“My armor worked perfectly.” I’m offended.

  “They mean that even if we hunkered down and kept going with the armor running, the settlers would eventually catch up,” Tam says. “They wouldn’t even need to attempt boarding the ship. Just wait until we ran out of food and had to come out.”

  Porter comes down a few moments later and stands near the motor, listening. “It’s working hard,” he says.

  “But running smooth.”

  “Not much farther.” His eyes meet mine. I nod to him, pick up the scattered tools I got out to make a few adjustments. As I wrap them in oilcloth and put them back in their case, I hear Porter say, “We might make it.”

  He sounds surprised.

  * * *

  • • •

  I want some air after all the heat and noise on the mining deck. I wonder about what Porter said as I climb the stairs to the top of the dredge. Did he think all along that what they were trying to do was impossible?

  I understand why he’d attempt it anyway. The one thing worse than struggling for the improbable is doing nothing at all. Demons catch up with you that way. You catch up with you that way.

  Brig is among those keeping watch. He smiles at me and I cross the top of the deck, which is pitted and scraped with scars from where the armor used to be.

  “It’s a whole different ship,” he says. “No armor. And we’re moving.” He reaches out to touch a strand that has escaped my braid. “Look,” he says, because my hair is practically streaming behind me. We’ve never been moving fast enough for that to happen before.

  The dredge is burnished by the light, orange and pink and gold, and it still cannot hold a candle to the sky, to the trees, to what the water can do with all this light and color.

  “It’s hideous out here,” I say, and Brig laughs.

  Clouds race in the distance, and the trees onshore dance in the sunset. Even with the breeze, the air is heavy and hot. Relief will come later, after the clouds burst and the rain comes through. I want to be up here so I can feel it, the cooling breath after the heat, the release.

  “Why did you all give up?” I ask. “Why did you come back to the boat after the raiders caught me? You could have stayed out there. You could have run.” I want to know. What are you, through and through?

  “Naomi needed medicine,” Brig says. “And Tam said we could help you better if we came back on board. Eira agreed with him.” He shakes his head. “Of course, that was before we knew Tam was in league with the raiders.”

  “And you?” I ask. “What about you?”

  “I decided to come back with them.” Brig’s eyes hold mine. “He loved you.” Brig swallows. “The one Naomi told us about. The one you burned for.” Brig knows I’m thinking of Call. It’s impossible not to when I’m up on the deck like this.

  “Yes,” I say. “He did.”

  “I wish,” Brig says.

  What does he wish?

  But that’s all he gets out. I hear the ache in his throat. I see want in his eyes and in the press of his lips. His hair ruffles in the breeze; the air has not yet cooled.

  I understand how it feels to love someone you can’t have. Someone you know you will never have. You will never touch their face, lay your fingers along their cheek; they will never put their hands on you.

  Never.

  And I understand something more.

  I think Brig knows how much I wish he were Call.

  Brig and I do not speak or touch. We stand side by side as the sun vanishes behind the trees. My ache is as vast as the universe, as specific as each individual star.

  CHAPTER 37

  DEEP DOWN IN MY DREAM, I know something is wrong. My mind begins the swim to the top, to the real world. Away from Call and where he has met me in the dark, in the last place I can find him, low and secret, when I’m suspended in sleep.

  The ship has stopped.

  I sit straight up and reach for my boots. Why isn’t it running? What happened?

  “Poe!” Lily’s voice outside my door. “Hurry! The settlers have caught up to us!”

  I pull on my boots, yank open the door. “Why didn’t you sound the main alarm?” I ask, taking the rifle and spare clip she hands me. We head down the hallway toward the stairwells.

  “It’s not working,” Lily says, her voice grim. “Someone disabled it.”

  “Who’s on the mining deck now?” I ask. It was supposed to be Lily down there for the night shift. “Why is the ship stopped?” My heart races. Have I made another mistake? Did the motor burn out because I worked it too hard? I thought we’d have longer than this.

  “Porter ordered it stopped when he saw the settlers closing in,” Lily says.

  “Why would he do that?” I ask in disbelief.

  “Come on,” Lily says, ignoring, impatient. “We need everyone up on the upper deck who knows how to shoot. The settlers are on both sides of the river.”

  I stop. I won’t go up until she tells me. “Why did he order it stopped?”

  Lily growls in frustration. “He doesn’t want to lead the settlers to the rest of our group.”

  I swear. He’s going to get us all killed to save them.

  “Who’s with the motor right now?” I ask.

  “You’re not going to start it,” Lily says. “It’s against Porter’s orders.”

  She’s not getting it. Yes, I’d like to start the ship running and prevent anyone from tampering with the motor again, but there’s another problem. “Who’s watching the tailings stacker?”

  “Dammit,” Lily says. “I didn’t think of that.”

  “You didn’t think of that?” I ask. “It’s how you got in!”

  “We had gliders.”

  “Maybe the settlers invented something, too.”

  We’ve reached the stairs. “I’ll go down there,” she says. “You get up top. Porter asked for you.”

