Archer was thinking. Thinking, not planning. There were so many possibilities for things to go wrong in the Kingsland, and he'd rather not figure out exactly how they'd play out.

He started with Denver, since he'd been Archer's first friend on the Avourienne—the first one to offer him kindness right from the beginning. He found him in his room right before lunchtime, so his roommate, the cook, would be out. Archer had only heard the man occasionally screaming at something in the kitchen; it was hard to find him without a scowl.

"Hi, Kingsley," Denver said, glancing over as he folded some of his clothes, "how's planning going?"

"It's...going," Archer said. He tapped the bedframe, trying out different approaches to this conversation in his mind. "Can I talk to you about something? It's serious."

Denver turned a little to face him. "Serious?"

"Look, I doubt this is something I should be telling you," he began, "but I feel like I should, still." He opened his mouth to continue, but he'd lost his nerve.

"What is it?" Denver crossed his arms.

"It's about the Kingsland," he said. "They've selected you to go inland."

"Really?" Denver asked, his blue eyes sparkling. "That's incredible!"

"Well, sure, except that it's not," Archer corrected quickly. "They're sending you because you're expendable. They can afford to lose you."

It's not that he wanted to inflict that look of hurt on Denver's face, but someone had to tell him. If they were going to put Denver through hell to join this crew, then he should know when he was being used.

"Oh," came Denver's realization. "Are you sure?"

"Yes."

He was silent for a moment, debating what this meant. His face creased into worry, then stilled again.

"Well...I suppose that's the way things are." He laughed, but it was uncomfortable. "I mean, let's be honest, I'm not really all that good. Haven't really been makin' a rep for myself, I guess."

"Denver—"

"Nah, Kingsley, it's not so bad. I mean, it's like an opportunity. If I can prove myself in the Kingsland, then they'll respect me for it. Then I'll be somebody to them."

But Denver wouldn't prove himself—he'd die. Silta implied even someone like Farley shouldn't have been able to wander the hallways of that place and live to tell the tale, and Farley had been specialized in combat. If Denver was the one who'd have to lose Archer, he'd be working his way back to the group on his own, far from Silta, Bardarian or any other form of protection.

"Can I ask you something, Denver?"

"Yeah, Kingsley. 'Course."

Archer watched him carefully. "This whole ship, the crew. Can you stand this life?"

"Whatcha mean, stand it?"

"The killing," Archer offered.

Denver, to his credit, took a moment to think. "Well, I mean, it ain't fun, I guess. But it's the way it goes."

"It's not the way it goes—or at least it doesn't have to be. You could do something else, somewhere else."

"Archer," he said, his voice accompanied by an edge of warning. "What're you saying?"

He backed down a little. Maybe Denver wasn't quite the man he'd painted him as in his mind. "Bardarian," Archer pressed. "You'd give your life for him?"

Denver thought about this again, then carefully said, "He's all I know."

"He made you kill someone you loved," Archer said back. Denver had told him about the murder of his sister one night in the common room over a few bottles of rum. There was pain in his soul from it, still; he had to harbour harsh feelings towards the man who forced it to happen.

"He also made a family for me," Denver pointed out.

"A family that sacrifices you when things get tough?"

"Back off, Kingsley. Yes, I'd die for him. What's this all about?"

Archer took a deep breath. Had Denver always been this way, and he just refused to notice? Whatever the reason, his first friend wasn't somebody he could relate to anymore—if he ever could in the first place. He shook his head, then stepped back out of the room.

He felt raw and numb at the same time, confused with every person around him. None of them thought the way he did, and it made him feel scared and alone.

But there was one last hope. One last person.

Archer found her downstairs in the common room, tossing knives at a target with the doctor, Miller. He approached them from the side, giving a polite greeting to them both. He nodded to Lyra.

"Can I talk to you for a second?" he asked.

Miller tossed her knives on the table. "I gotta go, anyway. I'll see you at lunch."

Lyra smiled at the doctor right up until the door closed behind her. She glanced at Archer. "What's up with you? You look all pale."

Archer shrugged, glancing around and declaring the room empty. "I'm fine. I wanted to ask you about something, though."

There were a few reasons he suspected this would work. For one, Lyra had been left behind before, in Port Kiver, and although she didn't quite know the extent to which that happened, he was sure it hadn't been the first time. And second, Lyra admired him for his morality. That first day, she'd commented approvingly on his mercy shot. He saw more than conversation in her, more than just a quiet girl with a talent for sneaking around; he saw someone clinging to her position aboard the ship against her will. She wanted to have Archer's surety in his ethics, but she lacked the freedom to find it.

"I never saw you as much of a killer," he told her, nodding at the knife she'd thrown on the bullseye.

"Oh, careful," she said, going to retrieve her knife. "That's quite the insult to a member of this crew."

"But it's not one to you, is it?"

She gave him a sideways glance, noting the weirdness of the conversation. "Wouldn't be to you either," she said.

