Chapter 30 Between Fear and Trust
Calla
As the doors closed behind the last pirate out, Calla pinched the bridge of her nose. “Okay,” she said between her teeth. “Let’s hear it. Why? Why would you do that?”
Riley frowned, all determination and sheer stubbornness. “For a lead,” she said, like it was obvious.
Calla’s hands dropped to her knees, nails digging into her flesh as she struggled to come to terms with what Riley had just done.
The crunch of the glass vial still echoed in the space between them, turning her stomach until she thought she was going to be sick.
“Do you care nothing for yourself?” she asked.
Riley flinched as if the question had been a physical blow, but Calla pressed further, voice tight with the panic clawing at her chest. “Have you forgotten how much trouble we just went through to get you that potion?”
Riley leaned against the bar, wrapping her arms tightly around herself, and looked down at the shards of broken glass. Guilt twisted her mouth, but her brows were still pulled into that infuriating, stubborn frown. “You forced my hand.”
Calla stared at her in disbelief. “I forced your hand?” She shook her head, nails digging into the muscle and tendon of her knees until it hurt, but that didn’t rival the storm brewing inside of her. “Riley, do you realize what you’ve done? Those marks will consume you–”
“Don’t treat me like a child,” Riley snapped, making Calla draw back. “Of course I know what I’ve done. It’s worth it if we find her.”
“And if we don’t?” Calla asked. She barely heard her own voice over the thud of her heartbeat in her ears.
That stubborn frown again. “We will.”
It was Calla who looked away this time. She wanted to believe that. She did. But–
“At what price?” The question fell from her lips in a hush.
It settled in the space between them, quiet and aching.
Outside, the dull sounds of laughter and singing settled in her chest like cold stones.
She knew what tonight was about for her crew.
A moving on. Mourning the lives lost, celebrating that they were still alive to feel the hurt.
Even as she refused to name it, the deep ache twisting inside of her was powerful enough to steal her breath away.
She didn’t know if she’d ever be able to move on if they never found her. And if she lost Riley too–
“What am I supposed to do now?” Calla asked the empty tavern. She dropped her head in her hands, locking her jaw against a sob half-lodged inside her throat. “I can’t pick between the two of you, Riley. I can’t.”
The heat and humidity of her own breath against her palms made Calla feel stifled–trapped between two impossible choices.
Should she set course back to the witch now?
Allow the Heart’s cursed marks to consume Riley in the hopes of maybe getting something useful out of it?
Whatever she did, she would be losing a piece of herself.
A scrape of wood on wood brought Calla back to herself, but before she could feel the sting of shame at crumbling so thoroughly in front of someone else–at forgetting who she was, that she was supposed to have the answers, or at least pretend she did–warm fingers wrapped around hers, coaxing her hands into her lap.
Calla didn’t meet Riley’s gaze–she couldn’t, even as Riley started massaging her palms, her wrists, as if saying, ’I’m still here. ’
Calla stared at the smashed glass at their feet instead. For how long?
With a soft sigh, Riley brought her stool closer until their knees nudged together.
“I know you’re the captain, Calla, but you can’t control everything.
And you can’t order me around like that.
You know that, right?” she asked, her voice the gentlest Calla had ever heard it.
“I can make my own choices, and it’s nothing to do with you. I’m still my own person.”
Calla inhaled sharply. It did nothing to cool the sting of those words. Her eyes stung at the unfairness of it all. It had everything to do with her. “I’ve never stopped you before–”
“I know,” Riley said softly. Her hands withdrew from Calla’s, making her heart twist in panic. It only lasted for half a stuttered breath, because Riley’s palms slipped to her cheeks instead, and her forehead pressed against Calla’s. “I know. So don’t start now.”
The warmth of her, feeling their breaths mingle together, did what Calla hadn’t been able to do by herself. It soothed her enough to hear what Riley was saying. Enough to understand that, in the fear of losing her, Calla had overstepped.
And yet she couldn’t help it, because she still remembered how Riley had fought her own rescue, trying to drown herself.
How she’d shuddered against her, cold and confused.
The lost look in her eyes as she stopped being able to tell what was real from what wasn’t.
How miserable those visions had made her.
