The days following Akula’s meeting in the great cabin were sleepy for the enlisted. The Paso Fino sailed smoothly across the flat turquoise Myriad, and the sailors fished for tarpon and played cards, lighting cheap San Coralino cigars and basking in the sun. They were unaware of the choice the officers were faced with, the stress they were under, and some would not care, even when they learned.

  Every man and woman on the crew was free to make their own decisions when it came to staying on, but the opinions of their division leaders would influence them greatly. The captain knew this, and telling the officers first was more than just a way to show respect. He was allowing himself time to win them over before the entire crew became privy to the information.

  In Grey’s opinion, a surprising number of the leadership were already on board with making the risky venture. Of course, there had been an uproar around the command table from the loudest in the group. But the blowhards, the purser, Trevor, and the quartermaster, Rollins, were not very influential when it came to the rest of the crew.

  The other officers had quietly considered, agreeing to think it over before delivering their decisions and speaking with their divisions. While the loudly dissenting Trevor and Rollins had left with red faces and tense shoulders, the rest filed out of the great cabin, lost in thought. The calm of it had all appeared suspicious to Grey.

  Had she not known to look, she would have missed several of them glance at Lotti as they passed her spot beside the door. So she had gotten ahead of the meeting, spilled Grey’s secrets. To confirm, Grey grilled her riptide, Callum. It wasn’t long until he confirmed it. He was an awful liar.

  But to Lotti’s motives? The Captain was a persuasive man, but it was not where his true strength lay. He was a master at surrounding himself with great people and then giving them the freedom to operate. This allowed them the range to excel where he, or their peers, might not.

  Overall, it was an excellent quality to have. It was rare that his crew members resented him, and they usually developed an independence and self-reliance that set them apart from other ships. All in all, Grey loved working for a man who let her work freely in her position.

  There were, of course, downsides to this style of leadership. The most common being that after becoming too accustomed to running without a bit, his leadership no longer respected the reins.

  In Lotti’s case, she often overstepped, and this time it was at Grey’s expense. The sage had gone to a significant number of the officers before the meeting to persuade them in favor of the Captain’s proposal.

  Akula had trusted Grey with sensitive information, and Lotti had immediately told several of the very people he hadn’t wanted to know. Lotti was one of the most persuasive people she had ever met, so she knew why she did it, but it infuriated her still.

  It did not take Grey long to decide that she would confront the wind sage. In fact, she stormed off mid-sentence, leaving Callum standing awkwardly on the foredeck.

  Grounders scattered as she marched across the stomp deck, her mood clearly apparent on her face. The door was cracked to Lotti’s quarters, so she pushed it open. There she found the Sage tinkering with a watch Finnian had procured her in Costa Verde. The island was a short sail from Nochebraga and as such, was full of drunk, oblivious nobles escaping the city. Even a sailor with thick fingers could lift a wallet in its packed streets. It was one of Finnian’s favorite layovers.

  Lotti had a knack for gadgets but a lack of attention span. Her room was always littered with half-finished projects and scraps, all tied awkwardly to save them from scattering if the sea was tossing the ship. It had taken her a week to transfer everything when Akula purchased the Paso Fino. For the first time, the mess, the state of disarray, irritated Grey.

  The items’ origins were as varied as their nature. Grey had even found disassembled pistols tucked in Lotti’s bag, which is one of the reasons she would no longer fetch things out of Lotti’s bag. They were illegal in every country in the Known Seas, and extremely expensive. They were also impractical in most altercations, firing only one unreliable shot. Only a tinkerer would take the risk of keeping one in their possession.

  Grey pushed the door fully open without knocking, stepping up to the table Lotti was hunched over. The Sage flipped up the lens loupes she wore attached to her glasses when she worked on small bits. She looked up and smiled, clearly deep in thought. She looked ridiculous, but that didn’t stop Grey from launching right in.

  “I told you about my meeting with Akula in confidence. Not that you give a shit, but if he finds out, he’ll never trust me again. Shit, even if he doesn’t find out, I’ll never trust you again.” Grey tried to relax her grip on the back of the chair that faced the sage.

