Chapter 1 - Drowning Sorrows

  (1 ? years later)

  Year 4243 of the Second Calendar, 2nd cycle of Elaina

  Eksa threw her legs over her cabin work table and tipped back her chair. She wiggled her feet, taking pleasure in the dull glow of orange luminite showing from the polished surface of her new black cowhide boots. The third pair of boots she'd purchased that cycle, added right alongside two pairs she'd stolen from a merchant's wife when raiding their ship.

  After all, why shouldn't she have luxuries when she could afford them?

  With her left hand, she grabbed the neck of a bottle resting in a pail of ice. She twirled it before her face, smiling lazily at her own glossy reflection. Dark liquid sloshed around inside. The label read Red Vine Black: Year 4180. More than a half century of age. A pricy bottle. But a mighty fine one. Condensation was pressed along its surface. A single bead rolled down and hung at the edge. Eksa sucked in a breath and let the cold bottle rest on her cleavage, both shivering and delighting all at once. Her heart thumped. She closed her eyes, imagining herself lying back on the barren cold of Estraea, arms pinned above her head…

  Her mouth was going dry. She clicked her tongue and pulled open the cork with her teeth, taking a deep enough drink to incur brain freeze. In her right, Eksa held shards of dried and salted cod. She ripped a large piece with her canines and chewed with an open mouth, pouring more vintage to help wash it down.

  She crossed her legs one over the other on her table. Square between her feet, pinned to the wall, was a sheet of paper hanging like a lonely leaf on an emptied tree. She blinked away the sleep deprivation fogging her eyes and read over the note's contents for what must have been the thousandth time.

  Eksa,

  I'm sorry, but I'm leaving. I've been putting this off for far too long. My place isn't here. It never has been. My responsibilities are too great for me to remain here any longer. I'd have asked you to come with me, but I can't steal your dreams away from you. You know who I am and what it is I need to do. I hope you'll forgive me for leaving without a word.

  Don't think of this as the end. Claim all of Kovar. I know you can. When I've claimed what is mine, I'll have you stand beside me as my naval arm. You are, and always will be, my beating heart.

  ~Aaron

  That was it.

  That was all she had left of him. She'd spent countless hours of countless days reading over those words, hoping to find some cruel jest hidden between lines, praying there was a shrouded meaning or phrase that said 'just kidding, I'd never leave you'.

  Like that, almost two years had passed since she'd last seen him.

  Of course there were hidden words in the note. Things Aaron hadn't said to keep his own identity and motives hidden. But all of it felt a knife in the back than consolation. He'd given no consideration to his responsibilities to the crew as her second. Nor any of his responsibilities to her.

  And what did he mean by not wanting to steal her dreams? Eksa didn't want to go exploring the sea if it wasn't with him at her side. Together, they'd spent much time planning different expeditions to conduct into uncharted and unexplored areas of the sea for after Kovar had been fully reclaimed. But none of that mattered when Aaron had left. He'd stolen her most important dream —the future she'd seen with him together.

  Eksa put the bottle to her mouth again, letting the chill slide down her throat without a care in the world. Some spilled out the sides, rolling along the edge of her face and down her neck. Claim Kovar, he said. Of course. Because when —if he became king, he'd need an excuse to pardon a pirate, and her being the dominant naval party in the Aegis Basin would be perfect. She could join as a privateer and be forgiven for her crimes.

  Forgiveness…

  Am I even deserving of it? Innocent trading vessels suffered beneath her thumb as they did under others of the Silver Serpent pirates. She'd become one with the corsairs as opposed focusing her efforts on destroying them. Her rising influence was no longer a threat to Dhorjun.

  Eksa tore into another piece of cod. She'd taken part in turning Lord Coraine's wife into a widow. Had taken part in orphaning hundreds of children. And now was actively living the raider's life when she'd vowed to be different. So much for trying to be better than everyone else, if ever she'd been better to begin with.

  'You are, and always will be, my beating heart,' she read again. That line brought more pain than the combined weight of her guilt. Pain that was easy to ignore after downing a whole bottle. Eksa was slowly losing sight of herself. She didn’t know how to stop it. There just wasn't a way to replicate the burning sensation she felt when she was with Aaron. The kind that had once made her feel invincible.

  “Claim all of Kovar,” he says. “Easier said than done.”

  She let the empty bottle slip from her hands back into the pail. Tilda Coraine had no choice but to allow food into Kovar to keep her captive people fed, all while living with the fact that her merchants could never leave her shores without a warship for a guard, of which she only had six. They were easy pickings for Eksa. Dhorjun knew that. He and Crow were planning land invasions that they were likely to put Eksa in charge of.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  “Easier done than said if you bothered to put your mind to it,” said a smooth and familiar voice from outside the cabin door. “And if you stopped drinking.”

  Of course. Jackrin. The most obnoxious crewmate to handle. Much of Eksa's combat power had fallen with the loss of Aaron and Viper, and the only extraordinary member left hardly ever followed orders. Because of it, Eksa had lost good sailors and fighters, bringing an end to her reputation as the Immortal Serpent who could capture ships without any allied casualties.

  “If all you're going to do is patronize me, you can right well piss off,” she snapped without turning her head. She'd gained a different kind of reputation over the last few months. The kind that Dhorjun had. The reputation of fear. If there was one thing about Jackrin she could purchase, it was his overwhelming tendencies toward violence, and she used that violence well to keep her crew in line —just not well enough during raids. Some twisted form of moral values on his part, she guessed. Revels in the torture of pirates but not innocents. Yet he hasn't cut off the snake's head yet. He hasn't killed me…

  Because he's your friend said a caged voice from deep within her breast. A voice she'd learned to ignore.

  “He wouldn't approve of you as you are now.”

