by Exley, A. W.
"Did it not occur to you that kindness is a greater cruelty? For you slice my heart open with your words and actions," she said.
His eyes widened and he drew in a sharp breath. "I couldn't hurt you, Ailin. I only wish to know you a little better."
A short laugh burst from her throat. "At least you don't use a knife to understand me."
"What did the others do to you, the men who captured you?" His frown deepened as he stood in front of her and then dropped to his knees.
She shook her head and raised one hand to touch her throat. The memories bubbled to the surface of her mind. "I want to forget," she whispered.
He placed a finger under her chin and lifted her face to meet his serious gaze. "Tell me, Ailin, please."
This landwalker with his compassion would strip her bare faster than a fillet knife. Her heart tightened, remembering hurt. "They said they pursued knowledge. They wrapped a cloth tight around my gills and held me under water to see if I would drown." She swallowed and fought the panic that threatened to rear up with the memory. She had struggled and clawed at them, unable to open her gills to filter the water and it forced its way down her throat instead.
She screwed up her eyes, trying to erase the images that flashed through her mind. Fenton's hand moved to stroke her cheek as she spoke.
"Then they slid a knife blade under my gills to hold them open in the air, to see what would happen." You could drown a fish on dry land, her body had gasped for oxygen but a large man pressed a cloth to her face so she couldn't draw breath like a landwalker. "Then they did other things, to my body, trying to learn how we mate."
She dropped her head and blinked back more tears. Those men bombarded her with questions about how her kind procreated and bore young. She refused to answer so they laid her on a table. They poked and prodded every inch of skin and hide as they sought to discover the secrets her form held.
He took her hands in his larger ones. "I'm so sorry," he whispered. "Not all men are like them."
"No, you are not like them." Fenton showed her kindness where before she found only pain and suffering. Plus there was something in his gaze, so lost. She wanted to find whatever he was missing. But was her curiosity real? Or simply that in her captivity she clung to the small kindness she found in Fenton? Did her mind twist him from captor to protector? Or worse, did her siren nature target him and try to bend him to her will and escape?
No, her soul whispered. I would know this man whether I lay here as a prisoner or swim free. He is different. His presence lulled her like the sway of the ocean. When he wrapped his arms around her, it thrilled her and set her nerves alight in ways she had never experienced before.
He stroked her hands for a silent minute, his head bowed close to hers. Through hooded eyes, she watched the tentacles wrapped around his arms and inhaled the fresh salt breeze caught in his hair. For a moment, she thought he was like her, a creature of the ocean. Perhaps there was a deeper undercurrent to their connection, more than them both being prisoners.
Then he stood and took a step backward, as though needing to put physical distance between them. "I must attend to my duties, but I could bring you some books to pass the time?"
She couldn't help it, she laughed, the idea of a mermaid reading a book so ludicrous quite apart from the obvious problem. "We do not have books, your markings mean nothing to me."
The frown returned to his too serious face. "Then how do you learn history, pass on stories or poetry?"
Do landwalkers not talk to one another she wondered, that they need to scratch everything down? "Stories are passed mouth to ear."
He made a noise and scratched his chin. "Chess then? I could bring a board."
She tapped her tail against the floor. She wanted to escape, not have some landwalker distraction. What she would give to swim, to power through the water. Her heart ached and struggled with each beat. Yet he seemed to be trying. "What is chess?"
"A game of strategy between two players."
Games. He offered her games. Lethargy took hold of her body, what was the point? It would be easier to lay down and die now, rather than be carved open by a laughing audience.
"Hey," Fenton's whisper drew her gaze. "Don't give up yet."
The tears sprung to her eyes again and she wiped them away. "You will not help me escape."
"I can't. The other men—" he choked the words out.
She waved a hand and cut him off, he was just as powerless. She was a pile of gold, they would never let her go. Better to concentrate on the small acts and perhaps distract herself. "I like games." She tried to smile.
He nodded and swallowed. "I'll send Timmy when he has a break. He has a sharp mind and he can start walking you through the moves."
