Chapter 32 Sails #2
“Not because of you,” he adds quickly. “But because I—” His brow creases.
“There are things I’ve done in this life.
Choices I’ve made. And when I look at you…
” His thumb brushes over my jaw. “You’re…
all light. And it kills me that I was the one to take something from you that can’t ever be returned—”
“You didn’t take anything from me,” I whisper. “I gave it to you.”
Rhyland’s eyes close like that hurts worse. When he speaks again, it’s with false levity, a crooked smile curving his mouth. “Just promise me you won’t write sea shanties about how disappointing it was.”
“Depends,” I tease, nudging his ribs. “Are you planning to give me more material?”
His grin sharpens into something closer to the pirate I know. “Oh, Nymph. I plan to give you an entire ballad.”
This is okay, I think. I can enjoy this for what it is until we reach Helgate, until everything changes.
He gives me a look and it banishes all thoughts of what’s to come, and Solomon with his strange madness and even stranger words.
The pirate rises then, pressing me back into the bed, his mouth capturing mine.
Our days grow long and hazy, so much so that sometimes it’s difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins. Nothing else outside our cabin quarters—our small, warm world—seems to exist.
We disappear into ourselves. Time yawns out around us like a fern unfurling in the deep wood.
The ship moves forward, barreling towards the end, a destination that spells doom for all of this, but I can't bring myself to care, curled beside him in a nest of blankets, watching the calm rise and fall of his chest when he sleeps.
His hair is dark and falls messily over his forehead.
It's the only time his hands aren't running over me, following the curves and dips with a sort of obsessive reverence.
Mine, mine, mine.
I find myself wishing it were true. That I can’t be taken from him, nor he from me.
He shirks most of his duties onto Briggs, much to the large quartermaster's annoyance.
Tasks that can't be delegated—their late night meetings, navigational plans and strategizing—are executed so quickly the bed hardly cools before he returns.
It's as though he can feel it too, that we're destined for ruination.
Now that the dam’s been broken, nothing seems able to stop this want, this need that lives between us.
He's kissing me with slow, insistent strokes when a knock rattles the door.
“Pirate,” I say, and make an effort to draw him back up to my mouth. “Someone's knocking.”
“Let them.” He murmurs it against my skin in a way that sends starlight across my vision, smirking up at me, his breathtaking face half painted in lazy shadows.
I groan softly, but the knock comes again, harder this time.
A low growl unravels from his chest. He releases my tangle of legs to press himself up, scooping discarded trousers to pull on as he goes to wrench open the door. “What?”
To be on the receiving end of that wrath could strike fear into the heart of Hlódyn's bravest.
Words are traded, too quiet for me to hear, and finally Rhyland sighs, saying something sharp and low before closing the door.
He comes back to me and I open my arms expectantly but he only shakes his head, shouldering a loose, dark shirt on.
“I need to speak with some of the men. Shouldn't be long.”
A frown twists its way across my lips but I nod, stretching long over the bed. The look makes him grin and cross the room to capture my jaw and plant a tender kiss over my lips.
Before he leaves, he turns and then hesitates for the briefest moment, voice wispy and hollow. “Nymph?”
“Yes?”
Quiet breath slips between his clenched teeth.
He regards me, a look that's warm and buttery. Something that almost makes me forget the cold usually burrowed within swirls of midnight sky. Those eyes drink me in like he’s trying to memorize every inch of something bound to be ripped from him, an agony I know too well.
Seeing it on his face though, it's a wound that won't close. A promise of misery.
“We should talk…when I return.”
I want to tease him. What good is talking when our time could be spent breathing together in the dark, bare and sweat slick? Finding all the places on one another that bring mind numbing bliss. That steals away reality, even for a little bit. But he sounds too serious.
“Okay,” is all I say, turning my face away from the emotion and dragging his blanket up tight around me.
He goes and stokes the flames of the coal stove that heats the cabin, though it's plenty warm already.
I drift off to sleep.
When I wake again it's to shouting. Tense, hurried calls that rise above the wind and waves.
“Sails! Sails on the horizon!”
Pale gray dawn bleeds through the slit in the drapes. I rouse myself, palming bleary eyes to clumsily tug on a pair of too loose trousers and a billowy top that gets tucked into my waistline. The cabin is sweltering. I need to remember to ask Rhyland to cool it on the coal chips for a while.
My pale curls are a wild mane framing sharp cheeks and too round eyes that stare back from my reflection in the water basin. I splash my face with the tepid, clean liquid then bind my unruly tresses back with a length of cord and tug on my boots.
Salty wind greets me when I toss the door open and step out onto the deck. I'm surprised to find only the dullest twinge of fear follows, something faded and unformed that could wisp away into nothing given time.
Time. It's truly my greatest enemy now. I feel it slipping away like sheets of silk. Water through my fingers. We're a week from Staygia. Maybe less given the good wind that's been strong at our back since the night it returned.
