Jeanne was attempting to dart for Everson, so Archer tugged her back. "Just stay out of it," he begged.

"I can't," she said, pulling away from him with surprising strength. Her face said one thing, but her body was almost being...dragged toward Everson. "I have to help him—"

Silta turned, reaching out to slam Jeanne's head against one of the bars. In a whirl of blonde curls, she fell to the ground.

He spun back to Silta. "You didn't need to hit that hard!"

"She'd get in the way," Silta replied, glancing at Everson, who was approaching quickly. He made it to the end of the hall and immediately threw a punch at Archer, who very simply stepped out of the way. Everson stumbled past, his momentum throwing his balance. With a foot out to trip him, Everson tumbled to the ground.

Archer looked up at Silta, who shrugged. Everson was getting to his feet, coming back for more.

"Are we allowed to do this?" he asked, watching Everson recover. "Like, two-on-one him? It seems unethical."

Everson reached out for her shoulder, so Silta flicked him in the forehead. To Archer's utter surprise, he stepped back, dazed.

"Siren bone density," Silta explained. "Look, you have a go. I'll step in if you can't finish him." She stepped out of Everson's reach, causing Archer to take the punch instead. He'd forgotten to duck. He could feel blood drip immediately.

"Bad start," Silta commented, sitting down on the stairs to watch.

Archer found his footing and twirled around Everson, taking out his other foot and sending them spiralling into the bars. Pain sprinted up his back from where he'd collided with the metal.

"You said she wouldn't come back for you, Kingsley," Everson said breathlessly, elbowing Archer in the gut. A knife glinted at his side.

"I lied," Archer told him, grunting from pain and chopping Everson's elbow away.

Silta whistled from where she was sitting on the stairs. "That was nice, Kingsley. But you have to keep your arms up. Otherwise—"

Everson took the open space as a chance to punch Archer right in the throat. He stumbled back, coughing.

"Otherwise that happens," Silta said.

Everson turned to her, ready to disregard Archer, who coughed one last time and reached for Everson's arm. He tugged it back with all his strength, completely overestimating Everson's size—he was a smaller opponent than Archer was used to, and Silta was extremely hard to injure. But Everson's arm pulled right out of the socket, dislocating it.

Archer looked down at it, a little shocked, while Everson gritted his teeth in pain. He took his other arm, easily resetting the limb with groan of agony. Archer glanced at Silta.

"That was impressive," she said. "Do you think you can do the leg, too?"

Archer glanced back. He leaned forward and knocked Everson's head into the bars behind him, leaving him to slump to the ground. Archer nudged him with his foot. He rolled over a little, dazed. He didn't get back up. No use in killing the unkillable, he supposed.

Archer looked to Silta. "Shouldn't that have been harder?" he asked.

She shrugged again. "He seems off today. How many other things do you think you can rip out of their sockets?" she asked. "Like a foot, maybe?"

Archer made his way over to her, shouldering his way past as he ascended the stairs.

"What about a head?" Silta asked, climbing up behind him. "Do you think you could just rip someone's head right off?"

As Archer crested the stairs to the cabins, something barrelled into him, sending him all the way into the far door and crashing through, splintering wood with a splitting noise.

"Graceful," Silta remarked.

Archer wiped the blood from his mouth and assessed where he'd landed. He was on his back, a tall man standing over him who didn't give him a second to breathe. He brought his foot down on Archer's stomach, knocking the air from him.

Archer rolled out of his way—into another kick. He coughed, instinctively bringing up his legs to protect himself. He attempted to swipe out the legs of the tall man, but he sidestepped. Another kick. Another cough.

"Novari!" Archer shouted, rolling to his knees and into the foot of the tall man. He was sent backwards again, blood pouring over his mouth and neck.

"One second, lover." Silta's smooth voice sailed over the space between them. There was a crashing sound from the other end of the hallway, and then she appeared behind the tall man. She brought two hands to his neck, and he was dead on the ground a mere moment after. Archer sat up against the wall, catching his breath.

"You can't end up as the only one on the ground, love," she said. "Very hard to recover from that."

"I'm aware," Archer snapped. He got to his feet, spitting blood. From behind Silta came another man, shorter but stockier than the last. Archer went to warn her, but she stepped out of the way before he could.

The stocky man stumbled into Archer instead, his hands outstretched. Another came from behind Silta, and she turned around to meet him.

At least Archer was on his feet now. As he delivered a swift gut hit, he turned back to Silta for a moment. "Where is the rest of the Avourienne crew?" he asked.

She was done, and she watched Archer as she leaned against the wall. "On the Avourienne," she said.

Archer ducked around the stocky man's fist. He rolled his eyes at her. "Why aren't they helping?" he asked, exasperated.

