The eternal struggle, p.16
The Eternal Struggle, page 16
part #2 of Black Phantom Chronicles Series
“Jealous?” Arnacin scoffed. “There was no one with whom to compete.”
Looking down at his desk, the captain slid out a drawer. “I have heard otherwise.” With those words, he held up the compass by its cord, dangling it before the captive, who paled as if realizing some treachery. “So, you recognize it?” the captain mused.
“What did she tell you?” Arnacin breathed, his gaze fixed on his compass as it slowly twisted around.
“She asked me to return it to you, and I agreed to do so… if I had to bury it with you. However, I think you stole it. You see, I talked with the artist, its creator, and he told me someone else purchased it.” Adhelmar stared closely at his captive, though he kept his face turned toward the compass. “How do you explain that?”
“She purchased it for me.” The words came forth with a shudder.
“She?”
“The Princess… Valoretta.” Those words broke painfully, and Arnacin dropped his gaze to the ground, trembling as he finished.
Momentarily, Adhelmar studied his captive, the one who not only remained unscathed by the trap, but actually sounded like the Miran princess’s death hurt him. Exhaling, the captain lightly dropped the compass onto his desk and, at its dull thunk, Arnacin looked up.
Staring into those masked eyes, Adhelmar resumed his seat, resting his elbows on his desk. “And you still say there was no reason for jealousy or competition?”
The mask flew away as fire lit in the captive’s gaze. “Only an ass would feel jealousy toward someone blind enough to think a noble cared. They’re rot to be trampled, all of them.”
“Yet you apparently want your compass returned to you, a gift from ‘that rot?’” No reply followed, yet the captain saw those dark eyes close in pain even as the captive appeared to study the carpet. “Do you know what I think, Arnacin of Enchantress Island?”
Arnacin’s head shot upward as if slapped, and the captain smiled grimly. “Yes, I know of the title. After all, I found all I could about you—and believe me, I did not glean much except that you are considered akin to a god or spirit. One sailor thought it was the most absurd joke that anyone could have you held prisoner anywhere, much less arrested for piracy. Let me say I learned nothing from him, except that he considered you to have vanished back into the clouds from where you came, never to be seen by mortal man again. I contemplated that one.”
The torment across his captive’s lowered face made all thoughts pause. “Is the pain new or has it been there long?” he softly inquired.
The anguish vanished from those features, leaving the cold bitterness the captain had expected as that gaze again rose to face him. “Whatever happened on Mira was every inch deserved by her rulers. What pain could it cause me?”
“Much. Enough to push you to the edge and turn to piracy.”
“What?” Arnacin asked in horrified disbelief.
“Yes. From this conversation, I think you left Mira internally wounded from the king’s supposed betrayal and, as that wound healed, you swore to rid the world of like filth, turning to piracy against every and all royal ships. I have come to the conclusion that you were with those pirates because you knew you could not continue alone and needed a crew. What better way than joining another crew until you could gain control?”
For a long moment, Arnacin simply stared at the captain, while Adhelmar repeated, “‘They’re rot to be trampled, all of them.’ Did you not just say that moments ago?”
“They trample themselves.”
His eyebrows rising, the captain asked, “What proof can you give that my conclusion is wrong?”
Dark eyes glittered. At last, the captive breathed, “None I will say.”
“I see.” The captain’s thumb flicked up and down in troubled contemplation, and then he laced his fingers together, leaning forward. “You have put me in a hard place, Arnacin. I should fail my queen if I were manipulated into allowing a pirate to sail free across her shores, yet I fear hanging an innocent man by mistake. I find you have yet to lie to me on most things, though I wonder.”
The captive gave no answer, and Adhelmar considered him. Either Arnacin was playing a very skilled game and had no proof, or there was some reason he actually refused to speak. Would threatened torture pull it out? From someone who purposely starved himself to death, it seemed unlikely.
