Well, it's been a while, hasn't it? This story is actual kind of on hiatus, I really shouldn't have started it when I did and it's fairly like that I won't update very soon after this, but I felt oddly inspired about this chapter, so I went ahead and wrote it...it's not real long though...anyway, maybe, just maybe (and no promises!), if I get lots of nice, pretty reviews, I'll be inspired to update again! Blackmailing, I know...but if it works :D Enjoy.
The sky hung orange, sunlight lingering on the horizon, though the sun had long since gone. The sea was dark, waves smoothed over with a glossy blackness, dark as the night, dark as his mind, dark as his heart. Or did he even have a heart now, or had she eaten that away as well, along with everything else he had, waiting only for his soul to complete her meal?
He sighed, feeling the air slowly leave his lungs until there was none left. He waited before taking another breath, feeling his lungs tighten, his head go light, desperately willing it all to end. He closed his eyes, let darkness reign...darkness...emptiness...space...no. The thought was firm and adamant in his mind, like fists gripping onto something, gripping onto life. He wouldn't do it; he couldn't do it. He took a deep breath.
He wanted to live, as much as he hated it. He opened his eyes again, looked around him. The glossy black sails, the perfectly polished wood, the flag fluttering in the breeze, wispy white hand reaching into the mouth of the skull. Oh yes, this was his ship, the dreaded Dark Shining, the fiercest and most feared ship on the seven seas. Any man would die to be its Captain and die to refrain from meeting its Captain.
He knew the rumors well enough. It was almost funny, the way he could see the truth in them and understand perfectly well where they came from. Some of them were remarkably close to the truth, actually. He knew that every good pirate in the seven seas wanted to be him. Personally, he would give anything not to be himself.
He laughed at the irony of the situation, a deep and mirthless laugh in the back of his throat. Then he spat and kicked the railing, as hard as he could. He wanted to break it, see it shatter into a million pieces. On the contrary, it had hardly any effect on the sturdy wood, leaving it just as intact as ever.
He stared at it, his hands clenched in tight fists. It was too well-made. Everything about the galleon was too well made! Why couldn't it break, for once? Why couldn't it be damaged, for once? He'd had it built that way, so nothing could breach it, especially not...her. And not him, either. It was built with rails high, sturdy, thick. It would be hard to get over those rails, so throwing himself overboard to her would be nearly impossible. He'd built his own prison.
For a moment he considered climbing up and jumping off anyway. Let her win, at least it would be over! He'd be dead and gone, no life and no soul, but it wouldn't matter any more. It would be done; he'd be over the rails out of the prison! He gripped the wood, feeling his muscles tense. He reminded himself, as calmly as he could, that he was only rebelling against himself. Jumping off was giving up, and that wasn't him. He didn't give up. He was too much of a fool to give up.
If he had given up on her when he should have, he wouldn't be in this situation. He knew she was a siren, he knew the only thing she cared about was getting his soul, but no—he was the smartest, he was the best, he could make her love him! Stupid. Arrogant. Young. It didn't help that she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen in his entire life, or that her voice...
Silent, he could almost hear it, sweet, melodic, entrancing. It was like rain, like waves, waterfalls, and rainbows all at once, rushing, flowing, still. It was a wide sound, but haunting at the same time, as though it were hitting several different notes at once, each more beautiful than the others. He could fall into it and lose himself, in the sweet, sweet...
A blast of wind hit him suddenly, straight in the face, pressing his eye patch in, blowing his hair wild. It was cold and shaking to the bone, just what he needed. I listen to the song of the winds, not your song. He held onto the thought, those words that he'd said to her, and listened, carefully and quietly. It was small at first, far off and distant, just a faint whistle really, but it was there. It was simpler, but better than her song; it was real, true. It had held him this far, it would keep holding him. He was alive and that calmed him.
His hand reached into his pocket and found his papers, his compass roses. He looked them over carefully. Levante, siroco, libeccio, maestro. They were each beautiful, each powerful, the most powerful things he had, in fact. But they were too few. Four, only four left out of eight. He'd lost too many of them. Now he was losing himself.
The wind blew hard at the waves; the ship bobbed up and down. Some water came up, smacked in the face, freezing and wet. He took a step back, almost involuntarily. Water...she was in the water; if he touched it...his hands were shaking; he felt ridiculous. It was just water. But if he touched it...he wouldn't touch it again.
Yet it had been cooling, calming. He...missed the water, as odd as it seemed. He couldn't go in it, not ever, not anymore. She was there and she'd find him, wherever he was. He sailed aboard the sea, but he wouldn't dare get close to it, wouldn't dare be in it, and tried as hard as possible not to ever get wet. He'd convinced himself that water was bad. It hadn't been that hard to do.
