“Not on your life,” she says, but there’s a smile teasing on the edge of it, and a little spark of hope flutters through me, hope that she might actually be on my side.

At the very least, I hope I’ve convinced her I’m no longer suicidal.

Reinhardt turns out to be the ship’s medic, a weasely looking man who prods at my ribs with long, bony fingers and comes to exactly the same conclusion I made ten minutes ago. Three breaks, but nothing horrible enough to put me out of commission. “I can medicate you, but I can’t fix fractures like this,” he says, pulling a bottle of pills out of the satchel on his hip. “Two of these a day, no more. And watch them carefully. We got a lot of addicts on this crew.”

I nod, taking the pills from him and immediately popping one. There’s no instant relief, but the fact that I have something to manage my pain is more than I expected. My gaze shifts to the tank, to the Reckoner pup who’s poking his snout up over the barrier and warbling. I’ve been taken care of enough—now it’s time to see to him.

I check the thermometer’s reading on the companion device. He’s running a little hot. No surprises there. I’ve never seen a birth this violent, but the pup’s temperature isn’t high enough to get me worried. I wave to get Santa Elena’s attention, cringing as my ribs twinge. “He needs to be fed,” I say.

“How much?”

I frown, trying to remember the conversion chart Mom keeps pinned to the wall of the nursery. “For a pup this size, twenty pounds of meat should do it,” I tell her, trying to keep the uncertainty out of my voice. “And we’ll need to swap out the water in the tank.” Over her shoulder, I spy two of her crew reaching for the empty purse floating in the pool. “Watch it!” I yelp, just as the Reckoner lunges.

His jaws snap shut, missing them by inches. He’s the most aggressive newborn I’ve ever seen, though admittedly I’ve never seen a pup get nicked by a knife during a birth. Most terrapoids are sluggish out of the purse. I was swimming in Durga’s pool mere hours after we hatched her. But this one’s already a monster without the training.

And I hate him.

He’s my charge, and he’s the reason I’m being used by a bunch of pirates. My life is tied to a beast that’s already done his best to end it, and for a moment I find myself wishing that they’d just killed me on the Nereid.