A Pirate's Song.

Chapter Twenty-Four.

I sat across from Caleb on the fallen statue, my first mate’s hat perched on the top of my head with my boots placed neatly beside me on the stone flooring.

My hair was starting to dry, the shirt still clinging to my body, leaving little to no room for the imagination as it hugged my curves and stuck to me like a second skin.

I glanced up at the statue looming over Caleb, a bearded man with a triton clutched in hand, his lower half made up entirely of tentacles while his ears and hands were webbed, his gills carved into the sides of his neck with scales littering his naked top half. His eyes were encrusted with sapphires that seemed to glow as the cavern was cast into darkness, the sun starting to set over the desert.

Neptune was the god of the seas, the ruler that controlled the tides and the sea folk along with it, he held power over mermaids, sirens, nymphs, the guardians such as Gigas and whoever dared to sail the seven oceans. I could remember reading stories about the god, how he had come to command the waters.

He was born a mortal, a man who had many children with many women, he had crafted the first ship and sailed out onto the ocean where he had been capsized, forced to sink deeper into the depths. It is said that Neptune drowned, however his heart was so consumed by the water that it gave him new life, granting him the ability to breathe underneath the waves, gifting him tentacles and scales.

The ocean had chosen him to be its ruler, the man who had such a vast hunger for the sea. His obsession was what made him the first sea being with his descendants all carrying the same love for the water.

I sat there, my eyes staring blankly at the statue as I contemplated whether Mary had been one of his descendants because of her undying love for the sea.

My thoughts were interrupted by Ben, standing up from the sand, his back to us as he called out to someone on the horizon. I locked gazes with Caleb and slid off the statue, reaching for my boots to tug them onto my feet while the Captain stood, moving closer to the hole in the ceiling of the cavern.

Nolan appeared, carrying a rope that was draped over his shoulder, letting it go so that one end of it fell down into the cavern. It slapped the ground while he tied the other end around his torso, hands winding themselves around the woven threads.

“Come on, las!” Nolan called down into the ruins, his voice echoing out around us.

Caleb, who had redressed himself in his hat, boots, shirt and coat knelt down in front of the rope with his back toward it, propping up one knee as he held his hand out for me to take. I was so afraid to touch his hand, so terrified of feeling his skin against mine but I did as he wanted, taking his hand and stepping onto his knee then onto his shoulder.

He stood, hoisting me higher, as close to the ceiling as possible before he moved away from me.

I wound my hands and feet in the rope to keep me rooted in place while Nolan and Ben worked together to heave me upward. I glanced down at the pirate Captain, his eyes locked onto me, a stern look on his face.

I had no words to speak, no way of asking him not to tell the rest of the crew of what I was so I could only pray that he would keep my secret like Ben had for so long.

When I reached the top, I began to pull myself out but a hand grabbed hold of mine, pulling me into a tight embrace. Ben had his face buried in the side of my neck, his arms almost shielding me from all harm.

“I won’t let anyone hurt you” he reassured me, whispering the words into my skin. I stared at the world of red sand and orange light behind him, my own arms moving to embrace him, hands gripping at the material of his shirt.

He had been referring to Caleb, to what the Captain had discovered within the cavern. If he decided to tell the crew then it could potentially place me in harm’s way, it could put my life at risk.

I buried my face into his shoulder and breathed him in, knowing that despite the pain I had caused him by having gained some type of connection to Caleb, he still cared for me and would fight for me no matter what it would cost him.

Caleb managed to climb the rope on his own, effortlessly pulling himself onto his own two feet when he reached the top, his eyes landing on me and Ben when I pulled away from the curly haired blonde.

There was a moment of tension when Caleb’s gaze flickered from me to Ben for the briefest of moments before he started heading in the direction of the ship.

His shoulder collided with that of Nolan’s, causing the Captain to pause, looking at the Irishman when he spoke “Return to the ship-.” his golden eyes, reflecting like fire in the fading sunlight moving to my face.

“We have a gem to find” with that he was gone, his figure disappearing into the distance, hands clenching at his sides with the red of his coat blending into the sand around us.

Nolan rolled up the rope, tossing it onto his shoulder and made to follow Caleb. My hands moved to grasp onto Ben’s right arm, hugging it firmly to my chest, the fabric of my shirt still damp from the water. He glanced down at me, a sadness filling his brown eyes. I was worried, terrified that Caleb would announce what I was to the crew once we were to reach the ship and Ben brought me comfort, just being able to touch him was enough to calm the raging storm that was my heart.

We followed Nolan, my hands eventually moving until only one of mine clung to one of his, letting him guide me for what felt like hours toward the shore.

I was worried about Rebecca’s ankle but also about the pain that I had caused Caleb by thinking that he would hurt me.

When we reached the ship, Caleb climbed up along with Nolan while Ben guided me to begin scaling the side of the ship, staying behind to make sure that I didn’t lose my grip and fall.

“Up we go, las” Nolan insisted from on deck, reaching down with his palm held out for me to take. I grabbed onto it, allowing him to pull me onboard with Ben climbing up after me.

Rebecca was sat in a chair nearby, her ankle bandaged and up on a small wooden table as she clutched a cup in hand, laughing at a few of the crew.

