A Pirate's Song.

Chapter Eighteen.

The tavern was filled to the brim with people when I stepped inside, catching the eyes of most of the men while mine searched for a familiar face.

Caleb was sat in the far corner with a cup of wine in hand while Rebecca sat close by, her feet kicked up onto the table. Various bracelets decorated her ankles, the skirt of her dress tucked in between her crossed legs, exposing her calves and shins. Ben was leaned over the bar, talking to the barman behind it.

The smell of sea food reached me, making my tongue tingle with the thought of eating something other than a broth of vegetables and water. I made my way over to the table when the barman handed two cups to Ben and he turned, almost bumping into me in the process.

He smiled and held one of the cups out for me to take. The red liquid inside it swished with the quick motion, a few drops hitting the tops of my feet, causing me to take a quick step back.

“Sorry” Ben rushed out, glancing down at my feet. I was about to stumble into the back of a man seated at the table behind me when Ben’s hand shot forward, winding itself around my arm and pulling me closer to him.

I glanced back at the table where men built like giants sat, their chests bare, their faces covered in beards with long, unruly hair. They looked like warriors, chests littered with tattoos and markings as they laughed among themselves.

“Fights here are common” Ben whispered in my ear, the heat from his breath sending a chill down my spine. I glanced up at him, the warning in his tone evident. It made sense that in a place so stacked full, some people would get agitated quickly, especially when a woman would bump into them. I nodded.

“Right” I made a mental note not to stumble into someone as I pulled my arm free to take hold of the cup he had previously offered me. With my head thrown back, I took a large swing of the wine, feeling it burn its way down my throat, leaving a sweet taste behind in my mouth.

Ben laughed when I nearly fell from drinking too much at once but steadied me and began leading me in the direction of the table. Rebecca tilted her head back, listening to the music with closed eyes while Caleb watched the people with squinted ones, observing them as if he was trying to learn as much about them as possible.

“She’s a pirate alright” Ben announced, taking a seat near Caleb as I finished my drink, slamming the cup down onto the table in front of me. I ran the back of my hand across my lips, hoping that the wine would make the questions and thoughts swirling in my head go away.

“You keep drinking like that and we’ll have to carry you back to the ship” Rebecca said, one eye opening to peer down at me. I braced my hands on the table, palms flat against the surface as I met her single eyes stare. She wasn’t the slightest bit drunk but I knew that the cup in her hand had to have been refilled at least three times by then.

“Would that be a problem?” I asked, half-jokingly with my eyebrows knitted together and my head slightly tilted to the side. My hair hung down, almost reaching the table because of how long it was, going down to my lower back whenever I wasn’t wearing it up. Instead of the redhead, it was the pirate Captain who answered me.

“No, but it be annoying having to babysit ye all the time” it was a snap, irritation filling his voice. I was agitated myself, particularly at him for bringing all of the problems that I had into my life. All the questions I had that were unanswered were about or revolved around his past or someone from his past. Before him everything had been so peaceful but then he just had to kidnap me and force me on some wild boat ride that I didn’t want to be a part of. My head snapped up in his direction, eyes glaring and nostrils flaring.

“You know what’s even more annoying?” I asked to which both Ben and Rebecca looked at me with slightly widened eyes. They knew what was coming next and they knew that it wouldn’t end well.

“Having to lead you to those stupid treasures so the least you could do is ‘babysit’ me” I placed emphasis on the word ‘babysit’ biting it out like it was some shameful scorn that I was placing onto him. Caleb’s eyes narrowed, Ben chocked on his wine, coughing loudly from beside me as the Captain leaned slowly back in his seat.

“Ye hit ye head, scrape ye arm, wound ye leg and now ye start drinking like a fish-.” he began, going on as if I was some problem child he had to take care of. My hands balled on the surface of the table when he jerked his head in the direction of my empty cup.

“What be next, cursing?” he asked to which I took a deep, slow breath in through my nose, holding it for a few seconds before I leaned across the table towards him. My teeth were gritting, my eyes narrowed and my tolerance of him at its limit.

“If I did, it be none of ye damn business” Rebecca tried to keep her composure but even I could see the grin threatening to break out across her lips.

Caleb stayed quiet, his eyes roaming over me, moving from my face to my body and back to my face before he took a slow gulp of his drink. His eyes never left me, even when a hand clamped down on my shoulder from behind, drawing me to look at the man that had appeared beside me, Caleb’s eyes still watched me.

“There be that look I was talking about, las” Nolan whispered, his hand slipping away from me as he made his way around the side of the table, drunker than he had been before when he slumped down beside Rebecca. I looked at him for a few minutes then turned my attention onto Caleb when the Irishman’s words registered in the back of my mind.

