Back on the Black Dog, Shiv and Neko were in the library, going over the ship manifest together. They’d persuaded a reluctant Michael, whose room it temporarily now was, to let them use it for a few hours for some work. It afforded them some privacy and they’d needed access to the old manifests which were stored in here under lock and key.

  “I just don’t like it,” Neko complained.

  Shiv sighed, and for the thousandth time attempted to quell Neko’s concerns in between reading the book he had out on the desk.

  “Stop worrying. They’re both safe. Michael can’t touch the girl and Sirius being gone gives us an excuse for all former events, as long as Michael can be persuaded to play his role.”

  Neko grumbled. “I still don’t see why we had to keep it a secret from so many of the crew, especially the captain.”

  “Because Sirius is shit at bluffing and so are half the men. No, there’s a few, like you who I had to tell because if I didn’t you’d make it too hard to pull off and given the way gossip travels on this ship they’ll all find out the truth eventually anyway, just hopefully not before we can pull off our plan. But for now, pulling this off relies on making it look as real as possible. The best way to do that is for it to be as real as possible.”

  Neko shook his head sadly. “But there’s so many that just went along with it. I always thought they were loyal to Sirius.”

  “Look Neko. Most men don’t give a damn who’s in charge. As long as their bellies are full, they got a nice bed to lie in, a song to sing, and some pretty wench to amuse them from time to time, they couldn’t give a damn about anything else. As long as they got that and they ain’t the ones making decisions they’re all happy dandy. Ain’t got nothing to do with them choosing between me and Sirius. The simple fact is they know it’s more effort to fight it than accept it.”

  “Yeah, but what’s this going to do to their long term trust, or Sirius’s?” Neko had sat himself down on “Michael’s Bed” and was looking very solemn. He’d barely looked at his own assigned pile of manifests.

  “They ain’t got no long term trust. I just told you that. And as for Sirius, it’s an important lesson. You can’t blindly trust your crew. They acted like they would’ve acted if any man came along offering them shiny new things. This was needed for both us and him. It’ll also give him some time to figure out what he really wants.”

  “But you ain’t just any man,” Neko retorted.

  “Ah ha!” Shiv exclaimed suddenly.

  Neko gave him a confused look.

  Shiv pointed down at his book, at log entered only a few months back.

  With a sigh, Neko pulled himself to his feet and walked slowly over to see what Shiv had found.

  Shiv scowled as he realised how slow Neko was moving. “See that.” Once Neko finally reached him he pointed at a small symbol marked in the margin next to one shipment. “See that symbol. That was on another log from a shipment last year as well, also from Captain Polly, also outta Wildwater. And it’s on our current shipment too. The same bloody barrels we picked up in Wildwater. Sirius is shipping blood and he didn’t tell me a damn thing about it.”

  Neko sat down on the desk with a sad sigh. “I thought we already knew that.”

  “Yes, but now I have proof,” Shiv replied. “And we know it’s not the first time.”

  “Mmm.”

  “Oh, quit your bloody moping. The captain will be back in a few days, and that horrid fiend”—Shiv pointed a threatening finger in the direction he roughly assumed Michael was—“will be off this ship, and things will be back to normal in no time. All we have to do is play nice to Michael for just a little longer and keep the crew under control.”

  “Crick’s talking about taking the captaincy for himself,” Neko said idly.

  “That’s exactly the sort of shit I mean.” Shiv splayed his hands out in exasperation.

  “Except, Crick is your man,” Neko pointed out with some satisfaction.

  Shiv made a noise that sounded like a growl. “What’s his complaint?”

  “He doesn't like Michael or being forced to play nice with him.”

  “Nobody likes Micheal. Have you explained to him that this is just a temporary state of being?”

  Neko turned to Shiv and gave him a slightly amused almost bored look. “He’s your man,” he repeated.

  Shiv mumbled several expletives under his breath.

  “And what about Amanda? How do you think she feels? She looked so hurt.” Neko’s shoulders drooped again.

  "She's a silly girl who has no idea idea what real sailing involves. Young, idealistic, just like Sirius," Shiv replied curtly without looking at Neko.

  “I thought you trusted Sirius?”

  “I don’t trust any man whose mind is on a woman.”

