The weather in the capital is consistent, if not a bit boring: clear, sunny skies nearly every day, with barely a cloud, save for the one rogue weather event in which I decided the hedge maze seemed like a perfect place to get lost. No matter where I go, intrusive eyes follow, but if I’m outside, there’s at least sun and fresh air. After the intense gazes and stage-whispered comments of the day, being alone has never felt more appealing.
I meander the property and find myself heading toward the hedge maze. It’s warm today. The sun bakes the foliage and coaxes late-summer scents from their depths. The air smells of fresh pine, roses, and dahlias. Other than the guards patrolling in well-choreographed increments, I don’t see any other people, and nobody stops me. The entrance to the maze stands alone, unguarded, and unblocked. I pause and look in, running my fingers along the hedge, as if to say, remember me?
Soft footsteps echo off the leaves and branches, and I strain to hear what the maze has stifled.
“Should I follow you in? Or are you just really into hide-and-seek?”
I gasp, touching my throat as Beck approaches from my right, a smirk across his sharp, scruffy jawline.
“Do you ever shave?” I ask. His smirk widens into a full-blown grin, his eyes sparking with sarcastic fire.
“I could ask the same of you, Capo.” I swing my arm at him, intending to hit him with a playful swat, but he easily dodges, letting me spin into the scratchy hedge.
“Oh, that’s just pathetic,” he says with a hearty chuckle. “I’ve seen kittens who were more ferocious.”
“I’m not a cat.”
“Neither are they,” he says with a wheezing laugh. I push myself back to my feet.
“What are you doing here?”
“I could ask the same of you,” he says again, and I roll my eyes.
“Is that all you know how to say?”
“I could ask—” This time, I do hit him, but with my injured hand. It throbs, pulsing sharp pain into my fingers.
“Ouch!” I cry, cradling my hand. I bite my tongue to keep back the embarrassing tears.
“Oh, jeez. Can’t have you doing any more damage, now can we? Come on.” He takes me by the shoulders and steers me along the maze, then around and back into the trees. About thirty paces into a grove of pin-straight ash and oak trees is his cabin. He stops me just before the door, letting go of my shoulders so he can open it and usher me inside.
I know I’ve been here before, but it feels cozier somehow. Maybe it’s the golden sun streaming in through the leaded-glass windows, or the sweet-scented breeze filtering in through the opened door. He directs me toward a small table tucked against the left wall, and I sit, looking around the small space. This time, I notice things I didn’t before: a small wooden wind-up clock next to bottles of jewel-toned liquids; stacked, leather-bound books in navy, forest-green, and vermillion; rusty andirons; a tarnished brass oil lamp with a milk glass shade. It doesn’t surprise me that Beck would be comfortable in a place like this—spartan, bucolic, honest.
Beck disappears for a moment, stepping back outside. When he returns, he sits, hooking his chair with his foot to position it where he wants. He holds out his hand, motioning for me to give him my injured fingers. I hesitate. He arches one eyebrow, waiting, letting me decide. Slowly, I stretch out my hand. He wraps a cool, damp rag around it, and I freeze, realizing that I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to let someone take care of me. I’ve always just fixed things myself. I watch him, thinking how strange it is to have an unshaven, orange-peel-chewing privateer hunched over my mangled hand, wrapping it until the ache fades.
He checks it over, and then leans back to grab a bottle of amber-colored liquid from the mantle. He pours and passes me a small glass of brandy. A dark chill passes through the cabin as the scent of alcohol hits my nose.
“No, thank you,” I say. He considers me for a moment, jaw working in a tight circle. Then he shrugs, lifts the glass to his lips, and tips it back with the same gusto a pyromaniac has while striking a match. He rocks in his chair, pushing the front legs off the ground, and drapes his left elbow over the back.
“They’ll heal,” he says. “It’ll just take time.”
“I know.”
“You know, if you’re gonna hurt someone, you should probably choose a method that doesn’t leave you in worse shape.”
“Yeah, I’ll work on that.” I look down at the bandage, my shoulders drooping.
“Everything okay in the Princess Palace?” he asks. I roll my eyes.
“It’s fine . . . I don’t know. Zerah’s gone, and everyone knows what happened . . .” My voice settles into the same decibel as the breeze. He hardens his jaw and lifts his chin, setting the chair down with a solid thunk. He leans forward, bending over his knees as he scratches his nose with his thumb.
“Let them think what they want. It doesn’t affect who you are, or how you live.”
“That’s easy to say.”
“Easier to do than you realize.”
I huff. “Maybe when you’re a pirate, or whatever it is you actually are—”
“Swift merchant with a sexy boat.”
“Or when you’re a man, and you have more freedom—”
“Last I heard, you were an Independent woman,” he says, raising his thick eyebrows.
“Yeah, but that doesn’t really mean anything,” I say. I stare at the floor, unable to meet the honest intensity of his stare.
“Like hell it doesn’t,” he says. “It means you’re free to do whatever you damn well please.” I shake my head and fall back against my chair.
“All it means is that nobody has to take me seriously anymore, because there’s not a man standing behind me. There’s no one to make it clear I matter.”
“Isn’t that what Declan’s for?” he asks as his lip curls. I glare, blinking around the reddish haze of stifling indignation.
“Screw you,” I say, standing. He groans.
“That’s not how you fight.” Crossing his arms over his chest, he leans back in his chair.
“What?”
“People say shit like that all the time. You can’t just say ‘screw you’ and walk out. You’ve gotta stand up for yourself. Fight back!” I open my mouth, searching for a good comeback, but nothing comes out. I cross my arms over my chest and sit, while he pours another glass of brandy. He holds it up in offering, and I shake my head. He stares at me for a long second, and then rubs his knuckles over his scratchy jaw.
