Oh shit. Was Tibs trying to piss him off to blow something up? If that was his plan, he was going to be disappointed in a hurry. Detan cursed Callia, Aella, and any other vowel-smashed imperial name he could think of. He could only hope Tibs and New Chum had worked out some sort of hand signal to let one another know something was amiss.
If only he had thought of that idea before, he could let Tibs know his own cursed self.
“Evening, warden.” Tibs tipped down the brim of his singed hat. “Nice of you to come see me.”
“Cut the shit.” Thratia’s cutlass whipped over Detan’s shoulder and pressed right up tight against Tibal’s throat. Detan cringed, sweating himself slick in two thumps of his heart, but he held his ground.
“Where’s my ship?”
“More to the point,” Callia said, slipping forward to stand on Detan’s other side, making his skin crawl with mere proximity. “Where is my doppel? I know you could not possibly pilot the craft yourself, Tibal. Not even with your watch captain’s aid.”
Tibs held his hands out and patted the air like he was calming an angry mule, his smile chock full of that rustic charm Detan damned well knew was an act. Worked on most ladies. Too bad these two sandvipers were nothing at all like ladies.
“Easy now.” Tibs placed a finger on the flat of Thratia’s blade and nudged it out to the side, then took a step back. Putting more distance between himself and Detan. The prick. “Ship’s coming round, though you’ll have to check with Pelkaia regarding just where she intends on going. Doesn’t have much love for your kind, understand.”
Tibs pointed behind them, and the ladies on the field turned as one to regard the tip of an all-too familiar mast creeping over the lip of the conical wall. Detan, however, kept his eyes squarely on Tibs’s sour face and tried to mouth out: N-O S-E-L.
Tibs blinked at him, big brows drawing together.
I C-A-N-T…er… B-O-O-M.
The idiot just shrugged. Detan clenched his fists, shuffled a step towards Tibs and gathered his breath to get his voice as low as possible.
The Larkspur crested the rise, big enough to cast a shadow over their little party. A surprisingly small shadow. Detan blinked, distracted, tried to work it through but–
“That’s not the Larkspur,” Aella said.
Detan spun around, let himself take a step back towards Tibs as he did it. Hovering above the firemount’s rim was the Larkspur as he’d known it, sails full and stabilizing wings spread wide in the afternoon light. Pelkaia stood on the deck alongside Ripka, both waving with big stupid grins. The exact same wave. The exact same grin.
He half-turned, saw Aella’s small face pinched with focus, sweat sluicing off her scrunched brow. Her fists were clenched at her sides, making her look even smaller for how tiny they were. Her jaw jutted forward with strain.
The Larkspur vanished. So did Pelkaia.
Aella staggered, all the color draining from her small cheeks. Detan reached for her but she swatted him back, forcing herself upright. Too damned proud to seek out help when she needed it.
She caught his eye and jerked her chin. He blinked, turned back toward the place where the Larkspur had been.
Selium rushed toward the blue vault of the sky, a reverse opalescent rain. Glimmering droplets raced away from their armature, his own sad little flier with a rather shocked Ripka standing alone on deck. The stitched-together contraption still had Happy Birthday Virra! Painted in purple along the side of one buoyancy sack. Detan thought he’d faint.
No time for that. Aella had dropped her hold.
He let the sel rise, higher and higher, straining himself until he feared it would escape his grasp. Once it had melded with the streaky white of wind-battered clouds he reached out for all he was worth and held. Binding, binding, smashing it all together until it was one massive globule.
He swayed, sick with the immensity of it, felt a familiar hand grip his arm and prop him upright. Tibs, that old bastard, grinning like an idiot. Probably because he was one. There was no way he could have seen Aella coming.
“Who the fuck is Virra, and where is my pits-damned ship?” Thratia spun on Detan and Tibal, cutlass lashing out. He was straining himself too hard to pay any real attention, but he thought he heard the telltale squeal of Callia drawing her own blade. Looked like the imperial was up to doing her own work after all.
“Over there,” Tibs said, voice relentlessly chipper as he stepped out of reach of Thratia’s blade, this time dragging Detan along with him. Thank the sweet skies. At least Tibs hadn’t gone completely mad.
Callia strode toward Aella, grabbed the girl by the front of her blouse and hauled her upright, vein throbbing in the center of her forehead. “Take down all illusions in this area. Now.”
The girl’s eyes went wide enough that Detan could see the gleam of the sun glancing off the whites of them. He wanted to scurry over there, to bravely shove Callia aside and tell her that was no way to treat a young lady, especially one in her charge. But he was weak and he was tired, and he didn’t have a thing in the world to answer for the length of steel in Callia’s hand.
Well, he had the sel. Too unwieldy to risk using. As always.
Callia let the girl go, shoving her forward. Aella turned in a slow circle, eyes narrowed.
“I told you–” Tibs began, but Thratia lunged and cracked the pommel of her cutlass against his temple hard enough to split skin and send the poor devil reeling. Detan forced himself forward, grabbed his friend by the shirt and held him up, tried to drag him back a step but was halted by Thratia placing the edge of her blade against his own scrawny neck. Detan froze, tangled up with Tibs, heart trying to escape through his throat.
“Everyone’s staying right here until I get my ship. Understand?”
Aella hissed through her teeth, drawing Thratia and Callia’s attention. She pointed straight behind their little group, eyes wide with wonder.
“It wasn’t there before!” she insisted to no one in particular as she held both hands out, so tired she needed the assistance of mirror-movement to make her powers work. Just like the weaker sods working the line, Detan thought.
The empty air just a few paces behind them rippled, shimmered, then fell away in tatters, ribbons of sel peeling off like rotten fruit. Testament to the girl’s exhaustion – she was only able to rip it at the seams, not shatter it whole. Detan let that sel go. There was no way he could hold so much.
When the illusion had passed, there the Larkspur hovered. Half its sails were tucked in, its stabilizing wings only half out. Pelkaia stood on the edge of the deck facing them. The rail had been taken down, and she had one booted foot on a roll of canvas as thick around as a corpse. She grinned down at their little gathering, cut Thratia a tight salute.
The ex-commodore strode forward, Callia falling in line at her side. But it was Aella that Pelkaia turned her attention to. The doppel inclined her head, a small smile of genuine respect on her time-worn features. Detan blinked, realizing he was seeing Pelkaia’s true face for the first time. He squinted, straining, but was too far away to make out any detail.
“You’re good, girl,” Pelkaia called loud enough for all to hear. “But you missed one.”
Aella spun around, overbalanced, and staggered sideways a step. She brought her hands up to cup either side of her head, pressing in as if she could stop the world spinning with the force of her hands.