Pirate Lord Read online

  PIRATE LORD

  Wolves shall not be tamed

  Prologue

  She darted across the rooftops, her feet slipping from tile to wooden beams without falter. Moving silently, she once again praised her faultless education. Most wouldn't take on a job like this without the cover of a strong wind, or perhaps even rain. The elements masked the pitter-patter of feet, but she'd never needed such cover. Her feet didn’t make a singe sound. Relying on Mother Nature was for fools anyway, a harmless shower could easily turn into a downpour, making normally safe passages a thing of nightmares. She sucked in a breath as she launched herself over a gap between two houses, rolling to her feet and sprinting once more. Time was not her friend this night. She couldn't afford to dawdle. Flicking the small grappling hook from her waist she didn’t lose pace while glancing up and hauling it at the gargoyles that decorated the corners of the church tower. Towers were an excellent way to get around, especially when your target lived in such an inconveniently located house. The hook caught. She tested her weight on the rope then leapt into the air, the tile beneath her foot scratching only slightly against its neighbour as it absorbed the full impact of her body.

  Clambering hand over hand she made it to the top of the rope, swinging an arm over the gargoyle's back and pulling herself up with no effort whatsoever. Being able to bear the weight of ones own body had been an early lesson, one that she had not had any trouble learning. Even now she was as flexible as she had been as a child. Though to be fair she was about the same size as she’d been when she was a child. Growth spurts happened to other people, she’d stayed slight and nimble. All the better for her particular occupation. Puberty had proved a trickier barrier, but binding her chest had solved those two issues.

  She glanced over her shoulder, though she knew it was an empty exercise. No one could follow her. The few that had tried had ended up decorating the pavements – not always by her hand. She wasn't being cocky. Assassins like her were hard to come by and her rates reflected her professionalism. Normally talents such as hers were held by those who were a few pennies short of a pound, but she’d never been anything less than perfectly sane. Perhaps that was her issue. She'd been young when she'd been taken to the institute but she'd been determined. She'd had the drive to prove herself, to make her parents regret their sacrifice, to make him proud. Blushing, the assassin blinked back the tears that rose in her stinging eyes.

  Stupid. Don't think about him now. There was a job to do. He'd explain himself later. He always did.

  Most of the time.

  She readjusted the hook, swung the cord around her waist in a complicated knot, then abseiled down the side of the tower. They called her his lapdog – never within earshot of course – but she'd heard the rumours nevertheless, from a few reliable sources who probably thought to get on her good side. It paid to not make an enemy of an assassin. They didn't know the full story, no one ever did when they started throwing around gossip. Her teeth gritted involuntarily and she pulled the blade from her belt with much more force than was necessary. Slicing it through the cord she rotated her body mid-air, preparing herself for the landing. Impossible for most, it barely knocked the breath from her.

  She gripped the edge of the roof, tensing her core and swinging herself down onto a windowsill. There was barely enough room to stand. She had to slip her feet sideways, toes splayed, controlling her balance. The window wasn't locked – she knew it wouldn't be. A fair amount of surveillance paid off, the majority of her peers under-appreciated the value of a good stake out. Freshly oiled, thanks to an earlier visit, the window slid open without a sound. She jumped through, crouching on the floor and blinking as her eyes adjusted to the thicker darkness of the room. Her hood slipped back as she carefully stood but she didn't bother to pull it back. It didn't matter if the target saw her face.

  She kept to the wall, traversing the room with the mental map she had memorised. Though it was pitch black she didn't make a wrong move. The assassin had contacts at pretty much every records house across the globe, access to house plans, underground passages, town planning. They knew who she was and whose protection she had, even without her flashing the inked octopus tentacle that wrapped around her forearm. The tattoo had been his idea. At the time she'd leapt at the chance to declare herself as his so openly. Looking back now that had been the moment she should have realised he didn't feel the same way as she did about him. But she'd been willing to take every scrap of kindness and attention he fed her. She still was.

