Page 19 of Wicked Tides
“Don’t got no kids.”
“Good.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose and took a scan of the waters surrounding us. Black waters. Water I couldn’t see through. It was a time when we had to be more vigilant.
“Gus,” I said, waving my hand at him. “A word.”
He groaned, taking one more swig of his drink before corking the bottle and setting it down on the barrel in front of the men. He swayed as he walked up the steps toward me, but I knew his sway wasn’t just from his drink. It was the weakness in his left leg that worsened the longer we were at sea. He was getting old and his injuries were catching up to him.
Meeting me at the top of the steps, he leaned forward on the railing with a sigh. I stood next to him, perching my elbows on the carved wood.
“Something on your mind?” I asked.
Below, the men watched us for a bit before continuing with their games. But they had quieted. Their ears would seek out our conversation and I usually let them. There weren’t many secrets on my ship.
“The waters are changing,” Gus said. “Been feeling it for a long time. I know you have, too. Every time we sail out, I feel like we know the waters less and less.”
I nodded, staring off toward the clouds gathering in the west.
“Something is definitely different,” I admitted.
“You know, me and your dad had this same kind of conversation just before that wretched island.”
I turned and met Gus’s cloudy eye. “Did you, now?”
“He told me the tides were shifting. I agreed. We went on anyway. See, the ocean doesn’t bend to us. You know that better than anyone. We push hard enough, she’ll figure out our tricks and she’ll push back.”
“You think we’ve been pushing too hard?”
“I think this whole idea of Whitton’s to bring business by offering exotic captures is going to change everything and not in a good way.”
“So? Tell me your thoughts, old man. You think we should all retire? Let the bitches kill merchants. Fishermen?”
“Maybe man wasn’t meant to live on the coast in the first place,” he grumbled. “Maybe man should stick to land. Bad as it all is, the sirens stick to the sea. We bring ‘em into towns, that won’t be the case anymore. And it’s not like we get thanked for all we do. If we were gettin’ proper thanks, we wouldn’t be living like dogs half the time.”
Something in me had considered that before. I couldn’t see an end to the conflict between man and sirens. I was simply going through the steps, letting vengeance guide me. But in truth, it was a path that I knew would end in death and likely long before I reached old age. Looking down at my men, I wondered if any of them saw it that way or if it was just a job to them.
Mullins, a man I purchased with coin (and a side of violence) from a man with no regard for life and an affinity for pain. James, a man who was once a boy with no shoes looking for work on the muddy streets of Boralis. Any work. Boil was a cook with too many gnarly features on his burned-up face to get a job anywhere in the eye of the public. Kole, Barney, Uther, Ben, Laurence, Jesse. They didn’t join my crew because hunting was their passion. They joined because they had nowhere else to go. Whether I earned their loyalty or not, it was a job. When they got enough coin, they’d stop. But me? It was my life.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Gus said. “You’re thinking that if you stopped, they’d win.”
I can’t stop.
But I didn’t say that. I didn’t say anything. My motives had always been and would always be different from my crew’s. For me, there was never going to be an end.
“Captain!” Jesse called from the crow’s nest.
My eyes flicked upward to see him pointing his finger westward. Following it, I saw a distinct shape floating on the water. A ship. I narrowed my eyes at the fact that no one ever took our route due to the moody waters and the shallows, which my crew knew very well. Other ships would be stupid to risk their cargo.
“Bit far from the usual pathing,” Gus pointed out.
I pulled a spyglass from my belt and aimed it at the drifting ship.
“Sails are up,” I said. “They’re anchored.”
“Out in these waters?”
Handing the spyglass to Gus, I said, “Whitton said the Cornwallis was behind schedule. They’ve been missing for a bit.”
