Helloooo! Sorry it's been quite a long time since I updated, I have had many a thing to do :) Thank you so much to everyone who's reviewed and those who have added this story to their favorites or story alerts - yay! I hope you enjoy this chapter and please leave me a review to tell me what you think - I really appreciate cnstructive criticism and would love to hear your views on the story.
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Chapter 18
Lily's scream rang out over deck and then everything was silent. A few of the pirates exchanged looks and occasional nudges but apart from that nobody acknowledged it. Pontac did, however, walk up to Samuel and clap him on the back, grinning.
"Looks like I might win a bob or two from you my lad – I've bet it takes ye a week, don't let me down," he said with a smile that was suspiciously close to a leer.
Samuel's only reply was to shrug his hand away in disgust. He was more confused than he'd ever been before – normally his feelings were so simple. He liked someone or he didn't; that's how it should be, he reflected, but then how did Lily manage to be such an enticing mixture of both? And when did he even realize he felt like that? He couldn't remember. It seemed to him like he always had.
Confusing, he thought to himself as he leaned back against the mast, it was giving him a headache.
Jack chose this opportune moment to wake up again and prop himself up on his elbows so he could look at Samuel properly. When he saw the young man's expression he squinted and shaded his eyes with his hands.
"Ye look like a chicken wiv two pairs o' legs that's wonderin' if it's just a freak or a reincarnation of Kali the destroyer, mate," he told him gravely and Samuel rolled his eyes at the drunken pirate.
"Looks like you've been forgotten about," he said, looking around at the pirates who'd all gone back to their work, leaving Jack on deck instead of in the brig where, in Samuel's opinion, he belonged.
"Fine by me, mate," Jack said as he flopped backwards.
Samuel gritted his teeth and grabbed him by his shirt, pulling him up to standing and ignoring his drunken wobbling.
The smell of alcohol was like a second skin on Jack, Samuel wrinkled his nose as the man swayed towards him, giving him a generous whiff of eau de I-drunk-so-much-rum-that-I-now-can't-stand-up-what-are-you-going-to-do-about-it parfum. Nevertheless, Samuel soldiered on and marched Jack down to the brig. Surprisingly the man didn't struggle or protest, merely hummed an old sea shanty as they walked in otherwise unbroken silence.
"Ye know she'll damn near kill ye if ye don't tell 'er the truth," Jack said eventually, turning bleary eyes to Samuel just a they reached the brig.
"I didn't ask for your opinion," Samuel snapped, shoving Jack unceremoniously in one of the cells and locking it.
"Ye didn't have to, I'm generous like that," Jack slurred, lying down with a thump on the hard floor and tilting his hat over his face.
"Forgive me if I don't extend my thanks," Samuel muttered, walking away. It was only when he reached the stairs and put one hand on the rough railing that he saw the eyes.
Lily's eyes. Just as deep and brown and the same almond shape – the same dark fleck just beside the pupil.
Samuel stopped. He caught his breath. His chest juddered.
He stepped closer, squinting at the form that outlined the eyes.
A voice:
"Are you planning on painting a portrait, since you're staring? Or perhaps writing a descriptive poem? If so, as an artist myself, I am obliged to let you but if not, please stop."
Samuel blinked. Of course it was her twin, of course it was...what was his name?
He frowned, "what's your name?" His voice came out clipped and harsh.
Will's pale face loomed out of the darkness as he sat up straighter, looking curiously at Samuel.
"I'm Will," he said slowly, as if testing the waters.
"Samuel," the captain's son replied before turning away and walking quickly back up to deck.
Will's cell was full of bemused silence. It circled him like a vulture.
A month ago he had been a guest of the highest literary circles, he had been writing a poem that he was sure would receive high acclaim and he was completely happy. Now he was slumped in a filthy cell on a pirate ship. And, he considered, for once this wasn't Lily's fault, one of her schemes hadn't gone wrong and her vanity and pride hadn't undone her as they had so many times before...no, this was somehow to do with his mother and father. His father who he'd never met.
Will sighed and rubbed a hand over his tired eyes.
If only he had some paper and a pen.
-000-
Samuel was once again standing outside Lily's door, listening with knitted eyebrows to the eerie silence from inside it. This wasn't normal – the scream had been normal, the crashes and stamps he'd heard coming from the room had been normal. Silence, for Lily, definitely was not normal.
A bad feeling engrained itself in Samuel's chest and he turned the door handle sharply, opening the door. He half expected to find her gone but she was there, sat on the bed. The problem was, it didn't seem like her. She was sat cross-legged with her hands clasped in her lap and there was a stillness about her that Samuel had never seen before. She was staring straight ahead with empty eyes and she didn't move a muscle when Samuel came into the room.
Had Will been there he could have told Samuel that this was Lily at her most angry, her most hurt. That the tantrums and shouting all came with minor injuries, this unsettling stillness was reserved for the highest betrayals. He would have also warned Samuel to get out while he still could.
Samuel wouldn't have listened to him.
He stepped closer to her, his footsteps loud in the silence.
"Lily?" His voice came out more gruff than he meant because of worry and an uneasy feeling but she didn't move still. He cleared his throat and ran a hand through his hair.
"Look – I didn't mean for -" he started to say but he got no further.
"Get out," Lily snapped, her voice quiet and contained but extremely venomous.
Samuel frowned. "No."
"Get out."
She still hadn't looked at him. Only her lips had moved.
"No! If you'd just let me explain -"
"I don't want to hear it."
"Well I want you to hear it."
"No."
Samuel unclenched his fists with an effort and pointed at her, his face tight.
"You are the most frustrating girl I've ever met," he told her.
"And you are the cruelest boy," she said with a slight crack in her voice, though she still didn't look at him.
This wasn't what Samuel had expected and it caught him off guard.
"It wasn't how it seemed," he said in a quiet voice that was most unlike him and it was only then that she turned to him and there was fire in her eyes.
"You used me to impress your father, Samuel. You kissed me just so that I would be distracted whilst my father – my father Samuel – went away. Not only did you ensure that I will never see my father again but you did it in the cruelest way possible. How dare you play with my emotions, how dare you pretend you care for me?" She was shouting now, her voice uneven as if she was about to burst into tears. Samuel could only stand there, stupefied.
In the pregnant pause that followed Lily did start to cry, silently.
"How dare you make me care for you," she whispered.
Samuel already felt as if he'd been punched in the stomach multiple times but at this he almost crumpled.
She cared for him?
This beautiful, frustrating girl cared for him?
"Lily..." He said her name quietly.
"Get out."
Her eyes were once again turned away, her back was still straight and her arms now folded.
She didn't move or speak again for the rest of the day.