“Your plan is incredibly reckless, Riley,” Calla said, pained.
“Like nearly getting us all eaten by storm drakes?”
Calla closed her eyes. The gentle stroke of Riley’s thumbs against her cheeks didn’t stop, and it was the only thing stopping her from drawing back. “I would’ve gotten between you and them if they’d even looked at you,” Calla said quietly.
“Yeah,” Riley breathed out. “I saw that. With Thorian. How do you think that made me feel?”
Calla had no good answer to that. Nothing that could get her what she wanted–both Riley and Sable, safe and at her side.
“We’ve tried everything else. Let me do this for us.”
Calla smiled. It felt like a grimace on her face. “You haven’t exactly given me a choice.”
Riley’s huff was a gentle caress against her lips, quiet and sheepish, but when Calla looked at her, she saw her own pain reflected in those hazel eyes.
She’d felt so alone in her hurt amidst the rest of the crew, but Riley had been out there, feeling just the same as she did, and neither of them had–
“Is this why you’ve been avoiding me?” Calla asked, drawing back.
Riley nodded, her hands falling to Calla’s again as if by instinct, thumbs stroking soothing patterns against her skin. A beat of silence passed. Then, hesitating, “Why have you been avoiding me? Before this? Before the compass?”
Calla froze. She knew what that question was about.
Before Riley had coaxed her into the sea for their last swimming lesson, Calla had felt…
off. Something about Venn chasing the life she’d so thoroughly rejected had brought everything back, somehow.
The self-awareness of what she was–of the changes to her body.
And she knew, deep down, that Riley found her nature off-putting, too, no matter how good she was at hiding it.
Anyone would. Calla hadn’t even been able to look at herself in days.
She’d thought it had gotten better, but–
“Calla?” Riley pressed, frowning.
Calla couldn’t say it. It was pathetic. Nothing good would come of it other than embarrassing them both. She couldn’t help thinking it, though. I don’t know how you can stand to look at what I am and still want me.
Riley startled. “What?”
Calla’s eyes widened. She hadn’t said that out loud. But the way Riley was looking at her made her breath stutter. She withdrew, standing from her stool to face the bar, busying her hands trying to pour herself another drink in an attempt at normalcy.
“I didn’t say anything,” Calla said, her tone careful and even.
Her movements faltered as her eyes fell on her hands on the bottle.
At the blue of her skin. The membranes stretching between her fingers.
Her black nails, sharp and glossy–claws.
As much as she trimmed them, they were still nothing but claws.
Her lips twitched in disgust. Had Riley been imagining her as she used to be, human, when she’d taken her?
Had Calla wanted Riley to imagine her that way?
Was that why they hadn’t fully faced each other that morning?
Riley didn’t move from her stool, but her voice carried, and it sounded hurt. “You think I haven’t touched you because… What? I don’t like what you look like now?”
Every muscle in Calla’s body tensed. Her grip tightened on the neck of the bottle, heart beating wildly against her ribs. “You couldn’t possibly have heard that,” she said faintly.
She hadn’t said that. She hadn’t.
Then she remembered. The selkie. How they’d communicated without either of them making a sound. She’d thought it would only work with her own kind. She hadn’t even thought of testing it out. And now–
Calla startled as arms encircled her waist. They paused for a beat, and when she didn’t move, they tightened around her.
Calla stopped breathing. Heat flushed all around her as Riley pressed herself against her back, resting her cheek between her shoulder blades.
“I did,” she said, sounding pained. “I’m sorry, Calla. ”
Calla’s stomach fell through the floor. It took everything in her to choke the wounded sound clawing up her throat.
An apology. It was one thing to think Riley was as disgusted with her as she was, but another thing entirely to have it confirmed so plainly.
A part of her had hoped to be wrong about this.
“I don’t need you to touch me,” she said tightly.
Could the ground swallow her right now? It would be kinder than going through this conversation.
She hadn’t even thought about the touching part, but now that Riley had brought it up–“I get it. It’s not about that, but I get it. ”
The quiet huff in response was a puff of heat, bleeding through her shirt. “I’m sorry I’ve done anything to make you doubt how stunning I think you are,” Riley said, her voice a quiet rumble against her back.