Jo's bare feet whispered against the planks as she crossed the deck. The ship ran dark, lanterns doused, and in the low starlight Amelia watched her pick past coils of rope and the shadow of the ship's boat. Swee's shirt hung loose on her frame, the linen pale against her skin, sleeves rolled to her elbows. She'd left her hair down. It fell past her shoulders, honey-blond catching what little light there was.
She stopped a pace back from the rail. "Captain."
Amelia didn't turn. She kept her eyes on the distant lights—small and orange, crawling along the coast of Jamaica. Still searching. "Quartermaster put you on watch with me. Know why?"
"To see if I'll bolt." Jo moved up to the rail beside her, hands gripping the wood. Her knuckles were pale in the starlight. "Or to see if I'll signal them."
"You're honest. That's something."
"I'm too tired to lie." Jo's voice came out smaller than she'd meant it to. She cleared her throat. "And I don't know how to signal a ship from here anyway. You'd catch me before I got two words out."
Amelia almost smiled. "That's also true."
They stood in silence. The sea moved beneath them, a slow breathing swell that lifted the hull and let it settle. Somewhere forward, a line creaked. The ship smelled of salt and tar and the last traces of the galley fire, banked for the night.
Jo's hands tightened on the rail. "If they catch us." She paused. Swallowed. "What happens to your crew?"
Amelia said nothing. She watched the distant lights, the way they moved in a slow arc along the coast. Still hunting. She felt the velvet pouch in her coat pocket—the weight of it, the outline of the locket inside. Her thumb found the shape of it through the fabric.
"Captain." Jo's voice was steadier now. "If I brought this to your door—"
"You didn't bring it anywhere we weren't already sailing," Amelia said. "We were already out of Port Royal. Already running. You just happened to be in the hold when we left."
"That doesn't answer my question."
Amelia turned to look at her then. In the dark, Jo's face was all shadows and angles, her jaw set, her eyes fixed on the coast. She was scared. Trying not to show it.
"If they catch us," Amelia said slowly, "they'll hang me. They'll sell the crew back to the plantations they escaped from. And they'll deliver you to your father in a clean dress, with an apology for the inconvenience."
Jo's breath caught. Her hands went white on the rail.
"That's why I don't intend to get caught."
A sound rolled across the water. Low at first, then sharpening into a crack. A cannon shot. Distant, but close enough to feel in the chest.
Jo flinched. Amelia's hand went to her pistol.
"Signal," Amelia muttered. "They're telling the harbor we're heading west."
"How do you know?"
"Because that's what I'd do." Amelia scanned the dark water. The lights on the coast had changed course. They were moving parallel now, tracking. "They don't have eyes on us yet. But they know the direction."
Jo's breathing had gone shallow. Fast. She was gripping the rail like it was the only solid thing in the world.
Amelia made a decision. She stepped close, took Jo's arm—the first time she'd touched her since the hold. Jo's skin was warm, her arm trembling. "Down," Amelia said. "Behind the bulwark. Now."
She pulled Jo down with her, onto the deck, into the shadow of the wooden wall. They crouched together, shoulders pressed, the sea beyond hidden now. Jo's breath was loud in the dark.
"They can't see us from here," Amelia said, low. "We're dark. We're quiet. They'll pass."
"You don't know that."
"I know my ship."
Jo's jaw tightened. She was close enough that Amelia could smell her—salt and linen and beneath it, something warm, something like honey. Her hands were pressed flat against the deck.
"I didn't mean to bring this to your door," Jo whispered.
"You said that already."
"I mean it."
Amelia watched her. The curve of her throat in the starlight. The way her chest rose and fell too fast. The fear she was trying to swallow.
"Tell me something," Amelia said.
Jo looked at her. "What?"
"Why did you really leave? Not the marriage. Not your father. You could have run anywhere. You chose a pirate ship."
Jo was quiet for a long moment. The distant cannon fired again—farther now, or maybe that was wishful thinking. She pressed her palm flat against her chest, over the place where the locket used to hang.
