“What will I do?” the ship taunted him lazily.

She could smash him at will. Wintrow pushed the useless fear aside. “You know what I mean. Althea and Brashen are seeking us. They may be lying in wait for us near Divvytown, or they may simply confront us in the harbor. What will you do, you and your serpents?”

“Ah. About that. Well.” The figurehead leaned back toward him. Her dark locks writhed like a nest of snakes. She put a hand to one side of her mouth, as if to share a secret with him. But her whisper was loud, a stage whisper intended for Kennit as he came step-tapping onto the deck. “I will do whatever I please about that.” She smiled past him at the pirate. “Good evening, my dear.”

“Good evening, and good wind, lovely one,” Kennit responded. He leaned over the railing and touched the large hand the ship held up to him in greeting. Then he smiled at Wintrow, his teeth white as a serpent’s in the moonlight. “Good evening, Wintrow. I trust you are well. When you left my cabin earlier, you looked a bit peaked.”

“I am not well,” Wintrow replied flatly. He looked at Kennit, and his heart came up in his throat. “I am torn, and I cannot sleep for the fears that roil through me.” He turned his gaze back to the ship. “Please, do not be so flippant with me. We are speaking of our family. Althea is my aunt, and your longtime companion. Think, ship! She set the peg in you, and welcomed you as you awoke. Don’t you remember that?”

“I well remember that she left me not long after that. And allowed Kyle to turn me into a slaver.” Bolt arched one eyebrow at him. “If those were your final memories of her, what reaction would you have to her name?”

Wintrow clenched his fists at his sides. He would not be distracted from his question. “But what are we to do? She is still our family!”

“Our? What is this ‘our’? Are you confusing me with Vivacia again? Dear boy, between us there is no ‘we,’ no ‘our.’ There is you and there is me. When I say ‘we’ or ‘our,’ I am not referring to you.” She ran her eyes over Kennit caressingly.

Wintrow was stubborn. “I refuse to believe there is nothing of Vivacia in you. Otherwise how could you be so bitter at the memories you do recall?”

“Oh, dear,” the ship muttered, and sighed. “Are we back to that again?”

“I’m afraid we are,” Kennit answered her consolingly. “Come, Wintrow, don’t glare like that. Be honest with me, lad. What do you expect us to do? Surrender Bolt back to Althea to prevent your feelings from being hurt? Where is your loyalty to me in that?”

Wintrow came slowly to stand beside Kennit at the railing. Eventually, he spoke. “My loyalty is yours, Kennit. You know that. I think you knew it even before I admitted it to myself. If you did not have my loyalty, I would not be in such pain now.”

The pirate seemed genuinely moved by this confession. He set his hand on Wintrow’s shoulder. For a time, they shared silence. “You, my dear boy, are so very young. You must speak aloud what you want.” Kennit’s voice was no more than a whisper.

Wintrow turned to him in surprise. Kennit gazed ahead through the night as if he had not spoken. Wintrow took a breath and forced his thoughts into order. “What I would ask of you both is that Althea not be harmed. She is my mother’s sister, blood of my blood, and true family to the ship. Bolt may deny it, but I cannot believe that she could see Althea die and not be harmed by it.” In a lower voice he added, “I know I could not.”

“Blood of your blood, and true family to the ship,” Kennit repeated to himself. He squeezed Wintrow’s shoulder. “For myself, I promise not to harm a hair of her head. Ship?”

The figurehead shrugged her great shoulders. “Whatever Kennit says. I feel nothing, you see. I have no desire to kill her, or to let her live.”

Wintrow heaved a sigh of relief. He did not believe that Bolt felt nothing. There was too much tension thrumming through him: not all of it could be his own. “And her crew?” he ventured.

Kennit laughed, and gave his shoulder a friendly shake. “Come, Wintrow, we can scarcely guarantee how they will fare. If a man chooses to fight to the death, how am I to stop him? But as you have seen, of late we shed blood only when forced to it. Consider all the ships we have set free to continue on their way. Slavers, of course, are another matter. When it comes to slavers, I must keep faith with all the people in my kingdom. To the bottom they must go. You cannot save everyone, Wintrow. Some folk have made up their minds to be killed by me long before I encounter them. When we encounter Captain Trell and Paragon, then we will act as befits the situation. Surely you can ask no more of us than that.”