by Kitty Margo
“No… food.” She shuddered as just the smell sent waves of revulsion rushing through her.
Sean blew out a quick breath and she noticed the determination register on his face as he dipped the spoon into the broth and brought it toward her pursed lips. “I must insist, Lynna. You cannot continue to live without nourishment. Therefore, you are either going to eat this broth or I will be forced to pour it down your throat. Now which would you prefer?”
She could tell by his tone of voice and the resolve in his eyes that he would brook no argument, nor was he going to back down on the threat. Her only hope was to try to eat the broth and keep it down at least until he left the cabin, then perhaps he would leave her in peace and allow her to sleep.
She parted her lips as he spooned the warm salty liquid into her mouth. It tasted divine, but felt as heavy as oil swimming around in her stomach. Miraculously she managed to keep it down. After swallowing several spoonfuls, she was convinced she would gag on another drop and turned her head. “No more…please.”
“Good girl. I’m proud of you.” Sean stood and returned the bowl to the table. “I’ll be back later with more broth. Hopefully, after a few days of liquids you can graduate to solid food. With the added benefit of the fresh sea air you should be back to your old self in no time.” Sean was being overly optimistic for her sake. In the condition she was in, it would be months before she returned to her former self. If ever.
True to his word, Sean returned every few hours with another bowl of hot broth and forced her to eat whether she wanted it or not, until she clamped her mouth shut and the liquid dribbled down her chin. Grinning with the realization that at least she now had the energy to be stubborn, he left the cabin with a contented smile spreading across his lips.
She would live.
After four days had passed, Sean noticed that Lynna was more alert and there was the slightest tinge of color in her cheeks. She was staying awake for longer periods of time and even occasionally showing a bit of temper when he forced her to eat something she didn’t particularly have a taste for.
“Where are we going?” Not that she really cared, she was just curious.
“To my home.”
“Could you be more specific?”
“Does it matter?”
It didn’t. Lynna knew Beau was safe with his family. Practically from the day he was born, she had been so sick she barely remembered her own child. Just his smell. The sweet talcum powder smell that always lingered on his dewy skin. Tears stung her eyes as she remembered the softness of her precious son at her breast.
But she wasn’t able to tend to him, so he was better off without her. She didn’t care what happened to her now that her last hope of finding Joshua alive had been shattered. Nothing really mattered anymore. It was of little consequence to her where she went or who was there when she arrived. One place would be as dismal as the next and she no longer had the will to fight. She just wanted to sleep. “No, I don’t suppose it does.”
Even though she was gradually improving, Sean was nonetheless shocked each time he entered the cabin by the sight of Lynna’s gaunt appearance. She still had a long way to go before the term healthy could be applied to her. The stunningly beautiful, vivacious girl with the golden curls he remembered seemed to be lost forever. Lynna was skin and bones and her eyes were all but sunk into black holes in her face. Suzanne had never admitted it, but Sean was convinced she had been poisoning Lynna, or feeding her some other voodoo potion. From the looks of her a few more days would have finished the job. The girl looked like death warmed over.
Lynna opened her eyes well after dark as moonlight spilled through the open balcony doors. She breathed deeply of the salty sea air, lulled by the gentle rocking beneath her. Listening to the sound of water rushing past the hull of the ship, she thought of Joshua on the deck of the Windjammer. His raven hair being brushed carelessly from his forehead. The twinkle in his eyes when he teased her. The passion when he made love to her. The love he had already held for their unborn child. She remembered their wedding day, the happiest day of her life. She thought of Beau, her beautiful son. Did he remember her? What of her father and Aunt Judith?
Lynna knew all too well what it felt like to lose someone you loved. She hoped her family’s suffering had eased and they could find their peace raising little Beau in her stead. So many loved ones left behind. And Suzanne. What of Suzanne? How could she have forgotten about her? What did Sean do to the poor girl? Did he let her go? Was she also on the ship? She had to try to remain alert and ask Sean when next she saw him.
