Page 9

Hybris

I should be hotter than a hornet’s nest at being tethered to the mast and dunked in the ocean, but smelling the bilge sludge on my skin for the last few hours made me grateful for the deluge of salty, ocean water.

One whiff of our funk, and the crew unanimously agreed to throw us overboard for an impromptu bath.

The rope goes from the Mizzenmast on deck to Greenhorn’s waist to my waist on the end.

I don’t care that the crew laughs from the railing as I bob in the waves.

Rinsing and finger-combing the bits of sea debris from my hair is worth it—even if the soap is harsher than the washing flakes our servants used on the laundry.

Greenhorn showboats by turning upside down and kicking his bare feet to their thunderous applause.

I’ve scrubbed to my waist when the skies darken. Frankly, it’s a relief that I won’t treat my aching sugarstick to the rough soap. It will burn like hell…but maybe it will take the fires of hell to burn off whatever plague Lady Patrice cursed into my trousers.

The rope around my waist threatens to strangle me as we drift from the boat.

I have faith the crew can pull us back in—they’re just playing with us.

Right? The crowd at the railing isn’t big enough to spell disaster, right?

I mean, half the boat is in the rigging, tying down the sails, and battening down the hatches.

It's almost as if they’re afraid of an oncoming storm…dammit.

“That’s it! Cut their rations! Two lads weigh more than a whale!” Chub yells as the group at the railing pulls against the building seas to haul us back in.

“It’s not us,” Greenhorn yells in return. “Nutmegs picked a rope that’s old and frayed. It’s soaking up the ocean like a sponge.”

“Step aside, nutmegs! Send a group of men to do a lady’s job, and this is what happens,” Catalina says as she steps next to Chub at the railing.

She unwraps the leather cuffs from her wrists as she says something to her husband that we can’t hear.

It’s not good—it rearranges his face into a severe frown.

Catalina, the Pregnant Human Cook, will rescue us when there’s a boat full of burly pirates and Others to do the job.

That’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard.

Is she a witch? She reaches her arms at me with her palms up like she’s summoning a water god to spit me back aboard.

She grits her teeth. Men scurry around to tie her to the railing.

What’s going on? How is she in danger of falling overboard?

Is this another example of Chub’s overprotectiveness?

My eyes widen to the size of saucers when the silken threads reach Greenhorn.

He binds his arms and chest using the opposing ends of the threads.

As lightning flashes overhead, the threads sparkle.

It clicks in my brain. She’s one of the Others this boat rescued.

And Catalina is not just any Other— she’s Arachne .

Maybe that’s why my family put me on this boat—to recruit Catalina to weave for us.

Greenhorn swims toward the ship’s hull as the group at the railing tugs the silken threads on their end.

Since Greenhorn is tied to me, I’m dragged through the swells.

I sputter and cough as I’m forced under.

Seawater burns my eyes and nose as I fight for air.

My hair tangles in my horns and yanks on my scalp.

My legs scream in pain as I’m thumped against the hull of the boat.

I bet I emerge with a thousand splinters.

My hair covers my face when I breach the surface.

Through dripping locks, I watch as Greenhorn climbs the Jacob’s ladder on the boat’s side.

Chub saws through Catalina’s thick lines to release her.

Crew members tie her lines to the railing in case Greenhorn falls.

The scramble to save their hearty is evident. Nobody looks at me. My blood runs cold.

I’d better start climbing. My arm muscles scream in places I never knew I had muscles. Hooves are not conducive to climbing, so my lower half is more burden than help. I slip and kick out when the boat lists to our side. My heart pounds as I struggle to lift my wet, clothed body.

Would the crew cut me loose, too?

My question is answered when my tether to Greenhorn catches on the railing.

The old, frayed rope gives up on holding us together.

Wind whips my shirt and hair like a tornado, making it difficult for me to see them lift Greenhorn onto the pointed forecastle deck.

A blanket is wrapped around his shoulders.

Eze claps him on the back. Chub cradles Catalina in his arms. The faces retreat toward the safer main deck of the boat.

I’m alone.

With my arms laced into the lattice’s weave, I cry. Big sobs shake my shoulders and quake my belly. They’ve left me to die. But why? Don’t they care about what my father will say? Won’t they miss out on their payment if I’m not returned?

Unless they collected all the money upfront…

but that’s not a good business. My father wouldn’t do that unless he wasn’t expecting them to return.

No, if they were taking me to my family in England, the weather would be colder.

Besides, when they passed Charles Town, the crew cheered and made rude gestures as if they had a history with the town.

Animosities like that can’t be faked.

“Get your yellow belly up this ladder, Flint,” Betts yells from the top of the railing.

Her long red hair reaches for me like the arms of heaven.

The tone of her words is gruff, but the worry etched on her face betrays her real feelings.

She’s the most beautiful sight I’ve ever beheld.

“If I have to climb down there to get you, I’ll flog the skin from your arse in the morning.

None of my mateys hide from their crew to cry over a storm. ”

“I’m not hiding!”

“Then climb—” she pauses her order to watch the lightning flash off our stern with a startled gasp “—climb as if your life depends on it!”

“Can you throw down some of Catalina’s lines?

