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John Childermass raged as he drowned, the salty water burning his eyes, dimming the sound of the battle above. He sank, arms and legs flailing frantically, useless against the weight dragging him into the depths. He didn't know how to swim. Even if he had, the coast was too far gone behind them, or too far ahead.
He was going to die.
He'd known that since he'd gone overboard, or perhaps since he'd stepped foot onto His Majesty's ship.
He was going to die, and he hated them. He hated them all because they hated him. He hated them because he had always known he would die before he was grown. Boys like him did not live long, and he had not expected any different.
His lungs burned. The cuts on his hand stung.
He hated the French for shooting the cannon that had shattered the deck he had been standing on and sent him plummeting into the dark water below.
He hated the captain who had led them into this battle, and the King who had ordered it. He hated all of the officers in their bright uniforms, buttons shining in the sun as they talked of duty and glory and their men died.
He hated the cook who cornered him in the darker corners of the galley, he hated himself for starving rather than eating, he hated the mate who had looked away, he hated the knife that hadn't killed the man and the bosun for stripping his back.
He hated the drunk lieutenant with blood and ink on his hands who had clubbed him on the head and told him he'd signed the papers, no matter that he didn't have his letters and certainly had not written his name.
He hated that he'd thought it might be better than dying on the streets, from the cold or the fists of a gentleman he wasn't discreet enough in robbing, or one who would absolve himself of his sins by killing him rather than paying him his due.
He hated that he'd forgotten the face of his dead brothers and sisters, those children who were his family by virtue of none of them having any other one. He hated that he would not see them in Heaven, because he was a thief and a buggerer and a sinner, and after the hell there on God's good Earth, he was bound for the one below.
He hated his mother, who had cursed him to this life by not deigning to drow him in her washbasin like she did with the other babes when her herbs failed, because she'd dreamed of a child that would matter. He hated that he'd once thought he mattered, before he learned that all that awaited him before damnation was hunger and cold, and the scorn of his betters.
And, most of all, he hated the Raven King, who had abandoned his kingdom to fade and his children to die. He hated that he'd prayed to him, cursed and blessed in his name. He hated the dreams that told him they would meet, that the King would look at him and take his hand. He hated the Raven King because he'd loved him and because he was dying, because of all of the children who'd said his name and died regardless. He hated the Raven King because no hope was better than hope betrayed, because he would never return, because he could have saved them all and didn't.
With his last breath, he cursed the King.
Water filled his chest, the last of the air in his lungs escaping. He was too cold to fight anymore. It was dark, and he wanted to sleep.
The ocean talked to him as he died, but he did not understand.
*
John Uskglass held the body of the boy. He was small for his age, ragged and worn despite his short life, back crisscrossed by scars and ribs showing below his torn shirt.
A child's curse was a powerful thing.
The hatred gone from his face, he seemed younger than he was. He had lived too much, and not enough.
So many children died every day. Drowned, starved, murdered, taken by illness.
There would, for once, be one fewer today.
*
John Childermass awoke on a French beach, waves lapping at his feet and sand in his mouth.
He had been dead, and he was not.
He has cursed the King, and been cursed in return.
He cried.
The King did not hate him.