by Sara Raasch
“It came from below. Lu?” Gunnar bounced in anticipation, stretching his fingers. “I said you should talk to her again. She planned her own escape.”
“We don’t know that.”
Ben looked up. The intensity of Gunnar’s heat held Ben immobile, like pyre flames drawing him in—and sunbeams stroking his face. They hadn’t been this close since the holding cells of Grace Neus Cathedral, when Gunnar had been the one on his knees, his chin in Ben’s hand.
Gunnar dropped his head, tangles of blond hair brushing the top of his clan mark. He shot Ben a look of annoyance. “Have you finished? Princes do not know how locks work?”
The lock came free with a click and Ben stood, returning Gunnar’s annoyed look with one of his own. But he felt the flimsiness of it.
Above, a bell tolled. Feet pounded—the ship awakening amidst a volley of gunfire.
Whatever was happening, they needed to use it, as they had used everything else.
“We fight now,” Gunnar said.
He waited for confirmation, but Ben knew that if he said no, Gunnar would shove him down and storm out of the room, an unstoppable fireball. Already the temperature around him had spiked, drawing sweat along Ben’s forehead.
Gunnar didn’t seem worried that he was wearing only the pants of his servant’s uniform. He extended his hand and birthed a flame in his palm. The orange light flared in his eyes, their color the blue of a sky at storm.
“Yes,” Ben said, wanting to retch, wanting to scream. “We fight.”
Gunnar smiled, the first time he had given Ben something other than a glower, and it was as incapacitating as his heat.
“Finally,” Gunnar said and sent fire blasting at the door.
Lu dove into the corner of her cell as the lit Variegated Holly hit the bars. A dome-shaped explosion erupted, brilliant white light flaring in a blast that rang in Lu’s ears. Debris sprayed across her, bits of metal and chunks of wood—but, thankfully, no seawater.
“You could have killed us!” Lu shouted, her ears buzzing. She clawed her way to her feet, analyzing the mess that had once been her cell door. A gaping, smoking hole now, it was littered with pieces of itself—and larger chunks of iron had embedded in the seaside wall.
Nayeli didn’t acknowledge any of these dangers. In fact, she was giggling.
Edda flew up from where the explosion had thrown her. “Nay, you dumbass!”
Nayeli waved her hands at her ears. “Can’t hear you. Explosion was too loud.”
Edda glared at her as she hobbled over to the hole in the cell. “Where’s Vex?”
The realization settled. They might have had the secrecy to find him—if Nayeli had not, quite literally, blown it away. But as Lu started to yell at her again, bedlam carried. Voices raised in orders, warning; an alarm bell tolled in the rapid pattern of a call.
Lu’s eyes went to the ceiling, hearing the expected footsteps thundering down to investigate the explosion. But beyond that, another noise came, faint yet distinct.
“Gunfire?” Relief washed over her. “Cansu!”
Nayeli cheered, but they had no time for further explanation. They shot up the first set of stairs, sidestepping the two unconscious defensors Edda had mentioned, and made for another staircase that would lift them to the middle deck. The closer they got to the main deck, the more mayhem would reign.
Lu jolted to a stop as shouting intensified, words she could make out now:
“Port side! Coming around the stern! More approaching from the shore!”
“Does Cansu have enough raiders?” Lu asked. But would any number of steamboats make a difference against Argridian brigantines and galleons? Cansu’s syndicate was the only group on this island fighting Argrid—they couldn’t afford to lose anyone in battle.
Nayeli shrugged. “Not taking on. Distracting.”
“Which is why we have to move,” Edda said. “Cansu won’t be able to hold on for long, and we don’t have Vex.”
Lu shook away the parts of her that wanted to sort through the larger goings-on in favor of their imminent survival. Ben would know where they were holding Vex. And they couldn’t leave without Ben, too—Lu needed him, if she was to have any hope of stopping Elazar.
“The laboratory,” she said. “This way.”
Lu shot up the staircase, intending to veer left down the next deck.
The defensors who had come to investigate the explosion barred her way. But what stopped Lu cold, her feet on the edge of the stairwell’s hatch, was the man who led them.
