RUSALKA

RUSALKA

A retired female assassin is mistaken for her lover in a piratical coup. On an uninhabited island in Sweden, Caina learns she's never changed.

They let me get hold of a blade.

Their mistake.

My mistake lay in believing the Rusalka's crew enough to protect us from pirates. The Marska had sunk in 1564, and someone we'd trusted had leaked the GPS location of the wreck. My scholarship and the crew of divers had found it, and its treasure. The pirates had found us. On the Baltic sea of all places.

The crew's blood had washed the deck, including the owner's. They only kept me alive because I'd lied my ass off. Good thing they'd believed me the titleholder. Granted, my lover and I did share a superficial resemblance. Her bank accounts alone were worth more than the treasure salvaged from the wreck. The pirates had kept me captive for days, sailing up the coast of Gotland to this deserted place.

I lay quietly where they'd thrown me after beaching the landing raft. I watched the bobbing lights of the yacht where she berthed far off the uninhabited island of Gotska Sandon. Deep into the night, my captors celebrated. My eyes burned, but I refused to shed tears, not yet. After my vengeance would be soon enough. The blood of friends and lovers cried out for company on the long walk into death, and I wouldn't let them walk alone. Not while breath filled my lungs.

I wrapped my fingers loosely around the blade I'd found. It was old, but still of modern make. Probably rusty as hell but the pirates wouldn't need to worry about tetanus when I'd finished with them. I worked my bound wrists down over the back of my thighs and pulled my ankles through the loop of my hands.

I listened carefully. They'd pitched camp on the side of the island furthest away from the national park. Tourists left at dusk. No one lived here. Far above, the sky spread like black velvet speckled with diamonds. In the east, a faint smear of gray edged the horizon. It needed to be now. These arsehats were early risers. Even if they'd drunk too much last night, one at least would wake early to piss.

Listening to the resonant snores of the crew, I sawed at the ropes binding my ankles, then braced the handle of the knife--a Ka-Bar by the feel--between my heels and raked my bracelets of knotted cord against the serrated edge. The fibers parted slowly but steadily, and gratitude that they'd used cotton clothesline to tie me warmed my chest. Nylon or chain would've been problematic.

Finally, the ties gave, and I eased to standing. I shifted on the sand, warming my muscles and getting the feel of the terrain. There were six of them, four men and two women. The harsh glow of the campfire--now reduced to embers--cast little light, but the full silver orb of the moon cresting the clear sky illuminated more than enough for my task.

Cold, night-damp sand shushed under my bare feet, and sharp blades of dune grass whispered against my jeans as I crept closer. The summer night slithered like cool silk over my bare arms. Excitement bubbled up inside me. I marked the man lying furthest from the flames for first death. Alistair--a young redhead with a Scot's accent--lay sprawled and uncaring on a mattress salvaged from Rusalka. I wanted the holstered DW razorback 10 mm near his left hand.

Accustomed to the dim light, the caress of the moon's rays gleamed on the brushed nickel of the pistol and the long, curving wave of Alistair's red lashes. I'd seen him moving around, as I'd watched each of my captors over the past days. The younger brother of the woman who led this group, he wasn't old enough for university yet. I inched closer, it wasn't the first time I'd killed. Eagerly, I crouched down. They didn't know that neither the name I'd given them nor the one I'd given my lover were accurate.

It was them or me.

Alistair's eyes flew open wide, and the guuerk that escaped him when I drove the rusty blade up under his chin and into his brain made me close my eyes in satisfaction.

Luck, fickle bitch, smiled on me in that moment as his scalding blood bathed my fist. The sound didn't carry the ten feet to the others. Nor did the scrape of leather against steel as I pulled his RZ-10. I've always had a gift for weapons, a benefit in my trade.

I checked the clip, full, and he carried it hot, a round in the chamber. Idiot.

I smiled happily, thought about playing with them and decided not to.

The trigger bit into my finger on the first hard squeeze, easier after that. At ten feet, my aim is close to perfect. Pink-gray brain matter splattered over silvered sands, the crack-crack-crack of my vengeance echoed off the pine forest skirting the beach, and the bellowing cries of seals marked my freedom.

Five times, I squeezed, five more lives I took. Hair of bronze, black or red silk, downy black braids and the bald brown pate of the last man, awake and training his weapon at me. My bullet gave him a third eye.

In the silence of ecstatic murder, the scent of cordite tasted bitter on the dawn air. The seals--iconic members of this Swedish island--and the startled birds of the dunes and forest, all objected to this violation of the peace.

I stood, alone, finally letting my tears fall. I'd miss her, my lover, I glanced at Rusalka, being her heir of record helped.

Brilliant purple flowers in a nest of green lay speckled with scarlet blood.

I fed the campfire, poured a cup of leftover coffee from the pot with calm hands, and drank it black.

I rarely let the monster out. We're all savages if pushed hard enough. It just didn't take much for me.

I liked it that way.