Page 9 of Crossbones
“You expect me to believe that?” I scoff. “A De’Vero ship, shuttling refugees? Towhereexactly?”
De’Vero never did anything so noble. I would know—this is exactly the type of ship I was once a slave on. The Captain’s lips thin and I see the first spark of defiance flicker in his eyes before he casts his gaze down on the deck beneath his feet. I step closer, using the barrel of my pistol to turn his chin up so he’s forced to meet my gaze.
“Where exactly?” My voice is low and dripping with warning.
“Verdun,” he says, but I know it’s a lie. My lip curls in displeasure.
“You’d think you’d be a better liar,” I say in disappointment.
I let the gun drop andthe man slumps back in relief as I step away. It will be short-lived because I have no intention of letting this ship continue. There’s enough evidence to condemn her and I don’t feel like drawing this out any more than I have to.
“Problem is, I don’t believe you—” I turn back. “De’Vero has a nasty habit of selling slaves from their conquered settlements.”
“That’s not what this is!” The Captain insists. “I’m telling the truth! They were refugees, I swear it!”
I walk past the Captain who’s frantically looking around for help from anyone. A few of theSeraphine’screw foolishly jump up and attempt to support their leader. A quick scuffle and they’re in hand once more.
“Which one is your quartermaster?” I demand.
I watch the Captain’s eyes jump to a man who’s on his feet glaring in my direction. I grab the man by the shirt and drag him forward, knocking him to his knees.
“He’s tellin’ the truth,” the quartermaster growls.
I lash out, my pistol catches him across the face and he falls onto his side. Before he can pick himself up, I pull the trigger and he falls dead. I step over him, already bored with all of this and ready to get off this infernal piece of driftwood. I’d approached theSeraphinewith the hopes of lifting any goods they may have been shipping, but that proved a waste of time with the discovery of an empty hold filled with debris and litter from quite a few people.
I wave my hand at the Captain. “Tie him to the mast—torch the ship.”
I head back to theTempest,irritated that this charade isn’t going to yield anything but a frustrated crew and serve no purpose but to compound my anger at De’Vero further.
“You’re a monster!” The Captain screams at my back. “We’re good men! Just tryin’ to help out others—”
I ignore his words, hearing the crack as Harrison slaps him to shut him up. I step down onto the deck of my own ship. Regardless of whether or not the Captain is telling the truth—the past is too close to the surface for me to just let this ship go. My vengeance needs to be answered with blood and nothing else will do.
My hands already drip with it, it eddies in my ship’s wake and still it’s not enough. It won’t be enough until I drag the crown through the halls of De’Vero, drenching the castle in vivid crimson. As I make my way to my cabin, I admit the Captain is right about one thing though—Iama monster.
CASPIAN
Ishove aside the anger I feel towards Aldric as I head deeper into the bowels of the castle. I had planned to leave the dinner early anyway—when an event like this is going on, it’s the perfect opportunity to make a run on the treasury. The hallways grow narrow and dank as I descend. An older man with thick grey hair and a neatly trimmed beard to match, materializes out of the shadows and falls into step with me.
“Heard your brother was an ass tonight.”.
“You say that like it’s not his default personality, Thaddeus,” I mutter.
The old General chuckles in agreement. He practically raised me growing up and after thescandal, when he caught me in a rage about the injustice of it all, he looked me dead in the eye and asked what I was going to do about it. I’m convinced he’s really the only reason why I’ve been able to avoid detection for this long. His network runs far deeper than mine and has far more nefarious goals than just to save displaced citizens. What those goals are, he won’t tell me—which, for now, I’m perfectly happy being in the dark about.
We reach the doors to the treasury. They’re small, nondescript and old. Not at all what you’d expect standing between oneself and the entirety of the kingdom’s wealth. The two guards standing watch bow deeply to me and salute Thaddeus smartly before they immediately fade off into one of the side hallways where the guard house sits. We enter the treasury unhindered where several men are already busy loading crates and funneling them into the back tunnels for extraction to a secondary location.
My quartermaster, Van, breaks off and walks up to us, wiping the sweatfrom his brow with his sleeve.
“Captain,” he nods to me. “General.” He’s around my age, a few inches shorter and not as filled out, often looking more scholar than seafarer. He gestures to the crates behind him.
“These are the last of them. We’ll be done in under thirty,” he says, but he still looks concerned. “We’re reaching a point where we’ll be making a real dent in here if we continue at this volume.”
I nod, seeing for myself the sparseness of the space. This entire cavernous room used to be brimming full of gold, jewels and treasure from all over the Seven Landings.
“We’ll need to start skimming off the tax collections then,” Thaddeus says. “I’ll see to it. After next month’s haul, my men will have the tax withholdings delivered to your warehouse. This was always a temporary solution, not to mention risky.”
The number of times we’d nearly been caught is too numerous to count, so I’m looking forward to skimming off the top of the wealthbeforeit hits this place. Plus there’s a certain kind of poetic justice in having the forcefully collected tax money go back to helping the people it was taken from.
