Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
Corynne's journal sat on my desk.
The sight of the leather made my mouth go dry. Not because it was rare or damning, but because it felt wrong that it had been in anyone else’s hands but my own. The scars on my back prickled beneath my shirt.
I reached for it, withdrew my hand, then reached again, hovering over the cover but not quite touching it.
The book seemed to pulse with energy, its silence more deafening than any scream.
I told myself that I was looking for useful information like star charts, calculations, anything that might help decode the map faster.
But three hours into my search, I'd stopped and shut the book.
It was futile. The words didn’t make sense because all I could hear was her snappy wit.
All I could see was the curve of her throat as she tilted her head up in defiance, even after she walked through the bloodshed I’d reveled in.
Corynne Godwin was more of a mystery to me than any journal, and it was impossible to decipher anything when her scent still clung to its pages.
I’d been staring at it ever since.
With a flustered sigh and a need for more, I picked up the tome again and turned its pages.
Her handwriting was cramped and precise, dates and times tracked alongside constellation positions. Notes about tidal patterns correlated with lunar phases. Observations made from rooftops, barn lofts, anywhere she could see the sky without obstruction.
Entry one read: Spotted Venus at dawn from the orphanage roof. Matron nearly caught me. She would have never understood, and I’d be left with more welts across my knuckles.
Entry two: The Perseids were magnificent. I counted forty-seven meteors before the clouds rolled in. I wish I had someone to tell other than you, journal.
Entry three was enough to make my knuckles whiten on the pages.
August says women aren't meant for scholarship. That my "obsession" with the stars is unnatural. He's wrong. The stars don't care that I'm a woman. They shine the same for everyone.
My jaw tightened.
I knew men like August Quincy. Men who saw brilliance as something to be collected and pocketed.
Dimmed until it only reflected glory back onto themselves.
I knew the precise angle of their smiles when they thought they'd won.
The exact cadence of their laughter when they believed themselves clever.
I knew, because I perfected that smile in my own mirror. I practiced that laugh until it sounded natural. It sounded hollow now, echoing in my memory. The curse didn't teach me empathy. It merely forced me to recognize the monster I had always been.
"I checked on the girl. Kept me hands off as you asked, Cap’n." Finch’s voice cut through my thoughts.
I didn’t turn, but I shut the journal, flattened my palm over top of it and made a point to not respond.
"Brig's damp this time of year," he said, matter-of-factly. "She'll catch a chill inside a week if the wind keeps up."
"She’ll survive."
"Probably. It just seems wasteful. She’s a pretty little thing."
I turned the journal over in my hands, letting the silence stretch. I'd known him long enough to recognize when he was waiting me out.
"What do you want, Finch?"
Finch cleared his throat. "Well. I was just thinking sir, that if you've brought her aboard to read the map, maybe it's best that she's a bit more comfortable."
My jaw clenched. "She's a prisoner, Finch. Prisoners stay in the brig." Even as I said it, her face flashed in my mind, those defiant eyes narrowed against the darkness below deck.
"Aye, Cap’n."
Though he was silent, I could hear the 'but' hanging in the air between us. My fingers drummed against the worn oak of my desk.
"Get on with it, Finch. For fuck's sake."
"Will you be sitting in the brig with her while she decodes the map?"
I pinched the bridge of my nose, feeling the curse pulse beneath my skin. Damn Finch for being right, damn her for being necessary, and damn myself most of all for the relief I felt at having an excuse to see her again. "One hour," I said finally. "In my cabin, and we’re to be left alone."
"And after?"
"Back to the brig," I said, my fingers tracing the embossed spine of her journal.
His gaze dropped to the book beneath my hand, then back to my face. "She was asking for that. She will want it back."
"She’ll get it when she’s earned it."
"Earned it how?"
My fingers tightened on the spine. Released. Tightened again.
Finch raised both hands. "Just asking so I know what to tell her. I'd rather not be standing between that woman and something she wants."
He turned to walk away and I let him go without another word. As the door clicked shut, I opened the journal again.
I wish I had someone to tell other than you, journal.
That line stuck with me even when I didn’t want it to. I knew that sort of loneliness better than the map carved into my back currently burning like hellfire.
I had three months until I could walk upon land again. Three months until the last of my memories were eaten by the curse.
The curse I’d cast upon myself and my crew.
I set the journal down very slowly. For countless years I searched for what the curse had taken. At first, I hadn't known what I was missing. Only that emptiness, a hollow where something vital used to be.
How had this journal ended up in her hands?
It was a question I wasn’t ready to answer.