The sky was black out on deck, and Archer's hands were still shaking. The chanting was loud and clear from the common room behind him, so at least the silence and the air gave him a moment to breathe. He tried to calm himself down, pressing his hands into the rail. He shook his head, trying to think of Farley, of what he might do. How unbelievably in over his wits was he here?

When his breathing calmed, Archer looked around. The crow's nest was empty, and nobody else graced the Avourienne's deck. He frowned, leaned over to see the bow. Just the old man at the wheel, but no other scout. His brows drew deeper as he took the stairs to the aft deck. Nobody at the stern, either.

"Wondering why we've got no scout?"

Archer tripped and slammed his hip into the rail trying to turn to face whoever had spoken. Four times. Four times he'd injured himself overacting to something today. "You people should announce yourself more often," he snapped.

"It ain't our fault you're so easy to spook." As she stepped onto the aft deck and the moonlight caught her face, he placed her as one of the pirates in on the brawl-fights in the common room. In Farley's account, Lyra Tailsley was the least notable of the three women on crew, but also incredibly quiet and stealthy, easily mislabelled as tentative and unsure because of her size.

Archer caught his breath and tried to calm down again. "So where's the crow's scout?"

She shrugged. "Don't need one—not at night." She gestured around her, spinning in a slow circle. She was unassuming in the physical sense, but she grinned with a mouthful of blood as she said, "This ship ain't like the other ships."

"I have managed to deduce that much myself," he said.

She laughed, wiping at her mouth with her sleeve. She leaned against the rail, her dark eyes hard to read in such little light. "When night falls, the Avourienne is damn hard to find," she said.

Archer looked up at the sails, still struggling to catch wind. Farley had said as much, but he'd never clarified if it was actually something magical or just a trick of good craftmanship and colouring.

"This morning," Lyra said. "With the mercy shot. That was ballsy. I mean, I'd say tossing a knife at Bardarian is ballsier, but you ain't have anything to lose at that point. The mercy shot, though..." She shook her head like she couldn't believe it.

He glanced at her. An outlier, someone who cautiously praised his morality. An ally, without a doubt. "And you?" Because the last thing he could do right now was talk about Jeanne, her body likely settled on the seafloor by now. "Who did you kill?"

She sighed and turned to watch the measly waves fan out behind the ship. "My father," she said. "He was capt'n of a privateer vessel the Avourienne decided to loot one night." Her eyes glanced off the water, out to the sky. "I knew we were goin' down, so I crept onto the Avourienne and curled up in a ball belowdecks, hoping I could stowaway to the next port." She shook her head like that was a silly, childish thought. "But my father had pissed off some other pirates, which meant there was a bounty for him, so Bardarian brought him down to the cells, and guess who was hiding down there?" Another shake of her head. "Cap was more amused than anything that I managed to get by them all. Told me he'd put me to work if I proved I was tough." She shrugged, minimizing the trauma to nothing more than a backstory. "I never much liked my father, anyway. I did as I was told and went on surviving."

Surviving. Archer wasn't sure many other crew members would use that word.

"Did you fit in at first?" She was maybe a year or two older than him, so she'd been young when she came aboard.

She threw her head back and laughed like this was the funniest thing she'd ever heard. She tossed him a grin, but it was fake. "Nah, Kingsley, they ain't treat me well at all. I was outnumbered to hell and back."

Archer examined her split lip, the bruise around her eye. She'd been giving those men a run for the money in the common room just fine. "What changed?"

Lyra shrugged. "Well, when Silta came aboard, nobody gave her any shit. Pirates pick on the weak. If you ain't act weak, you ain't get picked on. Throw just one punch—show you ain't the victim, and they stay outta your way."

"So Silta came on after you, then," he concluded.

She grinned, finding his deduction amusing. "Yeah, she did. I was on for at least a few years when she came along, which was—well, sixish years ago, now, I guess."

"And who did she kill?"

