"If you'll have me, as I am." She stood straight, chose truth. She could not let him plunge into this blindly, not knowing what others might later whisper about his bride. "Reyn, there is much that you first need to know about me."

At that instant, Vivacia shouted something about yielding. An instant later, a wrenching impact threw them both to the deck again. Reyn cried out with pain, but rolled to throw himself protectively over her. The ship shuddered beneath them as he gathered her into his embrace. He lay beside her, holding her tight with his good arm, bracing them both against the blows of the world. As sailors clamored and the fresh clatter of battle rose, he shouted by her ear, "The only thing I need to know is that I have you now."

WINTROW KNEW HOW TO COMMAND. AMIDST ALL ELSE, AS ALTHEA SCRAMbled to his orders with the others, she saw the sense of them. She saw something else, something even more important than whether she approved of how he ran his deck. The crew was confident in him. Jola, the mate, did not question his competence or his authority to take over for Kennit. Neither did Etta. Vivacia put herself in his hands, without reservations. Althea was aware, jealously, of the exchange between Vivacia and Wintrow. Effortless as water, it flowed past her. Naturally, without effort, they traded encouragement and information. They did not exclude her; it simply went past her the way adult conversation went over a child's head.

The priest-boy, small and spindly as a child, had become this slight but energetic young man who roared commands with a man's voice. She knew, with a sudden guilt, that her own father had not seen that possibility in Wintrow. If he had, Ephron Vestrit would have opposed Keffria sending him off to the priesthood. Even his own father had intended to use him only as a sort of placeholder until Selden, his younger, bolder son, came of age. Only Kennit had seen this, and nurtured this in him. Kennit the rapist had somehow been also the leader that Wintrow near worshiped, and the mentor who had enabled him to take his place on this deck and command it.

The thoughts rushed through her head as swiftly as the wind that pushed the sails, trampling her emotions as the barefoot sailors trampled Vivacia's decks. She poured her angry strength into hauling on a line. She hated and loathed Kennit. Even more than she longed to kill him, she needed to expose him. She wanted to tear his followers' love and loyalty away from him the way he had torn her dignity and privacy from her body. She wanted to do to him what he had done to her, take from him something he could never regain. Leave him always crippled in a way that did not yield to logic. She did not want to hurt those two, her nephew and her ship. But no matter how much she cared for both of them, she could not walk away from what Kennit had done to her.

It hurt worse, now that she knew Brashen was alive. Every time she caught a glimpse of him on Paragon's deck, her leaping joy was stained with dread. The thought of telling him tainted her anticipation of reunion. Would even Brashen grasp the whole of it? She was not sure what she feared most: that he would be enraged by it, as if Kennit had stolen from him, that he might spurn her as dirtied, or that he might dismiss it as a bad experience that she would get over. In not knowing how he would react, she suddenly feared that she did not know him at all. The open love and trust between Brashen and her was, in some ways, still new and fresh. Could it bear the weight of this truth? Her anger roiled inside her as she wondered if that, too, would be a thing that Kennit had destroyed.

Then there was no time to think anymore. They were beside the Jamaillian ship. Althea heard a terrible sound as it collided with something. Probably the Paragon, she thought with sudden agony. Her poor mad ship flung into this battle for Kennit's sake. The Jamaillian ship loomed larger, and closer and-

"Brace!" Someone shouted the word.

An instant later, she knew it had been meant as a warning, but by then, she was sliding across the deck. Anger flashed through her as she rolled and skidded. How dared Wintrow risk her ship that way? Then she felt, through her flesh against the wizardwood, how intent the ship had been on this chase and capture. Vivacia had chosen the peril. Wintrow had done all he could to minimize it. Althea fetched up against one of the bodies on the deck. With a shudder, she rolled to her feet. The side of the Jamaillian ship was as close as a pier. She saw Etta make the jump, deck to deck, a blade in her hand. Had Wintrow led the way? She could not see him anywhere. She scrabbled for the blade the dead man still clutched.

An instant later, her feet hit the Jamaillian deck. There was fighting all around her, too thick for her to make sense of any of it. Where was her nephew? A Jamaillian sailor sprang to meet her wavering blade. Althea clumsily parried his first two efforts at killing her. Then, from somewhere, another blade licked in, slashing him across the chest. He turned with a cry and staggered away from her.

Jek was at her shoulder suddenly, grinning insanely as she did for any danger. "Think if I save the Satrap, he'll marry me? I'd fancy being a Satrapess, or whatever she's called."

Before Althea could answer, something rocked the deck under her, sending combatants staggering. She clutched at Jek. "What was that?" she asked, wondering if the Jamaillian fleet was using its catapults against the locked ships. Her answer came in a frenzied shout from a Jamaillian sailor. "Cap'n, Cap'n, the damnable serpent has torn our rudder free. We're taking on water bad!"

"We'd best get what we came for and get off this tub," Jek suggested merrily. She plunged into the battle, not singling out any opponent, but scything a way for herself through the melee. Althea followed on her heels, doing little more than keeping men off their backs. "I thought I saw Etta-ah, here we are!" Jek exclaimed. Then, "Sa's breath and El's balls!" she swore. "They're down and bloody, both of them!"

THE JAMAILLIAN CAPTAIN HAD TAUGHT HIS MEN TO OBEY WITHOUT QUESTION. That was a thing to admire, until it was turned on you. Their complete obedience was in their eyes as they closed on Kennit. They'd kill both the pirate and the Satrap, without hesitation, on their captain's order. Evidently the Satrap either had to be in their control, or dead. Kennit's estimate of Cosgo's value soared. He'd keep him alive and in his own control. Clearly that was where he was the greatest threat to the Jamaillians, and hence most valuable. They'd come through a serpent attack and risked everything to capture him. Kennit would take him back, and then they'd pay more dearly than they had ever imagined. Vivacia was alongside; he only needed to hold them off for a few minutes until Etta and Wintrow came for him.

"Get behind me!" he commanded the Satrap, and pushed him roughly back. Kennit braced his hand on the ship's house to keep from toppling over. His body shielded the cowering Magnadon. With his free hand, Kennit tore his cloak loose. The oncoming men didn't pause. He foiled the first man's thrust by flinging his cloak around the blade as it came in and shoving it aside. He tried to grab for it, risking that he could wrench it loose from its owner's grip, but it slipped out from the folds of heavy cloak.

The second man was a big beefy fellow, more blacksmith than swordsman. Without finesse or pretense, he stepped up and thrust his heavy blade through Kennit and into the Satrap. The blade pinned them together. "Got 'em both!" he exclaimed in satisfaction. His killer's striped shirt was stained with grease, Kennit noted in shock. The man wrenched the blade back out of them and turned to face the boarding parties. Kennit and the Satrap fell together.