Young Writers Society

Benni blinked up at Archie. His eyes bore into his, and he waited a few seconds before he opened his mouth. Unfortunately, this is when Orvin noticed his presence.

"Benni! Go help Polly with the laundry, please." He called out. The girl Orthella was helping clean up a mess finally seemed to calm in her crying, and stood, stashing the bit of cloth in a pack on her waist.

Benni closed his mouth, and stared at Archie for a few more seconds.

"Benni." Orvin said again, this time more of a warning than anything else. The boy huffed and turned his head toward Orvin before turning entirely and beginning to walk towards polly.

"Yes, dad." He spoke loud enough for Orvin to hear, and there was a distinct irritation at the edges, but his voice was still full of a soft affection. He ran over to Polly and took her outstretched palm, turning back only once to bore his eyes into Archie's once more before disappearing below deck through the door on the opposite side of the ship from where Archie stood.

"Apologies." Orvin said. "Benni likes to test new people. He thinks it's quite amusing if he can get someone to find him frightening." He was still a good ten feet from where Archie stood, mostly vaguely watching Orthella and the young girl beside her. She bent over, picking up the pitcher that she had spilt in the first place. And Orthella brought her below deck, presumably to refill it, leaving just Archie and Orvin above deck.

So rationally Archibald knew the child couldn't see inside his mind, but found himself sort of leaning away from him without really meaning to. He was feeling investigated right now, and he looked it. But it didn't take him long to get over it. It was a nice, calm ten seconds for Archie, before he heard Benni call Orvin 'dad.'

He turned and looked at Orvin with a tiny but distinctly sceptical frown.

What? That boy was maybe four or five? Orvin was perhaps nineteen? Twenty? Twenty-one? He could hope. Archibald desperately wanted to know Orvin's age this very second so he could run some mathematics because if Orvin was in the age range that he resembled, and Benni was in the age range that he resembled-

Archie forced himself out of it in time to take in what Orvin was saying. He succeeded at least in replacing the sceptical frown with a more neutral surprised face.

And it did help, when Orvin told him that Benni just liked to scare people on purpose for fun. This was just something he did. Now that Archie knew this, he hoped that he might be prepared for whatever Benni might try next. He nodded appreciatively.

He meant to respond with "Oh, it's quite alright," or "Thank you, I'll keep that in mind," something polite like that. Instead, he asked the captain sort of bluntly,

"...How old are you?"

Orvin laughed a little. It was a reasonable question. "I just turned 20. Benni is 4, he'll be 5 in about 6 weeks." He paused, watching Archie carefully. "I adopted him when I was 17. I don't have any children of my actual blood. I've never been interested in women."

Archie smiled and nodded, impressed. A sparkle gleamed in his eye, he was moved.

"Ah," said the prince, who thought he knew what he was talking about. "So your love is the sea. I like your dedication."

Huh. Come to think of it, although Archibald wasn't a sailor until today, like Orvin he couldn't really think of a woman that had captivated him in the way people made it sound like she was supposed to. He didn't think much of it, he probably just hadn't met the right one. Oh well. More for the sea.

"Your children are wonderful. I can tell already they're well loved."

Archibald looked wistfully into the horizon. He continued in a lower, softer voice.

"If only all the world's thieves were like you, maybe no children would be left unwanted.

How many of them call you 'dad?"

There was a small awkward hesitation before he said the word 'dad', and the simple term sounded very out of place in his royal accent.

Orvin decided to leave the 'love for the sea' comment for a later discussion. Though he did give Archie a funny look.

"Benni is my only child. The rest are under my care, but they don't consider me their father." he paused, studied Archie for just a moment. "Most of them were older. Polly might come around to it, eventually. She was only 6, but she's an anxious thing."

Polly and Benni reemerged from the other side of the boat. They dragged a bag of laundry the size of them, and it was stuck on one of the last steps. Orvin frowned, and took a half-step forward, but stopped. They struggled for only a few more seconds before they wrestled it free and shared in a victory celebration. Polly looked back to see Orvin, and Benni did the same. He gave them a thumbs up, and they both broke out into wide smiles, continuing to drag the bag across the deck.

Orvin ruffled each of their hair in turn as they walked by before allowing them to disappear below deck into the captain's quarters.

"Shall we join the others? Orthella and Gwyn-" He paused, and gestured to the other side where the young girl disappeared with Orthella a few minutes prior. "Will likely be a few more minutes."