.”
“I don’t have to. Gwen is taking James back to London. Your gambit failed, Crowhurst. You’ve lost.”
“I still have Kashmir!”
“I don’t think Blake will let you keep him just to spite me. Would you?” I turned to Blake, and I saw the answer in his face. I smiled grimly. “In fact, there’s only one move left for the both of you, if you want to know if you can change the past.”
Blake glanced from me to Crowhurst—he had always had so many questions. “What is it, Miss Song?”
“Let us take Dahut. Now, before the storm. Before the myth has a chance to end.”
Dahut shifted on her feet. “What does she mean, Father?”
Crowhurst ignored her. “Why would I do that?”
“Because you can go back to your native time and read the myths about Ker-Ys. You’ll know if the legend is altered. You’ll know what’s possible.”
“Go back?” Crowhurst’s jaw worked. Was he considering it? His hand went to the flask at his throat—no . . . to the brass key. “I told you. I can’t go back, not yet. But I have another move.”
“What is it?” I asked, but I had my answer when he pulled the chain over his neck.
“Call Cook back,” he said; there was a threat in his voice.
My heart pounded, but I could not do as he asked. “No.”
“Kashmir’s in the pit, Nixie.” Crowhurst gave me a thin smile. “If the town floods, he’ll drown first. Are you sure you won’t reconsider?”
Blake turned to him, eyes wide. “You would flood the town?”
“Not if she brings me Cook.” Crowhurst fitted the key to the lock.
“You can’t do this!” I called, but he rounded on me.
“Prove it!” Crowhurst roared. “Prove we can change things, Nixie!”
There was a challenge in his eyes; did he actually want me to stop him? But he was not the one I was trying to save. “You can prove it to all of us!” I cried. “Throw the key into the water!”
But Crowhurst only shook his head.
“Stop him!” I shouted to Blake, to Dahut, to the gods—but my cry was lost in the squeal of the gears.
Underfoot, the mechanism rumbled. Metal groaned as the gates slid open. The pressure from the high tide warped them in their tracks; they ground to a halt a foot apart. But a green waterfall poured through, spilling into the harbor.
The flood was coming.
On the wall, Blake grabbed for the key, but Crowhurst belted him across the jaw. He reeled, sliding down into the lee of the tower. I had to help—I had to close the gate. “Slate!” I screamed over the wind. “Bring us closer!”
“This is as close as I can get!”
Swearing, I ran to the mast, pulling myself up the ratlines, the halyard in my hand.
“What are you doing, Nixie?”
I didn’t bother answering—my father knew what love looked like. Stepping quickly to keep my momentum, I teetered out to the edge of the boom; without stopping to think, I leaped, swinging across the gap. There was a moment of terrifying freedom between ship and shore. Then I landed on the wall and stumbled into a run, my bare feet slapping the slick stone.
Spray soaked my legs as I ran. The sea was whipped to a frenzy, the water swirling in spouts and vortices. The harbor was filling quickly. I careened toward the tower. But Dahut was already there.
She put her hand on Crowhurst’s arm. “Close the gate!”
He only threw her off. “Bring the yacht to the wall! Quick, before the wharf is covered.” Then he frowned, patting his pockets. “Where the hell are my other keys?”
“I won’t let you do this,” she said, shaking her head. “I won’t let them all drown!”
She lunged for the key again, but Crowhurst grabbed her. She twisted in his arms, struggling as he yanked her away from the mechanism. Her eyes flashed and she pushed him, hard—Crowhurst stumbled, catching himself on the very lip of the wall. She dove at him again, but she was so small. They struggled . . . she screamed—
He swung her around and let her go.
She tumbled off the wall and into the harbor.
“Dahut!” I skidded to a stop at the edge, breathless, disbelieving. Below, the green water swirled to white where she’d gone down. At my feet, Blake groaned, but I couldn’t tear my eyes from the harbor. Crowhurst stood beside me, panting, both of us watching for a sign of Dahut. Would she surface? I did not see it happen.
But something else splashed in the harbor then, a flash of silver in the light of the moon. I was watching when the next mermaid slipped through the open gates, her clawed hands gouging the brass as she propelled toward the wharf. She was followed by another, and another. Over the city, the bells of Ker-Ys began jangling an alarm. Then Crowhurst turned to me, and I realized just how alone I was on the wall.
The metal squealed again, the gates sliding open another foot, and the earth itself seemed to shudder as a fresh tide rolled across the harbor. The rising
water twisted the fishing boats on their moorings, turning them stern up, like dipping ducks. The docks were already swamped, and silver shapes circled hungrily in the water. Even now the tide would be rising through the sewers and pouring into the room where Cook had been—where Kash was now, without his lock picks, without me.
