All my senses rushed back to me at once. I’d kissed Rylander. Hell, I’d been willing to do a lot more. How could I so easily absolve his crimes? He’d killed my father. Yes, Captain Nathaniel was no good. Yes, he made mistakes—more than I’d even known. And yes, I was mad. I was bloody furious. But he was a pirate. I was a pirate. We weren’t to be trusted. Instead of ethics, we had codes, and greed won out over goodness. Self and sea over statute.

Rylander reached for me.

“Don’t,” I said hoarsely. I wrapped my fallen corset around my body and tied it loose, without bothering to rethread the wrested strings.

Rylander frowned and opened his mouth, but I held up the palm of my hand before he said anything.

“Not a word.” I stepped back. My jaw popped with rage. “Never do that again.”

With that, I walked away, taking with me what little dignity I had left.

Edgar waited for us outside the king’s library.

“Oh my,” Edgar exclaimed, hands clasped around his powdered, pink cheeks. His eyes roamed our disheveled clothes, trying to put together what happened.

“Don’t ask,” Rylander snipped. He didn’t bother trying to cover his exposed torso, just let the bright light from the sconces cast shadows across his muscles, my own personal hell.

“But, Captain, surely you want to…”

“See the king, per his urgent orders. Yes, so please let us in.” Rylander dismissed Edgar’s concern and opened the large doors himself. Silently, I followed.

I’d never much cared for reading, but I could still appreciate the grandiose scale of the place. Instead of portraits, each wall of this room contained a series of arching alcoves twice my height and an arm’s length across filled with books. Shelf upon shelf, bound in a variety of dark colors from deep reds to forest greens to oceanic blues. The king’s grand desk sat in the middle, a monolith of dark, stained wood carved with vines, the legs carved into lion’s paws. There was a sitting area and a hearth to one side, and a harpsichord on the other. I vaguely wondered who played the foreign instrument.

“Captain Rylander, Captain Lou, please sit,” the king said, still looking down at a sheet of parchment on his opulent desk. The back of the chair towered behind him, topped with a whittled eagle’s head. His mouth moved, silently reading along with the document. We sat in the two modest chairs across from him. When he finally looked up, his eyes widened. “What in the underworld happened to you two?”