Silver Tongue Devil (Devil in the Deep Blue Sea #1), page 5
I had no time to think, my sword clanking against three guards coming at me. Twirling and stabbing, my movements were ingrained in me. Master Yukimura’s lessons were as much a part of me as my cat was.
Gunfire popped in the air, accompanied by the clank of swords and screams of death. Blood sprayed across my face as I slipped closer to the carriage, the three men falling to the ground one by one, my blade dripping with the same red liquid.
“Captain!” Ty moved next to me, cutting through men blocking us from the treasure. “I got you. Go!” He nodded at the first carriage. We learned Tanvik always rode in the first one because so many leaders chose the last carriage; he liked deflecting.
Going for him first would stop his men. His life on the line would entice them to back off so we could take the treasure off their hands easier.
Darting to the carriage door, I ripped it open. A man sat inside dressed in a gold silk embroidered kurta and pants. His wide, fearful eyes met mine, sinking everything to the bottom of my gut.
Oh, fuck.
Although this man’s body type was similar to the president’s, his white beard was fake, and his youthful eyes and Asian features told me this was not the leader of India.
His features wouldn’t be noticed from a thousand yards away.
Deflection.
“No,” I whispered under my breath, already beelining for the carriage right behind while Cane dragged the young man from the first one. But holding a knife to his throat wouldn’t be the threat we thought it would.
Gage cleared the way to the second carriage. I yanked the door open and spotted the trunk Polly and Dobbs had noticed being loaded on.
Leaping inside, my hands shook because of what I already knew. I flung the top open, dread dropping on me like an anchor, rushing all the air from my lungs.
The box was empty.
My mind couldn’t accept what was right before me, that I could be tricked, my ego in denial of my folly. But it was all in front of me.
I hadn’t even doubted the intel we got about Tanvik’s arrival. He was rumored to have the gem, and bringing it to Batara for an alliance made sense. Everything had been laid before me, and I had gobbled it up, thinking I was getting the drop on them when it all had been a ploy. I was the one fooled. And I lead my crew straight into this ambush.
“This is a trap…” My voice came out softer than I wanted as my plan crumbled like my confidence. I was the best of the best. This wasn’t supposed to happen to me, and deep down, a nagging voice told me Croygen would have never let this happen.
Moving to the door, my only thought was getting my men out of there. “Gage… it’s a tra—” My words died on my tongue while I climbed out of the carriage, silence surrounding me. There were no sounds of battle, like everyone was frozen in place.
Gage held his knife to a soldier’s throat, but his attention was over my head. Twisting around, I followed his gaze to the top of the carriage.
A gasp got trapped in my lungs, acid torching up the back of my mouth.
Batara’s principal guard, Gou, stood on top. His curved katana dripped with blood. Gou was a fae who had no problem working for a human if the pay was right. He took a vow of silence a long time ago, but he needed no words. He was notorious for his skill with a blade, rumored to be an old twelfth-century samurai who slaughtered thousands without a thought.
But it wasn’t him that curdled terror and grief in my lungs.
Gripped by her neck, Ruby’s lifeless body dangled from his hand, her throat cut ear to ear, her dead eyes staring right into me. She was supposed to be safe. The job as scout was away from the fight, but Gou found her.
I swear I could hear her wonder how I let this happen to her. What kind of captain was I to not be there when she needed me? To let her die so brutally. Alone.
My heart screamed out her name, but only a whimper made it to my lips.
Gou’s expression didn’t change as he chucked her at my feet, his dark, beady eyes locking with mine. His sword, still caked with Ruby’s blood, went into the air, and a noise came from the lanes, chilling me to the bone.
Batara’s troops flooded in from the alleys. Hundreds of them, their war cry piercing the air.
I had gotten us out of a lot of close calls and tough situations. For once, I knew that would not be the case.
Gage and I glanced at each other, understanding in his eyes too.
