“Oh,” Nouli said, “oh my.”
Kisser’s wide hand fell upon Nouli’s shoulder.
“Where,” she said firmly, “did you learn that name?”
Chapter Twenty-One
The combined talents of all the deviants aboard did a splendid job of making the Larkspur look like a standard Fleet cruiser once more. And they’d been polite enough not to comment on the amount of sel they were missing due to Detan’s outburst. Despite the resource’s depletion, the remaining selium wrapped around the ship made Detan’s skin itch, and not only because it was a fortune’s worth of the material.
If he were to lose his temper again, he’d take half of Petrastad with him. The thought froze him to the spot, arrested his steps as he marched down the gangplank toward the grand double-doors of the watchtower. The Larkspur loomed behind him, its presence oppressive. So high above the city, the sea winds bit beneath the shelter of his stolen coat, but the chill wasn’t near enough to shake the fear from him.
Tibs gave him a gentle nudge in the shoulder. Right. Tibs was here. He’d never let Detan lose control like that. It was their deal – the cornerstone of their relationship. They balanced one another with jokes and barbs, skirted around the short-leashed tempers in both their hearts.
Detan dropped his voice to a whisper. “We’re going to save a damsel in distress from a tower, just like in fairy tales.”
“Don’t let Pelkaia hear you say that, she’ll pop your eyes out and throw ’em in a stew.”
“Oh, have a little fun. Has it occurred to you that we’re breaking a woman out of jail, to break a woman out of jail?”
“Thought had crossed my mind.”
“Once this is through, I don’t want to see another set of bars for a year. Not so much as a sharpening rod.”
“Rather thought you were enjoying yourself.”
Detan stifled a grin. “Shut up, Tibs.”
“As you say, sirra.”
A few long strides ahead of them Laella paused, sized them up with a wary eye, and snapped her fingers. “Hurry up, louts. We have two prisoners to take custody of. Prisoners you idiots let go.”
She spun on her heel, the long commodore’s coat flying out behind her like a standard of arms, and strode toward the unsuspecting lobby of the watchtower. Detan suppressed a whistle of appreciation. Essi’d been right, picking Laella for this job. The girl had her uppercrust act down pat. Probably because she’d grown up as one, just as Detan had.
The watchers’ dock was a two-tier affair, and as they ambled along Detan peered down to get a better look at their neighbors. Only one of the watcher ships was currently manned. A short-bodied barge with a three large buoyancy sacks netted above it, the craft was packed with a handful of watchers. At least three, Detan realized with a start, were sensitives. They appeared to be doing maintenance on the ship – holding sel in place while workers patched the buoyancy sacks. Their presence made him nervous. If they were strong enough to sense the sel hiding the Larkspur’s shape, this whole plan might come apart at the seams.
One of the watchtower doors lurched open, the tall pane of lantern light from within casting Laella in silhouette. In flat black outline, her chin high and her stride certain, coat making her figure mast pole-straight, she looked disturbingly like a whitecoat. Detan suppressed a shudder.
“It is the middle of the sands-cursed night,” a watcher, in a much fancier coat than the ones who’d come to cart Pelkaia away, said. It was a style of coat he’d come to think of as Ripka’s coat. Seeing it on another watcher’s shoulders made him scowl. The sturdy man strode out to meet Laella, his back near as straight as hers despite the grey in his beard. “Can you not wait until morning, commodore? At this hour my staff is thin enough. We cannot spare the distraction.”
Laella paused, letting the watch-captain close the remaining distance between them. A power move, that. Detan couldn’t help but wonder how far the girl had advanced in her courtly etiquette training before Pelkaia had whisked her away to the safety of the sky.
Detan and Tibs stood at ease, flanking Laella a half-step behind her on either side, their hands laid over the grips of cutlasses neither of them knew how to use. The blades had been loaners from Pelkaia’s costume trunk, just like Laella’s coat.
“I have come to relieve your staff of some of their burden.” She modulated her voice downward to lend it carrying power and propped one hand on her hip, admiring the nailbeds of her other hand. The watch-captain frowned at this. Poor move. The staunch old man wasn’t likely to take kindly to a bored, disaffected noble. Even if she was in a commodore’s coat.
“If it’s prisoners you’re after, come back in the morning. They’ll keep in their cells until the light.”
She jerked a thumb over her shoulder toward the clouds, switching from bored to controlled anger so fast it made Detan’s head spin. “Do you not see the storm approaching? A half-mark ago the sky was filled with the strangest lightning I’ve ever seen. Monsoon season comes. I’ll have my prisoners back now so that I can see them securely to the Remnant.”
Detan flinched as the watch-captain eyed the blackened sky, wary. Either he’d seen Detan’s little firestorm, or he’d heard rumors of it already. To Detan’s senses, the very air held the soft, charred aroma of ash.
One of the watchers who had taken Pelkaia away in the goat-cart appeared over the watch-captain’s shoulder, a sheaf of papers tucked under one arm and a sour expression on his drooping, exhausted face. Before the watch-captain could give his answer, Detan pointed at the young watcher.
“There! That’s the man who took our prisoners.” The watcher’s head jerked up as he looked for his accuser. Upon sighting Tibs and Detan, his shoulders heaved with a tired sigh.
“You!” Laella approached the man, shouldering the watch-captain aside. Detan followed, giving the captain an apologetic pat on the shoulder as he passed. “You are the man who commandeered Fleet prisoners from my men?”
“Uh,” the watcher muttered, glancing from the advancing gale that was Laella to his captain and back again. “They were our prisoners, commodore.”
“Really.” She stopped an arm’s length away from the poor sod and jabbed a finger into his chest. “Was that before, or after, they shot a Fleetman in the leg with an arrow?”
“Crossbow,” Detan whispered.
“Even worse!” Laella threw her hands toward the skies in frustration.
“They may have shot a Fleetie,” the watcher said.
“A what?”
“A, uh, Fleetman, but they did it in Petrastad. Means they’re ours.”
“He’s right.” The watch-captain crossed the lobby and stood beside his watcher, thumbs hooked in his belt loops and back slouched with ease. Detan silently cursed himself. He shouldn’t have let them retreat to the safety of their tower walls. They should have stayed out on the dock, where the shadow of the so-called commodore’s cruiser could loom over them.
“Those two did their crime on Petrastad’s soil. They’re ours,” the captain continued, jutting his chin out as if punctuating his point.
Laella drew her head back, squared off her shoulders, and curled her lip in the most vicious snarl Detan’d ever seen. He was suddenly quite happy she was on their side. If it weren’t for her deviant abilities, she’d have been the perfect cog in Valathea’s imperial machine.
“Do you think the Fleet cares about your petty soil? We guard the skies, captain, and everything below them. I will take those prisoners now. Bring me to them.”