Empress of the Sea|✔️

Chapter 23

***

Aeryn spent every minute in her thoughts.

She was about to spend another hour, impervious to the words of Juele and Iona on the White Crow, but Erel interrupted her plans.

"Aeryn, get to Aerel right now. Waste no time; I will meet you there."

Snapping back to her senses, Aeryn commanded her crew to get ready for hard-sail.

She answered none of Juele's questions or calmed any of Iona's concerns as she made her way to the ship's steering wheel.

Though the captain was surprised with Iona's ability to handle herself around the prince, considering how she spoke of Juele, she imagined Iona's reaction to being so close to him very differently.

Then again, Aeryn knew very little about her crew. The most conversation she had with them were orders, commands, and snippets of small talk.

"Captain," said a thick voice.

Aeryn turned, and her eyes laid upon the gunner of her ship.

Reyna Nair stood with perfect posture with a pistol in each of her thigh holsters. She gave a quick salute before speaking once again. "I'm sorry to be here when I should be preparing for hard-sail."

"That's alright. What is it?" Aeryn asked, bringing a hop to her shoulders and a grin to her lips.

Reyna scratched her hair, grimacing at the wooden floor.

"You can tell me."

"River...he..."

"What is it? Tell me." Aeryn had never seen Reyna so unsure of herself. She rarely met her gunner or spoke with her, but she knew when others slumped when she left the room and kicked dust under the carpet when she came, Reyna was genuine. She never slept on the job and always kept things clean. She was much more responsible than Iona, and it hurt when Reyna refused the quartermaster position.

"Come see," Reyna muttered. She held Aeryn's hand and pushed her brown hair out of the way. Odd, considering she always kept it in a braid. Reyna led the captain downstairs to the area where sailors would hard-sail.

The mast and wheel used to pull the anchor from the water stood in the centre of the cramped room. Aeryn couldn't put her finger on its exact name. "What's the problem?"

"We can't get the anchor up fast enough. I'll have to go on land and get some repair items to fix it. I'm guessing all the hard-sailing put a lot of strain on the technology down here. It'll take a few days to fix, but I suspect we won't be able to hard-sail for a few months."

Aeryn cursed under her breath. "What about River? You were talking about him."

"River," Reyna muttered. Her brother's name felt sour on her tongue. She knew he had broken a small part of the mast months ago, and that small tear had broken the whole system. But then again, no matter how much of an idiot he was, protecting him from Aeryn clawed at her. She had plans to sell him out, but with the captain in front of her, she changed her mind.

She would deal with River later.

"Nothing's up with him. He just...puked on Ryker's shoe." The lie in her words was evident.

Aeryn laughed. "Does he need some medicine?"

"I thought he did, but he'll be fine. I'm sure of it."

Aeryn put her hands on her hips. "Come up on the docks. Chit-chat, have fun. We're in the middle of nowhere, and we're stuck here for a while, so might as well enjoy yourself."