“Never go down without a fight.” He shrugged, his blade still at the man’s throat. “Fight or die trying.”
I struggled to swallow.
“For Ruby,” he said.
I nodded. “For Ruby.”
“Been a hell of a ride, Captain,” Gage said before dragging his knife over the man’s esophagus, dropping his body, declaring to the rest of my crew and our enemies that we wouldn’t go down without a fight.
Turning away from Ruby’s body, I swung my sword with a grunt, putting all my emotions into taking down as many as I could with me.
Soon I would be joining her.
Kicking out my leg, the blades in my heeled boots slid out, slicing a man’s stomach in half before twisting around and stabbing another. Their gurgling screams barely registered as I onto the next few.
They kept coming, more and more. Even if they were human, there were far more of them than us, nipping at our energy and wearing us down.
A familiar voice bellowed, and I craned my neck to the side. In the darkness, Dobbs went still, his eyes growing wide. Then his head tipped over, falling off his body before the rest of him collapsed to the ground. Gou stood behind him, holding his sword.
He killed two of my crew. My family.
My gaze locked on him.
He was mine.
He disappeared into the throng of moving bodies. As I advanced in his direction, my boots stumbled over Polly’s body, her heart stabbed through. So full of life a few hours ago; now her dead eyes stared blankly up at me.
This was all my fault.
I had been set on this mission, determined no matter the danger, like it would finally make me more famous than the Silver-Tongue Devil. His legacy still overshadowed my own; so blinded by ego, consumed by revenge, I led my family into slaughter.
The itch to shift, to sink down to a small cat and slink away, buzzed over my skin, but my pride would never let me do it. I would die with my crew. Fighting.
In my peripheral vision, a figure moved up next to me, and without fully looking, I knew who it was.
I was a dead woman.
Gou’s ancient magic skimmed my skin, his bloodied sword set to kill me.
Fuck.
All my work, all I fought for, and this was how I would die. A bragging right for Emperor Batara that he could bring down the illustrious Puss in Boots, solidifying his power as a pirate hunter. A fae killer. He would be feared and revered.
I couldn’t even make a move before Gou’s sword twirled in his hand, the handle coming down on my skull with a thunk.
“Captain!” one of my men called for me, but I could no longer see, and sound slipped away like water through your fingers.
Everything went black.
Pain stabbed through my skull, jolting me awake with a groan. It was a moment before I remembered what had happened. Before consciousness slipped back to me, allowing memories of fighting… of death…
Of Ruby, Polly, and Dobbs.
Oh, gods, they were all dead because of me.
My heart lurched against my ribs, forcing a loud gasp to burn up my throat. My nose burned, and I blinked from the light, confused about where I was and that I was alive. Slowly my senses picked up the gilded room around me and the small but stone-faced man standing over me with a bitter-smelling cloth at my nose. His likeness was painted on the portrait over the fireplace and adorned everything in this city.
Terror sunk to the bottom of my gut.
Emperor Batara.
He folded the handkerchief away, stepping back, his gaze rolling over me.
“To finally meet the infamous woman pirate raiding my seas.” His timbre, cold and stilted, was woven with fury. Visually, he was nothing special. A small-framed man, he had dark but graying short hair and obsidian eyes set in a face that never showed emotion, never letting you know how much danger you were truly in. I wasn’t afraid of humans, but for him, I made an exception.
He had me chained to a chair, the goblin metal leaching into my bones, keeping me from shifting or moving. Goblin metal was the nearest thing to kryptonite a fae had.
“What do they call you? Puss in Boots?” He tugged at the cuffs of his expensive suit. “A vulgar name, but what can I expect from someone like you? The worst scum of the earth.”
Not answering, I drifted my eyes over the space. The room was trimmed in gold and draped with rich reds and elaborate chandeliers. Asian-style motif wallpaper, elegant, curved furniture embedded with ivory, and rich handstitched rugs cost three times more than my ship. All fit for an emperor, enjoying his finery while his people starved.
