Page 38 of Wicked Tides #1

I got the picture. Then she proceeded to tell me the other girls’ names.

Kimi. Aponi. Halona. Knowing their names made a difference.

Since much of my purpose had been stripped in recent days, I made them my new purpose, and knowing their names solidified my decision.

I would need something to drive me until the day came that I could get my revenge the way I intended to get it.

After what seemed like ages, there was a knock at the door. I walked over and opened it to find Vidar leaning on the doorframe. Downstairs, the tavern sounded livelier and someone was even playing music, though the singing left something to be desired.

“Thought everyone should eat,” Vidar said, looking past me at the girls.

Half of them were already sleeping, but the other half were alert and attentive. I glanced back at Sakari.

“Hungry?” I said, gesturing to my mouth .

She nodded and without hesitation, I stepped out of the room, skirting past Vidar and heading to the stairs.

“You should stay close,” he said, catching up to me.

“Why? Do I not look human enough to blend in?”

“You look plenty human to the untrained eye, but that other ship just docked and men from the sea like pretty women. Keep your hat on.”

I looked over my shoulder at him and narrowed my eyes.

“Feeling protective?”

“Of the others, perhaps, because I know what you’d do to them if they even put a finger on you.” To drive the point home, he lifted his hand where two wooden fingers were strapped on in place of the ones I’d taken. “I don’t want a scene.”

I rolled my eyes and continued into the tavern where the men from the Rose were eating stew and drinking warm ale.

“I’ll try to contain myself,” I mumbled.

I walked up to the bar where the plump woman was lining wooden mugs out to be filled. She caught sight of me as soon as I arrived and instantly her expression warmed.

“Ah! A lady in my tavern. Color me pleased. It’s not often we get feminine faces in this port.”

I smiled at her, leaning forward. “I’ve got a whole room of young ladies upstairs and they’re famished.”

“Saw those girls when you all came in.” Her eyes moved to Vidar, who took up the space beside me, and her face soured. “Thought Cap’n Bone Heart here was doing a different sort of business.”

“Thelasa, you wound me,” he said, pressing a hand to his chest. “You don’t think they’re a bit young for me?”

“You’d be surprised what kind of nasty business I see passing through here.”

“I’m never surprised,” Vidar said under his breath, placing a few coins on the counter. “Fresh loaves of bread, cheese, and stew for six mouths. ”

Thelasa swiped the coins and stuck them in the pocket of her apron, pushing a brown curl of hair behind her ear.

“And for you two?”

“Nothing,” I said.

“Two mugs of ale,” Vidar answered, his voice overlapping with mine.

I shot him a look and he just shrugged

When Thelasa returned with two mugs, I glanced down at the foggy liquid and winced at the smell.

“What? Don’t like ale?”

“It has a rotten taste. I will never understand why men drink it.”

“And I’ll never understand your taste for human flesh.”

I sighed and picked up the mug, bringing it to my mouth.

I forced down a big gulp, displeased at the bitter tang.

Vidar huffed a laugh as he took two big swigs and leaned back on his elbows, watching his men engage in careless conversation.

There was tension in his brow as if something was bothering him and he had far too much reason to be bothered for me to question him.

He cared for his crew and I hated to relate to that.

Realizing how many vulnerabilities I had made me stiffen. I was too exposed. I’d attempted to make myself stronger by evading attachments in the past, but I failed time and time again. My soul longed to have companionship and it was my undoing. It would be forever because I could not stop.

It didn’t take long for Thelasa to bring out a few loaves of bread and some cloth-wrapped cheese. The stew, however, seemed to be brewing in the back and would take a little time. It smelled mildly seasoned and meaty, unlike the stale porridge that the girls had been served on the ship.

In the corner of the tavern, a pair of old men played string instruments while one of them sang in a raspy voice about beautiful women in big cities made of gold.

Soon, I caught Mullins walking down the steps with Sakari by his side. She was looking shy but eager, her eyes darting curiously around as she came into the tavern. Mullins brought her to the counter, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his worn trousers.

“Found her standing at the top of the steps,” he said. “She looked curious. Thought it couldn’t hurt.”