"I felt freer in your hold than I did in seventeen years in my father's house." Her voice cracked, barely audible. "When I came out of that hold and tasted the salt air, I thought—I thought, this is what I've been missing my whole life. The open. The sky. The sound of people who aren't pretending."
She looked at Amelia. Her eyes were bright, wet, unguarded. "Even if you throw me in chains tomorrow, Captain, I had tonight. I had this. And it was worth it."
Amelia's chest tightened. The velvet pouch was heavy in her pocket. She reached in and drew it out.
Jo's eyes went wide. "That's—"
"Yours." Amelia held it out. "Your payment. I kept it."
Jo didn't take it. "Why?"
"Because it's more than coins." Amelia pulled the locket free from the pouch. The silver glinted in the starlight. "It's your mother."
Jo's hand moved to her own chest, where the locket used to rest. "She died when I was twelve." The words came out raw, scraped clean of polish. "My father never let me grieve her. He just found me a new tutor, a new dress, a new cage. This is the only piece of her I had left."
Amelia held it out. "Then you should have it."
Jo took it. Her fingers closed around the silver. She opened it—the faint click of the latch—and stared at the two portraits inside. A woman with her same honey-blond hair. A girl with the same wide blue eyes.
"She was beautiful," Amelia said.
"She was." Jo's voice broke. "I barely remember her face. Just her laugh. And the way she smelled—lavender."
The world was quiet. The ship crested a swell. The distant lights were smaller now, fading into the dark.
Jo looked up. Her eyes were wet, but her chin was steady. "Why are you giving this back to me?"
Amelia didn't have an answer that would fit into words. She just looked at the girl—the woman—crouching in the dark, holding a ghost in her hand, choosing to trust a pirate. "Because some things deserve to be kept safe. And I don't think you've had anyone keeping you safe in a long time."
Jo's breath caught. She pressed the locket flat against her chest, over her heart. "Captain." The word came out soft. Almost sad.
Amelia watched her mouth. The curve of her lower lip. The way she bit it, just slightly, when she was thinking.
Jo's eyes dropped to Amelia's mouth. Her hand was still pressed over the locket. She didn't move away.
The space between them was small. The dark made it smaller. Amelia's hand lifted—she didn't plan it, didn't think about it—and her fingers brushed Jo's jaw. Featherlight. Barely a touch.
Jo's breath went shallow. She didn't pull away. Her lips parted.
Amelia's thumb traced the line of her jaw, slow, once. Jo's eyes fluttered closed.
"Captain." This time it was a whisper. A warning or a plea.
Amelia dropped her hand. The moment broke.
"The danger's past," Amelia said, her voice rougher than she meant. "You should rest. First light comes early."
Jo opened her eyes. Her hand was still pressed over the locket. She nodded, once, and pulled herself to her feet.
She paused at the mainmast. Turned. The locket was clutched in her hand. "Goodnight, Captain."
"Goodnight, Jo."
Jo walked away. Bare feet on worn planks. The loose shirt moving against her skin. She disappeared into the dark of the forecastle, where the crew had strung their hammocks.
Amelia turned back to the rail. The sea was dark. The coast was gone. She was alone with the sound of the water and the heat still lingering on her palm where she'd touched Jo's jaw.
She flexed her hand. Looked at it. Then she looked at the dark where Jo had disappeared.
"Iron Tide," she muttered to herself. "You're a fool."
The ship sailed on. The wind held steady. And in her pocket, the velvet pouch was empty. She'd given the past back to Josephine. What the future held, she couldn't see yet—just the dark water and the promise of open sea.
She found she didn't mind the not-knowing. For the first time in years, she was curious about what tomorrow would bring.
Amelia stayed at the rail until the stars began to wheel. The distant lights of Port Royal had vanished entirely, swallowed by the curve of the earth or the haze of distance. The sea was black glass, the wind steady from the east. She listened to the ship breathe around her—the creak of timber, the snap of canvas, the low murmur of the watch somewhere forward.
Her hand still remembered the shape of Jo's jaw. The warmth of it. The way she'd tilted into the touch like a flower turning toward sun.
Amelia pressed her palm flat against the rail and held it there until the feeling faded.
"Captain."
