“You look like you’ve got steady hands.” A huge bearded man accosts me, clutching a smaller man who looks to be in his fifties or sixties, who is spurting blood from a wound at his side. “Hold your hand out for me, pet.”
I obey, showing him how my hands are stable, despite several heartbeats pounding erratically in my chest.
“Good. I’m Cookie and this is Bones.” He hoists the bleeding man up. “I need you to help me sew him up.”
Bones’ face is covered in a sheen of sweat as I step closer, eyes darting to the wound and back before I slip my arm around Bones on his other side.
Clearly, life on this pirate ship is anything but predictable. But I’ve spent my life learning to be adaptable, and I’m not about to let someone bleed out just because I can’t keep up with what’s going on.
“Come on. Let’s get you downstairs,” I say.
“Oh, no.” Bones’ eyes flutter open, and he rolls his neck to gazeblearily at me. “I didn’t think it was my time, but there’s an angel here.”
“Maybe save your cheesy lines ‘til after you’re not bleeding out all over her hand, eh?” Cookie replies drily as I fail to suppress a snort of laughter.
Together we drag him down the stairs and safely into the med bay and there I help Bones to lay on the bed while Cookie bustles about, pulling out supplies.
“Are you going to help take the pain away?” he asks me with a dopey smile. “You could use your mouth.”
A chuckle sneaks out despite the tense situation and I wet my lips, swallowing hard as I pluck a huge needle from Cookie’s fingers.
“And why can’t you sew him up yourself?” I ask.
“Fat fingers.” Cookie thrusts his hands at me. He’s right. They are thick and twisted and don’t seem to bend all that easily.
He then pours dark liquid from an unlabelled bottle down Bones’ throat before glancing up at me. “Looks like there’s something stuck in there. Brace him for me.”
I grab his shoulders, holding him down as Cookie tugs shrapnel from his wound, clumsily stuffing some gauze into it before continuing, “My hands got broken years back. Never healed quite right.”
I thought all shifters had unnaturally fast healing, so I can’t imagine what must have happened for his fingers to be that badly broken.
Cookie wipes at the wound before shooting me a pointed look. “He’s ready for you to start.”
I clear my throat. “Do you, uh, have any gloves in here?” I ask. Just on the off-chance, I’ll form yet another mate bond with the next person whose flesh I make contact with.
Cookie raises an eyebrow, but rummages through the cupboards and drawers until he digs out a pair of thin gloves. They’ll mess up my dexterity, but have to be better than the alternative. I don them and get to work, sewing a line of stitches as neatly as I can while Bones moans and writhes on the cot.
“You can still cook, though?” I ask.
“Mostly stirring and shouting.” He gives a self-deprecating grin. “I leave the knife work to the others.”
There’s another chorus of yells and thumps from up on the deck, and I force my head to stay down. “Do either of you know what all of that’s about?” I ask, using my shoulder to gesture above us since both my hands are occupied.
Cookie snorts. “You know how long we’ve been cooped up on this ship?Months. Months without a port stop or a place to roam freely.”
“But... it’s one of the king’s ships. Won’t their crew raise the alarm?”
“Not if they’re all dead, they won’t.”
That shuts me up quickly. I can’t think of a damn thing to say in reply.
I wish Kit were here with me. Right now, it feels a lot like I just stepped cluelessly into a bog and I’m already up to my neck in trouble.
Cookie pours more dark liquid down Bones’ throat and then takes his own swig before holding it out to me.
“Better not,” I reply.
“Good call.”