She drew back at mention of another landwalker. "Not another man."
"Timmy is a youngster and he will treat you with respect." He withdrew as he spoke, physically by stepping backward and a wall seemed to drop between them. His openness of a few moments before, disappeared just as he did.
She wanted to scream with frustration. Above her head came the noise of men, the creak of timbers and the occasional call of a circling seagull. Fenton dissected her prison in easy strokes. She had only to drag herself up to the deck and freedom would be within reach. An expanse of flooring stretched between her perch and the bottom step. The slats were worn smooth by years of feet and cargo dragged along the surface. There would be few splinters to stick her on the way past. How hard would it be to haul herself up the steps?
A sigh rose in her chest. The crew worked above, how could they miss the sight of a mermaid crawling across the deck, hoping to reach the railing?
A light tread on the stairs interrupted her failed escape plans, and made her look up. Small feet in equally small boots appeared followed by a short, slender frame. Sun bleached blond hair curled around a chubby face that still carried puppy fat, although the hint of the man to come showed in the square jaw. The boy had one eye, the other covered up. He stopped on the last step.
"Hello, miss," he spoke softly.
"Hello, Timmy," she replied. She smiled since given the child's hesitance, he seemed to need encouragement to approach. Whatever the species, all young were the same, reluctant and curious at the same time.
He carried an object tucked under one arm and he swapped it to hold in both hands as he took slow steps toward her. "Mr Fenton asked if I would teach you chess."
"You have my full attention." The smile came easier this time, even though her heart sank heavy in her chest. The pressure seemed to build and she coughed to relieve it somewhat. Would death claim her if she just laid down and willed it to come?
Timmy dragged over another crate to act as a table and then rolled over a barrel for him to sit on. Ailin moved herself so her tail sat to one side, out of the way of their playing field and allowed her to lean closer.
A black patch bulged over one eye and the other held a serious gaze as the child set up the board. He caressed and named each piece and explained how it moved.
She tried to engage him in conversation but he held tight to his words. She only learned that he had lost the eye as a babe and his parents sold him to the ore-mancers, the men who worked magic with flesh and metal to be enhanced. They had added the telescope and sold him to the captain. She held in her revulsion at the coldness of men, where a landwalker became less of a person when they lost a part. How easily they turned a sick or injured person into a pile of coins to feed their endless greed. Little wonder they would sell her, she was only half a woman.
"What of Fenton? Where does he come from?" Another question bubbled in her mind, did he have a mate and young waiting onshore somewhere?
"He's the same as me," Timmy said, puffing his lean chest out as though he took great pride in having something in common with the older man. "We both came from the ore-mancers."
"Oh?" She had not noticed any mechanical parts to Fenton, perhaps they lay under his clothes? Heat rose up her torso at the
thought of stripping him bare to find his enhancement. "What does he do?"
The lad's voice dropped to a low whisper. "He makes the others afraid of him."
"Why are they scared of him?" Ailin's stomach rolled, was there something she missed about the landwalker? He was tall and broad, and yet exuded a gentleness at odds with his size.
Timmy cast around, as though making sure they were truly alone and then leaned in closer over the board. "He controls the kraken."
Her heart skipped a beat. "The kraken?"
Ailin's mind spun. The kraken was the most feared thing that dwelt in the darkest depth of the ocean. Vicious and cruel, it would rip another creature apart and then leave the pieces to drift on the tide. Her people thought it mad, driven insane by a constant blood lust that surged through its enormous form. Even their fiercest warriors spoke of it in hushed whispers, least the word vibrate through the water and reach its ears. How could Fenton be tied to such a monstrosity without being tainted by it?
Timmy continued. "Fenton must summon it whenever the captain tells him to, and order it to do as Captain Reis wants."
That explained the tattoo he wore, a visible sign of his invisible tie to the kraken. But how could a landwalker control a primordial beast that dwelt far beneath the water? A hundred questions rose to the tip of her tongue but remained unasked as a heavy step shook the stairs and the pieces on the board jumped. Men rattled down into the hold and filled the space.
