Teia realized her fist was closed over the little vial of olive oil she wore, squeezing it in a death grip. She loosened her fingers from the symbol of her slavery. The gift had been a threat and a reminder from Aglaia Crassos: olive oil, ostensibly to ease her work in the slave brothels. Olive oil, to keep her alive through thirty to fifty men a day. Whenever Teia thought she didn’t have any strength left, she touched that little reminder of slavery. Of what could be. Of what Kip had promised to put behind her, forever.
In the short months they’d trained together, Kip had become more than just her partner, he’d become her best friend.
And she hadn’t realized it until now. She hadn’t been there when he needed her. He couldn’t really be dead. If he hadn’t panicked, he could have floated until morning. Teia hadn’t heard any stories of sharks—not that that meant much. The survivors didn’t want to dwell on what could have so easily happened to them, too.
If he’d made it until dawn, he’d probably been picked up by a slaver. After how much Kip had drafted the day before, he’d be lightsick even if he wasn’t otherwise injured. He’d even left his spectacles case in his bunk. He’d be helpless.
If Kip was even alive, he was probably chained to an oar, right now.
And there was nothing Teia or anyone else could do for him.
Chapter 6
Zymun was standing, shading his eyes with one hand, the heavy pistol pointed straight down at the deck. Kip launched himself forward, popping the oars up through the open oarlocks. The sudden slap of an oar against the water attracted Zymun’s attention first. He looked toward the sound instead of toward Kip.
Kip’s arms were too weak to throw in front of him with the full weight of the oars in them. But he didn’t care about making it pretty. His hands dropped and he threw his shoulder into Zymun’s side. He caught the smaller young man at elbow level, crushing his gun hand back down, and as both of them were rising at the moment of impact, Kip’s big frame said, ‘Here’s all my momentum, brother. A gift.’
Zymun popped up into the air. His ankles hit the gunwale and he flipped upside down in a most gratifying manner. As the splash resounded, some distance from the boat, Kip fell. He smacked his cheek on the deck. With his arms behind him, anchored by the weight of the oars, there was no catching himself.
But he fell into the boat, and that was all that mattered.
With strength he didn’t know he had, Kip levered himself upright. He was already drawing in blue luxin, and in the rush of pleasure at drafting and at seeing his tormentor splashing in the water, he almost missed it: the boat was ringed with luxin. Red luxin and yellow. There was a long leash to all that luxin attached to Zymun.
Zymun surfaced and Kip saw the mouth of the pistol in his hand loom large. It was pointed straight at Kip. The hammer snapped down on the frizzen as Zymun pulled the trigger. And nothing happened. The gun was waterlogged. Zymun disappeared behind a wave.
Hurriedly drafting blue blades in each hand, Kip slashed through the green luxin manacles holding his wrists onto the oars.
Zymun swept a hand in a big, splashing circle. Kip knew he was reaching for the leash.
Kip dove off the opposite side of the rowboat.
Even as he hit the waves, he knew he’d done the wrong thing. Instead of drafting to cut himself free of the boat, why hadn’t he drafted to cut Zymun’s leash?
Stupid, Kip, stupid.
He was still underwater, kicking and putting as much room as possible between himself and Zymun, when it felt like a sea demon slapped the sea. Kip surfaced and saw a rising tower of black smoke and red-orange flames where the boat had been. He couldn’t see Zymun; the boat was between them.
Zymun would be the better swimmer, even if Kip had been hale and whole. There would be no vengeance for Kip today. If Zymun saw him, Zymun would come after him. If Zymun came after him, Zymun would drown him.
Kip bobbed in the water for a few more moments. He couldn’t swim. His arms were lead weights, and though his legs weren’t yet dead, they would be soon. His fat would make him float if he didn’t panic, but floating wasn’t going to get him away from Zymun, much less the pirate galley. Kip looked around for it, but from the water, he couldn’t see the ship.
And it wasn’t going to have any problem finding them, not with the bonfire Zymun had made of their boat.
Oh. Simple.
Kip drew in as much blue as he could hold and drafted reeds around his hands. The reeds let water stream past his fingers, then he shot luxin through the reeds, pushing the water out. Like the kick of a musket, by pushing water back, it pushed you forward. Kip drafted the reeds to brace under his armpits, took a deep gulp of air, and pointed his head for shore.