Lyra gave another one of those laughs again, passing him a look like he should know this. "That girl doesn't play by the rules, Kingsley. She ain't kill anyone. She got on the ship the same way she does everything else."

Archer leaned forward, urging her to continue the story.

She lifted her brows, tapping the rail, always moving. "Well, we were near Siren territory, which is balls-deep in Myria—"

"Why were you all the way down there?"

Lyra shrugged. "Hell if I know what we were doing nosing about in that area, but Bardarian's got a deal with the Siren Queen to stay out of her way as long as she doesn't bother him, so we ain't supposed to have problems. But as it turns out, the island Silta's from was a resistance or somethin', so they attacked the ship anyway. Did a damn fine job of it, too. We spent like a week starving in these musty cells on that stupid island before Bardarian struck a deal with Silta. She get him off the island, get his ship back, and he lets her tag along."

Figures. That vicious little woman had been playing games long before Archer came aboard.

"You ain't like her," Lyra noted.

Archer glanced over, realizing his face had soured. He cleared his throat and said, "What makes you say that?"

Lyra tilted her head as she turned to him. "Well, sailors always got questions about her, but they're usually more concerned with how loyal she is to Bardarian. Your interest is a lot more...calculated."

Archer went to speak, to insist he wasn't calculated, that he was just trying to sort out who was who, but something in Lyra's expression stopped him. When he peeled the layers from her façade, he found slivers of jealousy for the more talented, prettier crewmate who had overshadowed her.

"I find her too praised," he said. "Sneaking into the cells of the Devil's ship is far more interesting."

Lyra grinned. Just like that, he'd secured an ally. Perhaps he was no less manipulative than the Siren herself, but he needed people he could rely on, especially now that he had a target on his back.

"You have a good night, Kingsley," Lyra said. "I'll see you."

Archer let her go, but then he called her back. He should probably ask someone who wouldn't tell everyone he was asking. "Tailsley," he said, and she turned around. "Do you know what our path is? When we end up at the Kingsland?"

Her brows drew. Something cold coiled in Archer's stomach.

"Kingsland? Why would be go there?"

The cold grew, swirling and sinking. "I thought the Avourienne went there every so often to loot and send a message to royalty."

"Well, we used to," she said. "But I don't think we've been within half an ocean of that place in like two years."

Two years. How wonderful that Farley's leaving coincided with the ship no longer heading to the destination he needed to get to. Farley had been so sure they'd go, had been countless times himself, but maybe they just got bored and decided to taunt someone else for a change. Regardless, Archer was now stranded on a ship that wasn't even pointed the right direction.

"You all good, Kingsley?" she asked. "Lookin' kinda...pale."

"I'm fine." He rolled back his shoulders and passed her on the stairs. "I'll see you in the morning."

He had scheming to do.

*

"Um...Kingsley? Is that your name?"

Archer felt something on his shoulder. He let out a long breath as he rolled over, the cloudy morning light blinding him when he tried to open his eyes. "What?" His voice was rough from sleep.

"Oh, well, the ship's coming into port, and I thought you'd probably want to be up—"

Archer jolted awake. Someone leaned over him, already fully dressed down to the laces. "What?" he snapped.

The man stepped back, folding his hands together like he was some prissy royal lord. "I'm Kip," he said. "Your roommate."

Archer threw aside the pristine white sheets. "The ship's coming into port?"

"Yeah," he said. "Or, I think that's what the port call means, but I haven't really been here long, so—"

"Angels," Archer muttered, reaching for his boots. Denver had been right about the dud. "Aren't we supposed to be up at dawn?" he asked, buttoning the canvas shirt he'd boarded with as quickly as possible.

"Um...I don't think so," Kip replied. "I mean, I never am, and they don't really seem to care."

Archer didn't bother looking back at him as he reached for his jacket. The Avourienne likely ran on a personal accountability model. If you slept in, if you opted to be lazy, they'd get rid of you. If you showed you were useful and hardworking right off the bat, they wouldn't kill you.

