She could tell by his walk it was Nick. Chante only confirmed what she already knew, but he appeared to be carrying something—a sack of flour? No, it was brightly colored. A bundle of clothing?
Chante let out a breath of air, seeming relieved. He looked at the mate on his right. “He has Rissa. Is she alive?”
The mate shook his head. “She ain’t moving.”
“Rissa?” Ashley said. “Who is that?”
Chante lowered the glass and looked at her with that lion-like predatory gaze. “His daughter.”
Chapter Ten
It all felt like a dream to him. Nick heard the cries of the monkeys, the buzzing of the insects, the low rush of the wind in the trees, but the sounds were muted by the screaming in his head. He stood at the top of the hillock and stared at the charred ruins of what had once been a village. What had once been his home. Rissa’s home. The huts he’d labored with his men to build were black ashes on the ground. The well-trodden paths frequented by laughing children and singing women were littered with the detritus of attack—a solitary shoe, a smashed cup, the back of a chair someone had lovingly carved. Except the weeds that had already taken root in the untended ground, nothing moved. All was silent and still. Nick’s blood seemed to freeze in his veins, and he wanted to collapse at the sheer weight of helplessness and vulnerability crashing over him.
For a moment he was a small child again, frozen in terror in that dark alley where his mother had been raped and killed.
He rarely thought of that awful day in the rookery of Whitechapel. Later he’d come to learn his mother was a great benefactress of the poor. She’d brought her sons with her that day, and while she visited with a widow, he had run outside to play. Jack had found him playing dice with some other boys and dragged him back to the widow’s hovel. But their mother had also gone to look for him, and they hadn’t been able to find her. Nick could remember the sheer terror of thinking she’d left them. He’d held tight to Jack who pulled him along until they came across their mother.
It might have been better if they hadn’t. Jack shoved him behind a pile of refuse, where the two hid while their mother was attacked by three men. Jack had covered Nick’s eyes, but he’d never forget the sound of his mother’s screams or the smell of her blood. And he’d never forget the feeling of helplessness, wanting to do something and being powerless to stop the attack or save his mother.
That was the feeling he’d had now, that same dizzy, paralyzing helplessness.
“Captain?” Red was speaking to him, and Nick turned abruptly, realizing his bos’n must have been trying to rouse him from his trance for several minutes.
Nick clenched his fists and kept his voice level. “What is it?”
“Should we keep on going, Captain?” He gestured to the village. Nick wanted to shake his head and order them all back to the ship, but that was the coward’s way.
“Order one of the men to stay with Mr. Silva. The rest with me.” He waited for Red to relay his orders and then, with his men at his back, he started down the hill. It was only sheer force of will that propelled him forward. His traitorous legs wanted to turn and run, but he moved forward. His men deserved to know what had happened to their families. Silently, reverently, they entered the skeleton of what had once been their home on the island.
The fires had cooled, and the corpses no longer smoked, but he recognized the bones amidst the blackness of the frames that had once comprised simple dwellings. Nothing moved in the village. Not even ghosts. Were there any survivors? If so, they must have been taken as slaves because they had not come back to bury their dead.
Rage and anguish burned through him in equal measure. He wanted to weep and at the same time he wanted to destroy something—anything—with his fists. He wanted to return to the ship and sail as fast as the wind would take him to Yussef. He would kill that bastard. Watching him and his vessel sink was too good. He’d gut the man slowly, listen to him scream and plead for mercy.
But Nick had not survived by being a man of impulse and recklessness. Even in the midst of his grief, he knew his limitations. His ship needed repairs. It would have to be careened and the hole in the waterline addressed. That would take days, perhaps even a week. His rage would have to wait.
The men behind him had not uttered a word. Their silence was testament to their shock and anger. This village was a grave, and all seemed to understand the respect it deserved. Nick did not relish the next few days when they would dig graves and bury their loved ones. Would he find Rissa’s body amidst the debris? As much as he wanted her to have survived, he could not wish a life of slavery on her. He almost prayed to find her remains.
“Captain!” one of his men called, disturbing the heavy silence. Nick swung around and followed where the mate pointed. The village had been built in a valley, hiding it from view on all sides. Now he watched as a man made slow progress down a hill on the far side.
“It’s Locke!” Red called.
More ice slid through Nick. Locke had been a friend, one of the men he trusted with his life—with the life of Rissa. Locke shouldn’t be alive if the village was in ruins. Some of the men rushed to help the older man, and as he neared, Nick noted his beard was caked with mud and his clothing stained with what appeared to be old blood and gunpowder. He was thin, almost gaunt, and he favored his right leg. Nick’s gaze dropped to the man’s ankle, where a crude bandage had been tied.
“Captain.” Locke saluted when he finally stood before Nick. Nick stood immobile, seemingly heedless of the extra yards the man had to cross to reach him. Nick’s gaze swept over the burnt village, and Locke looked at the ground. “I’m sorry, Captain.”
Nick clenched his fists, barely resisting the impulse to strike the already wounded man. “I should kill you.”
“After what I seen, I welcome death, Captain. You want to hit me?” He glanced at Nick’s curled fists. “Go ahead. I deserve it and more. It won’t change it, though.”
“Give me a full and detailed report, and then, only then, I’ll—we’ll—decide”—he gestured to the men— “whether you live or die.”
Locke nodded. “Fair enough, but first I’ll take you to the others.”
“Others?” Red said behind Nick. His voice was hoarse with the same emotion coursing through Nick. Hope flared, and Nick stubbornly pushed it down. He could not afford to hope. He could not afford the plunge into despair when his hope proved false. He was already teetering on the edge of that dark, icy precipice. One false step and he would plunge down and down and down, never to emerge again. He had his ship, his men, his revenge. He could not afford hope or despair.
“Lead the way,” Nick said, his voice even. He saw nothing, felt nothing as they marched through the blackened village. Images of the dead during their last struggles hovered on the periphery of his vision. He glimpsed a twisted form and imagined her last moments as her fists pounding on a door barricaded from the outside while fire swept through the hut. Her screams in his mind all but deafened him as the fire reached her and claimed her.
At the edge of the village the remains of a man with a burnt rifle lay in the path. Nick moved around him, tamping down the visions of the man shooting and recoiling from the force of a pistol ball as Yussef’s men swarmed, thick and bloodthirsty as fleas.
