Vilbuck shares some useful information

Liv tried her best to regain some small shred of her dignity, but it was hard going from 'some random whore knees deep in filth sucking cock' to, well, anything remotely respectable. Vilbuck's sneer stayed pinned to his face, and despite all of her best efforts, there was nothing Liv could do to make herself feel even a little bit more dignified. The fact that they were still in the alley where the deed had been done did little to help the matter.

"The crew you'll be looking for is called the Million Banshees." Vilbuck said. His voice was firm and confident enough, but Liv still couldn't shake the feeling that this was all some elaborate trick. Her humiliation, and strange submissive response had unnerved her so deeply that she was even beginning to wonder if the book being stolen had been some part of the ruse to humiliate her. Liv tried to dismiss the paranoid thought.

"Is that all you have?" Liv's face turned into a scowl as she tried to stare him down, but... found herself backing off. She couldn't look him in the eye long enough to **** her anger at him. "I.... I didn't do all that just for a name."

"Sure, sure. It was also for the fun of it, right?" Liv's scowl returned, only earning a laugh from the man. "No, that's not all. They were through here a few days ago. It's always a big fuss when the Banshees pass by, you can hear their damn ship screaming across the whole damn city. Some say the engine's made of tortured souls."

Liv rolled her eyes. Pirates would believe anything as long as someone said it enough times.

"An old buddy of mine saw that book of yours, an eerie thing all shifting and warbling." Now it was Vilbucks turn to frown. The memory of it wasn't pleasant. "He figured it'd be worth a good bit of coin if we could filch it off of 'em, but I wasn't about to throw my other arm away too."

He paused for his joke to land. Liv just stared at him blankly.

"Probably someone around here knows where they were headed. They're the biggest and damned strongest crew around these parts, so they don't do much to hide where they're going." Vilbuck's smirk returned to his face as he reached out a hand to touch Liv's chin. "If you're gonna get yourself killed, it'd be awful rude of ya no to let me fuck ya real good first."

Liv tore herself away from him. Her instinct was to sock him in the jaw, then shoot him dead where he stood. As she hurried off out of the slums and back toward the main street, Liv found herself wondering why she didn't want to.