a shoulder under his.
“Cap’n, orders?” Pryce cried, drawing up before them. His face was soot-blackened as well. Rivulets of sweat had carved flesh-colored lines, which gave him an odd striped appearance.
“Where be the captain of that fair vessel?” Nathan asked.
Pryce dabbed the sweat from his face with his sleeve. “Which piece o’ him would ye care to address?”
“Burn that fucking flag,” Nathan said, glaring at the other ship.
“He’ll take it personal.”
“Good, because it is. Pray set that hulk aweigh as soon as possible.”
“She looks helpless,” said Cate, noticing the Nightingale for the first time. The two ships sat virtually yard to yard, bound by lines and boarding planks. Ravaged and listing badly, the Nightingale was a sorry sight. Mainmast splintered, yards tangled, shredded canvas draped from her waist to nearly her bow. Wallowing on the swell, she slumped in the water, her spirit as shattered as her rigging. The Eclipse’s sails, in the meantime, were no more than a blot of white at the line where sky and water met.
“And that concern would be mine, how?” Nathan’s brown eye glared ghoulishly through the glistening red. “A pirate with fewer scruples would have torched her, and then listened to them scream, until the magazine caught and they all went to the depths.”
“You’re to be commended for killing a captain, but not destroying his ship?” she said in disbelief.
“No, I’m to be commended for being alive and he’s not.”
“The Nightingale has able hands and land in her lee,” Pryce said, dispassionately. “They’ll do.”
Nathan wobbled. His legs buckled and his weight sent Cate staggering. Pryce dipped a shoulder to take the load and half-carried, half-drug his captain into the cabin.
“Put him on the bunk,” she called from behind. “And take off those boots.”
Pryce did so, pitching them into a corner. He passed Kirkland at the door, bearing hot water and cloths.
The cook hovered as she filled the basin, critically eying his captain, now splayed on the bunk like a rag doll. “He should be bled.”
Cate suppressed a reflexive shudder. “I think we’ve had quite enough blood let for one day. After all, the body does require at least a little upon which to carry on, don’t you think?”
Kirkland clearly didn’t “think,” but forbore pressing the point, and scurried out to go tend the casualties.
“Can’t abide bleeding.” She hadn’t realized she had spoken aloud, until she heard Nathan grunt in agreement.
Nathan made a flailing attempt to rise. Failing, he fell back on the bed, gasping. “I shouldn't be here,” he said and gathered up for another try.
“I have yet to witness bullheadedness being able to stop bleeding,” she said, pushing him back down.
Cate sat on the bunk to deter him from another escape attempt. She carefully pulled away his headscarf and dropped it to the floor with a sodden splat. His high forehead was divided by a sharp line of deep bronze below pale ivory. Head wounds tended to bleed profusely and this one was no different. Taking a rag, she swiped away the blood in order to see more clearly.
“You’ve quite a head of hair,” she said quietly, hoping to distract him as she probed.
Underneath his scarf, there were several inches of loose hair before being woven into the multitude of braids. One ended abruptly at his shoulder, sliced away by a blade. Blooming in their newfound freedom, the hair ends sparked in the candlelight with a multitude of colors: sable, umber, sienna, the occasional sorrel, and even bronze. Feeling through the heavy silk, she finally located the wound: a nearly finger-length gouge, running along the curve of his skull. Seizing the candle from the sconce, she held it higher for better light.
“Hmm, it looks like if it wasn't for that scarf, a good piece of your scalp would be gone.”
Nestling the basin on the mattress between them, she cleaned the abrasion and the area around it, picking away bits of hair, cloth, and wood. The water swirled redder with each squeeze of the cloth. The feel of Nathan's flesh made him so very real, no longer the personification of a legend, but a man, warm and breathing—a bit raggedly at the moment, but still doing so. At first, he twitched at her every move. Gradually, his shoulders eased and his body uncoiled, the hand curled in his lap falling open. She looked down at one point to find he was observing her just as closely.
“You have double eyelashes,” she said in quiet astonishment.
The thick dark frame around his eyes was composed of