  Eksa clenched her fists. “Then he shouldn't have Flaming left in the first place! And he left me with your sorry rear too. Flames! All you ever do is bring me headaches!”

  An awkward silence followed. Her words were insensitive, but sooner the world collapsed to a new onslaught of Heartless monsters before she ever uttered an apology. “What? Here for another drink, I presume?” she asked.

  The jester nodded.

  “Of course you are,” she grumbled. She got to her feet, clutching one end of her desk as her vision bent in all the wrong ways. She shook it off and rolled up her sleeves, holding out her arm for Jack to bite. He usually asked for a drink once every two cycles. Sometimes less when he managed to catch someone else unawares.

  Jack approached and took hold of her arm, treating it as if it were a delicate instrument. He let his smooth fingers run along a greenish vein showing through her pale skin. Eksa's breath caught. Her mouth dried up again. She nibbled on the edge of her lips.

  Jackrin was terribly handsome —more than a man had any right to be. He was beautiful, in fact. Her gaze caught in the pale blue of his eyes. She felt herself leaning forward and rising to her toes as she pushed herself an inch closer to his lips. Everything was easy to forget after a full bottle. The pain, her affection for Aaron, and even her values as an Estraean. Desire was amplified in its place. Perhaps, Eksa thought, after another bottle, forgetting the guilt of any actions this night would be easy as well.

  Jack bit into her arm.

  Eksa winced. She watched him swallow three mouthfuls before pulling away and pressing a kerchief to the spots where his fangs had pierced to staunch the blood flow. He still held her arm. Eksa continued to stare at him. If he was at all affected by how many buttons of her shirt were undone, he wasn't showing it.

  “About what you'd mentioned last we spoke…”

  She frowned, unable to recall what they'd last spoken about. She didn't care at the moment and decided to press him further. She stepped closer to him until they were inches apart. “About it?” she whispered.

  Jackrin's gaze fell to her cleavage and lingered there for a long moment. She saw his hands move and bit her tongue in anticipation. He grasped her shirt and buttoned it up all the way. “Stop. You'd regret this as much as I.”

  “Really? And is that a knife hidden in your trousers that I feel on my thigh?”

  Jack grabbed the empty bottle she'd been drinking from, taking a whiff. “Highly concentrated,” he commented. “It'd might be hard to resist without this inside of you. But blackened heavens does your blood smell and taste bitter right now.” He sighed and took a step back. “Did Aaron never mention what happened when last I tried to… you know…?”

  Eksa swallowed as it came back to her. Jack was smiling. Smiling wide whilst staring at his snow white boots, lost in the recollection of his own madness. His teeth were stained with her blood. She saw his tongue flick across those vicious canines and couldn't hide her fear of the beast hidden behind those twinkling blue eyes. He couldn't love another from fear of killing them. A fact he actively buried behind shrill laughter. A fact that had made her very wary of him.

  He's a friend, Eksa…

  She scratched her head, thoughts caught in a whirlwind between fear, lust, and personal principles.

  “About Dhorjun's ambitions into Xenarian mainland. You suggested that we… off him.” There was a rhythmic edge when he said those last two words.

  Eksa rubbed her temples. Right. I planned to kill him all to start a power struggle and attempt to seize control of the island. She no longer felt any emotion when entertaining such thoughts. Violence and death had become a part of her life. It'd become a second nature of sorts. There was a unique contentment that came from proving her superiority through physical prowess, even if that person was an innocent and unarmed merchant. Though, all her memories of violence were groggy. That moment of egotistical pleasure was always fleeting, fast to burn out, just as the brilliant dawn.

  Just as her time with Aaron.

  Eksa wanted to feel that pleasure again. Any kind of pleasure, for that matter. The best thing coming to mind was another drink. She sat back down before her desk and tugged on her hair. Her hands began to shake.

  “Eksa?” Jack asked.

  She ignored him and began gnawing on her lower lip. She pulled out the drawers of her desk and rummaged through all her pristinely preserved drawings until at last a spare flask revealed itself in the final drawer. She was overjoyed to still feel a weight to it. Eksa grasped it with the vehemence of a beggar snatching a spared coin, creasing the edge of one of her maps in the process.

  Kovari Amber. It burned just right. Burned her insides and all her sorrows. She felt a sudden resistance to her arm. Jack was slowly pulling her hand away from her mouth. “Piss off!” she yelled, slamming a fist on the desk. Spittle flew from her mouth. “He isn't here so stop Flaming telling me what to do! If he wants me to stop drinking, he can right well Flaming stop me himself.”

  Jack's gaze flickered to droplets fallen in her open drawers. “… And Dhorjun?”

  “Go Flaming kill him then! I couldn't care less.”

  The mad jester stood there for a long second, lips twitching. Eksa caught sight of a maniacal grin right as he was turning to leave. A sigh escaped her. She took in another mouthful of the drink. Her vision turned foggy. “Dhorjun's going to die,” she mumbled. “And I'm going to rule Kovar. Burn Aaron. I'll rule it and keep it from him. I'll keep it from Tilda too. I'll bloody keep it from everyone. My bloody hard work.”

  She grabbed one of her hand drawn charts and stumbled up to deck where starlight and the sound of waves greeted her. She held the map up to the sky, admiring the way the stars highlighted her masterpiece.

  Severum was standing near and saluted. “Captain!” he said, bright and cheery as if everything were as blissful as the night. As if her entire world weren't rife with thieves trying to steal her everything.

  She shoved him hard and he tipped over like a post poorly hammered in the ground. “My bloody hard work!” she shouted, slurring over her words.

  Her gaze flitted to the creased edges of her drawings. She couldn't remember when last she'd picked up a pen. Nor why those creased edges tugged so irritably at her nerves.