Page 49

And I let myself claim her death as my own sorrow because while she wanders from star to star, I am left with the consuming ache of her absence. That wretched feeling of being alone. Worse yet, that I am without the people I love.

My eyes are dry from the burning of tears as I look up at Grayson. “You’re right. I do need to forgive myself. I need to move forward. I’m just . . . not sure where to start.”

Grayson studies me for a moment before rising to his feet, his large frame taking up a lot of the space.

When he extends his hand out toward me, I take it. Slipping the duvet off my legs, I rise to meet him. And when his eyes rake over my body, covered only by the thin fabric of my undergarments, I feel a rising blush stain my cheeks. He tugs on my arm and I step toward him.

“You start right here, in this moment. Take one step forward. Without looking back.”

As I fall into his embrace, I let the refuge of his shadow keep my own at bay.

“You solved the puzzle,” Zaos says an hour later as he leans over Grayson’s large desk and stares at the intricately designed key I pulled from the box for all of us to inspect.

“I did,” I respond, raising my chin a little higher at his flabbergasted tone.

“It would have been nice to know this when you first made it back to the ship so we could work on solving the riddle sooner.”

I snort. “I’m sorry. Next time, I’ll try not to black out after almost being struck by lightning and drowning.”

“Yes, it was quite theatrical,” he deadpans and my palm twitches with the need to reach across the desk and slap him across the face.

Grayson looks up at us from where he sits behind the desk, cleaning his nails with the tip of his dagger. “Do I really need to separate you two again or can we all find a way to work together to solve the Serpent’s Key’s riddle?”

Zaos and I just look at him, neither one of us giving an inch.

“Let me remind you,” Grayson adds, “that we have Blythe on our tail with one of the best trackers in the entire Southern Realm.”

I look back at Zaos and there’s a shift—albeit small—in his demeanor. “What does it say?” he asks me, nodding toward the key.

Not one for apologies then . Not that I’m surprised.

I pick up the key and examine it for the second time since cracking the code on the puzzle box. Warmth radiates into my fingertips. An odd sensation since it’s made of gold and fire opal. Normally precious metals and gemstones are cool to the touch.

“It feels almost as if it’s . . . alive,” I breathe, drawing the key closer so I can read what the inscription says.

“If legend is true, it could be the magick of the Witch Queen’s curse making it glow like that,” Zaos says as he leans closer. My left hand instinctually moves to the dagger at my hip, but I stop myself. He wouldn’t try anything. Not with Grayson so close.

“Can you read it?” Grayson asks, placing his dagger down on the top of his desk. The sapphire on the pommel glints in the light.

He chose me for my knowledge of the old language.

He knows that I can, but the urgency in his voice tells me we’ve waited long enough.

We’ve moved further south since making it through the storm yesterday, but it’s only a matter of time before Blythe catches onto our course.

We have everything we need to find Thaeto’s treasure, but that doesn’t mean we won’t be intercepted before then.

“Yes.”

Zaos fetches the quill off Grayson’s desk and readies himself to write down the translation.

The inscription lies along the stem etched with fire opal in swirling cursive letters.

It takes me a moment as I reflect back to my teachings, but I recall the translation and repeat it slowly for Zaos to jot down.

“‘Where the earth reaches for the heavens, secrets lie. Deep beyond, in darkness you shall see.’”

I repeat the words one more time, and listen to the scratch of the quill against the parchment as Zaos finishes the last sentence. Then, I place the key back in the box and look at Grayson. “Any idea what it could mean?”

Raking a hand over the dark scruff that has grown on his chin since we left Harrick’s inn, he rises from his chair and moves toward the windows.

“Where the earth reaches for the heavens,” Zaos whispers to himself. His eyebrows are pinched tightly together as he stares down at the key like the riddle might solve itself right in front of his eyes.

Grayson paces the room, his legs working in long strides as I sit back on the edge of his desk and think.

“It must be something notable along the horizon,” I mutter. Grayson stops moving then turns toward me. “That’s the only way the heavens would ever touch the earth. At least visually. Right?”

I glance between the two of them.

Zaos straightens his spine and crosses his arms over his chest.

“Yes,” Grayson responds.

I rack my mind, trying to think of any special place I’ve seen along my ventures that might be worthy of housing Thaeto’s treasure.

Maybe it was dropped on the ocean floor to the west where the sun falls asleep each night.

But the riddle speaks of the earth, not the water. So, that wouldn’t make sense.

“The earth meets the sky along every horizon,” Zaos interjects. “So, it could mean literally any body of land in the entire Southern Realm.”

He’s right. There are far too many places for us to spend the time going to every landmass in the Southern Realm in search of some dark space. But maybe . . .

I look down at the parchment and feel a thrum of excitement course through my veins when I read the first line of the riddle again. “The riddle says the earth reaches for the heavens. Maybe that means it’s a mountain.”

“And within a mountain, there can be caves,” Grayson says, excitedly. He ambles toward the desk and points at the parchment with Zaos’s handwriting. “Deep beyond, in darkness you shall see. The treasure must be hidden within a cave system below a mountain.”

“But the mountains in Northern Esoros do not have caves,” Zaos says.

“No.” I shake my head and look at Grayson, wondering if he’s heard the same tales I have. “But there are other mountains. In the most southern part of the realm. Mountains that most would never dare to venture to.”

“The Solise Mountains,” Zaos whispers, his eyes growing wide in disbelief. “But they lie beyond Dead Man’s Passage. No one has sailed that far south and has lived to tell the tale.”

