Free Mutineer by J.A. Sutherland Page B

it to the table. He set it down and stepped back, as did all the others. One of the chocolates had been bitten in half and a viscous, bright red fluid seeped from it. It gave off fumes that didn’t seem to have a scent, they simply stung the eyes and nose viciously.
    “What is that?” Timpson asked.
    Alexis stepped over to them, squinting and sniffing as she opened her own box of chocolates. “I believe it’s a sauce of Shimea reaper chilies. I’ve noted the men challenging each other to try the stuff — quite soluble in alcohol, I’m given to understand.” She looked at each of the others, eyes wide. “I do hope my own chocolates don’t have the same issue.” She took one from the box in her hand and popped it into her mouth, feeling a bit of anxiety as she bit down that she might have grabbed the wrong package. “No,” she continued, chewing. “These are quite fine.” She held the box out to Timpson. “Would you like one? I’m quite happy to share, of course.”

CHAPTER SIX
    The shadows were closing in on her from every side. Dark, flowing masses, reminiscent of the darkspace clouds all around her.
    Alexis knew what was next — dreaded it, but knew.
    She turned and the shadows began to come together, solidifying into a figure. Head and face a mass of darkness, with barely the hint of features, but she could imagine them well enough. Dirty, pockmarked skin, long greasy hair, and a mouth filled with half-rotted teeth — the face of the pirate captain, Horsfall. Her last real sight of him vivid in her memory. His gloating, confident smile as he told her that she needed him to pilot the ship, Grappel , with its sabotaged navigation plot.
    The pistol had bucked in her hand, not even leaving time for his confident grin to falter before the bullet she’d fired struck him, punching a neat, dark hole just to the left of his nose. The part of her horrified that she’d killed a man warred with the part that was disappointed she’d been off-center at less than five meters distance. Followed quickly by a roiling sickness in her belly that she could even notice her aim when a man was dead, and fear of what that meant about her.
    The shadowy figure raised an arm, hand extended to point at her in accusation. Behind Horsfall, more figures formed. Only a few at first, but then dozens, hundreds more. One by one they raised a hand to point at her. Some she knew, though their faces too were lost in shadow. Hadd, a topman lost in the Dark when she’d failed to save him as she should. Corsey and Bays, two marines the pirates had killed when she’d failed to divine their intent to retake the ship. Robert Alan, who’d saved them all aboard that ship — and died for his trouble when she’d failed to see his intent. Even the pirate, young Brighty, whose last days had been filled with terror — terror of her and her threat that she’d put him over the ship’s side to die alone in darkspace while she watched. Terror she’d put in him by telling him she’d do that very thing unless he obeyed her. Then, when he’d done what she demanded and piloted the ship for her, she’d let them hang him as a pirate without even trying to stop it. If she had thought to speak on his behalf, perhaps he could have been saved.
    “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
    The figures she didn’t know, though, were the worst. There were so very many of them, forming and crowding forward to accuse her. Who were they? Had she wronged so many? Failed so many? She didn’t see how that could be … there were hundreds of them now, and she was but sixteen-years old. Or did she not recognize them because she had yet to fail them?
    That thought drew a moan from her as it always did.
    The figures drew closer, merging into a single, rolling mass.
    “I tried!” Alexis cried out.
    The mass rolled over her, consuming her like the darkspace winds.
    “I’m sorry!”
     
    “Oh, for all that’s holy, Carew, will quit your moaning!”
    Alexis’ eyes flew