The Black Lung Captain - Chris Wooding [157]
“It doesn’t have to happen that way,” he said awkwardly.
“Yes, it does. I can’t be here with you and there with them. There’s no weakness allowed in that world.”
He turned to her, swept his hand down to indicate her, head to foot. “This …” He fought for the words. “This isn’t weakness. When you put on all that shit and turn into the queen bitch of the skies, that’s weakness.”
She nodded faintly. “Perhaps you’re right,” she said. “But I live in a world where men judge me by my appearance. If I came to them as I am now, they’d see a woman. Trinica Dracken—Captain Trinica Dracken—needs to be more than that.”
Frey felt a surge of frustration. Why did she need to be so obtuse? How could she agree with him and still refuse to see what he wanted from her?
This past month, he’d hardly given a thought to that hollow sense of worthlessness that had settled on him. In fact, it had stopped bothering him completely. Perhaps it was because, in trying to catch Grist and prevent a disaster, he’d been doing something vaguely noble and selfless for a change. Or perhaps it was because he’d been doing it with Trinica at his side.
But now change was coming, and he was afraid. He’d got used to having her around. He didn’t want that to end.
Suddenly he wanted to do something to stop her. It couldn’t finish this way, with a weak and bitter goodbye. Once she was gone, once she was back with her crew, then all this would fade from her mind. He didn’t want her to forget him. That would be the worst thing imaginable. Even if she came to hate him, he couldn’t bear to be forgotten.
He slipped off his gloves and pulled off the silver ring around his little finger. Then he held it out to her in his palm.
“Oh, Darian, please,” she said. “Your ring? Isn’t my word good enough for you? You want to keep track of me too?”
It wasn’t quite the response he was expecting. “I just …”he said, but as usual the words crowded up in his mouth and nothing much came out. “I want you to have it.”
She looked at him oddly. “Why?”
“Next time you’re thinking of robbing me blind, I want you to look at this and remember … how good we were together.”
It had started out as a halfhearted attempt at levity, but that only made the finale more pathetic. Frey could feel himself turning red. Damn it, why were unfelt emotions so easy to express, when the real ones tied his tongue?
She didn’t laugh. Her face was solemn, and she had a fragile look about her. “Alright,” she said quietly. She slipped off her glove and held out her left hand.
He took it carefully. Handling her as if she were porcelain. Her skin was cold and dry. “Maybe I can find you again, after all this is done,” he said.
“That might not be a good idea,” she replied.
“Never stopped me before,” he quipped. Bravado made him feel less nervous.
He slipped the ring onto her little finger. Her fingers were smaller than his, and it didn’t fit.
“It’s kind of big, Darian,” she observed gently.
He tried the next finger, and it slid on perfectly and stayed there.
Her gaze flickered upward, met his, and held it a long time.
There was nothing in his head. A wilderness of thought, blasted white by the moment. There was only her, the planes and curves of her face, the intelligence behind those eyes. As long as those eyes stayed on him, everything would remain as it was, beautiful as frost. Her hand still lay in his, but now it was warm: thawed by his touch, perhaps.
All he wanted was that she’d never stop looking at him.
But then she drew back, and her gaze fell. She took her hand away from his and put it back inside its glove. “I must go,” she said. “Goodbye, Captain Frey. I’ll see you on your return.”
She walked away from him, back toward the Ketty Jay, not meeting his eye. He looked out over the docks and listened to her boots crunch on the snow until he could hear them no more.
He walked around for slow hours before he went back to the Ketty Jay. He wanted to give her time: time to change herself, time to leave. It was only after they were airborne and on their way back to Tarlock Cove that