‘Gariath could do a lot of things,’ Lenk snarled, scowling across the deck to the companionway that led to the ship’s hold. ‘He could come out here and help us instead of waiting for us all to die, but since he hasn’t, he could just choke on his own vomit and I’d be perfectly happy.’
‘Well, I hope you won’t take offence if I’m not willing to sit around and wait with you to die.’
‘Good! No waiting required! Just jump up to the front and get it over quickly!’
‘Typical human,’ she said, sneering and showing a large canine. ‘You’re giving up before the bodies are even hung and feeding the trees.’
‘What does that even mean?’ he roared back at her. Before she could retort, he held up a hand and sighed. ‘One moment. Let’s. . let’s just pretend that death is slightly less imminent and think for a moment.’
‘Think about what?’ she asked, rolling her shoulders. ‘The situation seems pretty solved to you, at least. What are we supposed to do?’
Lenk’s eyes became blue flurries, darting about the ship. He looked from the chains and their massive mother to the men futilely trying to dislodge them. He looked from the companionway to Argaol shrieking at the helm. He looked from Kataria’s hard green stare to the Riptide’s rail. .
And to the lifeboat dangling from its riggings.
‘What, indeed-’
‘Well,’ a voice soft and sharp as a knife drawn from leather hissed, ‘you know my advice.’
Lenk turned and was immediately greeted by what resembled a bipedal cockroach. The man was crouched over a Cragsman’s corpse, studying it through dark eyes that suggested he might actually eat it if left alone. His leathers glistened like a dark carapace, his fingers twitched like feelers as they ran down the body’s leg.
Denaos’s smile, however, was wholly human, if a little unpleasant.
‘And what advice is that?’ Kataria asked, sneering at the man. ‘Run? Hide? Offer up various orifices in a desperate exchange for mercy?’
‘Oh, they won’t be patient enough to let you offer, I assure you.’ The rogue’s smile only grew broader at the insult. ‘Curb that savage organ you call a tongue, however, and I might be generous enough to share a notion of escape with you.’
‘You’ve been plotting an escape this whole time the rest of us have been fighting?’ Lenk didn’t bother to frown; Denaos’s lack of shame had rendered him immune to even the sharpest twist of lips. ‘Did you have so little faith in us?’
Denaos gave a cursory glance over the deck and shrugged. ‘I count exactly five dead Cragsmen, only one more than I had anticipated.’
‘We don’t get paid by the body,’ Lenk replied.
‘Perhaps you should negotiate a new contract,’ Kataria offered.
‘We have a contract?’ The rogue’s eyes lit up brightly.
‘She was being sarcastic,’ Lenk said.
Immediately, Denaos’s face darkened. ‘Sarcasm implies humour,’ he growled. ‘There’s not a damn thing funny about not having money.’ He levelled a finger at the shict. ‘What you were being was facetious, a quality of speech reserved only for the lowest and most cruel of jokes. Regardless,’ he turned back to the corpse, ‘it was clear you didn’t need me.’
‘Not need you in a fight?’ Lenk cracked a grin. ‘I’m quickly getting used to the idea.’