The Ambrosia’s hands were again scrubbing and climbing and hauling. They were every sort of man, every race and age and shape. They worked perfect together, calling back and forth in French and Dutch and Spanish. Whenever the watchman spotted sails, they dropped their work and lined up at the gunwale, gazing at the ship that’d been sighted as they waited to know whether it was friend or foe. We’d been lucky to see ships flying English colors so far, but the thing with luck was it always ran out. With every passing wave, I felt closer to war.

As I sat trying not to despair about my future, land appeared in the distance. Endless land that glided by and by and by.

A continent.

“Ever been to America, Miss Coates?”

Startled, I spun to find Hackett behind me.

He smirked, the lines in his cheeks going deeper. “I suppose that en’t a question you can answer, seeing as you’re mute. And seeing as you en’t even her.” He waved at the sea. “Would you look at all that sparkle and shine!” He shook his head in amazement. “Beautiful. Just beautiful. The sea’s bright as diamonds today, en’t it?”

He looked terribly pleased with himself at his reminder of what I owed him—as if I could ever forget. In broad daylight the bruise round his eye looked worse, I was glad to see, swollen and purple. Lane had got him good. I wondered what damage Hackett had done back, but I’d yet to see Lane today.

“What’s the matter, Little Salt? You hate me or something?”

No one was near enough to hear, so I allowed myself to answer. “Course I hate you, you old buzzard,” I hissed, then dropped my gaze.

“You got some pluck, girl.” His shadow shook its head on the planks before me. “Fail me and see if ‘old buzzard’ don’t slice you open gullet to gizzard, then dance a jig on your entrails. Good day to you, madam.” He swaggered off, swinging the bosun’s club at his side like life was butterflies and honeybees.

I trembled as I watched him go, my gut queasy at his words. He was a blackguard if ever I knew one. Jewels or not, he just might gut me at the end of this either way.

At sundown, Izra brought my dinner to my cabin in a basket. After the upset of the previous evening, the captain seemed to think I’d prefer privacy, which was more than fine with me.

As Izra set dinner out on the table, he sniffled and hardly looked my way. I knew he felt terrible for letting Hackett in that morning, but I held my tongue. Frannie might apologize to a cabin boy, but Miss Coates surely wouldn’t—mute or not.

Soon as he left, I went over to the cuddy and stood before it, trying to shore up my nerve. I had finished Miss Coates’s journal entries earlier, and now I had only one hope left: Lane.