The stench. Maisero didn’t remember dwelling on it when he spent his first few weeks on the ship, but he could sure recognize it now. A bad mixture of old, wet wood and rotten fish, no better than the trash that a restaurant owner hides in the back of the property. But it didn’t make him sick anymore. A smell he couldn’t escape, sure—but it wasn’t anything that he was unprepared for. Not after the week he’d had.

He could hear other sailors moving around on the deck and generally making a commotion. It was driving him crazy. He would be just about ready to explode out of his room and shout down the entire crew before he jerked and remembered that there was rope binding him in place. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been sitting there like that, in the relative darkness. Without anything to do, and without much to see, everything seemed to blur a little bit.

Eventually, Balto opened the door. His fifth meal so far from that seat. The food was also hard to chew on for Maisero’s sensibilities, but he’d learned to swallow it. Balto dropped the food on the table beside Maisero, just close enough for Maisero to lean over and grab at it with his teeth.

Maisero threw in a question into the door frame before it had shut behind Balto:

“Where are we going?”

“The castle,” Balto replied, and left.