Chapter 1

The hatch slammed against the wall as I lay over a leaking plank, trying to lick seawater from the crack. A sailor hauled me up by my hair. “Lady Blackwood's sick again, and you're down here sleeping?”

He meant Vivian. They weren't married yet, but everyone aboard the Black Sail already knew what to call her.

I tried to tell him I hadn't been asleep. All that came out was a rasp. He slapped me, impatient with the effort of listening, then caught the chain around my ankle and dragged me out. The old wounds on my back scraped over the ladder until my vision went black. By the time he threw me into the captain's cabin, I'd left a broken trail of blood across the oak floor.

Ronan sat beside the bed, warming Vivian's hands between his own. His black night-watch shirt hung open, exposing the old scar beneath his collarbone. I'd stitched that wound myself, out on the reef. He'd been so worried about my cold hands that he'd enclosed them in his palms, needle, thread, and all.

“Reef venom,” he said. His gaze caught on my back for a moment before returning to my face. “Come here. Use your tideheart.”

Vivian reclined against the pillows and held out her bandaged wrist. Her silk nightgown stretched over the gentle swell of her belly. The moment she caught me looking, she shrank against him. “Don't let her look at our baby like that. She's scaring me.”

Before I could lower my eyes, his palm cracked across my face. “I warned you to stay away from her.”

I waited for the ringing in my ears to fade, my head still turned from the blow. “All right.”

His hand stopped in midair. Slowly, he closed it into a fist and lowered it.

I crawled to the bedside and unwound the bandage. Two tiny rows of teeth marked Vivian's wrist, the edges of the bites stained blue. Merfolk only developed venom in their saliva when they were starving. Vivian had been teasing the captives in the hold with food again.

“Is it bad?” she asked me, slipping her other hand inside Ronan's open collar to rest against his bare chest. “I don't want anything happening to our baby.”

He covered her hand with his and murmured that everything would be fine.

I undid the neck of my ragged dress. My fingertips brushed the wound on my chest, which still hadn't closed from the last time.

“Out,” Ronan told the sailor by the door. The man hesitated a second too long. Ronan drew his knife and drove it into the doorframe. “Did I stutter?”

Once the door shut, he tossed his sea coat over my waist and legs. That would've given me hope before. Now I just wanted to get this over with.

I pushed my nails into the flesh beneath my breastbone. When they touched my tideheart, the pain folded me to my knees. I drew out the silver-white pearl, fine strands of blood stretching between it and the open wound. It held my heartbeat and my soul. To Ronan, it was a supply of medicine that would never run dry.

He caught my shoulder to steady me, then let go when he saw the blood spilling down my chest. “Your blood was enough last time. Do you have to make a show of it? Is this supposed to make me feel guilty?”

I shook my head. I didn't explain that my blood had long since lost its power to heal. He'd taken enough of it to fill every rum glass on the ship.

The pearl's faint light fell over Vivian's wrist, drawing the blue from her skin. She opened her eyes, looked at me, and tilted her face up to kiss the corner of his mouth. “That's so much better. Hold me closer, darling. I'm still cold.”

He gathered her against him and stroked her cheek with his thumb. I remembered that hand against my own face, though even the ache came slowly now.

Vivian smiled at me over his shoulder, then covered her nose. “The smell of blood might bring the reef fever back. Could she leave us for a while?”

Ronan looked at me. His lips moved, but when he finally spoke, all he said was, “Go.”

I pressed the tideheart back into my chest. Too weak to stand, I braced my palms against the floor and crawled toward the door. Behind me, he quietly scolded Vivian for going near the hold. “Those things bite. Next time you want a look, I'll have someone keep them behind the net.”

I had barely crossed the threshold when a bucket of cold water hit me in the face. Meg, Vivian's maid, stood over me with the empty pail and a look of disgust. On the places where my scales had peeled away, it felt as though my wounds were being torn open again.

“What's with the act? It's not like you can die. Look at the mess you've made of the captain's floor.” She threw a piece of stiff, scratchy sailcloth at me. “Clean it up. Leave so much as a stain, and tomorrow you'll be dancing with your feet nailed to the deck.”

I knelt outside the cabin and worked my way along the bloodstains. Every time I cleaned a patch of floor, another drop fell from my chest. The door hadn't closed properly. Inside, Vivian complained that her ankles were cold and asked Ronan to take off her stockings himself. Her voice was soft and intimate, pitched so I'd hear every word.

I bent over the sailcloth and wrung it out. My tears soaked into it without turning to pearls. I was almost too worn out even to cry.

At daybreak, one of the last three silver scales on my wrist fell away.