I couldn’t get there in time to free him, even if I could swim through the icy waves. I had to shut the gate. But Crowhurst stood between me and the key, clenching his empty hands. “Maybe you were right,” he said then, and his voice was strange and faraway. “Maybe the past can never be changed.”
“I didn’t say that.” I slipped my hand into my pocket. “I just said you couldn’t do it.”
Crowhurst’s eyes glittered and in his voice, a warning. “I am a cosmic being.”
“You’re a madman.” I slid my finger through the loop of the lock as my heel wavered on the edge. From the Temptation, Slate was shouting over the wind, trying to push the ship closer, but I didn’t turn my head. “And you’ve lost.”
“I know I have,” Crowhurst said, his voice almost sad.
“So let me close the gate,” I said to him, almost pleading. “Let me save Kashmir.”
But he only reached for me, and I swung the lock. It connected with a meaty sound. He clutched his jaw and swore, the curse thick on his tongue. I tried to dart around him, scrambling along the lip of the wall, but he grabbed a fistful of my cloak and shook me—my god, he was strong! My toes brushed the stone as he hauled me close to his face; it was twisted with rage. A fleeting thought struck me then: here was the monster in the castle. “Just because I lose,” he growled, “doesn’t mean you’ll win.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone leaping the gap from the ship—could they reach me in time? I hit Crowhurst again, but he didn’t even seem to feel it. He stepped back, and I clutched desperately at his sleeve, his shoulder. My hand tangled in the chain at his neck as he heaved me toward the sea.
I dragged him to his knees as I fell, one hand on the flask and one scrabbling at the edge of the wall. I let go of the chain and grasped the slick stone with both hands. The high tide pulled at my ankles as I struggled to haul myself up. Crowhurst scrambled to his feet above me. The chain had snapped; the flask slid to the wall and clanged on the stone beside his right foot. As I watched, he lifted his boot above my fingertips.
But then—over the wind, the sound of running feet, and a small shaped barreled into him.
My mother.
They grappled on the wall, he with new fury, and she, fierce but overmatched. Gasping, I dragged myself back up to the wall as he wrapped his hand around her throat. She beat at his chest with her fists, but he did not let go. But then a sound like the crack of a whip, and Crowhurst staggered, eyes wide. Above the red sash he wore, a darker crimson started to spread.
There, in the lee of the tower, Blake was propped up on his elbow, the silver derringer smoking in his hand.
Crowhurst met my eyes—in his own, the shock of loss. He took one step, then another. The third took him over the wall, and my mother went with him.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The wind was screaming, and so was I. Out on the water, my father shouted Lin’s name as waves rammed the Temptation. The ship tilted on the tide, the stern swinging toward the wall; Slate had abandoned the helm to stare down at the clouds of spray, drifting up like smoke.
Bee scrambled for the wheel as it spun freely. But the captain only looked up at me, and the air between us seemed to dim and thicken before my eyes. His words were drowned out by the sound of the waves, but I knew what he said.
Then he leaped over the rail and vanished into the mist.
“Captain!”
I crawled to the edge of the wall. The water eddied and swirled in the fog below. On the wind, was that a siren song?
“Dad!”
There was no sign of him.
“Mom!”
No sign of either of them, as the waves splintered into fog and obscured the furious sea.
My ears rang, echoing with my father’s voice. Or was it the cries of the crew? Or Gwen’s own grief? Or the distant screams that rang from the town? I did not know, I did not care. This wasn’t right, it wasn’t happening. He had to surface, and soon—he couldn’t hold his breath much longer. Where were they? Where were they?
I rolled to my side and curled like a nautilus. The cold had numbed me, but not enough. Beside me, Crowhurst’s broken chain, and the copper flask; it was like a chip of ice in my palm. Starlight glittered on its surface. How much of the Lethe water remained?
A scream brought me back to my senses as the ship loomed out of the mist. The storm was too high, the wall was too close, and with a sound like snapping bones, the Temptation drove into the wall.
The rising waves ground her ribs against the rocks. Rotgut had left the sails, using a pole to try to fend off the stones, and Bee was frantically signaling the Fool, but there were not enough hands, not with Slate gone, not with Kashmir . . . Kashmir—
In a flash I was on my feet; spinning, I nearly ran into Blake. He grabbed my arms, steadying me—or perhaps himself. “Miss Song!” He squinted at me; his eye was swollen where Crowhurst had hit him. “We must get to the ship.”
