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Serilla took a slow sip of tea. They were in the drawing room of Davad’s house.

The Chalcedean raiders had burned the east wing, but this end of the house was still habitable.

She smiled small to herself. Her cup was not cracked.

A small thing, but a satisfying one. She had stopped fearing to offend him.

She looked at Mingsley levelly. It was time to draw a line.

‘I do intend to enforce the old Charter. More, I intend to suggest it as a basic foundation for the new Bingtown.’ She smiled brightly at him as if a brilliant idea had just occurred to her.

‘Perhaps, if you were willing to go upriver, the Rain Wild Traders might offer you the same status as they have offered the Tattooed. Of course, it would have the same requirements. You’d have to bring your true-born daughters and sons with you.

When they married into Rain Wild families, they’d become Traders. ’

He recoiled from the table, and snatched a kerchief from his pocket. He patted hastily at his lips. ‘The very idea is abhorrent. Companion, are you mocking me?’

‘Not at all. I am merely saying that the so-called New Traders had best come to the bargaining table with everyone else. And they must understand that, like everyone else, they will have to meet certain terms to be accepted here.’

His eyes flashed. ‘Accepted here! We have every right to be here. We have charters granted by Satrap Cosgo himself, ceding us land and…’

‘Charters you bought from him, for outrageous bribes and gifts. Because you knew that bribing him was the only way you could get such a charter. What he could not legitimately grant you, you bought from him. Those charters were founded on dishonesty and broken promises.’ She took another sip of tea.

‘If they hadn’t been, you never would have consented to pay so much for them.

You bought lies, “New Trader” Mingsley. Now the truth has come to Bingtown.

The truth is that the Three Ships immigrants have a true right to be here.

They negotiated it with the Bingtown Traders when they first came here.

Last night, they negotiated further. They will be given grants of lands, and votes in the Council, in recognition of all they have done against the Chalcedean invasion.

Oh, they will never be Bingtown Traders, of course.

Not unless they marry into the families.

However, I imagine the Bingtown Traders will become a ceremonial aristocracy of sorts, rather than a true ruling class any more.

Moreover, Three Ships families seem to cherish the distinction of being Three Ships.

Those of the Tattooed who choose to remain in Bingtown rather than go to the Rain Wilds will have the opportunity to earn land of their own, by assisting in the rebuilding of Bingtown.

Those that do will receive voting privileges with the land, and stand on an equal footing with every other landowner. ’

‘Ah, well, then.’ Mingsley leaned back in his chair and rested his hands contentedly on his belly. ‘That is what you should have told me first. If voting and control of the town are to be based on land ownership, then we New Traders have nothing to fear.’

‘Certainly, that is true. Once you legally acquire some land, you, too, will be allowed to vote on the Council.’

He went red, and then his face darkened until she feared he would collapse. When he spoke, the words burst from him like steam from a kettle. ‘You have betrayed us!’

‘And how did you expect to be served? You betrayed the Satrapy once, luring Cosgo to issue grants to you that you knew were illegal. Then you came here, and further betrayed Bingtown, by dirtying its shores with slavery and undercutting its economy and way of life. But that was not enough for you. You and your cohorts wanted it all, not just the lands of Bingtown, but the secret trade of Bingtown.’

She paused for a sip of tea, and to smile at him.

‘And for that you were willing to betray the Satrap into death. You would have used his slaughter as an excuse to let the Chalcedeans kill the Bingtown Traders, so long as you could keep their wealth for yourselves. Well, you were betrayed once, by the Chalcedeans. How that astonished you! But you did not learn. Instead you sought to bend me as you bent the Satrap, not with wealth but threats. Well. Now you are betrayed again, by me. If betrayal you would call it, that I stand up for what I have always believed in.’

In a very reasonable voice, she continued, ‘New Traders who labour alongside the Three Ships folk and the slaves in helping to rebuild Bingtown will be granted land. That the Bingtowners themselves decreed, with no prodding from me. It is the best offer you will get. But you will not take it, for your heart is not here. It never was. Your wives and your heirs are not here. Bingtown, to you, was a place to plunder, never home, never a new chance.’

