Page 9 of Dark Water Daughter

The gag came off and the Stormsinger coughed. Kaspin stepped back, proceeding to load a pistol as he said, “This is Mary. Mary, sing for us,something…subtle.”He cocked the pistol and pointed it at her head. “A simple demonstration will suffice.”

Half the woman’s face was rubbed red from the gag. She noted the muzzle of the pistol then surveyed the room, taking in each one of us in a way that made me overly aware of how I must appear, here among criminals. As if I were one of them.

There was fear beneath her resentment, and I reminded myself what Slader had said. She would be safest with us. Demery was a pirate. Randalf was just a smuggler, but from the way he leered, his company would be little better.

“One for sorrow, two for mirth,” Mary began to sing. Her voice was low and soft, not forceful, but cajoling. Outside the windows, the wind snuffed like a candle, and the falling snow became impossibly still. Beyond it the sun flashed through the clouds and bold, iridescent beams struck the water between snow-dusted ships.

Awe washed through me. Her voice did not just still the wind. It stilled my dreamer’s sense and left me feelingunexpectedly…whole.Awake and grounded in a way I had not felt for many years.

Logic told me this was simply my imagination, but for now, I ignored that cynical voice. I watched white flakes drift, caught outside of time, and let myself be captured too.

The Stormsinger sang, “Three for a death, and four for birth.”

Kaspin looked around with obvious satisfaction as Mary’s voice faded and Mr. Speck refitted her gag. The wind picked back up and the sun disappeared, but there was no doubt as to her power.

And I? An irrational yearning wove through my ribs, smothering my breath as surely as Mary had smothered the wind outside. I wanted, more than anything, to hear her voice again. To see the sun break through the clouds and the snowflakes drift to her unnatural song. That power. Thatpeace—imagined,or real.

Kaspin’s voice broke the silence. “Mr. Rosser, need we wait for your companion to begin?”

“Begin?” I repeated, still disoriented. “No, no.”

Kaspin eyed me, then ducked his chin. “Then let’s open with one thousand five hundred solems.”

“Five hundred,” Randalf said, turning up his nose. “She strikes me as untrained. Stilling a breeze and calling a storm are one thing.Dispersinga storm and maintaining a fair wind for a voyage? Those are another.”

Kaspin looked to Demery.

The pirate laced his arms loosely over his chest. “One thousand five hundred,” he affirmed.

Now, Kaspin turned his eyes to me.

My throat felt thick, the number poisonous on my tongue. I forced myself to look at Randalf again, at Speck and Kaspin and Demery, and reminded myself again that the singer would be better off with us.

That was not my only motivation, though. That voice. That song, and the way it had affected me. I wanted to help her. I neededto—evenif my only means was contemptible.

“My captain is prepared to offer two thousand,” I said.

“I’ll raise to two thousand five hundred,” Demery countered calmly.

Silence overtook the table. Randalf sucked at his teeth, obviously unhappy with the price. Kaspin refilled his cup with a soft clink and sat back, expectant.

As to Mary herself, she paled even more. She blinked hard and her face locked into an expressionless façade.

Demery noticed. “You’ll be well treated on my vessel, Mary. I run a clean ship, no drinking, no fighting, no gambling. A cabin of your own.”

“Puritan pirates,” Grant muttered from his gloomy corner, though I could not say if anyone else heard him. “Laud them.”

“The witch isn’t here to be wooed,” Kaspin said. “Three thousand, anyone?”

“Four thousand,” Randalf burst out, spitting the words as if they were broken teeth. “Four thousand bedamned solems.”

My heart hit the floor beneath my boots. Kaspin’s hand froze on his cup and Demery slowly twisted to regard the smuggler.

“What exactly, Mr. Randalf, do you smuggle?” the pirate asked. His tone was benign, but I saw the frustration behind his eyes. My guess? He could not afford to outbid that.

I could not, either. I fingered the worn coin in my pocket to calm myself, running the numbers in my head. Slader could not pay more than three thousand. One could buy an entire ship for four thousand solem weight.

“I deal in pineapples, for the most part,” Randalf said, still looking disgusted, but our shock had soothed him. A touch of arrogance tugged at the corner of his mouth. “You wouldn’t believe what the rich sots on Jurry will pay to carry around a pineapple at their parties, or just how fond Her Majesty is of pineapple syrup in the mornings. But they do not keep, which is why I need a weather witch, and my last one drowned herself. Fair winds, fresh cargo, good business.”