Chapter 29
Hook
His hook.
Now that was a story he hadn’t thought about in years. One he’d never fully told. Figures she’d ask about it eventually. He’d taken it as his name, after all.
He sighed and lay his head on the stone, staring up at the stalactites above. With Tink’s soft warmth curled against him and contentment from their coupling still flowing through his veins, it was as good a time as any to face those old memories.
“Ah, where to begin.” He slid his fingers through her hair.
“My ma got sick. Salt fever. It dries out the body slowly, over weeks, until a person is a husk of themselves and lets go. Lots of people got it that year, and the doctor’s stores of violet root had run out.
It was the only cure for the slow disease that ate away at her.
I was still on the edge of a boy, scraping by with what I could make working the fishing boats.
It took everything I had and then some—my first steps into piracy—to get the witch to use her spells and direct me to violet root.
It grew on another island, a few days’ journey by boat.
Didn’t have my own ship then. Thought to steal one, but captaining it on my own during the storm season was a fool’s mission.
Couldn’t help Ma from the bottom of the sea. ”
Tink propped herself up on one elbow. “I thought you and Smee were friends since childhood.”
“Aye, we were. But he was watching after Ma for me, along with his own family. One of us had to. His ma was pregnant, and his da, well, he’d been older when they settled down.
Could barely get around back then and passed not too long after.
Smee, as the oldest, always had a lot to do.
Even then he was happy to help. Loyal. Always optimistic. ”
His lips pulled into a grin at the thought of his first mate, his first friend, and really his brother if ever he had one.
They’d gotten into such trouble as boys before obligation to family encouraged them to straighten up…
and before they sought any means they could to provide for those they loved.
Hook shook his head, his smile vanishing.
“Anyhow, I heard of a ship going toward the island where the violet root grew.”
A soft gasp whispered across his skin. “The Kraken?”
Hook nodded. “I begged that bastard, begged him on my knees, to let me join him just until they reached my destination. I still remember how he grinned at me, one golden tooth gleaming through his thick, bushy beard. Then he clapped me on the shoulder with his beefy hand and proclaimed me one of his crew. It shouldn’t have been so easy, but I was too relieved to be wary. Too young and dumb.
“It’d be a lie to say he didn’t scare me.
And his crew… In so many ways they reminded me of the worn, rugged fishermen I knew.
Hard workers. Bodies worn by the elements.
Always singing a bawdy tune. But there was a dark edge to them, a look in their eyes that said they wouldn’t hesitate to slit my throat and throw me over the side if I stepped out of line.
So I worked hard. Scrubbing the deck, cleaning the cabins.
All the chores no one wanted.” A phantom burn heated his skin, a memory from when the sun had blistered his skin from days at sea in shabby clothes.
Fishermen were done by noon, selling their catch in the shade. Not Captain Blackbeard.
“We finally reached the island, and I followed the witch’s directions to find the violet root.
She was more direct that time. It was easy to find the field where they grew.
Things were finally looking up. I picked extra to sell in the port, planning to buy passage on the next ship home.
” His missing hand tingled, yearning to close into a fist though a hook now took its place.
“I didn’t get the chance. Blackbeard’s men found me and dragged me back onto the ship. ”
He could still see it, the grain of the wood that they tossed him down on in front of Blackbeard.
The faint scent of jasmine. Blackbeard’s polished boots thumping into his line of sight.
“Thought ta sneak off, boy?” Blackbeard had jerked him to his feet by his shirt, ripping it in the process. “A little rat, scurrying away.”
Hook’s cheek stung at the memory of the backhanded slap that came next. “Y’all leave when I say ya can.”
Something soft and warm brought him back to the moment. Tink cupped his cheek. Firelight flickered across her face and caught in her wings. “You don’t have to tell it.”
No, he didn’t—but for the first time, he wanted to. “I haven’t answered your question yet.” He covered her hand with his before tucking her closer into his side.
“You don’t—”
“I know. Even Smee doesn’t know the whole story.”
She jolted against him. “What?”
The hint of a grin pulled at his lips. “That’s right, so listen close, because I may never tell it again.
Where was I?” he asked, for dramatic effect.
“Ah, yes. Captain Blackbeard was furious that I tried to leave, even though we’d only agreed on me joining them for that one leg.
He thought to teach me a lesson.” He glanced at his hook, a lump in his throat. “He cut off my hand.”
It was a mercy he did it quick. He’d barely understood what was about to happen before one of the crew stretched out his arm, and Blackbeard swung the blade—a cutlass—he’d pulled from a crocodile skin sheath.
Tink kissed his cheek. The soothing motion of her hands over his bare skin kept him grounded. Without her… Gods, without her, I’d be lost.
“He threw me in a cell. Left me there to clean and stitch my own wound in that filth-ridden place. Most of it is a blur.”
