The Ship Beyond Time (The Girl from Everywhere #2)(33)

“And she was a pirate?”

“A captive.”

“Oh.” I bit my lip; overhead, smoke made the lantern light bleary. “Were she and Slate ever . . . ?”

“Ever what? Fishing buddies? Bingo partners?” Rotgut laughed a little as he shook the pan. “No. They were never. You should know, the captain’s not like that.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Like what?”

Rotgut flipped the pancake and gave me a look right back. “Likely to take advantage of someone who owed him.”

I shifted on my feet, a little embarrassed; then again, my father’s ethics had always been gray to me. “It seemed like she wished things were different.”

“They do have that in common. Just not the same things. The captain said she could crew with us, but she refused. Too proud. Or maybe too painful.”

I nodded. I could imagine both being true. “What will happen to her when she reaches the Margins?”

“That’s probably a question for your father,” he said. “But Gwen’s a survivor.”

“I believe that. What do you make of what she said? The dreams of her crew?”

“Who knows?” Rotgut shrugged. “I’m more interested in what she said about strange fish.”

I smiled a little. “Are you going to try to get your line in the water?”

“If there’s time. You can join me if you want. Good antidote to boy trouble.”

“Is that why you like it so much?”

“Plenty of fish in the sea,” he said, scraping at the pancake with a spatula. “Of course, there’s always the one that got away. That’s Gwenolé’s problem.”

I blinked. “Gwenolé?”

“Her full name. French or something”

“Celtic, actually. Very similar to the name of a saint from a local myth.”

“Whatever.” Rotgut gave the splotchy pancake a professional frown and flipped it onto the floor; Billie’s head darted out from under the shelf to snatch it. Then Rotgut poured out a dollop of fresh batter. “The first one’s always ugly.”

I drained my coffee with a grimace—my stomach was sour with it—and started washing the mug in the basin. First the king, and now the saint—but neither were quite like the myth I knew. Was it coincidence or something more? The madman had mentioned the dark horse too. Then again, he’d also mentioned a man in the pit and a monster in the castle, and neither of those were part of the legend.

What did it all mean? Last night, I had fled before I could find out, but it was easier to be brave in the light of day. Perhaps I should go back and ask him. I put the mug upside down on the sideboard and started down the hall.

“You don’t want a pancake?” Rotgut called after me. “This one is shaped kind of like a heart.”

“Maybe later.” I left the galley, but the smoke clung to my hair. I wrinkled my nose; if I was going to go back to the square, I’d need to change, and not just to get rid of the smell of breakfast. In this era, a woman wearing trousers in broad daylight would call attention I didn’t need. I slowed as I approached Kashmir’s door. My clothes were in there—but so was he.

What would I say to him? He wasn’t happy we’d come to Ker-Ys in the first place—and the events of last night had scored points in his favor. Would it be an insult to ask him to accompany me to the square? Not for protection. Not only for protection, anyway. But because I wanted him to help me talk through the mystery of the madman’s words.

And because I missed him.

But when I knocked, there was no answer, so I opened the door and found Kashmir’s nest of pillows empty. The slight breeze stirred the poems tacked to his wall—Rumi and Hafiz, Frost and Angelou. Love and caged birds and roads diverging. Where had he gone? Disappointment warred with fear in my stomach as I went to my trunk.

Digging through the clothes was like archaeology. The top layer was modern—the tank tops, the denim shorts with the gun still in the back pocket. Beneath those, the clothes I’d worn in Honolulu: tropical Victoriana, pinafores and bustled dresses in light colors. What to wear in winter in seventeenth-century France? My hand hovered a moment before I found a bell-shaped wool skirt folded in the bottom of the trunk. And here, a white linen shirt with long puffed sleeves and tiny buttons. Over that, I laced up a bodice cut from black velvet.

It was a suitable outfit for the era, and not too showy—the last thing I wanted was to be singled out, a strange girl with foreign features in a small town. Hopefully no one else would call me a witch. But just in case . . . I dug back through the pile of discarded clothing and pulled out the gun. Tucking it into the lining of my cloak, I felt foolish, but less afraid.

Leaving Kashmir’s room, I saw Blake coming from the galley, brushing crumbs from his lapel. He was wearing another of Kashmir’s old jackets, this one a rich green wool trimmed in gold braid, and he raised an eyebrow when he saw me. “Good morning, Miss Song. When I woke, I worried you’d gone back to your hammock.”

Rotgut tsked from the open doorway. “Boy trouble.”

“I slept in the captain’s cabin,” I said loudly as I headed toward the hatch.

Blake climbed up after me. “Before that, you left the Temptation.”

I made a face, though he couldn’t see it. But he had always been observant. And nosy. “I’m surprised you didn’t follow me.”