“You need it,” he said simply. “So take it.”
That was the Clove I knew. He’d have stolen the coin for me if I asked.
I gave him a weak, grateful smile. “I’ll pay you back. Every copper.”
Across the table, I could feel Koy’s eyes slide to me. He was clearly listening now.
“We’ll also give you passage back to Jeval, free of charge when we head back to the Narrows,” I added.
Koy bit his bottom lip, thinking. “What have you gotten yourself into?”
“You want the job or not?”
He shifted on his feet, hesitating. It was an offer he couldn’t refuse, and we both knew it. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why are you offering it to me?” His tone turned bitter, and I realized he’d figured me out. I had to handle him carefully if I was going to keep him on the line.
“You’re the best dredger I’ve ever seen. Besides myself,” I amended. “This is a job that’s next to impossible, and I need you.”
He turned toward the window, staring out at the street. Beside him, West was looking at me. He didn’t like this. The last time West had seen Koy, he’d been chasing me down the docks in Jeval, ready to kill me.
When Koy finally spoke, he set both hands onto the table, leaning over me. “Fine. I’ll do it. I want the coin now and I need a new belt of tools. Those bastards took them when they pieced the Luna.”
“Done.” I grinned.
“One more thing.” He leaned closer, and West got to his feet, taking a step toward us.
“What is it?” I met Koy’s eyes.
“We’re not trading favors, Fable. Understand?” His voice deepened. “I told you. I didn’t cut the rope. So, if this has anything to do with what happened on that dive, I’m out.”
And that was the thing about Koy. His pride was more stubborn than his hunger for copper. If I so much as breathed a hint that I owed him, he’d walk away from the coin.
“Fine. You didn’t cut the rope.” I reached out a hand between us. “We leave at sundown. I’ll have your tools and your coin on the ship.”
Koy took my hand, shaking it. He looked at me another moment before he turned on his heel, headed for the door.
Willa stared at me incredulously. I handed her the maps and she shook her head once before she got to her feet.
West watched her go. “What favor is Koy talking about?” he asked.
“That bastard saved my life when Zola’s dredger tried to kill me.”
“That’s what this is about? A debt?”
“No,” I said, standing. “I meant what I said. He’s a skilled dredger. We need him.”
I could see in West’s eyes that he wanted the whole story. It was one I’d eventually have to tell him, but not today.
Clove leaned back, looking at me.
“What?”
He shrugged, a wry smile playing at his lips. “Just thinkin’.”
I cocked my head to the side, glaring. “Thinking what?”
“That you’re just like him,” he said, taking another sip of tea.
I didn’t have to ask who he meant. He was talking about Saint.
TWENTY-THREE
“What else needs doing before we leave?” Clove asked, setting down his cup.
“You’re not coming,” I said.
His bushy eyebrows pulled together. “What do you mean I’m not coming?”
“If Holland finds out that you didn’t go to the Narrows, she’s going to want to know why. We can’t risk it. And I need you to tell Saint what’s going on.”
“Saint’s not going to like that. Me leaving you here. That wasn’t the plan.”
“Nothing’s really gone to plan, if you haven’t noticed. I need you in the Narrows, Clove.”
He considered it, his gaze floating from me to West. This wasn’t just about Saint. Clove didn’t trust West. He didn’t trust any of them. “This is a bad idea. That navigator of yours will have you run aground before you even get to Yuri’s Constellation.”
“That navigator will do just fine,” Auster snapped.
“There will be hell to pay if Fable doesn’t make it back to Ceros.” Clove was talking to West now.
“Fable got herself off that island you left her on. I think she can get herself back to Ceros.” West’s words were like acid.
“I suppose you’re right about that.” Clove smiled. “Guess I better find a ship headed to the Narrows.” He stood, giving me a wink before he started for the door.
“One of Holland’s,” I said. “We need her to know you’re gone.”