She made no move to help Archer out. "They're scared shitless of Everson," she answered.

"So they let you go on your own?" Archer shot back, kicking the stocky man back.

"They don't much fear for my life," Silta replied.

Archer turned to her, the stocky man significantly indisposed. "I thought you had control over them," he said.

"I do," she said. "But I'd be a bad captain to ask them to risk their lives to get my traitorous lover back."

"I thought we'd called it even," he argued.

"Right," she replied, tilting her head. Archer searched her face, and panic clawed at him. Her eyes were foggy, her face slack. Silta was doing that thing again—and now was the worst time for her to be dull on the senses.

Archer nodded to the stairs. "Move. Quickly." He walked by her again, back down the hall. "You have to focus, Novari," he told her, turning around to see her as he walked. "If you—"

"Kingsley—"

Archer recognized that tone in her voice, but only a moment too late.

His vision collapsed, darkness and cold sprinting through his body. He was pretty sure he was on the ground, blood collecting around his hair. The world spun; his own body felt uncontrollable and foreign.

He felt the pain next, sharp and grating as it pulsed through his head and down his neck, spiralling out into his arms. He groaned and rolled over, holding onto his fading consciousness.

"Kingsley—" Silta's voice was breathless.

Archer rolled right into a metal bar, blood coating the outside. The culprit of his pain—it probably came down on his head from some crew member, but no one could've gotten down the stairs in the time he had his back turned.

Panic shot through him as he got to his elbows, coughing blood. The hit had come from the entrance to the cells.

"He told me you didn't want him. That you wouldn't come back for him." Everson's voice.

A cracking noise.

"He lied." Silta. Breathless, still. Breathless was bad. Breathless meant she was getting beaten. Her stupid, stupid little affinity for getting manic at the wrong times.

"And what would Bardarian think of that?" Everson again.

"He'd find hilarity in the depths I'll stoop before I go back to you." It was witty, maybe, but it wasn't quite fast enough to be typical of her.

Archer steadied himself on the first step, blood running into his eyes. He took in a shaky breath. The world was still black.

Another crack.

"Kingsley." Silta's voice.

Archer stumbled over his knees, coughing up blood. His vision began to return, throwing black shapes over the stairs.

"Kingsley."

He took a hold of the railing, steadying himself. He blinked the blood from his eyes, too exhausted to wipe it with his hands. His head stung. He was dizzy.

"This is your last damn mistake, Novari." Everson. "Coming back for him."

The cock of a pistol. Where had that come from?

Archer desperately tried to stand, but his legs gave out and his eyes started to close. He felt the dark of the world seeping in through the sides of his eyesight.

"Kingsley." It was just a whisper, like if she spoke too loud, she'd get shot. It was a silent cry for help—the voice of someone who was about to die.

"When you're dead on the ground, Novari, I'll shoot myself next."

Archer twisted around, coughing up more blood, trying to reach something—someone's foot, someone's leg. His hands shook. He lifted his eyelids, but all he saw was red.

"I'll see you in hell, doll."

The gunshot was loud and echoing in the hall, the sound of it synonymous with chaos. At first, he couldn't process it. Did she just die? Did Silta just die? After all of that, all that fighting, that adventure, that talent. After all of that, she died from a simple, tiny bullet in her head?

"Get up, Kingsley." Britter's voice.

"Can you stand?" Alli's voice.

"I'm fine." Silta's voice, followed by a light smack.

Archer leaned back into the stairs, his body and mind exhausted. Silta's voice.

He suddenly started to laugh, his hysteria building. Silta's voice. No, no, of course she wasn't dead. Even in such a state, some evil wanted her alive.

He felt blood falling down his fingers. His eyesight began to clear, and he could see little patches of light. Everson was on the floor at Archer's feet, and Silta was getting up.

She caught his eye. Alli was standing over her, hands grasping under her arms. Archer felt Britter doing the same to him. When Everson rolled over on the ground, the blood coming from his shoulder, Archer only laughed harder.

Across from him, Silta started laughing too. It tumbled out like a giggle, at first, then spiraled into full-on hysteria. "He just won't die," she said, gasping for air.

Laughter shook Archer's body as he was dragged up the stairs. He watched Everson's body disappear into the hallway as he struggled to get up again.

Silta was being half-dragged by Alli up the stairs as well, but her teeth flashed in the dark lighting. She caught Archer's eye again and sent off into another fit of laughter.

Alli spoke to Britter, ignoring them. "I told you to go with her. You were all like, 'No, I'm scared of Everson'. You like Kingsley. Where's your damn loyalty?"

"I didn't agree for you to be my mother, Laurier," Britter snapped back.

"Somebody has to keep your morals in line."

"I don't have morals."

"Yes, you do. I'll leave you if you don't."

"I'm begging you, Laurier. Leave me."

