“Come below. Dem and I are starving after the Reutterance. You must have set sail right after the spell was cast to have found us so quickly.” Logan disappeared into the wheelhouse.
John Clark’s brow furrowed, but aside from a casting me a puzzled look, he said nothing, only followed Logan down to the galley/sitting room.
Clutching my empty glass, I followed, curious as a cat to find out what John Clark wanted to discuss.
The mouthwatering smell of brewing coffee greeted me as I descended the ladder. Logan stood at the stove preparing to fry a few eggs. I slipped behind him to get the last of the loaf of bread for toast.
“Eggs? You have eggs? Are they any good still?” John Clark gaped at Logan as he cracked an egg into the frying pan.
“It’s only been three days since we left port, and we do have refrigeration,” Logan said mildly, but the muscles in his jaw tensed as if he braced himself for something.
“Three days?” John Clark shook his head. “The Reutterance was three months ago. Surely –” He buttoned his lip, clearly mulling over the time discrepancy.
“Three months!” My eyes widened. “Logan, were we asleep or unconscious for three months? Is that why we’re so thirsty and hungry?”
“Dem.” Logan cracked another shell. “Think. We’d be dead without food or water for three months. No. Time must have passed differently for us than Galveteen when we went through the portal.”
“Portal?” John Clark blinked at us. “The night of the Reutterance the storms stopped. I was on duty outside the Regent’s mansion, and I felt the island give a little shake. Everything trembled, but only for a few moments. Then suddenly it was broad daylight out. In a wink of an eye it went from midnight to noon. I experienced a few moments of disorientation – I couldn’t figure out quite where I was. The Regent came out onto the porch and announced that the spell of Reutterance had been cast, and we were safe. Everyone celebrated for three days straight. People got drunk. Got married. Ran down the streets grinning like fools. I don’t remember going through any portal.”
“But you did.” Logan flipped the frying eggs over as I retrieved the toast slices and buttered them. “And so did we, but it’s not been three months for us. I’m not sure how long we were unconscious, but nowhere near three months. My beard isn’t even grown out. Nothing’s spoiled and the cup of coffee I left in the sink hasn’t evaporated or grown moldy. I’m thinking we were out for a few hours at most.”
“I suppose it doesn’t matter, and it does explain why we couldn’t find you before this. We’ve been searching for weeks now. Ever since –” Clark shut his mouth again and glanced at me in a way I deeply distrusted.
“Ever since what?” I demanded, cold fear spiking through my body. “Is it Mother? Did something happen to her?”
“Or Chelsea?” Logan’s hand trembled as he transferred eggs to plates.
Clark pinched the skin between his eyes as if his head ached. “Guess there’s no easy way to do this, so I’ll just say it.”
Logan nudged me toward the table. He juggled three plates, so I took two of them and set one in front of John Clark. I kept the other one and sat across from him, making room for Logan to sit beside me. The food smelled heavenly, but the sour acid in my stomach didn’t bode well for eating.
“Shortly after the Reutterance the Lord Regent released your mother, Demetria.” Clark reached himself a piece of toast, but didn’t bite into it. He looked at it for a moment before setting it down on his plate as if he wasn’t quite sure what it was.
“But not Chelsea?” I stirred sugar and milk into my coffee to keep my hands from shaking.
“He gave your mother a choice. Go free and live in Seawall South again while Chelsea stayed imprisoned, or become his mistress until he remarried and have Chelsea returned to her family.”
“Bastard!” Logan banged his fist on the table so hard I had to grab my coffee mug to keep it from overturning. I tried very hard not to vomit, picturing that horrible man’s hands all over my mother. Thinking of him in bed with Mother was a perversion.
“Of course she agreed to his terms,” Clark said bitterly. He shoved his plate into the center of the table.
“But,” I protested, nearly gagging. “Why would he want a witch in his bed? He hates witches.”
“To humiliate her. To send a message to those of us who work in secret to right the wrongs perpetrated on the witches. Because he can. She’s very beautiful, Demetria.” John’s voice trembled when he spoke my name, and he hung his head. “I failed her. I failed twenty years ago, and I’ve failed her again now. I know I can’t right anything, but I can fight for change.”
