Page 9 of The Withering Dawn
I glanced at Oliver, thankful and worried at the same time over the way his head was swaying and his eyes were rolling back.
“We need to do this fast,” Henry said with a sigh.
I wanted to believe it would work, but the way Oliver’s blood soaked the sheets under him and the paleness of his complexion told me things weren’t going to end well. Perhaps he was better off dying on that cot, passed out with some rum in his belly. Or perhaps we owed it to him to take a chance and try to save him, no matter the pain it caused.
As the captain, I should have known what to do.
I sat in the corner, my head resting against the wall as I stared into nothingness. I wasn’t sure who Oliver was, but I suspected it was his screams I was hearing after the captain left the hold. They were desperate and agonized sounds. I didn’t much like the noise of prolonged suffering. That was a filthy Kroan pleasure. Kroans enjoyed toying with their prey and sinking ships. Most other sirens preferred staying far beneath the surface, out of sight, or around remote islands were no ships ventured.
I wanted it to stop so I could sleep. Or try to, at least. Not that I had been able to get a good night’s sleep in years. I scarcely knew what it felt like to wake rested anymore.
The boy’s screams carried on for some time and were followed by low, tired moans.
And then… silence.
I hadn’t moved since the captain left me. I just tried to sink inward where my walls were thick and my mind was a silent wasteland. That place was more familiar than anything. Horrifying in itsown way, but familiar.
The night passed with painful sluggishness. The ship grew deathly quiet. The scent of blood and filth filled the air. Then, the scent of rum. The sweet aroma was actually quite pleasant and it was far more tolerable than the coppery scent of injury.
I was hungry. I hadn’t felt hunger in some time, but after tasting the broth, my stomach realized how empty it was again. It growled and cramped, needing sustenance, but considering the sounds I’d been hearing, I doubted anyone was thinking of bringing me food. A whole day passed that way, with my stomach cramping and men walking above me. And all the while, sorrow was spreading like a tired flame, weaving its way into the fibers of the ship.
Something horrible had happened.
Then a particular set of boots ambled my way and drew my attention. They stumbled, unstable and drowsy, until I saw a figure on the steep stairway leading toward the hold. I instinctively shrunk into the shadows in case they were there with nefarious intentions but was relieved to see Nazario again.
He did not look the same, though. Defeat weighed heavy on his broad shoulders, making him slump. And a thick aura of grief made it seem as if it was hard to pick up his feet. He dragged his heels, eyes downturned as if his mind was elsewhere.
He stumbled off the steps, nearly tripping on the chair. The faint amount of light that made it into the hold glistened off the side of a glass bottle in his hand.
He’d been drinking. I could smell it on him, but the scent of rum lost all of its appeal when I saw what it had done to him. I watched through the darkness, concerned that he would hurt himself staggering like he was. He reached the wall near the far end of the room and turned to let himself fall against it. Tiredly, he slid down until he was sitting on the floor and stretched one leg out in front of him, keeping his other knee raised to rest his arm over it. A low, humorless chuckle rose up from his throat before he lifted his half-empty bottle of rum to his lips and took a swig. Some of the mouthful dripped down his chin to his neck, staining the collar of his shirt. I watched the way his throatbobbed when he swallowed and mimicked the action. When he lowered the bottle and wiped his mouth with the cuff of his coat sleeve, he just rested his head back, defeated.
“What am I doing, muñequita?” he said softly as if he wasn’t intending for me to hear. “We are pirates. I’ve lost men before. Why does Oliver bother me so?” He took another unenthusiastic sip of rum as if just trying to retain the taste in his mouth. “I know why. He was very young, you know. I should not have let him stay aboard this ship. He was young enough at the time. Young enough not to understand what happened to us. To not harbor the same anger the rest of us do. And now he is dead,” he chuffed.
There was a slow sound to his words. He was not so drunk that he didn’t know where he was, but perhaps the alcohol had loosened his lips.
He went silent for a while, but I could practically hear his thoughts buzzing in the air like a cloud of bees.
“Your ship, I think, may have been cursed,” he said in a near whisper. “So many questions and so much violence in such a fleeting moment. Why, I wonder. Are you cursed?”
He looked in my direction, searching for me in the near darkness. His inky hair framed his face so wonderfully and I felt ashamed thinking he was beautiful when he was so full of sadness, but I had not felt genuine emotion in so long. His eyes were heavy, but still handsome, soaked in pain and longing.
“The rest of the men are sleeping. Oliver was wrapped and surrendered to the ocean, as all dead are. I have done it many times to many men.” The corner of his mouth lifted, but again, the expression did not reach his eyes. “I wonder if my death will be so routine. So common that I, too, will be wrapped in sheets and tossed overboard. One wrong move can do that, you know. One wrong move can wipe us out of existence, and I am spending my time stealing and pillaging and chasing a man I cannot seem to get my hands on.”
He held up a hand in front of his face, his teeth gnashing as he looked at it and then slowly closed it into a tight fist. Then he took another drink and started to slump further down the wall.
“It is a life I cannot leave behind,” he chuckled. “Behind the hatred, I am meant for the thrill of this life. And more than that, the freedom. There is no freer feeling than letting the wind take you across the water. To see no land on either side. It can fool you into thinking that perhaps your life is in your hands.” The light that flickered in his eyes when he spoke of freedom slowly dimmed. “But I suppose it is never really in our hands, is it?”
He took a few deep breaths and then settled on his back with one hand tucked behind his head.
“I speak of freedom to you when you don’t seem to know the meaning of it.” His words were a barbed arrowhead that hit me deep in my heart. “For that, I am sorry. Or perhaps you deserve these bars. Who am I to say? I only know that you are sad. Perhaps not the same sad that I am now, but you are. And I have always been weak for sad people. Maybe that will be my downfall, yes? Taking pity on those big, green eyes of yours.”
With a heavy sigh, he closed his eyes, his other hand rested on the bottle. “It would not be a terrible last sight. There was a time I thought my last sight would be Antonio’s face smiling down at me, the bastard.” His voice dropped to barely a whisper. “Now, I long to be smiling down at him while he gasps for breath, and I am twisting a knife in his gut.”
And then he was not speaking in words I could understand, but his own native tongue, rolling sounds together in a graceful and exotic manner. But despite not knowing the language, I could feel the pain in his tone. The quiet rage.
I watched him for some time until I realized his breathing had slowed to a steady, gentle cadence. He was sleeping, but the sorrow in his voice haunted me even after he stopped speaking. I didn’t even know him and yet I felt as if a part of me was so familiar with a partof him. The sad part. The part that was empty and aching to be mended.
I tilted my head to one side, observing the way his brows twitched in his slumber. I wondered what a man like him dreamt of and if it was like the dreams I used to suffer night after night. Dark. Uneasy. Stifling. Each one took a piece away and made me less.
