"I wish it was a lie." Cris sighed, and his shoulders deflated. He closed his eyes, and his anguish made her chest ache. "He is broken, Anne."
She grabbed her locket, the edges biting into her palm. "You must be mistaken—"
He laughed, a shrill, mirthless laugh. "My brother is broken, and sometimes he breaks people around him, too."
"Excuse me."
Anne fled to the quarterdeck and gripped the railings. She had wanted to discover more about him, had she not?
Broken. He was broken.
Footsteps sounded behind her, and she hastened through the gunwale. She reached the front deck and descended an unfamiliar ladder, arriving at a cavernous compartment. Hay and horse manure impregnated the place like a heavy cloud, and she blinked, adjusting her eyes to the dim light. Four wooden stalls were tucked against the hull. Hemera poked her head through the door, her long mane braided into neat buns.
Anne sighed, her shoulders sagging, and hugged the mare's neck. Touching was vital, like breathing or eating. Pedro could not go through life without a hug, a caress, a kiss. What of the intimacies shared between husband and wife?
Heat climbed to her cheeks, and she shut her eyes. They had held hands today, had they not? But then... what if he had allowed it because he was drowsy? Nonsense. Had she not touched him in the forest? But then, when she had linked her hands around his neck, he had turned cold, not even looking at her. And he always wore those black gloves...
It was true. Anne stared at her hands, hands that tingled to sift through his golden hair and more. An ache spread to her chest, and she leaned her forehead on Hemera's coat, breathing in her dusty, familiar scent. Look at her, thinking of herself when Pedro suffered. Living a barren life.
A threatening neigh lifted the hairs off her neck. When Anne turned, she caught herself staring into Erebus’s glassy eyes. Only a metal bar separated her from the stallion. A cry locked inside her throat, and she left the stall, stumbling on one of the twins. The young deckhand hastily apologized.
"It was my fault." She panted. "Dario?"
"I'm Mario, miss, and the captain always says I should look where I go."
The boys were identical, same olive skin, dark eyes, and curly brown hair. What made it worse, they wore the same sailor's uniform.
"Should Erebus be so close to Hemera?"
"The big brute won't have it any other way, miss. When Dante kept him alone, he carved a hole in the hull."
"But won't he bite Hemera or kick her?"
Mario shrugged. "He seems calm enough to me. I guess he likes to stay close to her. I'll be over there rubbing Mr. Queiroz's horse if you need anything."
Erebus eyed her calmly, behaving like an average horse and not a fire-breathing beast. Tentatively, she ambled closer. Palm up, arm quivering, she offered her hand. Holding her breath, she waited, the silence such that she heard the thumps of her heart.
Neighing, Erebus advanced, his ears glued to his head.
Anne stumbled back a step, cradling her hand.
Anne touched the green baize and flung the ball, enjoying the clacking and the smooth rolling as it reached the hole. Was this to be how she passed her hours? Playing billiards by herself? If the day of navigation had crawled, the night proved to be a snail, so slowly the hours ticked by. How was Pedro? Had he caught a fever? He had others to take care of him.
Anne twirled her locket on her fingertips. She hadn't asked to be here. This... this mad jaunt might damage her reputation beyond repair, but her future didn't have to be. Pedro was as different from the suitor of her dreams as a tiger from a kitten. Broken. Avoided touch.
A faint breeze invaded the billiard room, carrying the ocean's groans but also a moody twang. Curious, she slid the glass pane an inch. Waves lapped the coast, the rhythm predictable, the sea jumping ropes with the rocks. Beyond the sounds of the sea, silence. She had splayed her hands over the door to close it when string notes, guttural, percussive, brushed against her cheeks, vibrating inside her. Anne slid the door open and tiptoed along the promenade deck stretched on the yacht's port side.
Pedro sprawled over a wicker chair, a Portuguese guitar on his lap, his fingers strumming. She couldn’t take her eyes from his hands, the expert way he handled the instrument. How would it feel on her skin? The pressing and pulling and deft tugs?
She must be insane, conjuring the impossible. Anne pressed against the bulkhead, hugging herself. The melody increased the tempo. He fingered the guitar's bridge, coaxing a grave and exotic sound. The cadenza spoke to her of tortured feelings, of pain. How could the hand that wields a sword with viciousness play with such poignancy?
Anne closed her eyes, and the music painted a vivid image in her mind of Salgueiro's dead vineyards, the stalks protruding from the earth like lonely crosses. The desolation made her gasp.
The guitar ceased. "I can see you there."
"I didn't mean to intrude." Anne let go of the bulkhead and sighed. “You play beautifully."
He shrugged. "Art, any art, replaces life's ugliness, even if for a self-deceiving moment."
