Page 1

brITT

I f the ship rocked any harder from side to side, Denerfen would lose it. And the last thing Britt needed was a wild, tiny dragon rampaging through a closed vessel with his little snout spraying steam.

"Do not," Britt sang between clenched teeth, "do it. You lock that attitude up and swallow it like smoke."

A hiss replied.

Denerfen, a butterfly-sized emerald dragul, hid in the pouch of her hood. In the layers of fabric, he could fold his delicate wings against his spine and disappear when Stenberg sailors passed by.

Like right now.

"Keep it together, Den," Britt muttered, then smiled as she glided past yet another sailor. Two weeks on this wretched ship, and she'd only seen sailors once a day. Three in the last ten minutes?

Something must be brewing.

She ignored the frisson of paranoia that predicted they might stop her. If they were concerned, the first two sailors would have flung her back to the main servant's hold. This sailor ignored Britt like the others, so she'd take her luck while she had it.

Fortunately, Stenberg sailors weren't interested in island social norms like smiling. Their rigid social system—tyrant, wealthy, soldat, sailor, or scum—prohibited the higher-status islanders from acknowledging the lower-status ones.

As the scent of the sailor passed, so did Denerfen's irritation.

"Thank you, little one," Britt crooned.

Denerfen huffed, and the liquid-hot air rippled along the back of her neck. Britt's fixed smile turned pained. By the sea god Norr, why did steam hurt so much? Denerfen, you maniacal dragul! she wanted to shout. Stop burning me!

Britt kept the smile plastered on as she continued down the hallway. Instinctively, her right hand slid into her dress. With delicate precision, she wrapped her fingers around a warm, coiled body.

Tesserdress, a female dragul who should have been in the prime of her life, yet her violet scales had turned to lavender the past week. Without more potion, they'd start to shed, signaling the beginning of the end.

Thankfully, Britt had enough Helandalenda potion for a few more weeks.

If Tesserdress died, the entire race of draguls would go with her. Not to mention Britt, all of her family, and probably her island’s people. The Greater and Lesser Isles, too, considering the draguls’ importance in export and trade. Only Malcolm, Britt's second-oldest brother and Tesserdress' bonded partner, could save the wee thing.

"We'll find Malcolm," Britt whispered. She wrapped her lips around the promise, as if boldness could make it true.

Withholding her scoff hurt as she swallowed the skeptical truth.

How will we find him? her cynical half demanded. Malcolm was lost in Stenberg, a prisoner of war. As nephew of the General over Kapurnick island, he led the battle against Stenberg near Narpurra island. No Stenberg officer would allow him to live, certainly not His Glory. Malcolm is dead.

Britt steeled herself. The mean-spirited voice might be true, but better sense could go hang with the rest of the Stenberg islanders. She wouldn't give up while there were draguls and brothers to save.

As she squared her shoulders and rounded the corner, a giant blur startled her.

Acting on instinct, Britt leaped back with a cry, just in time to avoid a collision. Two hands caught her shoulders, preventing her from tipping backward. A Stenberg sailor gripped her arms seconds after his instinct arrested her plummet.

Smoke curled in his eyes like loose clouds. His brooding intensity carried to the slash of lips, square jaw. Scars riddled the edge of his neck like the ends of coiled snake tails.

Whip scars.

For five seconds, Britt stared in mute silence.

Not just a sailor.

A soldat.

The highest and most trained of all Stenbergian sailor ranks, the soldats lived, breathed, and slept their profession. Torn from their families at age five, stripped of their names, and reformed into a machine through constant exposure to pain and endless hours of training with all weapons available, the soldats made their reputation and kept it through sheer brawn and ferocity.

Her heart lodged in her throat. She didn't know soldats were on board. She wouldn't have been so . . . careless.

From the back of her neck, Denerfen growled, releasing a hiss of smoke. He vanished into her hood with a squeak. The cool brush of his teeth on the sensitive skin near her spine followed, but she stopped Denerfen from biting her with a cry.

"Not now!"

The soldat's steely eyes narrowed.

Flush with horror, Britt dropped her gaze. Blessed mermaids, why had she spoken? She posed as a traveling servant in order to get on the ship, which made her presence here very suspect. Surely, a soldat wouldn’t be too shy to interrogate.

In fact, the opposite.

Islanders rarely made eye contact with soldats, thanks to the soldat reputation for suspicion and ruthless questioning. Her survival hinged on him asking all the wrong things. Any soldat that discovered her family pedigree would take her prisoner and . . . well . . . the rest of that horrific thought didn't bear acknowledgement.

She sealed her lips and closed her eyes. A tremor of fear issued from her right pocket. Britt had to stop herself from setting a hand over Tesserdress's form and reassuring her with a whisper.

Four sailors in as many minutes, and one of them a soldat.

What did it mean?

"You said not now ?" he asked, hands folded in front of him. His gaze darted around in a mixture of curiosity and suspicion. "Why?"

“Why not?” she immediately countered.

He glowered.

She forced herself to smile.

Her heart slammed in her chest as she held his stare. By the skies, but she’d provide her own rope for a hanging if she kept this up. Stenberg sailors made a game out of forcing servants into errors, then punishing them. She had no reason to believe soldats would behave differently. Eye contact could be an accident, but speaking? There was no escaping that punishment. She couldn't search for Malcolm if her back was shredded to skin bits, could she?

Stenbergians loved their whips.

Denerfen growled again. The percussive sound echoed in the tomb-like silence of the hall. She coughed, poorly hiding her dragul’s noise two seconds too late. From the edge of her downturned vision, she noted how the soldat's head cocked to the side in inquisition. His hair, cut to pristine shortness along the sides, gave way to long strands on top. He kept it out of his face in a knotted queue, khaki-colored, like many in Stenberg. All of their thick mops had a reddish sheen.

He drawled, "Did I hear?—"

"No."

"No?" Amusement laced his deep tone. “I didn’t hear anything?”

Britt silently cursed her temper as she repeated, “No. I didn’t hear anything. Perhaps your ears deceive you?”

"My ears? No. But perhaps your eyes . . ."

She squeezed them shut, her nose wrinkling.

He laughed.

Shock brought her gaze open again.

The soldat laughed?

Was it possible?

Legends of soldats ruthless ways and surly temperaments abounded, but none of them included the descriptors of amused or curious or unfortunately handsome. Thankfully, a commotion from down the hall drew his attention at the same moment Denerfen threatened to bite her again. Reaching back, she pretended to itch under her hair, but flicked the dragul deeper into her hood.

Denerfen tumbled over himself and harrumphed.

"Considering I haven’t heard anything, I will be on my way," the soldat said before sliding past her, eyes trained ahead. His heavy tread thudded down the hall.

She stood there, frozen for several seconds, before finding the courage to spin around. What drew his attention and removed him so unexpectedly? The dank, narrow hallway, illuminated by arcane-infused, glowing stones that swayed in netted bags hanging from the ceiling, revealed nothing.

"I imagined him, Denerfen," she concluded with firmness. "No soldat could be that handsome, or that . . . normal. Come, my darlings. Let’s return to our closet for the rest of the evening."

And, she silently added, to prepare for the hard parts yet to come.

Finding Malcolm.

On Stenberg.

Alone.