Thinking of Suzanne brought her so vividly to mind that Lynna thought she must be dreaming, for it was as if Suzanne was hovering directly in front of her. Though a great fog swirled up around Suzanne, Lynna saw her clearly. She was at some type of gathering, almost like a religious ceremony, standing in the center of a group of… slaves. The slaves were bowing to her as if she were their leader, but that was unlikely as she had never known Suzanne to venture into the slave quarters.
But Suzanne was there, at least in her dream, with her hands held up in the air chanting words… strange words… in an unknown tongue. Sounds similar to what Lynna had heard drifting from the slave quarters at Magnolia House on hot summer nights when the windows were open to allow a cooling breeze to flow through her aunt’s cottage. And even though it couldn’t possibly be, it looked like she was holding Lynna’s hairbrush in her right hand, the red one her father had brought her from France. With her left hand Suzanne allowed wax to drip from a black candle onto the hairbrush coating the hair.
She opened her mouth and lifted her voice to the night sky. “I curse you with Three Days of Hell, Lynna.” Then her eerie chant echoed around the gathering:
Lesions on her skin will grow
Afflict her with a painful blow
Sores and pain afflict her now
For 3 nights she'll wonder how
Dukes of darkness, Kings of hell
Smite my enemy, bring her hell.”
Chapter 10
Joshua didn’t know if it was an hour, a day, or a fortnight later when he again opened his eyes, but he had company now. An adorable young girl of perhaps twelve years of age sat in a chair beside the bed. She grinned from ear to ear showing rows of perfect white teeth when he opened his eyes and, for lack of a better word… grunted. At least that was what it sounded like to him. Or maybe it was his mind playing tricks on him again. He closed his eyes for a second as vague images flashed through his mind and he desperately tried, without much success, to pull forth a memory.
The girl jumped up from her chair and hurried to the pot over the fireplace, ladling something that smelled absolutely divine into a bowl. He prayed she was in a sharing mood because he was ravenous and the spot between his belly button and his backbone felt hollow. Evidently she was, for with a light step she made her way back to the bed and placed the steaming bowl on a small table.
Joshua tried to speak, but his throat was as parched as desert sand and his lips so chapped he couldn’t force out more than a dry raspy croak. Noticing his dilemma the girl rushed to dip a cup into a bucket of water and bring it to him. Placing her hand gently behind his head to raise it, she held the cup while Joshua greedily drank of fresh spring water that tasted better than the finest wine he had ever consumed.
Lowering his head to the pillow, she held the bowl close to his mouth and fed him spoon after spoon of a delicious stew consisting of some type of meat, potatoes and onions. Although it was the best meal he had ever eaten, and before he could even congratulate the chef, the exertion it required to open his mouth, chew, and swallow took its toll and left him completely spent. Joshua drifted into a dream filled sleep of Lynna and the child she carried. His daughter.
Chapter 11
Lynna came fully awake and gazed out the window just as the first morning rays were creeping over the horizon. Attempting to sit up, she found the struggle to be not worth the effort required and fell back on the p
illow with a defeated moan. It had to be a horrible, horrible nightmare, of course. She and Suzanne had made their peace. She would have no reason to curse her.
Taking a deep breath, she was determined that today would be a better day. When suddenly, without warning, her head was filled with… screams. Vibrating noises that sounded like thousands of people screaming in her ears all at once until it was one loud keening shrill echoing in her head.
In the next second Sean entered with a tray laden with a variety of foods in hopes of tempting her to eat, but Lynna could not be roused. Had she taken a turn for the worse? As he was debating what his next step toward aiding in her recovery should be, Lynna’s eyes suddenly rolled back in her head and she opened her mouth and screamed a blood curdling scream that shook the rafters of the ship. Goosebumps shivered across the skin of each and every member of the crew as the nightmarish sound filled the air around them.
