Page 9 of The Isles of the Gods
“Liking has nothing to do with it,” I snap back, making myself lower my voice. “He could keep every tailor on the Crescent Sea in business and I wouldn’t care, if he was doing his job.”
“Maybe heisdoing his job,” the boy suggests, though his tone concedes the evidence is on my side.
“Are you delusional? He’s decided to decorate his flotilla with half the palace gardens—and we’re on the doorstep of winter, so I can’t think how many hothouses that sort of stupidity must have taken—then pack a Fontesquan chef and a bunch of his closest pals and waltz off along the coast to see if he can make friends with the neighbors.”
“He shouldn’t make friends with the neighbors?” the boy asks, frowning at the Queensguard, who are now watching a couple more of their number run along the docks.
“He should makealliesof the neighbors,” I shoot back. “But nobody’s going to take him seriously. Who ever has?”
“Ouch,” he mutters, and I turn my head to take a better look at him, crouching, framed by flowers.
Still handsome, but now I’m paying more attention to his voice. It sounds like money.Does he know the prince?
Suddenly I’m reminded of all the times Rensa told me to watch my tongue, especially around people I don’t know. At least he doesn’t know my name.
I know I’m taking all the frustration of my day, of my captain’s endless orders, of my father’s abandonment, of the blocked path to theFreya,and aiming it at him. And I know I shouldn’t.
Then again, he’s insisting on putting himself in my path.
Below us the Queensguard are still accumulating—there are a dozen of them now, and one’s pointing in all directions, sending them running all over the place. Forget slipping past just a pair of them—they’re swarming the dock.
I’ll have to get past after dark and stow away, because I’m sure as hells not getting to theFreya’s captain now.
“I think it’s about to get busy around here,” the boy says, watching the growing swarm of guards thoughtfully. “Looks like they’ve lost something.”
“Looks like,” I mutter. It’s fine. I’ll get through to theFreyatonight. It’ll be easier under cover of darkness, and she doesn’t sail until dawn. I can hide aboard until they’re well out at sea and it’s too late for them to do anything about it.
For now, I should hustle back to theLizabettabefore Rensa realizes how long I’ve been gone and loses her temper.
“Hey, look,” says the boy beside me suddenly, his voice rising, and I twist around urgently to follow his gaze.
“What? What do you see?”
He’s pointing at the deck of the nearest ship, where the brightly colored young nobles are crowding in around a woman wheeling a fancy little handcart toward the bow. “They’re bringing out refreshments. Bet you half a crown those are Fontesquan pastries.”
I make a noise like a strangled growl, and he falls silent.
Yeah, he’s definitely noble, not a palace servant. The rest of the city is humming with worry, we’re in a port full of ships with everything to lose if war breaks out, and instead of thinking up ways to solve any of our problems, down on the progress fleet—which is what everyone’s calling the ships embarking on this goodwill voyage—they’re flocking to their afternoon tea like gulls in the wake of a fishing boat.
“First flowers, now you don’t like pastries?” he asks, studying my frown. “What’s next, kittens?”
“I…Will you just go away?”
He smirks. “I think you’ll find I was here first. Come to that, when you arrived, you literally threw yourself into my arms.”
I could push him out of our little nest and off the top of the packing crate, but that might be too subtle for him. Shooting him a too-sweet smile, I reach into the nest of flowers around us, plucking a delicate blossom in Alinor’s royal sapphire blue. He watches me cautiously.
“There.” I lean across to tuck it behind his ear. “Everythinguseless around here is beautifully decorated. I wouldn’t want you to feel left out.”
His wariness eases, and his lips twitch again to one of those small smiles. This boy looks like he knows all the mischief in the world, and invented half of it himself.
His brown eyes stay steady on mine, and as my fingertips brush his hair, my stomach gives the strangest flip-flop. Must be the sun.
We both hold still for a moment, gazing at each other.
“So you’re not coming for a quick snack?” he murmurs, breaking the tension. I can’t shake the feeling I just lost that exchange, and I don’t know why.
“I’ve seen enough nobility for one day.” I’m already shifting my weight, preparing to climb down with a speed that feels a little like running away, if I’m completely honest with myself.