Logan’s gaze sharpened. He stared at John Clark for a long time while I struggled to process what had been said.
“How did you fail her twenty years ago?” My voice squeaked. “You didn’t even know her twenty years ago.”
Logan put his arm around my shoulders, and I was absurdly grateful for his comforting touch. I leaned into him knowing that whatever John Clark said, my life was going to blow up again.
“I was a young soldier assigned to Regiment Two,” Clark said.
“Regiment Two is assigned to Seawall South,” Logan told me. “Remember how I told you the guards would be assholes to us during the day, but you could find most of them drinking with witches in the taverns after dark.”
“You didn’t say drinking. You said flirting. You said there were a lot of romances between the guards and the witches.”
“He was telling the truth.” Clark took a deep breath, then exhaled. “I met your mother one night when I was off duty, and I fell hard. And so did she, much as she never meant to. These romances were never supposed to mean anything. Harmless fun. Only with us it wasn’t. And if I’d known she was pregnant, I would never have let myself be transferred to Regiment Thirteen no matter what she said. No matter how many times she laughed at me and said she’d never loved me and I’d never loved her. We both knew what she was doing. Regiment Thirteen is the highest honor a soldier can aspire to in the Regent’s army. I was going to turn it down for her, and she said I was a damn fool, that she’d never loved me. We said a lot of stupid things to each other, and I left her behind, swearing to never speak to her again. Cold-hearted witch. Even back then when I was at the height of my rage and wounded pride, I knew what she was doing. Not standing in my way because she knew how much I wanted advancement.”
Clark reached out to touch my arm, wincing when I flinched. “I would never have left her if I knew she was pregnant. Please believe me.”
I wanted to refute his words. Tell him that my father was Michael Adams, not him. Because if John Clark was my father, that meant Mother had deliberately aligned herself with a man she didn’t love so that I could grow up in Seawall North and have privileges I wouldn’t have in Seawall South. Not only had she turned her back on her own family for me, she’d endured a loveless marriage for me. For a moment I was standing on the widow’s walk on the roof of Moody Mansion. Mother and I had been having two separate conversations that night. She had just told John Clark he was my father, and he’d gone away to process that fact. Then I’d gone up on the roof to find her, and I thought she’d been crying over her husband, my father, but really she’d been crying over John Clark and a long-ago love affair.
Guilt equal to rage squeezed my lungs until I couldn’t breathe. Why couldn’t he shut up? Must he keep talking and making everything worse?
Clark’s hungry gaze fixed on me. “I never forgot her. Never married. Never stopped loving her.”
“Stop!” I screamed, clapping my hands over my ears. “Don’t tell me any of this. You weren’t happy, she wasn’t happy, and probably my fath – Michael Adams wasn’t happy. I don’t want to hear any more about people throwing away their chances for happiness because of me.”
I pushed Logan away from me when he tried to hold me back. I slid out from behind the table and charged blindly for the ladder. Othala, the guilt. I should never ha
ve been born then maybe everyone would have lived the lives they’d wanted, not the ones into which they’d been shoved. Why had they made the decisions they had? Would it have been so terrible for Mother to live with John Clark? For him to get a different job and not be a soldier? My father would still be alive and not torn apart by ravagers if two stubborn lovers hadn’t let a baby like me ruin everything.
“It’s not fair!” I whirled, glaring at John Clark. “Why did you have to tell me this? Why torture me the way you’ve tortured yourself and Mother? Why are you here? What do you expect me to do about it now?”
John Clark turned miserable eyes in my direction. “I thought perhaps you might let a stupid man in after all these years. I always wanted a daughter, and I missed your childhood. I know I can’t replace your father, but I could –”
“My father is dead. Ravagers killed him because he married a witch. Nobody can replace him, least of all you. Coward. If you loved Mother, why did you let her go? You stupid man. Why did you let her down when she needed you the most?”
