Alphas of Black Fortune Complete Series (23 page)

The morning that the
Oso Armonia
left the island for the long journey back to fetch the rest of Kelly’s den, Cressida went to the village with Reza. Reza went to say goodbye to Kamala, but Cressida had another purpose in mind for her last visit before they finally took to the sea again. While Reza took his sister for a walk through the village, Cressida was left in the chieftain’s hut, where she waited at the low table until Prija appeared from one of the adjacent rooms.

“My father said you wanted to speak to me,” Prija said, and Cressida could tell that she was confused by that bit of news.

“I do.” Cressida got to her feet and approached the tigress. She smiled, even though it was awkward as hell. Reza had not told her anything of his day and night spent in the village betrothed to Prija, but Prija was beautiful and Cressida wasn’t stupid. There was, at the very least, attraction there. She understood it. And certainly she understood why Prija might have been drawn to Reza. “I have a favor to ask of you.”

Prija’s eyebrows shot towards her hairline, plainly surprised. “To ask of
me
, Keeper?”

“Well, that’s the thing,” Cressida said. She lifted her hands to the chain around her throat, and picked up the stone, looping it free of her neck and holding it in her palm. “I think the jewel needs to stay on the island. While I’m gone, I was hoping
you
would keep it for me, and the sanctuary.”

Prija’s bright green eyes widened in shock and she actually took a step back, a hand covering her heart. “Me? But…can you do that?”

“I’m the Keeper of the Jewel.” Cressida laughed quietly. “I think logically that means I can do what I like. Only we will be going on a long voyage, and a perilous one, and I don’t want to risk losing it.” She held it out to Prija. “Will you guard it?”

“But I have not been judged worthy,” Prija said.

“
I
judge you worthy,” Cressida told her. “And you’re like me, I think. Your heart is wild, and your will is free, and you won’t be swayed by anyone. I want you to protect the jewel for me while I’m gone, and the bears who stay behind to build, and the sanctuary itself. You can turn me down, of course, but you’re the one I choose to hold my place.”

There was a long moment when Prija simply gazed at her, astonished perhaps and overwhelmed and processing it all. Then, suddenly, she smiled.

“I always wanted a life that was bigger than a single island,” she told Cressida, eyes bright with delight.

“Me too,” Cressida told her, laughing. “Different island. Same idea.”

Prija came forward and took the jewel from Cressida’s hand. Its light flickered, changed, dimmed and went out, but pops of color and light like falling stars still shot through the stone. Prija looped the chain around her neck and settled it between her breasts, turning it in her fingertips.

“It doesn’t shine for me.” She sighed.

“Maybe it will one day.” Cressida shrugged, but she felt a great emptiness in her heart now, a warmth fled from her veins without the stone. Then she blinked, and laughed softly, because Prija had spoken in English. Or Cressida had heard her in English, because though the jewel’s light was dimmed, its power was not. “Thank you.”

Prija covered the jewel with one hand. “I’ll guard it for you until you return. Safe travels, Keeper.”

They sat together for a little while, until Reza returned with Kamala. He was startled to find Prija wearing the jewel, but when Cressida explained her reasoning, he offered no argument. It wasn’t until they were back in the dinghy rowing towards the ship that, in between strokes of the oar, he apparently became unable to help himself.

“Are you
sure
that was the right decision?” he asked.

Cressida frowned. “It was my decision. I never know if I’m making the right one, I suppose.”

“The jewel gives you great power, Cressida.” He frowned back at her.

“I know. But it also belongs here. And I don’t think I should take it traipsing about the globe with us. It’s precious. It should stay in the home we intend to make.”

She watched him row, saw his expression change as she spoke of making the island their home. She wondered if he hadn’t believed her before, if he’d thought she would never come back to this place. At last, he looked at her again, and he smiled a little.

“You are very brave,” he told her.

She smirked. “Or very stupid. I just try to do what’s right. Well—and to get what I want. And I never, ever want to lose the jewel in some terrible sea storm or something. Prija will take care of it until I return for it. Until we return for it with the others, for good.”

Reza squinted. “You really think you could be happy on the island, forever?”

She shrugged. “I’m not saying I won’t want to go on the occasional adventure here and there, but it’s a much better place than most. With you and Kelly, I think I will happy just about anywhere. I will try desperately to be happy wherever you are, anywhere that you are.”

Reza’s smile seemed to broaden. “I think maybe you’ve saved us all.”

Cressida laughed. “Wouldn’t that be mad?”

Reza just shook his head and rowed the rest of the way in silence. Later that evening, in bed, he showed her just how very safe he felt, and between the panting breaths and gasping cries, Cressida perceived his gratitude that their incredible, insane journey together should end in such promise, such bliss.

And then it was time to weigh anchor, and it had been so long since Cressida had felt unmoored that when the sails unfurled and she felt the breeze gust against them, the thrill of the sea lit through her like it was the first time. She stood on the forecastle with Kelly, watching for hours as the island got smaller and smaller and smaller, and finally disappeared from the horizon altogether.

