three pieces of opal, but they’re not viable. Might be worth something in trade, but not for coin.” I shut the book with a snap, dropping it back onto the desk.
Zola watched me through the haze trailing up from the whalebone pipe. “How’d they do?”
“The dredgers?” My brow pulled.
He gave me a nod.
“I just told you.”
His elbows hit the desk and he propped himself up on them. “I mean how’d they do. Any problems?”
I glowered at him, irritated. “You’re paying me to lead the dives, not report on the dredgers.”
Zola pursed his lips, thinking. After a moment, he opened the drawer of his desk and set a small purse on the pile of maps. He fished out five coppers and stacked them before me. “Now I’m paying you for both.” I watched the lift of his mouth. The sharpening of his eyes. He was still playing his game. But I still didn’t know the rules to it.
Reporting on the other dredgers was the best way to get yanked from my hammock and thrown overboard in the middle of the night. “No thanks,” I said flatly.
From the corner of my eye, I thought I could see Clove shift on his feet, but both of his boots were planted side by side, unmoving.
“All right,” Zola conceded, scooting his chair up. “We need to hit double those numbers tomorrow.”
“Double?” The word leapt from my mouth, too loud.
That got his attention. Both of his eyebrows lifted as he studied me. “Double,” he said again.
“That’s not what you said. There’s no way we can hit that.”
“That was before I knew I had such a competent dredger to lead the dive. I didn’t expect you to hit these numbers in a day.” He shrugged, pleased with himself.
“It’s not possible,” I said again.
“Then none of you are getting back to the Narrows.”
I set my jaw, willing my face to stay composed. The worst mistake I could make with Zola was letting him shake me. I had to get back to my ship. It was all that mattered.
I blinked. When had I begun thinking of the Marigold as mine? My home.
But if I didn’t find a way to get the upper hand, that was never going to happen. “I know what you’re doing.”
“You do?”
“You let me loose in the crew’s cabin when they all know what happened to Crane. You put me in charge of the dive instead of your own dredgers. You want someone else to get rid of me before we ever make port.”
“So, you were there when West killed Crane.” Zola lifted his brows in revelation. “I wouldn’t have pegged you for a murderer. And it wasn’t my idea to put you in charge.” His attention instantly went to Clove.
I turned to look at him, but Clove was unreadable. His eyes were as empty as a night sky as they stared back into mine. And that was a different kind of threat.
He and Zola were on a tight schedule. One they couldn’t afford to break. I was Saint’s daughter, sure. But if they wanted to use me against my father, why take me out of the Narrows? There was something more valuable about me than that.
Clove knew what I could do with the gems, and for the first time I considered that was why I was here. Not only to dredge, but to find the gems they needed for whatever they were planning.
“What are you going to do with them?” I asked Zola the question, but my gaze was still pinned on Clove.
Zola half-smiled. “With what?”
“Why is a ship that’s licensed to trade in the Narrows sailing under a fake crest and dredging reefs in the Unnamed Sea without a permit?”
His head tilted to one side, surveying me.
“You’ve dumped your inventory, abandoned your route, and everyone knows that big gem trader in Bastian wants your head.”
“And?”
“And it begs the question. What are you going to do with over three hundred carats of gemstones?”
Zola turned the pipe over and tapped it against the bronze bowl at the corner of the desk, emptying its ashes. “Join my crew and maybe I’ll tell you.” He stood, rolling up the maps.
I glared at him.
“What’s it to you? You’d be trading one bastard helmsman for another.”
“West is nothing like you,” I said.
Zola nearly laughed. “Looks like you don’t know your helmsman very well after all.” He clicked his tongue.
A chill ran up my spine. That’s what Saint said when I saw him in Dern.