Page 34 of A Curse of Salt

My eyes shifted between them, a guilty flush creeping heat up my neck, into my cheeks. Only Mors met my gaze, his own clouded with a mixture of pain and sympathy.

‘We all lost our mothers young,’ Aron said quietly. ‘To sickness, to war, to our fathers.’

A wave of foreboding washed over me. Not everyone in my family had always been warm or affectionate, but they’d never hurt me with more than words. Which, however sharp, were parchment-cuts compared to the wound of losing a mother. I knew that much, at least.

‘So did I,’ I murmured, feeling responsible for the sombre mood that had settled over the table. I turned to the King, wondering why I felt the need to redeem myself to a monster like him. Still, I asked, ‘Don’t you ever miss your father, even a little?’

The silence that followed echoed louder than sea-braced cliffs. Even so, it couldn’t have prepared me for what he said next.

‘I killed my father.’

11

The King’s confession struck me like a hand across the cheek. I took in the crew’s downcast eyes, feeling the grim silence settle around them. They knew. Of course they did.

My skin crawled. Maybe it was naïve of me – few people had fathers as loving as mine. But murder . . . I couldn’t fathom the darkness that could’ve driven him to that.

He – Sebastien – was watching me. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end, his shadows slipping like silk over my skin. If he was waiting for a reaction, he’d get none. I had nothing to say.

I let the crew’s voices wash over me as they tentatively picked up the conversation. But the world around me was an echo as I lifted my gaze slowly up to the King, wondering if there were eyes beneath that hood at all. If he really was shadow, all the way through.

‘Scared of me now, are you?’ he murmured.

My glare hardened. You wish. But he was right, I was terrified. Terrified of how blurred the lines were becoming between what I could and couldn’t forgive. Between what I could trust and what would kill me the moment I turned my back. It would be too easy not to hate him if I let myself forget how much of the seas were blood because of him.

I stood abruptly, tossed down my napkin and stalked from the room, dodging the crews’ quizzical glances.

Anger flooded through me, a churning river that rushed the air from my lungs. The glow of the crew’s warmth had seeped into me, their infectious laughter tricking me into forgetting the darkness concealed in these gilded halls.

I burst into my room and slumped down at the vanity table. The useless one without a mirror. Why were there no gods-damned mirrors? I tugged my hair free from its bun, growling in frustration. This entire ship was damned, and everyone in it.

A part of me couldn’t help but wonder why killing his own father felt so much worse than every other life he’d taken. What had I expected? Half his victims had probably been fathers to someone, and the crew had still tried to justify their deaths.

Floorboards creaked out in the hall and I turned, temper already rising again at the thought that the King had dared to follow me. But a gentle knock dispelled my dread as the door inched open to reveal Una, hovering in the threshold.

‘Can I come in?’

I nodded, taking a deep breath to quell the rage kindling in my chest. ‘Sorry for leaving like that,’ I said. ‘I’m just . . . I don’t know. I miss my family, I suppose.’

‘Lass.’ Una waved me off, perching on the edge of the bed across from me. ‘We’re pirates. Ye can forget about manners. Just wanted to make sure ye’re all right.’

I blinked at her blithe tone. ‘I guess I just couldn’t sit there any longer and pretend he isn’t a monster.’

Una crossed her arms. ‘Who asked ye to pretend?’

I tilted my head, perplexed. She knew what he was. They all did – so why were they so loyal to him?

‘How could you ever trust a man who would turn on his own family?’ I asked at last.

‘He’s more’n just a man, lass.’

I’ll say. ‘He isn’t even a real king,’ I scoffed. ‘What right does he have to your loyalty?’

Una held my gaze for a long time, brown eyes dipped in a candlelight glow. ‘Not all families are tied by blood,’ she said eventually. ‘Ye might’ve been lucky, but the rest o’ us had to make our own. Aron, Golde, Mors, even Sebastien . . . they took me in when I had no place to turn. It ain’t what he is, but what he’s done. Fer me, fer his people. I’m sorry ye’re caught up in all this, but ye’ll understand everythin’ in time.’

I frowned. In time. I wanted to know now.

‘And what exactly am I caught up in? Why does Bane’s death mean so much to you all?’

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