skirt still hiked around her waist. Inej could see the glint of moonlight off the waves of the cove. Jump, she’d thought. Whatever waits at the bottom of the sea is better than where this woman is taking you. But she hadn’t had the courage.
The girl she’d become would have jumped without a second thought, and maybe taken one of the slavers down with her. Or maybe she was kidding herself. She’d frozen when Tante Heleen had accosted her in West Stave. She’d been no stronger, no braver, just the same frightened Suli girl who’d been paralyzed and humiliated on the deck of that ship.
Nina was still singing, something about a sailor who’d abandoned his sweetheart.
“Teach me the chorus,” Inej said.
“You should rest.”
“Chorus.”
So Nina taught her the words, and they sang together, fumbling through the verses, hopelessly out of key, until the lanterns burned low.
17
JESPER
Jesper felt about ready to hurl himself overboard just for a change in routine. Six more days. Six more days on this boat—if they were lucky and the wind was good—and then they should make land. Fjerda’s western coast was all perilous rock and steep cliffs. It could only be safely approached at Djerholm and Elling, and since security at both harbors was tight, they’d been forced to travel all the way to the northern whaling ports. He was secretly hoping they’d be attacked by pirates, but the little ship was too small to be carrying valuable cargo. They were an unworthy target and they passed unmolested through the busiest trade routes of the True Sea, flying neutral Kerch colors. Soon, they were in the cold waters of the north, moving into the Isenvee.
Jesper prowled the deck, climbed the rigging, tried to get the crew to play cards with him, cleaned his guns. He missed land and good food and better lager. He missed the city. If he’d wanted wide open spaces and silence, he would have stayed on the frontier and become the farmer his father had hoped for. There was little to do on the ship but study the layout of the Ice Court, listen to Matthias grumbling, and annoy Wylan, who could always be found laboring over his attempts to reconstruct the possible mechanisms of the ringwall gates.
Kaz had been impressed with the sketches.
“You think like a lockpick,” he’d told Wylan.
“I do not.”
“I mean you can see space along three axes.”
“I’m not a criminal,” Wylan protested.
Kaz had cast him an almost pitying look. “No, you’re a flautist who fell in with bad company.”
Jesper sat down next to Wylan. “Just learn to take a compliment. Kaz doesn’t hand them out often.”
“It’s not a compliment. I’m nothing like him. I don’t belong here.”
“No arguments from me.”
“And you don’t belong here, either.”
“I beg your pardon, merchling?”
“We don’t need a sharpshooter for Kaz’s plan, so what’s your job—other than stalking around making everyone antsy?”
He shrugged. “Kaz trusts me.”
Wylan snorted and picked up his pen. “Sure about that?”
Jesper shifted uncomfortably. Of course he wasn’t sure about it. He spent far too much of his time guessing at Kaz Brekker’s thoughts. And if he had earned some small part of Kaz’s trust, did he deserve it?
He tapped his thumbs against his revolvers and said, “When the bullets start flying, you may find I’m nice to have around. Those pretty pictures aren’t going to keep you alive.”
“We need these plans. And in case you’ve forgotten, one of my flash bombs helped get us out of the Ketterdam harbor.”
Jesper blew out a breath. “Brilliant strategy.”
“It worked, didn’t it?”
“You blinded our guys right along with the Black Tips.”
“It was a calculated risk.”
“It was cross-your-fingers-and-hope-for-the-best. Believe me, I know the difference.”
“So I’ve heard.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning everyone knows you can’t keep away from a fight or a wager, no matter the odds.”
Jesper squinted up at the sails. “If you aren’t born with every advantage, you learn to take your chances.”
“I wasn’t—” Wylan left off and set down his pen. “Why do you think you know everything about me?”
“I know plenty, merchling.”
“How nice for you. I feel like I’ll never know enough.”
“About what?”
“About anything,” Wylan muttered.
Against his better judgment, Jesper was intrigued. “Like what?” he pressed.
“Well, like those guns,” he said, gesturing to Jesper’s revolvers. “They have an unusual firing mechanism, don’t they? If I could take them apart—”
“Don’t even think about it.”
Wylan shrugged. “Or what about the ice moat?” he said, tapping the plan of the Ice Court. Matthias had said the moat wasn’t solid, only a slick, wafer-thin layer of ice over frigid water,