Smuggler : Night Tides Turning
Chapter 1
Firelight played across her face. Sipping the fourth cup of tea made by her Grandfather in a hope to distract her, she sat – focused only on the flames before her.
"I am sure he will return soon"
Captain Koenig smiled, placing his hand gently on his granddaughter's knee. "He is rarely gone longer than a week". Placing her hand over his she sighed: rarely a week, but often shorter was her wordless reply.
Deciding that for tonight there was little else that could be done, her grandfather slowly stood, heading to bed. He would leave her to sit and wait, as she had done for the past 10 days. Jack Vincent was nothing he had expected for his grandchild, a ruffian, at times vulgar and brash, yet he had integrity, inconsistent with his chosen life as a smuggler, which Koenig admired. Jack's absence was keenly felt, and though Koenig could not condone the attachment that had developed, he had decided to not stand in its way.
"Goodnight my darling", he leaned in to kiss her upon the forehead; she turned slightly to acknowledge him, smiling slightly, before returning to her quiet vigil.
With her grandfather's departure the room fell into a darkened silence. She had waved away the servants' hours ago, without their regular attendance to the fire; the flames had begun to falter. Absently poking the embers her mind drifted.
Jack had asked her to trust him, pulling her closely; he had kissed her just before her admission of love. Then nothing, he had gone, turning to the sea. Honesty had visited her a couple of days later enquiring if she had seen him. Usually he would know of Jack's plans, even if Jack had not shared them, Honesty had a way of discovering where Jack had sailed and the cargo he intended to bring with him. That Honesty appeared genuinely confused as to his whereabouts had been her first sense of something wrong.
A few days after Honesty's visit she had gone to his home. The weather had invaded through the windows, dirt dusted the floor and plates, which had been left discarded on the table, were now caked with mould. Several hours after, stripped of her finery, smeared with the labor of the day she had waited.
The sun had dipped into the ocean whilst the night crawled across the hills. Still she waited, climbing upstairs to lay her weary body upon his bed, an imposition she was aware, yet too tired to care. She could smell him upon the sheets, strangely calming, the familiarity passed through her clothes to rest upon her skin. Had Honesty not returned she might well have stayed all night, curled within the comfort of his world.
That was days ago, she had heard no word, nor returned to his home. She was sure by now the house would have resumed its state of disrepair, wiping her presence from his world. Maybe that's how easy it was for him, to remove her from his life – just let time accumulate in layers, covering what once was to what might never be.
The fire had burnt itself to blackened wood, a chill had climbed into the air, she shivered and stood. Making her way up the stairs to her room, she reminded herself to the thank Jenny in the morning for kindling the fire in her bedroom before she had retired; the warmth greeted her as she opened the door.
Quickly changing she slipped between the sheets, her mind began to drift, sleep gently tugged at her consciousness pulling it deeper into a twilight world of half-truths and imagined realities.
In such a state she failed to notice the window to her bedroom, slightly opened – the wind dancing with the curtain edge.