Althea had watched in horrified fascination. She was dimly aware that her mother was now holding and trying to comfort a sobbing, near-hysterical Keffria. Two servants, no longer able to restrain their curiosity, were peeping around the corner of the door. Althea knew she should intervene, but all that was happening was so far outside her experience that she could only gape. Kitchen servants gossiped of having squabbles like this at home, or one heard of tradesmen apprenticing their sons against their wills. She'd heard of ship's discipline like this on other vessels. Things like this simply never happened in the homes of Old Trader families. Or if it did, it was never spoken of.
    "Do you understand me?" Kyle demanded, as if shouting louder at the boy would make his words more comprehensible. Dazed as he was, Wintrow still managed a nod. Kyle let go of his shirt front. The boy staggered, then caught at the table's edge. He stood, head hanging.
    "Now means now!" Kyle barked in angry triumph. His head swiveled to the door and a gaping serving man there. "You! Welf! Stop your gawking and escort my son down to the Vivacia. See that he packs and takes everything he came here with, for he'll be living on the ship from now on."
    As Welf hastened into the room to take Wintrow's arm and lead him out of the room, Kyle rounded on Althea. His success at bullying his son seemed to have bolstered his courage, for he challenged her with, "Are you wise enough to take a lesson from this, sister?"
    Althea kept her voice even and low. "I'd be very surprised if we had not all learned something about you today, Kyle. Chiefly that there is very little you won't do in your ambition to control the Vestrit family."
    "Control?" Kyle stared at her incredulously, and then turned to the other two women to see if they were as astonished as he was. But Ronica met his gaze with a black stare, while Keffria sobbed against her shoulder. "Is that what you think this is about? Control?" He shook his head and gave a brittle laugh. "This is about salvage. Damn me, I don't know why I try. You all look at me as if I were a criminal, when all I'm trying to do is keep this family afloat. Keffria! You know what this is about. We've talked about this."
    He turned towards his wife. She finally lifted her tear-stained face to meet his gaze, but there was no understanding in her eyes. He shook his head in disbelief. "What am I supposed to do?" he asked of them all. "Our holdings are losing money every day, we've a liveship we're still paying the money lenders for, our creditors are threatening to start confiscating our holdings, and you all seem to think we should genteelly ignore it and take tea together. No, I take that back. Althea seems to think she should hasten our progress toward ruin by keeping the liveship as a toy for herself, while she spends her evenings getting drunk with the local water rats and having a bit of slap and tickle on the side."