“Why did they spare you?” asked Kasnov.
“Did they?” challenged Lila.
The captain licked his lips. He’d already decided what to do about the ship, she could tell; now he was deciding what to do about her. The Copper Thieves had no reputation for mercy.
“Baliz …” said one of the pirates, a man with skin darker than the rest. He clasped the captain’s shoulder and whispered in his ear. Lila could only make out a few of the muttered words. Londoners. Rich. And ransom.
A slow smile spread across the captain’s lips. “Anesh,” he said with a nod. And then, to the entire gathered crew, “Sails up! Course south by west! We have a golden fish to catch.”
The men rumbled their approval.
“My lady,” said Kasnov, leading Lila toward the steps. “You’ve had a hard night. Let me show you to my chamber, where you’ll surely be more comfortable.”
Behind her, she heard the sounds of the cask being opened and the ale being poured, and she smiled as the captain led her belowdecks.
*
Kasnov didn’t linger, thank god.
He deposited her in his quarters, the rope still around her wrists, and vanished again, locking the door behind him. To her relief, she’d only seen three men belowdecks. That meant fifteen aboard the Copper Thief.
Lila perched on the edge of the captain’s bed and counted to ten, twenty, then thirty, as the steps sounded above and the ship banked toward her own fleeing vessel. They hadn’t even bothered to search her for weapons, which Lila thought a bit presumptuous as she dug a blade from her boot and, with a single practiced gesture, spun it in her grip and slashed the ropes. They fell to the floor as she rubbed her wrists, humming to herself. A shanty about the Sarows, a phantom said to haunt wayward ships at night.
How do you know when the Sarows is coming?
(Is coming is coming is coming aboard?)
Lila took the waist of her dress in two hands, and ripped; the skirt tore away, revealing close-fitting black pants—holsters pinning a knife above each knee—that tapered into her boots. She took the blade and slid it up the corset at her back, slicing the ribbons so she could breathe.
When the wind dies away but still sings in your ears,
(In your ears in your head in your blood in your bones.)
She tossed the green skirt onto the bed and slit it open from hem to tattered waist. Hidden among the gossamer were half a dozen thin sticks that passed for boning and looked like flares, but were neither. She slid her blade back into her boot and freed the tapers.
When the current goes still but the ship, it drifts along,
(Drifts on drifts away drifts alone.)
Overhead, Lila heard a thud, like dead weight. And then another, and another, as the ale took effect. She took up a piece of black cloth, rubbed charcoal on one side, and tied it over her nose and mouth.
When the moon and the stars all hide from the dark,
(For the dark is not empty at all at all.)
(For the dark is not empty at all.)
The last thing Lila took from deep within the folds of the green skirt was her mask. A black leather face-piece, simple but for the horns that curled with strange and menacing grace over the brow. Lila settled the mask on her nose and tied it in place.
How do you know when the Sarows is coming?
(Is coming is coming is coming aboard?)
A looking glass, half-silvered with age, leaned in the corner of the captain’s cabin, and she caught her reflection as footsteps sounded on the stairs.
Why you don’t and you don’t and you won’t see it coming,
(You won’t see it coming at all.)
Lila smiled behind the mask. And then she turned and pressed her back against the wall. She struck a taper against the wood, the way she had the flares—but unlike flares, no light poured forth, only clouds of pale smoke.
An instant later, the captain’s door burst open, but the pirates were too late. She tossed the pluming taper into the room and heard footsteps stumble, and men cough, before the drugged smoke brought them down.
Two down, thought Lila, stepping over their bodies.
Thirteen to go.
II
No one was steering the ship.
It had banked against the waves and was now breaching, being hit sidelong instead of head-on in a way that made the whole thing rock unpleasantly beneath Lila’s feet.
She was halfway to the stairs before the first pirate barreled into her. He was massive, but his steps were slowed a measure and made clumsy by the drug dissolved in the ale. Lila rolled out of his grip and drove her boot into his sternum, slamming him back into the wall hard enough to crack bones. He groaned and slid down the wooden boards, half a curse across his lips before the toe of her boot met his jaw. His head snapped sideways, then lolled forward against his chest.