Page 40 of The Song of the Void

Reiven had the audacity to scoff, as if he wasn't completely horrid to me before we even knew each other’s names. As if he wasn't being a dick to me right then. “And what exactly do I do that's so familiar?”

“Taunting me that I'm so close to my home, but I can't get away from you. Endless mocking—” I spoke through gritted teeth, but my eyes were growing unbearably warm and scratchy. “You don't even think I'm worth being called by my name, do you?”

He pressed his lips together.

Words kept spilling out of my mouth as I raised my voice to a scream. “I’m chained to you like your fucking pet. And just like him—you've been acting nice to trick me into trusting you, so you can have an even better laugh when you beat me down!”

Rei stepped closer. The smell I associated with both him and Vaetrik, the smoke and male musk…it was shrouded in a veil of chamomile. The bathing concoction I brewed recently with the fresh ingredients Lyneca bought.

It almost made me pause, but he hardened his gaze and slammed his fist into the wall beside my head. “So, what do you have to say to me?”

Ash tried to jump in again but was silenced by a wave of Rei’s hand. His eyes didn't leave mine.

“I hate you.” A pathetic whisper.

“I can't hear you.”

“I said, I fucking hate you! I hate everything about you and how you make me feel! How…how you drain all my strength with a glance. How you laugh at me.” I buried my face in the palm of my hands to hide my tears. Crying always meant he'd punish me somehow. My voice trembled and cracked. “You always tell me that without you, I’m nothing. That I was born to be your wretched, obedient pet.”

“Come now, pet. Say you’re mine.”

“Even if it’s true, I’m too stupid to learn that lesson.” My body shook. Hot tears crawled down my cheeks as I glared up at him—not Vaetrik, but he might as well have been. Rage and more tears blinded me enough that I could pretend he was my kidnapper. The memory of his chilling smile, his heavy fists, the darkness of the hold of his ship. That sickening nickname.

Ashkade tried one final time to intervene, but his words sounded far away.

“I’m not your pet, do you hear me? Nobody owns me. I am a sister of the Abyssal Deep, untameable as the waves. The wrath of every ocean tempest flows through my veins. I’m—” I reached beneath my skirt, found cold metal. “Not—” My hand moved on its own to grip the front of his shirt. “Yours!” I screamed, driving my knife forward, straight for his heart.

Why, why didn’t he fight back? Normally he would have knocked me to the ground by now. My dagger stopped before it pierced his chest.

“Zephra.” That was Ash’s voice, right in front of me. He sounded pained somehow. “I’m sorry.”

I blinked away the tears that blurred my vision.

Ashkade had wrapped his hands around the blade of my knife. Blood trickled to the floor from the fresh slices in his palms. His grip shook, but he managed to keep a pitiful smile on his face as he pulled the tip of the dagger from where I had stabbed it into his shoulder. Not deep, but a small splotch of blood still dyed his shirt and vest.

“I’m real sorry,” he whispered again, as if I hadn’t just stabbed him by accident. He must have jumped in the way of my attack on Va—on Reiven, who stood there, dumbfounded.

I dropped the knife. My head spun in circles, and I didn’t know how I made it there, but I blindly stumbled my way to the door. All those stupid, warm tears made it nearly impossible to see. I reached for the handle, desperate to get away from both of them, from my past with Vaetrik, from what I had just done.

“Zephra, wait, please!”

Was that truly Reiven’s voice? If it was, that was the first time he actually called me by my name.

“Leave me alone,” I sobbed. “I-I just—I can’t be here with you anymore!” I flung open the door and escaped into the hallway.

Ash’s voice reached me just before I left earshot, but he wasn’t talking to me.

“What’s wrong with you? Did you just wanna make her cry?”

Lyneca welcomed me into the galley without a question, and Calinia decided I would stay with her.

She led me to the bedroom attached to the galley and promptly left to give me space. The moment I was alone, I dissolved into more tears, lying in a pathetic puddle on the cot. I didn't even know why exactly the tears came so fast. Reiven's words? Memories of Vaetrik? Guilt at stabbing Ashkade? All of it blurred together in an inescapable maelstrom, old wounds bleeding into fresh ones. I let out all the sadness and pain until I was numb.

The galley bedroom felt more like a box than anything, only large enough for the cot and a single crate. A lantern atop it flickered yellow light across the worn wooden walls. Shadows recoiled away, so I sat up and dully followed the movement with my eyes, hugging my knees to my chest.

Calinia returned like a silent, gentle breeze. She perched on the cot behind me and wordlessly touched my shoulder, then my hair. The pearls woven into my ponytail thudded onto the bed softly, and my ribbon floated to rest beside them like a whisper a moment later. Her fingers worked through my hair, spurring waves of shivers up my scalp. She separated my hair into three long plaits and wove them together.

“Would you like me to wound one or both of them?” Calinia asked lightly.