A gentler approach and a closer watch might be the only things to loosen that clamped tongue. Leastways, Adhelmar had no other ideas. “This is what I’ll do, Arnacin. For now, I’ll offer you my hospitality until I can determine whether my assumption is true or not.”
“I’ve had your hospitality,” Arnacin quipped. “I don’t care for it.”
His lips quirking upward slightly, the captain said, “If that is considered hospitality, Arnacin, I’ll remember to decline yours, if ever the chance arrives.”
The captive’s only response was the darkening of his eyes.
Finished, the captain inclined his head to Polion, who stood against the closed door.
As soon as Polion touched his chained wrists, however, Arnacin tensed. Stilling, Polion leaned forward to whisper, “I’m going to relieve you of these. Don’t make any sudden moves, or I’ll leave them on.”
Unobtrusively gripping his knife hilt beneath his desk, Adhelmar raised his eyebrows when Arnacin only studied the captain warily once released, while he slowly rubbed his right wrist.
His attention drawn to that movement, Adhelmar noted the sores. “Polion, call someone to bring some food and then fill a tub in here with seawater.”
Polion grunted, turning away. Still keeping his hand on his hilt, the captain nodded to the captive. “Salt water may not feel good, but a bath in it will help, and I have a good soap that will make you feel better.”
To his surprise, Arnacin recoiled. “I wish to be left alone.”
“Are you still denying hospitality? Come, take your compass. Food will be here in a moment…”
“That you made,” the captive muttered as his gaze returned to his compass. Slowly, he inched toward it as if it were going to strike him. Once he reached the desk, he made no move to reclaim the compass, staring down at its glass surface.
Just as Hans entered with a plate of food, Arnacin glanced up at Adhelmar. Studying the captain, he abruptly snatched his compass, closing it tightly within his fingers.
Staring into those eyes that now resembled those of a wild deer, Adhelmar softly pressed, “What’s the compass to you, a gift from that rot?”
It was as if some spell had descended on his captive. Arnacin trembled, yet he only pressed his closed fist against his chest, the black cord of his compass dangling from it, and retreated back to the center of the room.
Glancing at him appraisingly, Hans placed the food on the desk. “I’ll be back with the tub, Captain.” As he made to leave, however, he switched to the Nomacirrian language. “I think, whatever else happened, he’s deranged. That’s all there is to it.”
With a shrug, he left. Adhelmar nodded toward the food. “He thinks you’re deranged, Arnacin. Why don’t you act sane and eat like a usual starved person would?”
“He’d make himself sick if he ate like that,” Polion muttered from the corner.
Adhelmar barely smiled, waiting for a response. The only movement from the captive, however, was his thumb running around the edge of his compass. Then, his gaze dropped to it and his shoulders fell in defeat. Silently, he accepted the food.
Not so with the bath half an hour later.
If Arnacin’s protests were due to a strange amount of modesty, Adhelmar could not fathom it, and if it was a clever ruse to gain some time alone in which he could escape, that could not be allowed. When Arnacin first drew his cloak about himself, saying he wanted nothing to do with a bath, Adhelmar considered allowing him to stay dirty, but the sight of those raw wrists and blood-splattered clothes and hair convinced him otherwise. He simply stood aside with Hans as Polion wrestled Arnacin into the tub, soaked clothes coming off only afterward.
To everyone’s shock, the captive submitted once submerged in water, except that he never allowed Polion to pull him back out. Still, he permitted all but his torso to be attacked with soap and water, including his scalp.
Once he was done, he shot into the clean clothes they offered, as if afraid to leave his skin exposed to air for even a second. Compressing his lips, Hans tapped the side of his head and slipped out with the dirty bundle of clothes to be washed.
Chapter 9
The Black Captain
Evening came before Adhelmar could attempt any more conversation with his obstinate captive. Writing his review of the day, the captain glanced up at his silent clean prisoner.
