JARON

Baltessa

Mid-Rainrise

Pirates had attacked Port Hullscar when Jaron was thirteen.

He still remembered the screams, the smoke, and how he'd searched for his little brother's tuft of charcoal hair in the chaos and never found him. He remembered how he'd abandoned his search when pirates started pillaging the street, and how when he'd finally found the courage to leave the crate he was hiding in, he returned to a home engulfed in flames. But what he remembered most of that day was his little sister's lifeless eyes staring unblinkingly at the sky, empty as a broken bottle, her lungs filled with smoke from the fire. It was a shard in his memories, an ache that was present even in his dreams. Sera had been so full of life, yet that life was taken away so easily.

He'd vowed back then and there he'd do whatever he could to avenge his sister and find his brother. He'd bury the pirates of Cerulia to the bottom of their sacred seas. He'd burn their homes with a fire of his own, take away what they held dear, and when there was nothing left for them but hope, he'd snuff that flame out too.

He didn't know why carrying the Storm through the shadows of the palace reminded him of that forsaken day. Perhaps it was her small frame and the way she fit in his arms the same as Sera had. It was nothing but a fleeting feeling, something to be squashed. He focused on the tasks ahead, leaving no room for his mind to wander as he slipped through the last door and out into the night.

The moon painted the beach white, the wall surrounding the palace rising up like a tidal wave behind him while the true sea remained calm, lapping at the shore. His small ship was one of the several tied to the sleeping docks, waiting for him just as he'd left it. He breathed a sigh of relief that Crew hadn't run off with it like he thought he would. The man was as trustworthy as a pirate.

Had it really been as easy as Turncoat had promised? Using stolen white merchant sails had disguised his ship perfectly, the southern docks and servant's halls went unguarded, all just as he'd said. His boots echoed down the wooden path across the beach and to the docks. All he had to do was put the Storm on his ship before she woke up, find Crew, untie from the dock, and he was one step closer to fulfilling his duty.

An echo of footsteps that weren't his own. He stopped—one foot on the plank to his ship—and glanced over his shoulder. A silhouette stood where the path across the beach met the dock. He'd gotten all this way and of course, now someone found him. He sighed, frustrated that they'd been able to sneak up on and him and annoyed he'd probably have to use his embers. He turned back to his ship and crossed the plank, setting the Storm down carefully on the deck before retreating back down to the dock.

The silhouette hadn't moved, but now Jaron could make out a feminine shape. Long, straight obsidian hair waved in the wind like a flag. There was something at her back and in her hands, but he didn't realize what it was until she nocked an arrow in her bow.

Jaron raised his hands in mock-surrender. He was this close to getting out of Cerulia with their weapon. He couldn't let it slip through his fingers. Perhaps he could at least test the archer.

"Step away from the ship," the silhouette said. Her voice was as cold and smooth as a sheet of ice.

"I'm afraid I can't do that," he told her. "This cargo is too precious."

The silhouette didn't waver. "Then you should take your final glance at the moon because you won't be able to see it from the dungeons."

What an amusing threat. "Pity," Jaron said, lowering his marred hands. "I would've been much inclined to hear more, but I'm on a bit of tight schedule."

If she hadn't shot at him yet, then she either didn't have the aim from that distance or the nerve to do the job. Time was fickle and he didn't desire to waste it while standing around, trying to find out which one was her weakness. Turning on his heel, he took a step back up the plank to his ship.

A whir cut through the air. Then, shuck. An arrow sprouted from the wood where his foot would've taken its next step. Jaron whipped back to face the silhouette.

"You missed," he said.

"Did I?" the silhouette called, taking a step closer as she nocked another arrow in her bow. This woman wasn't what he'd thought. Perhaps he'd underestimated her. "That was just a warning shot."

She let go of the bowstring, her arrow splitting through the moonlight and finding its mark in his thigh. He cut off his own scream, holding it back with ragged breaths, the pain achingly sharp and dull at the same time.

"Missed," he grunted. "Again."

The silhouette stepped closer again, hand behind her head, ready to pull out another arrow. She wore a skirt over her pants, silver weavings on the sheer material shimmering as it fluttered with the sea-breeze. He recognized her then as the quiet one who stood by the queen's side. The graceful one who didn't dance with the others when the guitars had started.

"If I wanted you dead," she said, her tone even frostier than before, "then you would be dead."

The muscles in his thigh tightened around the arrow, his knee nearly buckling with the pain. With one hand, he gripped the shaft of the arrow and held down his thigh with the other. He yanked the arrow from his leg, blood spurting from the wound. Then he summoned his embers, fire spreading over his hand as he closed it over the wound, cauterizing it so that he could still fight. He hissed and cursed and surprisingly wasn't struck with another arrow, but when he glanced to where the archer had been, she was gone.

The docks were suddenly so quiet, he could hear the tide washing. The sails above rustled and flapped with the wind. His heart thrummed in his ears, the pace of it numbing the stinging burn on his leg. He glanced down the dock, across the beach, but she was a ghost. Where did she go?

"So, you're an emberblood," came her voice from his ship.

He spun to face her, craning his head to look up at her from the bottom of the plank. The way she stood with another arrow nocked in her bow looked as if she'd done it a hundred times before. "How did you...?" He cleared his throat and gripped his sword, unsheathing it slightly. "A bow is no match in close combat. Especially since you don't want to kill me."