Both exits in the room, plus the window, had two huge guards loaded with weapons stationed at each post. They stood so silently they could have been mistaken for statues.
Even if I could shift into my cat form, I wasn’t slipping out so easily. Humans had learned quickly how to level the playing field, how iron ripped magic from faeries, and goblin metal or druid magic basically crippled all fae.
“As you see, there is nowhere to go,” Batara spoke, his gaze never leaving mine. I could feel the emptiness behind them. How insignificant my life was to him, which made me wonder why I was here and not dead already. “And if I wanted you dead, you already would be.”
“Where is the rest of my crew?” What has left, anyway. I swallowed, my jaw locking so I wouldn’t betray my devastation—little Ruby’s slit throat, Dobbs’s headless body, Polly’s dead eyes staring at the sky.
In this line of business, emotions were something you learned to hide, to not let anyone see your weakness. My expression was blank, but my grief tore at my chest.
Were Gage, Typhoon, Hurricane, Zuri, and Moses still alive?
“You are a hard woman to track.” Batara moved confidently around the room. “I have some of the best spies in the world, and they still could not pin you down.”
I said nothing, my steady gaze watching his every move.
“It’s why I had to set up this elaborate affair.” He pulled a cigarette out of his silver case in his jacket pocket. “You should be honored. I have never had to put on a show for anyone before.” He lit his cigarette, taking a drag. “But I knew you could not resist. To have the notorious Blue Moon of Josephine, once worth over 48 million dollars. What is the worth today?” He tipped an eyebrow at me, taking another puff.
“Close to 80 million,” I replied.
“Yes.” He dipped his head. “What a thief could do with that kind of money.”
“Yes, like help feed the starving people in this city. Or provide clean water. Rebuild. So many things I would do.”
He stabbed out his cigarette, his lids narrowing on mine. “Let’s get to the point, shall we?”
“About time.”
His jaw twitched, and his shoulder tightened as he approached me.
“You are only alive because I have a deal I wish to present you.”
Acid pooled in my stomach. Nothing good came from “deals” with men like him.
“My only son, the heir to all my fortune and title…” Batara inhaled, and for one second, I thought emotion crossed his eyes, but it was gone before I could blink.
Batara had several daughters, but only one son. And in this sexist, misogynistic world humans still clung to, it was his son who would get everything. Not his daughters.
“My son is not well.” His jaw clenched, and I could tell how much he hated exposing this flaw to me. “Since he was a boy, he has battled leukemia.”
I schooled my expression. This was news to me. His son, though sixteen, had never been photographed or caught outside the city walls. Now I knew why.
“We thought we cured it, but it has come back.”
My mouth stayed firmly closed, and I wondered why he was sharing this and what it had to do with me.
“Your name has come up over and over as the best in the world to find lost treasure.”
“You want me to find you treasure?” I blinked at him. “You don’t have enough money to pay for treatment here? That gold statue could buy the entire hospital.” I gestured with my head; my hands still pinned behind me.
“You see, this treasure is not gold or jewels.” A strange look glinted in his eyes. “It is far more valuable than all the diamonds and money in the world.” He came closer to me, his voice dropping very low. “Especially to us humans. Especially to my son, who is no longer responding to treatments.”
My mouth was ready to get sassy, to say something smart-assed back, but I couldn’t forget who he was, what he was capable of. And though it pissed me off to no end, I didn’t have Croygen’s silver-tongued ways. He could say anything and get away with it. My strengths were in other areas. I wasn’t going to sleep with Batara, and I couldn’t kill him right now.
“Being fae, you are aware of the power of fae food.” He strolled slowly to his desk.
