Despite those somber clouds following us from the northeast, a quarter moon and few stars shone down to reflect like jewels on the quiet waves as evening settled over the sea. After the injection of Dilaudid, and waiting an eternity for it to take full effect, the thing that had once been my beautiful first mate had finally lain still.

Her eyes opened. Closed. In that brief moment, Ayanna stared back at us with the yellow irises and slitted black pupils of a reptile, then she appeared to be sleeping calmly, though who could know what bloody hell was happening inside her while she slept.

Watching Marisha return the needle and medicine vial to her bag, I told Demarae, “You need to talk to this super-shaman and find out how to slow down this… this whatever this is… until he can work his magic. If we let this continue, Ayanna won’t even be human when we arrive at Roatan.”

He nodded. I took Erin’s arm and coaxed her toward the door. Feeling a shudder, of what I presumed was empathy, I wrapped an arm around her shoulders. I needed a smoke, and Erin clearly needed a respite from Ayanna’s pain. Marisha pulled up a chair and sat down to watch over her patient.

On route to the cockpit, we’d stopped by the dining room, which was filled with spirited passengers, and I’d asked Cookie to send a plate to Ayanna’s room. Now, with only the crew who were on watch, we had the foredeck to ourselves.

An exciting cruise moment for our guests was the chance to take a turn at the helm, and while the sea remained fairly quiet, I thought it might rest Erin’s mind a bit. Fear and the adrenaline it produces work in peculiar ways at times. After giving the helmsman a break, I instructed Demarae in how to use the satellite equipment to call Shaman Shawnte.

Then I stood behind Erin, gently guiding her hands—the old wooden wheel with its brass inlays as familiar to me as my own boots. The closeness of her curves felt as dangerous as anything I’d encountered that day.

“Handle the wheel as you would the steering on your car,” I told her. “When you want to veer left, turn the wheel left. Turn right to go right.”

Even with the wind coming on at twenty knots, she soon got the hang of it. After a while, I sensed her body relaxing into the sea’s gentle rhythm.

“How old were you when you started sailing?” she asked.

“Nine when I boarded my first ship. A year or two older before I was allowed to take the helm.” Old Stryker would’ve busted a gut if he’d known. A cabin boy had to earn his way from one job to the next, and Stryker liked dangling the fun bits as enticements while making me do scut work. When he holed up for his naps, the sailors taught me things.

Eventually I encountered every yard and sheet, every plank and rail, and had even learned to load the cannons. Those years weren’t as bad as they might’ve been.

“Is life on the sea as glamorous as my sister seems to believe?”

“It’s whatever you make of it.” I smiled at the idea of glamorous. “There’s a delicious thrill about being at sea. Some find the thrill exhilarating, others find it frightening. You’ve nothing solid below, and all manner of creatures that would enjoy taking a bite of you. Your life quite literally depends upon knowing the vessel that holds you safe.”

“So sailors are basically daredevils.”

Her tone suggested “daredevil” equated with “idiot.”

“Some, I suppose.” How could I tell her I’d gladly spend the remainder of my life on land given the chance? “The most beautiful environments are often the least hospitable. Rainforest, dessert, Antarctic. The same sort who enjoys testing himself against nature in those locations might also be drawn to sea, as much for the beauty as for the thrill. When people gather in towns and cities, nature succumbs to asphalt, brick, the foul-smelling byproducts of transportation. I’m sure mankind will eventually find a way to muck up our oceans in the name of progress, but there’s a lot more water than land, so maybe that eventuality will be a long while coming.”

“Do you ever leave it? Do you vacation in Colorado or Mexico City, somewhere far from water?”

“I never have.” To say I’d like to do just that would invite questions I couldn’t answer without lies. But if I had the chance right at that moment to board an airplane to anyplace I chose, I might pass it up to spend more time with this woman. The fragrance of her hair and skin carried on the night air were intoxicating. I wanted to tighten my arms around her and bury my face against her neck.

Behind us, I heard footsteps that told me Demarae had completed his call. Bringing my mind back to the subject of that communication, I turned to face him.