The barmaid set down two large plates of bread and cheese, followed by another pot of tea. Auster didn’t waste any time, reaching for the dish of butter.
He lathered a thick layer onto a piece of bread and handed it to me. “Eat. You’ll feel better.”
I eyed him. “Why aren’t you mad like the others?”
“Oh, I’m mad,” he said, reaching for another piece of bread. “What you did was wrong, West. When you took us on, you said we’d each have an equal say. You went back on your word.”
“Then why are you playing nice?” I asked.
“Because.” He looked past me, to West. “If it was Paj, I’d have done the same damn thing.” He tore the bread and popped a piece into his mouth.
West leaned onto the table, letting out a heavy breath. The defensive, rigid set of his jaw was gone now and I knew the reality of what he’d done was setting in. Maybe Hamish would forgive the slight, but Willa and Paj wouldn’t be so understanding.
West stared at the table, mind working. “You know we can’t give the midnight to Holland if we find it. Don’t you? She’s the most powerful trader in the Unnamed Sea. If you find the midnight for her…” His words trailed off. “She could ruin everything. For us and for the Narrows.”
He was right. I’d been thinking the same thing.
“If she gets license to trade in Ceros, everything we planned is over. None of it matters.”
“Saint won’t let that happen.” I tried to sound sure. But the truth was that there was no telling what Saint would do.
Auster reached across the table for another piece of bread, and the tattoo of tangled snakes peeked out from beneath his rolled sleeve. Two knotted serpents eating each other’s tails. It was the same one the young man named Ezra had, the one who’d been in Holland’s office.
A distant thought whispered in the back of my mind, making me still.
The midnight would save Saint, but it wouldn’t save the Narrows. If Holland opened her route to Ceros, it would sink every trader posted there.
“Auster?” I said.
He looked up from his plate, his mouth full of bread. “Yeah?”
“Tell me about that tattoo.”
His gray eyes sharpened, his hand freezing in midair. On the other side of the table, West was silent.
“Why?” Auster asked warily.
“What are you thinking?” West leaned closer to me.
“You were right about Holland. This isn’t going to be as simple as trading midnight for Saint. If she gets license to trade in the Narrows, it doesn’t matter. All of us will be working the docks by the time she’s through.”
West nodded. “I know.”
“No one can touch her. She controls the trade in the Unnamed Sea and she owns the Trade Council.”
West shrugged. “The Narrows Trade Council has held out this long. There’s nothing we can do except hope that they don’t grant her the license.”
“That’s not true,” I said, my mind still unraveling the tangle of thoughts.
They both looked at me, waiting.
“We know that Holland wants to take out the traders posted from Ceros.” My gaze drifted, landing on Auster. “She’s got a commission with an unlicensed merchant to sweeten the deal with the Council. A commission she doesn’t want anyone to know about.”
Auster’s mouth went crooked. “With who?”
“
When we were with Holland, she made a deal with someone who had that same tattoo.”
Auster looked suddenly uncomfortable, shifting in his seat. “What was his name?”
“Ezra,” I said.
Auster’s eyes snapped up.
“Do you know him?”
“I know him,” he answered.
“What can you tell us about him?”
“Nothing, if I know what’s good for me. You don’t want to get involved with the Roths. Trust me.”
“Wait. You’re a Roth?” My voice rose.
But West didn’t look at all surprised. He’d known exactly what that tattoo was.
“You think we can use them?” West said, keeping his voice low.
“No,” Auster said evenly.
“Why not?”
“They’re dangerous, West,” Auster answered. “Henrik would sooner cut you than invite you to tea, like Holland.”
I pushed up the sleeve of Auster’s shirt, studying the mark. “How do you know him?”
Auster seemed to be deciding how much he would tell me. “He’s my uncle. We’re not exactly on good terms,” Auster added. “When I left Bastian, I left the Roths. And no one leaves the Roths.”
“And Ezra?”
