After the first few days, Kiara found herself settling into a sort of routine. It was a different sort of pattern than anything she'd experienced before—partly because it involved no blood but that of the food she was cooking, and no decision-making except what she might concoct from the stores on board—but she found the quiet… domesticity of it oddly soothing. On the ship, Isabela's was the opinion that called the shots, Isabela was the one people went to with concerns or problems or questions; Kiara was only a passenger. A helpful passenger, but passenger nonetheless. No one paid her much attention, except to thank her for the meals she provided.
After Kirkwall, after everything, it was oddly refreshing.
Occasionally Varric poked his head into the galley to look in on her, but his seasickness did not ebb and even she could see the smell of food did nothing to soothe it. More often than Varric, however, she was joined by Sebastian. They spoke little, but he was unceasingly helpful, and she began to find herself a little disappointed when she was left to prepare a meal without his help.
Kiara was pondering the evening meal's ingredients—the vegetables from Kirkwall would have to be used before they went off—when she heard the door creak open behind her. Turning with a smile, the expression froze when she saw it was not Sebastian in the doorway as she'd expected, but one of Isabela's sailors. She was doing her best to learn all their names, but this one was someone she hadn't yet spoken with. She thought he was one of the ones who spent most of their time up in the rigging; she saw them less, and knew them little. Like many of the sailors, tattoos crept up the man's muscled arms, fanciful sea creatures and waves and something that looked like the sails of a ship. His eyes narrowed as he watched her, and she felt the faintest tingle of danger when he moved into the galley completely, shutting the door.
Swallowing hard, Kiara kept her expression carefully neutral and waved toward one of the cabinets, using the motion to edge closer to the end of the table bolted into the floor, and therefore closer to the exit. "Dinner will be a while yet," she said, feigning mildness, "but there are biscuits if you're hungry."
The sailor snorted derisively, and the shiver of danger multiplied ten-fold. "Biscuits, she says. Princess, I'm not hungry for biscuits."
Without moving too quickly, she put a hand out to keep herself steady, as if her sea-legs were failing her. Her fingertips inched toward the handle of the knife she'd been using to chop vegetables. She didn't dare look away from the intruder; if she glanced toward the blade, he'd know her intention for certain.
There was no mistaking the intention behind his leer, however, and just as her fingers closed around the knife's handle, the sailor executed one of the moves Kiara had always admired when Isabela managed it—though she found she admired a great deal less when it was aimed at her—flipping through the air and drawing the twin blades at his back. By the time he landed, not a foot away, she had kitchen knife in hand. He ducked when she swiped at him and swept one foot out, sending her to the floor.
Years of survival made her tighten her grip on the knife as she fell, but he still had the upper hand and he blocked her awkward stab with disdainful ease, pulling the blade from her hand with a flick of his own daggers. She heard her knife skitter across the floorboards, but didn't waste time trying to see where it had gone; it was useless to her now. Instead, she tried to disarm him. He was bigger than she was, and stronger, and certainly superior at hand-to-hand combat, but she was desperate, and desperation made her brave.
The pirate growled as she landed a punch on his jaw. He was forced to drop one of his own knives in order to capture her wrist. Trying to take advantage of his positioning, Kiara kicked out, glancing a blow across the man's side even as she reached with her free hand toward the fallen dagger. Though she knew the kick had to have hurt him, he hardly flinched, and he dropped his second blade to capture both her hands, holding them above her head in a grip like iron. His lips curled in a sneer as she aimed another kick at him, and before this could land he twisted agilely, pinning her legs between his thighs.
"Look," she said, trying to keep the panic from her voice, "don't do something you'll regret. Isabela—your captain—she doesn't look fondly on—" before she could finish her sentence, the sailor spat down at her. The hot spittle slid down her cheek, momentarily stunning her into silence.
"I know your type," he snarled, his eyes bright with something dark and lustful and more than a little mad. "Swanning about as if you own the place, wiggling your hips, thinking you're better 'n all of us. Champion of bloody Kirkwall, brought down by a strong man, just like any common slut. The captain's another one, just like you. Women have no place aboard ship. It's time you whores learned it. I'll have her like I'll have you, kicking and screaming and wiggling like a fish on a hook. See how superior you feel then, you teasing bitch."
Kiara was strong. She knew she was strong, but whatever madness had the sailor in its grip made him stronger. She tightened the muscles of her stomach, attempting to gain enough power to either throw him off or twist out from underneath him, but his thighs only clenched tighter around her.