  Lotti removed her glasses and rubbed the bridge of her nose underneath the lenses. “I suppose it was too much to hope you wouldn’t put it together. I’m sure Callum folded, right? It doesn’t matter. If I had told you, I would have had to go directly against you. I knew you would be upset, but outside of going behind your back, I don't see the issue. None of it will get back to Akula.”

  She pushed the glasses up into her hair and took a breath. “You know that I'm capable of getting more people on board with a word or two before he formally proposed the idea. I just don’t want this to fall apart.”

  Grey responded quickly. “What about what I want? I never said I was on board; if anything, I was opposed when we talked. You’re so selfish, are we not friends? You’ll use anything or anyone you have available to get what you want.”

  Lotti looked shocked and hurt, but Grey knew she was right. It was obvious Lotti had just assumed she had won Grey over, and that Grey would be pleased with the results of her meddling. Lotti’s next question confirmed it.

  “Are you really going to pass this opportunity up?” She looked down at the table she was seated at, pushing scraps of chain around the boards.

  “That’s not really the point, is it?” Grey glared.

  There was a pause, and then Lotti said, “Grey, I’m sorry. I saw an opportunity to do what I thought was right for the crew, and I really didn’t stop to think..”

  Grey shifted where she stood, moving to interrupt. “Right. I’m used to it. I think, on some level, you know that. You knew you could get away with betraying my confidence and that there was nothing I could or would do about it.”

  Lotti barrelled past the hornet’s nest in the infuriating way that she did when she didn’t want to address something. “Please don’t cut off your nose to spite your face, Grey. Don’t abandon the Paso Fino and Mayacar because you’re mad at me.”

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “That’s insulting.”

  Lotti looked up abruptly. “I’m sorry! I really am. I did actually think you were coming around, and if the means justified the ends, you wouldn’t be that upset with me.”

  It was a selfish answer for a selfish action. Unfortunately, as close as they were, Grey sympathized with the choice. It pissed Grey off that she was tempted to drop it. So, instead of letting her friend slip out of the consequences of her betrayal, she spun on her heel and stormed out of the room.

  ***

  Grey kicked her feet up on the shoddy ship stool while Finnian strung his bow, and Callum looked quietly over the rail and into the sea. The early evening sun was low in the sky behind them, ready to set over the bow of the ship as they headed west.

  They shared a bottle of rum and a slow-moving game of Deepfleet on the table between them. It was a strategic game, requiring thought between its moves, but the friends were moving even slower this evening.

  With the bow strung, Finnian began stringing arrows to small reels fitted along the back of the ship. There were larger reels that were rigged with a long pole and spinning lure for trolling big game fish, but for bow fishing, the smaller ones worked much better.

  It was far too deep to hunt fish at the surface of the water; there were none, but the waves had been thick with fliers today. Depending on where you were in the world, the winged fish came in many shapes, sizes, and colors adapted to blend in with their environments. In the Myriad, they were of every color, flashing like jewels as they leapt from the ship’s wake to the crest of a wave and back again.

  Finnian peered over the rail, excitement showing on his face at the number crashing through the waves. He was the only ebbjack on the ship, and as such, had the finest short bow. He was also the most skilled at its use. Ebbjacks dealt in secrets, theft, and silent killing, and Finnian put more fear in Grey than anyone else.

  The lackwits of Etos believed the strongest opponent was the most dangerous. Grey knew from constantly being underestimated herself that death for any human was only one well-placed arrow, vial of poison, or shove off a cliff away. In many cases, success was only a matter of who struck first or, more simply, which person made the decision to initiate violence.

  Fortunately, Finnian and she were fast friends. She admired his quick wit and envied his skill with the weapons of his trade. She used every opportunity to learn from him and noticed that he wanted to learn from her as well. Where Callum was prideful and competitive, Finnian was genuine and excited to absorb information. He had even tried his hand at tide calling, to Nessa’s great amusement.

  Finnean spoke, his voice rich with excitement. “Will the Osprey go first? The birds are known to strike so hard a fish’s spine is snapped before it leaves the water. Did you know that Grey?” Finnian asked. He was one of the few officers on the ship to take her sobriquet seriously, and it always amused her.

  “No, I think I’ll watch Callum take a few shots. My skills always improve from observing what not to do.”

  Callum frowned in the serious way that he did. His face was sharp lines, in contrast to his flame hair and freckled cheeks. He had a sense of humor, but it had to be dug out of him.

