I didn’t think I’d ever see anything in the darkness, but the line of a shoulder appeared before me. My face was inches from a man’s back. Slowly, I came up on one elbow.

There were hundreds of men. I couldn’t tell where they ended.

“We are all going to burn,” Fire Man moaned. “It’s so hot. Can you not feel the flames?”

I could feel them. Flames consuming me. This fear and stench would be the end of me.

I stood only one chance of escaping this torture.

I breathed in deep, pretending it was clean air. Then I imagined diving off the wherry and breaking into clear blue water. I imagined coolness washing over me. I pictured myself kicking. Stroking my arms forward and back, swimming down, down, down to one fathom.

Then two.

All I had to do was get to the seventh. There was no rising in the seventh. No falling. Just floating. Just freedom. Anything I wanted, I could have there. I could make it possible.

I kicked down to three and then four.

Five…

Six…

And finally, finally, finally…

What had I done?

Chapter 27: Hell Afloat

The light of dawn came through the Jersey’s barred portholes in a gauzy yellow haze.

I peered through my lashes, watching as men thin as skeletons woke and stretched and unfolded. Some began to form lines at the portholes. I didn’t understand at first—there was nowhere to go. Then I realized they were taking turns breathing the fresh air.

I could see the entire deck now. There were a few hammocks here and there, but most of the men had slept on the floor. Only a few were still slumbering. Some talked in groups. Some stared vacantly. A few wept. The Fire Man still rambled.

He was an ancient creature. He appeared to be made of dead wood. Ashen skin. Branches for arms and legs. Long twists of matted gray hair fell to his shoulders.

“Fire, over there,” he said as he paced and pointed. “You’ll get that, won’t you, Decker? And there’s some embers there, Alex. Best put them out quickly.”

There were men of every age, some barely old enough to grow whiskers. Most white, but some black. They wore tatty garments that hung on their bony figures. Their skin was covered with grime; their eyes were sunken and wrinkled with suffering—even the younger ones.

There wasn’t a single lady here—myself included. For as long as I could manage, I planned to stay a boy. It was time for my long-forgotten masculine ways to make a return.

“Boy.” The man near me nudged my shoulder. “Wake up, boy. You need a meff.”

“I need…what?” I squeaked.

Only a few teeth poked from the cave of his mouth and he’d fought a battle for every word.