Bitterlich turned to Malgiers. “Lieutenant, find Marie and Djordji. Tell them we’re decamping under fire, and they need to collect Rebecca. Then have the men assemble at the docks, muskets loaded, swords loose, but look casual.”

Malgiers saluted and hurried off.

Isabelle rolled stiffly out of bed. “I’m glad you have a plan. Mind telling me what it is?”

“We’re going to steal the brig.”

“The one we just shot full of holes? Is it even skyworthy?”

“It hasn’t fallen out of the sky yet, and I’ve had the shipwright aboard making repairs in order to present it to the prize board. It’s the only ship in dock right now. Plus, it comes with its own crew, none of whom want to be hanged for piracy.”

“And who will turn on us at the first possible chance,” Isabelle said. “I don’t fancy being murdered in my sleep.”

“That’s why we’re going to collect their capitaine. I’m hoping to make a bargain with her to drop us at a neutral port. Also, she’ll be our hostage against the crew’s good behavior.”

“This is a fantastically bad plan.” Isabelle said, and laughed. “Jean-Claude will be sorry he missed it.”

On an instant’s reflection Bitterlich decided to take that as a compliment.

Isabelle hauled her sky chest from under the bed. “There are a few things in here I need.”

Bitterlich considered that the whole of her material life, including some irreplaceable quondam artifacts, were in that trunk, and hoisted the whole thing in one hand.

“No need to choose,” he said.

Isabelle’s eyes rounded in apparent appreciation. He was so used to striving to be normal, to appear safe to people who feared him, that he rarely made such a display of his strength, but now was not the time for that sort of subtlety.

“Actually, I do need to choose clothes,” she said. “We’ll be a lot less conspicuous if I’m not lurching around in my unmentionables.”

“Ah, yes.” Bitterlich put the trunk on the bed and Isabelle fished through it, pulling on a skirt, a blouse, and a mantle with a cowl. Shoes were out of the question, considering her toe talons.

In the end she was only inconspicuous by Isabelle’s standards. Being taller than most men, barefoot, surrounded by a cloud of pink and purple embers and possessed of a spark-arm, she still stood out like a parrot in a convention of crows, but at least she didn’t look like someone who’d been dug up from the grave.

“Lead on,” she said, and they slipped into the hallway.

CHAPTER

Twenty-One

Getting into the depot’s stockade wasn’t hard. There was a postern door made of heavy wood with a stout lock that gave way instantly to Isabelle’s l’Étincelle. Bitterlich made an unconscious heap of the one guard they encountered.