Eternal Submission Part I

Part of me was certain that I was dead. The other part, the one where I choke up sea water onto an already wet ship deck, was positive that I somehow survived.

They knew it was dangerous in these waters. The Leviathan lingered in the area we were sailing through and the one hundred square miles surrounding us were its hunting grounds. So it was no surprise to me when four of presumably eight tentacles latched onto either side of the ship, causing it to creak and crack until it snapped in half. People always say the screams are the worst part. The ones that curdle your blood and lay siege in your bones. But I think for me the worst was when the screaming stopped.

It wasn't until I let go of the post I was holding onto and fell into the sea that I remembered I had no idea how to swim. Surrounding me were those the Leviathan hadn't yet taken to the depths, their bodies suspended in the water and slowly sinking, inch by inch. I did my best to stay at the top, my head above water, but it was useless. I was drowning. The air in my lungs gave out and I couldn't help it when my body reacted and inhaled the sea water.

I felt cold and warm all at once as the salt water filled my lungs.

As I began to lose consciousness, I looked up. I could barely see the sun through the top of the ocean. But it was there. Then the sky turned black and a pale hand reached out for me.

Death, I had guessed.

It was Death.

When I woke it felt like my eyes were dried out, my lids too stiff to open. My vision was blurred and going in and out. It hurts to breathe. But I had supposed it was good that I could breathe at all.

I felt warm. Something held me, and it felt like skin on skin.

I didn't care. I nuzzled closer to it, nudging my toes against this warmth. It seemed to tighten around me when I did this. Then something tipped my head back. I could hear a voice, something that sounded gruff but angelic in the way it urged me to take from the round shape pressed to my lips.

Water. Clean water. It coated my dry throat.

Death had come to quench my thirst, I thought. And I almost laughed. What need would he have to do this?

I fade out again, not wanting to wake.

My eyes fly open at the sound of a roaring laughter. My body practically shoots out of the bed and I scurry off to one side until my back hits a wall. As my eyes begin to adjust to the dim candlelight, I begin to not recognize where I am. The bed was a soft mess of sheets and blankets that had acted like a nest around me until I leapt away from it. There were a couple of lanterns hanging around the room, lighting the space just enough for me to notice the ornate molding, the desk which was nailed to the floor, the clothes which lay over the back of a gilded chair. A large set of doors ahead of me seemed the only thing that separated me from the laughter of men.

Drunk men, from the sound of it.

The whole room rocks slightly as a wave crashes against the windows behind me. I look up, hoping I would be able to open one or at least see through them. But the outside world was warped by the shape of the glass and there was no sign of a latch.

Suddenly everything went silent, save for the sea.

The voices I could hear now were hushed and muffled on the other side of the door. Then the sound of boots falling against a damp wooden floor grew nearer. One of the door handles turn quickly and the door itself swings open. A man with his back still turned to me yells at the men trying to peer inside the room, “ Mind your manners, dogs! ” Then the door slams.

I throw my arms up over my head, fearing the worst.

“Ah, you're alive. That's good.” His voice is rough, as if he had gargled salt water for too long, but I don't look up at him despite his concern for me. “Put your arms down, mo chroí.”

My eyes dart toward him as he takes a seat on the edge of the bed. I don't get a good look at him though. I was almost afraid. All I could see was a stark black coat with faded gold trim.

“Who are you?” I manage to say, my throat dry, my voice broken.

He laughs. “You’re on my ship, I ought to be asking who you are.”

Something clangs together. Metal against wood. The smell of food fills the air, a mere stew, but my stomach roared at the scent. He sets it aside tho, on the desk nearby. When my eyes dart back at him, trying to find his face, I only feel his hand wrap around my arm.

That's when I kick. I swing my foot at him, which he catches in his other hand and pins down on the bed. “I mean you no harm!”

I refuse to look up at him and instead swing my free arm at him, my hand connecting with his face with a crack . After this he becomes still, his breath steady. I could feel it against my cheek even though he hovered a good couple of feet above me. He was warm. Which made me all too aware of how cold I felt.

The hand which held my arm was not tight. It was careful, simply unmoving.

“You’re hurt, mo chroí.” His voice was soft.

Slowly, I look at him. My eyes first connect with his. Where I half expected nothing but blackness, I saw the grayish blue of the sea staring back at me. Sun kissed skin, younger and somehow older than I imagined all at once. His golden locks of hair were a little damp and hung over me on either side of his face. There looked to be a few weeks worth of not being able to shave on his face, hiding the shape of his jaw.

He looked like the sort of man my father would call trouble.

He tips his chin up and gestures to my arm. “Your arm. You're hurt.”

I followed his gaze to the pain I had ignored. Mostly because my entire body felt like I had been twisted into knots and not been allowed to come undone. But my arm was already bandaged, the cloth having been bled through, and the blood turned brown as it had already dried. It must have happened in the wreckage.

“I need to dress your wound again.” He had leaned a little closer to me at some point. But I hadn't realized it until I looked back up at him. “Will you let me do that?”

I give him a small nod and he lets me go.

“I brought you something to eat as well. But it needs to cool down.” He flicks a knife between his fingers, and I flinch as I sit up. “To remove the bandage, mo chroí.”

