31. The Monster in the Mist
THE MONSTER IN THE MIST
If Captain Jonah knew his daughter was dead within minutes, it took him only hours to respond.
Despite it being nearly noon, the sun seemed shrunken and far off, its light watery and weak despite the cloudless day, as though they sailed under a veil. The wind had stopped, the waters calmed, and the Fortuna Royale drifted as not even a breath dared to stir the sails.
For the discerning, Jonah’s retribution was inevitable. He would come for the man who killed his daughter, and the pirates occupied their nervous hands with busywork while they waited for the fabled ghost captain to arrive.
Cecily, however, watched the water. She didn’t know what a ghost ship would look like, but she wanted fair warning before it was upon them. Instead of fear, Ann’s cries echoed through her mind. They sounded so much like her own deafening wails after losing her father.
Cecily was supposed to be the one who was dead, not that innocent girl, and that there had been so much grief from those who’d loved her.
If Fiero had killed her properly instead of mistaking another for his true target, Jack and Hester would mourn her.
Stede, and maybe Greyson too, but it wouldn’t compare to a mother losing a child.
There was too much grief in this world, but there would be even less if it had been Cecily.
She didn’t think it was self-pity that made her think so—merely a mathematical balance of moral scales she’d concocted to weigh her own soul.
Jack had healed many things for her, but she suspected some part of her would always grieve and regret all that had been done this past year.
The water rippled. Tiny rings blooming over the still surface, snapping Cecily from her thoughts right as a face emerged from the sea.
He looked human with hair black as night and eyes like a void. But then his lips peeled back in a smile that revealed long, sharp canines.
Her breath caught, and she jerked away from the rail. As soon as she moved, the face disappeared beneath the surface as quickly as it had appeared. The water eased back into smoothness as though he’d never been there at all.
“What do you see?”
Cecily cursed, jumping so fiercely that she had to catch herself from tripping over her own feet.
Jack stood frozen next to her. “Are you fine?” he asked slowly.
Clapping a hand over her thundering heart. “Don’t sneak up on me.”
“I called your name several times, but I can back away and say it again if you like.” The edge in his tone was no doubt leftover from earlier, but her hackles rose nonetheless.
“Don’t be smart,” she grumbled, turning back to the sea. If he’d come here to fight, she wasn’t in the mood to be understanding or nice and would fight with him if he wanted.
He sidled closer, gazing in the same direction. “I’m not being smart. I’m cross.”
“Obviously.” She peered at him out of the corner of her eye. She hadn’t seen him since the conversation with his father. “Where did you go?”
“I’ve been stewing in our quarters so I don’t do anything foolish.”
“Like kill Fiero?”
It was an unfair jab, but he took it in stride. He drew in a long breath, composing himself before saying, “You can’t be surprised. I saw you dead.”
She gave a humorless chuckle. “I saw myself dead. Saw a girl die for the crime of simply looking like me, how lovely is that?”
“It’s awful to be sure,” Jack said. “And I’m not stewing over killing Fiero. It’s…” He sighed. “You sided with my father, and I didn’t understand why.”
“Because he was right,” she said, her own frustration mounting. “And you know it. Fiero didn’t kill me, and I would’ve gutted him if he’d tried. I’m not helpless.”
He scowled. “I never thought you were.”
“Agreeing with your father had nothing to do with him, really. I agreed because Jonah will do worse to Fiero than you could.”
“I know, but you—dammit.” His hand disappeared into his pocket, and then he held up a gold coin. “Thirty seconds.”
That earned a surprised laugh, but she held out her hand.
He slapped the coin into her palm, and his tone gentled.
“I had thought you would be on my side, and thus I assumed you agreed with him to ingratiate yourself. I was wrong.” He swept his hand through the air as though to say, There you go.
“And now I suppose I’m a bit…nervous over Jonah.
” Then he admitted so quietly and quickly that it took her a moment to realize what he’d said, “And I’mafraidofghosts. ”
The coin glinted dully as she turned it over in her hand. “Was that thirty seconds?”
“I’ll give you a key to my coffers.”
Knowing Jack Copson was genuinely terrified of anything melted away her frustration. “Was that why you insisted on killing him? Because of Jonah?”
“I’ll do anything for you,” he told her, “but I will do anything to avoid ghosts.”
She slipped the coin into her pocket. “I’m sure it’ll be alright. He wants Fiero. The rest of us didn’t do anything to him.”
