Siren

Finals are finally finished!! Summertime awaits! With months of hospital clerkships but let's not ruin a good thing just yet. Anyway, here is the next chapter I promised for when I finished.

I want to say a special thanks to AwkwardMD for being my humor consultant on this chapter and I'm lucky to have one of the funniest writers on the site backing me up when I can't come up with a joke.

Enjoy!

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Ch. 6

There were subtle differences in the grip he kept on her. At first it had seemed they were all the same; a domineering, controlling hand wrapped so completely around her upper arm. In the weeks that followed her first performance Roland had made such a habit of clasping her arm whenever they moved about the ship that she began to take note of when his hold was lower and looser, or when his fingers felt like strangling iron bands across her muscle.

Today his thumb marched up the back of her arm instead of curling around its counterparts. His hand's position was lower, almost at her elbow and the weight of it would have been comfortable if she could admit it. As it was, his absolute control over her movement outside the cabin had initially flared her confidence, confirming that she'd gotten to him. But weeks later that triumph had faded and the familiarity of the routine had settled over her as she allowed herself to be steered down the steps and onto the lower deck.

Roland walked just behind her as they picked their way past the swaying hammocks on the way to the galley. Loud voices erupted next to them and Kenna started, taking a step towards Roland. The contraction of his fingers and arm aided her momentum and she found herself pressed tightly against his side. Three sailors were shouting over a game of dice, their overlapping voices reverberating in the small space.

"That's not how it works!" one of the red-faced men shouted. The other two, a small Welsh man she recognized as a dancer, if a poor one, and a larger African, stood their ground.

"Don't be daft, Ned, you can't change the rules whenever you lose," another called back, leaning in and squaring his shoulders.

The third gestured at the dirty cubes at their feet. "If ya roll two of the same then you can't just claim the pot, you have t—"

"See? Even Osei knows the rules and he's only just learned," the second one jabbed a thumb towards the larger black man.

"Of course he thinks them's the rules, 'cause you taught him your sheep-fucker game with no thought to the real way you play a fucking game of dice."

Kenna saw the first man grip his knife where it was tucked in his belt. The other two were bristling and the Welshman had turned bright red at the mention of fornicating with cattle.

"You would know from sheep-fucking seein' as you've been diddling the dairy goat for nigh on two weeks now."

Three blades whistled from their sheaths. In the heartbeat of silence that followed Roland stepped forward without releasing her, a large laugh rolling out towards the three of them.

"You can't tell me two fours is worth nothing on the pot." His voice was calm and full of good humor. Kenna felt it crack the tension up the middle, the air around the three men changing instantly as they turned their eyes towards him. But Kenna saw the set of Roland's shoulders, the strain that coiled in his neck and down his arm to where he held her behind him. The men pulled away from one another, the two arguing together put their knives away before the third would agree to do the same. They turned towards their captain and began speaking their grievances at once.

He turned back towards her, the men's voices still arguing over one another but with a distinctly less murderous tone. "Head to the galley and collect our meals. I'll be there in a moment." He released her and Kenna immediately felt unmoored. For a full moment she kept her place behind him as he turned back to the arguing crew members. It should not have been be difficult to step away from him, and so she pivoted and scurried the rest of the distance to the galley, ignoring the edge of panic that came with the movement.

The cook waved her in past the small group waiting, bowls in hand. Some of them had stepped out to watch the ruckus and she recognized the Quartermaster making himself scarce as he slipped by her, the sour faced Master Gunner following behind. The latter was recognizable in that he was the only one who never came to hear her sing. The scowls she received when they did cross paths did not recommend him as an audience member so it was satisfactory for both parties that he stayed away.

She put her hands inside the enormous pockets of the coat she wore and curled her fists tight. The crew were usually chatty during the evening meals, she'd heard them joking and singing, some not altogether terribly. But she felt the room hush a bit as she moved past them unescorted for the first time. Some heads were bobbed in greeting but no one spoke to her as she made her way towards the cook and his assistant.

"G'evening Missus Bell," the cook spoke, as she neared him.

