“Are they?”
Mary’s expression turned aghast.“Samuel, you haven’t so much as kissed me properly.I am so profoundly unsullied by you, byanyone, I think my virginity has actually come back.”
My cheeks flamed.I looked up and down the street, relieved to see no one listening to Mary’s outburst, then tugged her into the mouth of an alley.
“Oh, was that all I had to say?”Mary grinned, a mixture of bravado and nervous excitement in her eyes.
I put a fist over my mouth and held my breath, trying to corral my thoughts.
“Mary,” I began.“You are the first Stormsinger in centuries to have a contract.To be her own master.I am the first captain tohirea Stormsinger in just as long, instead of kidnapping or buying one.We must set an example.”
As I spoke, the reality of my words sank in.It was not as though I had not considered such things before, but they had seemed distant concerns.As Mary had so tactfully put it, I had not so much as kissed her.Our relationship, the warmth between us, was still too young and we too busy for anything more.
“If we are openly intimate, even if our relationship is amiable, the world will misunderstand,” I said.She watched me in silence now, a dangerous quiet I knew well.“They will misinterpret us and disregard what we have achieved.What you have achieved.”
“They will think less of you,” she translated.She laced her arms over her chest and leaned back against the opposite alley wall, careless of the filth.“And you’ve just gotten your honor back.Halfway back.”
I opened my mouth to protest, but a spike of guilt cut me off.“Yes,” I admitted, pulling the word like a fouled tooth.“But that is only one aspect.What I have said is true, you must see it.”
“I see it,” she said.“I, however, do not see how our relationship robs my contract of meaning.If you want me not to touch you in public, I won’t.But what you and I are to one another behind closed doors?That is no one’s concern but ours.We can be whatever we want.”
“I want to believe that,” I said, so honest it left me feeling raw.“But that is not how the world works.Rumors.Truth.Lies.Secrets.It always comes out.And this example we are trying to set, this security we might one day forge for Stormsingers?What you and I are could tear it down before we have even begun to build.”
“People will think you a lecher,” Mary added.She forced a smile, a hard expression that failed to hide how hurt she was.
“Mary, I am serious.”
“So am I,” she shot back.“I’ll be clear, just this once, so listen to me.I joined your crew for the opportunity, yes.For the contract, yes.But I also joined because I care for you, and I amverycurious to see where that goes.I have been engaged.I know what I want.I will not spend years dancing around your reservations, and I do not believe that you and I tangling here and there will destroy the future of all Stormsingers.So let me know when you decide that you want me more than you want shitlings like Captain Mercer to think you’re better than them—because I assure you, they do not truly care.”
Her words were knives, slowly pushed into my flesh, and I wanted them to stop.“Mary, be reasonable.This is not about Mercer, this—”
She ducked away and backed out into the street, smiling sweetly.“Thisis a conversation I’m no longer willing to have.Good night, Samuel.”
With that, she strode away down the docks.As she went the blood roared through my ears, my control slipped, and the human world faded.Mary’s form became one of grey-hedged teal light, and the Dark Water lapped around my heels, chased by errant dragonflies.
I grabbed the coin in my pocket.The human world solidified, and I sagged back against the alley wall, still harried by the sound of lapping water and dragonfly wings.
How could I forget?How, for one night, could I let myself disregard what I was and pretend that my condition was not a critical factor in why I needed to keep Mary at arm’s length?
Even if Mary and I won the respect of the world, I could not offer her a broken man.But that, at least, I had hope of rectifying.
The next day, I went to a talisman maker’s shop and made my request: a cure from Mere.
It was a week before the tension between Mary and I eased.Another month before I found the charred remains of the talisman maker’s shop and, in my distress, embraced her again in the privacy of my cabin, though I did not risk telling her why.A few of the knives between us were sheathed, even if a little more of my hope died the same day.
And together, we sailed on.
THIRTEEN
Smugglers and Thieves
SAMUEL
The only sounds in the night were the rush of waves up the beach and distant church bells from the small Mereish settlement of Orres.One bell came from inland, echoing between deep-carved hills, raw and ridged as if a giant had raked his fingers across the island.The other drifted down the coast from the pirate-infested town where Olsa and Illya had ventured two hours ago.
The waiting crew were quiet, perched on our longboat in the frost-laden sand, passing a pipe back and forth.Chunks of ice scattered the beach, hulks cast high by the ever-rising spring tides.
Still, the wind smelled like spring.Mary turned her face into it and inhaled reverently.I in turn drank in her expression, her dark lashes against windburned cheeks.