Jack looked doubtful. “If Jonah is anything like us, he likely won’t care about the bodies in his way.”
Before she could respond, a man cried out from the crow’s nest. Jack looked up, shielding his eyes with his hand. Behind the helm, Copson did the same.
The man shouted again, frantically waving. “Mist approaching off the port!”
Though the air remained still, a white cloud rolled over the waves off the port, obscuring the dark water as it moved toward them. Within moments, mist had shrouded the Fortuna Royale in white.
Jonah, Cecily thought. She reached for her sword. Futile as it may be against ghosts, the feel of it in her hand grounded her.
“Steady as she goes,” Copson called. Eerie silence fell as the mist thickened into fog.
Jack breathed steadily beside her, even as the light dimmed.
The heavy fog barreled in, an opaque wall of gray that blotted out the sun and obscured the sails and masts.
The last thing she heard was Jack’s quiet swear before it reached its totality, blinding her to everything but the wooden boards beneath her feet.
Her nostrils flared around anxious breath, sensing decay, rotting fish, sunken ships, and mud and bones and brine. She pressed her wrist to her nose to block the stench and looked at Jack.
He wasn’t there.
“Jack?” Spinning on her heel, she stepped toward where he’d been only a moment ago.
Any lingering sunlight had become more of a suggestion as shadows whirled around her, and she gripped her sword tighter, gently waving it through the dense fog.
There was nothing. No one.
Unnatural silence pressed against her ears. Not a single voice, bootstep, or even the water lapping against the ship.
Nothing but her own thundering heartbeat.
Threads of panic spooled in her gut as she trained her eyes on the murky gloom, the hair on the back of her neck raised as she wondered if it might suddenly split to reveal the ghostly face of Jonah Lovibond standing mere inches in front of her nose.
Then, high above, an orb of blinding blue light pierced the gloom.
Cecily whipped her head toward the crow’s nest. The silhouette of the man who’d heralded the fog appeared, and her heart lifted with hope at the sight of someone else.
The pirate lifted his arms to shield his head, then the light blinked out and the silhouette vanished.
She rushed in the direction of the mainmast, so concerned with looking up for another sign of life that she nearly stumbled on the body.
It was the man from the crow’s nest—or what remained of him.
She only knew it was him by his boots, because he’d reinforced the soles for climbing the ropes, but any other identifying feature was gone as it appeared the top of him had been…
bitten off, leaving only his legs, connected at the hips, and a bloody gouge where the rest of his body should have been.
The air left her lungs as she stumbled back, letting the fog swallow the gory mess. She hadn’t heard a scream or his body hitting the deck. The fog not only blinded—it deafened.
Jack could be calling for her. And where was Hester? How many people were on deck, crying out in terror or being eaten?
Jonah hadn’t come for Fiero. He’d sent something worse to kill all of them.
Too scared to scream, she took off toward where she’d last seen Jack.
Wooden boards passed beneath her feet, but she didn’t find anyone else, as though she were entirely alone.
She imagined the fog lifting to leave her surrounded by the corpses of her friends and crew, half-eaten by whatever monster lingered in the fog.
The thought was enough to make her gag.
The ship lurched, then rocked to one side, completely and terrifyingly silent. Cecily scrambled to brace herself, rolling her body forward as the port rose and the starboard tipped toward water she couldn’t see. Her foot slipped, and she yelped as she began to slide.
Faster and faster, she barreled over the planks, digging in her heels to stop herself and praying frantically when it didn’t slow her.
As though she fell through a cloudy sky, there was nothing to tell her where she was on the ship or if she was about to tumble overboard, and she only knew that there was down and up and eventually she’d reach the far side of the ship and plunge into the sea with God-knew-what.
She fumbled for purchase with her free hand, grasping at any small lip or gouge in the wooden boards, but she was moving too fast—
Then the tilting halted. The ship was suspended for a too-long second, held at a harshly steep angle—before it began to rock back.
It wasn’t fast enough, however, as Cecily kept sliding. A figure flashed by her, but as quickly as they’d appeared, they were swallowed by the mist, and there was no telling who they were or if they were alive.
Her feet connected hard with the balustrades.
Breath whooshed from her lungs as her knees bent to absorb the impact, but her speed was too great, the tilt still too severe, and she flew upright. Her side smacked into the rail, knocking into her stomach and leaving her gasping as she was held over a foggy void.