The Fanged Crown: The Wilds by Jenna Helland

impossible that the Chultan jungle would be the place he found her, curled up in a hollow like a frightened animal.
    Suddenly he didn’t know if he could take it. He wasn’t a sentimental man. Those who were close to him called him cold. And he wouldn’t have admitted it to another soul, not to Boult or Kitto, who were the only family he had. But the first time he Liel on the deck of the Marderward was frozen in his memory like a painter’s still-life. If it was possible to love someone from the first moment you saw them, Harp had loved Liel starting then.
    O- ŚŠŚ
    Harp had been twenty-nine years old when he first set foot on the Marderward, a three-mast ship with a glossy black hull edged with gold. The carving of a raven-haired maiden graced her prow, her painted arm outstretched as if she were leading them across the treacherous seas. The ship’s decks shone, and her sails were as white as snow. The crew’s quarters were spotless, and a collection of well-fed cats kept them free of vermin.
    But the ship’s impressive exterior hid a rotten core. After only a few days aboard the ship, Harp regretted the night when he shared a few pints with some of the crewmen of the Marderward. Harp had just ended a charter on a filthy, ill-run boat that ran stolen goods up and down the Sword Coast. He’d been on pirate vessels for nearly ten years and had a vague notion that he wanted a legitimate life away from the pirating that had marked his sailing career thus far.
    The Marderward’s sailors assured Harp that their captain was a fair man who ran a tight ship. The crewmen paid for round after round of ale, and before the night was up, Harp signed a year’s contract under Captain Taraf Predeau. He woke up with a headache and hoped for the best.
    The red-haired, broad-shouldered captain had a deceptively boyish face and friendly grin. On Harp’s first day aboard, the captain shook his hand and personally showed him around the immaculate ship, explaining the tight schedules and rigid discipline that was expected from his sailors. Despite his easy-going manners, Harp felt uneasy around the captain, with his booming voice and biting humor.
    From the beginning, Predeau made fun of Harp’s name, calling him Lute or Whistle. At first, Harp thought the captain was trying to get a rise out of him, but he soon realized the captain viewed Harp as a kindred spirit. And after a few tendays on the ship, it turned Harp’s stomach that there was something about him that was appealing to a man such as Predeau. By that point, Harp understood that Predeau’s clean-cut appearance was nothing but a facade. And it was his blood-encrusted whip and his steel-toed boots that told the true story of his depraved nature.
    Although he had a joint license from the Houses of Amn, Predeau was far from a merchant seaman, despite what the sailors had led Harp to believe. By the time Liel was kidnapped and brought aboard the ship, Harp had seen how Predeau’s kidnap-and-ransom scheme worked several times over. It soon became obvious that Predeau didn’t kidnap arbitrary people off the street, but he did so at the request of the politically well connected. Mostly, it was perfunctory—haul them out of their beds at night, take them to the ship, and lock them up until their kin paid the coin. It wasn’t pretty, but it wasn’t cruel either. And there was a certain amount of satisfaction in watching
    a silk-robed nobleman spend a few days locked in the hold until the price was paid.
    But Predeau hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d said he ran a tight ship. He issued beatings or withheld the crew’s payment for the slightest infraction. Still, Harp could have tolerated the conditions, except for the fact that Predeau treated the youngest members of his crew worse than the older sailors. Boys as young as eight who were purchased from parents who were desperate for any coin they could get their hands on. The so-called cabin hands were indentured until