Sail and I are dragged uphill.
We make heavy, sloppy tracks as we go, snow shin-deep, threatening to topple us with every step. But the Red Raids carry on easily, as if buried legs and pushed steps hold no difficulty for them at all.
Just a few dozen steps, and yet with the effort it takes for each one and with the pirate’s jostled hold on my arm, it’s enough to leave me panting by the time we crest the top.
I’m too busy catching my breath for a moment to take in the sight. But once I manage to look at the flat land below, my eyes widen. Beside me, I hear Sail suck in a breath.
Gone is the emptiness, the flat landscape of nothing except the snow-white expanse that the Barrens are known for. Instead, it’s been overrun.
There are three large pirate ships made of white wood below us. They sit on the snow drifts like ships docked in an ocean’s harbor, except they have no sails. Where waves of water and windy skies normally drive a boat out to sea, these ships are more like massive snow sleds, pulled not by wind or tide or oars, but by an entirely different force.
“Fire claws,” Sail says in shock and awe beside me.
My wide eyes hook onto the snowy felines below. They’re massive. Ten feet tall at least, with hooked fangs dripping down past their lower jaws, the ends shaped like shovels, used to scrape at snow and ice.
But the most remarkable part of them, aside from their sheer size, is the glowing flames that lick around their paws. Some are lit, some not, some have all four footsteps blazing red, while on others, only a single burns, as if they have one foot standing in the doorway to hell.
That explains the balls of fire we saw in the distance.
When one of the Red Raids raises his whip, cracking it over a line of the creatures to make them move the ship forward, a massive growl emits from the entire row of them, baring their ferocity in a unified growl. The noise cuts through the air and soaks into the ground, vibrating my very feet.
That explains the thunder.
“I thought fire claws were a myth,” I say.
The pirate beside me chuckles. “More like a nightmare,” he says, and even with his face covering, I can tell he’s smiling. “One swipe of their paw and they can kill a man—or woman.”
I look back at him, struggling not to shiver.
“You’re either gonna be dead from their razor claws or burned to a bloody crisp from their flames. Not a good way to go, either way.”
I don’t want to go anywhere near those things. Unfortunately, the pirates begin to tug us down the other side of the sloped hill, heading closer to the beasts, heading closer to the ships and the hundreds of more pirates below.
My eyes take in as much as I can, searching for familiar faces, both hoping I’ll see them and praying that I won’t. As we get closer, I can see signs of struggle, more dead horses, another carriage that’s being stripped bare and hacked up into pieces, every gilded inch pried away and carried onto the ships.
The pirates work methodically, pilfering everything, right down to every trunk and carriage curtain.
The surviving horses are being led onto one of the smaller ships too, their hooves clopping against the wooden ramp as they go, most of them eyeing the fire claws nervously. Crisp is one of them. I spot him by his tail, by the gold twine I braided into it.
Pirates crawl everywhere, hauling screaming saddles away, looting through all of our things. Fighting and taunting our vastly outnumbered guards. Every single one of them wears the same white fur clothes, the same red cloth wrapped around their faces and heads, leaving only their eyes exposed.
The flames from the fiery feline paws light up the scene, basking it in flickering red, somehow making all of this so much worse. My eyes sweep down from one of the ships, and I notice the blood splattered over the white snow—so dark that it looks black. And then I start to notice the unmoving guards littered on the ground.
Beside me, Sail goes still. Silent. Dread curls into my chest like acrid smoke, burning my eyes, polluting my chest.
Everywhere I look, there are dead or captured guards being stripped down to nothing but their underwear. The ones alive are battered and bloodied, shaking from the cold, even their boots stolen from them as their clothes and armor are thrown into a pile, to be distributed to the ships.
I bite my tongue so hard that the taste of copper drips against my cheek. I hold it there, crush it between my teeth, biting, biting.
When we get closer to the ships, the heat from the rows of fire claws chips away at the fierce chill of the night, but it doesn’t warm me. Doesn’t hold a lick of comfort.
I search the guards, seeking past the swarming pirates, but I don’t see the face I’m searching for. I don’t see Digby.
A gruff pirate sees us approaching and cuts over to us. “Another saddle?” he asks, looking me over. “Bring her over there.” He jerks his head to the left, and my head turns in the direction. The saddles are there, lined up, a group of pirates looking them over, leering, touching. Rosh, the male saddle, gets shoved onto his knees, the pirates mocking him, spitting on him. His blond head hangs down.
I whip my head back around. “Sail.” My voice cuts off, because I’m already being dragged away, while the pirates holding him head in another direction.
“It’ll be okay,” he promises, but even in my state of shock, I can hear the lie tremble from his lips.
“Sail!” His name is a cry. Panic expanding, bursting all at once. “Sail!” I scream again, struggling against the man who holds me.
Nothing. My struggles do nothing. Even if it did, even if I managed to break away from him, there are hundreds more to grab hold of me.
“It’s okay,” Sail calls, voice tight, face agonized. “It’s okay, it’s okay.”
His repeated reply sounds like a plea.
I’m wrenched away, Sail torn from my line of vision as I’m shoved toward the twelve other saddles. I get lined up with them in front of the largest ship, dozens of fire claws at our backs, their paws of red bringing steam from the snow, a haze turning the ground ruddy with temper.
