But the heart always will... pt2

"Stale bread?" Nance offered the choice as if it should delight a king's court even though it would likely offend even the most famished prisoner. There was little to offer until they made landfall again unless the captain decided these.. passengers.. should be offered any of their choicest fruit or dried meats that the first mate had procured when he was first brought on board. Nance took a step back a moment to look the girl over, her diminuitive yet fierce posture seeming to pull her out from beneath the shirt that covered her from all but his memory of the brief glimpse from moments before. Damn Victor and the teasing, but there had been more than a passing fancy that must have shown and probably did now that his own sudden hunger was clearly not for bread.

She took the bread graciously and nibbled at it, feeling his gaze more directly on her, she looked up to see him looking her over. The woman watched him, her head tilting slightly and her eyes moving over him with a curious expression which was neither timid nor shy. She may have been a lady of standing before but there was a wildness in her that seemed not to let her be a blushing and fawning or prim and proper girl.

She finished the bite she was chewing and set the piece of bread back on the small table. Her fingers unclasped the necklace and then the earings, along with her hair pins she set them to the table, then brought her gaze back to his. "If you were to.. call me something.. what would it be?" She had no name to answer to and it seemed that there should be some manner for him to address her that would be more comfortable than having nothing at all.

She read desire in his eyes and though she couldn't remember many things, her own name being one, she remembered other things.. She knew of many ways to provide him with pleasure and allow him to saite the hunger which showed. Without speaking of it, she began to undo the shirt she'd pulled on, slowly letting it lower and provide him a view of what he really wished to see.

"A single name?" Nance watched the fabric come undone and licked the salt off of his lip. The jewels lay abandoned, not as prized as the gem that glowed for his eyes now, her ebony hair flowing over her bared shoulders again where she stood. His head shook, absent a name of his own social circles that seemed to fit.

"Something for you to call me.. something for me to answer to.. I have none." The fabric dripped away and slid down to the floor in a pool at her feet. She kept her eyes on his face watching his reaction to her, moving slowly as if in a dance for him. She shifted toward him, holding her hand out to him to invite him to join her.

She reached for him, not her dagger and not to fight or run past him. Nance was curious, his head tilting and the gray of his stare narrowing and darkening beneath the confusion. A step forward let him grasp her hand. "Should you answer to any man, miss? Do you know the ship you're on?"

She smiled and tugged him closer, guiding his hand to her hip. "Perhaps you have a point.. I may be too fierce to 'answer to any man'.. but a man who is not just any man.. hmmm the possibilities of what could be shared.." She reached for his other hand to guide it gently to the soft flesh she'd uncovered for him. "I don't know this ship, yet I believe I know ships like it.. strange.. it has a name.. yes? I'm still in need of one." Her head tipped toward one of her 'painted' shoulders and her lips held a pouting expression.

"Not any man?" He repeated, feeling the softness of her skin press back under the rough touch of his weathered fingers. "Then not just any man should hear those possibilities, unless...?" He smiled and his gaze fell to the floor. He was ordinary and she clearly wasn't if she could affect even him. He glanced up again at how her hair fell. "Then not just any name will suit you, will it? These are not blood and stain, are they? These... where are these from?" The drawings were aligned and seemed familiar, though he didn't know what they meant.

She paused and looked down at her arms, smiling a little as she held his hands. She turned her back to him, bringing his hands to her waist to rest there as she lifted her hair and revealed the 'painting' that covered her back. "They're from..before.. from.. home, before the accident.."

Each mark was clear and delicate on her, begging him to look closer he realized as his hands smoothed downward. He smiled with a note of sadness that even home seemed lost to her, truly a child of the sea now... though not at all a child he realized with the curve and tilt of her form under his fingers. Again her back was to him but he was not held down in a boat, unable to move. This time it was him stepping closer, his arms trying to curl around her in any delicate way though the thoughts he was having were not gentle on him.

It seemed strange that he would move as he did, seeking to curl around her, to embrace her and doing so in a manner that tried to be tender. She allowed him and helped him, sublte shifts of her form closer and against him. Her hands drifting to his, fanning his fingers and moving with them to hold her more firmly yet letting him explore what curves he might wish to. She knew this.. but not from the husband she didn't mourn, this was from before but obscured by the shadows that hid the rest of her memories from her. When she could feel his breath on her skin, her head turned and her arm snaked up, fingers sliding into his hair so she could pull his mouth to hers.