All the Stars and Teeth(80)
At the sound of my door creaking open, I quickly wipe my eyes and dry my hands on my pants. Though I expect a freshly bathed Vataea, it’s Bastian who staggers in without knocking, a flask in his hand. He takes one look at me, and his face drops. “Are you crying?” he asks in a voice lightly slurred.
I jerk my head away so he can’t see my bloodshot eyes, and press my trembling hands into my cot. “Gods, what are you doing? Get out! This isn’t the time to be screwing around.”
“I’m not screwing around.” When I point to the flask in his hands, his face nearly melts off by how impossibly deep his frown stretches. “This? This is courage. Here, I brought you some.”
Though I turn to yell at him again, my mouth turns dry as I notice for the first time that his bloodshot eyes mirror mine. I know at once it’s not from the alcohol.
Slowly, I take the offered flask and pop off the lid, greeted by the sharp sweetness of rum.
“Where’d you find this?” I ask, my mouth burning as I take a swig and pass it back to Bastian.
“I’m a pirate,” he answers, though the edges of the words are bitter. He nearly spits them. “Every pirate has a flask.”
He takes a drink, and then it’s my turn again. This time I’m more liberal with my sips.
“If you came here hoping to continue what we started back on Keel Haul, you’ve picked the wrong night.”
Bastian’s nose crinkles. “I didn’t come here to fool around. There’s something—” His words cut off with a sharp hiss of air. He presses a hand to his forehead, squinting his eyes shut against the pain. Sweat licks his cheeks and the space above his lips as he crumples over, trying to steal deep breaths between his teeth.
I toss the flask onto the cot to grab his shoulders, steadying him. “Bastian? Hey, breathe! What’s happening?”
He tenses beneath my grip and remains like that for a long moment until his breathing steadies and his muscles begin to relax. When he lifts his head again there are tears in his eyes and a crack in his voice. “What’s happening is that I shouldn’t be here. I should have never returned.”
I help him straighten, wordless as I offer him the flask. He downs it and draws another from the inside pocket of his coat.
“Courage,” he says again, “and a remedy for straying too far from my curse.”
Though I pity him for the pain he must be in, I don’t let him take a drink from the second flask. I press it down when he lifts it to his lips.
“We need you sharp tomorrow.” I keep my voice stern. “I’m sorry you’re in pain, I truly am. But you have to fight it, just for this last night.”
Rather than argue, his face cracks and he drops the flask into my hands with a shaky breath. For a long moment he’s silent, staring straight ahead at the door as though he’s trying to burn it with his eyes. But then his shoulders crumple.
“Did you see the way Zale looked at me?” He practically chokes the words, shoving his face into his palms and breathing deeply into them. “Stars, she looked at me like I was him. Like I’m the one who did this to them. That’s how they’re all going to look at me, Amora. And I deserve it. I deserve the pain. I deserve this entire blasted curse. Look at me! I walked in on you crying, and didn’t even ask you what was wrong.” Looking down at his hands, he sighs and adds quietly, “I hate seeing you hurt.”
I desperately want to open the second flask and take another swig. I want to feel it burn all the way down, numbing my pain with each sip. But it’s as I told Bastian—one more day. We have to be sharp for one more day. “I’m crying because I’ve realized the truth,” I tell him quietly, letting the words ring with the full force of the conviction I feel. “I’m just as bad as Kaven. I’ve taken as many lives as he has, if not more.”
“Don’t say that.” Bastian’s snarl is so vicious that I flinch. “Kaven’s taken lives for no reason. He’s trapped Zale and her people here on this tiny stretch of land, and forced them to find a way to survive. He’s forced them to take a magic they don’t want, just so he can gain power. You’ve taken lives, Amora, but it was never like that.”
My focus wanders to my hands, tightly clenched and resting on my thigh. “It doesn’t matter. I still killed them. I still made that choice.”
“You thought you were protecting Visidia.” Bastian takes one of my hands and moves it slowly into his lap. “It’s not your fault you were told a lie.”
But I don’t want to believe those words. Because it’s like Zale said—I’m Visidia’s princess. How could I not know the truth?
“And it’s not your fault you were cursed,” I say, but Bastian’s as unwilling to accept kindness as I am.
Again he runs his hands over his face. Threads his fingers through his hair. He shifts and sighs until the distractions no longer work. “There’s something I have to tell you.”
I still. His chest stops its trembling as he looks straight at me, his words firm and determined. I’m not prepared for the next words he speaks.
“I haven’t been honest with you, and I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you this earlier, but I didn’t know how.” He pauses to run a tongue over his lips, and presses his free hand into his thigh, as if to brace himself for the words he’s trying to get out. “You need to know that Kaven’s not just some man on the island I happened to know of. You always wanted to know more about him, but I could never get myself to talk about him.