The Bright and Breaking Sea (A Captain Kit Brightling Novel Book 1)

The summons came the next morning as she was pulling on her boots. She was mildly irritated at herself for being excited to see Grant again.

“Viscount,” she reminded herself, and thought of the viscountess’s rooms at Grant Hall, the fine fabrics and soft furnishings, and the misery of being captive inside that prison instead of on the sea, where she belonged.

She met him in the palace, just outside the throne room. They exchanged nods. His tailcoat was dark blue, a shade that nearly matched what she’d seen inside the Northern Sea.

“You’re back in uniform,” he said.

“It is a relief.”

“It is a pity,” Grant countered. “You were very fetching in red.”

“I find the uniform suits me best,” she said. And from the tension in his jaw, he didn’t seem to care for the reminder of the obstacle between them.

“Lucien?” Kit asked.

“Was asleep when I left,” Grant said. “I asked Will to keep an eye. Your sister?”

“Home safely, without even an improper word from Dorian, which is a rather remarkable surprise.”

Grant bit back a smile. “I presume you managed not to follow another hackney on the return home?”

“I considered following the Earl of Glenndon,” she said with a glint in her eyes, “but given he has nearly ninety years, I thought it would be a very dull trip. A woman must have standards, after all.”

They were admitted with haste, found Chandler with the queen. Chandler in navy today, the queen in gleaming gold.

“The traitor was wearing a Guild token,” the queen said with disgust when they reached the throne. Grant had apparently managed to send an update, Lucien and Forsythe notwithstanding.

“He was, Your Highness.”

“Any possibility that you mistook a button or medal, or the token of some other merchant or organization?”

“No, Your Highness,” Kit said. “I saw the eagle quite clearly.”

The queen sighed heavily. “I’d hoped against hope the report was wrong. In matters as sensitive as this, one must confirm.” She glanced at Chandler. “You’ve made discreet inquiries about the wounded man?”

“I have, Your Highness, and will advise.”

The queen nodded, looked back at Kit. “I understand you were injured during the operation.”

“A minor laceration.”

“From the knife you collected and then threw back at the traitor.”

Kit nodded.

“In that case, well done.” The queen sat back, looked over Kit and Grant. “You’ve become a surprisingly reliable team. Your reliability, of course, is not surprising.” The queen smiled. “But your ability to work together was.”

It still surprised Kit.

“We know the Guild is involved in the creation of the ship, the passage of information to Gerard or his allies. That, in turn, implicates Frisia,” the queen said, gesturing for Chandler to continue.

“They have a ship,” Chandler said. “And apparently a ship that utilizes magic in some form. We need to know the Guild’s plan. Where they intend to sail it, what they intend to attack. Those plans are likely inside the consulate, probably in the office of the Frisian ambassador.”

“Once again,” the queen said, “and until we identify the traitor within the Crown Command, we must impose upon you. Infiltrate the consulate,” she said. “And find what plans you can.”

The situation was too dire for excitement, Kit knew. The threat of war too serious. But Kit couldn’t help but be . . . intrigued . . . by the possibility of sneaking through a foreign consulate.

“If you are caught,” the queen said, expression grim, “your mission will not be acknowledged by me or the Crown Command. We will disclaim any knowledge of your activities. That is a risk you must consider. And because of that, if you wish to decline, that declination will not be held against you.”

Grant and Kit looked at each other. Kit expected he saw anticipation in her eyes, and she saw determination in his. They nodded, looked back to the queen.

“Understood,” Kit said.

“We can provide a plan for the building,” Chandler said. “But it’s not been updated since the war, so it may not prove especially helpful.”

This time, Kit felt utter confidence. “I believe I know someone who can assist us.”

It was the last town house in a row, situated on a narrow lane only a half mile from her own. White brick, with a door on the right-hand side and a small plot of flowers on the left.

Kit used the iron knocker—shaped like an anchor, of course—and waited for a response.

The woman who answered a moment later was tall and striking, with light brown skin and dark, gleaming hair in a sleek knot at the base of her neck. Her nose was straight, her eyes wide, her mouth a small bow.

“Kit! How lovely to see you.” Her brows lifted at the sight of Grant behind her. “Is everything all right?”

“It is, Nanae. And I apologize for interrupting your time with him, but we need to speak with Jin.”

“Of course. Come in, come in.

“Oh, hello,” she said, with a grin that was as much interest and intrigue as surprise. “I don’t believe we’re acquainted.”

“Rian Grant,” he said, and made a perfect bow.

“Ah, the soldiering viscount,” she said with a sly smile. “I’m Nanae Takamura. Please come in.”