Archer found he could breathe again, although his vision was still stained red. He composed himself, avoiding glancing at Silta for fear he might lose it again. He felt her fingers over his arms, lifting him. He blinked a few times. The blood didn't clear.

"Can you even see, Captain?" Alli asked.

"I can see fine," Silta replied.

"I wasn't talking to you."

Silta looked at Archer. The laughing started all over again.

"Angels," Britter said. "The hell is wrong with them?"

Archer felt more hands on his arms. He leaned against someone—he was pretty sure it was Silta.

"I thought he shot you," he mumbled, sobering quickly at the memory.

"Britter shot him." Her voice was smooth in his ear.

"I though you were shot."

"I'm not."

"I know that, but I thought you were."

"But I'm not."

Archer sighed and managed to take a step forward.

"Here." Britter's voice.

There was cloth on Archer's head—wiping the blood from his eyes. After a few seconds, he opened his right eye. It stung, but he could finally see again. Britter was the one with the cloth, Silta was under his right shoulder, Alli under his left.

A few more seconds, and he could see properly again through both eyes. He blinked rapidly. The deck of the—the Canale, was it?—was nearly empty, with only a few stragglers. Archer figured whoever him and Silta hadn't gotten to, Alli and Britter had.

"You've got to jump, Archer," Britter said. "You think you can do it?"

He twisted around, his head shouting in pain. He shrugged Alli and Silta away, sure he could stand on his own. He glanced into the dark ocean. Squinted.

"There's nothing out there."

"The Avourienne is," Alli told him.

Archer nodded. "Right. So we just...jump into nothing?"

"Sounds about right," Silta told him, taking a few steps back. "Running start will help."

"Okay," Archer said, shaking off the dizziness. He glanced at Silta. Blood ran down her neck and from her hair. He knew he must look like a mess, too; he couldn't imagine the shitshow they would've been in if Britter and Alli hadn't shown up.

Archer coughed one last time, looking out at the ocean. Jump. Easy. Right?

Alli went first, always the daredevil. She catapulted across the gap, using the rail of the Canale to give extra momentum. Instead of splashing into the water below, her body disappeared into the darkness.

"Nothing to it," Britter mumbled, pushing Archer forward.

Summoning the last of his courage, he ran for the railing, kicking off the wood and sailing through the air. He wasn't sure what was happening for most of it, just the darkness of the air and the pain of his body. Then he hit something hard, hard enough to knock the air from him for the second time. He hadn't remembered to roll.

Britter landed after, and Silta a moment later. She did remember to roll.

The crew of the Avourienne cheered with sighs of relief when they landed, and Archer felt the ship move away from the Canale. He felt soft, careful hands lift him up, Miller's hands.

He allowed himself to be led to the captain's quarters, the blood quickly wiped from his face and neck. His hair was matted, and Miller threaded through it to find where the source of the bleeding was.

"I've got it, Miller," Silta told the doctor. "He's just dazed. He'll be fine in a minute. I'll do the stitches."

"You're not looking too good yourself, Captain," Miller said.

Archer snorted and looked up at Silta. Oh, she looked fine.

"I heal quickly," she replied.

Miller let out a grunt and pulled away from Archer.

"You know how to do stitches?" He wondered aloud as Miller left her kit on the desk. Normally, doctors were rare and unique, for they knew how to do skills most didn't. Those with medical knowledge had some sort of pact to never shared their skills with others. Silta didn't come from a line of doctors, so it was surprising that she knew anything about healing. But now that he thought about it, he'd seen her do stitches on Britter, too.

"I know how to do stitches," she repeated, searching his hair for the cut. She found it quicker than Miller had, her fingers careful and elegant.

"I was asking how," Archer said. His dizziness began to dissipate, replaced with the smell of ocean salt.

"To do stitches? It's really not that hard. Poke around until it stops bleeding."

He looked up at her, his head clearing. He'd ended up leaned against the desk, his hands steadying him on either side. She had one leg folded on the desk, eyes focused as she threaded a needle.

"How you learned to do stitches," he clarified.

"The doctor on Canale taught me," she said, getting it through.

He snorted. "And how many nights did he take to be convinced to break a hundred-year-old pact?"

She brought the needle to his hair. "She only took one," was her response, her expression out of view.

Archer rolled his eyes, and she steadied him with a hand near his jaw. His heart did that familiar little twirl, hypocritical in nature. Here he was, disparaging a doctor who broke a pact for Silta's touch, when he had done far more for far less.

"Action's over now, love," she told him, placing a gentle finger over his carotid.

"You make me nervous," he muttered, ignoring the tinge of pain from the needle. This moment, with her so close and the hilarity of the previous situation, felt dangerously close to a relapse.

