No one knew the source of Belle’s darkness. They could only sense it. That sadness that hovered behind her eyes as a constant companion.
The same with Janice. They kept their pain secluded and private as if too afraid to let it out, for fear that the mere mention of it could undo them. It pained Cameron that they wouldn’t share with them. For they knew better than to judge. There wasn’t a soul on this ship who hadn’t been through it. Phantom wretches all.
Besides, such wasn’t in her heart. She’d seen the truth of these women and she loved them regardless of their pasts. Regardless of whatever crimes had caused their damnation. Or perhaps she loved them because those pasts had made them who they are, and what they had become because of it.
Cameron…
She went ramrod stiff at the strange voice in her ear. A huskydeep tone unlike anything she’d ever heard before. Neither male nor female, it was a summons that was almost impossible to resist.
Blinking, she glanced to the others to see that none of them had heard it. Or if they had, they gave no clue. Rather, they continued chatting amongst each other, oblivious to the call that came for her ears only.
Unnerved and spooked, Cameron tried to ignore it.
That was easier said than done. The intensity of the voice picked up volume. It grew in intensity. Louder and louder. A thumping heartbeat that resonated through her entire being.
Belle turned to face her, then gaped. “Child…”
“What?”
“Holy mother of God!” Janice crossed herself.
As did Sancha and Valynda, who stared on wordlessly.
Taking their panic as her own, Cameron turned about, trying to understand what had them so concerned. “What is it?”
Belle dragged her toward the small looking glass in the corner that they used to dress their hair. There, in the dim light, Cameron saw what had them all pale and trembling.
Her hair was no longer white.
It was now silvery and it shimmered in the shadows.
Holy of mother of God, indeed!
7
Kalder left Muerig to rest on the bunk and returned the soiled dishes to the galley. Yet even so, he couldn’t shake the peculiar feeling he had deep in his gullet that something wasn’t quite right. It didn’t matter that the moon appeared perfect in the sky above, or that the crew acted as normal as they could while they went about their business. Or that nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
His unsettled feeling was undeniable.
You’re being ridiculous.
He was free. His brother was alive again and Cameron was back where she belonged. What more could he ask for?
And all the while Thorn’s warning about him having to choose between them stayed on his mind like some drunken bloke who could only remember a single stanza of one song—and even then it was with the incorrect words. Driving him to madness because he knew the truth of what the demon had warned. It was just the sort of treachery the fey bitch would play on him as punishment.
Nothing in his life had ever come easy or without the harshest price imaginable. It was why he’d settled for being a rake and a scoundrel, and nothing more.
Hard to trip and fall from grace when you lived your entire life on your belly, in the gutter. He’d learned to keep his head down and stay out of the line of fire of his ever-feuding family. Especially after his father’s death. No need to declare a side when his brothers shifted their alliances faster than the ocean tide reversed direction. One moment, he’d been protecting Darcel’s back, only to find himself Darcel’s enemy when Darcel aligned himself to Varice, and they both turned againsthimbecause he’d gone against Varice on Darcel’s behalf. All this when just hours before the two of them had been mortal enemies, vowing to see each other in their graves. ’Twas enough to make his head ache and stomach heave.
Ever the hated asshole—that was his one true role in his family. No matter what he did—even if he stayed out of their never-ending drama—he came up the short for it.
Only Muerig had been immune from their brothers’ feral and mutinous wraths, and that only because their mother protected him.As the youngest, he’d held a special place in her heart that the rest of them had never quite managed.
God knew she’d never spared Kalder a single moment of her hatred or blistering tongue. For whatever reason, she’d borne a special grudge against him from the moment he’d drawn his first breath and had held it against him the whole of his life.
Don’t think about it.
There was nothing to be done for it. All that was long ago. Centuries past. This was a different time and place. He was a different man now.
