Winds of Fate [Books IV - VI]

Chapter 189: The Guiding Hand

Eleanore takes a step outside, but she cannot stand seeing Sparta's open deck knowing Torkin is not well. Yet I am the Captain here... She sniffles. No. I can't... but am I not making everything feel direr, if I act like this? Seeing she is already outside, Eleanore resolves that she will just take a deep breath since she has mentioned anyway for the men to come up should they want to talk to her. As much as she loves them, she also wants them to make a choice on their own, without her influence.

She tucks her hands in her trouser's pockets and gazes up the skies. Something stirs within her soul. She grasps onto the rails and looks down at the still waters of the harbor between her and the other ship. In the quiet. Her eyes close. She quietly walks down the gangway. It is near noon, and few have docked anew in their part of the port, for it is really far from the city, so there are nearly no dock workers except for those who are walking by. Ensuring she is hidden under the shadow of the ship, Eleanore carefully climbs over the edge, the large boulders...

And takes off her boots.

She sits on the boulder and lets her feet soak in the cool seawater. Beside her, Sparta bobs gently from the swell coming afar. Unable to form coherent words, she could only pray and plead healing for her poor parrot, for Guadalupe and her poor family... and despite her hesitance too, she sighs deeply and remembers the words of the Lord, to forgive and bless our enemies. If anything they need His light and saving grace moreso now, and thus she pleads guidance for Pilar as well, her father the Cacique, and the whole village.

Tears spring in her eyes, but a heavy load eases from her heart, as if Someone had carried it away from her instead. I'm so sorry. Eleanore presses her hands to her eyes, yet the wind caresses her hair, her back... like a strong arm surrounding her, and she bares her whole heart to the Almighty. For her crew, she didn't want them to perish; may He guide them all as they decide. For Havana and Nassau, both lands still under empires—one day, may they see freedom, but today, may He spare them from war, and if war should be in the grander scheme, may He deliver them through it. For her family, her mother in the In-Between, her father out here in the Caribbean, for them to be safe... for them to be assured that she is well, despite it, and that she loves them both so much, much more than she could ever say; may she be given the chance to show them that love, especially her father, who is the one left in the land of the living.

And for Anton, her prayer remains. May his eyes be opened; may he know that he is not too far gone from the love of God. It is not Jones who has the final say. Never, she weeps, just as I was freed by You from Jones' power! Eleanore presses her hands together to her heart, and offers all her despairing and tainted thoughts at the feet of her Lord. For You make everything new and good, she pleads, You turn darkness into light...

Please... please...

And she trails off, calling on His name, on that boulder, in perfect quiet. Her heart then becalms like the soft waves lapping her feet. Promises she has not read for so long and could not read now without a copy of the Holy Book, are whispered directly into her heart. Eleanore opens her eyes, warm from tears, and the breeze blows softly past her. From between these ships, she is given the view of the horizon, the Caribbean stretching out to all ends of the other waters, and where, above, the sun illumines the land and sea with gentle, golden light.

Sus misericordias... nuevas son cada mañana. She breathes in the cool wind. Your mercies are new every morning.

Great is Thy faithfulness.

"Thank You," she whispers to the sky, where Sparta's masts, with the sails all rolled up, reach for heaven. Eleanore lets out a deep breath and nods, her blood singing in her veins again. She has a new morning, and the day is not yet done after all. Much could happen; she must not miss it. Encouraged, she pulls up her feet and dries it, wears her boots... and climbs back up again.