Chapter Twenty-Nine: Risks and Choices
In which Ian and Donal decide to return to the palace and Captain Graeme makes Piper and Seamus an offer.
Graeme leaned across his desk and stared at Ian. “’Tis your call, highness. You know the value of the blade, and you know your friend better’n I do.” He shrugged. “Me, I’d not care a whit if we ne’er saw the man again. I’m still not sure who cut those knots during the storm, and I’ll not be trustin’ that man on my ship again. See him free, and ye’d better make sure he gets home some other way.”
Ian nodded. He turned the blade over and over in his hands, thinking. “Lord d’Tarjian won’t kill him.”
“What makes ye say that?”
“Xian owes him money. Dead men don’t pay. The threat is just that—a threat. He wants to see who will come to Xian’s rescue at the last minute. He just wants his money.” He held up the blade. “The Eiryan crown will buy this from you. Name your price.”
Graeme leaned back and crossed his arms. “Will it? Ye’re so certain your da would pay for a thing like that?”
“Of course he would. This is a piece of our history.” Ian leaned over the desk. “Name your price.”
“What d’ye plan to do with it?”
“Send it back to Eirya. For good. Perhaps our armsmasters can make discover more about it.” He paused. “Ye’ll sell it, aye?”
“Swear to me ye’ll not be tellin’ yer father about the boy’s blood?”
Ian held out his hand. “I swear it.”
Graeme shook his hand. “Then I’ll come up with a figure.”
Rapid, heavy footsteps in the passageway announced Piper’s approach even before she slammed the door open and stepped into the room. She crossed to Seamus and poked him in the chest with one index finger. “I told ye, ye great ass,” she shouted. “Do. Not. Be. Takin’. My. Father’s. Things.” Her finger punctuated her words with a poke in his chest between each one. “Ye great bloomin’ ass, what were ye thinkin’? Eh? And they tell me ye lost it when ye stopped to watch a veil girl? Bah!” She slapped him.
Seamus lifted a hand to his cheek and backed up to a bulkhead. “Piper, wai—”
“And now ye have the nerve to come back here? I’ll be havin’ none of it, Seamus, and—”
“Piper!” He straightened and took her wrists in his hands. Two sets of blue eyes met across the jumble of hands. “I did it for us. Xian promised me payment. He said it would be enough for a ship.”
Her face softened. “A ship?”
Seamus nodded. “I wanted to surprise you.” Her arms relaxed, and he folded his hands over hers and lifted them to his lips to kiss her fingers. “Piper, I love ye. Ye know that. I only wanted us to start our life together.”
She frowned. “So ye stole from my father?”
“It’s my dag—” He stopped, shook his head, and sighed. “Aye. I did.”
She bit her lip and tipped her head to one side, considering him. “Will ye keep your hands off my father’s things, then? If I let ye back here?”
He nodded. “I will.”
She pulled her hands free and stood before her father’s desk, hands on hips. “One year. And for a year, ye make him your quartermaster.”
Graeme snorted. “Ye’re daft, lass! He stole from me, and ye’d have him in charge of stores?”
“He’s got a head for numbers, and I don’t. If I’ll be having him aboard my own ship, I’ll be needin’ someone to keep me in stores.”
Graeme chewed the inside of his cheek. “’Tis no good.”
Her eyes turned stormy again. “Da—”
“I’ll not be havin’ him moonin’ over ye for a year, tryin’ everything to get a ship o’ your own just so he can bed ye. And I’d be a fool to let a thief back on this ship.”
Piper’s face colored from her neck to the roots of her dark hair. “Father—”
He held up a hand. “But I have a plan. My old friend Robbie Dougal is in port. He’ll be needin’ a man with a head for numbers. His quartermaster died.” He leaned forward again and pointed at Seamus. “Ye work with him for one year, and ye keep your nose clean—no thievery, no women, no drinkin’ or gamblin’—and I’ll let ye marry my daughter and give ye a ship.”
Piper’s mouth dropped open. Seamus approached to stand beside her. “A year?” Seamus said.
Graeme nodded. “Any man that’d risk his life by stealin’ from me and then have the nerve to come back for the love of my daughter—well, I may not like ye yet, but I’ll give ye a chance. Mayhap I’ll see what she sees in ye. Eventually. But I’ll be needin’ proof first. And I’m thinkin’ that ye’ll never really be able to prove what ye’re made of here.”
Piper turned to Seamus. “A year isn’t so long, aye?”
He grimaced. “It’s not short, either.”
“But a ship, Seamus,” she said in a near-whisper.
Graeme grunted. “Go on. Talk it over on deck. Let me know what ye decide. Here for two years, separate for one—your choice.”
Piper and Seamus nodded and left the room, hand in hand.
Ian looked at Graeme. “You aren’t making this easy for them, are you?”
“Course not. Why would I? She’s the only kin I have left in this world.” He gestured. “Ye’ll be doin’ the same for your own daughters someday, I’ll wager.”
That would require a woman first, Ian thought. He motioned to Donal “Ye’ll come into the city with me, aye?”
Donal inclined his head. “Ye’ll be needin’ a guard, I’ll wager.”
“Wish us luck,” Ian said to Graeme.
“Ye’ll be needin’ the blessed hand of Alshada himself,” Graeme called after them.
Donal followed Ian down the rope ladder to the dock. “What’s your plan?”
Ian gestured to the faint purple of the horizon. “We need to get to the palace by sunrise. I’ll tell you on the way.”