He tossed open the door and jogged up the stairs, listening to the wind howl. Where had that been last night? When he came onto the deck, little droplets of rain were hitting the ship, and the sails were ballooned to full canvas. The Avourienne was hauling west, moving faster than Archer had ever seen something this size move for the second time.

"Barf boy decided to join us?" someone called, and a snicker came right after.

He didn't look to who it was. He beelined for Denver, who was helping trim on the port side. "Why didn't you wake me up?" Archer hissed, catching an open line and listening for the commands. If he acted like a deckhand, maybe they'd just assume he was one.

Denver looked over at him, brows creased in effort. "Because Starle came traipsing down the hall at dawn with a flute, and I couldn't imagine anyone slept through it?" He struggled to tie off his line as the wind fought with the sail.

Archer knotted his with all his might and reached for Denver's. "I'm starving," he said as he tied it off. "I threw up my last meal over fifteen hours ago."

"Here." Denver reached into his pocket and offered him some length of dried meat.

Archer didn't care what it was. He snatched it from his hands, listening behind him for the word to trim the sails again. Before he could thank Denver, something hit Archer in the face, knocking him off balance for a second. Chewing, he unravelled the soft cloth someone had thrown.

"Point me for our little game of catch." Silta leaned over his shoulder, but he managed not to trip and overact this time. "Put it on," she said.

Archer glanced at her, ripping the meat again as he held up the shirt. Solid black, with the red letter on the chest and one line on the shoulder. Deckhand. If he went down to change, he'd be mocked for being shy, but she was still standing there, so it was a lose-lose. "You said we wouldn't make port today," he said, swallowing the rest of the food as he pulled his shirt off.

"No I didn't," she answered. She took the white shirt from him and threw it over the rail like that was the obvious course of action. He tugged the black one over his head as she went on, "I said they"—she nodded to the little circle of men near the captain's balcony just a few steps away—"didn't think we'd make port today." The first mate, Bates, looked up as she said pointedly, "But, Kingsley, love, my darling minnow, I'm not important enough to make those calls."

Bates rolled his eyes and nudged Bardarian, who was frowning at a map. "Your woman is out of her place again," he said.

"Our place would be crushed against some rocks if we'd listened to you," she replied.

"Sir," Bates spat back. "You'll address your bridge crew as sir."

"Should I still call you sir as I'm suffocating you?" she asked. "Because I'm about to be suffocating you."

Bardarian placed a hand on Silta's shoulder. "Relax, both of you. Listen in." He started breaking down the plan for the day, which Archer struggled to hear as he tried and failed to see something through the misty rain on the horizon.

"Five teams," Bardarian said. "I'm staying on the south side, Bates is taking his people to the docks on the west side, and Courtley is moving up along the east coastline. Britter, you bring your team into city-center. Silta, you lead the scout team to the north—"

"Wait," she said, standing on her toes to look over the Captain's shoulder at the list he was holding. "My team is full of duds."

Britter tsked. "So picky."

"No, it's actually full of duds." She gestured for Britter to look at the list.

Bardarian let out a long sigh. "I hate being cut off," he muttered.

"Nelson, Tanner, Kingsley—" Britter laughed. "That is full of duds."

Archer ran through the names in his mind. Nelson was Trippy's real name, and he wasn't even sixteen. Tanner was Archer's roommate and also apparently notoriously useless, and Archer himself was brand new. A team of duds indeed.

"Well if you'd let him finish," Bates hissed, "then you'd know that you're the scout team, so there's no heavy lifting. You get the new guys."

"The scout team is the most precarious team," Silta said back. "I want Rusher. Trade him for Kingsley."

Archer glanced over at her. He was surely more useful than Tanner.

"You don't get to pick and choose your team," the quartermaster said.

"Of course I do. I'm a strategist."

"Novari, darling, self-proclaimed most talented among us," Bardarian interrupted, "you can handle your team of duds. Let's go."