Feeling it cooling, good, though, was like...a slap in the face. He didn't want to be reminded of what he'd lost. He sailed the seas. He hated it, because it was for her, she controlled him, but in a way...in a way, he loved it as well. It was as close as he could get to what he had, before. It was his life now and he accepted it, but he didn't want it to be too similar to the life that he'd lost. He wouldn't touch it again. Not just out of fear, but out of...grief, maybe? Mourning his loss...he wouldn't dwell on it. It was too uncomfortable.
There were footsteps behind him, sharp and purposeful. Not the aimless walk of the ever-wandering deckhands. Stupid men. He didn't know who they were, didn't care. They worked for him, served him, feared him. It didn't matter. But this wasn't one of them. He turned around. "Henry," he said, nodding at his friend and giving him as much of a smile as he could muster.
The man dipped his head slightly in acknowledgment as he came to a stop beside him. "Captain."
He nearly smirked at the formalities. He'd known Henry since...forever, it seemed like. He couldn't ever remember not knowing Henry. They'd been boys together, caught snakes and toads and rolled around in the mud together, the way boys do. Then they'd grown up together, of course, and could discuss more important things...girls, being the main important thing, it had seemed. Then, that was when everything had changed for him, but Henry had stuck with him still.
He certainly didn't need to be called Captain, not by Henry. Surely, his best friend could call him...well...what would he call him? He didn't know, not anymore. His old name...it...he wasn't that anymore. He wasn't who he used to be, not with the pirating, the killings, the...her. And Henry wouldn't call him what everyone else called him, for at least that he was grateful. He heard it among his crew often enough. The Dread Seidon, the most ruthless pirate in all the seven seas. He didn't need to be called 'dread' to his face ever again, not after the things he'd seen.
Men lured into the water, drowned, they're souls eaten away, bodies floating atop the water, cold, dead, lifeless. He'd brought them there, chased them to that point, but he didn't need to be reminded of it. The sirens were the dread ones, in his mind. Whatever he did, whatever kind of monster he'd become, they were the dread ones, not him. So he was Captain. That was all.
"Well, what is it, Henry?" he asked, after a moment, glancing again at the man standing beside him. "The sails alright, the wind? Anything problems?"
The man shook his head, slowly, deliberately. "None of that, Captain, it's all fine, it's—" he dug into the right hand pocket of his brown trousers and drew out something, a bronze circle with—oh, that.
He turned away and faced the horizon again, staring outward. He was sick of the thing. At least the roses helped him hear the wind, helped turn him away from her, but that...it was useless. It had led them nowhere, far too many times for his liking.
"It's this, Captain," Henry was going on. "It's pointing north."
"Well, isn't that what compasses are supposed to do?" he said dismissively, with a wave of his hand.
Henry sighed and said nothing for a moment. There was silence between them, not the uncomfortable, awkward silence between strangers, but the good, calming silence between friends. "I know you don't put much stock in it," he went on at last, "but...I think tramontanawas found."
He turned to face the man again, frowning, his voice hard. "So what if it was? Ponente was found and the compass pointed west! But it didn't matter then and it doesn't now. We'll never get it back." His voice nearly broke at the end and he cursed himself for what an idiot he sounded like. He nearly felt like breaking down, crying over the stupid compass rose, a stupid drawing of a compass, for goodness' sake! But it was gone, the last one he'd lost and he could hear her now, more than ever.
Henry was quiet again, allowing his anger to subside. Henry was a patient man, far more patient than he was. A better man. He always had been. It didn't matter. "It's not just that it's pointing north. Sometimes—frequently now—it's spinning in circles. Not just like it doesn't know what direction to point, but really spinning. Fast."
He stopped there, said nothing more, let him figure out the implications himself. He chose to ignore them. Spinning compasses, so what? That's what compasses did, it should be do to a magnetic disturbance, not...that. But, if it was...? No, it couldn't be. He'd searched already, everywhere. No one had heard of it, no one across the entire world! There were eight true winds, eight lines marked on the compass, and that was the way it should be. She'd probably been lying to him, so she could laugh at him later. There was no hope. But if it was...?
"If you don't mind me saying, Captain...there's no harm in going. It's better than waiting around for her to...you know."
He glanced at Henry, who was watching him carefully for a response. The man did have a point. He might as well go somewhere, do something, while he was waiting for the pains to begin, his right eye to inflame, the desire to hunt down and kill. Her desire.
He sighed. Fine, they'd do this, though he wasn't sure he could take it if it was nothing. "Well, tramontana is always north, is it not?"
Henry smiled, much more brightly than he would have thought imaginable. Henry was like that, easy to please, but level-headed, too. He always wanted to trace down the roses, though, and leave everything else behind. He supposed...he supposed it must be hard for Henry, too, only ever bringing men to their deaths. Henry wasn't a killer, wasn't wild or stupid enough to get himself into a situation where he would be forced to be one. Going on wild goose chases across the ocean, searching for extremely obscure objects, would have to be more fun, perhaps a treat even, compared to the rest.
"I'll give the orders, Captain," he was saying, and marched away across the deck again.
He sighed, turning back to the darkening horizon and hoping to high heaven that they'd find something this time, something worthwhile.