When he could see I wasn’t going to give up, Auster sighed. “He wasn’t born into the family. Henrik found him working for a smith when we were just kids. He took him in because he was talented. Henrik got him the best training there was, and by the time we were fourteen or fifteen, he was making the best silver pieces in Bastian. But Henrik couldn’t sell them.”
“Why not?”
“For years, the Roth family was the single largest producer of fake gems from the Unnamed Sea to the Narrows. The trade had made them rich, but it also cost them any chance they had at getting a merchant’s ring from the Gem Guild. It’s illegal for anyone to do business with them.”
That hadn’t stopped Holland from giving Henrik a commission, and I understood why. The sketches Ezra had shown Holland looked like something out of a myth. Only someone truly gifted would be able to cast a piece like that.
“So he’s using Ezra to get a ring.”
Auster nodded. “That’s what he wants, but he’s never going to get it. The Roths’ reputation is known at every port in the Unnamed Sea. No one’s ever going to trust Henrik, much less give him their business.”
“Holland did.”
“But she’ll never tell anyone who made it. Ezra will never get the credit for whatever she commissioned. Neither will Henrik.”
If Auster was right, then Henrik was a man trying to legitimize himself.
I tapped my fingers on the table. “Do you think they’d help us?”
“They don’t help anyone. They help themselves.”
“Unless there’s something in it for them.” I thought aloud. I leaned back into the booth, thinking. I didn’t know exactly what Holland had planned for the Narrows, but West had been right about her. She couldn’t be trusted. And I had a feeling that she was waiting to make her move. “Will you take us to him?” I asked.
Auster looked as if he couldn’t believe what I’d just said. “You don’t want to get tangled up with them, Fable. I’m serious.”
“Will you do it or not?”
Auster met my eyes for a long moment before he shook his head, letting out a heavy breath. “Paj isn’t going to like this.”
TWENTY-FOUR
“Crazy bastards.” Paj had been cursing from the moment we left the harbor, and it had taken all of Auster’s will to ignore him as we walked into Lower Vale.
When I asked Auster to take us to the Roths, I hadn’t expected him to agree.
Auster didn’t say exactly how he’d escaped his family when he and Paj left Bastian, and I didn’t ask. But it was clear that it was a past Paj didn’t want to revisit. He forbade Auster from taking us to Lower Vale, and only relented when he realized that Auster would go without him.
Now Paj had another reason to be angry, and I was more convinced by the minute that the break among us might be too great to be repaired. I hadn’t meant to pull them into Holland’s war on the Narrows, but West had made sure of it when he commanded them to Yuri’s Constellation. The only thing to do now was to see the plan through and hope we could salvage what was left of the crew after.
If Bastian had a slum, Lower Vale was it, though it was nothing to the stench and filth of The Pinch or Waterside in Ceros. Even the pigeons perched on the rooftops looked cleaner than the ones in the Narrows.
West walked shoulder to shoulder with Auster, shooting a warning look to the people on the street around us who were staring. They watched Auster as he passed, whispering to each other, and I didn’t know if it was because they recognized him or if it was because he was so striking. Auster had taken care with himself when he got ready in the crew’s cabin, brushing through his thick, dark hair until it lay over his shoulder like melted obsidian. His shirt, too, was clean and pressed. He was always beautiful, even after days at sea with no washing. But this Auster was magnificent. He was breathtaking.
Paj looked different too. There was an emptiness in his eyes that I hadn’t seen since the day he dared me to fetch a coin from the sea bottom at the coral islands. “I still think this is a bad idea,” he grunted.
That pushed Auster over the edge. He suddenly turned on his heel and Paj almost slammed into him as he came to an abrupt stop.
Auster looked up into Paj’s face, his mouth set in a straight line. “Are you finished?”
“No, actually, I’m not,” Paj growled. “Am I the only one who remembers what it took for us to leave these people behind? I nearly died cutting you from your deranged family!”
