So. Where did that leave her? For one treacherous instant, she wondered if she were free. If Vivacia was happy with Wintrow aboard her, if she was content with Kennit and her life of piracy, did Althea have the right to “rescue” her from it? Could she just go home now and tell her mother and sister that she had failed, that she had never found their family ship? For an instant, she teetered on a wilder decision. Did she, really, have to go home at all? Could not she and Brashen and Paragon simply go on as they had begun?

Then she thought of Vivacia, quickening under her hands as she slipped the final peg into the figurehead, the peg her father had filled with his anima as he died. That was hers. Not Wintrow’s, certainly not Kennit’s. Vivacia was her ship, in a way no one else could claim. If the earlier gossip she had heard was true at all, if Bingtown were in some sort of upheaval, then her family needed their liveship more than ever. Althea would reclaim her. The ship would learn to love her again, Wintrow would be reunited with his family.

She found she blamed Kyle more than Kennit for the deaths of Vivacia’s crewmen. Loyalty to her family had kept those men aboard Vivacia; Kyle’s betrayal of her father’s ethics had killed them. She could not mourn Kyle at all; he had caused her and her family too much pain. The only sympathy she felt was for Keffria. Better she mourn her husband’s death, Althea thought grimly, than to mourn a long life with him.

TIME HAD BECOME A SLIPPERY CREATURE THAT WRITHED IN PARAGON’S GRIP. Did he rest at anchor in Divvytown’s harbor, or did his outstretched wings send him sliding aloft on an updraft? Did he wait for young Kennit to return, desperately hoping the boy would be unhurt this time, or did he expect Althea and Brashen to return and lead him to his vengeance? The placid motion of the lagoon water, the dwindling patter of the evening rain, the smells and sounds of Divvytown, the guarded quiet of his crew all plunged him into a state of suspension almost like sleep.

Deep in his hold, in the darkness, where the curve of the bow made a cramped space beneath the deck, was the blood place. It was too small for a man to stand or even creep, but a small, battered boy could shelter there, rolled in a tight ball while his blood dripped onto Paragon’s wizardwood, and they shared their misery. There Kennit could brace himself and snatch briefly at sleep, knowing no one could come upon him unawares. Whenever Igrot began to bellow for him, Paragon would wake him. Quick as a rabbit, he would pop out of his hiding place and present himself, choosing to leave his sanctuary and face Igrot rather than risk the searching crew discovering his refuge. Sometimes Kennit slept there. He would press his small hands against the great wizardwood beams that ran the length of the ship, and Paragon would watch over him while sharing his dreams.

And his nightmares.

During those times, Paragon had discovered his unique ability. He could take away the pain, the nightmares, and even the bad memories. Not completely, of course. To take all the memory away would have left the boy a fool. But he could absorb the pain just as he absorbed the blood from his beatings. He could dim the agony and soften the edges of Kennit’s recall. All that he could do-for the boy. It demanded that he keep for himself all he took away from Kennit. The sharp humiliation and indignity, the stabbing pain and stunned bewilderment and the scorching hatred all became Paragon’s, to keep hidden forever deep inside him. To Kennit he left only his icy-cold resolve that he would escape, that he would leave it all behind and that someday his own exploits would forever blot from the memory of the world all trace of Igrot. Someday, Kennit resolved, he would restore all that Igrot had broken and destroyed. He would make it as if the evil old pirate had never been. No one would even recall his name. Everything Igrot had ever dirtied would be hidden away or silenced.

Even Kennit’s family liveship.

That was how it was supposed to have been.

The admission disturbed ancient pain, shifting it like unsecured cargo pounding him during a storm. The depth of his failure overwhelmed him. He had betrayed his family, he had betrayed the last true-hearted member of his blood. He had tried to be loyal, he had tried to stay dead, but then the serpents had come, prodding and nosing at him, speaking to him without words, confusing him as to who he was and where his loyalties should lie. They had frightened him, and in his fear he had forgotten his promises, forgotten his duty, forgotten everything except his need for his family to comfort and reassure him. He had gone home. Slowly, through the seasons, he had drifted, following friendly currents, until he had returned, a derelict, to the shores of Bingtown.

And all that befell him there was only just punishment for his faithlessness. How could he feel anger with Kennit? Had not Paragon betrayed him first? A deep groan broke loose inside Paragon. He gripped his stillness and his silence like a shield.