Song of Ashes

25: In Extremis

"Just leave her be."

Sarka was sitting on her canvas bed. She hadn't moved from the place where she had nearly been strangled the night before. It was before dawn, but folk rose early on the ship; the crewmen's sleeping quarters were empty of the day crew and those who worked overnight had stumbled down to take their rest.

Etza's voice came from somewhere behind Sarka. She did not turn to look.

Someone else said something in response. Sarka thought it might have been the first mate, but as her mind drifted, she failed to piece his words together.

Etza's voice was clearer. "Well? Sarka, did one of my men attack you?"

Sarka shook her head, her unwashed curls brushing her cheeks. She heard Etza's boots moving away across the deck toward the ladder that would take her abovedecks. After a moment, the heavier steps of the first mate followed her. Distantly, as they climbed, Sarka heard Etza again. "You know what's happening, Arjan, and there's nothing we can do. Leave her be."

Alone again in the dim belly of the ship, Sarka let her eyes fall closed, sitting with her knees pulled to her chest and her head against the wall. She was so tired. She did not know how a person could be this tired and live.

Perhaps they couldn't.

Sarka had decided in the darkest hours of that morning that throwing herself overboard would be the easiest way. She could take her own knife to her wrists or her throat, but that would be dramatic and messy-and it would require more bravery than a fall. Never having encountered a body of water larger than a well, Sarka could not swim. She could simply let herself tumble off the deck, and then she would drown. By the time she had any second thoughts, she would be beyond reach, beyond help.

With an effort, Sarka pulled herself to her feet and followed the path Etza and Arjan had taken up to the deck. She made her way to quiet part of the ship. There, she stood with her hands on the ship's railing, looking out across the ocean as the flaming sun rose above the horizon in an explosion of carnal color: the ruddy pink of a cheek, the purple of a bruise, the blue of a vein beneath the skin. It seemed impossibly beautiful, almost vulgar, to a woman whose eye had seen nothing but gray skies all her life.

The light reflected off the crests of the waves in slivers of gold. Beneath, the depths beckoned, black and fathomless.

Sarka had not succumbed to the idea that she deserved to die. She felt no guilt for having fled her homeland and her goddess. But going on would mean coping with the strain, the exhaustion, and the fear.

"Took my words to heart, did you? Sooner, rather than later?"

Sarka turned and saw Captain Etza standing a little distance along the railing, her arms folded. She had tied her many braids loosely back from her face, and in the light of the dawn she was strikingly beautiful. Sarka did not respond.

"Well? You're quiet, all of a sudden. You wouldn't shut up and let us alone back in Horn Harbor. Now you're here, which is what you wanted-and you're giving up. I should not be surprised. Now you've lasted as long as Ro's worthless brother and all your fight has run out. There wasn't that much in the first place, was there, girl?"

Sarka ignored her, looking down into the inky sea.

"I almost had hope for you, but you're just as weak as the rest of them."

"I'm weighing my options," Sarka said. "Call me weak when I'm dead."

She turned away from the ocean and the vibrant sunrise, making her way toward the hatch that would take her belowdecks. She brushed past the formidable captain without a glance.