Chapter 29 Dead Wind
The blood of the divine whispers in the veins of the unsuspecting, a secret tide that pulls towards destiny. When the truth of lineage breaks the surface, the wrath of the ancient ones stirs, and no mortal vessel is safe from the storm it unleashes.
The air hangs heavy and still above deck. I’d expected it to be cooler when I came up—a sharp breeze offered as a reprieve from the heat and stench below. But I was not so lucky.
“Bad wind.”
Cyprian stares across the water, the hard lines of his face more prominent beneath a harsh sun.
Bile teases the back of my throat to hear him say it.
I push sweat-dampened hair from my forehead, move up beside him and squint my eyes in the same direction, though the sight of open sea still quickens my heart.
We aren’t moving. There’s no white wake trailing behind the keel of the ship, just clear sleek surface when I peek over. We’re utterly motionless.
“Another storm?” Gods, the fear and anxiety muddling my tone is humiliating. I remember once I hadn't been afraid of anything. It had been freeing, that feeling. A sense of invincibility that made me strong…but stupid.
“Worse, a doldrum. Dead wind.”
I glance up the masts, noting how still the billowing black sails have become. Not even a ruffle to them.
Cyprian runs a scarred hand through the short beard he’s grown over the last week or so. “We could be stuck in one spot for days. Maybe weeks if the wind doesn’t return. Our food and water stores are low, given what we had to pitch overboard in the storm to stay afloat.”
A new fear fills me, quick keen pulses that feel like icy splinters in my veins; dry thirst already coats my throat, though the canteen strapped over my shoulder is full. How quickly will order break down under the threat of starvation? Where does loyalty end and ruthless self preservation begin?
“I’ll need to go speak with Rhyland.”
Absently, I nod. He reaches out to touch my shoulder with a warm squeeze as he goes. I watch him making his way past crewmen toward the helm where Rhyland stands, his tall figure silhouetted against the blazing sun. When he catches my gaze, I turn quickly away.
The sky is painted fierce cerulean, not a cloud for rain in sight, and the sun beats with a vengeance that draws sweat along every inch of me. I know I should go back down below to find Rowan and let her know what’s happening.
Already the whispers and unease are starting as the crew begins taking note of our condition. No wind to push the sails. No current to ride.
The heat presses down like a physical weight, stealing my breath and mirroring the suffocating dread that's starting to rise within me.
I linger by the railing, the smooth wood warm beneath my fingers, the vibrant blue of the ocean mocking our plight.
Below deck, the air will be thick with the smells of sweat and fear, but facing Rowan, facing the worry in her eyes, feels like more than I can bear right now.
Instead, I turn towards the bow of the ship. Perhaps there, with the wind—or lack thereof—whipping through my hair, I can find a moment of peace, a sliver of the courage I know I'll need to survive whatever comes next.
“Captain’s angered the gods, he ‘as. Now we’ll all bloody well pay for it.”
“Aye. They’ll be wanting a sacrifice.”
Their eyes lather me. I can’t seem to escape them.
It’s been days and still no wind. No rain. The Nightingale is adrift, as are my thoughts, weaving in and out of focus.
There’s plenty of work to be done to fill the idle hours. Rhyland set the crew to it almost immediately and I can't help but wonder if it’s to keep the restless men and women distracted—stave off a mutiny.
Tension hums around us all like a living beast. Briggs declared the food and water would be more strictly rationed than ever. Hunger, heat, and exhaustion are already leaving their marks. Two fights broke out before our meager breakfast was finished. Sabre’s tucked Rowan away in her cramped cabin.
I watch Rhyland, who holds command unflinchingly, passing orders out with a calculative set to his mouth.
I know he watches me, too, when he thinks I'm not looking. I feel his eyes on me often, heavy, possessive. Our last conversation plays over and over in my head.
That was your takeaway?
The words had been so incredulous, but I didn’t dare ask what it should have been. The idea of what his answer could be scared me too much.
“Holden, Mathews, Willoby, the hull needs cleaning. Saint, Austen, Marks, and Wilks, you’ll be taking the skips out to fish." It's Tannin, the boatswain, spouting orders.
I wait for a command to fall my way but they never do. Rhyland’s inner circle largely ignores me, save for Cyprian, Sabre, and, occasionally, Reave.
The forced idleness gives me too much time to remember.
To replay every exchanged word. To obsess over every touch that’s ever passed between us.
What was real and what have the dark corners of my dehydrated mind traitorously crafted while I wasn’t paying attention?
