Greythorne (Bloodleaf 2)

“Uro,” I said. Burn.

A groaning roar came from deep within the ship, juddering the timbers and rattling the glass in the lamps.

“What was that?” Castillion coughed as dust shook down into his face.

“That,” I said, “was your furnace, blowing a hole in your hull.”

“You’re sinking my ship?” he asked, eyes alight.

“It’s what’s fair,” I said. “A ship for a ship.” I turned to go.

“Wait!” he called. “You won the game. Don’t I owe you a secret?”

I turned back to him, his hands frozen on the desk, which was bolted to the floor. His shoulders were sagging, just like I’d seen on the bridge, but his eyes were bright.

“The ship I sank in Stiria Bay? It wasn’t Valentin I was after. You were supposed to be on it too.”

I tilted my head, considering him. “Why were you after me?”

“They told me—” He was almost laughing. “They told me that you would be my unmaking. I didn’t understand what that meant until now.”

I gave Castillion one last look from over my shoulder. The cards of our game were sliding between his splayed fingers as the ship began to tip forward.

Before I closed the door on him and left him to his fate, I said, “Si vivis, tu pugnas. The horseman sends his regards.”

26

Most of the longboats had already been deployed by the time I got out. I half ran, half slid down the promenade deck as the ship tilted toward the water. Not everyone had heeded Onal’s warnings right away, and those who had waited to board the escape rafts until after the explosion were now scrabbling after them in a disorganized panic that served only to hinder their getaways.

Many of the high-society hostages were among the last to board; they’d gotten too comfortable with their own incarceration, continuing to roll their dice while the people from the underdeck were already rowing away to safety.

Onal was waiting for me in one of the boats, the ship’s physician and Werner Humboldt ready to launch it from the side as the ship groaned and lurched again. “There!” she cried, pointing. “She’s coming! We can’t leave yet!”

But the doctor wasn’t listening. He was sweating as he tried to untie the rope while the other man screeched behind him, “No time! No time!”

I was no longer half running now; I was simply skidding. Objects loosened from above were pummeling me as I went down. The furnace chimneys were still belching black clouds into the night, and I coughed and rubbed my bleary eyes, hardly able to see.

The doctor finished cutting the boat away, and it hit the water with a jolt just as the ship tilted further and I tumbled down the decks. I was able to snag a thick rope on my way past and held on as it snapped tight. I swung around and crashed into the side of the hull and dangled there as the ship now protruded from the fjord at an exact perpendicular.

And then I let go.

I straightened my body into a spear, slicing through the water even as the cold choked out every other thought and feeling. When I broke the surface, I could hear Onal shouting for me, and I swam toward the sound of her voice. Above, an explosion sent tiny pieces of wood and debris raining down on us like missiles.

When I got to the boat, Werner Humbolt and Onal hoisted me into it and I huddled in the bottom, shaking violently. The doctor lay collapsed across the boat’s bow, staring sightlessly at the sky, a piece of metal embedded in his skull.

Humboldt pushed the man’s body overboard, grabbed the oars, and tossed one at us. “Paddle!” he yelled angrily. “Paddle!”

But I couldn’t; I could hardly move.

He turned, the whites of his eyes showing bright in the dark. “Listen, you worthless sluts. If we don’t get out of here right now . . .” He reeled his hand back as if to strike us, but one of the ship’s chimney stacks broke and slammed into the water. The force of it sent us careening wildly, water crashing over our heads. Onal and I hunkered as low as we could, clinging to each other, but Humboldt was swept from his feet and away into the dark depths.

We had barely enough time to wipe the water from our eyes before we heard the creak of the second funnel as it, too, began to break away.

If it fell now, we’d be crushed beneath it.

I fumbled for my knife, my fingers numb and clumsy, but when I touched it to my skin, no blood rose to answer it. My hands were too cold, my blood too sluggish in my constricting veins.

With no blood, there could be no spell. With no spell—