Page 59 of Valour

She stuck her chin out. “That’s fine.” They were just words, after all. Words couldn’t hurt her.

“And do they know what you are?” he shouted into the night, sweeping the harpoon over the gathered crew.

Hester stilled, narrowing her eyes. What was he talking about? “What I am?” Wait…he wouldn’t…

“Do they know you are a WITCH?”

A gasp of shock came from the crew.

Her racing pulse kicked up a notch. Bastard.

Hester scoffed, thinking quickly. She had to discredit him. The crew couldn’t know her darkest secret. They would surely shun her. Her anger rose like a spring tide. “Don’t be absurd. His Lordship is mad! Mad with grief for his ship. He is raving—he doesn’t know what he’s saying.”

“I know what I’m saying, witch. Your magic lured the orca twice now. And have none of you noticed the storms that rattle Havenport when she is in a rage?” Septimus pointed the harpoon at Fliss, her face lined with shock. “Not even you knew of this?”

Hester stepped towards Septimus and pointed a trembling finger at him. “He is talking nonsense.” She looked at her crew and poured venom into her voice when she said, “You cannot honestly believe this.”

The crew looked between the two of them, and then Charlotte stepped forwards. “This is ridiculous. Hester is not a witch. Witches do not exist. They are made in the minds of men who fear women and their strength.”

“She is! She is a witch and a whore,” Septimus roared.

Hester snarled, fog clouding her vision, heat filling her veins. She might be a witch, or whatever she was, but she was no whore. She leapt on Septimus, kicking and scratching, and he staggered back, dropping the harpoon gun and grabbing her, knocking her to the ice. He pinned her, his heavy bulk weighing her down, and it was not at all how she’d imagined him on top of her.

He bent low and whispered in her ear, “I hate you. You sank my ship and I will never forgive you.”

“The feeling is more than mutual,” Hester spat, and she was glad the magic had been used up, because the crew would have certainly believed his accusations if she had anything left in her, for anger like she had never known it thundered through her veins.

He got up, leaving her lying on the ice.

She didn’t rise. Wanted to curl in a ball.

Hester stared up at the stars.

The Intrepid groaned again, sinking further into the sea.

Hours later, when it appeared that the orca had gone and the Valour was safe, Hester sat at her dressing table, the lamp burning low. She opened the drawer. Inside lay the vibrant red of the torn dress from the night she’d flashed her tattoo at him, all those months ago. The colour seemed so strange after all the white. She ran her fingers over it, pushing it away to reveal the beautiful knife that Septimus had once left in her wall. The one she should have sold. She stared at the mark in the wood by the door. Her heart panged, face crumpling, eyes burning. The ache in her chest was unbearable.

It was all her fault.

All of it.

A banging on the door snapped her from her thoughts, and she shouted, “Go away.” She didn’t wish to see anyone, was content to wallow in her grief as long as humanly possible.

“No. I’m coming in.” Fliss opened the door.

“Oh. It’s you.”

“Who did you think it was?”

She had hoped it was Septimus, come to make amends. “Never mind.”

Hester bit her bottom lip and scowled slightly, eyeing Fliss. There was hurt in her mate’s eyes. She’d seen it before. Seen it when she had ripped Fliss’s stuffed teddy when they were little, seen it when her first love had broken her heart, seen it when she lost the only photograph she had of her dead parents.

“It’s true, isn’t it?” Fliss asked, arms folded.

Hester dug her nails into her palms. “What’s true?”

“You’re a witch.” Fliss had said it with such conviction that she couldn’t lie any longer.