Page 18 of A Curse of Salt

‘That’s really all ye’re thinkin’ about?’ The woman sounded impatient.

‘Ye know what they say,’ Aron replied. ‘Two fish, one net. All that.’

‘Ye think it’ll work?’

There came a long pause. Mors’ voice was faint by the time he responded. ‘It has to. Otherwise I’ve doomed her with the rest of us for nothing.’

Their steps faded as they went out on deck and I waited for the sound of the door shutting after them before I released a long sigh. Something heavy sat in the centre of my chest. Dread.

I was the catalyst to some plan I still didn’t understand, caught in the centre of a powerful web. Pirates, traitors, kings. I was yet to grasp what any of them really wanted with me.

I hurried back to my room, heart racing.

He’s angry.

They were talking about the King. What did he have to be angry about? Why were his crew planning things he wanted nothing to do with?

Doomed, Mors had said. If I wasn’t already, I didn’t want to know what that meant.

*

I didn’t leave my room again for a week, terrified that I’d find out.

I had nothing to guide me but the rise and fall of the sun, waiting for a man somewhere far away to hear of me and come looking. I ate as little as I could to get by – mostly bread and fruits – and begrudged every delicious mouthful. My guilt turned to sediment in the bottom of my stomach, growing heavier with each bite, each reminder of the empty hands my meals had no doubt been snatched from.

I drifted through a gloomy routine, picking at the trays of food that appeared at my door twice a day. I spent hours at a time stretched out on the bed, wallowing in my thoughts, and wandering lazily around my room, writing half-remembered poems in the condensation on the windows.

I didn’t want to face what I knew. The things those pirates had said made sense. About me – about King Oren. Letting that impossible truth sink in meant other things were true, too. That Father had kept it from me my entire life, lied to me about who I was. That he believed, for whatever reason, the cliff’s edge of the continent was safer for us than a king’s court. It meant that I had to see this through now. Because if I didn’t, if word of a rightful heir ever reached the continent . . . People – soldiers, nobles, dissidents – would come looking. King Oren’s enemies and allies alike would war over the last vestige of his bloodline. Felicie would never be free again, and I’d have given myself over for nothing.

What I did want, besides freedom, and food that hadn’t been pilfered, was a book to read. I doubted pirates had much use for such things, but if I got desperate, I’d seen a few dusty volumes stacked in the navigation room – though I’d do my best to avoid the place that had almost marked my grave for as long as I could.

Still, the loneliness crept up on me. The nights grew longer and sleep drew further from my reach. I knew I’d never be more than a jewel to stud my captors’ stolen crowns, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t at least speak to them – maybe even get some answers.

One evening, all but maddened by the nothingness, I opened my door. The hallway sang with a cold draft, scattering goosebumps over my skin. I stepped out, my feet meeting the cool floorboards, and I welcomed the discomfort.

Shadows spilled from the door leading to the deck at the far end of the corridor. A mounting darkness wrapped around me as I wandered, wraith-like, towards it. The lamps winked at me as I passed. It wasn’t yet nightfall, but the light that reached me through the crack beneath the door was muffled, as if the sun itself had to fight to withstand what lay beyond. The Heartless King was out there, I knew.

My instincts told me to bolt myself back in my room and stay there another week, a month, however long it took, but my feet disobeyed. It had already been too long since I’d laid eyes on another human, even if he was barely that. I didn’t want to speak to him, nor even alert him to my presence, but I couldn’t help my curiosity. Each step grew easier and, by the time I reached the door, I’d almost forgotten to fear what awaited me on the other side. Almost.

I cracked the door open, leaving a gap just wide enough to peer out. The waning sunlight bathed the deck in gold and my eyes alighted immediately upon the hulking silhouette on the other side of the ship, shadows splayed out around him.

The Heartless King’s power jolted through me like a bolt of black lightning. He stood at the starboard rail, his back turned as he stared out at the waves. That hood was pulled up over his broad shoulders and I couldn’t help but wonder once more what it hid.

Keep out of my sight, he’d said.

I couldn’t stop myself. I crept out on deck, letting the King’s presence envelop me as the door snapped shut in my wake.

Shivers raced through my body, the icy wood biting my toes. Everything in me told me to run, to cling to what little safety I had left, yet something drew me on. Maybe it was that I hardly had any life to preserve, alone in that room, cowering from all the things I didn’t know. Maybe it was that being afraid made me angry – made me hate him even more than I had every other day of my life. Calm seas and solitude were privileges the Heartless King didn’t deserve. What right does he have to hide?

He didn’t turn as I’d expected him to. That dark hood remained facing the water to the west. I watched him, curious. His silhouette was stamped against the sky, the colour of clouds before a storm. It was wrong, seeing such stark brutality haloed by the lilac gild of sunset. Such a thing shouldn’t have been so pretty.

I watched him, perhaps a moment longer than I should’ve. Stars stirred in the descending haze of dusk, and I could’ve sworn they quaked when the King’s voice broke through the silence.

‘You aren’t trying to sneak up and kill me, I hope.’

Try to kill him? What kind of fool did he take me for?

‘I don’t actually have a death wish,’ I retorted. ‘I’m only here because you threatened my father’s life.’

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