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James found her slumping in the shadows of his cabin, back turned to him, eyes set on something improbable in the distance from the windows. He wondered, for a fragile moment, if he should say something to her; nothing in the world could quell the rage in her heart, in both of them, but he hadn’t walked the earth with her for this long to think that his words would hold no meaning.
He put a hand on the back of her waist, but she seemed to barely register his touch.
“For all that’s been damned, I’m glad that you’re here,” he found his voice in the gaping dullness inside him. Miranda glanced at him, and he was relieved (more than he cared to admit) to see the mercy in her eyes.
“I am glad for it, too,” she whispered. “I can’t say the same for what little innocence we lost back there. But you must understand, now, that I am critical to you. To this war. You can’t push me away anymore.”
“Miranda—”
“James, I swear to God, if you see me as anything less than your equal after all the carnage, the blood, the destruction, then forget about surviving this war—if we couldn’t even survive ourselves.”
His protests died on his tongue at the open wound on her impression. It hadn’t fully occurred to him, until then, how much he had caused her pain. The knowledge made him curse at himself even more, but self-pity was not what they needed right now. So with a sigh, he wound his arm around her waist and pulled her in, willing to lose his warring mind inside her.
“I’ll destroy anything that dares to destroy you,” he murmured. “But you know that already. I suppose it would work, so long as we teach you proper combat, and we get the crew to accept the idea of a woman onboard.”
“I have spent a lifetime being among troubled men,” she remarked wryly, “this shouldn’t be a difficult task of persuasion.”
“I owe you a thousand apologies, Miranda.”
“You have been unfairly cruel, but I’ve also been silent. Both of us were overshadowed by the monsters of their making, and now it will serve us best to care and love for each other, despite all odds. Can you promise me that much?”
“You know I do.”
Miranda used to be a woman made for distractions, for sweet dreams and lovely peace. Hair that smelled of lilac and a smile that could curl around broken spines. In this moment, the woman next to him was made of other things: her voice was hardened, patches of her skin were bloodied, and her abundant hair that he used to adore now seemed a feminine nuisance.
“Let’s shave our heads,” he said.
“What?”
“If we are to arise from the ashes of Charles Town, doesn’t it make sound sense to deface ourselves?”
Her lips twitched, and his heart was lightened. “Are you quite certain you’re not using this as an excuse to experiment with some fashionable looks?”
“I mean it!”
“Well,” she admitted, “I do see the appeal in that. I’ve left it grown for too long. I’ve let too many things go on for too long, way past their due.”
They took a razor from Howell’s collection and sat in the watery moonlight to shave the other, watching the tresses fall from each other’s heads. Miranda now seemed a far cry from the dazzling bird of London society, traipsing around in manor halls and picking roses in the gardens. She looked the part of the warrior, defaced and shameless.
But James also knew that the two were one and the same good woman, each as likely to reflect on elegant china as much as the surface of a sword. When she was done with his hair, she took his face between her hands and in that moment, he found some peace.