and yet she had no words to tell him.
Slowly, the rum did its part. The world coalesced further: her blood no longer hammered in her ears, her breath slowed to something less than near-hysterical gasps. She could hear the Morganse’s song of wind and canvas, and felt the ship’s motion with the swell. The sky was still blue, the sea was still as deep, and the world was still there, right where she had left it.
Nathan scuffed to a halt somewhere near. He made several false starts before settling on, “You’re rather good with a knife, for a woman, that is.”
“For a woman, I’ve had plenty of practice,” Cate retorted, bitterly.
“You failed to mention you’ve a skill at wrestling.”
She looked up, glaring. “For a woman?”
“For a woman.”
Nathan's tentative boyish smile touched a chord, and she reluctantly did so, as well.
Damn him for being able to make me smile on command!
“As I said, I had five brothers,” she said.
Sensing it safe, Nathan ventured nearer. Propping his hip against a chair, he loosely crossed his arms. “What you lack in strength, you gain in wile.”
Cate made an unladylike noise in the back of her throat. “I suppose that could be the story of my life.”
She emptied her glass.
“Aye, there’s a ring o’ truth in that,” Nathan said, refilling it.
Closing her eyes, she leaned back and sighed. “I’m sorry; I didn’t intend to…”
What? Make a complete spectacle of yourself?
Nathan rolled his eyes toward the slap of bare feet passing overhead. “Some of the hands think you devil-possessed. What with those eyes, and now this…Poor bastard, Pryce only figures you wish to cut his throat.”
“I suppose he would,” she said, grimly rubbing her face. “I’ll apologize.”
“Don’t be surprised if he runs at seeing you coming.”
“Is it that bad?” Cate peered up from under her hands.
Nathan contained a smile. “That bad.”
Groaning, she buried her face in her hands. “I don’t know what comes over me sometimes!”
In a moment of bald honesty, this wasn’t the first time, nor second, nor even third. The spells came from nowhere, dissolving as quickly as they erupted. Perhaps Bedlam was where she belonged, somewhere that she could be prevented from hurting not only herself, but everyone around.
Nathan took another drink and pensively rolled the bottle between his palms. “Darling, we all have our dunnage to lug about. ’Tis not necessarily the weight of it, but where we choose to stow it.”
Cate looked up into a gaze that allowed her a glimpse at the burdens that dwelt behind his curtain, not to equivocate, but to assure that she wasn’t alone. The heavily-fringed lids lowered; the curtain closed once again.
“Thank you, Nathan, I’ll remember that. Sometimes, you are a very wise man.”
He broke a square-toothed, gold-laced flash. “Scary, isn’t it?”
Chuckling to himself, he swaggered toward the door. He paused at the table to pluck a mango from the plate of fruit, kept there by Mr. Kirkland, in hopes of tempting his captain into eating. He sniffed it, and with a curl of his lip, put it back. He gestured toward the skylight, and the quarterdeck overhead, as he ambled out.
“I’ll be just there, if you find you’ve need of me.”
Once alone, Cate buried her head in her hands and gasped, self-loathing only adding to the dejection and embarrassment. On the brink of a breakdown, she grabbed the glass and quaffed it down. Balling her fists, she closed her eyes once more, and inhaled deeply. When she opened them, the world was still there. The terrors were gone…like a dream.
###
Dark was soon to fall. A thunderstorm had rumbled through earlier in the day. It had been Cate’s excuse for her self-imposed seclusion in the cabin. Too embarrassed to be seen after her breakdown, she had spent the remainder of the day there. Frustration had come in many forms during that time. She tried to read, but the words wouldn’t stay in focus. She tried to embroider, but couldn’t concentrate.
She had gleaned what embroidery supplies she could from the Littletons’ belongings and made up a small piece to work on. Needlework had been a lifelong love. It had also been her salvation over the last several years. Many a night had been spent hunched next to a sewing lamp, in order to meet a customer’s last minute demands. Now she had the joy of doing it at her leisure, the pleasure dampened only by the desperate limit of thread, only a precise amount being allowed each day.
The storm still hung in distant flat-bottomed billows.