‘And when the Jamaillian fleet arrives here, what then?’ he demanded.

‘The birds that were sent out to Jamaillia primed them to expect Old Trader treachery against the Satrap. Lo and behold, we were more right than we knew! Your Bingtown Trader friends were the ones who sent the Satrap to his death.’

Her voice was cold. ‘You are so bold, you admit your part in the plot against Satrap Cosgo, and then threaten me with the consequences?’ She shook her head in patrician disbelief.

‘If Jamaillia were going to muster a fleet against us, it would have done so by now. Unless I am much mistaken, those who hoped to sail north and plunder Bingtown have found they must stay at home to protect what they have. If this threatened Jamaillian fleet ever arrives, I doubt there will be much to it. I assure you, I am all too familiar with the financial state of the Jamaillian treasury. The death of a Satrap and the threat of civil war will prompt most nobles to keep their wealth and their strength close to home. I know what the conspiracy hoped. You believed your Jamaillian partners would arrive with ships and turn Bingtown over to you. Doubtless you thought it wise to have this fall-back defence against the Chalcedeans in case they became too greedy. As they did, and far sooner than you expected.’

She gave a small sigh and poured herself more tea.

With a social smile, she waved the pot questioningly towards Mingsley’s cup, then interpreted his outraged silence as a refusal.

She took up her lecture again. ‘If this fleet ever arrives here, they will be greeted with diplomacy, a cordial welcome and a well-fortified harbour. They will find a city rebuilding itself after an unjustified Chalcedean attack. I suggest you consider the New Traders’ position in Bingtown from an entirely different angle.

Whatever will you do if the Satrap is not dead?

For if the dragon speaks truth when she says that Malta Vestrit lives, then perhaps the Satrap has survived alongside her.

How uncomfortable could that be for you?

Especially as I have it, in your own hand, that there was a New Trader plot against him.

Not that you were personally involved, of course.

’ She idly stirred a bit of honey into the mint tea.

‘In any case, if the fleet is met, not with a show of force, nor a scene of civil disorder, but with a courteous and diplomatic welcome … well.’ She cocked her head at him and smiled winningly.

‘We shall see. Oh. Did I caution you to remember that this Jamaillian fleet must first come here through not only the Pirate Isles, but through the Chalcedean “patrol” vessels? It will, I think, be rather like coming past an enraged hive of bees. If and when the fleet reaches us, they may be glad of a peaceful harbour and a dragon guardian.’ She stirred her tea again as she idly asked, ‘Or had you forgotten about Tintaglia?’

‘You will regret this!’ Mingsley told her.

He stood with a fine crash of china and cutlery.

‘You would have been carried alongside us to power! You could have returned to Jamaillia a wealthy woman, and lived out your days in civilization and culture. Instead you have doomed yourself to this backwater town and its rustic folk. They have no respect for the Satrapy here. Here you will be nothing more than just another woman on her own!’

He stormed from the room, slamming the door behind him. Just another woman on her own. Mingsley was not to know that he had flung a blessing at Serilla in the tones of a curse.

Kendry came back to harbour under sail, a diminished crew working his decks, but making good time nonetheless.

Reyn Khuprus sat on the skeletal rooftop of a half-destroyed warehouse and watched him come.

Overhead, Tintaglia circled once, flashing silver.

The dragon touched Reyn’s mind briefly as she passed overhead.

‘Ophelia is your name for her. She comes, also.’

He watched Kendry as the men brought him alongside one of the shattered docks and tied him off.

The liveship had changed. The affable boyish figurehead did not wave his arms in greeting, or clap and whoop with joy at his safe return.

Instead his arms were crossed on his chest and his face was closed.

Reyn could guess what had happened. Tintaglia had told Kendry who and what he truly was.

The last few times he’d sailed on the Kendry, he had been uncomfortably aware of the dragon lurking below the ship’s surface personality.

Now those memories would have bloomed in full.