Page 68 of Wicked Tides
With a full plate in hand, Boil walked around the table and set it on the corner for me, wiping his hands on his stained apron. The boy kept himself near Vidar as if for protection, watching me vigilantly. I turned my gaze from the boy to Vidar, then to the food, and lastly, to Boil and his haggard face. I scrutinized at him the longest, curious as to how he’d been marred so badly. Most of his hair was missing, replaced with rough skin and discolored slashes. Even one of his eyes was foggy.
“You stare long enough, you might see the devil, lass,” he said, his voice just as rough as I would have expected with an accent different from the other men.
I cocked my head to the side. “You think you see the devil looking into eyes like yours?” I took a step forward, lowering my voice. “That’s not where the devil is.” We stood there, staring at each other for a long while until I finally glanced down at the plate. “Thank you for the food.”
He shrugged. “It isn’t anything fancy, but it keeps our bellies full.”
“Will you be replenishing your food stores at the next port?”
“That and other things,” Vidar spoke up, his mouth full of apple. “Port Devlin isn’t big. It’s just the last port before the sea opens up and there’s nowhere else to stop.”
“I know it,” I said, taking a tiny piece of meat between my teeth. “Never been inland, but I know it. The fishermen there leave us alone.”
“That’s never stopped your kind in the past.”
I didn’t argue out loud, but I knew a few of my kind who had not killed before they were provoked to do so.
As I chewed on my salted meat, I glanced up at Boil again, my gaze tracing every gnarly detail of his face.
“What happened to you?” I asked.
“A bad fire. An angry wife. Ugly as I am, my mistakes match,” he chuckled.
“You’re not ugly. I’ve known a great deal of ugly things in my life.” My eyes flitted briefly toward Vidar. “I find your face far easier to look at than most on this ship.”
That drew another chuckle from Boil. When he smiled, the scarred skin around his mouth grew taut and smooth. It was oddly satisfying.
“Never has anyone said I’m easier to look at than the captain.”
“Billy,” Vidar said to the boy. “Why don’t you take some of the best apples down to the girls.”
The boy nodded and began sifting through the remaining fruit for the least bruised ones.
I wanted so badly to ask to follow. I hadn’t seen Ahnah and the others since Vidar had imprisoned Meridan and me and I longed to make sure they were alright, but my attachment to them had been exploited already. I didn’t need to let that happen again. I acted cold to the mention of them and took another piece of meat in my teeth, chewing slowly as the boy skirted past me with an armful of apples and a loaf of bread.
“They’re fine, by the way,” Vidar said. “They’re growing a bit too comfortable with some of my crewmen. Especially Gus, but I think that’s because he knows how to talk to them. They keep calling him grandfather.”
I wanted to smile, but I withheld it. Vidar, of all people, deserved to see me smile the least. So few ever had and I didn’t want to make him one of those few.
“When we get to port, I’ve told Gus to bring the girls to an inn with Mullins. They’ll look after them. Being off the water for a day or two will do them good.”
“Then I want to go, too.”
“No.”
“I wasn’t asking.”
Vidar rubbed his brow with his fingers as if annoyed. “Fine. The little one might like that, I suppose. She can’t stop asking about you.”
Ahnah. The girl was too attached for her own good.
“They’re just strangers to you,” I said. “I still find it difficult to believe you care what’s good for them.”
“And I find it difficult to think you care at all.”
Our eyes locked for a moment as if our silence was an accusatory jab.
“We both already know our motives when it comes to them,” he said. “Thank God we have that in common lest we use them against each other.”