"No, it wouldn't."

"What's your point, Kingsley?" she asked, seafoam eyes squinting to see him better.

"Maybe I'm just curious to know if you'd leave. If you could, of course. No strings attached. No betrayal or anything, of course."

"Of course," she repeated, abandoning the knives to give him her full attention.

"Would you?" he asked.

"Leave the Avourienne?" she repeated. "No strings attached?" She shrugged. "Yeah, I would. Ain't go nowhere to go, though. And, y'know. Leaving is betrayal."

"What if you had somewhere to go? Someone to..." He tried to look for the word. "Follow."

"Whoever would that be?" she asked, giving him a sly smile.

She knew who it was, and yet she gave no harsh comments, showed no shock. All in all, she didn't seem the least bit opposed to the idea.

"It would be someone you trust. Someone with similar views."

"Y'know," Lyra began, picking up a knife and turning back to the target, "if that person happened to be a crew member also, that would be mutiny."

Archer blinked. Would it? Was that the word for it?

"Full-fledged, ballsy-ass mutiny," Lyra continued, tossing the knife. "Against the king of the damn sea." She picked up another knife. "It would be getting down on your knees and just asking for the Devil to take you." She grinned, glancing over at him, dropping her voice to a whisper, "Yeah, I'd do it."

He felt the tension leak from his muscles, felt that old feeling of trust curl and build up again.

"That's..." he began, backing away. "Well, it's good to know, is all."

She gave him a look before turning back to her knives. "All in the theoretical, of course," she said.

"Of course," he repeated, still backing away. He gave her his best innocent look before exiting the common room.

Lyra was on the team headed inland, and she was on his side. She'd keep her lips sealed, and he could think of a way to get them both out of this hellhole. A new life, with someone he could trust.

But that word—the one Lyra had put in his head. It echoed and circled around and around, like it was mocking him, shocked he didn't think of it before. Sure, Archer had pissed Bardarian off already. But nothing would invoke his rath like that word would.

Mutiny.

*

The sky was morphing into a deep blue when he headed back to the strategy room after dinner. The golden sun dipped below the horizon, throwing those beautiful colours across the sky while they prepared to shove off. Archer listened to Britter talk himself through the plan over and over, picking out any possible mistakes. The ship rocked him to sleep carefully, nearly sending him to sleep.

The scrape of Britter's chair pulled him out of his calm state. He was pressed against the window, the fear on his face startling.

"Oh...holy shit," he snapped suddenly, backing up.

Archer moved to the window to see what was causing the outburst, but he couldn't visualize much in the dark. Something was covering the place between the dock and the plank, thick and black—like water, but not quite.

Archer pushed away from the window. Blood. It was blood. Tons of it, soaking into the wood and curling into the ocean below.

Britter was scrambling towards the door, tossing it open with urgency. Archer stumbled after him, blinking over and over to clear the image of all that blood. He tried not to trip as he raced down the narrow stairs, moving as quickly as possible. Whoever was bleeding down there was bleeding bleeding. That was a death sentence amount of blood.

Archer dropped to the main level of the deck, just a hair behind Britter. They sprinted around the side of the navigation room, both of them bursting through the door at the same time.

And it was unfathomable, what was out there on the deck. It made no sense, not to his mind.

"Novari?" Britter whispered, stepping towards her slowly, his words hushed and his hands out cautiously.

She stumbled forward, reaching towards him with bloody hands. It was everywhere—on her face, down her neck, dripping and pouring from footlong gashes down her arms. It ran down her sides, over her legs, pooling onto the deck, dripping through the cracks in the dock and falling into the spiralling water below. Tendrils of it curled over the Avourienne's black wood, fingers composed entirely of red. They reached out to Archer, sluggishly came closer to his frozen feet.

"Novari—" Britter began again, but he didn't have the words to say anything else. He looked like he wanted to touch her, to steady her, but he was too afraid. Instead, she took hold of the ship's rail, and they both saw the gash down the side of her neck, sliced from collarbone to ear.

"Move the ship," she told Britter, the words almost unrecognizable.

Neither of them said anything. Blood dripped from her nose, into her mouth.

"We have to go," she whispered, pitching over the letters like she was in a dreamlike trance. "Now."

But even as the other crew members flooded onto the deck, nobody said or did anything. It was all too foreign to them. She was the perpetrator, the bully that made you bleed. She didn't bleed. She was untouchable; she didn't even have blood in her. She wasn't flesh and bone like everyone else.

"Jackson!" Silta shouted, stumbling forward, letting go of the rail, losing her balance.

The scout came around the corner of the bow, eyes widening.

"Move the ship," she told him.

He blinked, just as shocked as anyone else.

"Move!" she shouted again, and now he did.

The scout screamed orders to the crew—to pull up the lines, drop the sails. They began to move, began to take action. Archer didn't. He didn't move an inch, because that was a death sentence amount of blood.

