"You what?" he asked, his voice hoarse. A single tear was racing down the side of his cheek. If this had been two years ago, Scarlet would have been at his side to clear the tear away, pressing her lips to his cheek to make the pain secede.

Not seeing any reason to act like it hadn't occurred, Scarlet repeated herself. "I was screaming for you to come and help me. I called out for you .. Hell I begged for you to come and help me! And just when I needed you most .. You. Weren't. There."

Wolf .. yes, that was his name. His nickname at least. The one he chose for himself after he and his crew and ship abandoned the Lunar Armada. There was dozens of ships like the Lone Wolf hidden in some cave somewhere. But the only one that Scarlet had cared to think of was the Lone Wolf.

She'd spent months on that ship. As a navigational assistant to Wolf. They'd been searching for a cure for their mutant features. They'd heard of a similar curse to theirs. One of the Cursed Gold of Cortez. Gold that – when taken from it's stone chest – would make men dead, but unable to die as well. They thought they'd found what they needed to serve as an antidote, yet could not find a way to reach it. For they did not know where the antidote was located.

That's when Wolf heard of Scarlet. She was an amazing navigator that could find her way to anything she put her mind to. On pure instinct, she'd found a handful of hot spots with treasure up to your knees. So, he offered her a bounty for the location of the antidote, and for her to lead them to it.

Their journey had been fruitless, as the myth Wolf had found had simply been that, a myth. Still, he asked her to stay on board a while longer. She helped them discover so much and led them to find so many adventures.

Over those months of traveling over the seas, they'd grown close. Too close, for some of the crews' liking. They confided in one another, and eventually, they fell in love. Wolf once told her that he loved her the way he loved the sea. Because it was always changing, always enticing, never dull, and pushing him to adventure.

Scarlet saw through his beast-like exterior and found parts of him that others were too frightened to venture for. She fell in love with his weaknesses, making them her strengths. His kindness and tenderness drawing her cheeks to reflect the shade of her hair.

Now, Wolf was barely holding it together as the muscles in his jaw twitched. "You were screaming?" he wheezed.

Squeezing her arms more violently than before and screwing her nails further into her skin, she bit back harsher comments and told him, "Of course I was screaming. How could you not have heard it? Everyone else in Tortuga did."

Wolf lowered his head in shame. Weakly, he revealed, "Ran drugged me."

"What?" was the first response to slip out of Scarlet. As far as she knew, nothing could intoxicate a Lunar Soldier to the point of him passing out cold. Well, nothing except for the promise of true love and to be treated like a human being. Both of those Scarlet could attest to.

The only things holding Wolf up from the table were his locked arms that pressed the heels of his palms deeply into the edge. "He tricked my into drinking liquid that he drugged with a narcotic plant's nectar. He was toasting with me to another year away from Levana, and I'd already downed the glass before I realized it was drugged. I was asleep for days, and I woke up when the ship was a hundred miles away from you."

Scarlet couldn't tell if Wolf was making this story up to gain her trust and sympathy or if he was telling her the truth. It did seem like something that Ran would do. He would have betrayed his own brother for personal gain, and do anything to achieve his goals. Ran, Wolf's brother, was jealous of Scarlet's close connection to the Captain.

The only reason Ran bonded with Wolf was to ensure that he held a place on the ship. Ran was probably the lowest ranking member on the ship that Scarlet had ever seen. On any ship for that matter. He was treated worse that a Cabin Boy or a prisoner even.

Though, Scarlet hadn't seen him with the soldiers boarded the Solstice.

"Where is that rat? Your brother, I mean?"

Every muscle in Wolf's body tightened. For a moment, he was frozen in time. Something about Ran had triggered a chain reaction inside Wolf. Now, he was a statue, and Scarlet could tell something had happened to Ran.

"Well?"

Wolf stood up, taking his balance off the table. Yet, he avoided her gaze. "He ... He's no longer on the ship."

Not wanting to dig further into that hole than she had to, she abandoned the subject of Ran. Wolf was certainly happy enough to leave his memories of Ran behind. She found nothing suspicious in his answer. After Ran drugged Wolf and threw Scarlet off the ship, he and his comrades were probably hunted by Wolf and his loyal crew members.

