Tears of the Sea by MaryLu Tyndall

Author:MaryLu Tyndall
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ransom Press
Published: 2015-07-08T01:44:04+00:00

Chapter 16

There wasn’t a spot on Perdita’s body that didn’t scream in pain. From the raw skin beneath the ropes that bound her legs and hands, to the roots of her hair that had been yanked repeatedly, to the bruises where she’d been punched and slapped, down to the burns on the bottom of her feet—each torture inflicted by the madman now pacing before her in a small storeroom in the bowels of the Scepter.

He rubbed the dark stubble on his chin and glared at her with eyes like a sea serpent. “What does it take to make you cry, mermaid?”

Perdita struggled against the twine that bound her to the chair and fought back the tears this man so diligently and desperately had tried to extract from her for hours. “I told you I am not a mermaid.”

“Then shed a tear and prove it!”

Monstrous shadows, cast by the light of a single lantern, stalked across the bulkhead, witnesses of her judgment. “I don’t know what I have done to make you torture me, Mr. Verrad, but I beg you, please let me go.” She tasted blood on her lips and prayed his strikes to her face had not marred her beauty overmuch.

He snorted. “If you would only cry—just one tear—I would release you. It is a simple request.” He leaned to study her as one would a strange fish caught in a net. “Yet for some reason you’ve not shed a single tear when most women would have been reduced to a sobbing puddle. Why is that?” He brushed a lock of hair from her face.

“I told you I don’t cry easily.”

“Humph. Apparently.” He brought himself up and drew his long knife. “Could you not make an exception for Verrad? Hmm? Most women—if you even are one—are experts at conjuring up tears on a moment’s notice.”

“I am not most women.” Light flashed at her from the blade, and she trembled at how far he would go to prove his theory.

“Precisely.” He grinned. “Which is what has brought us here.”

The ship creaked and groaned as her insides were doing, and Perdita searched her memories of when she had slipped up, for the mistake that had roused his suspicions.

“What makes you think I’m a mermaid?”

Verrad shoved his disheveled hair back, his eyes dark and sinister. “Damien Gund believes you to be so. That’s good enough for me. Ah, yes. I see it in your eyes. I also saw it in your eyes when he sauntered into the clearing. The terror, the knowing. He’s been searching for the mermaid who murdered his father. And he won’t give up until he finds her.” He slapped the blade against his palm. “By his actions yesterday, I’d say he believes you are she.”

“He’s as mad as you are.”

The ship tilted. Balancing on the heaving deck, Verrad came alongside her and leveled the knife at her neck. The tip pierced her skin. Her breath came fast. Stepping back, he raised his hand and slapped her across the face.

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