She scanned the wall with renewed intent, and there, near enough to the end of the row of hills that it was nearly covered by the mounded soil, gleamed a faint hint of metal.
“Gotcha,” she said, grinning, and jogged down the side of the hill, struggling to keep her jelly-tired knees under control. Just a little while longer, and then she could throw herself down to rest on the deck of the Larkspur. They were so, so close.
Brown-black smears of sticky nectar clung to her arms and legs as she waded through the rows of mudleaf shrub. She hesitated before the grate, breathing deep of the sea-damp air, waiting to be sure she caught no hint of the poisons Nouli brewed within wafting out at her. When she was certain the vent was clear, she felt along the edge of the grate, fingers dragging over the rough metal, until she found the hook that held it in place. Shoddy workmanship, but all the better for her purposes.
With Enard’s help she levered the grate free and threw it to the dirt, then peered carefully within. The room was faintly lit, the ruddy glow of cheap beeswax candles behind dusty glass the only source of light in the room.
“Nouli?” she whispered.
A soft rattling echoed from within. Nouli’s head appeared above his table, his face sallow and pinched with worry and suspicion.
“Captain, is it? Thought you buggered off with my supplies.”
“Our task was betrayed, I’m afraid. To the Glasseaters.”
Nouli hissed through his teeth, darting an uneasy glance at the door. “You’d better come in.”
“Can’t you come out?”
He glanced pointedly at the window, then at the width of his chest, and Ripka sighed. There was no way he could squeeze through. They’d have to take him out through the prison proper, and that meant risking detection.
“Honey,” she said as she levered herself up to crawl through the window. “You don’t have to help us with this. You could sneak back into general pop, maybe even all the way to your cell–”
“I’m coming,” she said, and though her voice was as soft as always there was no room for argument in it.
After what felt like a good half-mark of cursing and squeezing and scraping, they were all three through the vent, forming a half-circle around Nouli and his cluttered table.
“We must go now,” Ripka insisted. Nouli clutched a satchel bulging with papers tight to his chest.
“My niece…”
“We were sold out to the Glasseaters. Kanaea Bern is the only one who could have done this.” She hated to cut to the point so, but there was no time for this. They had to flee, now.
“She wouldn’t!”
“Unless it was you, there is no other possibility.”
He sucked his lips and shifted his weight, then pushed his spectacles up his nose and nodded to himself. “I do not like it, but I believe you. She has been acting… strange… lately. I fear she is more and more her father’s child every day. A gambler, that one. Obsessed with risk. I see no other solution to the evidence before us.”
Ripka sighed with relief. It was a pleasure to convince a mind as loving of evidence as her own. “Good. Do you know any shorter paths out of this place? We must avoid detection at all costs, and make it to the sparrow’s nest, where our escape ship is docked.”
Nouli barked a frantic laugh. “Impossible. There are less used ways, but with the prison in chaos there’s no way to know where the guards will be. Never mind any rabid inmates running amok.”
Ripka forced herself to relax her jaw. “Very well. Then we will do our best. Be quick and be quiet, do not speak unless–”
The workshop door flung open. Silhouetted in the brighter light of well-tended oil lanterns stood Kisser, flanked by two tough looking men who wore guard’s uniforms. Ripka reached instinctively for her cutlass, cursed and grabbed for one of the crates Nouli used for chairs instead.
“You two,” Kisser said, “are terrible at dying.” She advanced into the small room, thugs in tow.
Chapter Forty
“Hold them.” Aella ordered no one in particular as she wiped wine from her eyes with the back of her wrist. Detan danced back a step and waved the clay jug through the air as if it were as deadly as a sword. Aella snorted.
“Try not to embarrass yourself too much, Honding.”
“Bit late for that, don’t you think?”
“Was too late before we ever met.”
Tibs chuckled.
“Traitor,” Detan said
“She’s not wrong.”
“Honding.” Pelkaia’s voice cut through his rising mood like the Larkspur’s prow through a storm, and he winced. Wonderful. In one stupid word – never mind that it was his name – she’d encapsulated all her annoyance, all her questioning. Though he kept his gaze snapped on Aella he could practically see Pelkaia with her arms crossed, foot tapping out an impatient staccato as she waited for him to come up with some way to fix this. He looked at the wine carafe, at the maroon dribble snaking down its side, and tried to ignore the sound of nice military boots stomping through the halls, surrounding them.
“Err.”
“As entertaining as you are, I’m afraid I’ve rather had enough of this.” Aella tipped her chin toward the doorway behind her, and through it spilled a half-dozen guards looking like they’d had their lunch interrupted. One even had a smear of oil and vinegar at the corner of her lips. Didn’t hamper her ability to point a crossbow at him, however.
Despite her obedience, the salad eater looked a touch confused. She squinted at Pelkaia-Thratia. “Begging your pardon, mistress, but the commodore…?”
“Oh, that.” Aella held out a hand and clenched a fist. Detan felt nothing, he had his sel sense reined in tight, but Pelkaia staggered to one side. Coss barely got a hand out in time to hold her upright, and her face melted clear off, leaving the sand-dune cheeks she’d been born with.
“There. That’s better. Now, say hello to our latest additions,” Aella said, and there was a soft muttering amongst her people.
“Don’t look keen on it,” the woman with the spear said.
“Are you still here, Misol? Go and collect the other two,” Aella said.
Misol rolled her eyes and strolled out the door. Detan found himself wishing he could tag along with her. “If it pleases you, Aella, I’d be happy to retrieve my wayward companions–”
“You’re not getting out of my sight. Nor you and your friend, Pelkaia.”
“Who is this girl?” Coss asked.
“Just another collector.” Aella flashed Coss a smile.
“Enslaver, is more like it,” Pelkaia’s voice was a soft growl. “Did you come here for Ripka’s list as well?”
Detan and Tibs exchanged a nervous glance. In all the commotion, he’d forgotten to let Pelkaia know that Ripka harbored no such thing.
Aella’s brows shot up. “List? Never mind – I will discover the truth of that soon enough. If you must know, I’m here looking for our ilk.”
As Aella’s six guards spread out, Detan shifted his weight and cast a glance at Tibs, who only shrugged. No ideas there, either. The room was small, the door behind him of average size, but the windows were quite large, if partially shuttered. His mind raced, grasping for a solution while Pelkaia and Aella postured like overfeathered cockerels.
“In a prison?” Pelkaia scoffed. “It suits you.”