“Do you not like the taste?” he asks, with a lilt of cautious curiosity. I look down at my mangled hand, and then back up at him. He presses his lips together and nods, understanding. Then, in one fluid motion, he returns the contents to the bottle, caps it, and lifts it by its neck, placing it behind him with the other bottles.
“I can teach you to defend yourself,” he says, his green eyes wide.
“No, thanks.” My voice is soft and betrays my defeat. He tilts his head to the right and narrows his thick, dark brows.
“I can teach you to defend yourself. You should take me up on this. I have experience, you know.”
“Because you’re a pirate?” I say with a smirk.
“As a matter of fact, it is because I’m a pirate.” He looks pleased with his cleverness. “Of course, I’ve always known how to handle myself. But my crew, they needed some lessons. You should’ve seen Kern when he first showed up. Unhirable little grunt of a guy. But a damn hard worker. Now, he can lift Slick.”
“What’s a Slick?” I ask.
“Precisely,” he says, and when I narrow my eyebrows, he smiles. “A Slick is a large beast of a man, but also a member of my crew. He was a little too effective, if you catch my drift. I helped him refine his skills, become a more elegant hamhurster of a man.
“Then there’s the old Shazblister. Shel Shazzer, my first mate. Helluva guy, and best needlepointer this side of the Mittlesee. Comes in handy more than you’d think. And Perlman? Well, when that kid arrived, he couldn’t even handle his drink.”
“And now he can?” He sputters a laugh and shakes his head.
“Shit, no. But now, when he’s had too much, he knows to go to bed. Well, to a bed.” He holds his arms out wide and grins, as if to say, ta-da!
“Wow. What credentials,” I deadpan. The humor in his face drains away, and he levels me with a serious, sober stare.
“Let me teach you. You should know how to defend yourself.”
“Why?”
“Because you’ve been hurt. Because you shouldn’t have to feel helpless. Because . . .” He stops speaking, then leans in, angling his face so I have to meet his intense gaze. “Because the Arden I know is full of fight and fire, and the Arden I found that night gave up.”
I swallow hard and look away.
“How would we even do this?” I ask, my pulse far too fast against my neck. It feels wrong to be asking for help in this way, but I’m not really asking if he’s offering. Right? He shrugs.
“Afternoons during your breaks? For a couple weeks? I’m not shipping out anytime soon. More delays . . .” His explanation doesn’t actually explain anything.
“What are you really doing here?” I ask. He raises his eyebrows, but doesn’t try to brush off my question. Not entirely, at least.
“Waiting,” he says.
“For what?” I ask.
“Not entirely sure,” he says with a snort, but it seems like he’s responding to a different question.
“Well, what do you typically ship?”
“Things that need to go far in a short period of time.”
“Isn’t that everything?” He shakes his head and leans over, lifting my injured hand to unwrap the now warm cloth. He sets the cloth aside, and then rotates my palm up, inspecting each finger with the lightest touch.
“I’m pretty much the only captain that actually crosses the Mittlesee,” he says. I recall Fiona describing the Mittlesee’s treacherous combination of unpredictable weather, tides, and topography. Most ships sail along the coast. I study him, wondering why he’s the exception. Ever so gently, he lifts my middle finger, rotating it in the smallest of circles.
“Does that hurt?” he asks.
“A little.”
“Tell me if it’s too much.” He slides his fingertips up the first swollen knuckle and delicately massages around it, a sensation both painful and relieving.
“My father was a captain, and he taught me and my brother everything he knew. My brother wasn’t interested in learning the sea floor—didn’t see the point. No one expected him to actually cross the gulf, so why risk it? But I thought it was smart. Always know your enemy.” He slides to the next knuckle and applies the slightest pressure, then stretches it.
“I studied maps,” he continues, his voice as calm and gentle as the way his fingers move over mine. “I memorized every square mile of the gulf floor. I had to know the depth, the tides, how to forecast the weather, everything. Some of the valleys are only a couple miles wide, between shelves that are thousands of feet taller. In the wrong tides, or poor weather, it’s easy to bottom out and crash.” He tugs my ring finger, and I wince. Watching me carefully, he pulls again, loosening something in my knuckle and releasing pressure.
“The first time I got a trans-gulf job, I couldn’t believe the payout. But there was a storm, a sneaker squall. I didn’t see it coming. Giant red beasts of waves—we drifted off course. We had to drop anchor and wait it out. It was tense. I thought we might lose it all. But then it cleared, petering out as abruptly as it came. I figured out our location, and we made our deadline.
“Nobody could believe we’d made it through that storm. So I got a reputation for being the guy with the ship—and the crew—to do it.” He gently tugs on my pinky finger, and the steady release of tension slides up my arm.
“I bet your father was proud,” I say, my voice calm and soft. He stares at my hand, and then sets it gently in my lap, leaning back in his chair with a hard expression. He hasn't talked about his family much, and apparently, that isn’t going to change.
“You would think so, wouldn’t you?” He shrugs and shakes his head, then stands up and walks to the door.
“You saw what I did there?” he asks, and I nod, stretching my less-stiff fingers. “You can do that yourself twice a day. Use a cold compress, and then massage. It’ll help.”
“Thank you,” I say.
“Tomorrow, then.”
“Tomorrow. You’ll teach me how to take a hit,” I say with a dopey smile, but his green eyes are sober.
He shakes his head and says, “I’ll teach you how to hit back.”