Page 49 of The Dark Elf's Secret Baby
Memories of being forced to stand at attention for hours surface in my mind. If I acted out, I might be forced to go on long marches before I could have dinner. I decide now that I will never do that to my own son.
We’re cutting through the dark waters quickly, thankfully. I can’t have anything delaying me from getting back to Layla or Jasper. It’s already late at night.
“Can we arrive before midnight?” I demand the captain.
“Not likely,” he answers, eyes never leaving the horizon. “There’s no good wind. We’re having to sail through as best we can.”
Not good enough. At this rate, we won’t arrive until tomorrow. I have to get there sooner. What if there’s already an assassin being notified by messenger karasu?
“Hoist the aft sail!” I order the crew. “Find a headwind, now, or I’ll have your heads!” They give me dirty looks but refrain from saying anything. A muscle in the captain’s cheek is flexing as he grits his teeth.
“There must be something you can do!” I shout at the captain. “I’m not in the mood to be trifled with! Get this ship sailing faster or you’ll lose your head!”
He glowers at me. This won’t do. I don’t have a lot of money but I’ll do anything to move this damnable ship along faster, even if it means rowing the thing myself. “Here,” I hold out a bag of coin, pressing it into the captain’s hand. “Find a way.”
He looks down and nods once. “Hoist the aft sail and wake the night crew up,” he yells. “Let’s get this boat back to Zerva.
I breathe a sigh of relief. We’ll get there as soon as we can now.
Layla is there right now, thinking that I don’t care about her. I should have fought harder, I should have told her the truth.
I can’t waste another minute of our lives without telling her how much I love her. She should know that I’ll follow her wherever she goes. If she wants to stay on Zerva, I’ll stay with her. We can build a life together there.
I’ll give up my job, my position as Lieutenant, anything. I just want to be there to see Jasper grow up. I missed so much and I can’t bear the thought of missing more. If I have to get a new job on the island, I’ll find a way to do it.
The wind picks up speed and I grin. We’ll get there before the break of dawn at this point.
My mind drifts back to my family as we sail farther away from Zhoig. I envy my brother. Salnath and Ursalah seemed so happy together. They’re so excited to welcome their daughter into the family.
He’s the only one in my family who has ever tried to be supportive. I don’t think I gave him enough credit growing up. It was hard to live in his shadow, always being compared to him.
But he seemed genuinely happy for me when I told them about Layla. That means so much to me, that I know that I have someone in my corner.
Gods, Salnath is so lucky. He gets to be with Ursalah from the beginning of the pregnancy all the way through. I wonder how Layla looked when she was pregnant. I’m sad I missed out on the sight of her with a rounded, swollen belly, carrying Jasper inside her like the world’s best secret.
I’m going to make it up to them though. I’m going to be the best dad, I won’t miss out on anything else. Jasper is going to have a baby cousin soon too! Maybe Jasper can teach Ariah a few things about magic.
Salnath wanted to meet them, I hope that means he’ll be okay with Ariah and Jasper being friends. I want them to be friends. I want my son to know his cousin.
We’re getting closer now. I can feel it in my bones.
Just when I think things are going well, everything starts to go wrong. The winds pick up speed and the night sky grows thick with clouds. Rain bursts from the cosmos like angry tears of the gods.
A storm hits, delaying our trip.
The captain orders me below decks, as I’m no use to the sailors and a liability if I get swept overboard.
I end up stuck in my tiny cabin, the ship tossing us from side to side as the storm rages. Glowering at the ceiling, all I can do is lay there.
Shit! Why are the gods against me? I still don’t believe in them but I’m starting to suspect that they have a vendetta against me for my disbelief.
I cling to the bed, praying in my head that I make it to Zerva without incident at this rate. If I perish, at least I die knowing that I did everything I could to get back to my family. It’s not like I haven’t sacrificed everything for her. What’s my life at this point?
The storm is tossing us about so hard that it’s all I can do to hold on. Should I try to get some shut eye? At this rate we’re going to take longer to get to Zerva than I expected.
It feels impossible to sleep but at some point I must drift off because I end up waking up in the morning to the first break of dawn, the storm over.
I rush to the deck, trying to figure out where we are. The captain looks irritable. “We’re about twenty miles off course,” he snaps. “Thanks to your orders to rush, we hit the storm at the wrong time. We’re going to be a bit later than I planned.”