If there was one, singular thing that Archer had learned from Silta, it was that losing something was so much worse than never having it.

Adventure, uncertainty—he'd never longed for those things until he'd lost them. He didn't truly realize that he'd fallen in love until Silta had a knife through her. He didn't really realize how much he loved the Avourienne until it was gone.

Back in the truth circle, when Eiler had said Archer was lying about going back to Jeanne, He'd wondered if he'd ever really loved her. He wondered if he had kept her around just because he wanted to be the kind of man that loved her. It was confusing to call the simple thing he'd had for Jeanne the same name as the extravagant thing he'd had for Silta.

Even so, it was the same thing. Different, perhaps, but the same. He'd loved Jeanne, and Everson's deadly trick had proved that.

But since leaving Oprhano, nearly every part of Archer had twisted. He'd lost some of one trait to gain another: naivety for distrust, gentleness for confidence, morals for intelligence. He would never have loved Jeanne as the man he was now, but that wasn't the point. All that mattered was that he had, at one point in time, considered Jeanne to be the love of his life. She was his everything once, and Silta knew that. She'd taken that one sliver of sunlight in his life and snuffed it out. Her creativity was beyond admirable—she'd designed her revenge with his morals in mind: give him something he could enjoy if he were evil—if he could ignore the wrongness of it—but not something he could have if he were cursed with the need to do the right thing. It was that last, final, mocking lesson: Look, Archer. Look how right I was. Fortune favours the evil, because nothing stops them from getting what they want.

He couldn't be sure how long it had been since the Starling had been blown to bits and the Avourienne sailed on. It could've been hours; it could've been days, but the sky had turned grey again, and the red sea continued to fight with the Avourienne, pouring bloody water over the rails in massive waves and soaking every surface of the ship. There was a thin layer of red water on the floor of the corner room, but Archer didn't even notice as he stood from the bed.

He'd kill her. Silta. He was going to put his hands around her throat until she stopped breathing. He was going to drive the knife through her heart, then pull it out and do it again and again until she collapsed to the ground in death. That's what he was going to do. And if she killed him first, then so be it.

They'd been so close he could taste it. The smell of the salt on her hair, the feeling of her freezing fingers. The silent admission that she needed his help. The sliver of hope that maybe they'd work something out. Maybe things would be okay one day, and the heartbreak would heal. They had been so, so close to freedom, for just a moment.

But she needed her revenge. She needed to make sure Archer paid for what he'd done to Bardarian. If she'd killed Alli, if she'd blown the Myriad to pieces, if she'd gone back for the crown—those things, Archer could take. In fact, he could understand them. Enemies did those kinds of things to each other. But this? Friends did this to the people they once knew at the most intimate level. This was too far.

His consciousness, his rational thought, was hanging from his mind by a thin thread. His sanity was completely in the air, stretching thinner than that thin thread.

The water on the ground soaked right through his boots and into his socks, red as blood. The hallway had more of the same, and a few crew members were working to bail out some of the water. Archer's feet touched each stair, the wood slick. The deck was dark and cold, the sky roiling with clouds like it did the moment before it rained buckets of salty tears.

Across the deck, up the balcony steps, through the door. She'd be there. That sickening face would be there, looking back at him.

He didn't know it, but Rusher was there, too, getting a few more stars from Alli. Britter was there, watching Archer the moment he stepped inside the captain's quarters. Even Marquis was there, discussing something, maybe. Archer didn't notice them, or perhaps he did. Perhaps he did see those people there, knew doing this in front of them could change everything, but he just didn't care.

"Kingsley," Britter said carefully, but Archer didn't hear him.

She looked up when the door opened, glancing over at him. She searched his expression for a moment, and Archer wasn't sure what she saw. She looked tired—exhausted, but she didn't say a word.

He tilted his head to the side, then walked over to her.

She pushed back from her chair immediately, ever the predictor, hand out to stop him. She ducked under his first punch, trying to move around the table.

"Kingsley—"

The second time, Archer got her. Right there over the jaw and the nose, cutting off his name from her mouth. He felt the edge of her cheekbone against the round of his knuckles, felt the spiral of pain up his hand.

She went to duck again, tried to get out of the way, but Archer already had the next hit all lined up.

"Kingsley—"

Kingsley. Always Kingsley. Kingsley, the member of the crew. Kingsley, the deckhand that she might be able to use to get Bardarian's attention. Kingsley, the obsessive orphan that will worship her no matter what vicious thing she does next. Kingsley the chess piece.

Archer put the next punch to her throat, and she stumbled back from it, into the wall. Her head cracked against the wood, driven by another hit. Another on the jaw, one more on the nose.