  * * *

  • • •

  I shove the door open and crawl out onto the deck, toward a spot on the west side of the boat near the others. My knee scrapes against a rough piece of metal where my armor used to be and I feel the slice against my skin. The raiders and my crew crouch along the railings. When I catch a glimpse of the shore, I see the settlers in their metal wagons, riding their horses, coming for us. They range along the shore, the sandbars.

  They’re gaining on us.

  “Keep down,” Porter calls out. “We wait for them to fire the first shot.”

  I check my rifle to make sure it’s ready. As I do, I hear a familiar voice to my right.

  “We almost made it,” Tam says.

  “We still can.” Desperation edges my voice. I try to tamp it down, to mirror Porter’s even cool. “We take them out, one by one, until they’re gone.”

  “Have you been in a fight like this before?” Tam asks. “On your first voyage?” He sounds determined and afraid. His hazel eyes are flint-focused on the riverbank.

  Before I can answer, the settlers open fire.

  The first shots hit the side of the ship below the railing, and my heart knocks against my chest so hard I put a hand over it. Poe. Poe. Poe. In this moment, I know what I want. I know whose side I’m on.

  “When you can get a good read on them,” Porter calls out, “fire at will.”

  I can’t get Lily’s words out of my mind. Someone destroyed the main alarm. Someone is still sabotaging us. Are they up here on the deck? Will someone shoot me in the back, the way they did Call?

  A shot from our ship. I can’t see who fired it.

  And then a volley. Ours and theirs, ricochets and noise and bullets driving home.

  Someone on the south side of the ship goes down.

  Mouth, dry. Hands, cold. Do it. Hurry.

  I take aim, narrowing my eyes. There. A settler, crouched near a bush, gun in hand. I fire. Did they fall? I can’t tell.

  Again.

  Crack. Tick. Echo.

  The sound of a rifle. Of my rifle.

  Crack. Tick. Echo.

  Over and over, everyone around me, all over the deck.

  Cracktickcracktickcracktickecho.

  There are so many more settlers. The drifters overcame our crew because of sheer numbers. They no longer have that advantage, since most of them have gone upriver to safety, to their meeting place. The settlers have more people and more guns. And they have snipers, climbing up in trees and on top of wagons. I don’t look over to the east side of the river to see what’s happening there. We have our hands full.

  Crack. Tick. Echo.

  One of our people falls over the railing into the river.

  It’s surprising how intimate it is. How, even though the river is wide and the ship is big, I can see the settlers’ faces, upturned toward us, their rifles, their arms raising to kill.

  I liked it better when I didn’t have to see them die.

  Tam takes out a sniper, who falls slack from a tree and hits the ground hard.

  “When did you learn to shoot like that?” I ask Tam.

  “I grew up near the militia training grounds,” he says. He’s lightning quick about reloading his gun and I’m not far behind. Every moment counts, every crack is a bullet headed our way. “We’ve got to bring those snipers down if we want to give the drifters a chance.”

  When Tam speaks of the drifters, he never says we. It’s not as if he wants to hold himself apart—he’s eager when he speaks about them. Rather, it’s as if he’s not certain he belongs.

  “You weren’t stolen from the drifters,” I say. “But you still helped them. Why?”

  “Because they know a bigger world than we do,” Tam lifts the gun to his shoulder. “You care about them, too.”

  “You’re right,” I say. Tam smiles at me, a smile with nothing of humor but with a certain understanding. We bring our rifles up between the rails, get our sight lines on a sniper riding toward us.

  “One,” Tam says, “two,” but then the shot is perfect, and he takes it without waiting for three, me firing a second after, and the rider goes down, swinging-slinging in his saddle, rifle dropping out of his hands. That’s Tam’s shot. Mine goes wide, missing the mark and sending a spray of leaves in the tree near the rider.

  “What a shot,” I say to Tam, and out of the corner of my eye I see the twist of his grin, and then

  and then

  a spray of blood,

  on his chest,

  and he falls.

  * * *

  • • •

  “No, no, no,” I say, pressing my hand against the wound, trying to stop it. Blood and flesh on my fingers, Tam’s skin still warm. “He’s hit!” I cry out to the medic, Laura, who crawls across the deck as fast as she can while staying low.

  But it’s no good.

  Tam’s gone, too.

  This time I saw it happen.

  CHAPTER 38

  TAM’S BLOOD ALL OVER MY HANDS. His body on the deck next to me.

  Again.

  I can’t think of what to do.

  I can think of one thing.

  I crouch-run toward the steps down from the deck. Amid the cracktickecho all around, someone shouts at me—the word coward I think—but I have no time. I have thought of this one thing and I will do it.

  Too fast. I fall halfway down the stairs, but it’s fine, I’m back on my feet in a second. Race down the hallway, open the door to my room, find what I want sitting on my desk.

  My captain’s hat.

  Will the settlers be able to see it from where they are?

  Will it matter?

  I tear the case off my pillow and start for the stairs up to the deck. Partway there, I crash into Eira from behind. Her arms are full of ammunition from the weapons closet.