“If you’re scared, you can wait at the tavern.” Auster shoved him backward.
“It’s not me I’m afraid for,” Paj answered, and it was so honest and plain that it seemed to make the street noise stop around us. Paj’s face softened, his mouth turning down at the corners.
Auster took the sleeve of Paj’s shirt, as if to anchor him. “If it’s Ezra, we’re fine.”
“And if it’s Henrik?”
Auster gave his best attempt at a playful smile. “Then we’re screwed.” He pulled Paj toward him until he was low enough for Auster to kiss him. Right there in the street, for anyone to see.
I couldn’t help but smile.
“Finished?” West said impatiently.
Auster looked at Paj as if he was waiting for him to answer.
Paj sighed. “Finished.”
Auster let go of him, satisfied for the moment, and we followed him into the narrow alley between the last two buildings on the street. The opening lay between the signs for a tea house and a launderer, and the bricks turned black, painted with the soot.
Auster walked with his shoulders pulled back. I could see the armor going up around him, the softness of his face changing, and the weight of his steps growing heavier. Whatever he was about to face, he was bracing for it.
The alley came to an end, where an iron door lined with rivets was fit into the brick.
A string of something above it caught the wind, swinging. I squinted, trying to make it out, and grimaced when I realized what it was. “Are those…?”
“Teeth,” Auster muttered, answering before I’d even finished.
“Human teeth?”
Auster lifted an eyebrow. “The price of lying to Henrik.” His hand curled into a fist before he raised it, and he looked over his shoulder to Paj once more before he knocked.
“You should wait out here,” he said, keeping his voice low.
Paj laughed bitterly in response, shaking his head once. “That’s never going to happen.”
Beside me, West’s hand went to the back of his belt, ready to take hold of his knife. There was only the soft drip of water filling the silence as we stood before the closed door. I couldn’t stop staring at the string of teeth.
Paj tapped the buckle of his belt restlessly, but Auster didn’t s
eem concerned. He crossed his arms over his chest, waiting, and when the latch finally creaked, he didn’t so much as flinch.
The door cracked open enough for a young boy’s face to appear. The deep valley of a scar curved over his cheek. “Yes?” He looked more irritated than interested in whatever we wanted.
“Looking for Ezra,” Auster said flatly. “Tell him Auster’s here to see him.”
The boy’s eyes went wide as he stumbled backward. “Auster?” The way he said the name sounded as if it came with a story.
Auster didn’t answer, stepping into the dimly lit entry with the rest of us on his heels. A series of hooks lined the wall, where a few jackets and hats were hung beneath a series of gold-framed oil paintings. They were depictions of the sea in different styles and colors, and completely out of place on the cracked plaster walls. Even the tiles under our feet were fractured, their mosaic patterns tipping and turning where pieces were missing.
The boy’s footsteps sounded in the hall after a tense silence, and he reappeared, motioning us into the dark. Auster followed without a moment’s hesitation, but I pulled my knife from my belt, holding it ready at my side. The boy led us around a turn, and the warm glow of a lantern reignited the dark ahead.
A doorframe left empty save for its hinges gave way to a large, rectangular room. Rippling wallpaper the color of rubies was smoothed over the walls, the floor stained a deep mahogany where it was visible. Everywhere else, it was covered by a thick wool rug edged in fraying tassels.
The desk set before the fireplace was bare, but the boy straightened it methodically, lining up the quill along the right side. Before he was finished, the door along the back wall was pushed open, and the young man I’d seen at Holland’s appeared. Ezra.
His eyes immediately found Auster as he stepped into the room. “You’ve got to be shitting me.”
Auster stared at Ezra blankly before a smile broke on his face.
Ezra came around the desk, opening his arms and clapping Auster on the back as he embraced him. It was a different mask than the one I’d seen Ezra wear the day before in Holland’s office. But the warmth between them seemed to irritate Paj. He rolled his shoulders like he had the urge to punch something.
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