She turned. Mara stood at the base of the quarterdeck steps, a tin cup in each hand. Steam rose from both. She climbed the steps without waiting for permission and held one out.
Amelia took it. The heat seeped through the tin, into her palms. She didn't drink. Just held it, let the warmth ground her.
"Swee's got the girl in her hammock," Mara said. "Talking her ear off about the time you boarded a Spanish galleon naked."
Amelia snorted. "That was one time. And I wasn't naked. I'd lost my shirt."
"Same thing, according to Swee." Mara took a sip of her own coffee. Her dark eyes were fixed on the horizon, but Amelia felt the weight of her attention. "The girl's got a locket now. Didn't have one when she came aboard."
Amelia said nothing.
"You gave it back."
"It was hers."
"It was payment."
Amelia finally lifted the cup and drank. The coffee was bitter, strong, barely warm. She'd had worse. "She paid her way. The locket was never the price."
Mara was quiet for a long moment. The ship crested a swell, and she adjusted her stance without spilling a drop. "You touched her."
Amelia's jaw tightened. "I pulled her down behind the bulwark when the signal shot went off."
"After that."
The silence stretched. Amelia stared into the dark water. "There's nothing between us."
"I didn't say there was." Mara's voice was calm, unhurried. "I said you touched her. I saw the way she looked at you when she crossed the deck just now. And I saw the way you looked at her when you didn't think anyone was watching."
Amelia turned to face her. "What's your point, Mara?"
Mara held her gaze. Unflinching. "My point is that you've never been careful with your heart. You give it away to strays and orphans and runaway girls with sad stories, and then you act surprised when it gets broken."
"She's crew."
"She's a passenger. And her father is the governor of Jamaica. If he catches us, we hang. If we survive, she goes back to her gilded cage and you're left standing on a deck that suddenly feels very empty."
Amelia set the cup down on the rail. Her hand was steady. "I know what I'm doing."
"Do you?"
Amelia met her eyes. "I've kept this crew alive for five years. I've raided slave ships and burned merchantmen and outrun the Royal Navy. I know how to read the wind and the water and the people around me. And I know"—she paused, her voice dropping—"that girl is not a threat to this ship."
"I never said she was a threat. I said she was a risk." Mara finished her coffee and set the empty cup on the rail beside Amelia's. "There's a difference."
She turned and walked back down the steps, her bare feet sure on the worn wood. At the bottom, she paused. "Second watch is yours. I'll have Swee send up more coffee."
Then she was gone, swallowed by the dark of the main deck.
Amelia stood alone with the wind and the water and the empty cup beside hers. She picked up both and carried them to the galley, where the embers still glowed in the stove.
The ship was quiet. Most of the crew slept. She could hear the soft snoring from the forecastle, the occasional murmur of someone talking in their sleep. She poured herself more coffee from the pot on the stove, then carried it back up to the quarterdeck.
The night stretched on. She watched the stars. She watched the water. She tried not to think about honey-blond hair and blue eyes and the way Jo had said her name. Like it meant something.
She failed.
An hour before dawn, the sky began to lighten. Gray at first, then pink, then the gold of the sun cresting the horizon. The ship woke around her—the creak of hammocks, the shuffle of feet, the smell of breakfast being prepared in the galley.
Swee appeared at the top of the steps, a piece of hardtack in her hand. "Captain. Mara says you've been up all night."
"I'm fine."
"She says you should sleep."
"I'll sleep when I'm dead."
Swee grinned. "That's what I told her you'd say." She took a bite of the hardtack, chewed, swallowed. "Jo's awake. She's asking about you."
Amelia's chest did something complicated. She ignored it. "Tell her I'm on watch. She can find me after breakfast."
"She wants to help."
"She can help by learning the rigging. Ask Kofi to show her the knots."
Swee's grin widened. "Aye, Captain." She turned, then paused. "She's got that locket around her neck now. Keeps touching it when she thinks no one's looking."
Amelia said nothing.
Swee disappeared back down the steps.
The sun climbed higher. The sea turned from gray to blue. Amelia watched the horizon and tried to convince herself that the tightness in her chest was just exhaustion.
It wasn't working.