Chapter 19 Like the Old Times #3
“I kept wondering why you’re so obsessed with Pip, and then it struck me,” Riley said, allowing her posture to change ever so subtly.
Leading Neera around the ring rather than remaining on the defensive.
“You’re still the same insecure kid from a decade ago.
Nothing about you has changed. You’ve been stalking my ship for cycles because there’s nothing else going on for you in your miserable life, and the highlight of your year has been to see me cower again, hasn’t it?
You want Pip by your side because you can’t stand how all the other adults are stronger, or bigger, or smarter than you.
Are you going to set him up too? When he outshines you? Because he will outshine you.”
Neera laughed, and it was a little hysterical, high-pitched and sharp around the edges. “Set you up? Did you hit your head, Riles? You left us.”
Riley struck, then. Her arm flashed forward, faster than Neera could react, and then she jumped back.
Silence fell over the deck, punctuated by the lapping of waves and Riley’s own heavy breaths.
After a moment, Neera laughed again, more confident than before.
“Are you ready to give up yet? I’d hate to scar that pretty face of yours. Just say the word.”
Riley’s smile was sharp as she holstered her dagger again. “The game is over, Neera. You lost.”
Rule number four, lovely. Do not outshine me.
Neera faltered. Achingly slowly, she reached a hand up to her face, and then just stared at it. At her bloodied fingers. They started shaking as the cut on her cheekbone bled over, staining her cheek like blood tears.
“You said you had a lead?” Riley asked sweetly.
She knew she was goading. Playing with fire.
Riley realized too late she’d never seen Neera lose anything, ever.
The flash of rage twisting her features was her only warning before Neera grabbed the second dagger at her belt and charged, fast and vicious.
Unlike anything Riley had ever seen from her.
Riley froze in the face of it–of being hit with such pure, intense emotion from someone who’d never been real about anything in her whole life, and who’d molded Riley in the same image.
Who’d drilled those rules into her head over and over again until Riley had nearly ruined herself following them, even years later.
Riley’s breath got knocked out of her lungs as Neera tackled her to the floor and pinned her down.
She couldn’t breathe under the weight. She couldn’t move.
Neera’s blade rested against her throat, digging into her flesh with every gulp of air.
The tip of her other blade hovered a hair’s breadth away from her eye.
All Riley could do was lie there, frozen, heart beating wildly against her ribcage.
“I’m not walking out of here with nothing, Riles, you should’ve known that,” Neera sing-songed with a twisted smile on her lips.
Why had she thought Neera would honor her word? Stupid, stupid–
“So what’s it gonna be?” Neera leaned in closer, her breath washing over Riley’s face, coating her tongue in bile. “Your eye? More of your lovely fingers? I’m gonna be nice and let you pick this time–”
Riley gasped as Neera’s body got yanked off hers.
She looked up, shielding her eyes against Nivros’ glare.
It hung big and low in the sky, like an angry red ball of fire.
In the middle of it, Calla held Neera up as an offering.
Her webbed fingers were twisted in Neera’s blonde hair, yanking her head back, throat bare to Calla’s sharp dagger.
Neera gritted her teeth, her weapons clanking to the floor.
“You wouldn’t dare,” she spat. “Let me go right now, or I’ll have my crew burn your ship to the ground.”
Riley propped herself up on her elbows, and she glanced around. Neera’s pirates were held at gunpoint by the rest of the Moonshadow’s crew, waiting for Calla’s cue like they couldn’t wait to pull the trigger.
Calla was only looking at Riley, though. A small smile played on her lips. “Let me slit her throat for you, Riley,” she said. “We don’t need her alive.”
Riley parted her lips in awe, because she’d never seen anything better than Calla standing against a setting Nivros in all of her glory, holding the woman who’d ruined Riley’s life at her mercy.
Asking Riley for permission to end her. Riley licked her lips, tasting the words on her lips. She wanted to. She really wanted to.
Neera saw it on her face. The whites of her eyes flashed in panic as she craned her neck around to see her pirates, disarmed and useless, no sounds coming from her own ship.
“Wait!” she called out. “I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you what I know, and we can forget about this.
Yeah?” She shot Riley a hopeful, trembling smile, and that was when Riley realized she was still lying on deck, at her feet.