Arnacin sat in the large chair he had been offered, his heels tucked up onto the seat in front of him, his gaze fixed on one flickering candle hanging in its lantern. With his arms resting atop his bent knees and his thumb brushing his lips, he appeared quite oblivious to any movement around him, his breathing as ragged as his shivering implied. Although wrapped in a blanket, he still trembled.
Aside from a few moments when the sound of his breathing cut off strangely, nothing changed. Glancing from the figure in the chair to the two guards on each side of it, Adhelmar thought not so much of a watched prisoner as an ailing king protected by his attendants.
Shaking his head, the captain softly inquired, “You have not told me what caused your cowardice amidst the pirates, Arnacin.”
For quite some time, no answer came. The captain was beginning to think he had not been heard when Arnacin whispered, “I should be brainless to do so, after telling you the power it apparently has over me.”
“If it’s what I think it is, it doesn’t seem all that strong.”
Those dark eyes finally turned in Adhelmar’s direction. Yet, unlike that morning, they told him nothing, those still pools of depthless indigo.
Striving not to end a conversation that could lead to an answer, the captain confessed, “I also interrogated Captain Xavior. It was difficult to make him speak of you, although he gloated about what he did to our Captain Belon. He did let me know you agreed to remain on his ship just after that. If your agreement lay in cowardice, Arnacin, would your fear be of death at the hands of others?”
Arnacin’s gaze simply flicked downward, and the captain tried again. “I know what controls pirates, what can make them agree to drink poison to avoid it, but what about you? Are you also fearless about the possibility of death while in the midst of battle and then a coward when you must wait for that punishment?” He waited, yet no answer came. “Because frankly, Arnacin, I know you’re thinking you know what’s coming, and I haven’t heard any sound of a plea or bleat for it to be otherwise.”
The captain finally sparked a brief look of scorn, yet it reverted to the silence of before. Shaking his head, the captain searched for a different angle. In the silence, he did notice the sudden disappearance of his captive’s heavier breathing. Looking back up, he eventually tried, “Is Enchantress Island a real place or was it a title given to you?”
“I wouldn’t tell you either way.”
“In that case, what type of place would receive such a name?”
“If it isn’t a place, how should I know?”
Briefly looking heavenward, the captain gave up on that angle. “What were you blamed for on Mira?”
Again, those dark eyes turned to him, smoldering in their depths and, in the cabin lit only by the flame of candles, the captain could not shake the feeling that he had roused a dragon from rest. Shivering, he resumed his writing, hoping he was not moving too hurriedly. When he looked up a moment later, however, the captive had returned to staring through the wall.
Clicking his tongue, the captain asked, “Very well, Arnacin. Perhaps you would like to present a topic for tonight’s discussion?”
After only a second, Arnacin spoke with the same distant softness that marked everything he had said that night, “Where is this ship headed?”
“To its home port.” The answer brought a jerk of alarm, and Adhelmar added, “The queen will be awaiting word with growing concern.”
“You will release me before then.” It was half-question, half-order, and the captain grinned in spite of himself.
“You might as well not quibble. I hear your ship needs a replacement or two before she is on her way again. Therefore, you must land in some port.”
“My ship is ready to sail this minute.”
“Then we shall simply await the queen’s decision.” With that, Adhelmar returned to his journal. The sound of hissing metal and swift movement made him look up again to see that the captive had shot to his feet—and in reply, one of the guards had drawn his blade, resting the tip against Arnacin’s back.
“Sit down, Arnacin,” the captain advised, contemplating those rage-white features. “There is nothing for you to do, other than whatever pleases me.”
Ignoring both the order and the blade, Arnacin whispered, “If whatever pleases you is to bring me back to your country to hang or worse, you will find only death will bring me there.”
Reminded once again of a king, albeit a captured one, Adhelmar remarked, “It looks very likely, but I have not said once that I intend to play with you in any form. If I was hoping for that to happen, you would still be below. What I need to know, Arnacin, if you would be so kind as to actually assist, is whether or not you have ever committed an act of piracy.”