“What madness is this?” Sean mumbled, vowing that he had never heard a more ungodly sound in all his life. “Lynna!” Shaking her roughly, he tried unsuccessfully to bring her around, but it was as if she had been drugged with laudanum. “Lynna, wake up!”
She didn’t seem to hear him as she continued screaming louder and louder with pain. When she wasn’t screaming, she moaned and clutched the blanket over her stomach until her knuckles whitened under the pressure. Nothing Sean could do would halt her bone chilling screams or ease her pain. Lynna opened her eyes, but they were blank and unable to focus. Rolling her body from side to side on the bunk, she tossed her head back and forth on the pillow like a madwoman clutching at her stomach and pleading with Sean, “The pain… is killing me! Please help me! Make it stop! Oh God, please, make… it stop!”
Her eyes were angry red and bloodshot as tears of agony coursed down her cheeks. Her screams echoed throughout every corner of the ship for hours on end causing the crew members onboard to whisper amongst themselves that she must be possessed. She screamed until her throat was raw and she lost her voice and couldn’t utter another sound. Still, her eyes screamed with silent terror. The silence in the cabin was almost deafening when her screams finally died away, leaving the ship eerily quiet. After twenty hours of nonstop screaming, she finally slept.
Removing his boots, Sean tiptoed out of the cabin on silent feet afraid if he awakened her she would begin the ear splitting wailing again.
Sean instructed Rorie, his cabin boy, to sit with Lynna for the remainder of the night while he tried to grab a few hours sleep in the boys bunk before facing a new day. Tried. He doubted his ears would ever stop ringing with her pitiful cries.
Much to his surprise, Sean slept like the dead for several hours and when he returned Rorie informed him that after her screams had quieted down Lynna had slept like a newborn. “But she seems to have some sores on her face. I didn’t see her do it, but she must have clawed at her skin some time during the night, boss.”
Sean moved to stand beside Lynna’s rumpled bed, yet instead of fresh claw marks he found several weeping pustules on her face. It was a hideous sight and the yellowish discharge from the pustules smelled like something rotten or… dead. Evidently the sores itched like a bad case of poison ivy because Lynna clawed at her face constantly.
“Lynna, you must stop scratching at your face. You are drawing blood.” Sean tried to hold her hands to her sides, but she fought him like a wild woman. As a last resort he was forced to tie her hands to the bedposts to keep her from raking at the pustules in her sleep and leaving her face scarred and disfigured. She didn’t like being tied down and her mournful cries of torment once again echoed through the farthest recesses of the ship.
Several of Sean’s crew members stuffed wads of cotton in their ears to drown out her spine chilling screams. One of them was heard to murmur, “She sounds like a demon straight from the bowels of hell. It makes me want to jump overboard and swim to shore. I can’t take much more of her screaming. That ain’t no normal sound.”
On the third day, Sean shook Lynna vigorously trying to wake her, praying that she had turned a corner and today would be a better day. Opening her eyes, a weak smile curved the corners of her lips and she almost focused on him. She opened her mouth to speak, but instead a vile, green vomit spewed from her lips. The noxious fluid splashed Sean’s chest, covering him from neck to boots. Fortunately, he had jumped to the side and clamped his mouth shut in time or he would be retching over the balcony rail. As it was, his stomach was fighting a losing battle to hold on to its contents.
Lynna would barely have time to draw a breath into her starving lungs before more vomit was spurting from her. Falling back on the bed, exhausted, she could rest only a second before being seized by another fit and it would began all over again. Sean moved back from the bed a safe distance and could only watch the poor girl, offering her a sip of water in between intense bouts of nausea.
This went on for hours until Lynna, Sean, the bunk, the floor, the walls, and everything in between was coated with a thick layer of slime. Sean had long since stopped even bothering to change out of his soiled clothes. But the contents of her stomach had to have emptied hours ago. Where was the greenish liquid coming from?
