The door to Captain Sturmhond's cabin closed behind her with a threatening finality.
No going back now.
Alina clutched fistfuls of her robes, steeling herself. She'd wanted an adventure and an out, away from Port Keramzin. Well, now she'd found it. She could either mope about it or she could make the best of it.
She looked up from the polished floorboards to the cabin surrounding her. It was a large room, with diamond-shaped panels of glass making up a long window toward the top of the room. The light off of the golden candelabra with a bird-like base was warm, bathing the cabin in rosy light that seemed far brighter than it should have been.
The bed built into the wall was large, with plush pillows and embroidered scarlet silk sheets, fit for royalty. There was even a painting on the wall of some ocean goddess or another, with an ice dragon as her companion.
There was also an emerald chaise with a beautiful quilt and jewel-toned silk pillows from Shu Han.
Said candelabra was on a large, hardwood desk with a map sprawled across it. Alina examined the map—the continents and kingdoms recognized were fairly standard. It was recent, the colored ink still was relatively bright and crisp, although some spots had faded due to exposure to salt and sun.
There was more than just the continents and seas, however. There were little Xs all over the map—at least 800 of them, she was certain. Alina recognized one, in crisper black ink than the others, was over Port Keramzin.
Were these all of the targets they had taken?
Alina shuddered at the thought. Still, she examined the map more closely. It was a shame, how they had marred this one. There was artistry put down into this map, and the stupid pirates had ruined it in the pursuit of their own hollow pleasures.
Still, the point of most interest was a circle around an island Alina did not recognize, that was not far from Port Keramzin.
Isle of Curses, the accompanying ink read in a prince's calligraphy.
Alina moved to examine it closer, when her hand brushed upon a discrepancy in the wood of the desk. She'd read about these—here was a hidden drawer!
Before she could unlatch it, however, she heard footsteps. Alina sprang away from the desk, as if she had been burned, then straightened her gown and robe again as the door unlocked with a click.
"Been poking around, have you?" Captain Sturmhond strode past her, to the map, his fingers trailing over the X at Port Keramzin, to the circle around the Isle of Curses.
"What?" Alina blinked. "No, I wouldn't—"
"Shame." He glanced up from the map. "You might as well get used to the concept of looking through and taking things that don't belong to you. Otherwise, you're going to have quite the rough voyage."
Alina crossed her arms over her chest.
"Which reminds me, I've decided you've done a good enough job keeping this safe for some time." He pulled the medallion out of the pocket of his teal coat and tossed it at her. "Might as well keep it safe for another week."
Alina threw the chain over her head, removing her long white hair from where it could get snagged by the golden chain. It felt right there, like it was at home.
"Come, sit, we might as well share a goblet." He sat in the gargantuan gilded chair behind his desk, and opened a drawer to reveal a bottle of rum and two silver goblets.
"I'd rather not," Alina answered stiffly. "What I'd like to know is what you intend to do with me, if you will not give me safe passage back to my home."
"Just what I was planning to discuss." Sturmhond pulled off the top of the bottle. "Please, do sit—otherwise I'll have to drink this by myself, and Zoya tells me I'm a lightweight."
"Rather unbefitting of a pirate," Alina muttered as she reluctantly sat in one of the smaller chairs off to the side and scooted it forward.
"Ah well, hard to believe, but we all have our shortcomings, even men as handsome as I." He poured noticeably more rum into Alina's goblet than his own. "Cheers."
Alina accepted the goblet, but examined its depths with suspicion. She didn't see any evidence of a trick, but that was the whole point of sleight-of-hand. He could easily have put poison in it.
"It's not poisoned," Sturmhond added, as if he'd read her mind. "Truly, I'm offended you think I'm so low-class as to poison you. If I were to see your untimely death, Miss Starkov, we'll be face to face, and we'll both get our chance at one anther."
"How romantic," Alina deadpanned. She glanced at the rum in the goblet again—what a strange choice, indeed. Then she downed the cup, slamming it down on the desk.
"You'll fit right in." Sturmhond nodded his approval. "Just don't get into a contest with Zoya—you will lose."
"Noted."
Sturmhond did not touch his own drink—a detail that was starting to make Alina regret sipping hers. Instead he swirled it around, letting a few drops escape their silver confines.
He stared into the depths of his cup, his expression almost thoughtful. What was most confusing about him, Alina decided, was that he was a young man—relatively so, at least.
