Evocation

Chapter 8- Bed Ridden

I'm awoken to my bedroom door slamming hard. I jolt up, then all my muscles scream in pain at my sudden movements. Lorcan stares at me with fire in his eyes.

"What the fuck are you doing?" He shouts. I stare at him with wide eyes. All my time knowing Lorcan and he has never had this look. He has never had that tone in his voice. His hair is tied back in a tight slick knot and his beard is splayed out, un-brushed or trimmed. It's still weird seeing him with a beard that isn't perfectly short and combed. "Are you trying to fuck with Hadrien? Mess with his mind? What the fuck is wrong with you?" Disgust drips from his voice.

"Hadrien?" I ask, my voice still holding a slight rasp. "I'm not trying-"

"It's not enough that you're now fucking the crew, it's not enough that you get us attacked for carrying cursed artifacts on our boat," Lorcan continues shouting, pacing the floor in front of me. "It's not enough that half our men fucking died for you..."

"What?" I ask in shock.

Lorcan's eyes narrow, detecting my face for something. Lies perhaps? "And now you come back and you're throwing yourself at Hadrien? After everything he's been through?"

"I was hardly throwing myself at Hadrien," I scoff, my mind still swimming in panic about the earlier statement of half our crew dying. "I can't even sit up and feed myself, how was I throwing myself at him?"

"So you didn't tell Hadrien how you think he's handsome and brave and admirable? You're telling me you didn't say those things?" Lorcan stops in front of the bed and crouches down in front of my face. His breath his minty and hot.

"Not in those exact words, no," I confess. "But my intention wasn't to seduce him. I was letting him know that I see him and appreciate him. You don't think he deserves that?"

Lorcan's eyes almost turn black. "I'm so fucking glad you could come back and appreciate Hadrien." He practically spits his name, like he's jealous. "All that he has done for you."

"I know I haven't been the most attentive or appreciative captain, but I'm trying now, and that has to start somewhere-"

"Captain?" Lorcan interrupts me incredulously. "You are no captain, Echo. You left us to fucking die."

"I was taken against my will!" I shout. "I didn't want to be beat up and cut and starved, you can trust me on that!"

Lorcan's eyes soften slightly as he scans my body underneath the blanket, a look of sadness streaking his face for a split second. He was the one who carried me out of that cell. Was he also the one to bathe me? Wash my hair? Wrap my leg? Has he seen what they did to my body? His solemn look leaves his face in an instant and anger flashes back onto his handsome features, settling there and finding a home.

"You may as well have cursed us. That's what your presence here is." His voice is low and dangerous and his face is to too close to mine, threatening.

I look into his blue eyes. He has the most expressive eyes I've ever seen. The fear they held when I met him, the first look of happiness and belonging when he joined my crew, the look of pride when I told him "good job" for following orders. But now, they are dark and stormy and angry. They hold betrayal and hurt and fury.

"What happened to you?" I ask softly, feeling afraid of Lorcan for the first time in my life.

"Do you not remember how you left? Whipping us? Beating us?" His voice is quiet but dangerous. "Fucking them?" Jealousy rages in his eyes now. "And then leaving us to die."

"I didn't fuck Fenix to get some kind of fix." I want to cry at the accusation. I don't know why I slept with Fenix, but it wasn't to mess with anybody's mind or use them.