Milo pointed a pistol at her.
34
ABOVE, THE FIGHTING intensified. Gunfire came alongside shouting—and in the distant parts of the ship, Lu heard the clank of metal rotating, readying.
Cannons.
Lu put her hands out, feeling her own lack of weapons as Milo aimed his pistol at her. Behind her, Nayeli and Edda filled the hall, sighted by pistols in the hands of the defensors backing up Milo.
“It’s over,” Lu forced herself to say. “The raiders attacking will take you back to New Deza, and the Council will stop Argrid. It’s over.”
A bluff. She had no idea how this would end, nor how many of Cansu’s raiders there were, nor how many defensors the Argridians had to counter. But that was how it would play out, ideally—Cansu would take at least this ship, and they would drag Milo back to New Deza with a full account of his wrongdoings and the Argridian king’s plans. . . .
Lu knew it was a brittle dream. They would be lucky to get off this ship alive.
Milo sneered. “Oh, Miss Andreu,” he chided, the voice he’d used when his men had captured her so many years ago, speaking to someone too stupid to comprehend basic sense. “This island is Argrid’s.”
Once, Lu might have corrected him. The island belongs to its people!
Yes, Grace Loray did belong to its people. The ones who had fought for it as Lu had and the ones who enjoyed the freedom; the ones who fled here to escape their own homeland’s strife and the ones who came with stars in their eyes and hope in their hearts. This country was beautiful because of the variety of its people, and it was strong for that same reason.
Knowing that renewed Lu’s courage. “Let Argrid try to fight. We defeated you once; we will do so again.”
“Argrid controls the Mecht raider syndicate, and therefore the southern part of the island,” Milo said. “The Council has bowed to us as well. But please, do tell me how you think this tantrum of one raider syndicate will change anything. It proves what Argrid has known all along—that this island is desperate for the Pious God to cleanse it.”
Vibrations rang through the ship as a succession of explosions detonated—cannon fire. They came a breath before the door behind Milo and his men, the one leading to Ben’s laboratory, blew off its hinges.
Lu lurched back into Nayeli. Milo’s men toppled away as a roar of flames poured through the doorway, fire licking the air with searching, hungry fingers.
Through the flames stepped Gunnar, his face bent to match the fire he controlled. He turned right, away from Milo’s men and Lu’s group, and flicked his hand at passing bundles of flames to snuff them out.
Behind him, Ben braced himself on the doorframe, coughing. Half of Milo’s men recovered, rushing to Ben or tearing after Gunnar down the hall.
Milo leaped to his feet, pistol swinging to Lu again, though he shouted over his shoulder, “My prince, are you harmed?”
“No,” Ben hacked. “My assistant was defending me—we heard the attack. Stand down!”
Milo faltered, his pistol lowering. “What—”
Fire flared again, and three of Milo’s defensors screamed at the end of the hall. A thud, a shout, and Gunnar stomped back through the building smoke.
Only two of Milo’s men remained, divided between Ben’s call to stand down and Milo’s posture of attack.
But Lu saw who was behind Gunnar, a shadow in the smoke, and she moved.
She threw her body into Milo, knocking his hand in
to the wall. The pistol clattered from his grip and she swiped it up, kicking out his legs and sending him to the floor. Nayeli threw Hemlight at one of the remaining defensors while Edda elbowed the other in the face. They went down, taken out long enough for Lu to press on for the stairs, her pistol leading the way up to the main deck.
Dawn cast a flushed net over the golden-blue sky, a too-gentle backdrop. Commanders shouted to reload, aim, fire; defensors cried, “Huzzah!” when cannons struck targets or “Duck!” when Cansu’s raiders fired projectiles. The rock outcropping that the galleon had docked next to rose as high as its starboard railing, leaving the top of the deck and masts unobstructed for attacks from both sides.
Cansu’s steamboats peppered the water between the Argridian armada and the shore of Grace Loray, dots amid rolling waves of blue. Two of the brigantines had gathered around Elazar’s ship, but Cansu’s steamboats didn’t focus there—they skirted the jagged rocks for hiding spots around Ben’s ship. Against the size of the galleons and the lethal precision of the brigantines, it would not be a battle. It would be a slaughter.
