him at its head, his hands running with gold. Old Toady dead and Van Gast to blame for it, if his plans went well.
“I think—” the mage said. “No, I know that we want the same things. I’ll help you, Rillen, if you’ll help me.”
Rillen shut his eyes briefly to try to still the sudden thunder in his ears. “What help do you want?”
The mage shifted almost imperceptibly. A crystal flaked off by his chin and Rillen watched transfixed as it fell, see-sawing through the sultry air to land with a small blue spark on the tiles.
“You know more than you told your father. Tell me all you know, and I’ll help you kill him.”
* * *
Van Gast paced up and down on the violently green rug Guld had found to brighten his quarters on the Glass Dagger. Somehow it made Van Gast feel better. His mind was racing with possibilities, with questions he couldn’t answer with any surety. As always, it was almost impossible to know what Josie was thinking, what she was planning.
Josie was here for a little light robbery and revenge, Skrymir had said. Revenge against who? Him? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe she’d forgiven him, and maybe not. She’d seemed…different, but hers was the twistiest mind he’d ever known. She wasn’t planning revenge on him, she wanted his help. She’d said she’d wanted his help for a twist, a twist like he wouldn’t believe. He was sure that was the truth behind the game. If he knew where she’d berthed, where to find her, he’d have gone there quick as a hunting shark. Snuck into her quarters and persuaded her back into his bed, the way he did best.
But Guld had yet to find the old Ghost, Van’s ship that she’d stolen, and Van Gast’d had no more luck himself out on the streets. The ship wasn’t berthed in any of Josie’s usual places, and he’d heard no more than he already knew—she was in port. Other than that, she could be anywhere.
He stopped his pacing by the bed. She’d have found the Ghost’s real name by now, perhaps. Every rack ship had more than one name, like every rack. An outward name, and an inward one. For racks, only the most trusted ever got to know the inward name. For a ship, only the captain. Outwardly his old ship had been called Gast’s Ghost. Inwardly, it was something quite different, a name in this case etched behind the bed head.
Van Gast hadn’t quite got used to a different ship, not yet. The way the Glass Dagger moved to the swell, how far or fast he could push it, all its little quirks that made it seem as alive as any woman, and as unpredictable. But he’d made a start on its secret name, on turning this from a Remorian trader to a rack ship, through and through. He pulled away the bed head and got out his knife, thinking as he carved.
A little light robbery, and revenge. The excuse he’d given Holden for coming here—unbelieved—was that in the chaos they could earn good, hard cash. True enough, in and of itself. Racks could smell an opportunity from leagues away, and now they were swarming round Estovan.
But Josie wasn’t after just the small scams, he was pretty sure of that. Her twisty mind wouldn’t bother with them. Neither would he, usually. Something big, that was what she was after. Mind on a big twist, Skrymir had said, and she’d said much the same herself. The man who’d died at Bilsen was Yelen, and now Josie was going to twist his brother.
Which was madness. The Yelen ruled this city with a rod of iron and a bloody blade, at least within the city walls. Things were a bit more freeform in the delta, true, but because they allowed it, because they knew it was good for trade and the money dealt out here would, as often as not, end up in the coffers of the licensed traders, one way or another.
The Yelen were the law here, and they kept that law with teeth and guards and guile. Even Van Gast didn’t pickpocket inside the city walls. He liked his hands where they were. The guards were implacable, keen-eyed and—acolytes of the god Oku to a man—utterly unbribable. The gods themselves couldn’t steal so much as a copper fish-head from the Yelen and live to tell about it. Even thinking about it was stupid.