The look the pirate Captain held was one of a challenge, a daring one, an aroused one. I quickly sat down beside Ben, attempting to make myself seem as small as possible to the eyes of the lion observing me.

“Drink?” Nolan asked, holding his half empty cup out for me to take from across the table. I eyed it then him, eventually deciding that I needed whatever was inside the cup. I quickly downed the brownish liquid that was not as sweet as wine and twice as bitter. I gasped, skidding the empty cup back across the table where Nolan caught it and eyed the bottom of it.

“Me rum” he half complained, half furrowed his eyebrows up in confusion as if to ask where it had gone. Rebecca laughed, raising her own cup to take a swing of the red substance.

“You offered” she argued when he blinked at me. I ran a hand over my face as Ben watched me curiously and Caleb remained silent, slumped back with his chest bare from where his red coat hung down towards the floor.

An upbeat tune began to play and Rebecca shot up, her cup forced into Nolan’s hand as she grabbed hold of mine.

“Let’s dance” she insisted while I stumbled onto my feet. I paused, glancing back at the table to where Ben was smiling his caring, charming smile, Nolan was stealing a sip from Rebecca’s wine and Caleb had his golden gaze locked onto me like that of a hungry predator on the hunt. I shook my head in order to clear it and smiled up at Becca.

“Let’s” I needed to get my mind off things and if her showing me how to dance and me making a fool of myself in the process would do that then so be it.

Our dresses swayed in synch to the rhythm, my hands gripping the skirt of mine while hers moved to spin me around a few times after she would show me how to move my hips in a more seductive way. She would laugh, I would try again until she seemed satisfied then would start on our next lesson. It would happen every now and then, she would get lost in the music, forget that I was even there as she moved, twisting and turning, swaying her hips this way and that. Her arms danced around her, above her as the chains around her ankles jingled in time with her precise movements. Watching her was like listening to a Siren sing, mesmerizing, enchanting like that of a witch’s spell. It captivated everyone around her, men and women alike as she did what she loved.

A few more drinks and enough dancing to last me a lifetime later, we were all located on the deck of the tavern, overlooking the sea beyond with the men lounging in chairs, Rebecca perched up on the edge of the table where both Nolan and Caleb were seated at as I climbed up onto the railing that was around ten feet or so above ground.

“Careful” Ben quickly rushed out, moving to grab hold of my arm that was closest to him since he was the one constantly making sure that I was alright. I pulled my arm away from his grasp and stuck my tongue out at him.

“I can balance on my own” I stated proudly. Ben breathed a laugh, shaking his head as he watched me walk on the railing, placing one foot in front of the other until I lost my balance and had to swing my arms around wildly to catch myself. Rebecca and Nolan shared a laugh at the sight of me, a tipsy mess.

“So, Eva-.” Rebecca began, leaning further back on the table as she kicked her legs back and forth. She hardly felt a buzz much like Caleb who sat observing me with glaring eyes, most likely contemplating whether I had a death wish or not from where I was currently walking. I paused at the sound of the nickname, my head turning to look at the redhead.

“Yes?” I questioned, tilting my head to the side like a curious puppy. Was she going to ask me about Caleb, about Mary? Had I given myself away somehow? Did she know that I was a Mermaid? Did she know about the visions? My paranoia seemed to be nothing more than a fragment of my own imagination.

“Well since you know so much about us-.” she paused to motion between her and Caleb, referring to the night she had told me of their backstory and of how he had come to fall in love with a noblewoman.

“I think it’s only fair if we got to know something about you” I could feel Ben’s eyes on me. He did know the most about me out of all of them but even he didn’t know about my past, about my upbringing and adventures. I tilted my head back to look up at the stars, placing an index finger against my chin as my other hand fell freely to my side.

“Let’s see-.” I muttered under my breath as a light breeze danced through the material of my dress, letting it tangle in between my legs. I lowered my finger away from my face and turned to face them with little care whether I was to fall or not. Ben flinched, ready to catch me incase anything were to happen.

“I was raised an orphan with around sixteen brothers and sisters-.” my mind traveled back to my days at the orphanage, days of grey that were spent scrubbing floors, making beds, cooking and taking care of the younger children. I had to squint to remember the highlights.

“I took care of them, fed them, played with them, taught them how to read and write” I used to have strange dreams of me drowning, despite knowing better since I was a mermaid. I used to sleepwalk a lot and find myself on the shoreline whenever I would wake up, always facing the open water.

“Because I was the oldest I never got adopted-.” a thick silence followed my words while I stared straight ahead with eyes lost in thought. I never knew what it was like to have a mother or a father since I was just a little girl when my mother had abandoned me to the orphanage.