For the remainder of the third day Lynna vomited, yanked on her bindings until her wrists were raw and bleeding, screamed as if each breath might be her last, and begged someone, anyone, to scratch her face. Sean rubbed a smelly ointment on the scabs when it appeared she was sleeping and it seemed to ease the itching for a short while.
When all was quiet and Lynna was calm enough to drift into a fitful sleep, Sean deduced that all in all it had been three days of living hell. For both of them.
No hope for it. Sean’s clothes were ruined. Fifty washings wouldn’t remove the vile odor emanating from them, nor would a simple sponge bath cleanse the grime from his body. Shucking his clothes and standing naked on the balcony, he tossed them into the churning sea below. Grabbing a bar of strong lye soap, he shouted his intentions to his first mate on deck and jumped into the ocean to rid his body of the powerful stench. He rode the waves for a few minutes hoping the salt water would cleanse the stench from his pores. After furiously scrubbing every inch of his body until his skin felt raw, but clean, he climbed the rope ladder a crew member lowered.
Back in his cabin he donned clean clothes and fell into a bunk built into the wall so as not to disturb Lynna. The odor in the room was overpowering, but he was so tired he was asleep in seconds. Before closing his eyes he prayed fervently that he never again had to witness anyone suffer through what Lynna had for the past three nights. As he drifted off to sleep, he was left to wonder how much more the ailing girl could survive.
On the fourth day Sean stood over Lynna, surveying the damage. She looked like hell, and she smelled. Vile. The smells of vomit, urine, and the yellowish discharge seeping from her sores all fought for dominance making Sean gag and rush to the balcony, gasping for much needed fresh air. He continued to dry heave as the sickening smells drifted from the cabin.
Lynna’s hair was matted to her head and coated with vomit. Her face was scabbed over and her wrists were raw and bleeding. Dark circles lay under bloodshot eyes that stood out from the pallor of her pasty white skin and the entire cabin reeked of the foulest odor Sean had ever encountered.
Cracking open one eye she found the room spinning furiously around her. “I’m so dizzy, Sean. Please, don’t even think about making me move. Just let me sleep.”
“You can sleep later,” Sean insisted, with a clean handkerchief held to his nose. Putting his hands on her to lift her from the grime of the bed wasn’t exactly a chore he relished. “First we must get you out of this filth.”
Lynna gazed out the open balcony door, weak from dehydration. “I just want to die.” But when Sean held a brimming cup of cool water to her lips she drank greedily and begged for more.
“You don’t mean that, Lynna. If you can survive what you have for the last three days your will to live is stronger than you think.” Sea
n admired her courage. He reached down to finger the only clean spot on the blanket she covered herself with. “I’m not at all sure I would have lived through it.”
“Was what I experienced a symptom of childbed fever?” she mumbled dejectedly, not really seeming to care one way or the other.
If he were to venture a guess it was more a symptom of Suzanne practicing her voodoo skills and evidently the woman had become a master of the art. “Lynna, there are some things I need to tell you.” He hesitated. She had been through so much already, but she needed to know the truth for her own safety. “About Suzanne.”
“Suzanne! Where is she? Is she safe? You didn’t hurt her, did you?” Then Lynna remembered her strange dream from a few nights earlier. It had seemed so real. “I had a bizarre hallucination or nightmare or something a few nights ago.” She brought a crusty, trembling hand to her forehead and laughed uneasily. “Suzanne, of all people, was putting some sort of… curse on me.”
Sean scrubbed his hands over his face and leaned back in his chair. “Lynna, your concern for Suzanne is completely unwarranted, I assure you.”
Lynna closed her eyes, mumbling sleepily, “What are you talking about?”
“I took you away from home for your own safety.” Clutching the handkerchief to his nose he glanced toward the open balcony door with longing. “Suzanne has been planning your death for months.”
“You cannot be serious.” Confusion was etched on Lynna’s face. Suzanne had exhibited nothing but kindness toward her since Joshua’s disappearance. “Suzanne wouldn’t try to kill me.”