Page 28 of Salt in the Wound

Indrie shakes his head. His throat is still sore, the bruises tender when he swallows, and he keeps his answer brief. "It's for Kael." A pause, and then, because honesty feels owed to the manwho pulled a stranger's hands off his neck: "I'm not planning on staying up late anymore."

He doesn't mention that Eskil's concern has changed his mind about going over the railing. He doesn't mention the warm hand or the low voice or how the stars had looked brighter through the lens of Eskil's attention. He certainly doesn't mention how he lies in his bunk at night and presses his own fingers to the bruise on his throat, the same spot Eskil touched, and it's nothing, it's cold, it's just his own hand, and the absence of Eskil's is a deprivation he has no right to feel.

Bohdi probably knows anyway. Bohdi knows everything that happens on the ship. Indrie has stopped being surprised by how much the man perceives and started being surprised by how little he says about it.

Bohdi taps his nose thoughtfully, the gesture so characteristic it's practically a signature, and asks, "Is there anything I can do to help?"

Indrie's chest aches.

He shakes his head. But he doesn't look up from his work, because if he looks up Bohdi will see his eyes and Bohdi sees everything and Indrie is not prepared to have anyone see the storm inside him right now. He keeps his gaze on the herbs, on the steady circular motion of the pestle, on the green-brown powder forming in the mortar.

Bohdi doesn't leave.

He's quiet for a long moment, long enough that Indrie starts to think maybe he's accepted the dismissal and is just lingering before going, and then a hand covers his.

Indrie stills. The pestle stops. Bohdi's hand is large and steady and tattooed and it rests over Indrie's with a steadiness that isn't commanding. It's just there. Present. Undemanding.

He looks up.

Bohdi is looking at him patiently, still smiling. Not his usual grin, the broad, mischievous one he uses as armor, but something quieter. A smile that carries more pain than he lets on, worn by someone who decided, somewhere along the way, that the best response to a broken world is to be kind in it.

"No matter what occurs," Bohdi tells him, each word chosen with care and delivered at a pace that says he wants Indrie to understand every one, "no one on this ship will hurt you."

Indrie swallows hard. The motion pulls at the bruises on his throat and he doesn't care. He stares at Bohdi and the words hang between them, a promise, a vow, an oath spoken in a small room on a rocking ship by a man who means it with his whole chest, and Indrie doesn't say what he's thinking.

He doesn't say he wants to believe it. That he already half believes it, has been building that belief brick by careful brick since the day a tattooed warrior knocked him over in a hallway and then helped him up and asked if he was alright. The belief is fragile, new-built and unsteady, and the flogging cracked its foundation but didn't shatter it, and Eskil's visit last night had started the repair. He doesn't say he's scared anyway. That the fear is its own animal now, separate from the rational part of him that can weigh evidence and draw conclusions. That he can know, intellectually, that these people mean him no harm, and still feel his body brace for impact every time a voice rises or a hand moves too fast. The knowing and the feeling live in different parts of him and they don't speak to each other and he doesn't know how to bridge the gap.

Finally, after a long moment, he nods.

Bohdi pats his hand. The gesture is brief and warm and final, and then he gets up and leaves, his boots quiet on the wooden floor, his broad frame disappearing through the doorway, unhurried, having said what he came to say and trusting it to do its work.

Indrie stares at the sleeping draught. The herbs in the mortar are ground to a fine powder, smoother than they need to be, overworked by hands that kept moving while his mind was elsewhere. He adds water, measures the ratio from memory, stirs it until the liquid turns the pale green-gold of chamomile and valerian. The smell is familiar, earthy, slightly bitter, the scent of sleep distilled into liquid.

He finishes it and pours it into a small clay vessel and stoppers it with a piece of cork.

Then he goes to find the sailor who needed it.

Chapter 12

The wind shifts in the late afternoon and Eskil can smell the storm long before the clouds darken the horizon.

It's a particular smell, ozone and brine and something metallic, the air itself sharpened, and he's been at sea long enough that his body registers it before his mind does. The hairs on his forearms rise. The back of his neck prickles. He looks to the southwest and the sky is still clear there, pale blue fading to white at the waterline, but to the north the clouds are building. Stacking. Darkening from grey to charcoal to the deep, bruised purple that means the sea is about to remind everyone on it who's in charge.

He begins issuing orders.

"Batten the forward hold. Secure the deck cargo, all of it, ropes and netting. I don't want a single crate loose when this hits. Someone get the spare canvas over the hatch openings. Move."

His crew responds. They've done this before, not this specific storm, but storms that carry the same weight, and the routine is in their muscles, drilled deep enough that thought isn't required. The ship shifts from the easy rhythm of a calm afternooninto the controlled urgency of preparation, bodies moving in practiced patterns, voices calling out confirmations as each task is completed. The mainsail is reefed, drawn down and secured to reduce the wind's grip. The deck cargo, crates and barrels lashed along the railings, is double-bound with fresh rope and netting. The hatch covers are battened and weighted. Below, Eskil can hear the muffled thud of the hold being secured, crates repositioned, loose items stowed.

He stays at the helm and watches his crew work and watches Indrie work alongside them without being asked.

The healer is on the main deck, sleeves rolled to his elbows, hauling rope with Ermin. Someone, Dagny probably, has shown him the storm preparation routine and he's executing it with the focused efficiency Eskil has come to expect from him. He doesn't fumble. Doesn't hesitate. Doesn't look around for instruction. He sees what needs doing and he does it, and when Ermin struggles with a knot on a barrel lashing, Indrie drops to his knees beside him and works the rope with his healer's fingers until the knot holds.

What strikes Eskil now is not how Indrie looks. He's already catalogued that, already committed it to the part of his mind he can't seem to lock shut, and dwelling on it further serves no purpose except to make him grip the wheel harder. What strikes him now is how Indrie moves.

Two weeks ago, the healer moved through this ship with careful, calculated stillness, navigating a room full of traps. Every step measured. Every gesture contained. His body held tight and small, shoulders drawn in, occupying less space to make himself less of a target. He'd flinched at proximity, stiffened at sudden movement, arranged himself around the crew's patterns with a precision that said his survival depended on never being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

That man is still in there. Eskil can see traces of him in how Indrie keeps his back to the railing rather than the open deck, in how his head turns toward any voice raised above conversational volume. But the man on the deck right now is moving with purpose rather than caution. His strides are longer, his posture open, and when Ermin calls to him from across the deck, Indrie turns toward the sound instead of flinching from it. He's not navigating a room full of traps anymore. He's navigating a ship he's starting to understand, surrounded by people he's starting to trust, and the difference is visible in every line of his body.