My stare narrowed as I peered down at her beneath hooded lids. “Then you'd better make your excursion in the market quick.” Pulling my hand from her face, I coiled my fingers around her throat, droppingmy voice to a low whisper. “Because if I beat you back to the ship, you’ll be the one pinned beneath me with tears flowing down your cheeks while I deny you orgasm after orgasm.”
“And if I beat you?”
I dipped my head to the side, a lazy smile spreading across my lips. “You tell me.”
She grinned, lustfully gazing up at me. “I guess you’ll just have to find out.”
My footfalls echoed through the alleyway as I prowled the route I frequently took to get to the market. Trailing my fingers over the worn brick of passing businesses, memories danced in my subconscious, each more prominent than the last.
But all of them entailedhim.
I muttered a slew of curses, each more vulgar than the last. Rounding the corner, I was greeted by a lively atmosphere: stalls displaying a variety of goods, the scent of freshly baked breads lingering in the air, and countless individuals bartering. It was just as I’d remembered: chaotic, thriving, and boisterous. An instinctual smirk sprawled across my features as I indulged in the sight a little longer.
Slowing my walk, I allowed my boots to drag over the familiar grooves in the cobblestone—places I used to run through as a boy when my pillaging and stealing habits had just begun.
The morning sun filtered through the hanging banners, faded and fraying, casting red and gold shadows over the carts stacked high with goods. Fruit, some half-rotten, was polished like jewels to fool the first person with enough coin to spend. Trinkets, spices, and expensive cloth dyed in colors that always felt too bright for a town that’d always been a bit gray at the edges sat on display. The inhabitants’ hard work had always been what I admired most about Darswyth, not the corruption that lingered beneath its façade.
Those entertained by the idea of purchase bargained like it was abloodsport, voices rising, sharp with pride or desperation. A group of women laughed, their joyfulness echoing off the insidious tension that threatened to suffocate us all. Clashing with the merriment, a man in a wine-colored shirt jabbed his finger at a vendor, swearing the oranges were smaller than yesterday. He cussed back, claiming they came straight from one of the thriving orchards in Velispar—a lie.
My crew and I sank that ship weeks ago.
Turning away from them, I watched a group of young boys dart between the stalls, trying to snatch a loaf from one of the bakers. He shouted, throwing a tin can at them; its clatter was useless in ending their antics. It wasn’t their demeanor that gave away its lack of influence in diverting them, but the knowingness that hummed deep inside me—one that came from the experience of walking a life in their shoes.
A life that was once far more straightforward.
I pivoted, lifting my chin and catching a few onlookers’ attention. They nodded, a handful muttering greetings, which I returned with simplicity and nothing more. They knew better than to say my name too loudly, even if they recognized me from a long-lost life.
Not here. Not anymore.
I passed a cart loaded with smoked fish, their scales gleaming like moonstones under the sun. Continuing my route to the man I’d come for, a woman offered me a wink and a cut of meat, but I waved her off. I wasn’t hungry for that kind of memory, not when there were too many entanglements and deeper meanings behind every interaction here.
The booth caught my eye, set up in the same spot it always had been, to ensure returning customers. Standing taller than my six-foot-two frame, a large shelf cast a shadow filled with sin across the cobblestone. Decorated with varying colored bottles, intoxication hummed through their rainbow reflections. The display never faltered, ensuring the man running it secured a significant profit, even if he didn’t play the role of opulence.
Standing right beside it was the man of the hour. Clad in a flannel jacket and worn breeches, Arthur bantered jovially with another merchant. The two exchanged a handful of belly laughs, hinting atsomething in their conversation being inherently hilarious. Arthur’s lips parted in an open-mouthed grin, and each absent tooth spoke of another life that included the piracy and illegal activities that both Caspian and I had fallen into.
Arthur had been our introduction to the sea, a man of immense knowledge and wisdom as we began our journeys, just as he’d been the one to watch us crumble beneath one another.
Waving off his companion, he pivoted, scanning the crowd before inevitably finding me. His smile bloomed like a ghost-petal lily after the season’s first thunderstorm—a pale silver or seafoam-colored flower that grew low to the ground along the coastal cliffs, one we pirates used to ward off death at sea.
It was a fitting comparison for him, considering the lore he clung to and the secrets he refused to share.
The ghost-petal lily was said to grow only where someone had drowned. Arthur claimed to know where one of Ellira’s Eyes was. And the last time we’d spoken, he’d said it “walked among us”—something he hadn’t bothered to elaborate on, no matter how drunk I’d gotten him.
“Ace!” he bellowed, opening his arms for me as the gap between us vanished. “Long time no see, boy!”
Allowing him to draw me in for a hug, my nose filled with the pungent odor of alcohol that clung to him like a second skin. “It’s good to see you, too, Arthur.”
I pulled back, sweeping his frame to ensure no further damage had been inflicted on him since the last time we’d seen one another. As if sensing my observation, he lifted his right arm, wiggling his two left-over fingers. “No worries about your friend, er, um?—”
“Enemy?” I questioned, lifting a brow. “Good, I would’ve hated finding out that he’d wronged you once again.”
“No wronging,” he remarked, a deep grin sprawling across his lips.
Rolling my eyes, I shook my head. “What?”
“He stopped by last night.”
“He was in Darswyth?”