In the moonlight, Demarae’s expression was difficult to read. When it seemed he was going to take an eternity giving us information, I asked, “What did you learn?”

“Shaman Shawnte, after listening to what has occurred since Ayanna boarded the ship, seems confident he can reverse the Bokor’s curse and expel his presence. He didn’t seem at all surprised by the physical changes I described, and in fact believes he might have encountered this Bokor’s work at some point in the past.” He nodded, as if to himself. “We agreed to gather at his home mid-morning, if sea and weather permit. Regardless, he will remain available until we arrive.”

*

So far, we were making good time, but the northeastern sky suggested that might change.

“What recommendations did he offer until we arrive there tomorrow?” It might be the wee hours before passengers were stowed away in their cabins, leaving us the privacy to do another healing ritual in the dining room. Perhaps, instead, we could move Ayanna to my cabin, which was somewhat larger than her own.

“Shaman Shawnte believes we should take no further action.” Demarae’s smile expressed relief. “He recommends we not attempt another cure.”

Erin nodded rather emphatically. “I’m glad, actually. It was dangerous enough this morning with no one else on the ship. Who’s to say someone on board besides us might not be psychic enough to attract this devil’s attention?”

She was right, yet I hadn’t given that idea a passing thought.

“Then I hope Marisha has enough Dilaudid to at least keep Ayanna comfortable,” I said.

If not for the moon shining straight on his face, I might have missed it, but Demarae’s expression turned even sadder than when we were experiencing the peak of Ayanna’s transformation spasms.

“What is it you’re not telling us?” I demanded quietly.

He expelled one of his deep sighs. “Shawnte warned us not to give her more Dilaudid. He believes it may be the worst thing we could have done.”

Bloody hell! How could easing Ayanna’s agony be “the worst thing”? All right, along with numbing the excruciating pain, perhaps the Dilaudid also numbed her ability to fight off the Bokor. That made sense, and I had to agree that Shawnte might be right. Putting myself in Ayanna’s circumstance, however, I’d rather be lucid enough to fight the battle no matter how much it hurt.

So… what had we done to her? What was the Bokor doing to her even now?

The first drops of rain fell in a quick rat-a-tat, interrupting my thoughts. The storm had moved in. Wind and sea remained mild, but the clouds looked ominous.

“Cookie’s serving dinner,” I said, spying the helmsman returning. “Go. I’ll look in on Ayanna and give Marisha a break to join you.”

Eager to get indoors in case the rain thickened, they hurried off. I was glad to have a bit of time with my own thoughts. Every cursed soul that arrived aboard the Sarah Jane was cursed in a different way. Erin’s gift seemed more fortunate than most, but I felt certain she wouldn’t call it a blessing. Ayanna’s plight numbered among the worst I’d encountered.

As I made my way to her cabin, the vague notion of being followed overtook me. I glanced behind and saw only the crew who were on watch. Everyone not needed on deck would take part in the rainy-night festivities that would follow dinner, unless that northeast wind piped up considerably. Then it was all hands on deck. Passengers could entertain themselves with the games we kept for such occasions.

I knocked lightly before entering. Marisha was reading aloud, whether to soothe Ayanna or herself, I wasn’t sure. The doctor offered a thin smile, apparently glad to see me.

“Let me take over,” I said, “though my reading voice isn’t one of my better attributes. How is she?”

“Resting peacefully, as far as I can tell.” She closed her book over a paper marker and set it on the bureau.

“We can only hope.” I saw no reason to tell Marisha what Shawnte had said about the sedative she injected. Demarae would fill her in. In light of Ayanna’s restful appearance, I preferred to believe the drug might be hampering the Bokor’s nasty scheme. Shawnte’s advice came without his actually examining Ayanna, and since there was little we could do to reverse the sedation, why not believe the best?

When Marisha had gone, I felt too restless to sit. Noticing Ayanna’s altar to the orichas had been disarranged by the many pairs of feet in the room today, I knelt and neatened them. I was no shaman, and not even sure how much of their beliefs I understood, but I felt moved to light Ayanna’s candles. What could it hurt?