Silta was still protesting as the group moved from Archer's hearing range and Trippy shouted from the crow's nest, "Land ahoy!"

Archer snapped his gaze to the mist, where something dark was coming through. He almost missed the order to trim the sails as he searched for something more concrete.

The crew started splitting into predetermined stations, so Archer picked the one that seemed the least manned. He helped furl the top sails, cutting their speed. He stole glances at the rocks as they passed through, a real place other than Orphano.

Over at the bow, someone called something out that caused the helmsman to spin the wheel. The ship listed to the side, agile and quick. Attempting to stay on his feet, Archer followed the man in front of him. It was the same concept as sailing his dinghy. Just fifty times the size.

The movement calmed down as the Avourienne maneuvered the port, slowing to a crawl in front of the docks. The gangplank was already in place, ready for the ship. Archer spotted Lyra and a few other scouts jump from the rail, rolling onto the dock to secure the place. The hull hit the bumpers hardly moving, but he still almost fell. Dinghies didn't hit things that hard without snapping in two.

"Teams!" someone called, and Archer glanced around for the people he was supposed to be with. As the ship got tied off, he could see Silta still arguing with that group near the bow, but no Nelson or Tanner.

Archer jogged to the aft deck, pushing his way through the sailors splitting off into their groups. He didn't even know what the scout team or the contact team was, but he figured getting all the duds together might make the whole process a little easier.

He caught Tanner coming up from belowdecks, so he snatched his wrist and said, "You're with me. You see that young scout anywhere?"

"Nelson?" Kip asked. "I think he's one of the tie-offs. Probably on the dock."

Archer dragged Kip along behind him as he headed for the gangplank. The ship had stopped the dramatic movements, rocking slightly as the crew got off. He jogged down the ramp, glancing left and right. Sure enough, the boy knelt at one of the posts, helping Lyra tie it off.

She glanced over as him and Tanner came up, standing once more. "Mornin', Kingsley," she said. "Heard you got the scout team."

"With our favourite person," he mused. He nodded to Nelson. "I need him."

"You, Tanner and Nelson?" she asked. She clicked her tongue as she walked past him, seafoam eyes sparkling with amusement. "Hell of a team."

Archer gave her a look and snapped his fingers to get the scout's attention. "You're Nelson, right?"

The boy glanced up, even younger-looking down on the ground. "Aye," he said, his voice still high-pitched. "Who are you?"

"A fellow dud. Come on."

Nelson got to his feet, still a foot shorter than both Kip and Archer. He glanced down the dock, where sailors and workers were rushing about. "Who are we under?"

Archer led them back to the gangplank, where Bardarian and the other men were getting off, Silta still trailing and arguing. "Her," he said.

Nelson cleared his throat and kept walking towards the group even once Archer and Kip had the sense to stay back. Bardarian glanced at the scout and gestured him over. Looking hurried, the Captain gave the boy a few seemingly firm words, then sent him on his way.

"Kingsley."

Archer had to catch himself as he tripped over one of the posts at the sound of her voice so close. He whirled around.

"Get my team," Silta said, nodding to the ship. "Nelson and Tanner—"

"Done." Archer gestured to Tanner, who was inspecting a passing sailor very closely, and then to Nelson, who jogged over once Bardarian let him go.

"A useful dud," Silta noted, glancing at the bridge crew as they passed.

The Captain just held up his hand, silencing any argument she was about to present. "North," he said.

"Vallin—" she started.

"Save it, woman." He didn't stop, just pointed at her with a thick finger, his coat sweeping out in the wind. "You can get your team to the north, or you can pull mutiny on me." He kept walking, seemingly confident that she wouldn't, in fact, choose the latter.

"That's counterintuitive," Archer said.

She turned, brows furrowed. "What is?"

"A useful dud," he clarified. "It doesn't even make sense."

"You want to reignite the counterintuitive argument, do you?"

Tanner abandoned his people-watching to but in, "What's the scout team?"