"What's going on, Timmy?" Reis stood with one hand on an overhead timber. He scowled at the game in progress. The captain's black clothing relieved by the red sash around his waist, like a line of blood.
Timmy leapt to his feet. "Mr Fenton suggested I teach Ailin to play, to pass the time."
The scowl deepened and black eyes turned to rack the mermaid. "Don't try your siren tricks on the boy. No man here will free you, not unless he wants to serve himself up in your place." He struck out and the board flew across the room and the carved pieces rolled across the floor.
On the back swing, he struck the boy who cried out and scurried to a far corner of the room. The patch over one eye came loose and the half-light glinted on the metal embedded in his eye socket.
The captain levelled a finger at the child who held one hand to the side of his face. "Get up to your post, Timmy, and no more wasting time with the fish."
He gulped and shot a look to Ailin but she couldn't meet his hurt gaze. The boy's feet scrabbled to make purchase on the smooth floor, and it took him a few attempts to stand and place his feet under him. Then he scuttled up the stairs.
"Dinger, Yusuf!" The captain shouted over his shoulder and two men stepped forward. Both were as broad as barrels, but one a good foot taller than the other. "Put our treasure back in its chest and make sure it's locked away."
"No, not the crate. Please." Ailin tried to pull herself back as the men advanced but had nowhere to go. She fell to one side, hands out to protect her head. She hated being on land, her body clumsy and seemed to weigh as much as a whale. She couldn't move around out of water without great effort, hauling herself by her arms. If she were in the ocean, she would have shot away faster than any of them could pounce. Feet surrounded her while she tried to drag herself to a corner. Hands grabbed at her. One pulled a lock of her hair and she whimpered as pain shot over her scalp.
They threw her into the crate and the water slopped over the sides. She dropped below the surface and before she could sit up the lid slammed down and the padlock rattled as they locked her inside.
"No." She hammered her hands on the cold metal encasing her. "No," her voice dropped to a whisper as she cried. What was the point in trying to fight? Death awaited her regardless, better it come quickly and end her suffering.
Chapter Seven
From his position at the helm, Fenton saw the captain and the others disappear down the steps to the hold and his heart sunk. The wind caught any sound and whipped it past his ears, but he saw Timmy shoot out like a startled rabbit. The boy scampered up the ratlines as though a fire breathing demon snapped at his heels. An apt description for the captain when he emerged, a black mood fouled the air around him. The crew shrunk back and dropped their heads, no one wanted to attract Reis' attention when ill humour wrapped itself tight around him.
He barked orders and if he deemed men too slow to respond, Yusuf the quartermaster dispensed a lick of the whip to make them lift their feet higher. Fenton steeled himself as the captain descended on him, unable to abandon his post until relieved. Reis pushed him out of the way and wrapped his hands around the wheel. Yusuf's hand caressed the whip dangling by his side and Fenton waited for a blow that didn't fall. Not that he would have felt one, his body numbed like his mind. Instead, the captain kept him busy all day with mundane chores that would normally be undertaken by an ordinary hand. He knew punishment when he felt it seeping through his clothes and running down between his shoulder blades.
Sweat poured down the back of his neck and soaked his shirt as he worked high in the ratlines. There was no shelter from the harsh sun as he flexed his fingers to fix frayed rope. Timmy stood in the crow's nest, his telescopic eye scanning the horizon, searching for any sign of the Regulators, the lawmen that prowled the skies dispensing justice and collecting taxes.
The boy refused to look down or acknowledge Fenton and from the way he scurried from the cargo hold, Fenton could only hope Ailin was unhurt.
No sooner did his feet hit then deck than Reis found another task for him, from swabbing the decks to cleaning out the latrine. And so the day wore on without any break or rest until night descended and the crew changed shift. He swayed on his feet before Reis allowed him to go and Fenton dropped to his bunk fully clothed, too exhausted to even seek a dinner.
"What happened?" he asked Timmy from between cracked lips. He drank from a steel water bottle and cooled his parched throat. The lash never touched his back but he wished it had, at least a whipping was over quicker than being worked to death.
