The external cabin was dim when I awoke, but I sat up regardless, cursing the wooden shelf that served as my bunk. Fighting stiff and aching limbs, I staggered across the cabin to where my bag was tucked under the desk. It wasn’t a particularly large chamber, but it was enough to house me comfortably enough. The roof was an inch shorter than I, but accustomed as I was to renting inn rooms, the size was only a minor issue and the welcome quiet more than made up for it. Besides which, the reality of my failure collapsed over me with enough force to buckle my spine. Even if I had a favorable living situation and a vessel to call my own, I had no venture, no prospects, and no friends. Worst of all, it was my own damn fault. Couldn’t even maintain my deception for a full day, and Marlowe had walked away. Without a word. Walked away.

My hands found it instinctively, frantic in their clutching as I drew the strange totem from my bag. The tip of my thumb made comforting, familiar circles over the smooth, round surface. I had threaded a leather cord through a hole in the center, and I looped it around my neck, staring at it for a while longer before tucking it into my shirt. It felt strangely cold against my chest, and I spared a brief thought for the frigid north where I had obtained it. Sailors were a superstitious lot, and I wondered if a disc cut from the tooth of a gil’he-moahr had any meaning.

Bad luck, probably.

I snorted to myself, dragging a journal out of my bag as well. It had once detailed every element of my quest, and now I wanted nothing more than to pitch it into the sea. Only, something within me forbade the notion of throwing away six years of learning to read and write and think so I could gather legend and truth and…

A sigh fluttered the pages as I flipped the journal open.

In the year 1604, Captain Rogan DuParlie of the vessel Aurora Silver colided with a small iland. He and his crew climbed out of the rekage and took shelter on the iland. By the end of the therd day, nine of the therteen men had vaneshed. Servivor Pollux DuParlie (the captain’s young nefew) recals heering things moving in the night and seeing blood on the ice.

I had written Pollux DuParlie in large letters underneath, and later crossed it out upon finding him a madman. Quite a common situation, I had discovered, in survivors. Not that I had found many of those.

On the next page I had sketched a hideous, spined beast towering over an iceberg. It was a poor likeness, but a thrill of mixed terror and excitement danced over my spine. I could almost see it now. The thing’s colossal skull on the deck of Flux Levity, and belief in the eyes of all who saw it.

But no. Marlowe had to walk away.

The door of my cabin slammed open, making me jump half out of my skin like a startled selkie. The staggering light of middle-day flooded the cabin, and I lifted my hand to shield my eyes, all the while madly trying to hide the book. I made out McCrea’s smug-but-sour face looming forever high above me. His switch-thin body barely cast a shadow over me, and I was somewhat irritated to see him. Where McCrea was, I had no doubt Marlowe would be, too. And I had no particular desire to see either of them.

“What do you want?” I snapped.

“To be somewhere else,” was McCrea’s wry response. “But Marlowe wants you on deck.”

A pox on Marlowe. And one on McCrea too, if I was handing out poxes. A pox on Captain Searly and… I stopped myself there. It was bad luck, never mind bad taste, to curse the dead.

“You can tell Marlowe…”

“No, I can’t,” McCrea interrupted. He seemed frighteningly sober, which I was prepared to blame Marlowe for. My preceding anger at Marlowe made him an easy scapegoat. “Get your little trog ass off the floor and make yourself presentable.”

I took my leisurely time about being obedient. McCrea urged my pace by whipping me with the shirt I removed and discarded in favor of a clean one. A hard taskmaster indeed. After a number of weak lashes, I caught the shirt mid-swing and wrenched it out of his grip. He stuck his tongue out at me and I praised his vast maturity. The toe of his boot caught very deliberately on my ribs as he waltzed out of the cabin, leaving the door open behind him.

I scowled after him, picking myself off the floor and running my fingers through my unruly mop of hair. Presentable for whom? If it was only Marlowe and McCrea, I had no great desire to pretty myself up for them. But if it was the workers Marlowe had undoubtedly wrangled up to drag me off to the madhouse—I huffed out a sour little laugh—for them, I would put on a fair show.

I tucked the journal back into my bag and the tooth into my shirt before I stepped onto the deck. I counted my lucky stars that McCrea hadn’t noticed when I had changed my shirt. He had watched me pry the tooth out of the Jenny’s second mast and saw a disc off of its end. What little intuition I possessed told me his reaction to seeing the thing again would be less than pleasant.

“Captain on deck,” McCrea said loudly and sardonically as I stepped, blinking, into the light.