“People want children to raise not another house maid to take care of” my siblings would come and go as the days would turn into years.

My shoulders slumped slightly at the thought but it quickly faded when I remembered something a lighter shade of grey from the rest.

“There was this boy, Douglas that lived rather far away from the orphanage-.” I giggled, moving to sit on the railing that I was still balancing on. It was a clumsy motion that had me nearly tumbling over backwards. I gripped the sides and steadied myself when Ben shot forward but I brushed him off, going back to my story.

“He would always steel one of his mother’s yellow roses that she would import from the South and leave them on my bed for me to find” he was a few years younger, it hadn’t been anything but a boy’s crush and a simple one at that since he had later grown out of his flirtations.

“I remember going down to the docks one day to buy some fish and ran into Douglas who was about to go out on their family ship with his older brother” I tilted my head back and kicked my feet back and forth, feeling the cool breeze in between my toes as I squeezed my eyes shut, lost in the memory of the two noble brothers.

“Deacon was his name. I don’t believe I had ever seen such a finely dressed man before-.” Ben stilled beside me, Caleb remained silent, his hand clenched on the table in front of him. Nolan was laying on his arms, half asleep while Rebecca leaned forward, eyes wide with curiosity.

“He was handsome and I must’ve done something right, maybe it was the way I did my hair that day or maybe it was because his little brother liked me so much-.” I pondered out loud, tilting my head this way and that.

The image of the tall man dressed in tailored clothing with chestnut brown hair and light freckles on his cheeks. He had a strong jaw line and dangerous green eyes that were much like that of a snake.

“Or maybe it was because I always manage to attract the wild and dangerous ones?” Rebecca laughed, turning to glance down at Caleb from over her shoulder. I nodded, deciding to myself that the latter was the reason why and continued with my story.

“He took a liking to me, bought me gifts and jewels, did me up in fancy dresses but it all-.” I trailed off, my mind going back to that moment when I realized what he was doing.

I, the orphan girl stood in that tailors’ shop, clad in a gown that wasn’t meant for me and the words he whispered were like cold ice being thrown over me ‘You’ll make a beautiful noblewoman’ I wasn’t a noblewoman, I wasn’t meant to have riches or a large mansion, I was meant to be me, an orphan girl, I was meant to be free.

“It all was to convince me to act and move like a noble girl would, like a puppet on a string for him to control-.” I wiggled my fingers at the words. There was a long pause as I looked between the members of my audience.

Rebecca was the first to speak, her chin propped up onto her elbow as she imagined what it would’ve been like to be spoiled by a nobleman with all the money in the world.

“What did you do?” I hummed, thinking back and grabbed for the cloth that sat on the table directly in front of me. I took it in hand, hopped down from the railing and wrapped the fabric around Ben’s neck, pulling him down so that he was at eye level with me.

“I said ‘I am not a noblewoman, I do not want jewels and fancy dresses, I want to be free to be myself” I spoke all this to Ben who was slightly confused but of course it hadn’t happened exactly as I had said in that moment. I turned, tugging the fabric away from Ben’s neck only to throw it at him before I took a low curtsey with the material of my dress skirt clutched in each hand. Ben fumbled to catch the cloth.

“Now I bid thee farewell, kind Sir” Rebecca laughed at my dramatic antics, her smile unable to be contained as I stepped up onto the table before me, one foot on the chair, the other on the tabletop until I stood above all of them.

“I stormed out of the tailors’ shop in only my nickers, but I’ll be damned if I don’t say that I did it with dignity” I stood up straight, my chin held high and my shoulders square.

Rebecca burst out laughing along with Ben who had slightly tinted red cheeks. Caleb looked up at me with furrowed brows as if questioning my sanity. My eyes moved from the people around me to the open waters beyond, realizing something that I hadn’t been able to since I first left that small town.

My world was no longer mixtures of grey but colorful, painted with pink and purple, blue and red.

I fell to my knees on top of the table, the thoughts of where I had been raised bringing forth a newfound appreciation for where I now was, for the pirate Captain that had kidnapped me.

This was more a home, there with Ben, Nolan, Rebecca and Caleb than any home I had ever known. I smiled faintly and without thinking the words left me in a faint whisper, carried off by the breeze.

“I’m home” even if it was just a small realization of something I had already known deep inside myself, it still made me feel like I had someplace I belonged.

I was no longer a kidnapped girl on board a pirate’s ship but instead a member of the crew, sailing the open seas, witnessing things I had only dreamed of before then with my own two eyes.

Once the treasures would all be found, I hoped that Caleb would allow me to remain on his ship and not just abandon me to the waves when I had done what I was taken to do.