Star of the Sea
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Chapter Ten - Empty
“So you have been to
She had her back to him, hurriedly dressing, keeping her face averted as she
tugged her trousers up over her hips. He watched and waited but she ignored
him, pulling the shirt over the dragon tattoo that covered her back from
shoulder to hip. Wings spread, head raised, pride and anger, the
alive as she moved, he knew only one man in the world who could make ink live
that way and he was in
known to many. He chose those that he deemed worthy of his art and his choosing
had nothing to do with position or wealth. His pallet was those that sung to
him, those whose spirits spoke, Jack knew this as he too had met this man; he
too had bared skin and soul to needles and ink. One more facet to her, one more
thing that he knew of the Star of the Sea, Christ her name was
He swallowed his rum, he was not going to call her
Star of the Sea again. He was lounging, or attempting to lounge clad only in
the pants that he had pulled over his nakedness, just after they had regained
their senses, when gasping they had looked into each other eyes and recoiled.
He had seen the exact moment in that sea green, when lust had given way to
thought, when she had realized what had just taken place, one second after he
had realized the stupidity of his actions. One instant after he had imagined
just what Tia Dalma could
say to him next time that their paths crossed. But that horror in her eyes had
jolted him, he was unaccustomed to seeing anything other than want in women’s
eyes, and he had expected this time to be like all others. A
mutual exchange of pleasure. But he felt odd, discomforted, and she
looked shaken and he wondered what she now knew of him that he did not want her
to know. Had he just given her knowledge of the last little piece of who he
was? He took another mouthful of rum, swirling it around in his mouth as he
watched her dress, wanting to say something but not able to find the words.
It was not that he had not enjoyed it, not at all but even though their bodies
had joined and they had moved together, each taking pleasure from the other it
had been soulless pleasure. She seemed shut off from him, her mind closed and
while his body had shuddered in release he felt empty, empty and angry.
“It is no better is it Jack?” At last she spoke, she
was dressed, at the door, looking at him.
“I am sorry luv….”
“Why? It does not mean anything…it was a fuck nothing more”
And she was gone, slamming the door behind her.
He reached for the rum.
*
Alone in her cabin Maia punched the wall, her fist
pounding into it as with as much force as she could muster. The pain shot up
her arm, splinters digging into her skin, her knuckles screaming in protest but
she ignored the hurt and with hand clenched hit the planks again and again.
insanity had possessed her, to have kissed him, to have taken his body into
hers, for one brief moment she had felt herself wanting to let him know all, to
have let the walls down that she had built around her. Had she been thinking
that she would find some sort of joy in the act, some sort of
made a mistake, thinking that she could find what she was searching for here,
not that she knew what she was searching for, but whatever it was, there was
nothing here for her.
She had some rum, a small bottle but it would do, she upended her pack on her
narrow bed, scattering her few possessions across the blanket as she grabbed
for the small bottle, hands shaking as she pulled the cork from it.
*
Gibbs tottered along the deck, bottle resting loosely in one hand, singing
tunelessly to himself, he was looking for a spot to curl up, a place to
dreamlessly sleep, but instead he found himself looking up at the sails, then
at the sky, he cursed, stopped and peered up into the sky once more, hoping
that he was just drunk that he was imagining things. He was not. The wind had
died. There was nothing. Not a breath of air. The sails hung slack from the
rigging, yet on the horizon he could see the clouds racing under the full moon.
Something was not right. They were becalmed yet all around them he could see
that the wind was blowing. But the ship was not moving,
she drifted on a silent black sea.
He shivered and rubbed his arms. Nothing had been right since that woman had
stepped on board. She had saved the Captains life, but there was something odd
about her. If anyone had been about to have heard him he would have told
to be having a woman on board, he shivered, especially one of her kind, luck of
the worst kind.