The Ship Beyond Time (The Girl from Everywhere #2)(76)

“Yeah?” Slate stood. “And who writes history, Nixie?”

“The victors,” I said. I knew the quote.

“Damn right,” Slate said. “Who cares what history says, or fate or fortune or whatever? We’re going to fight it, and we’re going to win.”

“Right,” I said softly, trying to believe it the way my father did. I had to, didn’t I? That was the most important part. “Right.”

“So what’s the plan, then?” Bee said.

I straightened my shoulders, galvanized. “We’ve got to get back to the ship and make ready to sail. Kash and Blake will meet us there with Cook and Dahut. Then we’ll make a brief stop in Boeotia before bringing Cook back to London.”

“Why Boeotia?”

“Crowhurst erased Cook’s memory,” I said. “The cure is there.”

“Fine,” Slate said, waving away my explanation; he’d never been one for complexity. “Do you have a map of Cook’s era?”

“It’s his native time. He’ll take the helm through the Margins, and we should arrive right back in London.”

“Right. Okay.” Slate grinned at me. “Good plan.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

He stood then, clapping his hands together. “Are we ready?” Without waiting for an answer, he strode across the parlor and yanked the door open. But in the hall, two guards turned to face him with stony stares and crossed pikes.

They had not been there before.

Slate looked them up and down. “Get out of the way, dammit.”

“No one leaves,” said the one on the left. “Order of the king.”

My stomach turned to ice. Why had Crowhurst sent guards? What had happened to Cook, to Blake, to Kashmir? But Slate cursed again and slammed the door. “Where is Kash when you need him? Anyone else have a knife?”

Lin gave Slate a stony look. “You’re not going to brawl to the front gate.”

“Fine,” he muttered, crossing the parlor. “Plan B?”

I folded my arms, trying to tamp down on my fears. But I had to think—two guards at the door—and how many more between the suite and the front gate? If only I’d kept the gun. Was there a solution from the myths I knew? My mind threw me ideas like a dealer throws cards. Sleeping powders or potions . . . even the Tarnkappe, the Welsh cloak of concealment. But all of my maps were on the ship. I had no way to Navigate to the Isle of Britain, much less back again. How could I—

The crash of glass shattered my reflections. Slate was standing by the broken window, glaring down. Standing by his shoulder, I peeked into the bailey, thirty feet below. Guards were gathering around a battered chair, shards of glass glittering in the light of their torches.

Slate gave them the finger and stalked away from the window. “Plan C then,” he said to me. “You can do this one.”

Outside, the sky was thick with massing clouds, nearly obscuring the sun. Cold wind from the open window whipped my hair around my face, and I could hear the distant sound of the waves rising against the walls. A selfish thought—maybe it was best that Crowhurst was keeping an eye on Dahut and the key to the sea gates.

Disgusted with myself, I turned from the window. What did we have to work with? I could Navigate away, as could Slate, but that didn’t help the rest of the crew—nor would I be willing to leave Cook and the boys behind.

But perhaps they were already back at the ship—or at least out of the castle, in the sewers. . . .

“There’s a way through the sewers if we can just get everyone to the cellar.”

Rotgut cocked his head. “What, like a tunnel?”

“It leads down to the dock.”

He grimaced, half amused. “Well. There’s a much closer entrance than the cellar.”

“What do you mean?” I followed his eyes to the door of the little room off the parlor that concealed the water closet. “Oh. Oh god, gross.”

Still, it was the best option we had. I went to the door to look inside. The room was small and square, furnished only with the primitive toilet—a polished board with a cutout in the center—and a set of wooden hooks for robes. It was medieval custom to hang one’s best dresses in the water closet—the garderobe, they called it—in the hopes the smell would keep moths away. Here, the twice-daily tides prevented much smell, thankfully. I peered down through the seat into the dank circular hole that was, indeed, an entrance to the sewers. Below that, the light faded; it was a long way down.

Slate stove in the seat, the boards falling away into the dark, and Bee, Rotgut, and I stripped the bedding from each room, ripping it to long shreds and weaving the pieces into a thick rope. We worked as quickly as we could—we had to get out before the sea gates opened and the tide filled the tunnels—but it was equally important to make sure the rope was sturdy.

I listened for the bells that tracked the tide as it rose and began to fall again, and I breathed a little easier when high tide passed without incident. The sun was far below the horizon by the time we finished the rope, but after that things went fast. The crew was used to clambering over the rigging. Lin was the only one who needed help, so Slate went down first, boldly into the dark. Once he shouted the all clear, we pulled up the rope, made a harness for her, and lowered my mother down into his waiting arms.