Chapter 16: Violation of Trust

Himeno

He hauled me back with a strength that I could not counter. I struggled with tears of rage threatening to escape from my eyes, but his iron grip would not yield. I bit my lip trying to erase what I had just seen from my memory. But it was no good. The women—the young women with so much hope for the future—brought aboard bound and without hope to this hell ship had no future anymore. If they even survived the night…

Hayate threw me onto the bed and slammed the cabin door. His breathing was uneven and he kept his eyes averted. He seemed to be struggling with himself as he leaned heavily against the door. He brought his hand to his face as if trying to hide his expression even more.

Was he feeling guilt? Or pain, as he knew for sure what would happen to those women? Did he feel responsible? Even so, I could not forgive what he had allowed to happen. He may be the captain's dog, but he was better than that. I believed he was better than that…

I got to my feet and rushed towards the door, ready to take advantage of his moment of weakness to make myself out of the cabin. I was ready to fight off the entire crew with my bare hands if necessary to save those women. I had watched helpless as the Belleza was taken without a fight, innocents slaughtered like animals, those who surrendered bound and taken aboard. My pistol was poised in my hand ready to shoot—and how I had wanted to shoot the crew of the Pretear with every fiber of my being!—but Hayate's sword hilt was against my back, a warning against any rash action.

Any now he had the gall to trap me in his cabin! I rushed forward towards the door, hoping to force my way through by taking him by surprise, but he was more than ready for me. His arm snaked around me and held fast, binding me to him. I looked at him with rage and was met with an expression that was as stern as it was gentle.

Don't you dare look like that! I wanted to scream at him. For I sensed from that single expression what was passing through his mind as he kept me trapped. He was keeping me safe—the only woman aboard who would not feel Sasame's cruelty—because it was the only thing he could do. Save the life of one woman while countless others…

And Hayate began to cry. It was a simply a few tears that escaped from his eyes, but it was enough to make me pause. I felt my vision swim even as I tried to escape his grasp. When he tried to pull me closer to him, I resisted and fell backwards away from him.

"Don't touch me," I hissed looking away from him to avoid seeing his pained expression once again, "This is your sin as well…allowing that monster to do as he pleases…"

"Yes, it is indeed my sin. For I am the reason he is that way now" he said softly.

I looked at him with a puzzled expression. I thought he would deny my words, defend his captain as he always did. But even he could not defend his captain's honor now. But he still accepted it—accepted it the way a parent blindly loved their children, overlooking even the crudest of flaws—even as he knew the twisted truth. Why?

"Which is why I cannot let you leave this room. I cannot let you go on your suicide mission," he continued in the soft voice he had spoken in before. It was almost as if he were containing a multitude of emotions beneath that veneer of serenity.

A suicide mission—it would be worth my life to protect these women—to exact my revenge on the man who killed my first mate…and most likely killed my sister as well. My sister was beautiful and pure, an angel to our family. There was no way she had escaped his notice. If indeed she had been captured aboard this ship, as I feared—

I opened my mouth to retort to his statements when the screaming began. Horror filled my mind as my heart began to thump in fear. The screams of pure terror that I heard radiating through the very walls of the ship could have only resulted from—I did not want to think of it. I shuddered and tried to close my eyes, but I was frozen in place. Unable to move, unable to breath as the screams penetrated me.

"Himeno!" Hayate called out to me. I had somehow fallen to the floor—perhaps my legs had given way—but I still not speak or breathe. I would fade fast, escape from this reality where human dignity was not respected into my own internal darkness…

Hands covered my ears, dulling the sounds of the screams. And I was suddenly surrounded by warmth. The knot in my chest unraveled enough for me to begin to breathe once more. And the dam was opened.

"I'm sorry," Hayate breathed, holding me close to him as I trembled with tears streaming down my cheeks, "I'm so sorry."

He held me gently at first, then pulled me in tighter as if he, too, were holding himself together by the embrace. Two survivors of a shipwreck trying desperately not to drown. What had Hayate done all the times this had happened when he was alone? Drown in the horror and guilt alone?

The screaming suddenly stopped. I shuddered as my imagination took over for myself. I could not fool myself. The screaming had not stopped because Sasame had taken mercy on the poor woman. No…he had probably ended the job by slitting her throat…but perhaps that was mercy in itself.

Suddenly every woman aboard became my sister in my mind. I saw her suffering through Sasame's cruelty and dying in the worst way possible, her happiness, her hopes and her dignity crushed, her neck streaming blood as that monster laughed at his triumph. For her to see him, an evil manifest, as the last thing before she passed—it was unforgivable.

I dug my fingernails into Hayate's arms in frustration. I saw him wince and pulled back but could not conceal my anger and the keen desire to kill from my expression. Perhaps it had been the first time I had ever allowed such an expression in his presence, for he suddenly went pale.

"Himeno," he said, more of an attempt to reach me than a question. His gaze was suddenly too kind; kindness derived from an attempt to assuage anger. A kindness he seemed all too familiar with. And one that I could not trust.

For in my anger I knew what I had suspected all along: had Sasame truly taken an interest in me following the mutiny, my fate would have been the same as the women taken aboard now. And Hayate had done nothing but wait to see how Sasame would act. His relief when I was safe but his inaction while I was in danger spoke to a contradiction deep within him that left me purely unable to trust this man. I hated his kindness and his guilt, his sensitivity yet his ferocity.

"My sister," I hissed, "was one of the many women whom you caused to die."