As this war would be, if Elazar got his permanent magic, and no one on Grace Loray united to stop him.
Lu paused, gun limp, near the central hatch. Nayeli came up on her right, her fingers fluttering around bundles of Hemlight and Variegated Holly. Edda filled in on Nayeli’s other side and had drawn knives. Gunnar, Ben, and Vex joined them, Gunnar already holding balls of fire in his palms, Ben with a drawn sword, and Vex with a smile and a wink, as if those were weapons enough.
Defensors began to notice them as Milo burst through the central hatch with his battered and burned men. They gave Lu’s group a wide berth, not bothering with intimidation now that they had the upper hand. Milo wiped blood from a trickle down his chin and sneered at her.
She needed another play. Something to give them one last boost against the Argridians training dozens of weapons on them.
Tension wound around Vex and his group like a net yanking them to the surface. It’d break at any moment—a stray bullet, a battle-blind defensor eager to protect his prince.
Ben spun to him.
“Take me hostage,” he hissed.
Vex gave him a dumbfounded look. “What?”
Lu heard, too. She looked beyond him, at the defensors holding their positions.
“They don’t know you’ve turned,” she whispered. With no more than that, she smashed Ben’s back to her chest. He’d been holding a sword, but it drooped as Lu jammed the barrel of her pistol to his temple.
Well, this was not a situation Vex had expected.
The defensors had, though. They looked more murderous now that one of the prisoners had outright threatened their prince.
“Lower your weapons!” Lu shouted. “Move to the starboard railing!”
The railing that the ship had docked along the rocks. The port side would be free—
Shit. They’d have to jump overboard to escape.
The defensors didn’t move. A rifle cocked, the click like thunder.
“Now!” Lu shouted, pressing the pistol a little too convincingly to Ben’s head.
“Do it!” Ben ordered, wincing.
The defensors obeyed, lowering their weapons and moving. One man, though, watched Ben with a heavier weight than the rest of the soldiers, like he’d already planned something.
Lu twisted, pulling Ben backward across the deck. Their group reached the railing opposite the defensors, and Vex snuck a peek overboard.
The water was empty, but he’d bet his life that a boat was hiding behind one of the nearby rocks, watching for them. It might well be his life that he’d have to bet, too, free-falling off a ship like they were about to do.
Vex swallowed.
“We swim?” someone asked. The big Mecht.
“Don’t worry,” Vex countered. “There’s a boat.”
“There is no boat.”
“Trust me, it’s there.”
The Mecht growled. “There. Is. No. Boat.”
“Looks like you’re not the only one afraid of heights,” Nayeli said. She hopped onto the railing and leaped into the abyss beyond the ship with no hesitation, sinking elegantly into the crashing waves. Vex’s throat closed, but she surfaced and started for the nearest rock. Sure enough, a steamboat listed out of the shadows, Cansu at the bow, a pistol in each hand.
Edda waved for Vex to go next. Lu would have to be last, to hold Ben as collateral for as long as possible.
Every other fear scattered, and Vex reached for Lu.
“Lu, give me the gun—let me—”
Lu turned to him for one second. One goddamn second, and Vex’s panic rushed through his body before he knew why.
Jakes moved.
He dove across the deck, drawing his sword, swinging wide. Lu shoved Ben to his knees to protect him from the blade’s swing and so she could falter back.
Ben didn’t realize what he’d done until the steel of his sword rang where he caught Jakes’s blow.
His heart hammered, crushing into his ribs. Behind him, the remaining members of his group didn’t move, the whole of the deck caught in the crash of his and Jakes’s blades.
Jakes’s face went wide with shock. “Ben—” he started.
“Jump!” Ben hurled himself forward, catching Jakes off guard enough that he stumbled back.
The defensors on the starboard deck reacted, racing forward to resume battle. Cries ripped from throats, boots pounded on the wooden planks, and all Ben could do was hope that the rest of his group had heeded his call and jumped off the deck to safety.