No one dared to touch her, to help her, to do anything about it. She came forward, towards Archer.

"What's the matter, Kingsley?" she whispered. "Not a fan of blood?"

Archer said nothing. As she got closer, he took a step back. Out of habit, out of fear. It didn't matter why he did it, but he did it.

She lifted her brows, her skin ghostly white. She didn't take another step, but she did something far worse. Something haunting, something awful, something he would never be able to stop hearing.

She laughed.

It started with a smile, the brilliant white of her teeth stained red. Blood poured from her mouth, her lips, down her chin. Then she laughed, loud and ironic, at his reaction. The moonlight threw shadows over her lashes and down her eyes, teeth bared in a chilling grin as blood dripped down and over her chin.

"Tell me how perfect I am now, Kingsley," she insisted, getting closer. "Look at me now, lover. Tell me how pretty I look." She raised her arms, blood still pouring.

She was delirious, he realized. She was losing so much blood she couldn't afford the luxury of thinking straight. She was talking nonsense, blurting whatever came to her mind.

"Rule number five," she muttered. "Angels, I hate it when my mother's right."

The door above them slammed open. Archer didn't look up—he couldn't look away from what was in front of him. That twisted grin, those bloody canines. All that gnarled skin and mauled fabric.

Footsteps came down the balcony steps. "Why the hell is my ship moving?"

"Sir!" Britter shouted, drawing the Captain's attention. He said nothing else, just gestured over to Silta, still in front of Archer, who did absolutely nothing in the wake of all this turmoil. Perhaps he was just as useless as he seemed.

"Is that her blood?" Bardarian asked incredulously, coming down the stairs faster. He spun around the rail, jogged over to her. He was so calm, so right for the situation, for the chaos that followed her.

Archer stared, useless. All that blood—didn't that kill a person? Shouldn't it have already killed her? How could she be so fine when she left, so not fine when she came back?

"Miller!" Bardarian pushed through the crowd, then pushed Archer away, taking her attention. "Novari, darling, what happened?" He pressed a hand to her neck, the other to one of her arms to slow the bleeding. A methodical, right-minded thing to do.

Her eyes seemed to sparkle with mania as she glanced over at the dock, receding from view. She was still laughing, still amused at whatever it was amusing her.

"Novari," the Captain said again. "What happened?" There was something off about his calm fear, as if he knew exactly what had happened.

She tripped into Bardarian, her laughs turning into little breaths as her consciousness slipped away. She glanced up at him, the darkness turning the blood darker.

"He's so good, love," she whispered to the Captain. "He's so talented." She reached forward, grabbing fistfuls of his white shirt in her bloodstained hands. "I can't be perfect, not all the time," she insisted, eyes watering from tears, face twisting into agony, regret, some type of sadness that seemed misplaced on her features. "I'm sorry."

"Novari," he said calmly, still holding tight to her neck and arm. "I need you to—"

"I love you," she whispered. "I promise. Tell me you believe me."

Bardarian searched her face. "I believe you," he said, one of his hands running over her side, not like a comforting gesture, more like he was...looking for something.

"I did my best!" she exclaimed, pulling him closer, bloodying him further.

"Best against who?" Britter snapped, trying to control the bleeding on her other side but losing his grip from her constant movement.

"Him!" she said but she didn't point or clarify who. "He's so good, love."

"Who?" Britter demanded, pressing his sleeve to the slices on her arms.

"He's dead now," she said, seemingly speaking to the sky or the ocean or anybody other than the people begging for an answer. "I killed Him. He's dead." She laughed again. "For all that's worth."

"That makes no sense!" Britter shouted, still trying to stop the bleeding.

Finally, Miller dashed onto the deck, her arms full of white cloth. "Navigation room!" she barked, pushing the group of them over.

Archer wanted to move. He wanted to be level-headed and calm, like Bardarian. He wanted to be cunning and brave and helpful, but his body was stale and his muscles were dysfunctional.

She was laughing, still, looking over at Archer. "Rule number five!" she shouted to him as they dragged her away. "I just cannot follow that one, can I?"

Right after her declaration, she began to lose consciousness, becoming dead weight as she tumbled to the ground. Bardarian caught and picked her up with just one arm, as if she was some sack of flour or barrel of water rather than the most skilled person in the sea. She looked so small, draped over him like that—not so striking or tall, just some girl who passed out and bled like anyone else.

Archer almost laughed at how incredibly delusional this whole thing was. He backed away, swallowing the humour that bubbled up in his throat. He watched the navigation door shut swiftly behind Miller, and he watched the crew wait anxiously outside. He looked to port, far away from the ship now, becoming even more distant in the darkening sky. Something about this place was so wrong. So haunting and chilling and wrong.

Her face was ingrained in his mind: the blood, the teeth, the smile. It was all too much. It was a nightmare that had come to life and played out right in front of him. He could still see it when he closed his eyes, like it was burned into his very eyelids. He couldn't stop any of it.