Outside, the sun was high now, warm enough to chase winter’s breath off the mountain. Birds sang and squirrels rushed back and forth, carrying pinecones and acorns. I paused to listen for weird snorting or jaw clacking, anything that might herald one of those blue monsters. When I heard nothing but ordinary autumn sounds, I reminded myself that I was trying not to think about blue skin and ashes and fangs.

I was feeling tired, nearly drunk with fatigue, which made the not-thinking easier. I was actually shuffling my feet because it felt like too much work to lift them off the ground. Combat boots were heavy when you were exhausted. It must be an adrenaline crash—and the fact that I’d been awake for over twenty-four hours straight now. I just needed a nap and some food. And to be rescued, of course. I was pretty sure that would cure all my ills.

I stopped at the end of the road, the wind kicking up the dirt around my feet. I wanted to start running and not stop.

“ ‘When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor, a highwayman comes riding,’ ” I murmured to myself, but it didn’t make me feel any better.

Sighing, I turned slowly back toward the crumbling ghost town.

“You don’t leave a man behind,” Saga said from the doorway of a crooked house. “Good girl.” She was leaning on one shoulder, the light glinting off the tarnished silver buttons of her frock coat. She wore tight black rolled-up jeans underneath and a frilly white tank top.

I froze, then frowned. “Wait. Sunlight.” I lifted my chin. “I knew you guys were insane. If you were a vampire, you’d burst into flames.”

She extended one hand so that the light fell on her pale blue skin. It was like she’d been painted with watercolors, versus the man last night who looked as if he’d been smeared with rancid oil paint. She didn’t burn or blister or smoke like charred meat. The scars on her hands and forearms went a little pink, but that was it. The vampire thing was a delusion. It was some sort of historical prank, or they were garden-variety crazy people.

Which didn’t explain Connor’s dead faint.

Or make me feel any better, actually.

“Sunlight won’t kill me,” she said, amused. “I’m too old. But too much will make me feel worse than I would the morning after a barrel of bad rum.” She straightened. “Come in, girl. Aidan’s snoring like a wildebeest and I’m in need of easy company.”

I crossed the street hesitantly.

She smirked. “Not going to turn lily-livered on me, are you?”

I cleared my throat. “No.” I stumbled when I noticed the blue hand nailed to the door.

Saga shrugged nonchalantly, as if everyone decorated with body parts. “It’s a warning.”

I swallowed. “To who?” And of what, exactly? Extreme grossness?

“To the Hel-Blar.”

“The Hel-Blar? That sounds like a bad rock band.”

She just waved me inside the old house. I went with a great deal of trepidation. I really didn’t want anything cut off to be used as decoration, but someone who sawed off hands wasn’t someone I wanted to defy. Not until I got my bearings, anyway.

The house was swept free of dust and there was a shelf covered in pewter mugs and a big harvest table. Several muskets hung on the wall along with a few curved daggers, but no body parts. A basket of stakes whittled to such a fine point you could have embroidered with them stood by the door. Huge clay jugs crowded one corner. It looked old-fashioned but normal.

She poured something amber colored out of a smaller pitcher and slid a mug over toward me. “Have a seat and have a drink.”

I smelled it gingerly. It was like paint thinner. I wrinkled my nose and took the smallest sip possible, then choked violently when it burned down my throat and turned into fire.

“What is that?” I croaked, sitting on the bench with a thump. I wouldn’t have been surprised if smoke came out of my mouth.

“Grog.” Saga laughed loudly and drained her cup, slamming it down. “Finest moonshine rum there is. Makes me think of home.” She refilled her cup and then leaned back, crossing her bare feet at the ankles and resting them on the edge of the table. She licked her lips. “Your heart’s like cannon shot.”

I cringed back, looking around for a weapon. There were dozens everywhere but none within reach. She ran a hand over her mouth. She scraped her chair closer to mine and all I could smell was wet soil. “Relax,” she said. Against all odds, I did. My shoulders didn’t feel like they were going to shatter.

She turned and drank from a narrow fluted bottle that looked as if it was once meant for perfume. There were tight lines around her gray eyes and her lips. I was pretty sure it wasn’t alcohol in that bottle. For one thing, it was too red. “Never mind, lass. I’ve fought harder battles than this. I was born in Tortuga, and I sailed with the best of them. Grace O’Malley, Anne Bonny, Mary Read.” She smiled with what I could only term as nostalgia. “Once a pirate, always a pirate.”

“Is that why you took me? So I could be a pirate?” This was making less and less sense.

“I stole you because I’m a pirate. It’s what we do.” She leaned in, whispering conspiratorially. I jerked back, but her eyes gleamed with laughter, not hunger. Whatever was in that bottle had sated her. “We like to steal things.”

I nearly smiled. She was scary, with the daggers and muskets hanging all over the place, not to mention the needle-sharp teeth, but she was kind of fun, too. It didn’t make sense. She didn’t act like a kidnapper or a monster, or even like someone who claimed to be hundreds of years old.