You thought castrating a man would stop his quest for vengeance?

“He follows me now. I keep enough distance to taunt him. To let him think he’ll catch me, if he just gets the wind right, or if I make one mistake. Not sure how he motivates his crew. Imagine they’ll mutiny someday.”

“So you’re letting a lethal problem fester because … why? Because you’re bored?” That Gunner hadn’t killed his pursuer either said Gunner was a better man than Gavin had thought, or a far, far worse one.

“Gunner likes that word. What’s that mean?”

Which … oh, fester. “Get worse. Like a wound that gets gangrene or leaks pus.”

“Knew it was a good one. You’re a smart man, Prism. Festure.”

“Fester,” Gavin said before he could stop himself.

Murder passed across Gunner’s face in half a second, then departed. “Fester,” he said carefully. “What would your father do if I sent him your eyes?”

Gavin suppressed a quick stab of revulsion and fear. “That depends.”

“Pray tell.”

“He would doubtless make some public expression of grief. That would be a mummer’s show I should be sorry to miss. He’ll come after you regardless, but you tell me, are my eyes still prismatic?”

Gunner’s fist came out of nowhere, crushing the side of Gavin’s face. Unable to defend himself in his chains, on his knees, Gavin crashed heavily to the deck. He heard a mechanical sound and looked up, blood filling his mouth, to see Gunner had the musket-sword loaded, cocked, and pointed at Gavin’s head.

“You mock me?” Gunner asked.

What? “My eyes,” Gavin said. “Do they look like prisms? Do they reflect light anymore?”

“No, plain blue,” Gunner said, staring down the barrel. “Ah, prismic. Right. ’Pologies.” He hoisted up the gun. “Prismic?”

“That’s right,” Gavin said.

“Prismic?”

“Prismatic,” Gavin admitted.

“Prismatic. That’s right. Your eyes did used to be all prismatic. If Gunner popped ’em and sent ’em to Papa, he’d think that I don’t have his boy after all. Looks like you keeps your peepers. ’Course, I could pop one out. Just because.”

Karris, could you please come and save my ass? While there’s ass left to save, please? “You know, Gunner, I like you a lot. But you frighten me.”

Gunner smiled big, and the danger passed. He looked out at the sea again.

Gavin thought to speak, then thought better of it. Gunner was pensive. Let him think.

“A great musket and an impossible task,” he said after a long minute.

“Hmm?”

“That’s what I want. That’s all.” He looked at the musket-sword he’d pulled from Gavin’s side, somehow without killing him. “I used to want to make the perfect musket. This destroyed that for me. I can never make one this good. I used to want to shoot the Everdark Gates. This ship has destroyed that for me. It’s all been done.” He stomped on the deck. “Gunner was born too late. The last impossible task in this world, he accomplished in his youth.”

He sank into himself, the bright sun no longer penetrating his darkness.

“I don’t think that’s true,” Gavin said. “There are a dozen challenges worthy—”

The butt of the musket flashed out, slamming into Gavin’s stomach and knocking his wind away.

“Do not think to placard me, Guile. I’m no child to be twisted round your twosies. Take him below!” he roared. “Now! Before Gunner blows off the head of our prize!”

Chapter 19

Even as Teia’s feet beat the paving stones, her mind locked up. She was like an animal. She got to a narrow intersection in the alley, and realized she had the bloody knife still in her hands. She skidded to a stop, turned, and flung the knife down the alley, then turned and went the other direction. The ringing of the steel on the stones felt like another alarum bell. She scrubbed her face with a sleeve. It came away bloody.

She was covered in blood. Dear Orholam save her. Teia sprinted down the block, slowed to a walk at the corner, entered the main street, and moved toward the first shop. It was a wool carders’ and weavers’ store, broad shutters open, some of their wares displayed on the street. Seeing an old, toothless woman at the counter inside, Teia squatted down between a rack of woven goat wool ghotras and the wall outside. If the woman came out, the opening door would shield Teia from her.

There was only long enough to wonder if she’d made a terrible decision; then the whistles started. Teia heard men running, not ten paces away. The watchmen, blowing their whistles, high and angry. Running toward the murder, though, not away from it. Trying to figure out what had happened, right now, not yet trying to catch who’d done it.

It was agony not to be able to see anything, but Teia kept down, and in a few more seconds, the door squeaked open and not just the old woman but another woman as well walked out of the shop past Teia.

“What you figure they’re on about this time?” the younger woman asked.

Teia vaulted through an open window into the shop and with light, quick steps, darted up the heavy stairs. The large room upstairs was packed to the rafters with raw wool, but the door to the roof was bolted and locked.

“Jofez?” a man’s voice called out, apparently having heard her steps. “You up here?”

Oh, blackest hell!

She heard footsteps on the stairs and moved behind one of the stacks of wool. The man hadn’t brought a lantern with him, but neither had she, and her eyes weren’t accustomed to the darkness. She’d frozen up before and let fear stop her from dilating her pupils consciously. What if she always did that? What if she was destined to fail when it really mattered? What if—

Teia closed her eyes, let out one breath, and opened them again. She felt the stretching as her eyes dilated open, wider, wider to good night vision and into sub-red.

The warm blob of a man standing on the landing at the top of the steps came into the soft focus that was the best you could get from sub-red. Hottest at the face, hot everywhere skin was bare, duller everywhere clothes covered skin, except groin and armpits.

She tried to circle opposite the man, but in staring at him rather than paying attention to the darkness around her, she stubbed her foot against the wooden base beneath a stack of raw wool. It made a dull thunk.

“Jofez?” the man repeated, stepping closer.

Sub-red wasn’t good enough here. With speed she didn’t know she had, Teia relaxed her eyes further and drafted a paryl torch, but the paryl light didn’t cut all the way through the heavy wool. Useless.

Come on! Her desperation lent her will, and the paryl light sharpened and stabbed the way through edges of the wool stacks. It illuminated them only dimly, but it was enough for her to make out the figure stepping forward mere feet away from her. She wended her way through the stacks carefully, able to make out every detail of the ground easily, not making a sound now.

“Melina, if that’s your damned cat again, I’m gonna kill it. Scares the hell out me all the time, doesn’t even catch rats.” He continued grumbling and made his way down the stairs. “What the hell is going on out there?” he asked, finally hearing the whistles.