Caledonia couldn’t help the smile that bloomed on her face. Triple had set a trap. She’d convinced Caledonia that her pattern of three was unbreakable, and when Caledonia believed it, she’d taken her out. It was beautiful.

Hands clapped Triple’s back and Caledonia’s, too, as all around them the crowd reveled in the energy of a good fight. The rest of the Blades had seen Triple do this before, and seeing Caledonia beat in this way seemed to raise her in their esteem rather than diminish her.

“You see how she got her name,” Sledge said with admiring amusement. “She’s taken every single one of us with that ruse.”

“Some of us more than once, right, Sledge?” Shale called from the crowd.

“Hm,” Sledge answered through tight lips.

He ushered Caledonia and Triple away from the sparring ground to an open tent where water hung in solar sacks. The Blades hadn’t left the Bullet Seas empty-handed, and the few items they’d escaped with were both portable and critical. Like solar sacks. Their durable skins transformed from transparent to opaque depending on the state of the water within. Once purified, the sack turned dark blue. Sledge pulled one down for each of them.

“It’s not a ruse,” Triple protested in a way that suggested this was an old argument. “‘Ruse’ implies that I’m cheating, which I’m not. It’s a tactic.”

“A good one,” Caledonia added, pausing after for a drink. “You’d be welcome among my crew with moves like those.”

“The crew you left?” Pine, her constant shadow, stepped into the tent, which seemed so much smaller with the addition of a fourth person. He stepped close to her, ostensibly to retrieve a water sack hanging over her shoulder, but she knew it was more than that. Caledonia hadn’t spent a moment in this camp without Pine hovering somewhere in her periphery.

With the water in hand, he stepped away and continued. “Or was it the crew that left you behind? Which way did that go?”

“Pine,” Sledge warned.

Anger, resentment, and guilt gripped her throat with cold fingers. Pine was flinging barbs, hoping they’d strike a sensitive target, and they’d hit their mark. She’d left her crew. Forced them to leave her. Forced them to sail on without her, and now all she could do was hope the sea would keep them safe.

They’ll be fine, she thought. They are fine, and I will find them.

“Why does it matter?” Triple asked. “We all saw her fight Fiveson Lir. I think that’s everything we need to know.”