Sirius led the way through the forest. Amanda had to keep reminding herself that they weren’t outside at night. She also had to keep reminding herself to watch her feet. Someone had made a very good attempt to create a smooth pathway through this place but it had obviously been done quite some time ago and whomever maintained the thing had been reluctant to disturb the roots of the trees too much. The gravel itself was even and free from large stones or too many leaves, but every now and again a tree had pushed a root out like a finger to claim the path as its own. It gave a strange vein like appearance to the floor and made Amanda feel almost as if they were entering the mouth of a large slumbering beast where the trees were the teeth.

  Sirius seemed lost in thought, but despite that he never tripped. She could tell when his mind had wandered because he’d quicken his pace until suddenly he’d glance back to find her. Then he’d slow for a bit to her pace before speeding up again. She wondered what he was thinking about.

  She tried the infused compass a few more times as they walked but no matter which angle she came at it from, no matter how she thought about it, or focused her attention, it was always the same. It told her the ship was here. Except the ship quite obviously wasn’t here. She wasn’t sure what she was doing wrong. The compass wasn’t like the magic in his sword, nor was it like the sand. It was complicated and rough like raw magic but also twisted and tamed like the tightly wound sort. It was a contradiction she didn’t understand. She couldn’t sense an end to the magic in it either. It was like a bucket without a bottom yet which remained full to the brim no matter how much you took out.

  Much of her childhood experience had, at first, been with easy-to-use tightly-wound infusements, and later with the cheaper sort of raw magic, the sort sorcerers didn’t like existing; back-alley infusements sold by weak infusers, more common in places like Little Rock than in the cities, but easy to find for those who knew where to look. This compass was more like his coat. A tightly wound high class infusement that really needed an instruction manual or a spell. A spell could utilise most infusements although raw ones were the cheapest.

  She hadn’t used a lot of tracking magic before, just dabbles here and there, but her friend, Wolf, had been quite interested in it and she did recall a spell which, in an ironic twist of fate required an eel’s head as one of the ingredients. Alas, she didn’t think they had many of the other ingredients, unless Sirius had more secret stashes in his coat? At this point, it wasn’t completely out of the question.

  The sound of voices up ahead chased any thoughts of spellcrafting from her mind and drew her complete focus.

  Sirius too, stopped in his tracks. He looked at her.

  She looked at him.

  Both were thinking the same thing. Those were voices they knew.

  Grins spread across both of their faces and they started walking again at the same time, moving faster this time.

  “It’s left!”

  “It’s definitely right!”

  “I smelt them to the left.”

  “You couldn’t smell tinned tuna in a can if your mother’s life depended on it.”

  “Don’t you be bringin’ ma mother into it!”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sakes. Would one of you just pick a direction,” Shiv told the arguing Bob-bee and Dickie.

  “Left!”

  “It’s right!”

  “Hi Shiv,” Sirius said as the group came into sight.

  Before Shiv could reply, Bob-bee jumped in with “See, I told you it was left.”

  “That’s the right-hand path!”

  “You was pointing to the other one before.”

  Dickie opened his mouth to reply but before he could get a word out Shiv whacked him around the back of the head. Dickie turned around with a furious look on his face to see who had hit him but upon noticing that it was Shiv that stood the nearest, he dropped his eyes and said no more.

  Shiv smiled at Sirius. “Well, that’s the crew all back together again. Let’s get to the ship and get out of here.”

  “Not so fast.” Sirius shook his head. “We need to talk to the counsel.”

  “You have got to be joking, they betrayed us.”

  “Nigel betrayed us,” Sirius rebutted.

  “Bullshit.”

  “He as good as told me himself.”

  “What he give you some big villainous speech did he?”

  Amanda replied with a grin. “Yeah pretty much. Right before we escaped him and his group by jumping off a cliff.” She was still riding the high from their escape, and now they had found everyone again it seemed things were going much better. Also, she believed Sirius opinion, as well as Nigel’s own admission that the council didn’t know anything about what had been going on. For whatever reason, she trusted Beatrice, and her gut was rarely wrong about these sorts of things.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  Shiv scowled but he didn’t get to reply.

  A shout of alarm went up, as from every direction, every single path around them and out of the trees as well, their enemy suddenly attacked.

  Nigel and his group had found them.

  The fight was over before it had begun, not because either side dominated the other but because a third party intervened and all of Nigel’s group were soon being dragged away with their hands bound.

  Shiv, who had a knife in each hand, eyed the shear number of the intervening party, and reluctantly put his knives away.

  Sirius had already sheathed his sword and the rest of the crew who were present quickly followed suit.

  The new group who now surrounded them were wearing white uniforms with 3 quarter length pants, a little too tightly fitted on some, and loose white jackets with stripes on the shoulders in different colours. The words ‘ Capilliaria Guard’ were emblazoned across the front of some jackets with the insignia ‘CG’ on the biceps of others. They were carrying torches in one hand and solid black fighting sticks in the other.

  From among them, a fair-skinned man with red eyes, and blueish-black hair approached. He was wearing the tightest pair of purple pants that Amanda had ever seen. They flared out at the bottom, hiding most of his boots. His pale blue shirt was also tight, his hair was slicked back, and he had several gold earrings hanging from both ears.