A bruise bloomed over the lad's cheek. "Cap'n didn't like me teaching Ailin to play chess. He said she was trying to use her siren ways on me to escape. They threw her in the crate and locked it." The boy's words choked off. "I can still hear her crying and hammering to get out."
Fenton swung his legs over the side of his bed. He'd not leave her like that, it didn't matter how tired he was, he would at least open the lid for her, so she could see the moon. He only made it three strides before he way was blocked.
"Where are you going, Fenton?" Yusuf stood in the middle of the bunk room. Arms crossed over his massive chest. He was the only man on the crew taller than Fenton and he made an impressive obstacle to surmount. One would have to climb over or tunnel under.
He raised one eyebrow. Only the captain could order him around. It was unusual for a seaman to question his movements even if he was the quartermaster and held an equal rank. But then today had been an unusual day. "I have some business to see to."
Yusuf shook his head and more men moved to stand either side of him. "Captain says you're to get your beauty sleep. Said that fish is getting into your head and I'm not to let you out of here tonight. None of us want our share of the gold to slip overboard under the cover of dark."
Men murmured in agreement and slid from their hammocks to stand shoulder to shoulder. Greed affected each differently but they all shared one common trait: they wanted the reward waiting for them in Darjee. Even their fear of Fenton and the kraken paled next to a huge pile of golden coins and enough narcotic to bliss out their brains.
He fisted his hands. One or two of them he could take, but not all of them, not at once. It pained him to leave Ailin trapped in total darkness and his gut rolled at his betrayal. Yet again he failed and proved himself unmanly. He vowed at first light he would go to her.
He slept in snatches as exhaustion rolled over him. He tried to will his brain awake but the next wave would catch him and pull him under again. It wasn't until dawn crept through the port ho
les and edged over the floor, he was able to get up. Men watched him from their hammocks, but none stood against him in the bright light of morning. Their worries lessened with the rise of the sun. The crew on deck would have their eyes on him. There was no cover of dark for him to try and steal their reward and throw her overboard.
His hands itched to snatch her away from under their noses, but he wouldn't make it three paces from the hold before they would tear him down. He sneered at his cowardice, that concern for his own worthless hide stopped him. A real man would at least try to save her. Perhaps he it was time he acted like the man he pretended to be.
He drew a deep breath of salt air into his lungs and then leapt down the steps, not wasting time to tread each one. He landed with a bang that rattled the lanterns on their hooks. The key hung next to one and he snatched it down and unlocked the crate and then threw open the lid. Ailin floated under the shallow water like a beautiful creature trapped within a mirror. With her eyes closed, she lay so still that for one long heartbeat he thought she was dead.
"Ailin," Fenton called her name and reached out. His hand broke the surface of the water and he stroked the side of her face.
Her eyes opened but her gaze appeared dull and lines tugged at the corners of her eyes as though she struggled to keep her lids open. Strands of hair floated around her face and where it pulled away from her neck he saw the tiny ripple of her gills. She breathed but made no effort to sit up and only the faintest rise and fall showed through her chest. The spark of life ebbed from her face as he gazed at her.
She's given up. He knew the look of someone who had lost their fight to live. He saw it in the mirror when he shaved. Ailin waited for death to claim her.
"Hey, I've come to let you out despite what the captain says." He leaned into the crate and slid his arms under her body, lifting her from the shallow water.
Her eyes drooped half shut. "Please," she whispered. "Can't breathe. So tight inside. Need to swim."
One thought flashed through his brain as he cradled her, was this a trick to be released back into the ocean? Was Reis right all along and she used him? He was the only one who spent time with her, apart from Timmy, had she dug her claws into his mind in their short time together? He hated himself for even thinking it and then he took in her pale complexion. Not the alabaster of a moonlit night but the pale grey of dish water. Her scales had no lustre. Her chest heaved with short, shallow breaths. This was no trick. He either acted or she would die, and he could not be deprived of her company. Not yet.