"Knew you'd come around," he said, his leer widening into a grin. He was missing two teeth. He ground his hips against hers. "Knew a woman who walks like you do would want it, no matter how much her pretty lips protested."
"I don't," she spat. "I want no part of this."
He lowered his head, close enough for her to smell the reek of rum and rot on his breath, but not near enough for her to smash her forehead into his, as she wished to do. "I don't care," he replied. All she could see was his face, twisted with hate and ugly desire. The ends of his hair tickled her cheeks and she tried to bite at it but he only laughed.
Until the cast-iron pot came crashing down on the back of his head.
The sailor fell in an abrupt, boneless heap atop her and she nearly gagged as she hauled herself out from beneath him. Sebastian—wielder of the pot—grabbed the man by the shoulders and threw him aside. The sailor bounced off the wall and lay motionless.
"Hawke…" His voice was gentle, though his cheeks were flushed and his eyes flashed with barely-restrained rage. He bent and gathered the man's blades, staring down at them as if he did not understand their purpose. "Are you—?"
"I'm fine," she said, still breathless, her nostrils still filled with the scent of alcohol and hair left too long unwashed. She scrubbed her hands down the front of her thighs, already feeling bruises forming at her wrists and along the flesh of her legs. "I'm fine. He didn't—I'm fine." She gasped. "Are you okay? Your wound—"
"Is fine," Sebastian said. "I'm fine, Hawke. I promise."
"Is he dead? Did you kill him?"
Sebastian's eyes narrowed, and his hands clenched around the hilts of the daggers. "I wish I had. I should have—"
"No," she said, still shaking with adrenaline and no small amount of fear. She was not used to feeling helpless; not used to being the one rescued. It felt wrong in all the worst ways. "Isabela will deal with him. Isabela will… she'll do something. She'll do something. Are you sure he's not dead?"
She glanced past Sebastian, wrapping her arms around herself and willing her body to cease its trembling. The sailor lay where he'd been thrown, but even at the slight distance the rise and fall of his chest was visible. "No, then. It's fine. Isabela. Isabela will—"
"Hawke," Sebastian repeated, less gently. She forced herself to meet his gaze, and was surprised to find only concern there, and none of the pity she dreaded.
"He surprised me," she admitted, hating the words, hating the way she wanted to cry, even though the danger was past. "I—my guard was down. He moved so… he was so fast." She frowned, looking down at the planks beneath her feet. "Why didn't I scream? I… I could have screamed."
Sebastian lowered the daggers onto the table next to the pot and took a tentative step forward, hands held where she could easily see them, as though he was approaching a skittish horse. This made her frown harder. "Hawke," he said for a third time. "This wasn't your fault."
"I know," she snapped. "Don't patronize me, Sebastian."
His hands clenched into fists and he turned his head slightly, as if she'd slapped him. Then he swallowed hard and said, "Go get Isabela. I'll watch him until you return, though I don't think he'll be waking any time soon."
Kiara managed three steps before her legs would take her no farther, and she put her hands out to brace herself against the table. Sebastian was at her side in an instant, though he didn't touch her. It was she who turned and wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing her face into his chest. "Thank you," she mumbled. "I don't know—I couldn't—I tried—just… thank you."
One arm snaked around her shoulders, and the other hand cupped the back of her head gently. He said nothing, and she found herself oddly grateful for his silence. After several moments, she pulled away. His arms dropped heavily back to his sides. "I'm fine now," she repeated, almost believing it. "I'll get Isabela. Feel free to hit him with that pot again if he so much as twitches."
"I might do it even if he doesn't," Sebastian replied, glaring over his shoulder at the felled sailor. His brow furrowed. "I don't understand. Isabela vouched for these men. She said she trusted them."
"She wouldn't be the first to be mistaken about a man's character," Kiara said softly. "It happens to the best of us. Still. It seems… he had to have known he'd be caught. There's nowhere to hide on a boat. It doesn't make sense. It's like he wasn't thinking."
Sebastian shook his head, expression still dark.
#
Isabela waited until the man woke before she passed judgement. When he glared up at his captain, blood still matting his hair, eyes bright with feverish defiance, Isabela brought the back of her hand across his cheek in a vicious slap that made his neck crack. He spat at her, cursing.
"I hope you're a good swimmer," Isabela said coolly, as two of her sailors dragged the man to the starboard side of the ship. Before he could do more than mutter a protest, the men tipped him over the side. A moment later there was a solid-sounding splash, followed by another sputtering curse.
