Heart of Iron (Heart of Iron #1)(22)

I do have fun, he thought angrily, quickly changing into the new breenches, and sat down to lace up his boots again. The trouser legs were so long, he had to roll them up to his ankles.

“And I’m glad to know that all Solani—” Robb went to stand again when black spots ate at his vision. He swayed, trying to catch himself on the side of the cot, but the Solani caught him first and set him down on the edge of the bed again.

Robb was afraid to move until his head stopped spinning.

“You’ll pull your stitches if you don’t slow down,” the silver-haired boy cautioned, and rerolled Robb’s left pants leg.

“I’m fine.”

“I’m sure you are,” replied the Solani, and leaned forward, “but just a word of warning: if I catch you lying to me or the rest of the crew about anything you’ve said, I promise you’ll wish I’d let you fall out of that skysailer on Nevaeh. Do you understand?”

Robb sat back, distancing himself from that fierce violet-eyed glare. His chest wound tight—from panic. It was definitely panic—

A shrill bell rang across the intercom.

Robb jumped.

Jax quirked an eyebrow. “It’s the dinner bell, little lord. Stop being so jumpy. You act like you’re expecting company.” He stood, dusted his knees off with his leather-gloved hands, and left the quarters.

Once he was gone, Robb finally got a chance to catch his breath. The lingering smell of lavender was suffocating.

The sooner this band of space pirates found the fleetship, the better. He hoped this antique ship had enough of a head start to the Tsarina before his mother tracked him down. What happened after—to these outlaws, to that Solani and that girl Ana—didn’t matter.

His father mattered. Finding him mattered. And the answers were on the Tsarina, Robb was sure of it. He was sure he’d find his father. Or find out where he’d gone—find something. He had to.

He’d spent seven years searching, and he wouldn’t let anything stop him now.





Ana


Ana rubbed her half-melted pendant, contemplating the playing cards in her hand.

The crew sat around the cramped galley table, playing a round of Wicked Luck after dinner. A scoreboard hung on the far wall of the galley with little tick marks under each of their names to signify who had won previous nights. Jax was leading by forty-seven wins.

But no matter how much Ana tried to concentrate on the queen, jack, and three aces in her hands, she couldn’t, too afraid that the Royal Guard were still in pursuit and that all of this would be for nothing. She barely ate any beef stew. Her stomach was tied in knots, and hers wasn’t the only one. Beside her, Lenda—who normally ate three helpings—hadn’t even touched her food.

Please, don’t let this be for nothing, Ana thought. Please let the Tsarina be there.

“Five hours until we reach our destination,” Di’s voice rang out over the intercom.

“Seriously?” Lenda groaned, brushing back her floppy dishwater-blond hair. She was solid, with narrow brown eyes and tawny skin with rosy undertones. She displayed the scars on her arms like trophies—battles won in the fighting arenas of Iliad. Lenda was twenty and unafraid of everything—

Except, maybe for Palavar. “We’ve only been traveling for two? It feels like years.”

“Eh, don’t bother me. Three jacks,” said Barger, a stout man in his mid-twenties with a ginger mustache. His fingers were always grease stained, nails ripped short, the signs of a tireless weapons mechanic.

Lenda frowned over her cards. “You can’t have three jacks,” she told the ginger-mustached man across from her.

Barger snorted. “You ain’t gonna call Wicked on me, Len. Hey, Solani, your turn.”

At the far end of the table, Jax tossed two cards into the middle. “Patience, you heathen.”

The object of Wicked Luck was to lay facedown however many cards you had of that pair, and lie your way to zero cards first. If someone caught you in a lie—by saying “Wicked”—then you got the entire pile of discarded cards.

And there was nothing like calling someone a liar to ruin friendships and solidify lifelong grudges.

Jax tossed two cards facedown onto the pile. “Two aces.”

“Wicked!” Lenda called, pointing to Jax. “Wicked, Wicked, Wicked!”

Jax rolled his eyes and flipped the two cards over. “I can’t lie, Len,” he said, and the crew roared with laughter.

Lenda raked the entire pile of cards toward her end of the table and sorted through them in her hand.

Ana patted her on the shoulder sympathetically.

At the head of the table, beside the captain, Talle—short and thin, with black hair in a pixie cut and hands so steady she could slit a throat clean while navigating the skyways of Nevaeh—sliced a piece of bread in half with one of the dozen knives from her belt, and buttered it. Siege leaned forward and ate it out of her hand. “Sunshine! That was mine.”

“Ours,” Siege replied, kissing her, and played her hand—three twos. No one called Wicked against the captain. No one ever did. Except Talle.

Talle and Siege had been married longer than Ana had been part of the Dossier. She always wondered how they’d met, but it was a secret—like Siege’s last name.

Di once said that it seemed surprising that two people who were so opposite could fall in love, but he didn’t see that while Siege was the flame, Talle was the shadow. One could not exist without the other.