  “I don’t think she deserved that. I like her. She’s nice and she’s fun and she’s good with music. You like her too. I know you do. Ain’t right what we done.”

  “I done what needed to be done. Shit was gonna get worse. I could see it.”

  “What if she’d fought when we kicked them off?”

  Shiv shook his head. “What would that have gained her?”

  Neko went quiet.

  Shiv sighed. “Of course I like her. I like both of them. But they were a liability to this shipment and our relationship with this client. How do you think a meeting between this client and Amanda would go? Whose side do you think Sirius would take? And in Scarlett of all places. There’s more than enough elemental tension in that place. Imagine the fallout if anything went down. I know that port. I lived there. So just stick to the damn plan and keep Sirius’s men placated until this is all over. Sirius is a forgiving man.”

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  “You hope.” Neko sighed then asked, “Is Amanda?”

  There came a sudden knock on the door. Both men went silent and stared at it. Then they looked at one another.

  “Who is it?” Shiv eventually asked.

  A moment later Griff stuck his head around the corner of the door. “We’ve got company,” he told them.”

  Shiv frowned. “Another ship?”

  Griff shook his head. “Just a man.”

  “What do you mean just a man?” Shiv asked as he crossed the room. “We’re in the middle of the ocean.”

  “Yeah, well, he came out of the ocean. Mathias saw him from the crow’s nest. The man says he’s got a message for you from a Captain Morgan of the Wolverine. Said it’s urgent.”

  Shiv paused mid-stride across the room. “Bring him down here.”

  “Yes Captain.”

  Once Griff had left, Neko turned to Shiv with a frown. “The Wolverine?”

  “It’s who I asked to pick up Sirius.” He was worried. What could possibly be so urgent that they’d send a shifter with a message across the open ocean?

  Neko was still frowning. “I thought we were going to back and pick them up, after we finish up at Scarlett?”

  Shiv shook his head. “Scarlett’s not our last stop in that direction. Besides, I didn’t want to have to wrangle this crew for any longer than I had to. Don’t want them getting too used to things this way. Life needs to be just uncomfortable enough that when Sirius gets back they accept him without question.”

  Neko gave him a studied look and then a shake of the head. “I really think there must have been a better way to resolve this issue. I mean, now we have to figure out where all that blood’s supposed to be dropped off or who, if anyone Sirius told about it.”

  “If he told anyone, it was probably Fallon,” Shiv replied thoughtfully. “He’s the only one he’d trust who isn’t also likely to blab.

  Neko looked hurt at that comment.

  Shiv gave him a frank look. “How many people have you told about my plan? Really?”

  “Well, just Benny.”

  Shiv nodded. “Yeah, and Benny will have told Thatch, and Thatch will have told Alice, and Alice will have told Pierre or Crick or Dickie and once Dickie knows something everybody knows something. It’s only a matter of days.”

  “So that was part of your plan too?”

  “It’s all part of my plan.”

  “Even the bit about having to hunt through all the old manifests to figure out where the blood’s supposed to be shipped to.”

  Shiv’s next string of mumbled expletives were interrupted by another knock on the door. “Come in,” he grumbled.

  10 minutes later Neko, and Shiv were silently trying to process what Leo had just told them.

  “So, what you’re saying,” Shiv summarised. “Is if we don’t find a way to heat up these dragon eggs to a very hot temperature in the next say, 24 hours, they may not make to their destination alive.”

  Leo nodded. “That’s about what they said. They said it may be more than 24 hours but just to be safe…” he trailed off at the look on Shiv’s face. Leo evidently found Shiv to be quite intimidating. Indeed, the look on his face almost could have melted steel itself.

  Neko wisely said nothing about how it wouldn’t be a problem if they hadn’t left Sirius and Amanda on an island. He ducked his eyes and stared at the floor whenever Shiv glanced his way.

  Shiv paced backward and forward in the middle of the room. “Remind me how hot they have to be again?” Shiv asked.

  “1000 to 2000 degrees Celsius,” replied Leo.

  Shiv stopped his pacing and gave one loud huff.

  “I suppose it is technically the client’s fault for not specifying this when they shipped them with us,” ventured Neko.

  Shiv turned to him with a look of rage. “For not specifying that they were shipping fucking dragons inside a box with a fucking firestarting seal that we technically never should have fucking opened if fucking Sirena had caused havoc with her fucking beetles.”

