“I feel obligated to say this is a bad idea,” Dilly said, eyeing our small boat.
I turned from the evening sky and stared at Dilly with her red curls pulled back into a pony and her cheeks pale beneath freckles. If I had any sense at all, I would have taken one look at the fear in her eyes and burned the boat in front of us.
“We’ll be back before morning,” I said, stepping in.
“Famous last words.” Val snorted, scar glinting beneath dwindling sunlight.
No fear commanding my first mate as she hopped in the boat like we were going sightseeing. She sat across from me and grinned wildly.
“You could have been the captain, you know.”
The words erupted from my mouth without any warning. Words I’d held tightly onto for months. Sometimes, when I was feeling especially bitter, I thought about going and finding her and demanding the why.
Her long blond hair was braided to perfection over her shoulder, while a single wisp of bang threatened to fall over her forehead. That smile faded, and I knew this version of her. It was different than the woman who came alive with danger or who laughed so she wouldn’t remember. This version was far worse; it was real.
“I’m a follower. Always have been. I’ve never found anything I wanted enough to be a leader,” she said.
The words layered over me, cementing me into the moment. I’d never thought of myself as a leader. I was impulsive and always said and did the wrong thing. All until the game changed. When necessity became a way of life. Now I was whatever thiswas–a far cry from the woman who boarded a pirate ship with a fool’s plan a year ago.
“I would like to second Dilly’s concern,” Emille said.
He clambered on as delicately as a very tall, bald French doctor could. The boat swayed with the effort, but I didn’t flinch. The world felt heavy, and I missed who I used to be. Even though I’d spent hours and days replaying all of my faults, that version had been lighter.
“Third,” Inu said.
“All concerns have been noted,” I said.
I picked up the oar sitting over my lap and felt the pang of loss once more. A year ago, I’d hit Billy right in the stomach with one of these. Now his body was at the bottom of the sea. If there were a heaven, I knew he was there.
Pirate or not, his soul was good. One of the best to ever traverse land and sea alike. And if he wasn’t in heaven–well, I didn’t want to be either when my time came. A daunting concern given tonight could be just that night.
A wise man once told me that a man with nothing has nothing to fear, but a man with everything lives in fear. I was now a woman with nothing, trying to claw my way back to having everything. Tonight, I would risk life and limb because tonight I had nothing to lose.
The five of us rowed silently into the wide abyss of endless sea, chasing the sunset. Eager water lapped at the bottom of our boat, and I closed my eyes, listening to the waves. Listening for some divine intervention that never came.
I pressed my hand to the mark over my right chest that Emille had inked a few months ago. It hadn’t hurt nearly as much as I thought it would, but back then, it’d been hard to feel anything. I missed my brother. I missed Bash. All the pretty words in the world couldn’t change that. Some things demanded to be felt.
“The island should be just east if it will be there at all.” Dilly hummed, tracing her finger over the map in her hands.
“What do you mean by‘ if it's there at all ’?” Val asked, “I thought that’s why we were out here on this particular night rather than drinking and gambling.”
Dilly sighed, and worry tugged at her lips and the corners of her eyes. Normally, everything in the sea delighted and fascinated her. She had given me multiple earfuls about why this wasn’t a good idea, but desperate times and whatnot.
“San Borondón is rumored to change its location often, which is what makes it so dangerous, and this a colossally bad idea.” Dilly’s bright blue eyes glared up at me. “Aspidochelones are known for their laziness. Naps that extend decades, sometimes centuries, though, of course, there is no proof, only theory. I’ve read several accounts of an aspidochelone being inhabited for decades before it awakens. Should I recount what happens when it does,Captain?”
Sassy. I almost liked this version of Dilly. She had more bite than usual. Part of me wanted to remind her that she’d run out into certain death just for the chance to see a kraken, but who was I to judge? All she would have done is remind me that we were on death’s door anyway, so in her mind it was justified.
“Please do.” I held up my hand in welcome.
“I think I would rather not know,” Emille said, looking a little green around the gills.
“If I tell you and you get scared, will you convince Rose to go back?” Dilly asked.
The last of the pink and orange sky disappeared over the horizon, and I wondered if I’d see it again. The truth was that Dilly’s tactic was working. The urge to let my knee bounce with restless anxiety was loud, but where I once lacked restraint, I was more than my urges. It felt like killing a part of myself. Late at night, when I felt trapped in this body or like someone elsewas controlling me from within, I would remind myself it was only temporary. I could go back to who I was when I had them back.
The lie stopped being convincing a few weeks in.
There were some things a soul could never come back from.
