Page 88 of If I Go Down with This Ship

“What?”

“The water.”

I stare out at the inky black.“The fear is technically still there,” I admit.I press a hand to my gut.“Here.A bit of a nervous flicker, if you will, but it’s nothing like it used to be.The ocean is wild, free, and unpredictable, but it’s just nature.”

“That’s right,” he whispers.“It’s the nature of water, to be free.”

I can’t help but think he’s speaking of more than just the ocean.

The first inklings of a sunrise bleed from the horizon, pinks and oranges marking the beginning of another day.The sky is a canvas of pastels, and it reminds me of the sunrise I saw on the beach when Silas and I had that single blissful day together.Oh, how I wish we could return to that beach, to those soft moments in the sand when I told him who I am, how I came to be here.

The sunlight catches on the water, making it a churning sea of cotton candy.A disgruntled meow sounds from the stern, and I smile as I turn toward Silas when a light flares in the distance, no more than two hundred feet away, catching my eye.It’s followed by a second, and a third, and then a fourth.

“Laszlo,” Silas says, his hand reaching for his belt.

The first thing I see are the flags, distinct red flags with the Union Jack in the upper left that catch the flickering light of the lanterns.There aren’t three ships like in George’s tale, but the one facing us is certainly more than the two of us can handle on our own.People move on board the distant ship, silent, bent, and creeping beneath the dim light, and their cannon hatches are already opened.

Pointed right at us.

“Laszlo,” Silas repeats, this time more urgent.

Before he can get out another word, the first cannon is fired.We don’t get any warning as it whistles through the air and crashes into the bow of the ship.The impact sends us rocking, and Silas wraps an arm around my waist, steadying me as I struggle to stay upright.

“Are you all right?”he asks.

“Me?What about Sir?I heard him right before the cannon blast.”

“He’ll be fine, Laszlo.That cat’s lived through worse.”

Shaking my head, I curl my hands around the railing and squint out over the water.That’s when I see him.Hux.Hands on his hips, chin tilted up, he stands at the bow of the ship, carnivorous grin lit by the lanterns like a monster in the dark.

“I should have known,” Silas hisses, hand wrapping around his pistol.“I should have seen it.”

The betrayal.

The betrayal George spoke of was never about Peter, never about the raid.This means Silas has been betrayedtwice.Was Hux putting on a front all this time?Is he as incapable as he was as our master rigger?And where the hell did he get a ship?After all the effort Silas has put into his ship, all the love and support he has given his crew, this is how he’s thanked.

“What a little snake,” I mutter.

“If you surrender now, you’ll be granted a pardon by the governor of New Providence,” Hux calls.His voice cuts across the water, booming against the quiet of the early morning.

Silas looks at me, expression inscrutable in the dim light.

Maybe Silas will accept the pardon, but would he be forced to hunt down his peers?Would he be bound to the very government he despises?When I picture him standing at the helm, his blue jacket draped over his shoulders as he looks out at the horizon, I cannot see him anywhere else.He told me people were not born to be pirates, but rather made into them, but I think he’s the exception.Silas wasbornto be a pirate.He would never step away from it, not even for me.

“I will if you tell me to,” he says.“I’ll surrender for you, Laszlo.”

But I can’t do that to him.I can’t be the reason he loses this part of himself.

“Silas, don’t.”

I hear it before I see it, cannon fire blasting through the top of the foremast we fixed only a week ago.Silas shoves me out of the way, and I crash into the deck, breath whooshing out of me.I roll over to watch as the foremast goes toppling, slicing through the air where Silas and I were standing.It slams into him, pinning Silas down, his head knocking back against the deck.

“Silas!”I scream.

There’s a beat, my ears ringing, the sharp sound muffling Silas’s voice and the creaking of the ship as it begins to split, and when I crawl to the railing, my chest and hip aching, there’s a spark of a flame on the deck of Hux’s ship, and acannonball whizzes across the distance and smashes into our hull.The ship rocks violently beneath us, water splashing me as I stand on shaking legs and make my way to where Silas is.

Before I reach him, a cannonball flies past me, crashing into the mainmast.I barely roll out of the way as it falls, the deck splitting apart beneath my feet, creating a chasm.Crying out, I cling to the railing, trying to pull myself to stand when I notice the chunk of wood lodged in my calf.Squeezing my eyes shut, I grasp the piece and yank it out, hissing at the stabbing pain that lances up my leg and into my hip.