  Narrowing her eyes in a silent reprimand to her wandering mind she halted at the bedside, cocking her head as she made a quick analysis. Reaching up behind her neck she pulled at the band around her hair, tightening it. Plenty had already escaped its clutches, loose tendrils snaking across her sweat-beaded brow. She'd debated cutting her hair short at one time but he'd told her that he liked it long. Since then she'd barely had it trimmed.

  Her target was male, blonde hair struck through with wisps of grey. His jaw bore the suggestion of a beard, skin too pale for a merchant and fingers stained with ink. He was the first heir to a rather reputable trading company, but his predecessor did not like the idea of the business falling into his hands. As such she'd been approached for the job.

  She was never forced to do a task if she didn't want to; the assassin appreciated that at least. There was always a choice. She’d be given all of the details, able to decide her own path upon her conscience. But her conscience had shut up a while back.

  Slipping the cord from the lining of her jacket, she wrapped it around her gloved hands. What came next happened quickly. She stuffed a roll of cloth into the target's mouth, wrapped the cord around his throat even as his eyes opened in shock, and flipped him over to constrict her hold. Then it was just a matter of waiting it out. He thrashed for a little time, but she was stronger than him despite the difference in their size. He didn't stand a chance. He knew it, she knew it – he was a ghost the moment she stepped foot in his home.

  She didn't particularly like strangling targets. There were quicker and more efficient ways these days to pull off a quiet assassination. Tiny blades that could puncture the heart, the jugular, letting the target bleed internally and leaving no more evidence than a bug bite. But the client had specified the method of death. They had right to do that, but the assassin didn't like it – she was the expert after all. However, there were still those clients who liked to feel they had a hand in it, the ones who had been plotting the executions for years, never quite working up the balls to go through with it. She provided what they lacked.

  The target finally stopped struggling. She tightened her hold a while longer then let him slip from her grasp, unwrapping the cord from his neck. It would leave a mark, but it wouldn't show up immediately, the cord she used was too thin. She'd designed it herself, then made sure to sell it on the open market. She was renowned on the weapons scene, though not by her own name. Having a tell was not in her nature, she preferred to remain inconspicuous. The only weapon she hadn't shared with the rest of the assassin community was the most recent of her pin-blades. That one she planned to keep for herself. It was completely undetectable anyway.

  Pin-blades were her personal favourite. She’d been schooled in most forms of artillery including pistols, though she rarely used them in her own work save for the few sniping opportunities that came along every now and again. Making a scene was not her style, and people tended to notice when someone collapsed in the street with a bullet hole in their skull.

  She checked for a pulse then, finding none, yanked out the cloth gag. No bruising, it wouldn’t show up for a few days minimum – if she was lucky she might get away with accidental causes. It was something of a sting to her pride when her assassinations were noticed as
such. She took great satisfaction from the kills that graced the walls of the hospitals with titles such as 'cause of death unknown' or 'natural causes'. There was something of an art form about it, something rewarding from tricking the system so effectively. She tucked the body back beneath the sheets, closing his eyes and parting his mouth slightly. She'd seen enough corpses to know what one looked like after dying in their sleep. He wasn't that old, but there were those who died young. Doctors these days didn't question too far. It helped that he had his fingers in a fair few pies, they wouldn’t push too far for fear of what enemies they might dredge up.

  Double-checking the body and the lay of the room, she made sure her presence would not be noticed. There were a number of her past clients who'd raised the preference for assassinations that were quite obvious – a warning, a lesson, but this one was to be ‘discreet’. The assassin blew a kiss to the body on the bed, about all the farewell she would offer him. She didn't tend to delve too deep into reasons or background. It didn't matter if the target was considered a good person or a bad person, it was a job, a target. That's all it had ever been to her, and that's how she intended for it to stay. Let it get too personal and it only complicated things.