Head raising, Arnacin stated, “I told you.”
“In words only. Where is the proof of that? You refuse to tell me anything that will help me make a decision.” In frustration, Adhelmar slapped his hand against his journal. At the snap of paper, he exhaled. “What brought you to sea?”
Slowly returning to the chair, Arnacin buried his head in his arms. Still, the captain waited. After long, ticking minutes, a muffled voice breathed, “You don’t want to hear about anything before Mira. It doesn’t have any answers.”
“Then what do I want to hear?”
“Why I yielded to Xavior.”
Yet Arnacin had refused to reveal that piece of information. Asking again would likely bring the same answer—fear of what Nomacir would do with that knowledge.
Softly, Adhelmar tried anyway. “Why would we use that information, Arnacin? What do you really have to give us—your bondage? Nomacir has no extra strength to keep slaves in line even if we wanted them.”
The top of that black head only rocked back and forth in refusal. If there was something special he could give, perhaps no one could blame him for keeping the secret, despite anyone’s frustration.
Rubbing the quill along his nose for a second, Adhelmar returned to his writings.
With his right ankle chained to the creakiest bunk in Isholt’s Revenge and guards posted nearby, Arnacin found no chance to escape. For the first half of the night, a candle burned while guard and captive watched each other. When the candle burned out at last, Arnacin lay there, feverishly striving to keep his visions of sealed tombs at bay while he waited for the deeper, even breaths of his guard.
Finally, the awaited sound came. Cautiously, Arnacin raised his head and winced as the bed creaked beneath him. Abruptly, the guard’s breathing changed. Even in the dark, there was no doubt he was awake.
Sighing, the islander rolled onto his back, feeling his compass tap lightly against his chest as he did—the compass Valoretta had given him.
Valoretta. He could still clearly picture her as he last saw her a year ago—regal, pale and silent to the injustice transpiring before her.
Even so… Pulling his compass out from under his shirt, he tightened his fingers about it. Once they had laughed and teased each other in Mira’s library. In sharing their deepest concerns and dreams, he thought they had become family. But by her silence that fateful day, she had proven otherwise.
As if in contradiction to his hurt, the princess’s last words to him seemed to echo in the dark. Come out by noon, Arnacin. Don’t die before you can.
Birds circled around a muddy dell, where a bundle shivered. Approaching, Arnacin’s breath stopped. Valoretta lay there in a curled ball, covered in dirt and blood, her tangled hair sprawling about her face and the ground, a thin shift hardly even covering her skeletal legs. Whether she was conscious or not, even the birds knew it was only moments before her last breath.
Abruptly, Arnacin stood on the edge of a rock tower rising out of the sea.
“How are you here?” The snap was Charlotte’s, as she glided downward to land beside him, her ebony eyes flames burning beneath her skull.
Retreating a step into the grasping waves, Arnacin quickly shook his head. Yet, his horrific sister pressed onward. “You’re here solely through the death of someone else! You’ve betrayed us all, brought dishonor on yourself and your family, abandoned your rescuer to her death—”
“Charlotte, every sane person knows she’s likely dead. It would be foolishness to return to Mira!”
“Coward! Can you live with yourself for not personally finding out?” With a curl of her scarlet lips, his sister circled him. “Besides, who said you’re a ‘sane person?’”
As that condemnation struck like a dagger, Arnacin woke. Tossing his blankets to the bottom of the bunk, he released a long exhale. Since he had heard of Mira’s fall, his nightmares continually grew ever more insistent and condemnatory. No longer could he deny that, regardless of Valoretta’s betrayal, he could never return home without first going to Mira. If she still lived, he could never leave her to die like some of the pirates’ female prisoners. And if she was really dead, he had to know.