A lie. He’d never forget those days, hovering on the brink, laying in his own mess.
Every moment was etched in the darkest part of his soul—the part that vowed vengeance.
It had festered there, a disease of sorts that no amount of time healed.
If anything, it only grew worse until all he could focus on was revenge.
At least, that had been the case until he met a certain pixie in a bar.
He brushed a hand through her hair again. “But one day, Blackbeard arrived at my cell. He threw a polished metal hook in with me. A way to end myself if I wanted.”
Those cold, uncaring eyes still haunted his nightmares. “Fisher boy,” he’d said. The man wouldn’t even use his name, though he knew it. “Gut yerself or git yerself together.”
A shudder of anger passed through him. “I lived, and they let me off at the next port.” Dumped him on the dock was more like.
“Boy might become a man after all,” Blackbeard had laughed. His bushy eyebrows pinched together as he stared him down like he was a fish that flopped on his boots. “I’ll be watchin’ ya, boy.”
And Hook would be watching him. He’d made a vow that day.
He’d rise, make a name for himself, and take away from Blackbeard the one thing he loved—the seas.
Killing him would be too easy, too quick.
Better that he suffer by seeing the boy he’d nearly destroyed rise to become a better pirate than he.
“That was the hook?” Tink glanced at the offending object.
“I’ve had it with me every day since. He thought to bring me low with it, and so I used it to make a name for myself.”
She kissed his chest before grinning up at him. “And here I always thought you just lacked creativity.”
Leave it to her to find a way to make him smile.
“At least it’s better than being named for what your parents do and their favorite flower.” She pouted.
Tinker Bell. “I always wondered about your name,” he said. Such an odd one it was.
Her face flushed, and she dipped her head. “It’s pixie tradition. You have family names, we have job names. Our job name comes first, then our given ones.”
Interesting. “Can’t change jobs?”
“Oh, you can. Then your name changes too. I thought about it. I like music, but tinkering and making things are what I’m best at. Like my old treehouse,” she sighed. “Besides, the elders may have thrown a fit if I’d asked for a formal change.”
“And Lily? She’s a…”
“Tinker. Tinker Lily.”
His lips quirked. “So why don’t you go by Bell?”
“It’s too…” She waved her hand up in the air.
He understood. Bell was a beautiful name, maybe too gentle for her wild nature and fiery heart. No wonder she’d chosen to go by Tink instead. It fit. Even so… “You could change it if you hate it, love. Humans don’t have such rules.”
One finger slid down his collarbone. “I’ll think about that.” She took the silver ring on his necklace between her fingers. “She’d be proud of you, I think.”
He glanced at her from the corner of his eyes. “I doubt that.”
“What…?” She shook her head. “No, never mind.”
Hook swallowed down the knot lodged in his throat. “What happened to her?”
She looked away. “I don’t want to…” Tink blew at the lock of hair falling across her face. “Well, I guess I’ve already ruined the mood.”
“You could never ruin anything.” He tilted her face back to him.
“It hurts to speak of her, I can’t deny it, but my vengeance against Blackbeard isn’t just for me.
” He pushed the lock of hair behind a pointed ear.
“I finally made it home two weeks later. By some chance, I’d managed to keep some of the violet root.
But it didn’t matter. She’d passed two days before I returned. ”
He took Tink’s hand in his, closing her delicate fingers over the ring against his chest. “If Blackbeard had let me go, I’d have made it in time.
She could have gotten better.” He wouldn’t have forgiven Blackbeard for what he’d done to him.
He’d have still sought revenge, at least for a time, but maybe that would have faded over the years.
But his mother’s death? That he could never forgive.
Tink leaned impossibly closer. “When we’re done here, once we’ve retrieved the scale and lifted your curse, I want to help you stop him.”
He sucked in a breath, turning to face her fully.
“What about your home? And Lily?”
“She can go back and tell everyone I’m okay. Her bracelet is still intact, so we just need to get her back to one of the doors. Once Blackbeard is defeated, I can use the pearl to fix myself and go back later.”
So she’d still leave him. A deep ache rent through his chest. Should have known.
“That is…” She released the ring, her fingers trailing down his skin. “Unless you don’t want me to,” she rambled on, clearing noticing the change in him no matter how he tried to hide it. “He’s hurt you worse than me, I just want to help—”
“You do help. I’d love your help.” And so much more.
But he couldn’t ask it. She hated the sea.
Bloody hell, she can’t even swim and retches up everything in her stomach half the time.
And he couldn’t leave his crew…or the sea…
They were part of him as much as the air in his lungs. “We’ll figure this out.”
She nestled into his side with a soft sigh. A murmur slipped from her lips, too quiet to hear. Despite the troubles that no doubt awaited them, in that moment he had everything he desired.