Blinded by tears, I hauled myself up the ladder. Once on deck, I had nowhere to go, but I thought seriously about throwing myself overboard. Anything to get away.
Inside me, the earth whispered, wanting to know if it could help. Just what we needed. An earthquake or the ship blowing apart. Carefully, I narrowed the links between me and my earth magic. I could be angry without destroying everything. I had control. Othala, please let that be true.
Wiping tears from my face, I stumbled for a bench in the stern and sat there, staring sightlessly out to sea.
I didn’t react when Logan sank down beside me. Even when he put his arms around me and drew me against his chest.
“I’m an awful brat, aren’t I?” I whispered forlornly. “That man poured his heart out to me, and I threw it all in his face, and I’m not even that sorry about it either. I’m trying so hard not to be mad, but not because I feel bad, but so I don’t inadvertently kill us all by sinking the ship or something.” I tried to laugh, but it came out more of a sob.
“It was a lot to process all at once.” Logan stroked my hair, untangling the snarls with gentle fingers. “But the main thing is that you shouldn’t blame yourself for decisions your parents made. You weren’t even born, Dem. You’re mostly mad because you think they threw their lives away. They’re in their forties, not nineties. They’ve got a lot of living left to them. They might even find happiness together still, and that largely depends on you. Whether you accept John Clark as your father or not.”
“Why?” I raged, even though he made so much sense. “What difference does it make what I think or do? We’re banished, Logan. We can’t go back. Not if we don’t want our families to suffer. You won’t hurt non-magicals. You won’t fight and neither will most witches, will they? Because you protect. So what difference does it make what I do?”
“Because I think we are going back,” Logan said, his jaw jutting. “We haven’t heard everything Clark has to say yet, and I think he’s going to tell us enough so that we’ll choose to go back. You heard James. He says the witches are behind whatever we decide to do.”
“Like start a war?” I stared at him, aghast. “Because my mother has to sleep with the Regent? I hate the idea she’s got to go to bed with him, but even I wouldn’t want innocent people to be hurt just so she doesn’t have to be touched by him anymore.” Admitting that made me feel like the world’s worst daughter. As if I were condoning what was happening to her. But I was powerless to help her except by violence, and as much as I talked about the witches revolting against their treatment, I remember how I’d almost thrown a fireball at Colonel Murgatroyd. Nausea churned in my stomach. Fighting with magic wasn’t fair.
“I don’t know about war.” Logan rubbed his jaw as if it hurt. Probably did from clenching his teeth so hard. “Maybe there’s a bigger base of support among the non-magicals than we considered. Regina told us Clark wasn’t the only guard who secretly supported witches.”
“But Regina’s dead. And she was their leader.” I buried my face in his shoulder, inhaling his sea- watery scent.
“Let’s just listen to what he says. I know as much as he hates what’s happening to your mother, there’s got to be more going on than that. I think we should at least hear him out.” Logan pressed a kiss to the top of my head. “Have I told you how much I loved you yet today, my earth witch?”
“Not in words, no,” I said. “But you show me every time you look at me. I see it in your eyes. Do you see how much I love you in my eyes?”
He nodded and hugged me tightly. “Dem? Do you want to listen to him?”
I sighed. “Let me talk to him alone first, okay? I hate apologizing when I have an audience.”
He laughed softly before kissing me. For a moment nothing existed but us and our love, but all too soon we broke the kiss, and I had to face my father.
My father. Even in my head those words sounded strange. Would I ever look at John Clark and think Father? I had no clue, but I had to at least try. No matter what Logan said, I did blame myself for his unhappiness and for Mother’s, and I intended to rectify the situation to the best of my ability.
Chapter 22
John Clark sat at the table, his face in his hands. shaking with sobs. I stopped dead for a moment and forced myself to approach him. I’d made him cry. I thought I’d wanted that, but one look at my handiwork, and I felt about two feet high. If that.
“Don’t.” I slid behind the table across from him, marshaling my courage. How could I undo what I’d done? Perhaps it was impossible, but I had to try.
