His faith in her had been steady since the day he showed up on the docks of Subrosa, a scraggly kid looking for more than the usual handout. His starry eyes made her think, at first, that he was as interested in her as in Wind Sabre, but over time it became clear she lacked the preferred interactive body parts to be his type, and that the helm was the only thing he wanted to get his hands on. Didn’t mean he wasn’t enamored with her, though. He’d staunchly defend her any time he was given the opportunity. Started more than one bar brawl before even Dug could on account of someone saying the wrong thing to, or about, his captain.
Everyone onboard needed Wind Sabre for their own reasons. For Tisker, the ship was his salvation. His way out. The only way an orphan who had grown too old for the urchin gangs could escape Subrosa. Well, not the only way, but she certainly could see why he wouldn’t have chosen the usual, less savory options.
He stood at the table, looking down but not seeing the cup in his hand. “If it makes a difference, I can wait for my back shares.”
Well. There it was. Too late to send him off and avoid this conversation.
Talis pushed herself straight up in her seat and pulled on the hem of her jacket to smooth the wrinkles that had formed against the chair back.
“First, I don’t intend for my crew to suffer for this situation.”
He nodded, as if he’d been expecting that answer. “And second?”
She gathered her utensils onto her plate and pushed it toward him so he could clear her spot without having to come around the corner of the table. “Second, deferring your shares only helps us buy Sophie’s engine part if we have the money to dole shares out in the first place.”
She owed them for this job and the last one. She didn’t like running the ship on her crew’s credit, but the contract from Jasper seemed like such a sure thing, even with the luck needed to drop into flotsam for an object as small as he wanted. With one hand the ancient Breaker man had pushed across the payment for their previous job, a shallow tray of Imperial presscoins. The royal family’s faces had glittered there, smiling up at her. The stack was a little thin, but after ship’s costs and captain’s share, it would have netted her crew just over a thousand each. And then Jasper, his great serene face belying nothing of what was to come, mentioned a new contract. Mentioned how the payment sitting solid as stone on his desk before her would neatly cover the cost of refurbished descent gear and its installation. How the coin could be multiplied in only a few days. Reminded her that the descent gear would broaden their skill set for even more contracts later, and opportunity to prospect for more valuables on the side.
She wasn’t a tyrant, didn’t take the contract on her own say-so. She ran it by her crew. Their money in her hand, right in front of them. They could have taken it if they wanted. If they chose the payment they could count with their hands instead of their imaginations, fine. Talis could have found them some other job. Something smaller, no doubt, but that wouldn’t require negatives in their logbook. Gods rot it, she could’ve bought that bi-clutch right then.
But they trusted her. Took her enthusiasm up as their own.
As Tisker opened his mouth to speak again, she saw his chest rise with an unsteady breath. “You think Sophie’s gonna leave us?”
Sighing, Talis stood up, and grabbed the rum bottle off the table. It was nearly empty. One more thing on the list of purchases she couldn’t afford to make at their next stop. She fumbled to re-cork it, then stowed the bottle away.
“What Sophie does is up to Sophie. But one day, yeah, she’s going to want to follow through on those plans she’s always scratching at.”
Sophie wanted her own airship. More than that, and more expensive, she wanted to commission her own ship, from her own designs. Talis knew that someday, when the prize from a contract topped off what it would take to make that happen, Sophie would leave Wind Sabre and go be her own captain. Then maybe she’d learn what kind of hard decisions it took to keep a ship and crew together.
“But… soon?” Tisker was still just a kid. Didn’t know that a pain barreling down at you in the here and now was sometimes easier to deal with than one you could only anticipate. One haunting the distances beyond your prow, too far out to get a bead on.
“Not as soon as maybe she’d like,” Talis said. Her voice sounded bitter. She hadn’t meant for it to come out like that. The rum had made her too honest. “Don’t know what she’s managed to put aside for it, but it can’t be enough for the marvel of engineering she’s no doubt got going.”
Not that Sophie was keeping the plans a secret. Probably the girl wanted Talis to show some interest in them. No doubt, as first mate and liaison to the crew, Dug knew a lot more about the workings of Sophie’s dream ship than he did about Wind Sabre’s. Talis had really only let Sophie tell her about any upgrades she could imagine for the ship she was on now. They’d made a number of them over the years. It was how they ran a ship built for twenty hands with a crew of four, with shift rotations. Sophie could plan upgrades for the ship for the rest of her career, and Talis would be quite satisfied with that.
But Sophie wouldn’t.
“It really is an impressive design, Cap.” Tisker wiped down the table with a cotton cloth, soaking up the droplets spilled from their
