By some miracle, I make it out of the castle grounds unnoticed. The city inhabitants have clearly heard the bells and are now gathered at the main castle gate with candles and flowers, all while shouting and sobbing.
I fear for Everland’s future, and for Wendy, but staying here will only endanger her more. I have to go. I have to go quickly.
All of the streets leading away from the castle are full of onlookers and mourners and I have to fight my way through.
I’ve just made it past a growing crowd when I hear crying. Not the soft sobbing of a mourner, but the frightened sniffles of a child.
I scan the surrounding intersection and spot a little boy huddled in a shop alcove, his coat torn, his face smudged with dirt and wet with tears.
There is no one else around.
I glance from the boy to the next street, the one that will take me directly to my ship.
“Bloody hell,” I mutter and turn back for the shop alcove. “Are you lost?”
I don’t know how old this boy is. Maybe four?
“Can you speak?” I try when he doesn’t answer.
His eyes are red and watery, but the whimpers have ceased now that he’s got sight of my hook.
Children hate the hook. I know it’s frightening. And that’s part of the reason I chose it. A pirate captain must be frightening if he means to get anywhere with his crew.
“It’s all right,” I tell him, putting the hook behind my back. “Are you looking for your mother?”
“Mommy,” he says on a whimper, confirming my suspicions.
“All right. Up you go.” Using my other arm, I scoop him up and set him on my hip. His tiny fingers curl into the lapel of my coat and he rests his head against my shoulder. “Which way is your mother?” I ask.
He points to the left. I have no time to waste so I hope he understands what I’m asking.
We go left. More people flow in from the city to the castle gates. I shield the little boy from their jostling and frenzy.
“Why do these people care so much if an old man dies?” I mutter and the little boy looks up at me with his big eyes and says nothing. “Pray to the gods you grow up with more sense.”
“Henry!” a voice rings out over the crowd.
The little boy hiccups a breath.
“Is that your mother?” I ask him.
“Mommy,” he whines.
“Henry!”
I follow the voice replaceing a woman in a threadbare cloak, hands wringing in front of her as she searches the crowd.
“Henry!” she shouts when she spots the child on my hip. “Oh, my boy!”
The little boy starts sobbing harder and stretches out his arms for her. She takes him from me, wrapping him in a tight hug. Both of them cry together.
“Thank you,” she says to me and squeezes my hand. “May the gods bless you. You are a good man. A good man who has done a good deed!”
“It’s quite all right. No fuss necessary.”
She yanks on a corded string tied around her neck, breaking it, and then hands it over to me. Dangling from the end is a pendant of a shining star. Most of the islands have some kind of religion. And most islands have some form of religion that considers the stars as gods.
“For you,” the woman says, urging me to take it.
“I couldn’t—”
She cuts me off, depositing the charm in my hand. “Yes. You must take it as a token of my thanks.”
Then she tucks the boy beneath her chin and disappears around the next street corner.
I hold the necklace up to the light from a nearby lamppost. The charm spins back and forth, the star catching the golden light, then facing away again, to the dark.
You are a good man.
The words echo in my head.
A good man.
A good man.
Another crowd hurries past. I grab the nearest person and yank him to me. “Do you have a knife?”
“What?” He tries to shake me off but I’m determined now.
“A knife? Do you have one?”
His friends are pulling away from him. He looks from them to me and curses beneath his breath. “Here.” He deposits a pocketknife in my hand. “It’s cheap steel. Don’t cut yourself with it.” Then he’s gone.
My stomach rolls.
I stuff the necklace in my pocket, then flick my wrist, and the blade pops open with a snap.
Am I really going to do this?
A good man who has done a good deed.
Roc challenged my belief about my blood. I have to know if he’s right.
I put the sharp edge of the blade against the underside of my arm, just below the leather strap that keeps my hook attached to my arm.
“Here goes,” I whisper, feeling like I might already vomit.
With a short, sharp pull, the blade cuts through my flesh. My vision tunnels, my head swaying. But I manage to stay conscious and look down at the blood welling in the cut.
It’s black.
There is no difference whether I do a good deed or a vile one.
My father tricked me.
“Bloody hell,” I say through gritted teeth and change direction.
Roc was right.
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