“I’ve been waiting for that. But I believe I told you not to come.” Hadrian shifted in his chains and sighed. “I don’t suppose there’s much chance of a beautiful princess coming in here and saving us again.”

“That card’s been dealt.”

“I wish I had met Gaunt,” Hadrian said at length. “It would have been nice to actually meet the man, you know? My whole life was fated to protect this guy and I never even saw him.”

They were quiet for a time, and then Royce made a hmm sound.

“What?”

“Huh? Oh—nothing.”

“You’re thinking something. What is it?”

“Just interesting that you think Arista is beautiful.”

“Don’t you?”

“She’s okay.”

“You’re blinded by Gwen.”

Hadrian heard Royce sigh. There was a silence, and then he said, “She already named our children. Elias if we had a boy—or was it Sterling? I forget—and Mercedes if a girl. She even took up knitting and made me a scarf.”

“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry I dragged you into this.”

“She wanted me to go, remember? She said I had to protect you. I had to save your life.”

Hadrian looked over at him. “Good job.”

Chairs moved in the outer office, footsteps, a banging door, agitated voices. Hadrian caught snippets of the conversation.

“… black sails … a dark cloud on the ocean …”

“No, someone else …”

A chair turned over and hit the floor. More hurried footsteps. Silence.

“Sounds like the fleet is in.” Hadrian waited, watching the door to their cell. “They left us for dead, didn’t they? We told them this would happen. We came all this way to try and save them. You’d think they’d have the decency to let us out when they saw we were right.”

“Probably think we’re behind it. We’re lucky they didn’t just kill us.”

“Not sure that’s lucky. A nice, quick decapitation is kind of appealing right now.”

“How long do you think before the Ba Ran find us?” Royce asked.

“You in a hurry?”

“Yeah, actually. If I have to be eaten, I would sort of like to get it over with.”

Hadrian heard the sound of breaking glass.

“Ah, well, that didn’t take long, did it?” Royce muttered miserably.

Footsteps shuffled in the outer room. There was a pause, and then the steps started again, coming closer. There were sounds of a struggle and a muffled cry. Hadrian braced himself and watched the door as it opened. What stood in the doorway shocked him.

“You boys ready to go?” Derning asked.

“What are you doing here?” they both said in unison.

“Would you prefer me to leave?” Derning smiled. Noticing the riveted manacles, he grimaced. “Thorough buggers, aren’t they? Hang on. I saw some tools out here.”

Royce and Hadrian looked at each other, bewildered.

“Okay, so he’s not a beautiful princess. But it works for me.”