Another five days had passed on the ship from hell. I sat with my legs wrapped around a railing with my head over one knee ready to heave my gullet at any moment. The first four days had gone as planned and thus sick free. The last four had been worse than hell. I'd woken with a grey face and nothing stayed down for more than five minutes. Kaen had tried to give me some herb paste that would allow me to eat again, but it tasted as foul as what I threw up.
"Hurin… Do you yet feel better?" I could have hit him for asking. I looked like death, smelled like rotting clothes and I could only imagine what I looked like.
"Yes, Kaen… a little… Can I have some water?" I drank the water because it made throwing up easier. With nothing in my stomach heaving because painful and just being able to wash away from the flavour of vomit from the tongue was a godsend.
"You will be fine alone?" I waved him away because I was afraid something other than words would come out of my mouth. A moment later a flask dropped into my view and I drank back half of the contents before realizing it was not water. It was sweet and tasted like berries.
"Kaen…" I turned around and Kaen was not standing next to me. Instead it was a strange man I'd not seen before.
"Feels better than throwing up, no?" I pushed the flask back to the man and he chuckled when he realized I would not be drinking anymore of it. "What is such a pretty looking girl doing on a ship with one from the beast tribe?" I couldn't only think 'where the hell is Kaen?'
"I-I… am sailing to Palas… I am a gift for the Merchant Prince, Dryden." The man gave her the oddest look and suddenly found it required to look her over again. It was sickening to see.
"Oh? And what name do you have? Such a tempting looking lady such as yourself?" I was thinking of telling him off and maybe kicking him in the moneybag, but I couldn't. I didn't trust myself let alone the people on this boat.
"Millerna… Who are you to ask about someone else's property?" His grin grew with my irritation it seemed, which was more than fine. I had a lot for the creepy man.
"Where did you sail from? You are not one of the beast tribe and they do not trade human women… Why such a lavish gift?" The man suddenly was hauled backwards by Kaen, the guys face changing from arrogant to startled.
"You will not speak to Hurin. She is not yours." The name 'Hurin' seemed to make the man take the man's edge away and he bowed slightly while asking forgiveness.
"My apologizes... But a week on this hunk of driftwood is enough to make anyone chat up a pretty lady such as yourself." I couldn't help but feel like everyone on the ship was suddenly watching me and judging me so as asked which coin I would offer for making my sickness go away and handed it to the man from my bag hidden in my pant-leg.
"It is a long ride and I've been sick and foul tempered. I can only imagine how one who doesn't have a sickness to consume their thoughts must feel… forgive me for being rude…" I bowed in the traditional Japanese sense and wondered belatedly if it was odd or out of place. It didn't seem so because the man left me the flask and walked away with a smile on his face.
As the man turned down towards the cabins below Kaen put his arm across my back and turned me to the sea.
"We will dock tomorrow shortly after noon. From now until then, you must stay with me at all times. That man has been around our cabin with a woman I do not know… Be cautious Hurin. We are being watched." I couldn't help but tense under him and his arm pulled me in a bit to hide the reflexive instinct my body had. The sickness was gone, but now I had other things to occupy my mind. Like being chased and strangers, spies and princes and king and knights!
"Kaen… I don't think I can do all of this… I'm starting to lose my grip on myself… I want to find that man and push him over the railing of the ship and tell him if he ever even looks at me again, I have you kill him; And Allen, if I ever meet him again, that my mother should never have been blasphemed like she had. The King of Fanelia, that if he didn't find me a way home I would make sure that he regretted it. I was sick and tired of being pushed around, moved around, forced to run, too scared to speak because there were strange machines, floating ships, on a planet that was invisible to earth and I didn't even ask for this." He buried my face into his chest to muffle my words and only the last sentence or so was audible, but only to him.
"I know Hurin. It is hard, but you have friends trying to help you. Your mother gave you the best advice I am sure to get home. Ragan is helping you and so am I. All you must do is be you. If you must weep, then weep. If you must scream, then scream and if you have to push the odd smelling man off the boat then I will find him and do it for you because he is rather big for you… But do not think that only you are here." His finger dug into the hard spot between my breasts to where my heart was. "Because a lot of people are with you and waiting for you."
"I hate you Kaen…" He smiled as I smothered my face into him. I cried once again and thanked god for having sent me Ragan and Kaen; for there being a King Van and King Chid, and even on a strange planet far from home, a place where her mother had been.
"We will wait until you are finished and I will take you below deck again. We should not leave our room until tomorrow before leaving the ship." I nodded despite the fact that I kind of wanted to look at the sea more, but I allowed Kaen to lead me away. We did not end up sleeping much that night as we stayed up while I taught him some card games I knew from earth. Not once did he mention the fact that they were clearly children's games and he played them avidly. It wasn't until I dropped my hand of cards twice that he forced me to go to sleep. My last thought was wondering when Kaen slept, seeing as he was always awake when I was whether it being going to sleep or waking up; I would have to make this up to him somehow if and when I got a hold on things.