She stood, taking her time dusting off her pants, her ruined shirt.
“Please,” Neera hissed through her teeth. It didn’t sound like pleading as much as a threat.
Riley tilted her head to the side. “Talk, then.”
Neera gritted her teeth as Calla yanked her head further back, the grip on her hair tight enough it must hurt. “Tell her to let me go first!”
Calla tutted at her back. Her blade dug deep enough into Neera’s throat to draw blood, and a trickle of it slid down, bleeding into her collar. “I don’t believe you’re in a position to be making any demands,” she said, her voice as cool as winter’s breath.
Neera blanched, hands tightening into fists at her sides. “They’re in the Desolate Sea,” she hissed through her teeth. “They booked passage on the Blight, and that’s where it was heading. All likely dead by now.”
Riley hadn’t heard of the Desolate Sea before, but the way Calla froze in reply was telling enough to make her stomach churn. She stepped closer to Neera, looking her in the eye. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
Despite being a literal inch from her own death, Neera smirked. “You don’t. But you can check my pockets for proof.”
It was another power play, and Riley nearly played into it before another twitch of the blade made Neera flinch. “You’ll take it out yourself. Slowly,” Calla said, right by Neera’s ear, making her shudder.
Neera complied.
Her hand went into her right pocket and came out holding–something.
When she opened her fingers, Riley frowned at the object.
It was Kittredge’s juggling ball, painted in a myriad of obnoxious colors.
She’d been struck in the head by one of these at least once while Kittredge was busy learning, physically unable to sit still even with a sprained ankle.
Riley took the ball from her, rubbed her thumb against it. Fuck, she missed her friend, and it hit her now, like the cold coming on with Nivros’ last fading rays.
“Tell your pet to let me go now,” Neera said, making Riley still. When Riley lifted her eyes to her, Neera’s smile was smug. “Yes, I saw how you looked at her just then. Didn’t know your tastes ran so freakish, lovely. What else have you been hiding from me?”
All around them, the crew stiffened. Calla might as well have been a statue carved of ice.
Riley held Calla’s gaze as she stepped closer, not Neera’s.
She tugged off her glove and placed her butchered hand over Calla’s.
The one holding the dagger at Neera’s throat.
Without a word, she pressed down, and Calla drew herself out of her frozen state. She tilted her head at Riley.
“Wait, I’m–”
Whatever Neera was going to say, it died in a gurgle as Calla and Riley slit her throat, the heat of her blood spilling over their joined fingers.
Her blonde hair slipped through Calla’s fingers as Neera’s body slumped in her hold, and Calla let it fall at their feet.
Neither of them looked at her. They looked at each other.
Calla’s palms rested against Riley’s cheeks, smearing them with blood, and then she kissed her, hard and deep.
When their lips parted, Calla’s forehead rested against hers. “Never do that again,” she said, quiet enough to stay between them.
Riley let out a breath, her head swimming with everything that had just happened. Neera was dead. And Sable was clearly doing something dumb. “I can’t promise that,” she said, holding Calla’s wrists, willing them to stay like this for just a moment longer.
Calla’s hands slipped to her jaw, holding Riley firmly in place as she looked at her like she didn’t get it. “I thought I was going to lose you,” she said, even quieter than before. As if she were… scared. “Don’t do this to me again. Please, Riley.”
And Riley saw it now, in the way her eyes were searching hers, pleading. The way she was holding her in front of the whole crew, uncaring of what anyone would say or think. Calla was scared. Of losing her.
Riley’s breath hitched in her throat, and there was only one thing she could say in the face of that. “For you, captain? Anything you ask.”
The fear gave way to just a hint of exasperation, and then Calla huffed a laugh, and pulled her into a hug that stole the last of Riley’s breath away.
Calla was still holding her as she addressed the pirates who were no doubt staring at them.
“I suggest you make yourselves scarce before sundown, unless you want to meet your captain in the afterlife.” She nudged Neera’s lifeless body with her boot, and when Riley finally pulled away from the hug, the pirates were already tripping over themselves to get back to their ship.
By the time night fell, the frigate was out of cannon range, and Neera was sinking to the bottom of the sea.