"So what? We are all best friends now?" Farzaneh hisses in my ear as we watch Aziz pull back the covers on a distrustful Kane.
"Yes. Aziz was just lacking love and acceptance. We've all been there." Now Aziz lays their hands on Kane's shriveled chest. The god of life's silver eyes are flashing in silent anger. Seems he doesn't trust Aziz much either.
"Everyone evil suddenly becomes good nowadays. Where's the true villains? It seems it's not going according to legend." Farzaneh crosses her arms and glares back at me.
"We all have a little evil in us." I reply smoothly, pointing first at my chest. "I'm a pirate at my core, ship or no. I torture for my information. I kill those I consider against my cause." I raise an eyebrow at her. "And you're..."
"A too-powerful witch who burned her lover alive by accident?" Farzaneh shoots back dryly.
I shrug with a grin. "I was going to say beautiful."
She snorts. "Good thing you didn't." Leans back, shaking raven hair from a long, browned neck. "I would've punched you, oh captain my ship-less Captain."
We settle in as Aziz's eyes glow an even brighter red, like hot coals lounging in a fire pit. Their skin takes on a fiery quality. Beautiful, but deadly. Magic soaking like venom from their veins as they press life back into Kane, undoing the Matriarch's curse.
Kane's skin grows muscle again, the lean figure of youth. Obsidian skin shining, chest filling out from a hollow shell beneath the covers. Broader shoulders. Gray hair turned back to a gleaming silver, like moonlit thread. Eyes glittering as stars, the eyes he'd plucked from Cato's head in revenge for blinding and betraying him. God of life. God of legend.
A god again.
"If we weren't related," Aziz quips, taking in Kane's newly remade physique, "I'd try my hardest to seduce you, darling."
Aziz falters a little, woozy from giving so much of their own energy to restore Kane from his curse.
Kane looks up and peels his lips back in a growl. Then he bites the anger back at seeing Aziz's weakness, sighing. "Thank you for healing me." Then he motions me over. Awestruck, I follow. "And thank you for healing Aziz from their heart's sickness."
I nod, my tongue still stumbling for words.
Farzaneh, rolling her eyes, answers for me. "The ship-less captain thanks you."
"Stop saying I'm ship-less." I feel a flush heat up my face.
"What?" She snorts. "Do men like measuring their ships against one another? Is this a masculinity thing?"
I'd be angry if she didn't have a point.
"You're awfully sarcastic."
She shrugs, a wicked gleam in her eye that suits her. I haven't seen it before. She's starting to act as brazen as Ali. I'd fear the day they ever got together. "Coming back from near-drowning tends to do that to you."
"Children!" Kane barks, getting to his feet. He leans on Aziz, whom he towers over by a head at least. His full strength really is a terrifying thing. "Where is my wife?"
"Here all along, delbar-am." Ode leans against the doorframe, a scimitar swinging with a deadly curve at her waist. She wears her armor, as always. Polished. Her hair is braided back tightly to mask the streaks of gray. She almost seems shy of her wrinkles, having covered her eyes in an extra layer of kohl.
"I'd expect you'd want me to undo your aging too..." Aziz sighs, walking over.
Ode takes in Kane and Kane, Ode. He runs his thumb along her wrinkles, the gray streaks in her hair. Aged from giving up blood in sacrifice. Aged from summoning death's gruesome forces. From battle and bloodshed and loss far too young.
"I didn't notice anything." Kane says, taking in the sight of her. His eyes, his gaze, the vulnerability making Fari and me feeling highly uncomfortable. As though we're intruding in their private sanction.
"Maybe take away the wrinkles, Aziz." Ode smirks. "But keep the streaks in my hair. They're like lightning. Thunder and power. Like wisdom and age, they make me strong." Ode pulls him to her, the act possessive. A claim.
"Should we look away?" Fari asks, hesitant.
I cover my eyes, peeking through. "I already was."
***
Hey Pirates,
Captain Dice is at it again with the ship-measuring contests.
Sigh.
-Sophia