nereya marlowe | d4 | fin

I was five. Pa brought me along on his fishing boat. The sailors cooed and patted my head and told Pa how adorable I was as we sat cross-legged on the deck and he taught me to tie a simple bowline.

A fisherman's lifeblood, he said as he made me memorize all the knots. Bowline. Clove hitch. Sheet bend. Nets and baskets to trap entire schools of fish. I would work alongside him, my tiny fingers gripping ropes as thick as my wrists. And when I had a break from the lessons I would wander around the deck and the other men would pick me up and set me on top of the rigging.

Little Rey, they called as my little arms struggled to haul a net of fish across the deck. One day you'll be strong, like your father, eh?

¤

I was nine. Two hours from shore the storm raged and set the ship to shaking and rocking on the waves as rain poured down. Wind whipped the ropes around until a knot tangled around one of my fingers and tore it away from my knuckle. My hand throbbed and blood ran down to mix with the rain drenching the deck, and my lip quivered but I did not cry.

One of the sailors held out a glass filled with an inch of golden-sweet liquid that burned as it slid down my throat. For the pain, little Rey, he chuckled as I coughed and sputtered, spraying a mouthful of the liquid on his shirt. You are brave, kid, just like your father.

¤

I was twelve, that age when the sailors would begin teasing that I was still as short as when they met me at five. That age when the other kids were beginning to fill out, and I worried that I would always be the shortest. Pa ruffled my hair and told me I'll always be his little Rey, and to enjoy being small while I can before I get too heavy to climb to the very top of the fishing boat.

That was the winter an epidemic ripped through our village, and left Pa too sick to go out on the boat and work as he had for all those years. I watched him waste away, watched his muscles shake and his breath come out in wheezing gasps after merely climbing the hill to the market.

One day you will be Captain, he said to me, his voice a hoarse whisper, haven't I always told you that? I suppose, little Rey, that I only regret it happening sooner than I expected.

¤

I was fourteen. That was the year my body finally began to catch up with other girls'. I shot up a full six inches and grew curves on my hips and chest and gained more weight than I would have liked. Pa was right; there wasn't much I liked about suddenly being a lot bigger than I was used to.

He passed away two weeks after my fourteenth birthday.

"Take it easy," one of the sailors told me, all warm smiles and condolences, and like the naive girl I was, I stupidly accepted. Days turned into weeks and if they acted a little bolder, if they interrupted me a little more, if they steadily began reaching across and taking over the tasks I did as though I hadn't been around the boat for longer as most of them had - no matter, I was still the captain.

But what's a title without the power?

Its not until one day when we're anchoring the ship and one of the sailors comes up and presses his hand against my chest that I realize - it's been years since any of them told me I was like my father.

¤

I was fifteen. The Career academies of Four were out of my reach; they were for the rich and powerful with idle hands, not some fisherman's family with barely enough to feed themselves. With Ma at home taking care of the young'uns and me bringing in the day's catch to trade to the Capitol, there's little time for that sort of thing.

But as they learn to throw silver-encrusted tridents at training dummies, I pick up the harpoon I have used for years and impale wriggling silvery fish. And after facing storms and fog and one particular shark whose jaws had almost snapped the ship in half, well, the academies start looking a bit more like marble towers than training centers. It would certainly explain why we call ourselves a Career district but have only one victor in living memory, less than even Ten, Eleven, and Twelve.

¤

I am eighteen. No longer Little Rey. If my voice is louder than then, my hands more skilled, my muscles stronger - there are still times when none of that matters. When the curves of my body and the tatters of my clothes are enough to drown out my words and actions.

Sometimes I ask myself why I never went and tried to find work somewhere else, away from these idiot sailors. I guess I've been holding on for so long I don't know how to let go. Some kind of loyalty to my father's ship, and all the happy memories I had on it when I was a kid. But maybe those were all just fantasies, anyways.

¤

I am eighteen, and I dream of power.