“And if I don’t?”
When Sledge paused, it was as though the small tent leaned toward him. He studied Caledonia with a gaze so long and impervious that she found it difficult to draw a full breath.
“I will do anything to defend them,” he repeated, each word a low rumble of thunder.
The threat slid over Caledonia’s shoulders and skimmed down her arms to loop around her wrists like manacles. If she ran, if she was caught, she was certain Sledge wouldn’t give her a third chance.
“Prisoner, then,” she said.
Sledge remained impassive, but he pulled something small from his waistband and held it out to her. In his hand, engulfed by his massive palm, was a small black blade with a wooden handle.
“I wouldn’t arm a prisoner.”
Caledonia was suddenly dizzy. Her ears buzzed lightly, her fingers tingled. It was the blade Lir had stabbed her with four long years ago, the night he killed her family and destroyed their ship. She kept it with her as a reminder—of what she had lost and why she needed to fight. She drew a slow breath and took the blade.
“Thank you,” she said, her voice unnaturally distant.
Sledge stepped back and moved to the doorway, opening it to reveal a sky filled with a dusky-blue glow and a boy seated just outside. She recognized him by his scowl and his shadowed jaw, and thanks to Sledge she had a name for him: Pine. His attention was focused on the blade in his hand and the whetstone he used to sharpen its long edge.
Before leaving, Sledge turned to meet her eyes once more. “It’s a true pleasure to have you in our camp, Caledonia. I do hope you’ll consent to stay.”
CHAPTER THREE
Caledonia spent hours watching the color of her tent change from a very dark khaki to shadowed khaki to smudged khaki to khaki with a hint of sunlight behind it. She went from thinking khaki was a beautiful, subtle color full of unexpected variations and depth, to thinking it was an insult to all other colors to call it such. She’d traced the patterns of dirt stains and followed each seam from beginning to end more times than she could count, and she still couldn’t move a muscle without setting off a chain reaction of pain that reduced her to shivers.
Most of all, she focused on the color of her tent to keep from thinking about how she was trapped inside it. Again and again she steered her mind away from whatever distant waters now carried her crew. But no matter how hard she worked to drown her thoughts in the khaki threads around her, she discovered herself far away.
She imagined the sleek hull of the Mors Navis cutting through the warm waters of the Bone Mouth as the crew made for the Net. Pisces would scowl at the wide ocean plane not because she was afraid, but because she was still angry with Caledonia. And because being captain would keep her on deck more often than she’d like. Amina would see Pisces’s struggle and step in close, challenging and encouraging the new captain as needed. Hime would stand beside them, ready to keep the ship healthy in body and spirit. They were the perfect trio—compassion, strategy, and fortitude—to lead the crew into brighter seas. It wasn’t the future they’d planned, but it was a future they couldn’t have had if she’d remained on board.
Nettle would become a fixture at the helm if she hadn’t already. Tin would eventually figure out that the work she did managing the duty roster was essential and valuable. Pippa and Folly would turn their fighting style into an art form that each of the girls would one day master. And Oran—oh, seas, the last thing she’d done was to take the kiss he’d offered. Just thinking of it now made her heartbeat tap erratically in her chest. It had been a reckless act and she wasn’t sorry, but it felt unfinished in a way that thrummed under her skin.
She pressed her lips together. Meeting Oran had changed everything. He’d saved Pisces’s life and defected from his Bullet clip, coming aboard the Mors Navis at great risk to himself. She’d tried to kill him, but Pisces convinced her to wait, to show compassion and mercy, and in return, he gave them information they’d never hoped to have. Their little brothers were alive, and he knew how to find them. They’d rescued Ares. And Donnally—
Her stomach twisted violently. Before she could follow that thought too far, she plunged her mind back into the colorless cloth above her head. There was a patch where the threads were thicker, as though they’d grown stronger as they were spun and now they were knotted together forever. Immediately, her mind returned to Pisces. She had always been the strongest thread of their fabric, holding both Caledonia and their crew together with a kind of strategic caring Caledonia could never quite reach. Pisces may not have believed she’d be a good captain, but she was wrong. She was just as strong as Caledonia and just as clever. And with Amina and Hime at her side, she’d struggle that much less.
They would all be fine.
“They’ll be fine,” Caledonia repeated to herself. Yet even as she said the words, she knew no one was fine in this world. She might never know what became of her girls. She’d traded her place in that family, and she’d failed to kill Lir in the process. She’d given up everything, and for nothing.
When at last the tent flap opened, Caledonia was so tired of her own thoughts, she almost hoped it was Sledge or even sullen, heavy-handed Pine come to scowl at her. Instead, a girl with strands of hair ranging from honey gold to reddish brown passed into the tent with a small bag in her hands and a sense of purpose in her step.
“Awake, I see,” she said, voice warm yet as deliberate as her stride. “I’m Triple, and I’ve got a surprise for you. Can you sit up? Here, let me help you.”
She moved to Caledonia’s side, settling herself on the edge of the cot as Caledonia slowly moved into a sitting position. Triple was small and sturdy with muscled curves that reminded Caledonia of Redtooth, except where Redtooth had been as white as lilies, this girl was tanned in a way that suggested the sun would never burn her. She was dressed in clothes reminiscent of Sledge’s—black top over green pants with a woven sash of silver knotted at her waist, long tails fluttering by her knee. An empty sheath hung from one hip, and Caledonia suspected the blade had been removed specifically for her benefit.
The girl rummaged around in her bag and produced a square patch that was so gray it was almost metallic. “A nanopatch,” she said proudly. “It’ll fix that wound on your back better and faster than anything else we’ve tried.”
Caledonia knew about nanopatches. They were old-world medtech. They were rare. And they were incredibly valuable. She didn’t like the thought of being indebted to these people any more than she already was, but she also didn’t like the idea of sitting around here for weeks while her body slowly knit itself back together.
“With your permission, of course,” Triple said, holding up her free hand with her palm facing Caledonia. When Caledonia shook her head in confusion, Triple added, “With your consent.”