  She hopped onto the windowsill before jumping up to catch the edge of the tiles and flipping to perch on them. Returning via the tower would be the most sensible route but she was running low on hooks as it was. Using up one just for the sake of an easier route seemed short-sighted. Chewing at her lip and panning her vision around, she honed in on another possibility. Reckless and death-defying, the leap from this height would kill her if she didn't make the gap to the other building. Grinning, she stood up, padding over the tiles like an acrobat traversing the high wire. Skipping into a run, her arms pounding at her sides, she bounced on the last possible point and sailed out over the gap. Hitting the roof with a tuck and roll, she sucked in the breath she'd been holding, her heart pounding in her chest. Her hair had unravelled completely, long and straight and black. A breeze caught it and sent it billowing behind her. Gathering it up impatiently, she tucked her locks into the collar of her jacket and tugged her hood back over her features. The sun was already lightening the horizon, she was supposed to be at his side. He didn’t tolerate lateness. Containing the curse to her target who had taken his sweet time over dying – she'd been taught it did not serve well to speak ill of the dead – she darted into a sprint and launched off the wall next to her, using it as a point of rebound to reach the next rooftop.

  Chapter 1

  Children of Wolves

  Six years. Or thereabouts. That was how long had passed since Tristan found her on that slavers ship, since he’d coaxed her out of the walls she’d built around herself. Looking at her now, her hair billowing behind her as she twisted to flick her daggers, she bore little resemblance to the filthy skeletal figure that they’d dragged out from below the deck of that slavers ship. He’d known her the moment her eyes met his, not just in that their paths had crossed before, but something…more. Tristan had spoken to Chop about it, one of his oldest friends and crewmates, and only received teasing remarks in response. Really he hadn’t expected much else. Joke was on him now really, as Lily had turned out to be something pretty special. And now he was married to her.

  He smiled to himself, his sword spinning in an arc and almost decapitating the man before him. The body slumped to the floor in a pile, blood gushing from its open neck. Tristan stepped over it, his wrist twitching as he freed his blade of the lingering gore. Lily was deep into that place she went during fights. Tristan gave her a wide birth – you could tell by the look in her eye she wasn’t completely conscious of who she was. He’d seen men go into that state before, soldiers and seasoned pirates, those who’d seen their fair share of death. Lily had been born with it, some sort of inner ability to switch off her conscience and just kill –without hesitation, without remorse. He’d seen it in her when they’d first met at the Mermaid’s Descent, much as she’d attempted to conceal it, but when there was a dagger in her hand it was as if she came alive. He still had a tiny pinprick scar on his abdomen. A souvenir of the moment he’d tested her, and seen just how deadly Lily could be.

  She’d been trained by a whore from the pits, and she fought like it too – dirty and with everything she had. He’d seen her claw a man’s face open with her own nails when she found herself weaponless. Tristan blew out a short sharp breath, wiping his hand across his brow. A mixture of sweat and blood clung to his palm. He wiped it off on his shirt. It wasn’t his best shirt, but he wasn’t thrilled about it being dirtied. Still, needs must, and they couldn’t pass up the opportunity of raiding a Whitman ship when it crossed their paths so temptingly.

  They were on their way to the Pirate Lord, answering a summons for Captain Tigerlily and her children. No mention of Tristan. Something about that stung, though he should be pleased to not be name-dropped by Lord Merek, the Pirate Lord. There was ancient history between the two of them, history that Tristan would hate to repeat. Captain Wolf wasn’t afraid of a lot of things, and he wouldn’t class what he felt for Merek as fear, but the Pirate Lord came pretty high on his ‘not to piss off’ list.

  Eli was beside Lily. It had become a familiar sight in raids. He was about the only crew member – Tristan included – who dared to get anywhere near Lily when she was fighting. His long white dreadlocks were tied back with a cord of leather but even that hadn’t spared them a blood bath. Pulling a hatchet free from his belt, he ducked as Lily whirled another dagger before striking to finish off the quarry. They fought like one person, in a hypnotic sort of way. It was as if they could read each other’s minds, knew what the other was going to do before they did it. Tristan knew it was more likely they were both just good at reading other people.

