I didn’t know West. So was Zola. I’d only seen the sides of him that he’d chosen to show me.
“We’ve all done things to survive,” I said.
“That’s not what I’m trying to tell you.” The air around him changed as he spoke, “Fable, I need you to understand something. I did what I needed to do. I didn’t like it, but I had a sister and a mother who needed my wages, and I had a place on a crew that treated me well. I know it’s not right, but if I could go back, I think I would do it all again.” He said it so earnestly. “I don’t know what that makes me. But it’s true.”
It looked as if those were the words that had cost him most of all. Because he was telling the truth. There was no blame to be placed on anyone else’s shoulders. This was West, and he wasn’t lying about it.
“That’s why Saint doesn’t want to lose you. Why he gave you a shadow ship to run.” I rubbed a hand over my face, suddenly so tired. “But why didn’t you tell me?” I asked. “Did you think I wouldn’t find out?”
“I knew I was going to have to tell you about my work with Saint. I just wanted to…” He paused. “I was afraid you’d change your mind. About me. About the Marigold.”
I wanted to say that I wouldn’t have. That it wouldn’t have made a difference. But I wasn’t sure if that was true. Crewing for my father was one thing. I knew him. There was no mystery about who he was or what he wanted. But West was different.
“We’re going to have to figure out how to trust each other,” I said.
“I know.”
I knew that West was in deep with my father, but this was something different. West was the reason people feared Saint. He was the shadow Saint cast on everything around him. The haul from the Lark wasn’t just buying West’s freedom from my father. It was buying his soul.
“If you hadn’t known about the Lark … if you hadn’t needed it to save the Marigold, would you have taken me onto the crew?”
“No.” He answered without a breath of hesitation.
My heart sank, tears springing to my eyes.
“I don’t think I would have. I would have wanted you to get as far away from me as possible,” he admitted. “In a way, a part of me still wishes that we hadn’t voted you on.”
“How can you say that?” I said, indignant.
“Because you and I have cursed ourselves, Fable. We will always have something to lose. I knew it that day in Tempest Snare when I kissed you. I knew it in Dern when I told you that I loved you.”
“Then why did you do it?”
He was silent for so long that I wasn’t sure he would answer. When he finally did, his voice was hollow. “The first time I ever saw you, you were standing on the dock at the barrier islands. We’d made port at Jeval for the first time, and I’d been watching for you. A girl with dark auburn hair and freckles with a scar on the inside of her left arm, Saint said. It was two days before you showed.”
I remembered that day, too. It was the first time I’d traded with West. The first time I’d ever seen the Marigold at the barrier islands.
“You were bartering with a trader, arguing for a better price on the pyre you were hocking. And when someone called from the deck of his ship and he looked up, you slipped a blood orange from one of his crates. As if the whole reason you’d been standing there was to wait for the moment when he wasn’t looking. You dropped the orange into your bag and when he turned back around, you went right on arguing with him.”
“I don’t remember that,” I said.
“I do.” The shadow of a smile lifted on his lips. “Every time we dropped anchor at Jeval after that day, I had this constricting pain in my chest.” He reached up, tucking a hand into his open jacket as if it were there now. “Like I was holding my breath, afraid you wouldn’t be on the docks. That you’d be gone. And when I woke up in Dern and you weren’t there, it came back. I couldn’t find you.” His voice wavered, splintering the words. He looked so heavy. So tired.