Yet Adhelmar would never release him. Had the officer intended to do so, he would have already. Arnacin’s only chance was escape, and he had limited time for that before he was sentenced to the gallows.
Looking down at his desk, the captain slid out a drawer. “I have heard otherwise.” With those words, he held up the compass by its cord, dangling it before the captive, who paled as if realizing some treachery. “So, you recognize it?” the captain mused.
“What did she tell you?” Arnacin breathed, his gaze fixed on his compass as it slowly twisted around.
“She asked me to return it to you, and I agreed to do so… if I had to bury it with you. However, I think you stole it. You see, I talked with the artist, its creator, and he told me someone else purchased it.” Adhelmar stared closely at his captive, though he kept his face turned toward the compass. “How do you explain that?”
“She purchased it for me.” The words came forth with a shudder.
“She?”
“The Princess… Valoretta.” Those words broke painfully, and Arnacin dropped his gaze to the ground, trembling as he finished.
Momentarily, Adhelmar studied his captive, the one who not only remained unscathed by the trap, but actually sounded like the Miran princess’s death hurt him. Exhaling, the captain lightly dropped the compass onto his desk and, at its dull thunk, Arnacin looked up.
Staring into those masked eyes, Adhelmar resumed his seat, resting his elbows on his desk. “And you still say there was no reason for jealousy or competition?”
The mask flew away as fire lit in the captive’s gaze. “Only an ass would feel jealousy toward someone blind enough to think a noble cared. They’re rot to be trampled, all of them.”
“Yet you apparently want your compass returned to you, a gift from ‘that rot?’” No reply followed, yet the captain saw those dark eyes close in pain even as the captive appeared to study the carpet. “Do you know what I think, Arnacin of Enchantress Island?”
Arnacin’s head shot upward as if slapped, and the captain smiled grimly. “Yes, I know of the title. After all, I found all I could about you—and believe me, I did not glean much except that you are considered akin to a god or spirit. One sailor thought it was the most absurd joke that anyone could have you held prisoner anywhere, much less arrested for piracy. Let me say I learned nothing from him, except that he considered you to have vanished back into the clouds from where you came, never to be seen by mortal man again. I contemplated that one.”
The torment across his captive’s lowered face made all thoughts pause. “Is the pain new or has it been there long?” he softly inquired.
The anguish vanished from those features, leaving the cold bitterness the captain had expected as that gaze again rose to face him. “Whatever happened on Mira was every inch deserved by her rulers. What pain could it cause me?”
“Much. Enough to push you to the edge and turn to piracy.”
“What?” Arnacin asked in horrified disbelief.
“Yes. From this conversation, I think you left Mira internally wounded from the king’s supposed betrayal and, as that wound healed, you swore to rid the world of like filth, turning to piracy against every and all royal ships. I have come to the conclusion that you were with those pirates because you knew you could not continue alone and needed a crew. What better way than joining another crew until you could gain control?”
For a long moment, Arnacin simply stared at the captain, while Adhelmar repeated, “‘They’re rot to be trampled, all of them.’ Did you not just say that moments ago?”
“They trample themselves.”
His eyebrows rising, the captain asked, “What proof can you give that my conclusion is wrong?”
Dark eyes glittered. At last, the captive breathed, “None I will say.”
“I see.” The captain’s thumb flicked up and down in troubled contemplation, and then he laced his fingers together, leaning forward. “You have put me in a hard place, Arnacin. I should fail my queen if I were manipulated into allowing a pirate to sail free across her shores, yet I fear hanging an innocent man by mistake. I find you have yet to lie to me on most things, though I wonder.”
The captive gave no answer, and Adhelmar considered him. Either Arnacin was playing a very skilled game and had no proof, or there was some reason he actually refused to speak. Would threatened torture pull it out? From someone who purposely starved himself to death, it seemed unlikely.
A gentler approach and a closer watch might be the only things to loosen that clamped tongue. Leastways, Adhelmar had no other ideas. “This is what I’ll do, Arnacin. For now, I’ll offer you my hospitality until I can determine whether my assumption is true or not.”