I stared at him—in his face there was such sorrow, and I rejected it. “No!” Something snapped in me. “Let go of me! Let go!” I shoved him; he staggered back, slipping on the ice on the wall.
“Where are you going, then?” Blake said.
“To save Kashmir!” Out on the water, Rotgut called to me—there was desperation in his voice. But Gwen would help them, wouldn’t she? I started toward the stairs.
“Nix!” Blake grabbed my wrist and spun me around. “He’s gone!” I followed his stare to the city, the water swirling around the slate roofs of the houses. “He was locked in the pit. He had no picks. The water is ice cold, and you would drown in it too. He’s gone, Miss Song.”
With a roar, I flung him away and sprinted toward the stairs, but I didn’t get far. Blake tackled me to the stones, wrapping me up in his arms and crushing the breath out of my lungs. Kicking, I tried to regain my footing, but he swung me over his shoulder.
“No!” I pounded on his back. “I won’t lose him too!”
But Blake did not listen, or if he did, he did not stop, not until we reached the ship. He tossed me to the deck and leaped aboard after me. I landed in a heap.
Scrambling to my hands and knees, I felt the snapping of timbers through my palms—belowdecks, water would be pouring into the hold. The Fool had belayed a line to the Temptation, and she was ready to haul against the tide. We could not stay longer, or the storm would smash the hull to pieces. But Gwen had Cook; they did not need me to travel. Could I jump back to the wall?
“Let me go!” I struggled upward, pulling myself to my feet against the bulwark. Why was my ankle buckling? “Take Cook to London and let—me—go!”
I put both hands on the rail as another wave lifted the ship from the stones, but Blake yanked me back to the deck. Furious, I wrenched Kashmir’s knife from his belt—only then did he back away, hands up, face pale. But the wave withdrew, and the Fool swung her sails to catch the gusting wind. With a groan, the Temptation shuddered out to sea.
“No!” I rushed back to the rail as the wall retreated. “No!”
“I’m sorry, Miss Song.” Blake’s voice broke, and he could not meet my eyes. He turned to help Bee and Rotgut with the ship. But I stayed at the rail, screaming wordless rage as Ker-Ys receded. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. This was not how the story ended.
The wayward saint had returned with her warnings. The devil had opened the gates and cast Dahut into the sea. But the king was dead—who would ride away on the Dark Horse?
Crowhurst’s question had stayed with me; he had taken Kashmir’s lock picks, but where had his keys gone? The key to the treasury, the key to the manacles, the key to the yacht . . .
Kash had them. He must have. I believed it wi
th all my heart. I watched for him, and waited. I knew he was coming. Beneath my feet, the Temptation trembled as the Fool towed us toward the gathering fog, but I kept my eyes on the sea gates as the city receded. Then Bee took my arm; I spun in shock at the touch.
“Come away, my girl.” Her voice was soft with anguish. “The ship is lost.”
“What?” Finally I tore my eyes from the flooding city, only to realize the Temptation was sinking.
The deck tilted. The sails sagged as if defeated. The ship sighed and shuddered in her grief. Her prow was already submerged, the carved mermaid figurehead greeting the sea at last. Repair would be impossible; her ribs had been snapped. She was gutted; water poured into the broken heart of her. The ship was going down with her captain.
On deck, Gwen and her crew were helping to salvage our belongings. Sailors scrambled back and forth from the Fool, hauling armloads of maps and medicine, books and baubles, crates and clothing. As I watched, Blake abandoned ship, carrying Billie in his arms. Rotgut followed, clutching his old mahjong set. And now Bee was tugging at my hand.
Still holding Kashmir’s knife, I let her lead me to starboard side, where the crew of the Fool had made fast to the Temptation. A ladder hung from Gwen’s ship; Bee pushed me toward it, but I shook my head. “Go on, Bee. I’ll be right behind you.”
She searched my face, and I could tell I hadn’t fooled her. “Nix . . .”
“Go,” I said again, my voice harsh with grief. “Captain’s orders.”
Tears shone in her eyes as she pulled me into a fierce hug, but then she released me. Taking hold of the ladder, she climbed free of the wreck, and she did not look back. So I raised Kashmir’s knife and swung it down on the rope binding the Fool to the Temptation.
The corvette sprang free, leaving the caravel behind, with me aboard.
The captain was going down with her ship.
Off the Fool’s prow, I could see the bank of fog beginning to form. I didn’t waste my time watching her meet it; instead, I clambered toward the stern, uphill against the slant of the deck. I had to use the rails to climb the stairs. When I reached the helm, I clung to the wheel.
