Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 144411 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 722(@200wpm)___ 578(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 144411 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 722(@200wpm)___ 578(@250wpm)___ 481(@300wpm)
I look back over at Ramsay, who has now borrowed the whittling knife from Drakos and is attempting to carve something out of a wood plank, laughing as he goes, Henry looking on in excitement to see what he will create.
“He’s a good man, Maren,” she adds with emphasis, leaning in to tap her shoulder against mine. “He may be rough around the edges, but pardon me for telling you this, I haven’t seen him this happy in a very long time.”
“Happy?” I ask, puzzled. “I assumed he was always like this.” Not that Ramsay has been joyful all the time but he certainly doesn’t have the seriousness of his brother.
“He can be brooding for sure,” she notes with a smile. “Nothing like Thane, of course, he’s a grumpy bastard by nature. However, before you came along, there was an inherent restlessness with Bones. The way we’d cross the Pacific over and over again. Always searching for the sea witch, as if that would bring him peace. The thing is, and I do hate to say it, but even if he finds her I don’t think killing her will bring him peace. His daughter is gone and no revenge will ever bring her back.”
I nod, though I don’t want her words to be true. Will killing Edonia bring me peace? Perhaps not. But I don’t even want her dead necessarily, I just want my fins back and my world back.
I still want that, don’t I?
“She also has that book,” I say. “The magic book that his witch wife wrote for him.”
“Aye, that too. But he doesn’t realize the book is pointless.”
I look at her in surprise. “Pointless?”
She takes off her hat and adjusts a few strands of wayward red hair before putting it back on. “What is the book going to do for him?”
“Isn’t it a way for him to access more magic?”
“It is. But what does he really want?”
“His wife back,” I whisper, trying to ignore the knot in my stomach. “Can the book bring her back?”
She gives me a sympathetic smile. “No. It can’t. And I know Bones has made peace with her death. It’s been a very long time, Maren. He’s let her go. He’s moved on.” She sighs. “But the book, he has not. His daughter he has not forgotten. His grief for her runs deep. For he knows that he can’t get Hilla back, but he can get the book back and he thinks that it’s the same thing. The book to him is his past. He needs to learn to let that go, too.”
“And you haven’t voiced this to him?”
Sam laughs. “Good heavens. You think he listens to me at all? He thinks the only reason I married his brother was to annoy him for the rest of his life.”
“And that wasn’t the case.”
“No, just a bonus, if you will,” she says with a smirk that causes a dimple in her cheek. “Though I will tell you, Thane wasn’t my first choice.”
My brows go up. “No? You wanted Ramsay?”
She nods. “Aye. I did. I had a wee crush on him, as did all the girls in Port Royal. Every time the Nightwind would come into port, I hoped I’d get Ramsay alone. I was a bar wench at one of the taverns, only came from Scotland a few years earlier. Had no idea that they were the same as me, the Dearg-Diulai, I only suspected it, the way you can sometimes tell where a person’s from. We have this sheen, ya see? One night I stole upon the ship, thinking I would seduce Bones in his bed. I got the wrong bed.”
“No,” I exclaim in a hush, looking back over at Ramsay and Thane. They both share the same strong jaw, thick hair, build and height, but Thane is an inch or two shorter and a little more square in the face. Here Ramsay’s hair is long and a deep dark brown, but Thane’s is a little lighter and short, cropped close to the head. Though they both remain frozen at age thirty-five, Thane does somehow look a couple of years older, though perhaps it’s just his mannerisms.
“One thing lead to another and bam,” she says, pointing to Lucas who is talking to his father about something. “I was with child. Soon as Thane found out, we were married and I was the newest member of the Nightwind.”
“And you never told Ramsay this?”
She tips her head back to the sky and laughs. “Oh, he knows. I remind him all the time. He was with Venla at the time anyway, it was a fool’s game for me, but I was young and,” she shrugs, “it all worked out, didn’t it? Yet another reason I was grateful for the ship. You could get pregnant out of wedlock here and not be shunned and condemned. Can’t think of a better place to raise our boy to be honest with you.”