To Kill a Kingdom(63)
“Just trust me,” I tell him.
“It’s not you I don’t trust.”
Lira laughs, like someone worrying about my safety is the funniest thing she’s heard all day. “Better be careful,” she tells me. “I could strike a bargain with the Xaprár and use those three days of sword training to stab you in the back.”
“As though you’d ever abandon the luxuries of the Saad for Rycroft’s rust boat,” I say, gesturing to Rycroft’s ship.
It isn’t a bad vessel, but it’s no match for the deadly beauty of the Saad. With a redwood body and sails the color of ash, it’s more than worthy for looting, but to hunt the Princes’ Bane and her sea witch mother, or hold a prince whose heart does not beat but crashes like ocean waves . . . well, it’s not quite capable of that.
“I don’t see much difference,” Lira says. “Paint the wood a shade darker, give the captain a large chip for his shoulder, and I wouldn’t notice a thing.”
I widen my eyes, outraged, but Lira only smiles.
“Just remember,” she says, blue eyes glistening,“if you want this scum to believe you and I could be together” – her voice echoes with shameless disbelief – “then you need to take off that ridiculous hat.”
“Just you remember,” I say as we step out from behind the shrubs and approach my lounging rival, “if we’re caught, there’s no way in hell I’m risking my neck to save you.”
Rycroft spots us the moment we maneuver out of the dark and into the unforgiving light of the star-dappled sky. He doesn’t speak as we approach, or move from his sprawling position on the dock steps that lead to his ship. But I know he sees us. He continues counting his riches, but his moves are more precise. It’s not until we’re directly above him that he deigns to look up with a gold-studded grin.
Objectively speaking, Tallis Rycroft isn’t a handsome man. His features don’t quite seem to belong to him, just another thing he’s stolen. His eyes are dark pits that bore into his ashen skin, and his lips are pale brown – thin and curved upward in a permanent smirk, hooded by a slender mustache. A deep burgundy turban wraps around his head, and from it large pieces of gold and silver hang like droplets, falling into his face and down his neck. When he looks at me, he runs his tongue over his lips.
“Where’s your guard dog?” he asks in heavy Kléftesis.
“Which one?” I reply in Midasan, not willing to give him the satisfaction of making me use the tongue of thieves and slavers.
Rycroft stands and leans against the rope of the dock steps. “If you’re here, Kye and that tattooed whore can’t be far off. And let me guess: She has a target on my head? Like a pissant prince would dare take me out.”
I school my features into surprise. “Such paranoia,” I say. “It’s just me and my lady friend, alone and unarmed. Really, you can’t be scared of a single pissant prince, can you?”
Rycroft narrows his eyes. “And this one?” He casts a lecherous grin toward Lira. Though I’m sure she doesn’t speak the language – there aren’t many outside Kléftes who do – her face twists in measured disgust.
“Not a guard dog,” I tell him.
“Really?” He slips into Midasan and lets an alley-cat grin loose on his face. “Looks like a bitch to me.”
I keep a lofty smile on my face. “You’re as pleasant as ever.” I slip a lazy arm around Lira’s waist. She bristles and then eases herself rigidly into my grip. “And after my new friend and I came to admire your ship.”
“Admire it,” Rycroft repeats. “Or steal it?”
“An entire boat?” I give him my most shit-eating grin. “It’s nice to know you have such a high opinion of me.” I turn to Lira. “Do you think it could fit in your purse?”
“Perhaps,” she says. “Nothing here looks very big.”
She casts a meaningful look at Rycroft and I cough, covering my mouth to hide the possibility of laughter.
Rycroft snarls. “Okay,” he says. “I’ll play this out.” He opens his arms in a dangerous welcome, revealing the full mass of the ship behind him. “Come aboard. We’ll talk over rum fit for a king.”
It’s a jab. A double-edged sword to point out what I’ve not yet become and mock me with what I will one day be. Never a pirate, always a prince.
I accept Rycroft’s invitation with a curt nod and keep my arm wrapped protectively around Lira. My every instinct is on edge, telling me to walk behind him and not in front. Watch his hands and his eyes and the two dozen men who are leering down at us as we settle around a table on the ship deck. To never, for a single second, think that he doesn’t wish me dead. And that he’s not going to try to make that wish come true when I steal the Págese necklace.
The rum Rycroft offers us is from Midas, which wouldn’t bother me half as much if it wasn’t also from the royal cellar. The bottle is blown glass, twisted into the shape of our crest, with liquid gold printing the intricate details. The drink itself is littered with gold dust that glistens against the reflection of the glass. I don’t know when he stole it, or why – if he did it just because he could, or if he did it just because he wanted me to know that he could – but my hands clench into fists under the table.