Page 148 of The Worst of Them

Like so many times before, Cecily accepted that death was here for her. For how many times she’d thwarted it, this seemed like a fitting way to go—surrounded by ghosts when she was practically a ghost herself, and next to the man she loved.

She was not afraid.

With her sword in one hand, a mermaid-scale knife in the other, her focus locked on a massive ghost hulking toward them, cutlass in hand, his scowling gaze set on Jack’s unsuspecting back.

Cecily stepped behind the first mate, her back to his, and threw up her sword to catch the weight of the cutlass before it could split his skull, screaming as the force of it hammered down her arm. Her other hand moved of its own accord, following instinct and memory before she could remember the futility.

The mermaid-scale sliced knife deep into the ghost’s stomach. The blade met flesh and bone, and blood poured from a deep cut. The ghost flickered, gaping as his body lost its translucence—and he became real enough to sink to his knees.

He carefully touched his wound then looked at his shaking, bloody fingers.

Cecily met the ghost’s gaze. They stared at each other in shock.

Then a jerk of her arm had her sword buried in his gut. He gasped and slumped to the deck—well and truly, impossibly, dead.

Behind her, Jack had stopped, and so had the ghost he’d been fighting. When she turned, they both gazed at the knife in her hand.

Whatever awful power imbued the mermaid scale had suddenly made this fight possible. Realizing this, Jack locked his sword with his ghostly opponent’s and shoved him toward Cecily. Wielding the dagger, she pierced the artery under his arm.

He became fully man and was run through with Jack’s sword.

“You’re a dream,” Jack panted with a maniacally gleeful grin. “A damn impossible dream.”

She stepped into him, crushed her lips to his, and slapped a mermaid-scale dagger into his palm—the one with Copson’s gifted hilt. Then she spun away and reached for another knife.

They threw themselves into the fight, scale-daggers slicing into ghostly flesh, followed by their swords. They cut some ghosts as they passed so the pirates could finish them, while others they killed with their own blades.

They passed Greyson and Hester who fought back-to-back, Greyson with his axes and Hester wielding cleavers, their faces drawn and blooming with sweat despite the chill. As Jack and Cecily tore through, turning the ghosts corporeal, Hester broke into a cackle.

“You Copson fiends!” she cried joyously, lodging her cleaver into a ghost’s neck with a spray of blood as Greyson dispatched another.

Cecily moved across the deck, consumed with this deadly dance for the sake of her husband, her friends, her father-in-law, and his crew she’d protect like her own because she was a Copson, and this ship and its company were her family and her life. Her feet were sure, her precision terrifying, and by the time she reached the bow and the foremast she’d hidden behind so many times, she killed the final ghost in her way and spun, weapons raised, to begin her way back.

A wall of ghosts stood behind her, but none of them rushed to attack. She flinched toward them, prepared to meet their assault—but they recoiled, staring at her with their weapons lowered.

Some gaped. Others looked confused. Then a tall, skinny ghost stepped forward, his brow creased. “Vanetta?”

Cecily’s breath clouded before her as she panted from exertion. “I’m not⁠—”

Winter wind blasted over the ship. She threw up her hands to shield her face, gritting her teeth as the air dropped to a temperature that burned her lungs and skin. Had it not been so frigid, so punishing and searingly painful, she might have cried out.

But the icy power had her body curling in on itself, preserving what little heat she had left.

As quickly as it had come, the wind abated, though the chill remained. Quiet descended over the deck, and she slowly straightened, panting, and lowered her arms.

The ghosts still stood before Cecily, unaffected by the cold. They didn’t advance, but she didn’t trust they’d stay that way. She forced her limbs to move, brandishing her sword. But as she took a tentative step forward, they backed away and split down the middle, revealing the middle of the deck.

Jonah’s crew had surrounded Copson’s pirates, holding them at sword-point. Hester and Greyson were among them, detained but alive.

But Jack—she couldn’t find Jack. Cecily sought him, her heart pounding faster, each sweep of her gaze growing more frantic with every second that passed.

The center of the deck had been left clear, except for spilled the blood that puddled on the wooden boards—and Captain Copson, who knelt by the mainmast, shivering as he faced the Neptune.

Cecily followed his gaze—just as a towering ghost drifted through the hull of the Neptune and stepped onto the Fortuna Royale.

Ice splintered beneath his boot, frost spiderwebbing from each slow step as he advanced. He was tall, his strong body slightly translucent, though the twin swords hanging at his hips were entirely real as they gleamed in the moonlight. Dark hair spilled from beneath a wide hat that hid his face in shadow, but even unable to see his expression, he carried a fury that was as cold and unforgiving as the air.

Every nerve in Cecily’s body sang with warning, pleading for her to flee. But this⁠—