  He grinned as Lily looked to him and stuck out her tongue. She was back. He launched himself over the huddle before him, taking out a couple of them on the way, then landed in a roll, smoothly bringing himself to standing, his sword spearing through the chest of the man before him. Lily’s hand sought his, her back lining up with his own.

  “How long have we got until we make the seas of the Pirate Lord’s domain?” Her voice was calm, completely out of context for the chaos going on around them.

  “Really, asking ‘are we nearly there yet’ now, of all times?”

  Lily shrugged, “Seemed as good a time as any.”

  Tristan dropped his sword, gripped both of her hands and flipped her over his back. She landed facing him, biting at her lip in a rather distracting manner. He managed to ignore her, kicking his blade back up into his hand and spearing it through the pirate that was stupid enough to approach them. In almost the same instant Eli’s hatchet came spinning out of Tristan’s peripheral, rooting itself in the skull of a nearby attacker. Tristan had almost forgotten he was there. It was like that, with him and Lily. When he was with her he tended to forget that anything else existed.

  Eli winked, yanking his hatchet free and disappearing off into the chaos – Tristan could be trusted to watch his own wife’s back for the time being.

  “What are you looking at me like that for?”

  “I’m seriously thinking of lifting the ‘no weapons in the bedroom’ rule. You look far too good when you’re holding a sword.”

  Lily rolled her eyes, but her lip curved. “There’s plenty of time for that – I’m not going anywhere, there’s no need to grab me at every opportunity.”

  “I disagree entirely.”

  She smiled properly, “You haven’t answered my question. How far left?”

  Stig, Tristan’s first mate, leapt down from the top deck and scratched at his short ashy blonde beard, “A few more days. Then we should reach the labyrinth.” His kind blue eyes fell upon her, the sweat on his bald head catching the light.

  Tristan opened his mouth to ask how Stig had even heard Lily’s question over the hubbub, then stopped himself. Like all pirates Stig was unbelievably nosy, no doubt most of the crew had on
e ear on their Captain’s conversation.

  “Labyrinth?” Lily’s eyebrow arched, a rather impressive movement that made grown men go into cardiac arrest.

  Internally Tristan cursed. Externally he narrowed his eyes at Stig, “I thought we agreed to keep that quiet?”

  Before Tristan could lay into his first mate, or provoke Stig into all-out shouting match, Lily intervened. There were advantages to being co-captain, and the wife. “Tristan?” Lily folded her arms across her chest, her glare unrelenting.

  Tristan looked anywhere but in her eyes, though the tightness in his jaw remained. “The Pirate Lord’s Island is hard to reach, it’s surrounded by reefs. You can only safely get there if you’re led, or if you’ve been before.”

  They had received the message a couple of months ago, the summons to the Pirate Lord’s court, and had set out in the direction of the Island immediately. The message was brief, brought to The Shadow by albatross – apparently the norm for messages from the Pirate Lord. There had been no explanation for the reason behind the summons, and there was no council due – they were very rare and always avoided if possible. The last proper council had been during the great wars, hundreds of years ago.

  Since receiving the summons Tristan had been strangely withdrawn whenever she raised the topic. All he’d deigned to tell her so far was that the Pirate Lord was not an easy man to deal with. His summons were not always good news. He had requested to meet Lily by name, and also to meet the children. There was no mention of Tristan. He assured her this would have been completely deliberate. The Pirate Lord did everything with meaning.

  Lily barely blinked as Stig parried a blow from an attacker, gifting him with a rather nasty blow to the chest. She finished him off herself with a kick to his side. Her heels were sharp. Tristan wasn’t telling her something, she could see it in his depthless eyes.