  Of course, she still liked Callum. He could rub people the wrong way, but he had everyone’s respect. As riptides, they drilled every evening, sharpening each other in a way that only rivals could. Personally, she didn’t feel the need to compete with him, but she knew she was better for his desire to do so.

  The training created a sweat bond between them, and in combat, they fought as a unit. Their relationship was watertight, though she probably wouldn’t have originally picked him for his personality.

  Callum’s bulky build was a stark contrast to Finnian's. While Finnian was tall for an ebbjack, he was still short when compared to Callum and Grey, and both beautiful and handsome at the same time. He kept his long, onyx hair braided back in intricate patterns, with bones and beads decorating its curves. His dark skin made his smile break like the dawn, and he was always smiling.

  Callum stood and shook out his shoulders. Grey thought he looked like a dire bear. “The only thing I’ve done wrong is waste my evenings with you lot. I could best either of you at tournament, including archery, and you know it.” Callum replied.

  Grey, in fact, did not know it. It might be a close contest between her and Callum, but Finnian had a Chaos-gifted talent with the bow. Callum was tall, block-headed, and delusional, but the whole ship knew that.

  The dynamic between the three of them was abnormal, but it worked. They spent much of their free time on the ship fishing, playing Deepfleet, drinking, or training.

  As officers, all three had been at Akula’s meeting, so the mood today was more contemplative. The game of Deepfleet was slower, and Grey was looking forward to some bow fishing to get her mind off of Mayacar and Lotti. Finnian had just finished lining a few thin arrows with barbed heads to the small reels, and Callum stepped forward with his thick riptide bow.

  Grey kicked up her legs, not actually intent on watching Callum fire. She needed to put some thought into Lotti, into the next leg of their journey, on her options if she were to leave the ship.

  Her mind wandered, but not where she wanted it to go. She couldn’t get the little, flashy fish off her mind.

  Fliers weren’t the only creatures that leapt from the sea while trailing a ship, but they were the most common by a long shot. Common folk thought they had grown their thin, iridescent wings to leap through the air after sea skaters, small bugs that lived on the tension of the water’s surface. It would make sense.

  The ship certainly stirred the skaters up as it cut through the open ocean, but the reality was that the fliers followed the ship for the kitchen scraps and more disgusting refuse tossed off the back. If you wanted to know the real reason a fish had grown wings, all you had to do was ask a tide sage. Nessa could feel the movement of the monsters below, even those Grey would rather she knew nothing about.

  Nessa had also been the one to explain the finer details of the history of most creatures to Grey, something sages learned at Court. As for the fliers, the easy way of looking at it was that their ancestors learned to burst from the sea to escape death, and so they eventually grew wings. While Order priests kept it simple for the majority of the population, sages and those who dug further could uncover the whole process.

  As Grey eventually understood it, the fish that leapt the farthest and had the most efficient fins for doing so lived longer and created more offspring. The repetition of this phenomenon, for a span so long it was impossible to imagine, resulted in a creature that could take advantage of a space their predators could not. The distinction between “growing” wings and evolving into a species that had wings was one that Grey thought about often. The real answer required centuries of failures and thousands of deaths, a harsh reality about change, but an important one to learn.

  As for their feeding habits, it always seemed to Grey like it would make more sense for the colorful creatures to find their meal somewhere further from the ecosystem that trailed her ship. The marlin, tuna, and sharks followed the ship because they knew the fliers and other small fish would be there. It was a dangerous place to feed, a dangerous cycle of violence.

  It was the ease of procuring a meal that attracted the odd creatures, often leading them straight to their death and continuing the evolution of their species. The sharks could always count on the fliers gathering behind a sea vessel, and the fliers didn’t have the foresight to know the sharks would be there. When you couldn’t see the bigger picture, it was easy to make a predictable, dangerous decision.

  An arrow from Callum's bow pierced the spine of a large flier, warranting an excited whoop from Finnian. They bickered over the reel, each thinking they knew the best way to keep the fish on the arrow while they brought it in.

  She laughed easily at her friends, but she wasn’t completely removed from her mind. A thought stuck uncomfortably there, something she couldn’t shake. If the fliers couldn’t foresee the danger beneath them after all these years, how could they possibly know what waited for them above?