The majority of the crew was young, Alina had noticed. That was on parr for her romantic novels—but not for reality.
"What do you know about the medallion around your neck, Miss Starkov?" Sturmhond finally asked, still not looking up from his goblet.
"My medallion?" Alina felt it in her hands. "Not much, I'm afraid. I've had this for as long as I could remember."
"Is that so?" Sturmhond raised an eyebrow. "Tell me, have you heard of the great Captain Daiyu?"
"The name's familiar," Alina admitted. Not that she could recall why.
"Should be." He set the goblet back down on the desk, running his fingers along the engravings on the stem. "Nearly every pirate there ever was heard about the great Captain Daiyu—and what a shame it was, when she married a nobody, that Dmitri Starkov."
"Starkov?" Alina whispered.
"Some Ravkan man who fancied himself an adventurer, just like every other sailor on the high seas." Sturmhond shrugged. "He wasn't like Captain Daiyu, she was extraordinary. Came from Shu Han, and there wasn't a treasure that evaded her. Not even the Morozova Gold."
"The ghost story?"
"Aye." Sturmhond nodded. "She found nearly every legend, or so they say—but that one proved to be too much for her."
He sat up, now meeting Alina's eyes. "Her original crew found it, on an island on only one map, constructed of many parts scattered around this world. They took eight-hundred and eighty-two gold pieces, exactly like yours, from the chest in the story, the one made by Ilya Morozova."
Alina held it up to the firebird candelabra, and could see an abstract carving of a stag in the gold, intricate and suddenly distinct. She'd never made the connection before, but now that she had. . .
"What happened to them?" Alina met Sturmhond's eyes, her stomach sinking.
"The gold was cursed, and so was every member of her crew." Sturmhond now looked to the map. "Thing is, they didn't know until they'd spent it, until they scattered the gold, until they'd brought on more members of the crew."
Well, that explains the younger faces, then.
"That's when they realized, that no one aboard the ship was aging." Sturmhond picked up the goblet again, twirling the slender stem between his fingers. "When they ate, food turned to ash, drink could not quench their thirst. They were alive—but at what cost?"
He then met her eyes again. "Of course, their immortality only made things worse—the sea knows her dead and her living, and she does not like being cheated. So she sent her messengers after the crew."
Alina thought of the inky blackness, of the ship surrounded in shadow that flew, following the Volkvolny.
"The Flying Dutchman has claimed some of the Volkvolny over the years, and they will not pass on to the true land of the dead until the curse is ended," Sturmhond continued. "And every member of the Volkvolny and her crew will walk the earth, cursed to never die."
"This isn't just a story, is it?" Alina's blood ran cold. "You're cursed, aren't you? That's why you won't drink?"
He smiled. "Good observation, Miss Starkov."
"And Starkov and Captain Daiyu—they were my parents, weren't they?" Her heart ached as she realized what had happened that terrible first night she could remember.
"As far as we know, and the medallion would confirm it." Then he frowned. "The question I have is—why haven't you run into a problem yet?"
"A problem with what?" Alina demanded.
"The drink—does it not satisfy you?"
"I mean, I tasted the rum, I. . ." Alina paused as the meaning of that caught up to her. "I'm not cursed, then."
"Despite being a part of the crew now." Sturmhond leaned forward. "And from what the few older crew members have told me, you were a child aboard this ship, and were never under the effects of the curse. You were even born under it, somehow."
"And I'm somehow immune." As many questions had been answered, about her parents and that night, Alina was beginning to realize this was only the beginning.
"Indeed." Sturmhond sighed, leaning back. "A mystery, for certain. But a more pressing matter—the rest of the coins were found, the right blood spilt to pay back the curse. There's only one coin left, and you can free the souls of both your parents, with a little blood from your hand."
"That's why you took me from the harbor, didn't you?" Anger surged in Alina's blood. "I might have gone with you, if you had explained things, but you had to trick me!"
Before he could answer, her small fist collided with his sharp jawbone.
She didn't care about the consequences, or anything. The waves rocked, the wind cried, despite it being a relatively calm night.
"Good one," Sturmhond admitted, rubbing his jaw. "I think you'll get along fine here, Miss Starkov."
"I don't think so." Alina turned to the doors—only to find that they were locked.
"You aren't leaving so soon." Sturmhond stood. "You will break the curse. One way, or another."