Kelly arrived beside her, drifting a few fingers down her arm. “We’ll see it again,” he said softly.

She nodded. “I know. It just feels strange to be going…back.”

Kelly leaned over and pressed a kiss to her temple. She knew that his thoughts were heavy of late, that he had his den’s happiness to worry over. And the trip. They had all nearly died on the journey to the island to begin with. They might not even make it back. And it would take time to gather all the dispersed members of the den, all the women and children they’d had to leave on islands in the sea, people they’d left behind during these long months. But at least they had hope. They had the hope of a home. Cressida thought that was the singular thing that kept them all going. Certainly it was the one thing that they all had in common, no matter what incredible differences existed as well.

After months at sea, again, Reza was convinced that once they put to port, finally, on the island of his birth once more, he would never leave it again. Dry land. He’d have given anything for dry land for the rest of his days, firm ground beneath his feet that never moved. He simply wasn’t meant to be a sailor, yet here he was, at sea for now nearly two years of his life overall.

The journey back was no less perilous than the journey out. The sea cared not at all about man, or his intentions. It was a summer of storms, too, and more than once they were left adrift in the great, wide blue with torn sails or snapped rigging, nothing to do but sit and sew and starve until they could get moving again. What couldn’t be like before, however, was Reza’s position amongst the crew. Though none of the bears really understood the relationship between the three of them, over time they had grown to accept Reza a member of their den at last. They didn’t yet afford him the same respect and obedience that they did Kelly, but he knew that it would take time. Patience, determination and time.

It was quite the adjustment for all of them. Though the mark bound them together in love and affection, it did not make them any less fallible, any less mortal. Neither Reza nor Kelly were prone to fits of jealousy, but they had them. Neither one of them wanted to hurt the other, but they got into several raucous brawls on the top deck over whose night it was to spend in the captain’s quarters with Cressida. Who had, in all practicality, become the captain herself. On each of those occasions, she had emerged from her quarters and simply exiled them both to the barracks until they could cool their heads. The rest of the den, the crew, never chose between Reza and Kelly. They always chose Cressida. Slowly, her alphas were learning to compromise. They were learning to communicate better.

And there were nights when none of them could stand to be apart at all. Those nights were like being back in the cave at the stone sanctuary of the Keeper of the Jewel, a tangle of limbs and breath and sweat, the three of them discovering each other. Cressida had a gift, or perhaps the mark led her instincts, and even in bed with both of them she managed to balance them. She managed to love them both at once, and never did Reza feel that she showed any kind of favoritism. Even when he did feel those jealous pangs, knowing that she was with Kelly on an evening when he was alone, they sent him into a rage for loneliness, not envy. He missed her when she wasn’t in his arms, and he supposed Kelly did as well.

It was a dance, and one that they grew ever more skillful at dancing. By the time they put in to the first island port where they would find members of the den and restock the ship, Reza and his co-alpha and their mate had the moves damned near perfected. Reza and Kelly stayed more or less always in Cressida’s orbit, and the den orbited them. They were their own solar system, and Cressida the sun.

There were three small port towns where Kelly had been forced to leave off members of his den, three little dots on a map of the Caribbean, and each one presented the same obstacles. Taxes were expensive, and every town required a tax to put to port and a payment for the berth, and all the goods and supplies they needed were expensive, and also taxed. They’d begun to sell their own possessions because they were so short on coin, with no real time to waste ferrying cargo or people for a fee. Then, when they actually found the dispersed members of Kelly’s den, they had to convince them to come to the island.

Most of them did. In the first town, all of them agreed to come. There were a dozen people altogether, led by Cort’s wife, whose sister had been married to Harry, and those two women had fire in their hearts, to be sure. Reza liked them and their determination immediately. They were quick to say to hell with the small fishing village, and they came close to him and Cressida immediately, hugging and sniffing and curious. Ella, Cort’s wife, had a fondness for braiding Cressida’s hair, which she took with good humor even if Cressida had never struck Reza has a hair-braiding kind of woman.

In the second town, only one woman with her young son chose to join them. Kelly was crushed. The rest of the den left to survive there felt abandoned, and refused to acknowledge him as alpha again. They had resigned themselves to the life that he had left them to. Heartbroken, Kelly stayed in the captain’s quarters for a few days, drinking himself into oblivion. Reza said nothing of it, letting Cressida console him night after night as best she could. Reza, of course, understood being turned away from one’s family. He regretted that Kelly now knew what it felt like. No one should know what that feels like. Reza even brought him a flagon of ale himself on the third night, while the men were all in town enjoying a last night in port. Cressida had gone with Ella to take inventory.

“I abandoned them,” Kelly mumbled drunkenly, as Reza set the flagon down on the long table in the captain’s quarters. “I just lef’ them.”

Kelly was sprawled across the bed on his back, shirtless. Reza took a seat at the table.

“You knew some of them might not come back,” he reminded him gently. “The important thing is that
you
came back.”

“Late,” Kelly sighed. “Too late.”

“For who?”

Kelly lifted his head, squinting one eye at Reza. “Hmph.”