  As we right ourselves, I see her taking in my hat, the pillowcase. “What are you doing?”

  “Tam’s dead,” I say, and she ricochets back, as if she’d fired a rifle and the kickback from it has rocked her, and from above we hear cries and the muffled cracks of guns.

  I shove my way past Eira and head up the steps.

  Please let me be doing the right thing.

  Please let this make a difference any difference at all.

  * * *

  • • •

  Someone has dragged Tam’s body aside, out of the way, and piled it with several others. We have lost seven all told. Already. We can’t afford any more.

  I don’t want to look at Tam, dead, but I can’t help myself.

  I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry

  There are his eyes, his mouth, that horrible gaping wound in his chest where the bullet came out—

  Wait.

  The bullet came out the front? But we were facing the settlers. It should have entered his chest from the front, not exited that way.

  Someone on our ship shot him.

  My entire body vibrates with fury. Steady. I crouch down and dart my eyes all over the deck. And there. A movement, strange and precise, amid the turmoil. Someone turns, careful. Someone waits until the cracktickechoes are so fast and wild that no one notices, and then they fire, right across the ship, into our own people. A drifter falls.

  Someone small and gray-haired and collected, cool, relentless.

  It’s Naomi.

  How could she why would she? my mind asks, and my heart sinks. I don’t want to believe this, but I saw enough to know. She shot. One of our people fell.

  Where is Brig?

  There he is. On the west railing, a few people down from where Tam and I were. I sprint across the deck—my eyes and my gun on Naomi—and shove in next to him.

  “Brig,” I say, “Naomi’s shooting at us.”

  He keeps his eyes on the settlers, and I keep mine on Naomi.

  “Are you sure?” he asks, and right then—

  She turns and looks at me and something shifts in her face, locks into place, an expression of satisfaction.

  As if she’d been looking for me this whole time.

  She’s going to shoot me.

  Why now? I wonder. Why not kill me sooner?

  But then Naomi lowers her rifle slightly. She’s going to take me down but not kill me.

  Why?

  Something about my silence alerts Brig. I feel him turn and before Naomi fires, she’s down, grabbing her arm, and Brig is on the move, heading across the deck. “Tell Porter,” he says. “I’ll lock her up below.”

  * * *

  • • •

  “Naomi was killing people on the deck,” I say to Porter. “Brig shot her.”

  He nods, lifting his rifle, not taking his eyes off the settlers on the shore.

  “She’s not dead,” I say. “Just hurt.”

  “We’ll fix that,” he says, and I feel sick rise in my throat.

  “Tam’s dead too,” I say, because it matters, I feel like people should know, and this time Porter’s face changes, some muscle twitches in response or sorrow. But we have no time for it.

  “Why did you stop the ship?” I ask. “We might have made it.”

  “I’m not leading the settlers to the rest of my group.”

  “You protect your people at the cost of mine,” I say.

  “It’s not only my people,” Porter says. “There are others there, too.” He calls out, “They’re shifting north!” and then, to me, “Get back to your post.”

  “We’re not going to die for gold,” I say to him. “Not anymore.”

  * * *

  • • •

  Back in position, where Tam’s death has left a hole in the lineup and a slick of blood on the railing, I stand up. I pull my braids in front of my shoulders and shove the captain’s hat on my head. If the settlers are looking through field glasses, they’ll know it’s me. I lift up the white pillowcase, wave it like a flag.

  Will I feel it? How bad will it hurt?

  Please not in the back, like Call.

  Like Tam.

  Hit me where I can see it. Where I can watch the blood bloom as I die and know, for a moment at least, that I was here, I am leaving.

  CHAPTER 39

  HANDS PULL AT ME, try to drag me down. “What are you doing?!”

  “What the hell?”

  I grip the rail with one hand, wave my makeshift flag with the other.

  A shot hits the railing.

  “Poe!”

  It’s Brig.

  Someone else falls on the deck a few feet away. On the shore, the settlers look invincible. There are bodies on the ground, yes, but most are standing.

  There are so many more of them. And there. Behind the others, almost in the shadows, out of the range of fire.

  The Admiral.

  I want to drop the flag. Lift my rifle and try to hit him, no matter how far away he is. No matter that he’s been certain to place himself out of reach.

  “Don’t shoot Captain Blythe!” I hear Porter call. How many drifters and crew had guns aimed at my back? I don’t turn around to find out. “Hold your fire!”

  “You’re saving as many of your people as you can,” I call out to him, in the new almost stillness that hovers in the smoke from our shots, in the pause that cannot last. “I have to do the same for mine.”

  “Poe!” Brig calls out, his voice desperate. “What are you doing?”

  “Surrendering,” I say.

  CHAPTER 40

  THE SETTLERS LOCK US UP in the cafeteria.

  I was hoping for the mining deck.

  Some of my own crew look daggers at me. The drifters spit and swear in my direction. Lily’s eyes are full of anger, which I’m used to from her, and betrayal. That’s new. She never expected anything from me before, so I couldn’t disappoint her.