"Don't flatter yourself," the archer seethed. From this angle, he could see her smoky black eyes through the mask she wore. "The only reason to keep you is alive is for information about Incendia. We can twist, break, and peel every secret out of you—who you are, why you're here, how you got in and out unnoticed."

"You noticed though," he quipped. Maybe if he threw her off, she wouldn't notice that he was inching closer. "It appears I didn't do as well as I'd thought."

"It's my job to notice things. Are there more of you?"

"Don't you think they'd have attacked you by now?

A slight bit closer.

"What do you want with her?" she motioned to the resting Storm on the deck behind her. "Was it the Incendian King who sent you or someone else?"

Jaron slowly slid his foot up the plank, another step forward. "I thought you were going to torture the answers from me. Why ask your questions now, archer?" He was close enough now that he could unsheathe his sword and attack.

"In case I have to kill you before I can ask them."

There was a pause then she lunged forward, swinging her bow down. Its curved tip struck him across the cheek and he stumbled back down the plank, nearly falling flat onto his ass. He reset his feet and unsheathed his obsidian sword. She unsheathed her own blade, longer than his, but thinner, curved with a sharp pointed tip.

"Fine," he growled. "Have it your way."

They collided in the center of the plank, the clash of their steel echoing across the quiet beach. She had the advantage with the higher ground, her slender frame able to hold its own against the brute force of his. He slid his blade down and they clashed again, but this time he gained ground on her, pushing her back toward the ship. Again, and again their swords crossed until she was one step away from falling back onto the deck next to the Storm. If she wasn't so quick, his sword would've sliced through her by now, but she was swifter than most swordsman he knew. Shame he'd have to take down someone as skilled as her.

He drew his sword back to strike again and swept it in a low-angling arc. The archer leaped away, his blade cutting the ribbon on the tail of her skirt. He stepped down onto the deck and she jumped back, tearing at the ties on her skirt until she was able to toss it away onto the wood. There was a tear on the lower leg of the pants she wore beneath. Blood shimmered in the moonlight. It seems he'd cut more than just the ribbon on her skirt. If it hurt, she didn't show it, her expression just as much of a mask as the one she wore over her eyes.

He took the opening to slice the rope tying his ship to the dock and cut the one holding the sails closed. Once free, the sails billowed with the wind, the ship sailing forward, leaving the dock behind.

"What are you doing?" Nara said, stepping forward, eyes calculating like she could somehow escape with the Storm before the ship was too far from the dock. But they were already being carried out with the waves. Her only option now would be to kill him and commandeer the ship. She couldn't though, could she? Crew had told him it took at least two people to man the ship and he still wasn't anywhere to be seen.

"You're brave," Jaron said as he made his way to the helm of the ship, only a few paces away, never turning his back to her. "But you don't have to die." It would be such a waste.

Just kill her and be done with it, came the whisper. Leaves more room on your tiny ship. The whisper chuckled, a dark scratch in Jaron's mind.

"Death would be better than whatever grim fate you have planned for us." She didn't lower her peculiar sword like he'd thought she would. "Take us back to the docks at once."

This nearly made Jaron chuckle. Were all Cerulians this demanding or just her?

When he gripped the wheel and straightened the mast instead of turning back in the direction of Baltessa, she tossed her sword to the deck and reached behind her back to grab her bow.

Jaron jolted around the wheel and raced toward her before she could grab an arrow and nock it. He grabbed both her wrists and when he went to pin them behind her back, she clocked him with an elbow to his gut. If he let her get away, he'd be dead in mere seconds from an arrow in the head. He stumbled after her and grabbed for her again, his other hand reaching into a pocket at his belt and pulling out his cuffs. In one swift movement, he slid his hand down to her wrist and slapped the the silver band across her skin.

The moment the metal slid into place over her wrist, he snatched her other arm, forcing it into the band. She kicked back, the heel of her boot hitting below his belt and everything went black for a moment, pain exploding through him like he'd just been shot with a pistol. A scream that didn't sound like his own ripped into the air. He curled in on himself, clutching himself in the precious spot where'd she'd hit him.

"What is this silver contraption?" He heard the archer's panicked voice over the raging thrum of his blood in his ears.

Blinking away the tears that had forced their way into his eyes, he looked up at her from the deck. He hadn't even known he'd fallen, the pain had been that immense and overwhelming—his soul, what was left of it, had nearly left his body. He squinted up at her, watching her squirm as the silver band tightened on her wrists.

"What kind of evil contraption have you placed on me?" she hissed at him. The silver clicked the more she moved, constricting her wrists even tighter.

"Those," he said between breaths. "Those are cuffs, designed—" He coughed and rolled up onto his knees. "Designed specifically for pirates like you. The more you squirm, the tighter they get. Keep squirming and you'll lose your hands." He glanced at the pack of arrows on her back. "How would your shot with a bow be then?"

Jaron expected her to scream at him or at least react in some way, but her face remained a stone carving beneath her mask. He wished she'd had ripped it off already so he could read her properly, yet for some reason he didn't think it would've aided him.

A defeated sound escaped from the archer's lips. If he wasn't listening carefully enough, he would've mistaken it for a wave washing against the ship.

"Are you going to kill us then?" she asked, knuckles white, gaze calculating.

"If I wanted you dead," he told her, repeating the same words she'd told him earlier, "then you would be dead."

"You won't get away with it." She glanced past him at the fading capital island behind him. "The Queen of Bones and the Pirate Fleet will hunt you to the edge of the seas."

Jaron rose to his feet with a groan. "Then it's a wondrous thing that where we're heading, there is no sea."