That gray-black ship had been sailing continuously for a month. A waist-high section of railing was missing from the port side, temporarily replaced with several lengths of rope tied beneath a sheet of canvas.
The top of the mainmast stood bare. Where the pirate flag had once flown, there was now only half a burned-through rope, its charred end swaying in the sea wind.
Makeshift repairs covered the deck. The nails had been driven in unevenly, hemp fibers were stuffed into the seams between planks, and a dark brown bloodstain still marked the aft deck, not yet wiped away.
Lane stood at the bow.
He was barefoot, his trouser legs rolled to his knees, wearing an open dark-red captain's coat with none of its buttons fastened. The sea breeze blew its hems apart, revealing an old scar slashing diagonally from his collarbone to his ribs.
He was not especially tall, but his shoulders were as broad as an anchor's crossbar. A pendant carved from a lion's canine tooth hung around his neck.
His features were rough and hard-edged. His brow ridge was high, and his nose had been broken once and badly reset, leaving it slightly crooked to the left. It gave his entire face a permanently irreverent, provocative look.
"I think I can see another island!" Lane grinned, showing a canine slightly sharper than the one beside it.
"Green means fresh water. Fresh water means people. People mean booze."
"You said that last month too. Turned out the island only had a herd of goats." The man sitting cross-legged on the deck rested a whetstone on his knee.
First mate Yin Blade Dean.
He was in his early thirties, thinner than Lane, with a back that remained perfectly straight in any position.
He wore an old shirt that had