The answer came in a blast of heat—Gunnar. A wall of fire washed a handful of defensors backward with screeches of agony, and Ben used the distraction to heft his sword and counter the swing of an approaching attacker.
He’d destroyed any chance he had of pretending not to be the Heretic Prince. However this battle ended, his world would not be the same.
Lu braced herself on the railing, gun at her hip, Edda tugging on her other arm. Below, waves thrashed Cansu’s boat as Nayeli beckoned from the deck.
She needed to jump. Ben’s sacrifice would only give them a short delay.
Next to her, Vex watched Ben, his face grim.
If they left, Ben would be condemned for helping them. More than that—if Lu left this ship without him, this war would swallow her up.
Lu’s consciousness tore away from the chaos. She saw Edda dive in front of her, back-to-back with Vex as they fought off defensors. She saw Milo across the deck, shoving defensors out of his path, his sword drawn and his eyes on her.
A Tuncian steamboat fired a ball of Variegated Holly close enough to make all on deck duck. It bounced off one of the masts with a rocking explosion, leaving the mast teetering, not taken out.
Lu grabbed Edda in the pause. “Get Vex off this ship,” she told her. Begged her.
Edda met her eyes, but Lu moved, shoving Edda toward the railing. She gave them cover with a shot from her pistol. The defensors dropped back, created room, and Lu wanted to look at Vex.
But she couldn’t. Not now.
She had the cure for Shaking Sickness—a way to protect them as they experimented with Grace Loray’s botanical magic.
Ben had the start of permanent magic. He’d figured out on his own that making concentrated magic increased its potency.
Together, and with Gunnar’s begrudging help, they would find a way to make magic permanent. Powersage, for muscular strength; Bright Mint, for mental function. Healing. Speed. Defense. Everything. Like Elazar wanted—but they would use it to escape and show the island, the world, that they had no need of the Church or Argrid. They had no need to fear any attacker, for they had the defense, and they could build a world on their own strength.
With that arrangement, Lu had secured her own future as well. To do this, to save her island, she would become as transparent as Grace Loray had come to be. Only its truth remained, the fact of what it was: an island of outlaws, of
raiders, of sinners. Of Grace Lorayans in as many sizes and shapes as there were plants in their rivers.
But Lu needed Ben to create the permanent magic. And, selfishly, she needed Ben to find the cure for Vex. He would know, or be able to determine, the plants used by the Church, the ones Vex couldn’t remember even with help.
The little girl in Lu, the one who had wanted so badly to help the revolution, cried out at the chance of still being able to help her island. She could make up for what she had done.
She owed Grace Loray that. She owed it everything.
Lu spotted Ben in the fray, two men deep. Gunnar neared him, igniting defensors, swinging punches, and throwing kicks.
“Go, Edda!” Lu screamed, twisting back once. “Get him off this ship!”
Vex heard her. Edda—loyal, determined Edda—grabbed him and heaved him back, but Vex dropped his heels into the wood.
“Stop! LU!”
Nothing else mattered until the Argridians could no longer use Vex against her. Until every member of his crew was off this ship and safe.
Lu ignored Vex’s cries and searched again for Ben, rotating the now-empty pistol to use as a club. She would take down the defensors nearest Ben with Gunnar’s help and haul him out as Edda hauled Vex, and they could leap off together.
Fire shot through her middle, stabbing from her belly to her spine. Lu’s jaw dropped open as her mind scrambled for a sensible solution—had Gunnar burned her?
But she blinked, focused, breathed.
Milo threaded his arm around her back, holding her as if in a waltz, while the orchestra played rifles firing and cannons blasting and men dying.
“I would rather see you dead than escape me again,” he whispered, pressing his lips to her ear. The motion twisted the sword in her belly, gouging deeper, but pain didn’t come.
She had felt this numbness before, spreading out from a single point, immobilizing one limb, then another—
Lazonade. Milo had tipped his sword with Lazonade.
All the horrible things Lu had done came back to her, demanding recompense here, now. She let free one foolish whimper, and Milo held her closer.