She stepped aside while they entered, and closed the door behind them. The foyer was small, a parlor to their right, a narrow staircase leading up to the second floor. A hallway led back to the kitchen.

“Our housekeeper, Mary, has the catarrh, so we’re a bit out of sorts,” Nanae said, then led them into the parlor.

Jin sat on a sofa of green velvet. With one hand, he cradled their youngest, Emi, who chewed contemplatively on a small toy. In the other, he held a small book. His older daughter, Saori, was curled on his other side, gaze on the book.

It was, Kit thought, a pretty perfect visage.

“I’d rise to greet you,” Jin said quietly, eyes dancing with humor, “but there are two very heavy weights upon me.”

He wore no uniform today, but buff trousers and a matching vest, his long legs booted and stretched out in the sunlit room. His long, dark hair was loose, framing his oval face. It was a side of Jin she rarely had the opportunity to see.

“We’re sorry to bother you,” Kit whispered. “It’s just that we need your . . . unique advice.”

His brows lifted with interest, his eyes alight with it. “I enjoy providing unique advice.”

Nanae smiled knowingly. “Let me take the girls,” she said, then lifted Emi from Jin’s lap. “Come, Saori. Let’s go have a bit of lunch.”

She hopped off the couch and took her mother’s outstretched hand, but looked back with wide eyes at Kit and Grant.

Kit watched them leave. And wondered, not for the first time, how difficult it was for Nanae to raise two children while her husband, her partner, was gone for months at a time, and she’d receive only sporadic updates about his safety. Kit wasn’t sure how they managed it. The separation, the fear, the danger.

“All right,” Jin said with a smile. “What are you planning to steal?”

“We aren’t sure yet,” Kit said. “But we’ll find it in the Frisian consulate.”

Jin’s eyes went wide. “There are very few times that I regret the loss of my rather adventurous bachelorhood. This may be one of them.”

“It would be a joy to have you along on our felonious adventure,” Kit said. “But your place, for now, is here. However, if you’ve ideas, we could use them.”

Jin’s smile was bright and broad. “Oh, I have ideas. Take a seat,” he invited, and waited until they had. “Now,” he began, when his pupils were ready. “There are four means of ingress on the first floor of the building.”

It was specific. That was Kit’s first and last impression of Jin’s plan. It was very, very specific.

“He’s put great thought into this,” Grant said outside.

“He puts great thought into everything he does,” Kit said. “He enjoys evaluation and consideration. But this particularly? Yes. Jin is as skilled a thief as you will ever meet.”

“A good thing he’s on our side.”

“Yes,” Kit agreed. “It is.”

They returned to their respective homes, waited until darkness fell, and met outside the consulate, both in black. Kit had borrowed a jacket from a footman, paired it with dark trousers and boots. Grant wore a dark greatcoat over a dark ensemble.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

“I’ve been waiting all day. Finding evidence of treachery is more enjoyable than I’d have imagined.”

“Yes,” Grant said dryly. “It’s only the being caught and imprisoned that ruins the mood.”

The Frisian consulate was three symmetrical stories of columns and windows in white stone. As Jin had warned them, the main entrance was in the middle of the front facade, and was guarded by soldiers. So they weren’t going in that way.

The consulate was the middle of three buildings that stood in a row. On the right, the offices of the Isles’ revenue department, where taxes were levied, stamps were issued, paperwork was reviewed. It had its own entrance and, by some determination of the architects, a door in its basement that led into the consulate.

No one bothered to guard the paperwork, Jin said, and Kit and Grant walked easily inside the front doors of the revenue building, offered severe nods to the only human they passed as they moved through the quiet hallway and then down a flight of stairs to the basement.

They passed shelf after shelf of leather-bound ledgers in green and red, and more than a few spiderwebs, to the very back of the storage space. And the narrow wooden door that led into the consulate.

Carefully, Kit turned the knob, bracing her body as if to ward off the sound.

It turned silently, and she pulled it open, glanced inside.

From revenue basement to consulate basement, and revenue storage to consulate storage. More ledgers, more files, and more doors. They crept through tall shelves of ledgers and boxes to another opening, then into a long corridor with more locked doors. It was quiet enough here that Kit could hear her own heartbeat, currently pummeling her ribs as adrenaline pumped.

The corridor ended in a simple wooden staircase. They stayed against the wall, moved upward to the main level, and waited just outside the doorway.

The building was silent. But as Jin had promised, it took only moments for slow steps and a bobbing light to come nearer, pause, pass. A guard on duty, making a search of the floor.

When silence fell again, they crept down the corridor, then to the grander wood and iron staircase. They took the steps two at a time, then peered around into the second floor, found it empty.