Rhyland's at the ship's stern, gazing out over endless blue through a burnished gold spyglass.
Briggs looms at his right and Sabre has perched herself over the banister to the left, hand tented against a rising sun, torrents of blonde hair whipping about.
My eyes find the source of concern: a distant white haze of billowing sails.
“Too far out to identify her,” Rhyland says and slowly lowers the glass.
“But we're bound to start encountering all sorts now that we're so close to Staygia. Have the lookout keep an eye on her. All hands and full sails ahead. Last thing we want is for her to catch our wind. Save the fight for the colosseum.”
Colosseum—a swollen reminder that sucks all the peace from my mind.
The skin at the nape of my neck pricks when the air shifts behind me.
Someone gently bumps my shoulder. I turn to find Rowan, tired looking but smiling.
Her long auburn hair falls in a messy braid over her shoulder, resting upon a short flannel blanket that's pulled tight around her neck against the mornings that are chilly compared to scorching afternoons.
The weather here makes no sense; it can't seem to make up its mind.
“I made tea. And Davvey sprinkled cinnamon into the oat gruel. Let's get some while it's hot.” She threads her cool fingers through mine and tugs me toward the trap door that leads down below.
I’ve missed this. Her. A friendship that’s like a safe, woolly blanket.
The Nightingale groans and sways softly around us as we navigate the cramped passageway, my free hand trails along the bulkhead that divides the corridors of the underbelly.
The interior is a labyrinth of shadows and half-light, lanterns swinging precariously overhead, casting flickering patterns on the walls that dance like sleepy sirens.
This low, the sounds amplify: the rhythmic thump of the ship’s heart, the creak of the hull against the waves, and the murmur of voices echoing from below and above.
We maneuver through the gun deck, a cavernous space lined with the dark muzzles of cannons I hope we'll never have to use: their iron flanks gleam cold and menacing. The air here is heavy with the acrid smoke scent of gunpowder, a reminder of the Nightingale’s deadly prowess.
A few shadowy figures move amongst the cannons, their faces grim and focused.
I think of the sails on the horizon. Of what it might be like to engage in battle on open water, cannon fire splintering the artful arches and rails.
It stings some to think of it—not only the danger but the demise.
Perhaps the old girl has grown on me. Seeing her ruined might shatter the careful admiration I've grown and tended to during my time aboard her.
Further down, there's the distant smell of breakfast. The clatter of metal plates and boisterous shouts of the crew.
We reach the bottom of the companionway; the low, arched doorway of the galley looms above us.
The massive iron stove glows red in the corner, its heat radiating outwards, chasing away the chill of the depths.
Rough hewn tables are mostly abandoned at this hour.
Rowan goes to Davvey to secure a helping for each of us, and then to the stove where her tea’s been brewing. I accept both with a quiet thanks and she gives me a tentative smile.
“So.” She clears her throat after swallowing a bite. “You and the captain seem to be spending a lot of time together.”
I nearly choke on my scalding tea, and a rush of heat coats my face.
I'm not sure what to say, or what she wants to hear.
She's the only one on the ship who knows the truth—about my Máma, and how I did manage to find and hide the crown piece from that cave.
So why is it suddenly so hard to be honest with her about Rhyland?
Because it's a betrayal of your own path. And you're loath to admit it out loud. It becomes real if you do.
Oh, how unhelpful transparent thoughts can be.
“I could say the same about you and the first mate,” I finally counter.
Now she's the one blushing, but a look of delight blooms in the tilt of her lips. “Sabre really is wonderful.”
The bite I take is too hot. I have to breathe around it, puffing out steam as it burns my tongue. “Tell me,” I half choke, “exactly how she and Nicklas are related to Rhyland again?”
Her smile broadens. “They’re Mór's children.”
“Mór's?” The title slips out more severely than I intended it to, but there's genuine shock. Mór having children? Adult children? Somehow, I can't imagine it. And if that’s the case, why did neither of them come ashore on Elaris? Wouldn’t she want to see them?
“Yes,” her smile falters as she blows the wafts of steam curling over her teacup. “I understand it's a tragic sort of story though, so I haven't pressed for the details. You shouldn't either.”
A tragic story. Maybe that’s why they wouldn’t—or couldn’t—go to the isle.
Bitterness wells within me. “Seems misfortune favors us all.”
Rowan's expression becomes brittle, though her eyes stay warm and thoughtful as she assesses me.
"Misfortune," she echoes, swirling her tea.
"It's a strange thing, isn't it? How it weaves itself into the most unexpected patterns.
Like threads in a tapestry, you might think you understand the design, the colors, where everything is going.
But then...a single thread shifts, and the whole picture changes.
Sometimes, irrevocably." She takes a slow sip, her knowing gaze lingers on the steam rising from her cup.
"And often, the threads we trust most are the first to unravel.”