That wasn’t why I flinched. But I wasn’t going to tell him that. Gingerly, he takes my arm, almost out of frustration. But there was a hint of amusement.

“What's your name?” he asks as he cuts the crusted bandage from my arm.

“Tess-” My eyes lock on the bloody mess of my arm. The cuts were shallow enough, as if something had scraped against my flesh from wrist to the middle of my forearm. The man takes a rag from a place on the floor near the bed, wringing it out before he uses it to clean up the dried blood.

It stings a little, but it is otherwise tolerable.

“Do you remember what happened, Tess?” he asks.

I look at him, his focus strictly on my wound. “Leviathan. What is your name?”

He smiles just a little. “Kraven. Are you aware you're lucky to be alive? You're practically unscathed.”

A chill runs through me. I realize that I may be alive, but everyone else on the ship is dead. At least as far as I'll ever know. They were lost to the sea unless-

“Were there others?” I ask him anyway, hopeful.

He shakes his head. “Afraid not.”

A new bandage is tied firmly around my arm, the other contents disposed of. I flex my arm, allowing the new dressing to adjust to my movements. Kraven then shoved a bowl of stew in front of my face and produced a spoon for me as well.

“Eat up.”

I shove several mouthfuls of some kind of meat and half cooked vegetables into my mouth.

“Slowly! It would be a shame for you to die by choking on your own dinner after surviving a Leviathan attack.” Kraven urges me.

I nod, and I finish the bowl at a much slower pace, allowing my stomach to fill without aching.

But I was still hungry.

“How long was I out?” I wonder as Kraven takes the now empty bowl away from me.

“A few days.”

It takes a long while for it all to hit me as I look at Kraven a bit more. His clothes were fine but well worn, several decades old at least. He removed his coat, throwing it over the rest of the clothes on the back of the gilded chair. He rolls up his sleeves, revealing the tail end of a tattoo that I couldn’t quite make out.

“Are you a trader?”

Kraven takes his spot on the edge of the bed again, but only very little of it. “Depends on what you mean by that.”

The ship rocked a bit as it sailed over larger waves.

“I am a businessman, Tess.” He says my name pointedly, leaning forward and pinching my chin. I reel back, trying to peel away from his touch, but he only grips me harder.

“Why not leave me to the sea? You have no use for me.”

“You were alive enough to save, mo chroí.”

Whatever it was he kept calling me, it felt like a claim. “I'm nothing but extra cargo, then.”

He stares at me.

“I'll have people looking for me.” I told him. It is only barely a threat.

“Will you, now?”

I nod. But the truth was that it was all gone in that wreckage.

“You know. . . I don’t think you will.”

I had pulled my knees close to my body and wrapped my arms around my legs. Kraven's eyes were on me, assessing me. He leaned away and stood up from the bed again. And he looked almost offended, but understanding of why I was so scared. Or maybe he was pissed off that I reeled away from him.

“I'm not looking to bed you,” He says. But then he cocks a brow and flashes a smile. “ Yet .”

“Oh.” My heart, which had leapt into my throat, dropped back into my chest, and then through the floor. “You don’t have to do this-”

“Actually, I do. You’re exactly what I’ve been looking for. Shame the way you had to fall into my lap. But fate can be a fickle thing.”

“What could you possibly need me for?!”

He leans on his desk, arms folded over his chest. “What indeed.”

“If you’re going to kill me, just do it. Don’t act like-”

“Rest.” He cuts me off and pushes off the desk.

I blink at him. “What?”

“ Rest . I won't ask you again. We can talk once we’ve made port.”

I hate the way my mouth snaps shut in obedience. But he was the one with a knife on his belt. This was probably his ship. He held the power here. Not me. That shouldn’t surprise me, though. I’ve never held the power in my own life. Even when everyone who controlled me was gone. And what was I to do without them? My mother was gone, my father was dead now, even the man I was set to marry went down with that ship. We had very little money and almost no connections. None that would take pity on me, anyway. To do as this man says was all I had if I wanted to survive.

So I lay down in the bed, my body still sore, fatigued. “Then where are we going?”

He cocks his head slightly at my response. I can’t tell if I’ve made a mistake or if he has simply become curious. But he kneels low beside the bed now, peering at me with his stormy blue eyes. He reaches out, snatching my chin between his fingers.

“What did I tell you?”

I swallow.

He smiles, but it isn’t joyous by any means. There is something lingering beneath it. “You’re new. So I will forgive your ignorance for now. But you will learn that I am not fond of repeating myself. Now, what did I tell you?”

“To rest.”

“Precisely. And what are you doing now?”

I wriggle under his hand. “You’re hurting me.”

He yanks his hand away from my face, leaving my chin sore. “Oh, sweetheart, you have no idea.”

“So you do want to hurt me.” Why was I not listening to him?

“Keep disobeying me and I might.” His words are stern. “Don’t worry, mo chroí. You will enjoy it when I do.”

Shock seeps through me and heat pools between my legs. The ultimate betrayal. How could I enjoy something like that?

“Rest now. We should reach our destination by morning.” His words are final as he slips through the door. And this time, I listened.