Chapter 16: Lighthouse Fires

The lighthouse on Windmouth's northern point rose over the rocks like a lone white fang, its light sweeping steadily across the water every few seconds, and it struck Mira as the one honest thing in this whole affair, where literally every participant in the coming meeting intended to deceive the others.

The crew took up their positions well before sunset — Dolf and Barro hidden among the boulders at the base of the cliff, Gretta and two sailors settled into the brush a little farther up the slope, where they had a clear view of the open ground before the lighthouse, while Captain Darnveil waited below alone, as the note had demanded, unarmed at first glance, though Mira knew a short knife was hidden beneath his coat — not for attack, only as a last resort.

Mira herself was hidden in a nearby crevice in the rock, against her own protests.

"Renhart wants you," Gretta said firmly, settling her into the hiding spot. "Which means you're the last thing that should appear on that ground, not the first. Wait for the signal."

Renhart arrived exactly at sunset — not alone, but with four soldiers, and Tobb, bound but, to Mira's relief, clearly unharmed, whom one of the soldiers shoved forward into the open space before the lighthouse.

"Captain Darnveil. Punctuality — an underappreciated virtue these days." The inquisitor's voice sounded as polite and level as it had at their first meeting on the open sea, as if they were discussing the weather rather than a hostage exchange. "As I understand it, the young lady we discussed is somewhere nearby as well? I doubt you'd have come without some insurance."

"Let the boy go," the captain said, not answering directly. "Him first. Then we'll talk about the rest."

Renhart tilted his head, as if weighing the request with genuine curiosity rather than from a position of superiority.

"You know, captain, in the short but eventful course of our acquaintance, I've come to hold you in a certain regard. You're stubborn, resourceful, and clearly willing to go far for your people. A shame that quality has landed you on the side of heresy rather than the side of the law."

"A law that kills children for what they were born isn't worthy of the word," Darnveil shot back, hard.

"A philosophical debate for another time, perhaps." Renhart nodded to one of his soldiers, who shoved Tobb a little closer to the captain, then stopped, clearly awaiting further orders rather than releasing the prisoner outright. "The boy goes to you the moment I see the girl. Not before. I'm not so naive, captain, as to give up my one point of leverage before I get what I came for."

This was the prearranged signal they'd agreed on — not a word, but the very hesitation itself, the moment the inquisitor refused to release Tobb without Mira's appearance. Gretta, hidden in the brush above, gave a short whistle, mimicking a night bird's call, and in the next instant the captain's plan snapped into motion.

Dolf and Barro rose simultaneously from behind the boulders, striking the two soldiers nearest Tobb from the flank before they could react. Gretta and her men opened musket fire — not to kill, aiming at the ground near the remaining soldiers' feet to sow panic without spilling blood unless absolutely necessary. The captain lunged forward to Tobb, cutting his bonds with the hidden knife in a matter of seconds.

"Run for the rocks!" he shouted at the cabin boy, shoving him toward cover, then spun to face Renhart, drawing the knife openly now.

The inquisitor, against Mira's expectations, showed not the slightest panic — he stepped back, calmly watching the unfolding chaos with the expression of a man for whom this was an unpleasant but predictable inconvenience rather than a genuine threat.

"How crude, captain," he said, drawing from his belt not a weapon but a whistle, and giving it a short blast. Voices rose from an Inquisition boat moored nearby in the shadow of the rocks — it turned out Renhart had brought far more men than he'd first revealed, and now half a dozen more soldiers spilled out onto the ground before the lighthouse.

Mira, watching from her crevice, felt Gretta's resolve about "wait for the signal" begin to give way to panic as she saw the balance of force shifting rapidly against them. Tobb, having reached cover safely, immediately turned to run back and help the captain, but Mira caught his arm.

"Stay here, you just got free!"

"But the captain's out there alone against three times the men!"

The fight at the base of the lighthouse was spreading, and though the Gray Current's crew fought desperately and skillfully, it was clear: without some additional edge, they wouldn't hold out long against the inquisitor's reinforcements. Mira, gripping the dagger Gretta had given her, made her decision before she'd properly finished thinking it through.

She stepped out of hiding.

"Renhart!" she shouted, and every eye on that ground — friend and enemy alike — turned to her at once. "I'm here. Let them all go, and I'll come with you willingly."

"Mira, no!" the captain cried, but it was too late — Renhart, seeing her, raised a hand, halting his soldiers with that single gesture as easily as he might have stilled servants at a dinner table.

"A sensible decision," the inquisitor said, with what struck Mira as genuine satisfaction. "Though I confess I'd expected to obtain you differently. Well, I won't complain about good fortune."

He took a step toward her — and at that exact moment the ground beneath everyone's feet trembled palpably, as if the sea, until then quietly murmuring at the foot of the cliffs, had suddenly roared with a single deafening crash of wave against stone, though there wasn't the faintest trace of a storm anywhere in sight.

Renhart froze, glancing toward the water with an expression that, for the first time in their entire acquaintance, had lost its unshakable politeness. And then, seizing that single moment of his distraction, Captain Darnveil lunged forward, knocking the soldier nearest Mira off his feet with a powerful shoulder blow.

"Fall back to the ship! Now!" he roared, and the whole crew, seizing the sudden chaos, began pulling back rapidly toward the shore, where the boat awaited them.

Renhart, to Mira's surprise, didn't give immediate chase — instead he stood motionless, staring at the water churning against the rocks with the expression of a man who had just received an important, troubling confirmation of his own suspicions.

"We'll meet again, child," he called after her, and in his voice, usually so level, there rang for the first time a note of real, unconcealed impatience. "Sooner than you think. You see, I'll soon have a far more persuasive argument for our next meeting."

The crew reached the Gray Current without losses, save for a few scrapes and bruises, but Renhart's words gave Mira no peace the whole way back. Only once the ship was already pulling away from shore under cover of night did Dolf, having searched the pockets of a soldier knocked unconscious in the fight, silently hand the captain a folded sheet of paper.

It was a cargo manifest — a dry, official Royal Service document authorizing "the transport of special cargo, designated Relic Number Seven, for delivery to the caves of the southern coast, for the purpose of conducting a suppression ritual in the presence of a Senior Inquisitor."

"The southern coast," Hasso whispered, reading the manifest over the captain's shoulder, his face going whiter than the ship's own canvas. "That's… that's my cave. The one with the altar."

Captain Darnveil looked up from the document, and in his eyes Mira saw the same understanding that had gripped her a second before.

"So the Anchor isn't with Renhart," he said grimly. "It's already on its way to the cave, separately, under the guard of someone even higher-ranking. And judging by the date on this manifest, we have less than two days to get there first."