"Good evening, Mr. Munro," she gave him a small, tight smile in greeting, her hands still knotted in her pockets.

"Gid Evenin'!" the assistant chimed in, pouring the mead as he bounced over. In contrast with most of the crew, Mr. Hansen was incessantly chatty around her. A fair few had tried to engage her in conversation these last few weeks, but none so doggedly. Mr. Hansen had subjected her to more stories than she could count, and she'd found each deliberate attempt to divert her more and more grating.

"Good evening, Mr. Hansen," Kenna said mirthlessly. She had years of practice putting people off and yet none of her icy looks or lack of acknowledgement seemed to deter the man at all.

He pushed a fop of dirty blond hair back from his face. "Charlie is really quite fine, Missus."

"I will take your suggestion under consideration, Mr. Hansen." Her tone held no hint of humor but the man walloped a laugh and slapped his knee. "I'm here for the captain's dinner," Kenna said, turning to the cook who was looking at his assistant with a detached air of incredulity.

"Of course, Mistress, it'll just be a moment," He jerked his thumb at the pantry and spoke in a deliberately sterner tone to the man still chuckling at nothing next to him. "Charlie, get the captain's share and be quick about it."

Charlie unwisely chose to ignore the order, or at least his enthusiasm for his next joke overwhelmed his reason, and perhaps his hearing as well. "Beggin' your pardon missus, but did I ever tell you the one about the rabbit-"

"Now!" Mr. Munro's voice cut through whatever haze surrounded the young man's head and the gangly body leapt to obey. Kenna and the cook watched him disappear into the pantry. "You'll have to beg his pardon, Mistress. He's got a bit ahead of himself and two left feet to find his way back." Kenna's lips twitched at the image of the awkward sailor circling himself on two feet twisting the same way.

She turned back to the cook and nodded, "I assure you, Mr. Munro, I take no offence to his..." She paused, considering her choice of words. "...enthusiasm."

Mr. Munro was about to speak again but the shouting in the hall beyond them erupted again. Kenna jumped and turned to see Roland about to descend the last few steps into the galley. His eyes caught hers, his face serious but blank, before he turned back to see to his crew. Kenna felt a strange swell of pressure in her chest and deeper in her gut when she saw his expression, but instead of trying to decipher what it was she was feeling she turned back to Mr. Munro. He was lean for a cook, too strong-looking to let her imagine he wouldn't be put to better use on deck, but she had tasted his food and she wasn't surprised the crew kept him here. A good cook was worth more than another gunner.

"Tell me, Mr. Munro, is it not normally the quartermaster's task to settle arguments amongst the crew?"

The cook raised his eyebrows a bit at her. Short of her singing or storytelling, few beyond the captain had heard her speak that many words together unprompted. He inclined his bald head in agreement. "Aye, you're not wrong. But Mr. Dooley is still new to the job, and a bit too handy with the dice to keep the men from doing it. Perhaps he'll work his way into the role sometime soon, give the captain a bit of a rest." The man's large hands assembled several bowls on the cutting block and he turned to stir the stew.

Kenna was quiet, still considering what he'd said when Mr. Munro surprised her by speaking up again. "He's not the worst we've ever had." He looked back at her and saw the question in her face. "Mr. Dooley, I mean. We've had worse quartermasters aboard. Captain Dougray wasn't the most discerning of fellows."

Kenna's hands had begun to relax in her pockets but the mention of the man she'd stabbed drove her fingernails back into her palms. Her unease must have been obvious, for Mr. Munro picked up his story again quickly. "Before Mr. Roland got voted in, less than a year ago, we had a Mr. Freeman on our crew. Good chap, blond as a Swede and red as a lobster. Aboard he was one thing, a fine sailor and a decent quartermaster. But the minute that man's feet touched the sand he was drunker than an Irishman at a funeral on his birthday."

Kenna relaxed a bit at the joke. Mr. Munro had a quiet way about him as well as a casual cadence, so she felt no need to ignore him as she did Mr. Hansen. "Of course, what a man does on the beach is his own business but he had a bad habit of making a mess of our orders. Once we left with barely enough wood to mend the ship in a light rain much less after the storm that left us full of holes a week later. The next time it was sails and powder. But the last time did him in. He decided to have a go at the butcher's daughter right there on our order and got chased off without any of the meat for our trip, or the purse to buy more."