“Or maybe there are some,” I whisper, “who came back and chose to never speak of it.”

My father used to tell me stories of those who would sail to the unknown parts of the world in the hopes of discovering something new—of the great seafarers who knew the secrets of the Aelynthi Sea better than anyone.

I look up at Grayson and when his eyes meet mine, I know in my heart he is one of the few who has done it: sailed through Dead Man’s Passage and made it out alive.

“You’ve done it, haven’t you?” I ask. Zaos looks at Grayson, his chest doesn’t move as he holds his breath, waiting for a response.

The muscles in Grayson’s jaw flex; his lips form a firm line and for a moment I’m not sure he will answer.

“Tell us,” I urge.

Shadows gather around his shoulders as his eyes glass over.

Lost to the distant memory, he finally says, “It was a very long time ago. When the world teemed with life and the marble city of Esoros was bright and gleaming. It was before King Renard’s blight moved across the city, darkening everything in its path.

When there were a lot more free men and plenty of prizes to be won.

“But as the tides shifted and King Renard came into power, new players emerged on the board. King Renard did not like that there were people who cared little about his control. Our kind started to dwindle when bounty hunters from the city started sharing secrets.”

“Secrets? What do you mean?” I whisper.

Grayson’s chest rises and falls as he sighs.

He doesn’t look at me when he continues.

“King Renard ensured that pirates would not survive the new age unless they bent the knee to his will.

When most of them did not, he sent out word to his spies to gather information on us—and not just pirates, but creatures of all kinds, who answered to their own rulers and not him.

“It didn’t take long before the children of pirate lords and creatures were captured or threatened—or some vital secrets were spilled, putting them in danger with their own kind.

The king also placed bounties on all our heads for evading his reach.

It was a dangerous time, not just for us, but for the people we loved. ”

Something twists hard in my chest as I see the claws of pain burrowing into Grayson’s shadowed face.

. . . for the people we loved .

My father .

Could he have been one of those men?

He was a pirate, one of the most well respected amongst our kind.

But once he fell in love with my mother, everything changed for him.

I didn’t make much of it—how secluded we were from the world.

How he always showed me ways to escape, or places to hide when we’d travel from Emerald Cove to the mainland.

When he’d sail on his ventures, he’d leave my mother and I for long periods of time, not knowing where he was going.

My mother always told me that everything my father did was for me—to protect me.

As if a stone was dropped into the pit of my stomach, I feel a heaviness settle at my core as I look at Grayson.

His eyes shudder when his gaze finally meets mine.

What does he know?

What is he not telling me?

There’s an almost imperceptible shake of his head, but I catch it and my heart skips a beat. He knows something about my past, but he doesn’t want to talk about it. Not while Zaos is here.

Fine .

But the moment we are alone, he won’t be allowed to leave this room until he tells me everything. The wicked heat of betrayal licks up my spine, but I take a deep breath in to steel my nerves. Grayson is a pirate lord and I am not special.

I should have seen this coming, but I let myself be blinded by . . .

I’m not even sure what to call my feelings for him.

Whatever they are, I tuck them away to deal with later.

“What does that have to do with the Solise Mountains?” My words are clipped and Zaos eyes me carefully as Grayson reaches out to take my hand.

I slip it behind my back and stare at the riddle, unable to touch him for fear that I might make true on my promise all those weeks ago and stab him in his stomach.

Grayson’s shoulders drop a fraction before his face shifts to that mask of stone he so easily wears.

“Once King Renard deemed all pirates’ lives to be forfeit, he paid the Seiffre a hefty fortune to hunt us down unless we bent the knee.

Some chose to sacrifice their freedom in order to protect their families.

The rest of us were forced to scatter once the Seiffre pursued their bounty.

“By then, there were too few of us to fight back. Not when the king gave the Seiffre kin an entire fleet of ships. Those of us who were left decided to flee in search of somewhere else where we might maintain our freedom. The king’s navy had the Narrow’s Passage blocked.

There was no way for us to head to the Northern Realm.

So, we sailed south. Ready to take our chances, we searched for what could be beyond Dead Man’s Passage.

It was better than surrendering our destinies to a tyrant.

Grayson pauses, his throat working as he swallows.

“What we did not anticipate was just how relentless the Seiffre would be.

They did not care about their own demise, for the fear of death had been wrought out of them since childhood.

The only thing they cared about was the wild pursuit toward the deadliest of traps for any ship, no matter how strong.

“They chased us right into the claws of death.”

Emotion strangles his words as he takes in a deep breath and continues.

“I lost many of my friends that day. Their ships sunk by cannon fire or run aground, into the rocks of the underwater mountains that litter Dead Man’s Passage.

The Caelestia was the only ship to make it to the other side of the passage, and that’s when I saw it.

The very thing those stone isles are meant to protect—the Solise Mountain range. ”

Zaos and I look at one another. Understanding flashes across his face. If some of the best captains weren’t able to cross the passage without their ships running aground, how would the Caelestia make it through a second time?

“Is there any other place the riddle could be pointing us too?” Zaos asks.

The air is heavy with our silence as I shake my head. “No. Not that I’m aware of.”

Zaos uncrosses his arms and shrugs. “Well, Captain. We’ve followed you everywhere else in this wretched world. How bad could this really be?”

Grayson runs a hand through his hair and grumbles, “Bad. Really bad.”