Red Seas Under Red Skies: The Gentleman Bastard Sequence, Book Two (Gentleman Bastards 2)

‘You must drink it, love,’ whispered Drakasha. ‘It’s a special nighttime drink for pirate princesses.’

‘No,’ muttered Cosetta.

‘Are you not a pirate princess?’

‘No!’

‘I think you are. Be good—’

‘Don’t want!’

Jean thought back to his time in Camorr, and to how Chains had sometimes behaved when one of the young Gentlemen Bastards had decided to throw a fit. They’d been much older than Cos, true, but children were children and Drakasha looked hollow-eyed with worry.

‘My, my,’ he said loudly, approaching the Drakashas so that Cosetta could see him. ‘That looks very good, Captain Drakasha.’

‘It does look very good,’ she said, ‘and it tastes better than it looks—’

‘Feh,’ said Cosetta. ‘Ahhhhh! No!’

‘You must,’ said her mother.

‘Captain,’ said Jean, pretending to be entranced by the silver cup, ‘that looks so wonderful. If Cosetta doesn’t want it, I’ll have it.’

Drakasha stared at him, and then smiled. ‘Well . . .’ she said, sounding grudging, ‘if Cosetta doesn’t want it, I suppose I have no choice.’ She slowly moved the cup away from Cosetta and toward Jean, and the little girl’s eyes grew wide.

‘No,’ she said, ‘no!’

‘But you don’t want it,’ said Drakasha with an air of finality. ‘Jerome does. So it’s going away, Cosetta.’

‘Mmmm,’ said Jean. ‘I’ll drink it straight away.’

‘No!’ Cosetta grabbed for the cup. ‘No, no, no!’

‘Cosetta,’ said Drakasha sternly, ‘if you want it, you must drink it. Do you understand?’

The little girl nodded, her mouth an ‘o’ of concern, her fingers straining to reach the suddenly invaluable prize. Zamira held the silver cup to Cosetta’s lips and the little girl drained it with urgent greed.

‘Very good,’ said Drakasha, kissing her daughter on the forehead, ‘very, very good. Now I’m going to take you down so you and Paolo can go to sleep.’ She slipped the empty silver cup into a coat pocket, slung Cosetta round to the front of her chest and nodded at Jean. ‘Thank you for that, Valora. Deck is yours, Del. Just a few minutes.’

‘She hates doing that,’ said Ezri quietly when Drakasha had vanished down the companionway.

‘Feeding Cos for the night?’

‘It’s milk of poppy. She puts them both to sleep . . . for the Parlour Passage. No way in hell she wants them awake when we go through it.’

‘What the hell is going to—’

‘It’s difficult to explain,’ said Ezri. ‘It’s easier just to get it over with. But you’ll be fine, I know you will.’ She ran one hand up and down his back. ‘You manage to survive me in my poorer moods.’

‘Ah,’ said Jean, ‘but when a woman has your heart, she doesn’t have poor moods. Only interesting moods . . . and more interesting moods.’

‘Where I was born, obnoxious flatterers were hung out to dry in iron cages.’

‘I can see why you ran away. You inspire such flattery that any man who talked to you at length would have been caged up after—’

‘You are beyond obnoxious!’

‘I need to do something to keep my mind off whatever’s coming—’

‘What we just did below wasn’t enough?’

‘Well, I suppose we could always go back down and—’

‘Alas that the biggest bitch on this ship isn’t even Drakasha or myself, but duty.’ She kissed Jean on the cheek. ‘You want something to keep yourself busy, you can get started with preparations for the Passage. Go to the for’ard lantern locker and bring me the alchemical lights.’

‘How many?’

‘All of them,’ she said. ‘Every last one you can find.’