A lot of things. That's what could go wrong, A lot.
Celeste hissed as she yanked at the chains encompassing her wrist, they didn't budge. She flicked her sweat drenched hair out of her face and scowled at the dimly lit cabin around her, water dripping from the wooden beams above. The dim gas light did little to illuminate the stuffy belly of the ship.
Oh, Lukas Pennington's days were numbered.
The lovely plum gown, the one Pennelope had labored over, was the only thin barrier to the thick chains, iron chains, encompassing her waist and pinning her to the ridged wooden mast. Idiots she would have called them, fools for thinking iron could hold her had it not been for the ash splinters littering her limbs.
"Don't look so put out darling," A dusty blonde headed fae man purred from his position propped against the entryway into the bowels of the ship, his mossy green and gold eyes luminous in the shadowed cabin, a predator standing guard over its prey, "I could help you ease your discomfort with those shackles you know." a flirtatious grin graced his face as he peered forward, eyes crinkling in amusement.
A growl escaped Celeste's lips that pulled a pleased chuckle from the man's lips- lips that were upturned in a self-righteous, pompous smirk that made Celeste want to smash his pretty jawbone. The smirk meshed flawlessly with his beautiful face, one of nothing but slick planes and sharp lines. Celeste might have ventured to have regarded him as attractive, stunning even, has she not been so dead set on ripping his throat out just to shut out his insufferable taunting.
Taunting that had been ongoing for the last several hours, since she'd been hung up like a freshly slaughtered pig left to bleed.
"Or not," he cooed, tilting his head to the side, sending his cropped shaggy tresses across his forehead, the strands curling at the ends with the humidity, "suit yourself. "A nonchalant shrug, dismissive. "I've had woman throw myself at me in less ideal conditions than this. You'll be the same soon enough."
Fire, angered chaotic flame, flared to life in Celeste's chest.
"Why don't you come here," Celeste bit back in in return, her lips pulling back from her teeth in a sneer, bucking against the chains around her waist, the useless iron chains, holding her in place against the beam, "and I'll ease your discomfort of existing."
"Ah ah ah," he clicked his tongue, ticking his index finger in time, his booted footfalls unnaturally quiet and light as he approached her, "there'll be none of that. Captain's orders not to ruin that pretty face of yours." He reach out a long, lean finger as though to caress her face but stopped, his thumb coming up to rest against his finger and—thunk. He flicked her on the nose.
The growl that escaped her lips was nothing less than primal.
"Oh I don't think it'll be my pretty face being ruined," she willed the chain around her waist to buckle, to break, "I think I'll break your nose first. Then you're jaw, then stomp your knees caps before ripping your spine out through your throat. How's that order sound to you?"
The ship rocked, throwing Celeste off kilter and to the side painfully. She bit down on the scream of pain as the ash splinters in her arms swelled agonizingly.
"Sounds like you're in no position to be making threats." The blonde man gave a halfhearted bow before turning on his booted heel and walking out through the archway, his shadow long in the dim light, "don't worry you won't be our problem much longer."
The man disappeared up a set of stairs and Celeste let out a slurry of curse words that would have made any sailor blush. Letting out a hiss of defeat she slumped against the mast, her head falling forward.
How had it all gone to hell so quickly? She lifted her head up and glanced around the cabin, the ichor and stench nearly intolerable. She hoped Anelisse had at least listened and had gotten the hell out. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. How could Anidre have betrayed them like this?
She forced the tears to subside, they would do her no good.
A black tarry sickness had settled in the pit of her stomach, a sickness that stemmed from the fact that Anidre had willingly sold Anelisse into marriage to fuel her own foul desires.
She forced away the images of Anelisse screaming, begging pleas as they'd stormed the house and pinned her down, a nasty lot of skulking human men that had encompassed her in ash and drug her onto a boat to be sold to the highest bidder, for a power she'd thought had vanished. She should have never saved Marrien, but she'd only acted on instinct, acted on knowing what it was like to drown-
Oh things had gone wrong, definitely wrong.