Mr. Hansen bounded back into the room, but he caught Munro's eye and snapped his mouth shut. He dropped the burlap sack on the block with a disappointed huff and moved back to serving the mead. "Men will put up with a lot, and he was a good sort so we laughed off most of the other mishaps. But nothing turns mens' minds around like empty stomachs." Mr. Munro stirred the stew with a nod, silently declaring it done and took up one of the large, lidded bowls Kenna would be tasked with carrying.

"What happened?" Kenna asked, no thought that she might not want to know the answer.

Mr. Munro looked back at her, his face studiously serious. "He helped make stew. Lasted nigh on four weeks if I remember correctly." He poured the next ladle of the meaty liquid into the bowl with an intentionally languid movement. "Best meals I ever made."

Kenna's eyes went wide when she caught his meaning. Her lips split into a grin of their own accord and she clapped her hand over her mouth as a laugh escaped her throat. The cook gave her the smallest of smiles, his face quietly triumphant as he finished fitting the meal together. Kenna could not keep from giggling into her palm and was unprepared to take the food when it was offered.

She composed herself just enough to take the burlap and stacked bowls and she gave Mr. Munro another grin. "But how did you manage the keep for a full month?" Her voice was still full of her laughter. She felt it in her shoulders, as if her laugh had shaken something loose.

My goodness, how long had it been?

The mischievous smile that crept across the cook's face was unprecedented in her experience, but she decided she liked it all the same. "It's a matter of packing salt in the right places, Mistress."

She laughed again and shook her head. She turned to Mr. Hansen to collect their mead, but he was staring at her slack-jawed. A prickling sensation erupted on the back of her neck as she came to realize the low hum of conversation that had been going on behind her had completely ceased. She swallowed at the sight of all those silent faces staring at her.

"Don't mind them." Mr. Munro spoke up behind her and drew her attention back to the only friendly face in the room. "They just ain't never heard you laugh much less smile." He gave her another reassuring smile which she returned. "Go on now," he said with a nod towards the steps.

Kenna let her hair fall forward as she moved past the men. Her smile had stayed with her, and she didn't need them staring and ruining the first bit of fun she'd had on this god-forsaken ship. Back on the lower deck the men were scattered, and Roland was having words with Ned who looked at least somewhat cowed. Kenna made her way over towards the pair but stopped short of joining the conversation.

Roland jerked his head in the direction of his cabin and she took it to mean she shouldn't wait for him. She made her way with the burden, more used to the sway of the ship now but somehow still unsteady without the ever-present hand on her arm.

When she reached the cabin she set out the food and drink and took her seat. The boat dipped and rolled with their pace. She knew they'd been making better time with the repairs complete. Roland had seemed more relaxed, in her estimation, because of it. But then the crew had started fighting more in the absence of the extra work. The loss of Captain Dougray had been more divisive than expected. It seemed the last quartermaster was not his only questionable hire and the crew was brimming with dangerous men who had been promised much more than they were going to receive.

The thought of the ill-fated Mr. Freeman brought her smile back. There was something in Mr. Munro's telling of it that had surprised her and made her laugh before her mind could drag her down with ill thoughts. She had let him tell her too, allowed herself a moment to wrap herself up in someone else's story instead of one of her own. She smiled and shook her head. It had been far too long since she'd done that.

"Something amusing, Kenna?" She jumped at the sound of Roland's voice and turned towards the door, surprised that she hadn't heard him approach. Her smile disappeared and she ducked her head. The man's effect on her was still confounding and her body coiled in anticipation when she heard him speak her name.

"Mr. Munro told me of your predecessor and his unfortunate fate," she said softly. Roland strolled easily over to his seat and took it, relaxing and looking back at her over the table she had set for them.

"And what fate would that have been?" Roland took the top off his bowl and dipped one of his biscuits into the liquid before looking back at her expectantly.

