Page 22 of The Sea-Ogre's Eager Bride

“Better?” he asks, rich voice oddly demanding.

I nod enthusiastically, raising a hand to my mouth to cover it as I chew the tougher skin. “You are too kind, truly, Ranan.”

He crouches in front of me on his haunches, silent but full of tension. “You lied to me again.”

A shiver runs down my spine. His voice is so low and deep that it makes everything sound ominous. I can’t tell if he’s pointing this out as a fact or if he’s upset with me. “Aye, I did. I thought an old wound might be better than my menses. Most men think a woman unclean while she bleeds. I’m making a mess, I can’t practice swimming, and I worried you’d be upset.”

“I am more upset at the lies. You said you would stop.”

“I know.” My voice is small and frightened. “It’s…habit. No one wants to hear the truth from a slave.”

“I do.” He puts his finger under my chin and forces me to look him in the eye. “You are my wife.”

But I’m not. He can say I’m his wife, but we haven’t had a ceremony. We haven’t shared a bed and we barely know each other. Nothing is permanent yet and it would be far too easy to walk it back. “I just didn’t want you to change your mind. I don’t want to be a bother to you.”

I’m still thinking about that day on the beach, and how he’d almost left me. In that moment, I realized that my future is more fragile than I’d realized, and it could end up being worse than the fate I’d had in Sunswallow.

Ranan’s eyes flash with irritation. “Itoldyou that you were my wife. How do I prove this to you?”

“I don’t know.” All I know is that I’m going to do my best not to anger him. I’m going to be the sweetest, most eager bride ever. Perhaps I should try touching him to ease things along. My abdomen cramps with another painful squeeze and I shove another seagrass fruit into my mouth so I can avoid answering him.

With another frustrated growl, Ranan gets to his feet and stalks out of the tent.

Chapter

Eleven

RANAN

This human female is infuriating. No matter how many times I tell her that she is my wife, yet she does not believe me. She looks at me with doubt in her eyes, fear in her posture. She frets that the smallest inconvenience will make me change my mind and I will abandon her on the nearest shore.

She is…right.

That is the worst part of it.

Because I did try to get rid of her. I did attempt to find a human settlement and leave her there, only to realize they would treat her far more poorly than I would. So I am keeping her, and yet the promise of that is not enough. I must somehow prove to her that I have truly changed my mind. That I will not abandon her just because she has her monthly moon courses, or that she does not feel well. I will not leave her behind just because I am inconvenienced by her presence.

I don’t know how to prove this, though. I do not need to make clever conversation to the rocky shores and the waves. I do not need to entertain the fish I catch. I certainly do not need toplease the humans I rob with my presence. I am good at being alone, and I bring my wealth back to my family’s flotilla. It is an arrangement that suits both of our parties well.

And yet now I have a wife, and I must change something, because it is growing increasingly clear to me that she will not be able to survive with the few amenities I keep stored on Akara’s back. I think about the look on Vali’s face when I offered her cloth—the sheer wonder when she touched the silks, the way she held the burgundy fabric as if she had never caressed anything finer. It makes me want to find the nearest human settlement and shake them all, one by one, for treating such a pleasant female in such a manner.

It makes me want to find more pretty things to please Vali, too. That urge annoys me, because she should be grateful I am keeping her, and yet I am the one eager to please. Hmph. I do notneedto do anything to give her a better home than she had.

I tell myself this even as I spend all night hunting the seagrass fruit.

I tell myself this as I make the swim to shore and cut down more cattail pods for her.

I tell myself this as I spend half the night swimming ahead of Akara to my grotto, where I store the goods I steal from humans and look for things that might please her. I have jewels and weapons and a few statues and vases, but nothing that seem as if they would appeal to a woman in pain. Frustrated, I dig through the fabrics I have stolen from laden ships and use them to make a large, soft pile that will act as a bunk. I normally drift in the water at Akara’s side when I sleep, but she clearly needs a bed.

I remember that she mentionedrawfish, too. The humans cook their meat, I recall from the few human settlements I’ve passed through. They cook their meat and cover it with salt and add roots, as if they are trying to make up for all the flavor they have burned out of it. She will want to cook her food once Ibring her to the grotto, I suspect. She liked the raw fish I gave her before, but she could have been pretending. I look around at the treasures and pick up a jewel-crusted pot, wondering if this is used for cooking. My people do not cook. We eat what the sea provides, cold and raw. It irritates me that I must go to such lengths to suit her, and I toss the pot aside with a huff.

I swim back to Akara, my mood sour. Through our mental bond, I know automatically how to find her, letting our link guide me to the hamarii despite the endless sameness of the open waters. I climb back up onto her back as dawn nears, and glimpse into the tent at my human wife.

She lies upon the floor in a huddled ball, curled around her limbs. Cattail pods are emptied, the shells neatly lined up by her feet, and the scent of cattail fluff—and blood—is everywhere inside the tent. The burgundy fabric is carefully folded under her head, acting as a pillow, and she uses her torn dress over her loins instead of the fabric I gave her. Vali is asleep, her breathing regular. Even in her sleep, however, her brows are furrowed, as if she cannot escape the pain even then.

All of the annoyance I have felt at having to accommodate her vanishes in a moment. She hurts, and I want to make it better. She has been all smiles and eagerness since I met her, and I do not like seeing her like this. I do not like how helpless it makes me feel.

I drop my bags of cattails and seagrass fruit just outside the tent, hitch one of the pouches of gold to my belt, and head into the waters again. Perhaps I can find a place where they will trade gold for this “willow bark.”

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