Page 49 of The Lost Child

Why had I expected anything different?

“If the men knew—” I began to threaten, thinking of how they’d mutiny if they knew my father’s plan.

“They will find out nothing because you’re leaving as a bride. It’s the least you could do for killing so many of my men. They’ll be happy in more than one way to see your backside.”

I flinched at the reminder. I’d mostly pushed away those thoughts while on the mainland with the witches. I’d killed nearly a dozen of them in one go.

I don’t know if Jagger died in the battle or because of me. I didn’t know if Hai or Kai lived. Probably not, if I was the only survivor. Sweat broke out on my forehead. My breaths came quickly, as if I were in an active battle, but everything around me was so, so still. All except for Canavar, who was watching me with a frightening intensity that curdled my father’s sneer even further.

“Move,” he said to Canavar, and the large draken lowered his head before growling slightly. Canavar met his gaze obstinately.

“Obey me or I’ll take it out on her skin.”

Canavar bared his fangs, but took a step back and away.

I whirled around, enraged that my father would use me to force Canavar to obey him.

Marriage was just another cage. Father liked to put things in cages so he could control them—pirates that didn’t obey him. Canavar. Me. It was easy to see now.

“No. I won’t do it,” I swore.

I wasn’t aware I’d actually spoken until father’s hand cracked me on the side of my face.

SMACK.

There was a roar of anger and pounding feet as Canavar lunged at my father. He yelled for his men and drew his sword, and soon his office swelled with men rushing to subdue Canavar. My father screamed orders, and I got knocked down in the melee. Nothing was discernible except the smell of sweat and blood as unwashed bodies piled around and on top of me.

A clawed hand reached through the chaos and tugged me straight up, gathering me to a chest covered in light scales. I stumbled as Canavar set me on my feet, and then I was shoved away as eight men fell on him, swords gleaming and clubs waving.

“Stop! No!” I screamed at them, but it was no use. I looked around for any blood to use, to channel my new powers in a conscious way so I could help Canavar.

It was no use; there wasn’t enough blood.

I gave a cry of pain as a hand seized my hair and yanked so hard tears gathered at the corners of my hands. My father forced me to my knees, not relenting in his twist of my braids until I was in front of him, docile as a new pup. I raised my eyes enough to see Canavar subdued and bloody, bruises already forming on his face as the men dragged him out of the room, and likely away back to the caves.

Canavar and I weren’t any bloody different, were we? Both were kept as possessions, and set out into the world to hurt and kill on command.

It was just my father and I, alone in his office. Rage filled my veins along with a buzzing sound in my head. Father was saying something again, but I wasn’t listening. My sword had been taken from me, but my father was covered in knives. If I was quick enough and waited for the right moment …

My father released me with a shove, and I seized my opportunity. Instead of falling away from him, I grabbed onto the leather band around his hip that held a myriad of weapons, pressing my body against it and preventing his access, while pulling him down and off-center. My left hand snatched my knife and I swung it up at my father in a wide arc.

But my father wasn’t the pirate lord for nothing.

He anticipated my strike and leaned back. The blade of my knife only nicked his neck, kissing him with a thin red line. His boots kicked out and struck me on the chest, pushing all the air out of my lungs. Another kick to my head followed, and I nearly blacked out on the spot.

Something cracked in one of my fingers as he stepped on my hand, forcing me to drop the knife. He leaned down close to me, until his putrid breath was an inch from my face.

“You’ll marry him tonight.No one in the company will find out my plan. He’s in my office now.”

Some part of me screamed in denial at the evidence that my men and I had been set up, and this entire feud with Macguire’s fleet was going to end with everyone dead, and my father sipping wine from a silver goblet in a court far away somewhere.

I coughed blood on the toe of my father’s boots, but he withdrew without a care in the world. The cold sand seeped into my clothes as I lay there. There was a large patch of blood on the sand a few feet away from me where Canavar had been beaten into submission. A long trail marked where he’d been dragged away.

Back to his cage.

Would I go back to mine?

I’d attacked the pirate lord. I was lucky I wasn’t being fitted for a noose this very second. I expected more men to come forward and drag me back to my room, but my father and I were still alone.

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