Kenna's lips twitched. "He said your Mr. Freeman was a bit of a fish on the beach, in his cups as soon as you made land and it lead to him making a series of mistakes with your orders until finally he lost the crew an entire store of meat for the voyage."

Roland looked back at her with a blank curiosity as he chewed. She decided he hadn't heard the story before and the thought occurred to her that she might be able to get a laugh out of him as well.

"As you know, hungry men are harder to charm, so it seems resentment built up until the crew found a way to relieve the meat shortage by volunteering their quartermaster to make the stew." She paused, trying to pull in the smile that threatened to overwhelm her lips and ruin the joke. Roland stopped his eating and looked back at her with an expression she could not interpret.

He leaned back in his chair again and studied her, the smile she'd been hiding disappeared under his scrutiny. "You found this story amusing?" his voice was similarly inscrutable.

She didn't entirely know how to answer. "I suppose I found the absurdity of it comical, yes." A strange pit had started in her stomach. This is what she got for attempting levity with her jailor.

For a long moment Kenna did her best not to squirm under his look. Why must every interaction be so fraught? She looked down at the stew and decided she lacked an appetite.

"I didn't think that would have been the one," Roland said thoughtfully. She raised startled eyes to beg more of an explanation. "A fortnight ago some of the crew made a wager on who would be the first to get you to laugh, or at least smile. I do believe you've made Mr. Munro quite a bit of money tonight." He offered her a small smile of his own and Kenna nearly fell off her chair when she sensed no mocking or sneering in the expression at all.

She thought it over for a moment and suddenly a great many interactions from the last several weeks made more sense. "Poor Mr. Hansen," she said finally.

Roland chuckled and Kenna swore the world had been turned inside out and she'd failed to notice. "Indeed," he said in agreement and he began to eat again. For a moment Kenna could only stare but soon she too took up her meal.

"Why didn't you think I'd find Mr. Freeman diverting?" Kenna asked when he had finished.

Roland looked back at her. "I thought you might take it seriously." Kenna's incredulity was poorly masked and he continued. "The tales of what we pirates get up to have been often overstated, in many cases entirely invented. It seemed reasonable given your attitude towards the crew that you might think they were base enough to resort to cannibalism when frustrated with a meal."

Kenna tilted her head and took a long moment to look at the man across from her, for he was only a man. Despite her earliest impressions, Kenna knew that while his behavior and her shameful reactions to it were their own particular form of torment, he was no devil incarnate.

"Perhaps, living among them, I've come to see the stories about pirates to be vastly overstated." Her tone was light but she knew he would hear her challenge. But instead of the familiar predatory approach to quiet her, Roland chose to stay seated, his eyes studying her stiff posture as he defied her expectations.

"Perhaps." Was all he offered in response. For a moment she thought he would not speak again, but it was always his way to wait just a bit too long and set her off balance again when he began to speak. "You did prove to be quite a challenge to the crew, despite seeming to prefer their company over mine." He turned his head in a mirror image to the way she had cocked hers moments before. "At least at one point."

They had not spoken of her first song. His response had been a cooling of communication unless he was giving her orders, including the songs she was permitted to sing, or that she was only to take requests from the men. Their interactions inside his cabin had fared little better. He still used her often, manipulated her body into rapturous agony, but some barrier had been forged in her defiance and neither one of them had addressed it directly.

Such was their avoidance of the matter that Kenna found herself at a loss for how to respond.

It hadn't taken long after she'd finished the song for her to realize how foolish it had been. Had she succeeded she would have stirred a mutiny on a ship of pirates where she was still prisoner. Despite his use of her, the captain's treatment was not unendurable and the crew might very well have killed her or worse. She had never imagined success with the Golden Vanity. The impulse had been to injure him as he had done to her, with no thought to the consequences. She hazarded a look back at Roland and found him simply observing her, his face unreadable.

What was she to respond to that? She could not admit the misstep. It had been her only triumphant moment, brief though it was. Was she ready to speak aloud the foolishness that had been behind it? She broke her gaze and looked away from him. He would understand from her face. She couldn't hide anything from him.