Kiara tried to feel pity for the man left floundering in the dark seas, but couldn't. Beside her, Sebastian stood silent, his expression inscrutable as he watched the man begin the likely-fruitless attempt to swim for shore.
Behind them, Isabela shouted orders and her men leapt to do her bidding. Soon the sails billowed out, filled with wind, and they left the swimmer behind, but Kiara remained at the railing, watching the spot she'd last seen him. Sebastian stood at her side, still silent.
"Sebastian," she said at last, tentatively, trying to make sense of his expression, "was the punishment too harsh? Is that what's bothering you?"
"No," he replied stonily, without looking down. "I'm not certain I would have been so merciful."
#
Kiara woke, gasping for breath, heart thudding in her chest. At first she thought it only another forgotten nightmare. In the five days since leaving Kirkwall—and two since the sailor's aborted attack—sleep had been more elusive even than usual, and what rest she managed was troubled.
When the ship beneath her lurched and she found herself flung against the wall of her bunk, she realized it was no mere dream causing her anxiety. A crash of thunder punctuated this comprehension, deafening even from belowdecks, and Kiara pulled herself unsteadily to her feet, staggering across her tiny cabin. The ship rolled again, and it took several tries to unlock her door.
She heard the rain before she felt it; it sounded like a stampede of rabid brontos running across the wooden planks above her. Kiara clung to the ladder as the boat shifted, pushing the hatch open with one hand only to be instantly swamped by the deluge. The wind howled around her, trying to either rip the hatch from her grip or beat her down with it. A flash of lightning briefly illuminated the deck, but what Kiara saw brought her no comfort: two of the sails hung torn and useless, flapping in the strong wind as men tried to pull them in; other sailors were desperately trying to clear the deck of anything that might be washed overboard and lost to the angry sea; the waves themselves towered, and explained the heaving ship.
Before Kiara could pull herself fully up the ladder, Isabela appeared, one hand clutching a rope, legs braced but feet still slipping on the rain-slick boards. The other hand wrapped around Kiara's wrist and tightened so painfully she knew there would be new bruises layered over the ones left by the sailor. The roar and crash of the sea, coupled with another roll of too-near thunder stole the pirate's words, but Kiara could see her screaming. Another flash revealed how utterly drenched Isabela was. She'd lost the ever-present blue headscarf, and her hair was a snarled tangle around a face gone pale with a strange blend of fear and excitement and iron resolve.
The ship crested another vast wave. Isabela only wrapped the rope once more around her wrist and pulled it taut, while her feet remained impossibly steady. Kiara lost her grip on the ladder momentarily and cracked her ribs as she fell sideways against the open hatch, but Isabela's grasp on her wrist was immovable and kept her from completely losing her balance. In the moment of silence between thunderclaps, Isabela shouted, "Get belowdecks and stay there! I've already lost a man to this storm; I won't have you be another casualty!"
"Let me help!"
Isabela's smile was fierce, her eyes narrowed against the onslaught of the elements. "Sweetheart, you handle yourself well for a landsman, but you've no place here. This isn't the kind of battle you know how to fight."
Kiara opened her mouth to protest, but another booming roll of thunder silenced her. Isabela shook her head. "My ship, my rules. Get below. Stay until I come get you. Same goes for Princess. I see your faces and I get mad. I get mad and you get yourself knocked over the head with something heavy and no one wakes you up until we get to Starkhaven. Got it?"
Kiara nodded, but whatever reluctance she felt was diminished by the crash of yet another wave over the bow. It took all her strength to keep from being swept away. She'd fought in all kinds of untenable situations—feet slipping in blood, unsteady on sand—but she knew Isabela was right: trying to help now would mean only a fast death.
Isabela only shook her hair back and snarled something at one of her sailors. Above the pulled-in sails, the masts rose like skeletal fingers bereft of their flesh. The image sent a shiver down Kiara's spine, but she blamed it on the cold rain, and the even colder wave.
"Shut that hatch, Hawke, before you fill the hold with seawater and drown us all. Go! Now!"
"Aye, Captain," she shouted. As she carefully eased down the ladder, lowering the hatch, another flash of lightning illuminated the scene, and Kiara saw Isabela grin.
The madwoman's actually enjoying this.
Varric and Sebastian, Kiara soon learned, were most definitely not enjoying the storm. When she pushed open the door to their cabin, Varric blinked at her but didn't lift his head, and Sebastian's expression was very nearly as pathetic.