"I would think you'd be past that," she said. He felt it, that slight nudge of the conversation in the direction she wanted it to go. Ever the seductress, ever the cunning one at that.

"Never," he replied.

That pleased her greatly; he could hear it in the silence as she pulled the needle through for the last time. She didn't speak again as she washed the blood from his head with the cloth. Her fingers gently through his hair, feeling for other injuries. The innocent action felt hauntingly intimate, leading him into that perilous territory.

"We're close to the chest?" he asked, shaking off that feeling. He'd spent these last few weeks fighting with her, compromising with her, playing a war of mind games. But in the end, when it was all over, he'd spent the night stoically staring at her ceiling, just to let her sleep. That other territory was years ago, lost to him in memories he had to leave that way.

"We should get there tomorrow," she told him, wiping away the blood on his neck. She caught his eye, and therefore his thoughts. She turned away to wring out the cloth.

"That's good," he replied. He felt too dizzy to move, but he wasn't sure if it were his head injury or her proximity. That glassiness in her eyes had faded almost entirely, the golden shade sharp and clear as she glanced back at him for a moment.

Then, she sighed and reached for his head again. "You're still bleeding. Where the hell is it coming from?" She sat up to sift through his hair again.

"Just leave it," he told her, that little edge in his voice hardening.

"Oh, relax, lover. I'm trying to help—"

"I said leave it," he snapped.

She stilled at his outburst, resting her hands on his shoulders. He shook his head; he could feel those nails, feel the weight of those skilled hands. It felt eerily similar to the first time she'd ever put her hands on him, so unpredictable and helpless.

"I'm only trying to help, love," she said.

He glanced at her. "No, you're not. You're doing what you do best."

She placed a hand over his ear to steady his face. Her thumb rested on his jaw, and even though it was in no way enough force to make him turn, he did anyway. Her eyes were in that lyrical storytelling mode, uncharacteristically showcasing her thoughts.

"Archer, love. I'm not using you."

"No? You're always after something."

Her head tilted slowly to the side. "There's nothing to use you for, Kingsley. No man to threaten, no power to obtain, nothing left to prove."

He let out a scoff, unwilling to open all the way back up and risk getting scarred more than he already was.

She shifted so her knee rested on his thigh in that typically subtle-but-obvious way. She draped her forearms over his shoulders, raised her hands to his face. He let her, but that's as far as he'd go. He promised himself.

"Archer, love," she whispered, "it's all over."

He shook his head. Closed his eyes. Refused to believe her implications.

"It's over, Kingsley," she repeated, voice nothing more than a murmur. "We won today, but he's going to win tomorrow."

"You can't be sure of that."

"It's the only thing I am sure of, love."

He opened his eyes, held her gaze. He could write prose, poems, entire stories, all kinds of words in different forms, and yet he'd never quite capture her.

"It's over for me." Broken, but not bristling. At peace. "I wish I could save you from it, but I think you're coming down with me."

Archer couldn't blink, couldn't look away. He'd learned when she said something with this level of surety, she was always right.

"Why can we never win?" he asked softly.

She held his gaze, telling him what he could never seem to believe: There were some things she didn't have the answer to.

"I've done everything right," he told her, willing tears to stay far inside. "I acted for everyone else. I killed and I suffered from it. After all that good, why had nothing has ever gone my way?"

She brushed her thumb over his jaw, around the line of his lips. "My love," she said softly, "that's the life of the good. The one you chose."

He tried to understand why everything seemed so simple to her, so black and white. His words came out strained, "It's not fair." He knew his eyes were glassy, his face flushed. He wasn't being the authority she fawned over, but it hardly seemed to matter.

She ran her thumb under his eye, brushing away an invisible tear. "To be fair is to be certain," she declared quietly. "And we've never been a fan of certainty."

He ran his hand over her shoulder, over to her forearm. "No, we haven't." He let the words hang in the air, let them give him bravery as he prepared to let her hack away at his heart again. He would let her do it; sometimes he felt his purpose was to simply be whatever she asked.

She didn't need to lean much forward, for there wasn't much of a distance between them. It wasn't the kind of kiss he was used to from her; it was so much sadder. It wasn't I've missed you; I want to spend the rest of my life with you again. It was I'm sorry I broke you. It's what I do to people I love. It was a semblance of a heartfelt apology.

He tilted up his chin, hand frozen on her wrist. He heard her shaky breath, then felt the drop of a tear on his face. He wanted to pull away, to prove to himself with his eyes that she really was capable of tears, to see what such an emotion looked like on her, but he settled for the feeling instead. It was the end, without a doubt. The end of what, he couldn't be sure, but it was important enough for her to mourn it.

He didn't need to justify this choice to himself; this didn't say I love you or I miss you. This said goodbye.

And he thought he deserved that much.