I’m not steady on my hooves,” I reply, but I boost myself up a rung anyway.

She engages in a conversation with someone on deck.

What could distract her from her apprentice clinging to the boat’s hull for dear life?

Is that all the fondness I’ve earned? Just an order to save myself?

Hell, Greenhorn had a whole entourage to boost his arse from the sea, and he’s an adept climber with a lifetime of piracy experience.

Maybe earned isn’t the word I should use to justify my rescue.

I nearly burnt down the kitchen and sank the boat.

I tantrumed every time someone asked me to sew, only finally learning the craft when I needed to repair my own clothes—which forced someone else to waste their time teaching me.

I spent my mornings reading Magda’s journals, napped all afternoon, and partied all night.

Not exactly what a crewmember does to earn his keep.

I’ve annoyed the hell out of the captain… starting from day one.

“Climb faster and stop mumbling to yourself,” she calls down to me.

Her hair reaches toward the sea, like tentacles, but her hands stay planted on the railing.

The pale hue of her skin and the arresting green of her eyes make her seem more like a siren than a pirate captain.

The flimsy linen blouse that hangs open on her curvy frame billows in the wind, giving me an eyeful of dairy.

She makes no move to cover herself. She doesn’t care what I see.

For once, a woman bares her breasts to me without lecherous promises.

Somehow, it makes me feel lower than dirt, as if I don’t deserve her attempt at modesty or seduction.

My arms and legs busy themselves as I contemplate the puzzle of Captain Betts.

How can she judge me for servicing the lonely women of Boston, yet flash her dairy at any male who catches her at the right angle?

Does she hate sewing too, and find maintaining buttons tedious?

It’s not for flirtation. Most women, in my experience, love nothing more than fabric over their skin… the more expensive the better.

“Two more steps,” she says, backing away from the railing so I can board. She folds her arms, refusing to help me. Jealousy burns in my heart as I recall Greenhorn’s welcome, the blanket over his shoulders, and the crew’s cheers of relief.

“Kind of you to assist me,” I sneer at Chub, who stands next to Betts.

No other crew members pause to welcome me aboard.

They are too busy securing the deck before our stores roll into the sea.

Eze fights the wheel at the helm. Greenhorn is probably changing his clothes below or enjoying the warm blanket they gave him upon boarding.

“None of that, Flint,” Chub scolds. “You saved yourself like a sailor—not a fancy puff who tells sailor stories. Don’t shake your head at me.

I’ve heard all your dribble, first and second hand.

Tales of foreign lands from the snowy southernmost tip of the globe to the fragrant spice roads of the east, from the northern lands of my birth to the sunset in the west—all travels you never took.

Stop trying to inflate your trousers with your lies. ”

I look at Betts to contradict him, add her opinion, or rule on his judgment.

Her attention is anywhere but on me—the helm, the storm, the sails—like she doesn’t care an ounce whether I live, drown, or die by Chub’s sword.

Then why did she coach me to the top? Did she want to see me drown or earn my way on deck?

Rain splatters on the deck between us as if Mother Nature decides to throw her gauntlet at me, too.

“I apologize, Captain, Quartermaster,” I reply to my hooves.

“Go below before the sea decides she likes your taste and wants to keep you,” Betts orders, her voice thick. She stomps away, but not before I think I see tears threatening to spill over her cheeks.

Her retreating form is as powerful as the building storm as she crosses to the sterncastle deck at the back of the boat.

She points to places where the sails blow loose in the rigging, sending crew members scurrying across the booms and ropes to fix them.

She kicks a rope snaking across the deck as if it offends her.

Gretta appears at her feet to coil the rope and secure it to the deck.

Instead of taking the wheel from Eze, she presses a spyglass to her eye to gaze over the sternside railing.

Always has one foot forward and a scowl on her lips.

I wonder for the thousandth time what happened to Betts to make her heart so cold.

She made no move to assist me, nor did she burst into hysterics like a colonial woman.

My life-or-death situation was met with frozen indifference, but the tears suggest it’s encasing true emotion.

Who took her warmth? Is this the natural evolution of a pirate woman?

No, she’s not this cold to the other crew members. It’s me…or my father…

Pride blooms in my chest. I’ll take rancid hatred over indifference any day.

I’m acknowledged as a sentient being if she hates me—whether I deserve it or not is another matter.

My teeth clatter as the wind pushes me across the deck.

I want nothing more than to climb the sterncastle deck stairs to confront Betts, but doing so in a storm would make me look more like the selfish child I’m often accused of being.

Our eyes lock before I stomp down the galley steps to the orlop deck.

“You made it out,” Greenhorn says with a look of surprise, pulling his eyes and mouth into circles.

“Was I not supposed to?” I sneer as I cross to my bunk. Maybe I wasn’t supposed to make it. Maybe Betts, Chub, and Catalina didn’t help me because they hoped I’d be washed away.

How much of it was fake? Just the rescue, or the bath, too?

Was Greenhorn sent into the ocean as collateral damage, necessary for ridding them of an irritant?

What about how we bonded over fencing? Was that fake too, so I’d be so covered in bilge sludge that I wouldn’t argue with going overboard in stormy seas?

When he doesn’t answer, I whirl around to question him.

He’s vanished.