“I’ve had your hospitality,” Arnacin quipped. “I don’t care for it.”
His lips quirking upward slightly, the captain said, “If that is considered hospitality, Arnacin, I’ll remember to decline yours, if ever the chance arrives.”
The captive’s only response was the darkening of his eyes.
Finished, the captain inclined his head to Polion, who stood against the closed door.
As soon as Polion touched his chained wrists, however, Arnacin tensed. Stilling, Polion leaned forward to whisper, “I’m going to relieve you of these. Don’t make any sudden moves, or I’ll leave them on.”
Unobtrusively gripping his knife hilt beneath his desk, Adhelmar raised his eyebrows when Arnacin only studied the captain warily once released, while he slowly rubbed his right wrist.
His attention drawn to that movement, Adhelmar noted the sores. “Polion, call someone to bring some food and then fill a tub in here with seawater.”
Polion grunted, turning away. Still keeping his hand on his hilt, the captain nodded to the captive. “Salt water may not feel good, but a bath in it will help, and I have a good soap that will make you feel better.”
To his surprise, Arnacin recoiled. “I wish to be left alone.”
“Are you still denying hospitality? Come, take your compass. Food will be here in a moment…”
“That you made,” the captive muttered as his gaze returned to his compass. Slowly, he inched toward it as if it were going to strike him. Once he reached the desk, he made no move to reclaim the compass, staring down at its glass surface.
Just as Hans entered with a plate of food, Arnacin glanced up at Adhelmar. Studying the captain, he abruptly snatched his compass, closing it tightly within his fingers.
Staring into those eyes that now resembled those of a wild deer, Adhelmar softly pressed, “What’s the compass to you, a gift from that rot?”
It was as if some spell had descended on his captive. Arnacin trembled, yet he only pressed his closed fist against his chest, the black cord of his compass dangling from it, and retreated back to the center of the room.
Glancing at him appraisingly, Hans placed the food on the desk. “I’ll be back with the tub, Captain.” As he made to leave, however, he switched to the Nomacirrian language. “I think, whatever else happened, he’s deranged. That’s all there is to it.”
With a shrug, he left. Adhelmar nodded toward the food. “He thinks you’re deranged, Arnacin. Why don’t you act sane and eat like a usual starved person would?”
“He’d make himself sick if he ate like that,” Polion muttered from the corner.
Adhelmar barely smiled, waiting for a response. The only movement from the captive, however, was his thumb running around the edge of his compass. Then, his gaze dropped to it and his shoulders fell in defeat. Silently, he accepted the food.
Not so with the bath half an hour later.
If Arnacin’s protests were due to a strange amount of modesty, Adhelmar could not fathom it, and if it was a clever ruse to gain some time alone in which he could escape, that could not be allowed. When Arnacin first drew his cloak about himself, saying he wanted nothing to do with a bath, Adhelmar considered allowing him to stay dirty, but the sight of those raw wrists and blood-splattered clothes and hair convinced him otherwise. He simply stood aside with Hans as Polion wrestled Arnacin into the tub, soaked clothes coming off only afterward.
To everyone’s shock, the captive submitted once submerged in water, except that he never allowed Polion to pull him back out. Still, he permitted all but his torso to be attacked with soap and water, including his scalp.
Once he was done, he shot into the clean clothes they offered, as if afraid to leave his skin exposed to air for even a second. Compressing his lips, Hans tapped the side of his head and slipped out with the dirty bundle of clothes to be washed.
Chapter 9
The Black Captain
Evening came before Adhelmar could attempt any more conversation with his obstinate captive. Writing his review of the day, the captain glanced up at his silent clean prisoner.