My eyes locked onto the retreating back of the Captain as Ben perched himself beside me on the railing of the ship. He moved to wrap his arm around my shoulder while Nolan went over to Rebecca, taking a swing from her cup, but before the fisherman could touch me, I was making my way to the Captain’s quarters, my feet carrying me along in pursuit of Caleb.

I rushed down the stairs, pausing halfway to grab hold of his wrist.

“Caleb!” the name came out rushed, almost frantic when he turned to glare up at me. My hair dangled down between us, my face looming overhead with my free hand gripping the wall to steady myself.

There were so many emotions swirling around in my chest, so many things that I wanted to say but all I could do was stare down at him, my lips slightly parted and my chest rising and falling.

“Don’t call me that” he bit out, tearing his arm away from me to storm further into the room, tugging his coat from his shoulders but pausing midway when his eyes landed on the dress splayed out across the surface of the bed. He brushed it off, removing his coat and tossing the red dirt stained piece of clothing onto the dress he had been keeping safe, clean for so long.

I followed him, my boots thudding against the wooden flooring as I removed my hat, setting it down on the desk.

“What do ye want, Evangeline?” he bluntly asked when he paused at the nightstand, his eyes landing on the heart shaped locket that he had picked up off the floor from the night before.

I sat down on the chair in the corner, my fingers going to undo the laces of my heavy boots, kicking them off and to the side so that I was left only in a dry shirt. My hands gripped the arms of the chair.

“A-Are you going to-?” I trailed off, my eyes falling down to the floor when I spoke. Caleb’s eyes darted in my direction, his dangerous golden gaze almost seeming to glow beneath the shadow of his hat. He knew exactly what I was asking and reached his hand out to trace the leather of the small book that sat beside the locket.

“Tell me crew that ye’re a mermaid?” he finished for me, his head lifting to lock eyes with me from across the room. My heart was pounding and I could hear it drumming in my ears as I nervously waited for him to snap at me, to announce it to the world but instead his features remained set in stone.

“They may be me crew but that doesn’t mean that I trust ‘em” he removed his hat, tossing it onto the bed along with his coat to expose most of his hair that was dangling down to his shoulders with only small parts still up in its bun. The stubble on his chin and the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes made him look tired, older than what he really was.

“They’re like hungry dogs, as soon as they catch a whiff of gold they stop at nothing to get their hands on it” he turned to face me, his jaw clenching, causing his cheekbones to rise and fall with the motion of tensing muscles.

I could feel my bottom lip trembling as I stared at him, not sure what to say when he raised the book into the air between us.

“And because of this, I can’t have them killing ye just yet” I breathed in a sharp gust of air, my eyes unable to blink, unable to focus on the image of him moving toward me. His last two words echoed in the back of my mind ‘just yet’ like a warning, a threat that if I didn’t do my job properly by helping him find those treasures, he’d let the entire crew know of who I was and set them on me like hunting hounds on a helpless fox.

“So, love-.” he began, placing both hands on the arms of the chair, forcing me to lean back with my arms wrapping themselves protectively around my torso, shielding me from the threat looming overhead. His lips pulled back in a sinister grin.

“I trust ye’ll keep doing ye job?” he asked, his face inches away from mine. I searched his features, my fear fading when I realized what he was doing. I had been afraid of him in the cavern which had hurt him, so there he was trying to purposely scare me off, threatening me to get the reaction he expected me to have. He expected me to shrink back in fear like I was doing. My arms loosened themselves from around me.

“I will” I whispered, my hands going to grip the arms of the chair as I moved to sit up, forcing him back. He still had the book in his one hand as he held onto the seat, positioning himself so that he was slightly more upright when I continued.

“Not because of your threat” I took the book from his hand, mine caressing the back of his when I did so then I held the book up between us, my feet placing themselves back onto the floor since they were no longer being pressed up against my chest.

I wasn’t afraid of him; I wasn’t scared of what he could do. The only reason I had felt threatened was because of the feral instinct inside me that I couldn’t control, the part of me that saw humans as enemies and prey.

“But because I want to know why these gems are so important to you” his face darkened, a predatory glint taking over his eyes. He was hiding something, something I wasn’t sure I wanted to know, something that made the usually angry and irritated lion turn into a monster that was capable of even murder.

“Why is Caleb Campbell gathering the seven treasures?” I asked, seeing the metaphorical line drawn directly before me and choosing to step over it anyway.

His darker side, his more animalistic and murderous side made my stomach flip upside down at how vulnerable I was.

His gaze studied me, glancing down my body and up to my mismatched blue and grey eyes.

“Some questions are better left unanswered” he said as he stood upright, his hands slipping away from the arms of the chair when he glared down at me. If I didn’t look so much like the woman he loved and if I wasn’t his only way of finding the gems, he would’ve most likely killed me in that moment.

“Start reading” he ordered, nodding his head toward the book that I still held in my hand.

He growled lowly then turned to leave, his back muscles rippling through the material of his shirt as he went back above deck, leaving me there with my breath still caught in my throat, my eyes locked onto the stairs and my heart racing with adrenaline from having been so close to a man so deadly, so sinister, a man who for some reason my past self has fallen in love with, a man whom I was starting to fall for.