There were no men in fancy clothing and grim expressions with gloves and nets. It appeared I was not bound for the madhouse after all. What I was bound for, I could not have determined. For there were no doctors, but there was a small crowd gathered on the forecastle of Flux Levity. I caught myself walking toward them, and stopped just shy of the forecastle. Halfway gaping, I made a quick count. Nineteen, including Marlowe, who stood in the front of the crowd and eyed me with a cool, neutral gaze. What had he told these people, that they were now gathered on the deck of my ship with…was that a murderous glitter in their eyes?

“What is this?" I asked, hesitant to hear the answer.

Lacking a generous measure of his regular inflection, Marlowe said, “Your crew.”

My. What.

“I would like to make it clear,” McCrea said, loud enough to wake the starfish on the seafloor, “that I had nothing to do with this.”

A trace of amusement tickled the corners of Marlowe's lips. "Nothing at all," he repeated.

I barely heard them. “My…my crew?” I repeated stupidly.

McCrea leaned conspiratorially toward Marlowe. “Isn’t he cute when he’s speechless?”

Marlowe shrugged his shoulder so it bumped against McCrea's upper arm, but he didn't reply, thank Merdagh. Instead, he gestured toward me. "Gentlemen," he said, "Captain Owen Peige."

“He’s been expecting you,” McCrea said, giving me a pointed look that told me to shut my gaping mouth and look the part. I did my best, drawing myself up to my full height and offering what I hoped was a dashing smile.

McCrea threw an arm around my shoulders, situating his mouth uncomfortably close to my ear. “I thought I told you presentable,” he murmured.

“I am,” I muttered back through my gritted teeth.

He huffed out a breath, like that was the least believable thing he had ever heard. “Your smile is crooked,” he told me, and stole his arm back to his own side.

“A few words for the crew, Captain?” Marlowe prompted. His eyes were still chilly, but his lips were limned with pride. He was pleased with this crew he had gathered. They ranged in age and size, but not one of them was more than a few inches taller than Marlowe. But, I supposed, between McCrea being a lanky idiot and me being slightly on the taller end of average, we had enough height. What we needed were sturdy, stalwart men with hearts of gold and nerves like fishing line. With the knowledge Marlowe had, I could only hope he had found me what I needed.

“Welcome aboard Flux Levity,” I said. Then, after a moment of consideration, I added, “I expect we will do great things together. As you were.”

The men all nodded their heads and dispersed. I dithered for a moment, then made directly for Marlowe. He greeted me with a stiff smile.

“Can we talk,” I said, not quite a question.

“Will it involve an apology?” he asked, falsely pleasant.

I eyed the men gathered in little clusters on the deck. We would crew Levity with twenty-one men, which seemed a reasonable number given her size. They looked a probable lot, strong and capable and full of bizarre optimism. Marlowe had outdone himself.

“Possibly,” I said.

Marlowe finally broke into a real grin. That seemed good enough for him. “Lead the way, captain.”

Once in my cabin, I sat on my bunk and gestured for Marlowe to sit in the chair. He eyed it dubiously, then perched himself on the edge of the desk. “What can I do for you?”

Oh, where to begin? Words gathered on my tongue and I didn’t know which to spit out first. I considered it for a moment, and then decided. “Why am I captain? I thought McCrea was going to be captain.”

Marlowe chuckled. “I went to him first. He told me he wouldn’t captain a ship again. I, ah, tempted him with the title of first mate. That leaves you as captain. Don’t worry, you’ll do great.”

“And the others? How’d you snag them?”

“Tales of grandeur,” he said dismissively.

I eyed him up and down. One more question bit at the edges of my tongue, but I wasn’t sure I had the guts to ask it. He stared back at me, challenging me to ask it with his vivid blue eyes. We sat in silence for a moment, and I glanced around the cabin to fill the silence in my skull.

“Nice setup you’ve got here,” he said dubiously, mimicking my wandering gaze.

“How much do they know?” I blurted.

Marlowe nodded slowly, his expression nearly impressed at how little time it took me to ask. “Varying degrees,” he said. “Everyone but McCrea know we’re headed north. He'll figure it out soon enough, but it'll be too late by then. I didn’t tell Kiran--cabin boy--about the gil’he-moahr, but everyone else knows that we aim to kill one. They’re ambitious and stupid, but they’re salt of the sea, Owen. You’ll like them.”

Watching his eyes light up brought a smile to my lips. “Why did you do this for me?” As far as I could tell the day before, he had been ready to give up on me. What had changed his mind?

A strange earnestness came over him. “Owen,” he began. “McCrea is never going to feel like he is alive until the past is in front of him. And neither am I. Nothing is going to put us right unless we can conquer the nightmares. I had to think about it, first. But you’re not wrong.

"Now. Shall we meet your crew?”