Arnacin sat in the large chair he had been offered, his heels tucked up onto the seat in front of him, his gaze fixed on one flickering candle hanging in its lantern. With his arms resting atop his bent knees and his thumb brushing his lips, he appeared quite oblivious to any movement around him, his breathing as ragged as his shivering implied. Although wrapped in a blanket, he still trembled.
Aside from a few moments when the sound of his breathing cut off strangely, nothing changed. Glancing from the figure in the chair to the two guards on each side of it, Adhelmar thought not so much of a watched prisoner as an ailing king protected by his attendants.
Shaking his head, the captain softly inquired, “You have not told me what caused your cowardice amidst the pirates, Arnacin.”
For quite some time, no answer came. The captain was beginning to think he had not been heard when Arnacin whispered, “I should be brainless to do so, after telling you the power it apparently has over me.”
“If it’s what I think it is, it doesn’t seem all that strong.”
Those dark eyes finally turned in Adhelmar’s direction. Yet, unlike that morning, they told him nothing, those still pools of depthless indigo.
Striving not to end a conversation that could lead to an answer, the captain confessed, “I also interrogated Captain Xavior. It was difficult to make him speak of you, although he gloated about what he did to our Captain Belon. He did let me know you agreed to remain on his ship just after that. If your agreement lay in cowardice, Arnacin, would your fear be of death at the hands of others?”
Arnacin’s gaze simply flicked downward, and the captain tried again. “I know what controls pirates, what can make them agree to drink poison to avoid it, but what about you? Are you also fearless about the possibility of death while in the midst of battle and then a coward when you must wait for that punishment?” He waited, yet no answer came. “Because frankly, Arnacin, I know you’re thinking you know what’s coming, and I haven’t heard any sound of a plea or bleat for it to be otherwise.”
The captain finally sparked a brief look of scorn, yet it reverted to the silence of before. Shaking his head, the captain searched for a different angle. In the silence, he did notice the sudden disappearance of his captive’s heavier breathing. Looking back up, he eventually tried, “Is Enchantress Island a real place or was it a title given to you?”
“I wouldn’t tell you either way.”
“In that case, what type of place would receive such a name?”
“If it isn’t a place, how should I know?”
Briefly looking heavenward, the captain gave up on that angle. “What were you blamed for on Mira?”
Again, those dark eyes turned to him, smoldering in their depths and, in the cabin lit only by the flame of candles, the captain could not shake the feeling that he had roused a dragon from rest. Shivering, he resumed his writing, hoping he was not moving too hurriedly. When he looked up a moment later, however, the captive had returned to staring through the wall.
Clicking his tongue, the captain asked, “Very well, Arnacin. Perhaps you would like to present a topic for tonight’s discussion?”
After only a second, Arnacin spoke with the same distant softness that marked everything he had said that night, “Where is this ship headed?”
“To its home port.” The answer brought a jerk of alarm, and Adhelmar added, “The queen will be awaiting word with growing concern.”
“You will release me before then.” It was half-question, half-order, and the captain grinned in spite of himself.
“You might as well not quibble. I hear your ship needs a replacement or two before she is on her way again. Therefore, you must land in some port.”
“My ship is ready to sail this minute.”
“Then we shall simply await the queen’s decision.” With that, Adhelmar returned to his journal. The sound of hissing metal and swift movement made him look up again to see that the captive had shot to his feet—and in reply, one of the guards had drawn his blade, resting the tip against Arnacin’s back.
“Sit down, Arnacin,” the captain advised, contemplating those rage-white features. “There is nothing for you to do, other than whatever pleases me.”
Ignoring both the order and the blade, Arnacin whispered, “If whatever pleases you is to bring me back to your country to hang or worse, you will find only death will bring me there.”
Reminded once again of a king, albeit a captured one, Adhelmar remarked, “It looks very likely, but I have not said once that I intend to play with you in any form. If I was hoping for that to happen, you would still be below. What I need to know, Arnacin, if you would be so kind as to actually assist, is whether or not you have ever committed an act of piracy.”
