had her eyes on one ship in particular, had been watching, coveting, all day. It was a gorgeous vessel, its hull and masts carved from dark wood and trimmed in silver, its sails shifting from midnight blue to black, depending on the light. A name ran along its hull—Saren Noche—and she would later learn that it meant Night Spire. For now she only knew that she wanted it. But she couldn’t simply storm a fully manned craft and claim it as her own. She was good, but she wasn’t that good. And then there was the grim fact that Lila didn’t technically know how to sail. So she leaned against a smooth stone wall, her black attire blending into the shadows, and watched, the gentle rocking of the boat and the noise of the Night Market farther up the bank drawing her into a kind of trance.
A trance that broke when half a dozen men stomped off the ship’s deck and down the plank in heavy boots, coins jingling in their pockets, raucous laughter in their throats. The ship had been preparing for sea all day, and the men had a manic enthusiasm that spoke of a last night on land. They looked eager to enjoy it. One kicked up a shanty, and the others caught it, carrying the song with them toward the taverns.
Lila snapped the pocket watch closed, pushed off the wall, and followed.
She had no disguise, only her clothes, which were a man’s cut, and her dark hair, which fell into her eyes, and her own features, which she drew into sharp lines. Lowering her voice, she hoped she could pass for a slender young man. Masks could be worn in darkened alleys and to masquerade balls, but not in taverns. Not without drawing more attention than they were worth.
The men ahead disappeared into an establishment. It had no obvious name, but the sign above the door was made of metal, a shimmering copper that twisted and curled into waves around a silver compass. Lila smoothed her coat, turned up its collar, and went inside.
The smell hit her at once.
Not foul or stale, like the dockside taverns she’d known, or flower scented like the Red royal palace, but warm and simple and filling, the aroma of fresh stew mixing with tendrils of pipe smoke and the distant salt of sea.
Fires burned in corner hearths, and the bar stood not along one wall but in the very center of the room, a curved metal circle that mimicked the compass on the door. It was an incredible piece of craftsmanship, a single piece of silver, its spokes trailing off toward the four hearth fires.
This was a sailors’ tavern unlike any she’d ever seen, with hardly any bloodstains on the floors or fights threatening to spill out onto the street. The Barren Tide, back in Lila’s London—no, not hers, not anymore—had serviced a far rougher crowd, but here half the men wore royal colors, clearly in the service of the crown. The rest were an assortment, but none bore the haggard look and hungry eyes of desperation. Many—like the men she’d followed in—were sea tanned and weather worn, but even their boots looked polished and their weapons well sheathed.
Lila let her hair fall in front of her blind eye, wrangled a quiet arrogance, and sauntered up to the counter.
“Avan,” said the bartender, a lean man with friendly eyes. A memory hit her—Barron back at the Stone’s Throw, with his stem warmth and stoic calm—but she got her guard up before the blow could land. She slid onto the stool and the bartender asked her a question, and even though she didn’t know the words, she could guess at their meaning. She tapped the near-empty glass of a beverage beside her, and the man turned away to fetch the drink. It appeared an instant later, a lovely, frothing ale the color of sand, and Lila took a long, steadying sip.
A quarter turn around the bar, a man was fiddling absently with his coins, and it took Lila a moment to realize he wasn’t actually touching them. The metal wound its way around his fingers and under his palms as if by magic, which of course it was. Another man, around the other side, snapped his fingers and lit his pipe with the flame that hovered at the tip of his thumb. The gestures didn’t startle her, and she wondered at that; only a week in this world, and it seemed more