She brought her hands up to protect her face, tried to catch his fist, but she didn't hit back. She didn't reach for a knife, didn't knee him or kick him or fight at all. She simply stayed there, back to the wall, head recoiling from every punch. Blood streamed down her face, over her nose, into her mouth, around her eyes.

The first time Archer had seen her bleed, it had startled him. She was Silta. She didn't bleed. But as it turned out, she bled just fine.

One more punch, and then Archer reached for her neck. He slid one finger under the Orphano chain and snapped the clasp, threw it as far as he could across the room. He slipped both hands around her neck and pressed.

"You," he whispered, "are the worst thing that has ever happened to me."

She opened her mouth to try and breathe, blood pouring over her lips and teeth. Those two canines, so sharp and unnatural, looked like any other tooth.

"Being abandoned," Archer murmured, pressing harder, "leaving Orphano, murdering Jeanne, stepping over Denver's dead body, killing Bardarian—nothing, nothing compares to the curse of having known you."

She curled her hands over his wrists, but she didn't pull. Her throat made that familiar cracking noise, but she didn't seem to panic as she tried to breathe.

"You stole me from me," he whispered. "You're a thief."

She was raising one hand beside Archer's head, and he barely registered why: She was calling off Britter and Rusher, silently telling them not to interfere. Good. Her pride would kill her.

Archer pressed his fingers into her trachea, into her carotids. He pressed as hard as his slick, bloody fingers could.

Everything in him was snapping or had snapped, and the thin, thin sanity thread finally did the same. His vision was red and black at the edges, and he couldn't feel the warmth of her blood anymore. He couldn't feel or hear or smell anything.

You stole me. You're a thief.

He couldn't be sure if he were really saying the words, because everything was so foggy and confusing. He couldn't be sure if she really was beginning to panic, her nails digging in terror.

Archer realized he really was going to kill her. Britter might step in once she went unconscious, but Archer could handle them both. He was really going to kill her. He really could. She grasped for his face, for his arms, desperation shining in her pretty eyes. She didn't have the right to be so pretty, so beautiful even in the face of death. She tried to gasp for air, but she couldn't even do that. She kicked out, not quite fighting but also not quite giving up.

And just like that, her arms fell away. Her eyes were open, but they began to drift shut. Her head started to roll back. Death sunk its deep, dark fingers into her skin.

He let go.

Her head rolled forward again, and she took a startling, ragged breath of air. Oh, she was good. She wasn't dying with her pride, she was making her next horrible message: You can't kill me, Kingsley, not even now. It's not in you.

He didn't understand why he couldn't. Because he loved her? Still, after all this? He didn't understand how that could coexist with this hate.

So he couldn't kill her, but he could still hurt her. He reached for her wrist—anything that he could snap or break or ruin—but he never got the chance. He felt his body being dragged backwards, across the floor.

Silta was still conscious against the wall as she slid down and hit the floor. Her breaths came heavy and hard, her face almost entirely red. She watched Archer get dragged away, resting her wrists on her knees.

It wasn't Britter behind him, because Britter had been ordered not to move. It was Marquis—it had to be Marquis, maybe Alli too—but Archer didn't care. He elbowed whoever it was, breaking free and lunging again. He still couldn't get back to Silta, though, because that awful person behind him continued to pull him back. He turned around to get rid of that person, ready to kick and punch his way back. One was Marquis, for sure, and that blonde haze had to be Alli.

Before he could do anything to them, Silta finally gave the cue. Britter and Rusher pounced on him, and with the help of Marquis, dragged him back. Because her, Archer could punch, and she'd let it happen. But Marquis and Alli? No, that she wouldn't watch.

His thoughts were screams, and they came out as violent, disturbing noises in his head. He couldn't be sure if they were also echoing across the room, too, but he didn't care either way.

There's nothing to you! Could she hear him? He hoped so. I don't understand how you do this to people—you're not worth any of these fights you cause. You're a vicious, nauseating soul-stealer. You fuck every man you come across and tear them apart for mere entertainment. Archer elbowed and kicked and tried desperately to get back to her. When he knew it wasn't possible, he did the job with those word-thoughts instead, Your father hated you; your mother hated you; Bardarian could barely deal with you; I hate you with everything I have, but you still think you're some champion?

She was still and silent on the floor, but she listened. She watched him with an ironic type of patience as he went on and on—she was a whore, she was a bitch, she was every awful word he could think of. She would be nothing without her looks, without her body. She slept her way to power. On and on, until it wasn't even about what happened with Jeanne, it was just about the destruction of Silta's character.

One moment, the world was a bloody, hysteric mess, but the next, somebody had the sense to knock Archer out. And then the world was just black.