The ambassador’s office was at the end of the hallway in a suite of rooms that overlooked the road, the palace beyond. They saw no one, and the door was closed, no light beneath. And as Jin had promised, unlocked. So confident were the Frisians that no one would make it past the guards.

Ironic that they could also use the advice of a thief, Kit thought.

Grant opened the door, and they slipped inside. He found a beeswax candle on a side table and lit it, and they looked around. Sitting room, necessary room, and office proper. The office was smaller than Kit had expected, but neatly appointed, with fine furniture and a desk of pale and gleaming wood.

Kit moved to the desk, and in the dim candlelight, began inspecting each pile. Found personnel records, budgets, summaries of foreign trade. Nothing even remotely resembling a state secret. Frustrated, she moved into the center of the space, turned a circle to take another look, and felt something shift beneath her feet.

There you are, she thought.

“Grant. Bring the light.”

He moved over, the candle casting a circle of light over the floor.

Kit pressed a toe against the other end of the board, and it popped up, revealing a small, dark hold. “One of my favorites,” she said, and reached inside, pulled out a small diary bound in black leather. And beneath it, two leather portfolios of papers.

She took those, too, closed the board again. From inside the first portfolio, she found a folded drawing. Casting a cautious glance toward the hallway, and finding it dark and quiet, she spread the document on the table.

It took a moment for Kit to parse what she was looking at; the shapes and lines were so foreign to anything she’d seen before. And then she understood.

It was a ship. An enormous one, nearly two hundred feet from bow to stern. Two decks of guns, and two spindly masts that weren’t nearly large enough to move the bulk of it, and were disproportionately short. And between them, an apparatus. Some kind of machine, she thought, with gears visible, attached to a long cabinet.

A ship whose sails, perhaps, were only necessary in limited circumstances, so they needn’t be as many or as large. A ship that relied on whatever was inside that box to operate.

She flipped through the other pages in the portfolio, but found no other schematics. Grant had done the same, shook his head.

“There will be another drawing,” Kit said, pointing at the box. “Of what, exactly, this is, and how it operates. We have to find it.”

Kit went back to the desk, looked through the piles again, hoping she’d missed something in her first perusal, because this was the information they needed.

Something clattered in the hallway. Kit blew out the candle, slapped a hand over Grant’s mouth as they watched light glow beneath the door. The doorknob rattled once, then twice. Then the light faded again.

Then she pulled her hand away.

“I wasn’t going to speak,” he whispered.

“Abundance of caution,” Kit said. “They might be back. We need to go.”

“I’ll take the portfolios,” Grant said, and began to slip them inside his coat. “It will be easier for me if we’re caught.”

“Because you’re a man or a viscount?” Her voice was dry.

“Both,” he said evenly, gaze level.

Kit supposed she could appreciate the chivalry. But she didn’t need to be coddled.

“We each take one,” she said, and held out her hand.

He handed her a portfolio, and she stuffed it inside her coat, ensured the buttons were tied. Time to make their escape.

Another hackney home again, this time with Grant in accompaniment. He ignored her declarations that she could make the trip on her own.

“I’ll be watching to see if we’re followed,” he said, and pulled out a small pocket mirror, which he used to survey the street behind him.

“Clever,” she said, and was glad he’d thought of it, as she certainly didn’t want to lead anyone back here.

She opened the door quietly, found Jane inside in her wrapper, toe tapping.

“You’re late,” Jane said as Grant followed Kit inside.

“I told you not to stay up,” Kit said.

“It’s so late,” Grant agreed. “Surely you need sleep.”

“Having your sister involved in sorting out treachery is not good for slumber.” Jane’s mouth thinned. “I like you, Colonel Grant, so I’ll excuse your telling me what I do and do not need, given I’ve lived in this body for twenty-two years, so I’m fairly well aware of it.”

Grant worked to bite back a smile. “I stand corrected.”

Jane inclined her head. “Now that you’re home, I’ll just go to bed.” She leaned forward, kissed Kit’s cheek, then narrowed her gaze at Grant. “Go away,” she said firmly, before turning on her heel and making for the stairs.

“The Brightling girls are very independent sorts,” Grant said.

“We are,” Kit agreed, then yawned hugely. “I’ll admit to needing sleep, so we can spare that particular argument. Breaking into government offices is rather exhausting.”

“There’s little about espionage that isn’t. One grows used to it.” He turned for the door, then looked back. “You said I didn’t trust you—about Lucien. I do trust you,” Grant said. “But your bravery is rather terrifying.”

That might have been the nicest compliment he’d given her.

She nodded. “Good night, Grant.”

“Good night, Brightling.”