Chapter 4 Snubbed #2
Pip thrust his chest out, proud. “Yeah! I didn’t just wait around doing nothing!
That would’ve been boring. And sad. I met a bunch of important pirates working the tavern, and a captain was so impressed with my service she actually asked me to join her crew!
She was very insistent on it, too, once she found out I already knew my way around a ship and all, but I turned her down, because I’m loyal, and I’d never do something like that! ”
Riley looked at him, trying to figure out who in their right mind would beg Pip of all people to join their crew.
He was a kid. He talked a lot. He was hyper.
He was a kid. It could’ve been one of his exaggerations, something he made up to make himself seem self-important, but he didn’t seem particularly focused on her reaction to his boast as he studied her.
“Oh, you didn’t like that. Sorry! I didn’t mean anything by it! I swear!”
Riley’s face crumpled in confusion. “What?”
Pip cringed. “The loyalty thing. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad about betraying Calla. You did it for Eryx, and she would’ve never if she’d been in her right mind, right? So I didn’t mean to make you feel bad!” A pause. “That’s why you were staring, right?”
“Oh,” Riley said, something in her chest twisting in on itself like a wounded animal. “Yeah, sorry. I just…” she trailed off, then she shrugged, at a loss.
Pip’s look turned intense. It made her uncomfortable. “I think she’ll forgive you.”
Riley side-eyed him, and started walking again, though she didn’t know where she was going.
Far away from this conversation would’ve been great, but Pip followed right along, still staring at her intently.
He was being creepy. How was he reading her like this?
He was just a kid. “No, she won’t,” she said, trying to shut down this whole line of questioning.
“Yes, she will.”
For fuck’s sake. Riley inhaled sharply. Maybe if she just went along with it, it’d be over faster. “What makes you say that?”
Pip shrugged. “She didn’t throw you off the ship.”
“Did she ever throw anyone off her ship?”
“Oh, yeah!”
Riley stopped in her tracks and looked Pip square in the face. She’d never heard anything about that. “Really?”
Pip grinned. “Some asshole tried to blackmail Sable into joining another crew, and Calla slit his throat in front of everyone! It was gnarly.” His grin grew wider, the memory seemingly one of his highlights.
“That’s when we knew Calla would always do what’s right for the crew, and you’re crew, because you’re still here!
You’re still just learning that, but she knows you’ll get it eventually!
A few have also gone overboard for bullying, so there’s also that.
So don’t do either of those two things, and you should be golden.
” He nodded to himself in self-satisfaction, as if keeping in Calla’s good graces was the easiest thing in the world.
Riley wrapped her arms around herself, holding in a shudder.
Somehow she’d convinced herself she knew the limits of Calla’s mercy, but apparently not.
Did the captain also believe Riley had done what she’d done for Eryx?
Was that why she’d been spared? “Thorian’s a bully,” Riley said weakly, trying to steer them off this conversation.
She didn’t like the small voice at the back of her mind, wondering. Had she done it for Eryx?
Pip scoffed. “He’s just pretending.”
Riley huffed a laugh. “He’s very good at pretending, then.”
His glares still spelled murder whenever she crossed his path on deck.
Calla pretended Riley wasn’t even there, but Thorian seemed on the verge of saying fuck it and throwing her overboard anyway whenever he caught her in his sights.
The worst thing was that the rest of the crew just treated her the same as always.
What kind of mindfuck was that? It was a twisted sort of punishment, them smiling at her when they should’ve spit in her face instead.
Suddenly, Pip grabbed her hand and tugged her to a side gallery. “Come! I’m taking you to the markets!”
“The markets?”
“You’re gonna want to buy some stuff, right?
Like some new boots? You’re a pirate now, you should dress like one!
I know a real fancy place you can check out, and that captain I was telling you about might be at the markets today.
She knows everything going on around the Gullet, so she might’ve heard something about Sable if she and Kit nosed about.
You do have coin with you, right? You didn’t gamble all your pay? ”
Riley felt like her head was spinning. Pip was a damn typhoon, dragging her in ten directions at once. Or maybe it was the galleries. The way sound bounced against the walls, a constant undertone of echo where Riley couldn’t tell what direction anything came from, no matter how hard she listened.
But Pip was right.
How hadn’t she thought about it? She did have coin, and she most definitely wanted new boots. So she followed.