Head raising, Arnacin stated, “I told you.”
“In words only. Where is the proof of that? You refuse to tell me anything that will help me make a decision.” In frustration, Adhelmar slapped his hand against his journal. At the snap of paper, he exhaled. “What brought you to sea?”
Slowly returning to the chair, Arnacin buried his head in his arms. Still, the captain waited. After long, ticking minutes, a muffled voice breathed, “You don’t want to hear about anything before Mira. It doesn’t have any answers.”
“Then what do I want to hear?”
“Why I yielded to Xavior.”
Yet Arnacin had refused to reveal that piece of information. Asking again would likely bring the same answer—fear of what Nomacir would do with that knowledge.
Softly, Adhelmar tried anyway. “Why would we use that information, Arnacin? What do you really have to give us—your bondage? Nomacir has no extra strength to keep slaves in line even if we wanted them.”
The top of that black head only rocked back and forth in refusal. If there was something special he could give, perhaps no one could blame him for keeping the secret, despite anyone’s frustration.
Rubbing the quill along his nose for a second, Adhelmar returned to his writings.
With his right ankle chained to the creakiest bunk in Isholt’s Revenge and guards posted nearby, Arnacin found no chance to escape. For the first half of the night, a candle burned while guard and captive watched each other. When the candle burned out at last, Arnacin lay there, feverishly striving to keep his visions of sealed tombs at bay while he waited for the deeper, even breaths of his guard.
Finally, the awaited sound came. Cautiously, Arnacin raised his head and winced as the bed creaked beneath him. Abruptly, the guard’s breathing changed. Even in the dark, there was no doubt he was awake.
Sighing, the islander rolled onto his back, feeling his compass tap lightly against his chest as he did—the compass Valoretta had given him.
Valoretta. He could still clearly picture her as he last saw her a year ago—regal, pale and silent to the injustice transpiring before her.
Even so… Pulling his compass out from under his shirt, he tightened his fingers about it. Once they had laughed and teased each other in Mira’s library. In sharing their deepest concerns and dreams, he thought they had become family. But by her silence that fateful day, she had proven otherwise.
As if in contradiction to his hurt, the princess’s last words to him seemed to echo in the dark. Come out by noon, Arnacin. Don’t die before you can.
Birds circled around a muddy dell, where a bundle shivered. Approaching, Arnacin’s breath stopped. Valoretta lay there in a curled ball, covered in dirt and blood, her tangled hair sprawling about her face and the ground, a thin shift hardly even covering her skeletal legs. Whether she was conscious or not, even the birds knew it was only moments before her last breath.
Abruptly, Arnacin stood on the edge of a rock tower rising out of the sea.
“How are you here?” The snap was Charlotte’s, as she glided downward to land beside him, her ebony eyes flames burning beneath her skull.
Retreating a step into the grasping waves, Arnacin quickly shook his head. Yet, his horrific sister pressed onward. “You’re here solely through the death of someone else! You’ve betrayed us all, brought dishonor on yourself and your family, abandoned your rescuer to her death—”
“Charlotte, every sane person knows she’s likely dead. It would be foolishness to return to Mira!”
“Coward! Can you live with yourself for not personally finding out?” With a curl of her scarlet lips, his sister circled him. “Besides, who said you’re a ‘sane person?’”
As that condemnation struck like a dagger, Arnacin woke. Tossing his blankets to the bottom of the bunk, he released a long exhale. Since he had heard of Mira’s fall, his nightmares continually grew ever more insistent and condemnatory. No longer could he deny that, regardless of Valoretta’s betrayal, he could never return home without first going to Mira. If she still lived, he could never leave her to die like some of the pirates’ female prisoners. And if she was really dead, he had to know.
Yet Adhelmar would never release him. Had the officer intended to do so, he would have already. Arnacin’s only chance was escape, and he had limited time for that before he was sentenced to the gallows.