Silta looked at Archer, then started down the dock, ignoring him. The three of them followed her towards the port, with Nelson jogging to keep up.

"The scout team checks in with the Avourienne's contacts," the scout said to Tanner. "We have one on every important island."

"What island is this?" Archer asked, his head on a swivel as the crowds got thicker near the end of the dock. The rain kept tapping the wood, sharp and cold on his skin. There were too many things to look at and too much to catalogue. There were people—hundreds of people—gathering by the docks, bartering for supplies, loading up their ships, maybe even trying to catch a glimpse of the one that just pulled in.

"Port Marcel," Nelson replied. "It's the most westward port in Myria, so a lot of ships stop for repairs here before heading to the Cobalts."

Archer accidentally bumped into another sailor—a quartermaster, by his rank—coming the other way. The man took one glance at Archer's new shirt and said, "Sorry, lad." He stepped away as quick as he could.

His head was on a swivel as they stepped off the docks and onto a stone path, trying to take in as much as he could. The market around them was bustling, sailors shouting over the prices of fresh fish or spices, young thieves darting through the crowd to see who they could make a victim of.

It was a pirate port, Archer realized. That's why they could dock so freely, why there wasn't any trouble getting the Avourienne a spot. Everyone here was some sort of criminal, setting up their business just close enough to the Cobalts to avoid both the horrors and the law.

"What are the contacts for?" Tanner asked. His breath came strained, obviously out of shape.

"The Avourienne's business of trade and storage is far and large," Nelson said. Archer wondered where he'd learned to talk like that, if he'd learned to read and write from books, or if he could do those things at all. "Our contacts keep that situation moving when we're gone, ensuring the supplies still interact with us when we need them."

"Trippy," Silta said, glancing over her shoulder at them. "Be quiet."

"They should know," Nelson answered, not quite as intimidated as everyone else seemed to be. Even as they made their way down the cobbled streets, the crowds gave them a wide berth.

Silta whirled around, and Nelson skidded to a stop to avoid hitting her. "Enough," she said. "I mean it."

Archer glanced at her as a family came out of a shop to their right, as deserving of his attention as every other brand-new person on this busy island. Most of the windows were drawn, avoiding the drizzle. When Nelson gave a terse nod and stopped talking, Silta took a deep breath. "Take Kingsley and Tanner to the minor contact. He owns that grain shop two blocks to the east—you met him last year."

Nelson pursed his lips. "I can't do that."

Silta's gaze was sharp and narrow, her silent question clear.

"Bardarian told me not to let you do that," Nelson clarified. He cleared his throat, taking a step back to clear her reach. "He said you would probably try to go alone to the major contact, and he said that if I let you do that, he'd cut off my thumb. I need my thumb."

Silta smiled, but her face implied anything but amusement. She leaned down to look the scout in the eye and said, "I can cut thumbs just fine."

"Or," Archer said, tearing his gaze from the mother soothing her crying baby, "we could just split two and two, and everyone keeps their fingers."

She glanced at him. She'd argued profusely against the arrangement of this team, a behaviour that was far too easy to put off as whiny, entitled and entirely within her character. And yet—an arrogant man is my favourite kind. She would not be underestimated by him again. She didn't want Archer on this team because he was a wild card she didn't trust with the inner workings of the ship yet. She had something against Tanner, too—incompetence was dangerous, after all—and she couldn't take Nelson, the only one she trusted, unless she left the two she didn't trust on their own.

Now, though, Bardarian had trapped her with no way to keep his information safe, short of blatantly admitting who she suspected. Considering Archer was legitimately suspicious and Kip was just useless, she'd probably pick the dud.

"Kingsley," she said. "Come with me." She turned her gaze on Nelson. "Make it quick, in and out. I'll meet you back here."

Archer narrowed his eyes. Odd thing number three. As Nelson nodded and led Tanner to the minor contact, Silta turned north again. The rain kept coming down, dotting the cobblestones with dark spots. So much for observing.

Archer followed her up the street.