Learning that Wolf could have been drugged changed a few things. Though, it couldn't change all of the pain and loss Scarlet had felt from that day to now. How betrayed she'd felt. The days upon weeks of trying to build herself back up from what she'd lost.

Meeting Thorne and his crazy pursuits had helped her cope with the abandonment. Him and his nutty ship, that beautiful work of wood that he'd bargained for. Well, stole, then made adjustments to. Once that fun was done, Scarlet moved on to captain her own vessel and group of scalawags. It hadn't been perfect, but it was enough for her.

Watching her ship burn and sink as she tread water had been severely heartbreaking. But nothing would ever break her soul and tear her to shreds as much as the day Ran deprived her of the last thing she loved in her life. Or when she called out for Wolf, and he didn't come to her aid.

Nothing would bring back the days she trusted him with her life. Scarlet felt that she would never even love again after that. Always so paranoid that a similar fate would befall her should she fall in love a second time.

Turning her back to Wolf, Scarlet rested on the table with her back pressed to it. She didn't speak to him, no retort, not a word. The only thing she could think of was the constant sound of her own yelping and crying when Ran was carrying her off the ship.

It had escaped her mind until that moment that she still had the scar Ran gave her. On her right thigh, she'd received a cut from Ran when resisting his strength. Slashing at her, his claw-like nail sliced through her flesh and made her bleed. With no desire to heighten Wolf's stress and depression, she neglected to inform him of this. If he knew that Ran actually hurt her, Wolf would have killed his brother.

Closing her eyes, Scarlet saw the rising flames of her ship swallowing up all of the treasures she'd saved up over that time. The screams of her crew members ringing out over the ocean surface. For hours, she dodged the keen eyes of the Lunar Soldiers and stayed well away from their ship.

At one point, she distinctly caught Wolf leaping over the side of the ship and swimming out towards her because he thought he smelled her scent. The only reasons Wolf did not manage to spot her were the large rock Scarlet had hidden behind and the soldiers that jumped into the water after Wolf and towed him back to the ship.

"I know you'll never trust me again like you did before Ran tricked us. But .. please, just give me a chance, Scarlet. We can make up for lost time and at least try to be what we were before. I- .... I can't lose you again." His tone was purely desperation. And Scarlet knew why. "You're the only one, Scarlet," he said, in such a heart felt voice. "You'll always be the only one."

"And you are probably the only person I'll ever love," Scarlet confessed. Without looking at him, Scarlet knew he was shocked and delighted by this. Still, she wasn't finished. "But I don't think we'll ever be what we once were."

She turned around, finding that Wolf appeared just as broken as she did. "I have a proposition."

"And what could that be?" It was clear that he was no longer interested in negotiating. Scarlet thought he might rethink that once he heard what she had to say.

"You have no interest in Thorne or his crew, right? You're only towing the Solstice because you want to make sure I stay out of danger?" He nodded in agreement. This gave Scarlet what she needed to give Thorne what his heart yearned for. She knew what Thorne was searching for, an item that had been stolen from him. One that he would kill for in order to retain it once more.

"Then I propose an easier alternative to keeping an entire ship's worth of people under lock and key. If you and your crew help Thorne and me get what he's searching for ... I'll go with you."

His head raised and his looked her in the eye, thinking that she wasn't serious. On the contrary to what he thought, she was all too serious about this offer.

"Help us," she reiterated, "And I'll go with you on the Lone Wolf for as long as you want me to stay. I'll stay on that ship forever if it makes you happy, and you'll always be able to make sure that I'm safe. I won't do anything that you think is unsafe, and I'll never try to escape. As long as you want me on the ship, I'll be there."

Wolf gulped down his internal strain. "You would really do that for your friend?" was what he came to ask first.

Presenting herself with all of the authority she could, she told him, "It's not that hard to do. And it will count as telling me to leave if one of your crew members throws me off the ship." She meant it as a sarcastic remark that he could dwell on for a while.

Instead, Wolf was at her side in less than three strides. His looming figure hovering over hers. His expression full of determination, his Adams Apple bobbing slightly. He didn't touch her, keeping his chances of keeping all of his fingers fairly high. As his shadow swallowed her whole, he made his opinion on the matter clear.

"I'm never going to let that happen again. We have an accord."