Vidar didn’t look happy at first, but within moments, he warmed to the idea of her being there.

He handed her his half-full mug of ale with a smile and she took it, hesitantly looking at the contents and giving it a sniff.

She didn’t recoil like I would have expected.

Instead, she took a good-sized sip, cringed, and gave it back.

Mullins and Vidar chuckled and she laughed with them, bashfully covering her mouth.

“These girls haven’t been out much I think,” Mullins said.

Sakari noticed the music before noticing the food and gravitated toward the men playing. Her face lit up at the sound and she stood near one of the tables closest to them to listen, gently swaying to the melodies.

She and the other girls had been on the Rose for days and no man had touched them or given them a reason to be afraid, save for the first night when Vidar had used her against me.

She seemed to have gotten over that and looked like she was feeling nothing but safe among the men.

It boggled me. I kept a close eye on her, holding my mug but not drinking the bitter contents.

Finally, I saw Thelasa filling bowls in the back with stew. I was eager to go back upstairs and get away from the increasingly rowdy men in the tavern. They were growing louder with every passing moment and I could do without their boisterous laughter and excessive drinking.

Just as Thelasa was walking bowls over to us, the front doors to the tavern rushed open.

No one cared except for me and Vidar and a few of his less intoxicated crewmen.

From outside came a whole new group of strangers I didn’t know and by the look on Vidar’s face, he recognized them.

I dipped my head to keep my face hidden in the shadows of my hat and watched as a dozen men strolled in, clearly in need of sleep and drinks .

I didn’t have time to study them fully before Vidar straightened, his eyes landing on a tall young man with a slender build and orange curly hair.

“Fuckin’ hell,” he hissed, slamming his mug down on the counter and splashing warm ale across the wood.

Amongst the newcomers, one of the other men caught sight of Vidar and paused, squinting. The corner of his mouth lifted into a grin, but there was no kindness behind it. A few days’ worth of stubble traced his jaw and a head of thin hair was tied into a ponytail.

“Ah!” he said, announcing himself to the tavern, but mostly to Vidar. “So those were the Rose’s sails I saw out in the water.”

Vidar’s jaw pulsed with tension as he stepped away from the bar, hanging his thumbs on his belt.

“Collin,” he greeted coldly. His eyes shifted to the boy again and his anger began to give off a dangerous scent that only I could smell. “David,” he said. “What the fuck are you doing with Collin Jones, boy?”

The boy’s face went rigid with disappointment. He didn’t speak. He simply dropped his gaze elsewhere, a sense of shame on his cowering expression.

“I see you know my newest recruit,” Collin said. “He said as much. Called you a bastard if I remember correctly.”

Vidar did not take his eyes off the boy as Collin spoke.

“Well, we’re not here long,” he continued. “The hunt never ends, but my men deserve a drink.”

The new crew began to make themselves comfortable around the tavern as Thelasa and her sparse amount of employees began to deliver drinks.

Vidar turned to Gus, saying something to him that I could not hear over the noise, and then marched clear across the tavern toward the young man.

Collin let out a guffaw of amusement as Vidar took the boy by the arm and led him out like a disobedient child.

Gus moved gradually to my side, watching the newcomers as vigilantly as I was. Mullins moved inward, taking a place near Sakari as if unwilling to leave her to the wolves that had crowded the space. I watched them with as much caution as I did the sailors.

“Boy’s like a son to the captain,” Gus said, slouching onto a stool beside me. “Fucking Collin has no business bringing him into his crew.”

“Vidar was younger than he was when he slaughtered my mother,” I said, my eyes on Collin as he propped his feet up on a table and drank from a wooden mug.

“We all know how that turned out. Which is why he doesn’t want David on a ship.”

I turned to look at him, finding it strange that he felt it necessary to even speak to me let alone tell me who David was.

“Why do you think I care to know this?”

“I don’t,” he shrugged. “I personally don’t think you’re even capable of caring about anything at all. I think that’s what makes us so different.”

I wanted to argue that, but what did it matter? The more anyone knew how much I actually cared, the more I was stripped of the armor that had been keeping me alive.

“Perhaps I don’t care,” I said.