He lied. He lied and used me. Every brush of his hand had a hidden purpose. Ambition.
It has been a millennia, Nymph, since this heart beat for anything other than ambition and fury.
Gods, I’ll drive myself as mad as the queen in Staygia with this. Even if it somehow ever meant more to him…I couldn't allow it. This ends in one of two ways, neither of them romantic.
Sudden commotion breaks the monotony of routine, ripping me out of my own thoughts so hard I nearly gasp.
A short but stocky sailor with full, pocketed cheeks and hair like crimson flame lunges at the man a few paces away from me, ripping the ratty satchel from his shoulder and shoving him to the ground.
“Thief!” he shouts when the contents spill over the deck. A thick wedge of goat cheese and brick of cured sausage. “I knew I saw you snag extra rations when ol’ Davvey wasn’t looking!”
He winds back and kicks the felled pirate straight across the mouth. There’s a terrible crack as his jaw dislocates. Blood and saliva and teeth splatter near my boot.
“Won’t be eatin’ anythin’ now, will ya?” the redhead snarls, then spits on him.
To my surprise the fallen man stands, cradling his jaw with one hand, but uses the other to swing at his attacker. The quarterdeck becomes a mass of violence when the rest of the crew on deck joins in.
I leap out of the way best I can just as Briggs’ deep voice bellows over the rabble—curses, threats, the promise of where he’ll put his very large boot if they don’t cease their fighting.
A pile of rope catches my feet and I’m too weak, too tired from heat and dehydration, to do much to slow my fall.
A mass of bodies swarm around me as the men and women continue to pummel each other.
There’s shouts of pain and outrage. Someone’s heavy boot stomps over my fingers, sending a jolt through my hand and up my arm.
I’m knocked back when I try to rise, again and again.
Despite Briggs shouting, they’re slow to break apart, but I can tell the moment Rhyland steps forward for they scatter like leaves on a breeze. The pirate captain rushes to me, untangling me from the pile of rope I tripped into, pulling me up and dusting me off.
Cold fury swirls in his eyes. “Are you alright, Nymph?”
I nod. My fingers throb and my knees shake but it really could have been worse.
He turns to the instigators. “Collins, Hurst, remind me what the punishment for thievery and fighting is aboard my ship.”
The man with the broken jaw swallows hard; his dark eyes grow wide. A slow drip of blood rivers at the corner of his mouth.
“Rhyland.” Briggs’ voice rumbles in low warning and I think I’m beginning to understand the dynamic between the captain and his quartermaster. A careful balance they keep for each other. “Take a moment.”
For a heartbeat, I worry at the tension that ripples the air, but then Rhyland pulls in a breath; the rigorous set to his jaw relaxes.
“See them punished, quartermaster.” He turns on his heel, towing me along behind him.
We’re in the cabin, and his door slams shut. Darkness swallows us, and the cool clean scent of soil.
“Careful.” I try and fail to pull away from him. “People might get the wrong idea and think you actually care for me.”
He ignores the jibe but his hands are suddenly everywhere—my arms, throat, the curve of my cheek. The rough calluses of his fingertips glide over every sensitive inch, raising goosebumps along my skin.
“I’m alright, Pirate, really.”
It’s torture, this careful dance between us. He catches my chin, turning my face side to side in the light that slips lazily through half drawn curtains.
“Rhyland,” I say more firmly and reach for his hand to stop the scrutinizing.
What would he do to them, I wonder, if he found a scratch on me?
I hide my injured hand behind my back. Dangerous.
So, so dangerous. He’d have a point to prove, of course.
A blood debt to settle to maintain his reputation as the most ruthless pirate to sail the Dread.
I may not be his wife in spirit, but in name we are one, and that is all it would take.
Imagine…imagine the monster he would be if he really loved anything.
“I’m fine, Pirate, I swear.” I curl my fist, step back and give a slow spin for emphasis. His eyes assess every inch of me, cataloguing every pore, every strand of hair out of place.
Mine. Mine. Mine. He whispers it in his sleep sometimes. But he is a fool if he believes it. I cannot belong to anyone, not for love, not for his crude notion of possession, because I have something he wants more than life itself. The midnight crown will never be his if I can stop it.
It has been a millennia, Nymph, since this heart beat for anything other than ambition and fury.
Fuck, I’ll drive myself mad with this, trying to understand the impossible. Pirate. Monster. God. None of which are predictable.