Reza tilted the flagon of wine to him. “You have fulfilled your word. You returned and offered them a home, as you said you would. Your debt is paid, my friend. I think you are not upset about that. You are upset that now you have nothing holding you back. Now all you have to do is live your life.”

Reza thought this was Kelly’s problem, because it was his as well. So much time spent on one goal: for Reza, it had been returning home, and for Kelly, it had been finding a home for his den. Now that they had accomplished these things, they were left to their own devices, and…what next? Once they made it back to the island, once the den was settled, life would simply…continue apace. The reality of having families and homes, of having attachments, was quite overwhelming for two men who had carried such a weight of loss between them for so long.

That night, Kelly flapped a hand at Reza and spluttered, “Piss off,” instead of acknowledging it. But Reza knew he was right all the same.

“You’re pissed enough for us both,” he muttered, taking his flagon of ale, and leaving Kelly to his inebriation.

The next morning, though, Kelly emerged from the captain’s quarters fresh and sober, and they weighed anchor and got on their way. One town left.

The morning, when they put to port in the last town, Kelly had expected Cressida to meet him on the top deck. She always accompanied him to speak with the families. Seeing him with a mate seemed to please most people, and if he was being really honest with himself, having her by his side gave him courage and strength and pride.

He knew it was going to be a difficult day, too. He was going to speak with Hilda, Esterbrook’s widow. It had been hard enough telling Harry’s wife what had happened, and she had Ella there to comfort her, and Cort to help her raise her son. Of course the den would collectively take care of Esterbrook’s children, two girls, but there was no one to comfort Hilda, really, except Kelly himself. And Cressida. He marveled sometimes at how well she understood and empathized with the women of his den. And without the Jewel of So Sur, even.

So he was somewhat at a loss when she didn’t appear, as she usually did, right as the town chapel’s bell struck seven, the sun an early-morning glow in the sky. He stood, waiting, for another quarter of an hour, and just as he’d resolved himself to go knock on the door of the captain’s quarters, she emerged from below decks.

“Cress?” He went to her, catching her hand, and raised his free hand to trail the backs of his knuckles along the curve of her jaw. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” She smiled, but she looked tired. “Just a bit of a bug, I think. I’m sorry I’m late.”

“Do you want to stay aboard instead?” Kelly asked, frowning.

She shook her head. “No, I want to go with you. I’m
fine
. Honestly. I’ll have some tea and be fine. Let’s go.”

Reza arrived on the top deck, too, and shot Kelly a nod. He’d hold the ship while they were gone. Cort arrived with a pack, a small bundle made up of all of Esterbrook’s things to give to Hilda, and they set off.

The town was small and compact, a naval outpost, so kept more or less in good condition, roads clean enough and safe enough. Esterbrook’s wife lived above the bakery where she worked, and she was so ecstatic to see Kelly and Cort’s faces that she burst into tears on the spot. First of joy, and then once Kelly had sat her down and Cort had given her the pack, her tears turned into agonizing sobs. It was horrible, as it had been with Harry’s wife.

“I’m sorry, Hilda,” Kelly told her softly. “He was a good man. One of the best. We all miss him. But he gave his life for us to have a home.”

Hilda nodded, sniffling into the handkerchief Cort had given her. “He always believed in you, James. I’m glad he wasn’t wrong. Of course I’ll go with you.”

Kelly smiled, sad and touched. “Let’s get your things packed up, then.”

And it was as they were helping Hilda fold what clothes she’d want to have on the island, and pack away what mementos they could reasonably fit, and get her two daughters packed as well, that Kelly realized that Cressida had disappeared again. She wasn’t in the kitchen helping Cort or in the bedroom helping Hilda. She wasn’t in the bakery helping the two girls or even outside just getting some air.

When at last he found her, he found her in the washroom.

“Cress?” She had a cool handcloth pressed against her face, and was slumped against the wall by a basin of fresh water. “Are you all right?”

She lowered the towel and looked at him, and breathed out a laugh. “I think so.”

He didn’t get it. “Are you sick? Do you need to go back to the ship? Do you need a doctor?” He went to her, pulling her into his arms and easing a hand over the pale fall of her hair.

She smiled and he was struck by how much affection he suddenly saw in the expression. Not that he doubt she loved him, but on this day in particular, she seemed to love him especially well.

“What is it?” he asked stupidly. “What’s going on?”

“I’m with child,” she told him, shaking her head a little. “You perfect idiot.”

Kelly stared at her, astonished, as joy and terror simultaneously gripped his heart, the joy more than the terror, but certainly both combined. He hugged her impulsively tighter, and then his grip gentled.

“Is it…me?” he asked her, blinking. “Or…”

“Well, I don’t know,” she admitted, looking earnestly back at him. “Does it matter?”

Kelly hesitated. He didn’t want to lie to her. So he paused, thinking about it for once before he just blurted any old thing, and found that in his heart, when he thought of the children of his future, they were as perfectly balanced as he and Cressida and Reza. So he shook his head, and smiled back to her.

“No,” he said quietly. “It really doesn’t.”