“Crew?” Sigursson raised an eyebrow. “What are you babbling about?”
“These dogs are all salted,” the captain said, gesturing to Mia and her fellow captives. “Crewed to the Maid afore we shipped out from Godsgrave after the games. And here you are, treating them like freshwater trout.”
“Saaaaalted?” Valdyr drew the word out as if savoring it, leaning out over the railing with his chiseled teeth bared in a grin. “Is that so?”
“Light’s truth, Majesty. May the Everseeing rot my toddler off if I lie.”
“A tale to both confound and amaze.” The king smiled wider, tongue pressed to one wicked-sharp canine. “Since the Maid just put into harbor this very hour, and these seven arrived in Amai yesterturn?”
“I sent them overland from Galante,” Corleone said. “I had business inland.”
“Bull-fucking-shit,” Draker spat, dragging his thinning red hair off his brow.
Corleone tilted his head. “You mean to tell me you know who crews aboard my ship better than I, Hangman? When was the last time you set foot on my decks?”
“When I was plowing your mother,” the captain growled.
“O, aye, she sends her regards, by the by,” Corleone replied without skipping a beat. “She told me to tell you she hopes you’re not still embarrassed. It happens even to the best of men, apparently.”
Guffaws and chuckles echoed about the room as the Maid’s captain turned attentions back to his king.
“Majesty, these seven are my crew. Salted, every one. There’s no place for them on their knees or in the pens or the pool, besides.”
“Seven?” Valdyr crooked one scarred eyebrow. “Even the child, now?”
“Cabin boy.” Corleone offered his four-bastard smile, sweet as honey and smooth as silk. “My last fell overboard in the Sea of Silence.”
“Tragic.”
“BigJon certainly thought so. He goes in for a bit of buggery recently.”
The Maid’s first mate dragged his pipe off his lips, about to voice protest. “I do—”
“So one of your crew still knocked my boy’s teeth out of his head.” The captain of the Hangman spat on the deck. “There’s tithe owed for that.”
Corleone glanced at the monocle boy, flinched at the sight of his mangled snout, then leaned in for a closer look. He turned and held a finger aloft to Valdyr.
“A moment, great King, to confer with my people? I’ve not had a word crossways since Galante. I’m sailing a tad behind the tide.”
Valdyr leaned back into his throne, hefting Mia’s gravebone blade and smiling like the cat that got the cream, stole the cow, and bedded the milkmaid twice.
“By all means.”
Corleone turned to Mia and her comrades, the easy smile on his face belying the deathly urgency of his tone. “Right. I’m dangerously close to being hideously fucking murdered here, so if you bastards would like to catch me up with what the ’byss you’ve been doing since you arrived, that’d be appreciated.”
“Murdered?” Bladesinger frowned up at the Scoundrel King. “He’s done nothing but smile since you walked in.”
“The more Valdyr smiles at you, the closer you are to dead,” Cloud said. “He’s about two crossed words away from slitting my throat and fucking the wound.”
“That’s disgusting,” Ashlinn hissed.
“Aye, the last man who endured it probably thought so, too.”
“Tric, are you all right?” Mia asked.
The boy was still sprawled on the floor in chains, but he glanced up and nodded.
“AYE, I’M FINE, MIA.”
“Look, I don’t mean to sound impolite, but fuck him,” Corleone said. “And unless you want to be as dead as he is, you need to tell me what in Aa’s name you did.”
“The twat with the monocle put his hands on my tits,” Mia said flatly. “So I broke his face. And two of his friends. Ash helped.”
“It was exciting,” Ashlinn nodded.
Mia thumped the girl’s arm to quiet her.
“Did you request said hands be placed on your…” Corleone’s eyes drifted downward. “… accoutrements at any point?”
Mia raised her eyebrow and stared.
Hard.
“Right,” Corleone nodded. “Had to ask.”
The captain turned to the assembly, arms held wide.
“My salts tell me their ungentle treatment of Draker Junior here was warranted response to advances both unseemly and unwelcome.” Corleone shrugged. “Seems a plain sailor’s quarrel to me. Certainly nothing to be troubling His Maje—”
“Shuzafuggin larr!” Monocle slurred through his busted lips.
Corleone looked at him sidelong. “I beg pardon?”
“He said she’s a fucking liar!” Draker spat. “I got the tale rightways from my three lads, they said this lying slip asked them for a roll then got shirty when rebuffed.”
“And you believe that?” Mia blinked. “Are you a liar or a