Anne Dray's Arc

Chapter 9 of 28

The code held, but Anne had made a promise she could not yet keep. She sat in the tavern at dawn, the timber walls gray with salt, and stared at a chart with no mark on it. She had sworn to bring back Kate's stolen ship. She did not know where it had gone. Grimjack's warning still rang in her ears. Deliver the win, or lose the fleet. Empty words would break what ink had bound. Kate found her there. She dropped into the seat across the table, black hair loose, her red coat still salt-stiff. Her eyes had the mean look Anne had learned to respect. "You've got a chart," Kate said. "And nothing on it." "I need a heading," Anne said. "Not a promise." Kate stared a long moment. Then she reached into her coat and set something on the table. A brass key, worn smooth. "My old cabin lock," she said. "There's a man aboard my ship who kept a spare. He was there before I took her. He stayed after." She tapped the key. "He sailed her off while my back was turned. I know it." Anne leaned forward. "You know the man. You know his habits." "He drinks where his crew drinks." Kate's mouth went flat. "A cove two days south. He always put in there for water. Cheap women. He won't have changed." "You never told me this." "You never asked the right thing," Kate said. "You asked for trust. I don't give that. I give a heading." She pushed the key across the wood. "Take it. Match it to the lock when you find her. That's how you'll know she's mine." Anne closed her hand over the key. It was the first hard fact she had. A cove, a habit, a thief with a face. "Then we sail south," she said. "The whole fleet." Kate stood. "Not the whole fleet. Two ships. More than that and he runs before we're in the water." She looked down at Anne. "You lead one. I lead the other. That's the code, isn't it? Nearest red captain commands." Anne almost smiled. Kate had learned the rules fast. "That's the code." By midday the two ships slipped from the shore. Anne stood at the rail with the brass key in her fist and the cove marked on her chart at last. She had turned an empty promise into a plan. The fleet on the beach watched them go, and Anne knew what the watching meant. If she came back without Kate's ship, the ink on the plank meant nothing. If she came back with it, the red banner was truly one. The wind took the sails south. Anne had a heading now, and a thief waiting at the end of it.