’Course, it didn’t help, the way that the former seemed to have a habit of becoming the latter. As far as Gwenna was concerned, the word was just a way to weasel around a hard truth. Instead of, “I had to grab the guy’s kid and put a knife to her throat to get him to cooperate,” you were encouraged to say, “We had collateral when we hit the target.” Instead of saying, “The kid got burned down with the building,” it was just “some collateral damage.”

As much as she hated the word on the Islands, however, she was discovering that she liked it even less now that she—she, and Annick, and Pyrre—had become the ’Kent-kissing collateral.

“Are we just going to sit here?” she demanded. It was a stupid question, but it felt good to say something. Talking wasn’t doing, but it was a long sight better than waiting with your thumb up your ass to see if the bloodthirsty, savage chief in whose care you got dumped intended to play nice, which, as far as Gwenna could tell, was exactly what they’d been doing for the past day.

“Certainly not,” Pyrre said, raising her head from the far side of the fire. “I intend to drink heavily.”

The assassin was making the most of the comforts of the api Long Fist had provided. Sprawled out on a mound of bison hides, half reclined, one hand playing idly with her hair, she might have been waiting on a servant to bring another pitcher of chilled juice. Only she wasn’t drinking juice. Gwenna had tried one gulp of the clear liquor in the skin and nearly spat out her own tongue. Pyrre just tipped back her head and shot a long stream into her mouth.

“You shouldn’t be drinking,” Annick said, looking up from the bloody shank of bison she was cutting into strips, then drying over the fire. “We should be planning.”

“I do love a good plan,” Pyrre agreed. “Why don’t you girls whip something up and let me know the details?” She frowned. “Hold on. A plan for what, now?”

“Oh, for ’Shael’s sake . . .” Gwenna spat.

The Skullsworn stopped her with an elegantly raised finger. “Have a care about how you invoke my god.”

“A plan,” Annick said, ignoring the exchange, “for how to get out of here.”

“And why,” Pyrre asked, raising her eyebrows, “do we want to get out of here?” She gestured to the fire, the sizzling meat, the bulging skin of liquor in her hands, then to the clean hides stretched over the poles above them, keeping in the heat, the light. “Admittedly, we got off to a rough start, but Long Fist is turning into a gracious host. Maybe it was just those boys of yours he didn’t like. . . .”