I had no food to replace what had gone stale, but the orichas were said to appreciate tobacco. My leather pouch held plenty to share, so I dropped a fair-sized pinch in each bowl.

As I lit the candles, it seemed important to pray. That formality was abandoned when my parents were killed, and despite everything I’ve seen, I’d never felt the desire to resurrect the practice. Not formally, anyway.

“This is a good woman,” I said. “She deserves your attention and all the help you can give to fight off this evil practitioner who means to claim her for his own sinister desires. Come, let your goodness shine on Ayanna. Give her the help she needs.”

Directly after the third candle was burning, Ayanna made a sound deep in her throat. Rising, I stuffed my pouch back in my pocket and walked to the side of her bunk.

Her yellow eyes were open and staring. At my approach, they slid sideways in their sockets and regarded me with a burning fierceness. Her leathery lips stretched in a fierce grin.

“Ayanna?” But I knew it wasn’t my first mate peering at me through those eyes.

The throaty sound came again, like a wounded bear trying to escape. Then her hands moved, not in the twitching motion as earlier but—

What I saw was not possible, yet there it was. With telescoping compression, her arms became shorter, the bones moving, adjusting beneath her skin with a sickening crunch.

She shrieked, groaned as the process went on and on, and I stood as helpless as marble. It was Ayanna suffering, but looking into those yellow eyes, I felt the Bokor’s wrath. He wanted me to see this, to see Ayanna’s pain and know that my anemic effort to engage the orichas had done naught but enrage him.

My hands gripped air as I desperately longed for a knife to cut my enemy’s throat and watch those arrogant eyes cloud over in death. But Ayanna was in there, too.

Wasn’t she?

Ayanna might not even be alive any longer, so why not beat the life out of this thing before it attached itself to some other unfortunate soul aboard my ship? If two healing rituals could not stop the Bokor from torturing Ayanna’s mind and body and turning her into a raging beast, why should I believe a third ritual would fare any better, no matter how powerful this new shaman? Why shouldn’t I end the Bokor here and now?

My fists tightened to deliver the first blow of many, to punch that horrible smug grin into pulp. Then Ayanna’s facial bones shifted beneath her skin, as her arm bones had done, pushing the nose and mouth outward, spreading the odious smile wider, the teeth longer, sharper.

I raised my fist.

Another groan escaped her throat, and in the sound I distinguished anguish in the voice I knew to be Ayanna’s—or thought I did. Impossible, of course. Yet the despair in that single muffled cry froze my hand in mid-air.

What was I doing?

Hatred and disgust for the fiend I saw behind that sub-human face kindled my savage urge to crush, destroy, obliterate. I stifled a howl of anger. Turning from the bed, I snatched open the door and ran.

I would have killed her. There was no doubt in my mind.

“Captain? What’s wrong? Are you okay?” It was Jase Graham.

I must have appeared somewhat like a monster myself, my face twisted with fury and with the painful effort of breaking away from the madness that had taken me.

“Yes,” I managed. “Fine. Just…”

He glanced at the door. “Is Ayanna’s illness worse? I could go to the dining room, ask if there’s a doctor aboard.”

“No. We have someone treating her.” I wrenched the words from my brain with difficulty. “One of the newcomers is a doctor. I was sitting in while she went to dinner.”

“Anything I can do?”

“Yes, actually.” I took a breath and did what I had planned to do earlier in the day. “You can assume the position of first mate for at least the remainder of this cruise. If Ayanna improves over the following week, we’ll reexamine the situation.”

“Yes, sir.” He nodded and had the decency not to smile. “Thank you, Captain.”

“For now,” I added, “make sure the passengers are enjoying their meal and the evening festivities. Show that handsome face around the ship.”

He gave his usual casual salute and walked briskly away. Only after he had left my sight did I wonder how Graham happened to be in that precise part of the passageway at that particular moment.

Join me here next week for another chapter of Paradise Cursed, or BUY THE BOOK now, because you’ll want to read what happens next.

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