  He held out a hand toward Sirius. “Hi Sirius, I’m Renault. One of the council members. I don’t believe we’ve officially met.”

  Sirius shook his hand. “I know who you are.”

  Renault nodded. “I must apologise for the actions of some of my citizens today. We were unaware of them until some of your crew alerted us this morning.”

  Amanda could hear Shiv groan beside her. Evidently someone back on the ship had called in the big dogs. Amanda was glad of it.

  Renault continued. “I’m afraid we can’t replace the crew who have been lost, but Beatrice says you have great potential as a long term ally. I hope you won’t hold this event against us and I look forward to many trade discussions in future. I’m sure there is much we can offer you. We have located the hideout of the renegade group in question. A few members may have escaped out to sea, however we have a pursuit in progress as we speak and the rest of the city is being scoured for any who may have escaped our notice here. I assure you, we will leave no stone unturned until we have found every single one of them.”

  “Does that mean we are free to leave?” interrupted Shiv.

  Sirius shot him a sharp warning look.

  Renault’s smile fell. “I’m afraid there is one small matter remaining that has since arisen and will need to be resolved before we can let you leave. It has come to our attention that there was or has been an altercation with one of our other clients during your time in Scarlett. A Ms Sirena Silver has lodged a complaint against you. It’s rather serious I’m afraid and we’ll need to take you”—he nodded at Sirius—“into custody. There is a hearing to be scheduled before the council tomorrow morning where we will hear both sides and make a judgment. Your crew is free to either stay or leave as they wish but you, as captain and the accused party, must remain until the end of the hearing and shall be submitted to whatever punishment or payment is the result of the hearing. If you need, we will accommodate a small support group both at your accommodation, which we will fully cover, and at the hearing. You may also select people to speak on your behalf. We must however insist that until the hearing is over, no less than four of the Capilliaria Guard will accommodate you wherever you go. You are otherwise free to travel about as you wish, so long as you remain on the shores of and within Capilliaria. Is that amenable to you?”

  Sirius was quiet a moment. Then he gave a single nod.

  Shiv and Amanda opened their mouths at the same time but Sirius shot them both another warning look and both held their tongues.

  “Good,” said Renault. “I’ll—“

  Amanda couldn’t help herself. “If he’s going to be on trial, shouldn’t he get a lawyer?”

  Shiv pressed his own lips tighter together as if to prevent himself from speaking.

  Renault smiled with the patience one might give a small child. “We don’t really have lawyers here in the typical sense but as I was about to say, we will send someone who is familiar with our system to talk with you. That way you’ll know what you are entitled to and how the process works.”

  Sirius gave another nod.

  This time Amanda refrained from speaking.

  “I’ll see to that now. Any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.” Renault smiled, bowed, and then left. Many of the guard left with him, sent off in different directions with different orders.

  A skeleton crew lingered not far away.

  Shiv eyed them all. “I think we could take them,” he whispered.

  “Shiv.” Sirius gave him a look. “We need Cap as a trading partner.”

  “You needed Sirena too,” Amanda reminded him.

  “Yes, and look where pissing her off has gotten us,” Shiv was quick to point out.

  Sirius sighed. “You two are incorrigible. Look, it’s just a hearing. They aren’t unreasonable. Sandy and Beatrice will be on our side I’m sure of it. I’ll talk to them and get some advice.”

  “I’m afraid Beatrice has been forbidden from speaking to you,” said a voice belonging to one with very good hearing. “The council is worried that you are already too close and it may cloud her judgment. But you may speak to me.”

  They turned to find Sandy walking down one gravel path. His long dark hair was tied back in a swinging braid.

  “Sandy.” Sirius greeted him.

  “Mmm.” Sandy stifled a yawn. “It’s the middle of the night for me so I hope you appreciate this. Anyway, how about we go somewhere for food and maybe a coffee and I’ll explain everything?”

  Shiv turned to Sirius and, ignoring Sandy, said, “I don’t intend to leave you here but it might be prudent if we got the ship out of the docks and sent a longboat back in.”

  Sirius shook his head. “That would take too long Shiv, and would, I think, be disrespectful to our hosts. We trust the council of Cap after all and our true enemy has been caught.”

  “All of them?” Shiv asked not making it clear to which he was referring. His face was the expression of resignation though.

  Nearby, Sandy watched silently with what Amanda thought was an amused expression on his face.

  Sirius chose to assume he was referring to the renegades, and in a voice that held undertones of an order he said, “Perhaps, given there may still be a few renegades on the loose, it’s best if all the crew, including yourself, return to the ship until after the hearing.”

  Shiv eyed Sandy and then Sirius before giving the slightest of nods. It was clear he was still suspicious but his concerns were foremost toward protecting the ship and her crew.

  Amanda’s were not. “I’m not going anywhere,” she declared. She’d just found Sirius, she wasn’t losing him again.

  Sirius just nodded.

  Seeing they’d sorted everything out, Sandy stepped forward. To Shiv he said, “I’ll have a guard show you the way back to the docks.” Then he turned to Amanda and Sirius. Giving them a fang-baring grin he remarked, “So, how about food?”