Hero's Journey

Chapter 73

Early update!

~Ashlee

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Delia's lips still tingle from her kiss even though it is hours later and night has fallen. Moonlight filters through the portholes, basking part of the brig in a silvery-blue glow. It is the only beauty in this place.

Delia leans against the wooden floor her chains are attached to. The acrid scent of urine pervades her nose, but she does her best to ignore it. She too will soon have to go to the darkest corner of the brig and release her bladder.

I am now one with the people I pitied. She realizes as she looks at the sleeping forms around her. The only sound is heavy breathing and a child whimpering in their sleep.

Delia runs a hand through her coppery-blond hair, it had come undone from its updo from the rough treatment of the crew, now she doesn't know where the strip of fabric that she usually binds her hair with even is.

It's probably lost among the dirt and huddled bodies.

She runs her hands along the goosebumps on her arms, trying to keep away the cold of the chilly night. In an attempt to ignore the cold, she looks at her friends that lay before her. Maude is curled up like a bulldog at the foot of a fireplace, Tavius is lightly sleeping with his hat pulled low over his eyes, and Kagon is leaning against the wooden pole across from her.

Her eyes can't help but trace the slope of his lips and the hard ridge of his stubble-lined jaw. To anybody he is the perfect, brave and handsome hero. He is those things, but to Delia he is more than that, he's Kagon of Pik, the idiotic and stubborn man that helped save her from the clutches of her oppressive father. Kagon is the man that she spent so much time adventuring with, the man she lied to, and the man that forgave her. All of these reasons are why Delia loves him.

As if he senses her, Kagon cracks open a blue eye. Delia's eyes flit away and she can feel her cheeks become rosy with the heat of embarrassment. After a moment Delia looks back over to Kagon only to see him watching her with a pensive gaze.

"Cordelia," He begins slowly, voice still gruff from sleep.

A ball of nerves clenches in her stomach at the mention of her full name. Delia bites her cheek, but otherwise makes no other movements.

"Were what you said and did earlier an act of preservation to Captain Baymont's threats?"

There it is. The chance for her to take back all that happened comes to her as easily as turning left or right.

I can turn left and blame my actions on Captain Baymont. Then things can go back as they were before. Or, I can turn right and admit that all I said was true. However, this path leads into the unknown where my future with Kagon is uncertain. The answer that my decision lies within is a simple question; do I want to go back to pining like a cowardly maiden after the man that she loves?

"It was an act of preserving your safety from Baymont's blade." Delia says. "However, everything I said and did is true to how I feel. Honestly," her breath hitched and her lips quirk into a nervously half-smile, "I love you, Kagon. I think that I always have."

Just like on The Sea Sorceress, Kagon's expression is unreadable to her. Delia's heart aches within her to kiss him again. She can imagine the chafe of his stubble that she committed to memory.