Page 115 of The Sea Witch
The bodies splashed next to where the creature butted its head against the hull. It wheeled in the water and dove for the corpses, leaving theSea Witchin peace.
Moving away from the railing, Alys strode to Ben. He stood still as she unlocked his manacles. He didn’t react when his bindings clattered to the deck.
“I’ve never...” His eyes were wide.
“First time you’ve killed anyone.”
He nodded.
“I wish it didn’t get easier,” she said.
Chapter Twenty-Five
The seawater in the basin changed from clear to pink and then to a rusty red as Ben bathed in Alys’s quarters. He emptied the basin out the window twice and refilled it with water. He’d stained three cloths, but he couldn’t consign them to the ocean. They were heaped beside the bulkhead, to be taken away later. Whoever did the laundry aboard theSea Witchwas surely familiar with getting blood out of fabric.
Ben stared down at his now clean skin. Though his markings now stood out in bold relief, the last traces of the Redthorn’s blood were gone.
Not so. His clothing bore permanent traces of what he’d done. An oxidized pattern heralding a decision he could not, would not, undo.
Alys had disappeared after their brief encounter on the top deck. His gaze kept straying to the door.
Without the manacles weighing down his movements, he pulled on his breeches. God, fresh clothing would be incredibly welcome. But what would those garments be? The ensemble he wore as a naval navigator? Or something else?
He turned his wrists this way and that. Red chafed skin glowered at him. He might always bear the reminder on his flesh of the time he’d been held prisoner aboard theSea Witch. He wasn’t held captive any longer. His sword through the monk’schest and throat was the closing of a door. On one side of the doorway was his life in the Royal Navy. On the other side... he didn’t know.
Alys strode into her quarters.
“Shipshape.” Like him, she appeared to have bathed, her wet hair spread on her shoulders. She wore a linen shirt and laced bodice of deep wine-colored twill, along with her favored leather breeches and tall boots. The bodice had the added benefit of lifting her breasts, freckled half-moons rising above the neckline.
He held himself still as she approached him.
When she stood less than a foot away, she asked, “May I touch you?”
“You may.”
His chest heaved as she ran her hand over his pectorals, tracing the patterns.
Their gazes locked as she continued to touch his flesh, skin against skin. She drizzled more water down his arms. Her fingers skimmed along the corrugations of his abdomen. His muscles twitched.
“I wanted to see these again.” She eyed his markings, and traced the patterns that twisted and wove across his body. “Remind myself of what they looked like.”
“I hate them.”
She laid her hand against his chest. Her eyes widened, no doubt because his heart pounded against her palm. “I saw them, back there at the monastery.”
“My markings?”
“In a book in the Redthorn’s library. I’d recognized the language this time. It was the same as the parish register at the church in Domingo.”
“Latin.” He straightened. “You brought books back with you.”
“Not that one.” Regret flashed across her face. “Someone took it.”
“Who?”
“A powerful mage. Got no fealty to anyone. Only himself.” She added, frowning, “I’d heard, once, he had an allegiance, but that’s long past.”
“Who’s this mage?”