  “I mean, maybe if-” Neko started.

  “Don’t even fucking say it.” Shiv cut him off. He started up his pacing again. “I mean what sort of fucking person do you think even ships dragons let alone with such an advanced infusement. What do you think the chances are that we’ve got fucking dragons eggs that belong to some fucking sorcerer or aristocrat? Do you think anyone like that is going to give a damn whose fucking fault it is? If we don’t deliver those things then we’re the ones they’re gonna take it out on. Forget fucking Sirena and her bloody friends, this is a much bigger fucking problem.” Shiv rubbed his temples with both hands.

  “Maybe we can heat them up.” Griff stuck his head in the door, evidently having been eavesdropping from just outside. It wasn’t like Shiv was being that quiet.

  “How the fuck are we supposed to heat something that big to 2000 degrees? The ovens don’t even go anywhere near that high,” Shiv spat.

  “Crick can do temperature control,” Griff replied.

  “Not to 2000 degrees.”

  Griff shrugged.

  “Maybe it doesn’t need to be that hot just to keep them alive?” Neko suggested.

  “Go get Crick!” Shiv ordered.

  “What other powers you got?” Leo asked as Griff scurried off to find Crick.

  Neko started listing them. “We got a summoner... but we’re in the middle of the sea. Shapeshifters… but none that can turn into a dragon…” He trailed off and glanced at Leo.

  Leo shook his head.

  Neko continued listing. “There’s a materiokinetic… maybe he could craft a furnace?”

  Shiv brightened briefly. “Well, that might work, but he’s currently got his hands full keeping those damn arasnids contained.”

  “Well, we’ve got an infuser so all we’d need is someone else familiar with materiokinesis.”

  Shiv’s frown returned. “Yeah, someone familiar enough that they’re not going to craft an extremely hot furnace that suddenly reverts back to its original form spilling molten hot rocks on the ship floor. I can see that burning through the boat in seconds.”

  “What about the wood the egg box is made of,” Griff offered. “It must be able to withstand a decent amount of heat, unless it was magically shielded but if Amanda was heating them up maybe whatever protects it is still intact. I know there are some woods that don’t burn. They use them in the construction of buildings sometimes in places were dragons are more common.”

  Shiv looked thoughtful.

  “You could always test it,” Leo said with a grin. “Cut a piece of the crate out and see if it burns.”

  Shiv nodded. “Griff, why don’t you go and get Benny. He always has good ideas. And Fallon’s got some experience with materiokinesis so maybe he can infuse some into an item and then swap roles with Sable. If the crate’s fireproof at least we could set the furnace on top of it. I can probably float anything that falls out if the furnace collapses. Crick can cool it.”

  Now Neko looked worried. “Can Sable make a large enough furnace though? Whenever he mends the sails he always does small patches at a time.”

  “They last though,” Griff pointed out.

  “I suspect crafting new things might be different from tying broken things together,” Leo offered with a slight wince.

  “Well that makes it even less likely he’ll be able to do a furnace,” groaned Neko as he sat on “Micheal’s bed” again.

  “Maybe if he does it really slowly,” Griff replied.

  “I think we’re a bit short on time,” Neko said in a dejected voice.

  Shiv looked from one to the other thoughtfully. “It’s better than nothing. Griff, go get the others I mentioned. If we throw enough heads at this we should be able to come up with something.”

  Once Griff left Neko said to Shiv, “You know if we pull in more people soon the whole ship will know about this. What effect do you think that will have? You think they’ll hate Sirius for hiding this or start wishing he was here and we hadn’t kicked him off. And then they might start questioning your orders.”

  Shiv set his expression into a look of decisiveness. “I’d say that’s up to you Neko. At some point we need them liking him again. You’ve got the best feel for them. Nobody worries what they say around you. But for now, you just need to convince them that the dragons are important to keep alive and our goal is to get all of the animals safely to Scarlett so we can all get paid. They want to get paid. Remind them of that. Keep them distracted. Play them some music that sets their minds at ease. We just have to keep their spirits up and their bellies full so we can focus on one problem at a time.” Shiv started for the door. “Get everyone brainstorming once they get here. I’ll be back in a minute.”

  “Where are you going?” Neko asked.

  “To speak to the chef about tonight’s dinner.”