I bit my lower lip. “I believe you would have stayed with her if you knew I was on the way. Mother’s stubborn. I know that. She decided she knew what was best for you, and that’s what she made sure you did.”
Clark drew in a deep, trembling breath.
“She pressed your buttons, so you’d leave angry at her. Not try to get back with her.” I pulled one of the plates of eggs closer. Everything was cold, but I was damn hungry. Plus, it gave me something to do with my nervous energy.
“You said you had to accept a dishonorable discharge or be thrown in jail. Why? Did you try to save her?” I picked up a piece of toast, and bit off a piece. Hunger roared awake inside my stomach making it hard to concentrate on anything other than the toast.
Clark watched me devour the slice before he answered. “I got all the way to her bedroom before Murgatroyd caught me. He’d been watching me, waiting for an opportunity. I’m only grateful he was so excited to get me he didn’t let me actually make contact with Helena – or she would have been involved too. But then again – how would I know what the Regent did to her after I was arrested?”
“And Chelsea?” I prompted around a big forkful of eggs. “Did she end up back in jail?”
“Chelsea’s way underground.” Clark scrubbed at his jaw so his fingers rasped in thick stubble that was almost, but not quite, a full-fledged beard. Apparently there weren’t razors on the Selkie or if there were, he hadn’t bothered with one. “I made sure of that before I ever tried to get to Helena. Logan’s whole family is, except for one of his sisters. She’s a spitfire. Refuses to hide.”
He looked at me, his bloodshot eyes full of baffled respect. “She’s your age. Idealistic as hell. Thinks being a rebel means changing the world.”
I smiled a little, even as my throat closed over with tears. “So says the soldier in a sailor’s sweater growing out his beard because he lost his commission trying to save a witch.”
“Ah,” he growled. “That’s different.”
“If you say so.” Impulsively, I reached out a hand to touch his sleeve. He caught his breath and stared at me with such hungry approbation my heart ached. “Is it okay if I call you John?”
“I said so, didn’t I?” His gruff voice couldn’t hide the fact he was almost overcome. His face worked for a moment before he took out a handkerchief and blew his nose. “Damn sea air. Think I’m allergic. Or catching
a cold.”
Whatever he had must have been contagious because the world doubled thanks to the tears burning my eyes. This man was my biological father. However, I couldn’t call him that. Not yet anyway. I’d have to work up to that.
“Demetria,” he said.
I held up a hand. “Dem. Everyone calls me Dem. Nobody calls me Demetria unless I’m in trouble.”
John smiled, but sadness tinged his eyes. “Demetria is such a beautiful name. Do you mind awfully if I call you that? It suits you.”
Too choked up to speak, I nodded. He’d missed my infancy and my childhood. My teen years. Maybe this could be something just for him. A father/daughter thing. Othala, if only I knew him better. Out of his guard’s uniform and with his face covered in gray and red hair, he didn’t look like anyone I knew. A stranger. A heartbroken, beaten-down one at that.
“Was she really that unhappy all these years? Your mother?” John picked up his coffee mug and slurped. His cheeks looked thin. Hadn’t he been eating lately? “I don’t like to think of her as unhappy. Tell me she loved your father. That she had with him what she couldn’t have with me.”
I sighed. I thought of my father buried behind his newspapers and books. Holding out an empty cup for refilling without even saying please.
“I never once saw them kiss. Or even hug,” I confessed, blowing out my breath. “But he bought her a house with an ocean view from the second-floor back windows. We were never hungry, and we had nice clothes. He never said, ‘I love you, Dem’, but I didn’t feel unloved. Truth is, Mother made me the center of her world. I can see that now. I don’t know if she had room for him. Not really. Maybe he tried at first. Maybe he gave up. I don’t know. He married her, he must have loved her, right?”
I rubbed at my eyes. What if she’d enchanted him with a lust spell? Logan said witches couldn’t conjure love, that lust was the best they could do. Would lust impel someone to marry another person? I didn’t want to think about it.
Sea Cursed: An Adult Dystopian Paranormal Romance: Sector 13 (The Othala Witch Collection) Page 23