Page 94 of Wicked Tides
“Dahlia.”
I took a deep breath and kicked an empty wooden crate over to sit on it.
“There a reason you’re filling this space with your presence?” he asked, his tone solidifying my suspicion that he hated me.
“Yes. I have a favor to ask.”
“Ask away. Don’t mean I’ll grant it.”
It was fair. I didn’t expect anything much from him.
“You speak to the girls,” I said. “You understand their language.”
“I understand enough.”
Sakari lying on that ship’s deck, her head bleeding and her body limp, flashed across my mind. I swiped it aside, trying to focus on what I wanted.
“How do you say, ‘I’m sorry’?” I asked.
Gus paused, resting his pipe hand on his stomach as he blew out a breath. He wrinkled his forehead like he didn’t think I was done with my sentence. Then his face softened.
“Oweh,” he said softly.
“Oweh,” I repeated.
He shifted his weight with a groan. “Oweh tia paloei.”
“Oweh tia paloei.”
He nodded and cleared his throat as if a little uncomfortable. “I’m sorry. For your aunt. That’s what it means. I’m sorry for aunt, actually. Don’t know how to say ‘your.’”
I blinked at the fact that he knew my intentions. When our eyes met, he looked a little defeated. He slumped back against the wall, pulling in a lungful of smoke.
“You know, either you’re the best actress I’ve ever seen, which isn’t too far-fetched for your kind, or you truly care for those girls. What I can’t figure out is why.”
I hesitated, watching one of his smoke rings float away and dissipate.
“I believe I was caught in the middle of a war I did not want to fight when I was a girl,” I said. “And it turned me into a horrible monster.”
Gus slowly nodded his head, coming to understand my meaning. Luckily, he didn’t push it further. I wasn’t sure I could truly explain my motives even if I wanted to.
“Boil made beans and pork,” he exhaled. “Should get the meat while we have it. I hear pork tastes like humans.”
I raised a brow at his comment and then rolled my eyes. “Humans are greasier.”
He paused mid-breath to stare at me and then, the slightest hint of a smile graced his lips and I couldn’t believe the sight. The joke was morbid, but amusing in some darkly satisfying way. Still, it was Gus. I shook my head and moved to retake my place near the railing for a few hours more.
“Thank you,” I muttered as I walked away.
When my few hours were up and the night was thoroughly upon us, I ventured down into the hold where Meridan was picking at a plate of food.
“Food’s bland,” she said.
I shrugged. “And what would you call what we usually eat?”
We both half-smiled with amusement as I continued to the other cabins. In the largest of the divisions was a space full of beds and hammocks where half the men were already napping while others took shifts around the ship. Further in was a smaller cargo room where bedding had been laid out for the girls. I slowly headed toward it to find most of the girls already sleeping, but Ahnah was awake, her fingers black with charcoal as she sketched designs on a piece of paper. She had a few other pictures spread out around her on the floor. Someone had given her supplies to draw and she was fully taking advantage.
She looked up at me with a sad, flat look on her young face. She no longer smiled when she saw me and it broke what little was left of my heart in two. I wasn’t too sure if I was even welcome around her. I was the last one to see her aunt. We were both taken and only I returned. I couldn’t imagine what was going through her head.