"You didn't go out there, did you?" Varric groaned. "Are you actively courting death, Hawke? Knowing you're going to sink to the bottom of the ocean in a sodding sailed coffin isn't enough for you?"
Kiara smiled faintly, but the listing of the ship kept the gesture weak. "I thought I could help."
Varric swallowed hard, one arm clinging to the railing of his bunk, and the other clenched tight to his middle. "Put me out of my misery. That'll help."
"He's been begging for death for half an hour," Sebastian said, sounding none too healthy himself. Kiara could hardly blame him. The room was small and close, and the storm meant the single tiny porthole was shut tight. The air within was too warm, and smelled of sour, stale sickness and retching dwarf.
"Give me what I want and I'll stop begging," Varric replied. "Promise."
Sebastian grimaced. "I've half a mind to oblige you, Varric, if only to shut you up."
"I think Isabela has things under control," Kiara offered. Varric only rolled his eyes and groaned again.
"Rivaini's got lots of talents, Hawke, but calming stormy oceans by sheer force of will isn't one of them."
Her smiled widened slightly. "As long as you're still using nicknames you're healthy enough to live, I think."
Varric muttered under his breath—very unflattering things not just about her person, but about her family, which was hardly fair to Amelle—and rolled to his other side. Sebastian, sitting on his bunk and propped against the wall, shrugged his good shoulder. She found herself reflexively checking his face and his posture for signs of pain, but apart from looking weary and wrung out and a little green around the gills, he did not seem to be suffering.
Kiara sat on the opposite end of his bed and leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. Sure enough, the wrist Isabela had grabbed was already purpling with new bruises. Her bones ached, still haunted by the memory of phantom fingers.
"Remind me," Sebastian said softly, his gaze on her bruised flesh. "What exactly was so very wrong with taking the overland route?"
Kiara chuckled, her stomach lurching along with the movement of the boat. An ominous creak sounded from above, but when it wasn't followed by a crash of masts breaking or the ceiling falling in she exhaled her relief. "You mean apart from your certain death?"
"Ahh. Certain death. I'd forgotten."
"Boats sail through storms all the time," she said, attempting to sound reassuring. And failing.
"Ships," Varric mumbled. "She'll pitch you overboard if she hears you say boat one more time."
"Ships," Kiara amended.
"Didn't her last ship go down in a storm?" Sebastian queried mildly.
"Lightning never strikes twice," Kiara replied. The porthole brightened as lightning flashed outside, and it was instantly echoed by thunder that seemed to shake the very hull. "Ahh. Bad choice of idiom."
Varric moaned.
"Come on, Varric," Kiara cajoled. "Think what a fantastic story this will make."
"Fantastic story my hairy ass. There's a reason I favor fiction."
"Write what you know?"
Varric glared at her. "Don't tempt me, Hawke, or my next book will be about a devastatingly handsome dwarf who kills his obnoxious, red-headed friend in cold blood."
Kiara smiled. "What did poor Aveline do to piss you off?"
Varric's snort could almost have been interpreted as a laugh, which Kiara took as an epic victory, all things considered.
The amusement, however, was short-lived. Things grew worse before they grew better. At one point the porthole blew inward, extinguishing the lantern and allowing several inches of water to pool on the floor before they could wrestle it closed again. At another, the ship canted so sharply Kiara was flung against Sebastian; he winced as her weight slammed against his wounded side. He reluctantly allowed her to fuss over him afterward, but even that distraction was not enough to keep her from imagining the stifling terror of death by drowning.
By the time Isabela finally appeared below, all of them had taken turns retching, though Varric's illness was by far the worst; Kiara hadn't known it was possible for anyone to be paler than skimmed milk. Isabela, still soaking wet and leaving puddles around her boots wherever she stood, looked haggard and exhausted and also somehow more alive. She glanced around the cabin and said, without preamble, "So there's good news and there's bad news."
"Let me guess," Kiara said, "the good news is we're not dead."
"I'm mostly dead," Varric moaned in protest. "I might still die. I'm pretty sure I'm going to die, actually."
Isabela shot the dwarf a fond glance. "You're fine, Fuzzy. Nothing a little dry land won't cure. Yes, the good news is we're not dead. And the ship is still mostly in one piece."
Varric turned his head and raised his eyebrows, looking pathetically hopeful. "Dry land, you say?"
