Shark Teeth

The mercenary came as Tiana cleaned the previous night’s detritus and drunken fools out of the tavern. She wore a saber at her hip and a thousand horrors studded to her coat—trophies, the sailors whispered, little deaths hoarded like a dragon’s gold upon the fabric. A line of earrings about the collar, coins hanging from the cuffs, and a set of stolen pistols in her bandolier, each of them with a lock of hair pinned to the stock. My sweethearts, she’d whisper, but none of them so beautiful as you, my darling. And she would come with a gift—always, always, a gift. 

Once, she came with perfume. Another time, with a flower carved from delicate pearl. The time before that, with a knife that gleamed like the dawn. 

This time, she came with a child. 

“For you, sweet girl,” the mercenary said, and smiled. There was something awful about her mouth, some bargain that she’d made long ago that gave her a shark’s jagged grin. It split her face into a rictus, the teeth almost too big to be contained in something human. She’d put those teeth against Tiana’s throat once, pressing down but never quite drawing blood. And she smiled now with those same teeth and a child on her hip—some knobby-kneed thing with a bandage pressed over one eye. A child of no more than a year, Tiana thought, clutching to the mercenary’s bandolier. 

“Where’d you find it?” Tiana asked finally, wondering if she ought to offer wine. The mercenary always asked for wine, eventually. And a little while after that, she’d ask to put her hands under Tiana’s skirt. 

The mercenary flashed her shark’s grin. “He was on a ship, my dear. I rather thought that was implied. Do keep up. And then he was on the deck, wading through the blood and what remained. I looked down and thought, what a brave little thing to have survived me. I killed his father, you know.”

She said this quite blandly, one eyebrow raised. The child—thus far nameless—sucked his thumb. 

Tiana put her hands on her hips. “Why would you do such a thing?”

“Why did you let me put my hands on your bonny hips?” the mercenary countered, arching a brow. “I rather imagine you wanted to.”

It went like that more often than it didn’t when the mercenary came, chasing storms and what she called the aftermath. And in that aftermath, she came to the island with riches and the little horrors stuck to her coat and Tiana let her stand close, where they lived—occasionally—like husband and wife. The mercenary promised her nothing but storm after storm, season after season, she returned to the island and to Tiana, each time laden with gifts, and each time Tiana’s fortunes increased. 

Tiana had come to the island an orphan, carrying nothing but the clothes on her back. One day soon, she would have enough to buy the tavern itself. 

The mercenary—whose name had been Mira once, a long time ago—hefted the child onto her arm. The boy sniffed and reached for one of her braids and—to Tiana’s surprise—the mercenary allowed it, even when the boy put one into his mouth. “Do you know why I took these?”

She tapped her thumb against her shining teeth. 

Tiana narrowed her eyes. “I rather imagine you’ll tell me.”

The mercenary laughed. Her eyes were very bright then, like coins. Or starlight on water. “Sharks, oh. They’re truly remarkable creatures. Did you know that they never lose their teeth? Not like other predators. They grow new teeth constantly, eternally. They falter, my girl. They’ll hunt forever unless something stops them.”

Like you, Tiana supposed. She’d never asked what deal the mercenary had made, or what it would eventually cost her. “Does something hunt you, Mira?”

The mercenary just grinned. “Of course. But not this far, and not here. I’ll always come back to you, sweet girl, just as I’ll always be hunting. One day something will kill me and my fellows will return to you with my teeth upon a chain for you to wear upon your neck, but not just yet. Not just yet, my sweet bonny wife. Not before I’ve put a child in your hands.”

She gave the boy a meaningful look. He chewed on the mercenary’s braid, watchful in the way children often were. 

Tiana sighed, then held out her arms. “What use do I have for teeth?”

“The same use I have for trinkets,” the mercenary purred, and pressed the boy into Tiana’s arms. “You’ve never drawn blood upon the deck, but I think you’re like me where it matters. I want to hunt and you want to build, wife of mine, and together we’ll come to a legacy.”

She stepped forward, her teeth gleaming as Tiana cradled the boy to her chest. He smelled of salt and old blood, his weight a strange comfort against her breast. Unfamiliar, but welcome. 

“Oh, my bonny girl. Won’t you rise with me?” the mercenary murmured. “Wife of mine, won’t you come hunting? Carry my child and I’ll build you a world all your own.”

The boy clung to Tiana’s neck, his little hand clinging tight to her collar. Tiana breathed in his scent. She knew him then, in the primal way that mothers did. Mine, she thought. And yours. 

“Come to bed,” Tiana said finally, the child heavy in her arms. But she could bear the weight. “You might as well.”

The mercenary smiled, her shark’s teeth gleaming. There was blood in her hair, and upon her hands, but Tiana was used to that. “Wife.”

Oh, what things they would build, Tiana thought. She held her son to her breast and took the mercenary by the hair to kiss her and those shining, shark teeth.  Their son cooed, and the mercenary purred into Tiana’s mouth. 

Mine, she thought, and bit down until she tasted blood. 

***

Emma Johnson-Rivard received her masters in creative writing at Hamline University. Her work has appeared in Tales to Terrify, Coffin Bell, and others. She currently serves as an editor at The Common Tongue, a dark fantasy magazine.