When I’m put in line at the end of the other saddles, I face forward, my back to the ship, and I see Sail being dragged across the way, where he’s shoved onto his knees in the snow, next to the other guards who are still alive.
The pirate leading him sends a crushing kick to his side, ensuring he stays down. But even as Sail coughs and clenches his arms around his middle, he keeps his head up, keeps his eyes on me. Like he wants to make sure he doesn’t lose me, or that he wants to show me that I’m not alone.
At the sound of a whimper, I look to my left and realize it’s Polly trembling beside me, with tears running down her freckled face. She’s crying so hard that she’s having trouble breathing, her dress ripped in several places, the top bodice in pieces. And though her shaking hands try to hold the scraps together, it’s too ruined, her breasts nearly bare.
Anger rises in me, anger and despair. I quickly remove my coat and place it over her shoulders to help cover her. She flinches when I touch her and tries to smack my hand away, but when she sees that it’s me, the fight seeps out of her. “What are you doing?” she asks, the usual mocking bite from her tone absent.
I ignore her question and instead grab her arm and shove it through the arm of my coat before helping her arm through the other side. When her arms are in, I do up buttons, though my hands are shaking so hard that it takes me several tries just to get the top one done.
When she’s covered, she looks over at me, a harsh line slashed against her cheek, clearly marking where she’s been slapped. “Thanks,” she mumbles.
I nod, feeling the cold air bite at me more aggressively now, but bright side? At least I still have on my heavy wool dress and leggings. One look at the mostly naked guards is enough to make me grimace for them. If they don’t get out of the cold soon, they could go into hypothermic shock and be at risk of having frostbite.
“What are they going to do to us?” I ask, noting the pirates as they continue to work. A couple of them are watching over us, making sure we stay put, but aside from crying and whispering, none of the saddles dare to move.
A few people down the line from me, I can see Rissa speaking in low tones to the girl beside her. She’s one of the newer and youngest saddles here, and I still haven’t learned her name. She’s small and waiflike, with silky black hair and almond-shaped eyes, and right now, she looks petrified. Rissa catches my gaze, but her expression is grim despite the way she holds the girl’s hand, offering comfort.
Next to me, Polly gives a bitter laugh. “What do you think?” she answers. “They’re pirates. The Red Raids are known for being savage and brutal. No one else could survive out here in the Barrens. They’re going to use us up and then sell us off just like everything else they steal. And that’s if we’re lucky.”
My whole body trembles, and my hand comes up to grip my scar. I was terrified that night with King Fulke. But this? This is an entirely new level of fear. This is a different form of captivity.
One look at these pirates, and I’m certain that none of us want to be brought onto those ships.
But with the savage fire claws behind us and the vicious pirates all around, there’s nowhere to go. Nowhere to hide. A leering voice inside of me tells me that this is my fault. That I should never have wished to leave the safety of my cage.
I’m a fool.
The bleakness of our reality slowly sinks in. Sinks deep as we stand there, shuddering in the cold. The snowfall hasn’t stopped and continues to drop in a slow, delicate descent, the flakes landing on shaking shoulders. Another burden to carry on our backs.
I’m not sure how long we stand there.
The pirates work to strip down every single item we possessed. Then piles are distributed, pieces picked out, and one by one, everything is hauled onto the ships, down to the last piece of dry, salted meat.
The near-naked guards still kneeling in the snow grow weary, and two of them collapse, unable to hold themselves up any longer. The other guards try to nudge and rally them, try to encourage them to get back up. One does.
The other doesn’t.
Sail’s teeth started chattering a while ago, and even from several feet away, I can see that his lips have turned blue. His thin pants soaked through where he’s been forced to kneel.
Frost has collected on brows and temples where nervous sweat dripped down. Despite the waves of heat coming from the fire claws at our backs, the bitter chill saps our strength, leaches our spirit.
But through it all, Sail keeps looking at me, gaze steady and unyielding. When my body shivers, he holds his in. When my lips tremble, he pulls his up into a sad smile. When a tear falls against my cold cheek, he nods, still speaking to me, even without words.
You’re okay, you’re okay.
He protects me, bolsters me, there in those kind blue eyes.
So I don’t look away from him when another one of our guards crumples to the ground. I don’t look away when a fire claw growls, so close that I swear it’s about to slash a line down my back. I don’t look away when one of the women wails and begs. Her cries like a shatter through brittle ice.
I don’t look away.
And then, someone descends. From a ramp lowered on the largest ship, heavy boots sound against the white wood. Each step scares a heartbeat to skip, and only when I hear him right behind me do I finally let my eyes tear away from Sail’s face.
The Red Raids go still as the man stops at the foot of the ramp, every single pirate stopping to face him. My eyes hover at the side, taking him in, noting the white fur on his body and the red band around his face, same as the rest—but I also note the grisly pirate hat sitting proudly on his head, the color like rusted crimson, as if the leather was soaked in blood. A single black feather sits at its plume, like a mark of death, and it’s this that tells me exactly who I’m looking at.
The captain of the Red Raids.
