Dark Tides (Kingdom of Bones #2)

Original Edition: ◇ Chapter 14 ◇ Smuggler's Harbor ◇

CSILLA

Silver Sea

Mid-Rainrise

Csilla sat in the crow's nest of the Wavecutter, feet dangling down over the edge while she craned her head back to watch the sky. She'd hoped tonight there would be stars to distract herself from sleep, but there were only clouds to greet her.

Sleep wasn't something she allowed to come anymore. It would creep up on her every night, dragging her eyelids down, her dreams trying to take her captive, and every night she'd find herself in a different part of the ship, awake with her mind wandering.

Catching sleep in spots during the day was something she resorted to, but even then, she'd started to feel the dreamwraith's presence lurking under the sun with her, looming over her like a shadow no one else could see. She'd tried to tell herself differently, that it was just her guilt eating away at her, but she knew the truth. The dreamwraith would continue haunting her until it had its fill of her torment. Would anything be left of her then?

There was a flash of blue in the distance. Odd. The cloud cover had been increasing the past couple of days, but they hadn't seemed dark enough to promise a storm.

"Storms out there," suddenly came a voice from below.

Csilla glanced behind her to see Flynn's sand-colored mop emerging through the hole in the middle of the crow's nest. She turned back to the railing she straddled. "Looks like it."

A bit of knocking and scooting around and Flynn sat down next to her, letting his own legs hang down by hers. "That storm in the distance isn't the only thing on that mind of yours though, is it?" One of his wry smiles threatened to unlock her secrets.

"You always seem to know when I'm swimming in my thoughts," she said, tucking back a curl that had blown loose from her scarf.

"You disappear every night," Flynn said, leaning back onto his hands and looking up at the sky. "It wouldn't take a brilliant mind to figure that out." A smile lifted his tone. "Unless you think I have a brilliant mind?"

Csilla chuckled. The first genuine one since the masquerade party.

"Do your dreams plague you in the day?" Flynn asked. "It's fine if you don't want to talk about it, but I am curious."

"You always are," Csilla said. In the past, this would be the part where Csilla would push him away and mock the idea of vulnerability, but up in the nest it was just the two of them, two birds flying high above the sea. As she gazed ahead into the night without the comfort of the stars to guide them, the unknown should've rattled her. Yet next to Flynn she felt safe. With him she could spread her wings, with him she could be free.

"The wraith only visits me at night," she said. She glanced down at her legs, focusing on the scuffs at the knees of her pants, trying to somehow anchor herself to the conversation. "I've stopped sleeping at night because..." She paused. Csilla could wear an intimidating mask and say the words that needed to be said to gain the upper-hand against those who challenged her. She always promised herself she wouldn't let others see the holes in her armor, but the holes had only spread.

"...I'm scared that if I fall asleep, I won't wake up again."

Flynn grabbed her hand and she didn't pull away this time.

"So that's why I found you sleeping in the cargo the other day," he said. "You were even snoring."

A small smile escaped from Csilla. "It seems to only feed on my dreams at night," she said. "But lately I've been feeling its presence during the day too. Maybe it's getting stronger."