“Yes, but it was all destroyed when the wall fell.” Before our worlds collided, if humans found their way into the Otherworld and ate or drank fae food, they could never eat human food again. Nothing else but fae food would satisfy them, pouring magic into their system. It became an addiction. All they craved. They would slowly go insane without it if they went back to Earth’s realm, starving themselves until they died. The upside was that eating fae magic turned them more fae-like. They were cured of all diseases and sicknesses, lived for centuries, and were much less fragile than humans.
All pure fae food was lost when the barrier dropped. Humans who heard this tale had been searching the globe for something like it, coming up empty.
“You know it doesn’t exist anymore. It won’t help your son.”
He pressed his fingers into the top of his desk, taking another breath. “What if something is out there like it?”
“Like fae food?” I shook my head. “There’s not. Nothing survived. Earth nullified all that type of magic.”
He cleared his throat. “There are whispers about an object found after the Fae War, which bestowed humans with immortality, strength, and magic. Curing them of disease and weakness. In other words, it turned them fae without the side effects.”
“It sounds like wishful thinking to me, a fairy tale, and I live in a world of myths and legends.”
“There is a scientist who is convinced it is real.”
“Then he’s a quack.”
“I do not believe he is, and he is not the only one claiming its authenticity,” Batara stated. “I believe it is real. You will find this object.” A muscle twitched in his cheek, anger flaring his nose. “And bring it back to me.”
“You want me to find something that is nothing more than a story? That might not exist?”
“This is not up for negotiation. Your survival depends on it.”
My catlike eyes glided over the room, my magic pushing against the goblin metal, feeling the threat to my life rising. Did I have enough energy to shift? To escape all the obstacles and slip out of this room? I couldn’t hide under the sofa forever, and no doors were open to get away.
“I see we are still hesitant. Then let me raise the stakes. A ship is essential to a pirate, is it not?” A smug smile hinted on his face as he grabbed a folder out of his desk.
Bile burned up the back of my throat.
“Your ship, The Revenge, is now being boarded by my men.” His dark eyes met mine. “I’m holding it as collateral.”
“What?” My heart sank. It wasn’t just a ship to me. It was a symbol of my success. My home. My entire world. It carried everything which meant anything to me. The last letters my father ever wrote me before he was murdered. A necklace from my mother. “You can’t take my ship!”
“I just did.”
“How the hell do you expect me to find this object for you, then?”
He strolled to me with the file in his hand. “I will allow you the use of one of my boats.” I flinched at the term boat. It was always obvious who didn’t breathe the sea air in their lungs as they used those terms interchangeably.
“My crew?”
“They are also being held as insurance.”
“What?”
“Those who lived anyway.” He smirked. “Though with every moment you hesitate, the other five will be the ones who are penalized. Brutally.”
Fear and dread slid over my skin, ramming my pulse in my ears, my stomach rolling with vomit. Yet I hung on the number. Five were still alive.
“You will be crewed with my men.” Batara tilted his head with a cruel grin. “I need to know you will stay on task, Puss.” His gaze ran over me as if he suddenly realized I was a woman. He was notorious for his concubines and not being very nice to them. “So you won’t do something foolish.” He leaned into my face. “I hold everything you have. And if you have any doubt, I will take it all from you if you disappoint me.” He stood fully up, nodding at a guard near the door.
The buff man walked up, a piece of cloth in his hand, and placed it in Batara’s.
Batara peeled the fabric apart, lowering it for me to see clearly.
My stomach knotted, my throat tightening. I had seen a lot in my time. Death up close was brutal and pitiless. I had learned to curb my gag reflexes. But laying on top of the handkerchief was part of a bloody ear, with an earring I recognized.
Gage’s.
At least I knew he was alive, and Zuri, Moses, and the twins were captured too.
“A token for you to remember what is at stake,” the emperor stated. “I need your vow that you will locate the object for me.”
My throat dipped, going dry. Promises and vows were binding with fae. And he knew it.
“Pirates pull in a big crowd when I publicly execute them,” he threatened. No doubt he would torture and kill the rest of my family.