"Which brings us to the bad news," Isabela continued. "We lost most of our stores. Even on rations we don't have enough fresh water to get us to Starkhaven. It'll cost us an extra day or two, but we've got to put ashore."
Beside Kiara, Sebastian stiffened. Though he did not immediately speak, she could practically hear the protest rising to his lips and she put out a hand to forestall it, tightening her fingers around his wrist. It was enough to make him look at her, and whatever he saw on her face was enough to keep him silent.
"Which brings us to the other good news," Isabela said. "The storm blew us off course, but because we have to put ashore, it's a good off course. We're no more than a few hours' sail out of Hercinia."
Sebastian's expression darkened even further. "You've a strange notion of good news, Isabela."
Isabela pushed a hand through her hair and scowled, shaking her fingers, when it came away damp. "It'd be a dull world if we were all cut from the same cloth, Princess. As long as we don't bother them, they won't bother us. A little respect goes a long way."
Sebastian snorted. "Respect like you showed the qunari?"
The pirate's hand twitched close to the hilt of her dagger before closing into a fist; Kiara had to admire her restraint. Or possibly Isabela was only too exhausted to fight. Her tone, however, was anything but weary. "You want to swim the rest of the way to Starkhaven? Be my bloody guest."
"Please—" Kiara began, only to be cut off by Sebastian's clipped retort, "You're a thief and a liar, and you expect me to blindly walk beside you into a place like Hercinia?"
"That's enough, Choir Boy," Varric warned. The dwarf was still pale and ill, but he'd managed to pull himself upright, and the look he fixed on Sebastian was dangerous even though they all knew he hadn't the strength to follow through with the violence it promised.
Kiara frowned. "What—why is this place so dangerous?"
"It isn't," Sebastian said, without taking his gaze from Isabela. "If you can follow their rules."
Trying to defuse the situation, Kiara said, "So no drinking or swearing or whoring or murdering people out of turn. I'm sure even Isabela can behave herself for the time it requires to buy provisions."
But Sebastian was clearly unamused. His eyes were cold and sharp when he turned to face her, and it took a great deal of willpower not to flinch away. "And what do you know of the Marches, Hawke? What do you know, apart from Kirkwall's bickering mages and templars? There are places in this world where wit and a wink make for poor currency, and Hercinia is one of them."
"Then we'll all stay safely aboard ship until the supplies are—"
Sebastian shook his head, eyes narrowing. "You've already broken their rules and you don't even know it. The Assembly's Book of Law is three inches thick. Even dedicated diplomats who study the Book for months or years still make mistakes."
"So we apologize," Kiara snapped.
Tilting his head, Sebastian's expression turned patronizing. "Of course you do. But in Hercinia you apologize with your life."
"Now you're milking the melodrama, Princess," Isabela scoffed. "You'll have Hawke thinking the streets run with blood." Turning to Kiara, she explained, "It's not death you face, but servitude. Those who fail to uphold the Law spend the rest of their lives serving the Law. And in spite of what Vael would have you believe, I have managed to anchor at Hercinia any number of times without incident." Isabela turned a saccharine smile on Sebastian. "Unless you think you can't mind your manners, sweetheart?"
Sebastian said nothing, but if looks could kill, Isabela would have been instantly reduced to a twitching corpse.
"Why can't the rest of us stay aboard?" Kiara asked.
Isabela shrugged as she wrung a fistful of water from her hair, ignoring Sebastian and his glares entirely. "Hercinians place great stock in hospitality. Every guest to the city—for whatever reason—must stay one night. They must sleep in a Hercinian bed and eat of a Hercinian table. It's no hardship; the Hercinians make fine fish pie and even finer mead."
"It's still a risk," Sebastian growled. "And one we can easily avoid. If we can sail to Hercinia, surely we can make Estwatch."
Isabela snorted a laugh. "We might make Estwatch, yes, but I can guarantee you'll find no provisions there, and you'll need to hire a new captain besides. Estwatch and I… don't see eye to eye, and the captain of their guard has a long memory."
Sebastian spat a curse, and it was so vitriolic Kiara did flinch. "Sebastian," she soothed. "We'll be careful. It will be one night. We can't make it to Starkhaven without food and water."
This time when he raised his eyes to meet hers, his expression was resigned, and beyond weary. "I've offered my warning, and you've ignored it. Maker have mercy on us, Hawke. Maker have mercy."
For an instant even Isabela looked unaccountably nervous, and Kiara wondered just what she'd agreed to.
