The Beast's Ward

Chapter Fifteen: Curse

I awoke to a view of a leaky ceiling in a damp bed that smelled of mildew and salt. The room had been ransacked. Crates of dwindling supplies filled the majority of the room. My father's solid oak desk was toppled over on its side. Papers and his personal effects were scattered about, prized possessions shattered, broken. The captain's quarters of The Beatrix had once been grand and welcoming, but now, just like my family, it had been destroyed.

I sat up stiffly, still dressed in the starlight ballgown. The diamond-studded pins were scattered across my pillow, my hair having tumbled loose as I slept. A change of clothes waited for me at the foot of the bed. It was men's clothes, a plain white shirt, and black trousers. A pair of old boots sat nearby on the floor. I dressed hurriedly, grateful to be out of the gown, and bounded up the stairs to the upper deck. Intent on finding my father.

And demanding answers. 

Peter Craft stood at the bow, watching the horizon. He'd cleaned himself up, though he still looked shabby in an outfit very similar to my own, the fabric rumpled and worn, except for a vibrant blue coat with golden buttons. His hair that now hung past his shoulders was snowy white, no color left in it at all. Around him, the deck was mopped and the sails unfurled by unseen workers. Waves washed up and over the deck, gently lapping at the ship, yet with a current strong enough to wash the blood from the wood and carry the dead that littered the deck out to sea. My father's hands twitched at his sides, orchestrating the entire scene without tearing his eyes away from the edge of the world. 

I watched a young boy, whose clothes I suspect I now wore, disappear beneath the waves and I swallowed the bile rising up in my throat. "Papa?" I called, an unspoken question ringing through it. What have you done?

My father turned towards me. Light sprung up in his dark eyes, warming them to their usual brown color. "You're awake! Thank goodness!" He pulled me into his arms and held me, just as I had so hoped for since that messenger came to tell me of his demise. I felt a warmth pass over me that I never thought I'd be able to feel again. My fingers clutched his shirt. I breathed in the scent of him. Sea and pipe smoke. Even when he was on dry land, he smelled the same, as if the brine of the ocean were ingrained into his flesh, as much a part of him as his limbs. Tears pooled in my eyes and wet his shoulder. He was real. He was really here with me. Alive. Breathing. Yet...changed. I felt that old grief wash over me like a wave from the sea. I already knew that nothing was ever going to be the same as it was. Too much had happened. He was different now. As was I.

Magic whirled around me, called upon by him, but it did not feel like my own. It felt for all the world like Rosalyn's. Wrong and terribly great.

"Papa," I began again, clutching onto his arm as I stared towards the helm where the wheel of the ship spun and held, the ship steered by magic alone. Still, I couldn't get the words out. They stuck in my throat, choking out the sound.

"I'm well, child. Don't you worry." He shushed me and kissed my hair, petting the long dark locks. "Though you wouldn't believe what all has transpired since I left you."

Judging by how the tide turned red as he beckoned it over the deck of the ship, I could guess.

He rubbed my shoulders gently as if calming a crying child. "Now, go back below deck and rest. We'll be docking in Jamaica shortly to restock on supplies." Jamaica? So we were in the Caribbean. Far away from England. Or Spain for that matter. Hadn't he been going to Spain for trading? Just how far could the mirror take him? His cheerfulness faded, his eyes going dark again. "We have a long journey ahead of us." 

"Where are we going?" I finally forced out. So many questions tumbled in my mind. So many horrific images. 

He turned from me, facing the horizon again. "I was thinking France for a start. Then Russia if she insists on tracking us down. I doubt she'd follow us there."