My Lady Pirate Read online

  He turned, faced her, and said desperately, “You must release me.”

  “Why should I?” Again, she fell to paring her nails with the knife, slanting an amused look at him from beneath her long lashes. “You have an excessive amount of fear of Nelson . . . it makes me ponder the real reason you jumped ship and deserted your navy. . .”

  A cold chill seized Gray’s heart.

  The Pirate Queen gave him another sidelong glance. “Makes me wonder, perhaps, if you’re

  not merely a deserter, but a traitor . . . You see, I loathe traitors even more than I do deserters.”

  The knife’s motion stopped and she raised her head, staring hard at him. “You’re not a traitor . . .

  are you?”

  He swallowed thickly.

  “Are you?”

  “Now Majesty—”

  “That’s it, isn’t it?” she cried suddenly, slamming the knife into the scabbard with violent fury. “You were selling out to the French! To Villeneuve! Spying for them! No wonder such fear of Nelson! No wonder such sudden desperation to leave here, so you can go off and tell Villeneuve everything I just told you about Nelson!” Her eyes blazed, as though he had betrayed not his country, but her. “You are despicable, you know that? Despicable!”

  “Please,” Gray said, dropping to his knees before her, bowing his head and showing her the respect her self-proclaimed sovereignty demanded. The French, the English . . . either navy would pay handsomely for him, but if he ended up in the hands of the wrong one . . . Dear God above. But how to play this hellcat? Which would serve him better—the truth, or a lie?

  He made an instant decision.

  “For the love of God,” he said shakily, and looked up at her, “I implore you, Majesty,

  please, do not bring me to Nelson!”

  “I will bring you to whoever pays the most for you!”

  “The English will not pay you! They’ll merely seize me and hang me from the yardarm

  without benefit, even, of trial!” He got himself under control, knowing he was playing a

  dangerous game indeed. “I beg of you, Majesty . . . please, don’t turn me in! Don’t bring me to Nelson, he will certainly hang me—”

  ‘Traitor, you deserve to hang!”

  “But I am your Gallant Knight, remember?”

  “I never said I wanted a Gallant Knight! And such an idea is naught but rubbish, anyhow.

  There are no Gallant Knights, at least not for me, and as for you, you’ll do nothing but break my heart. I wanted an honorable man, someone I could admire, a handsome, decorated sea-officer , but there’s not a heroic bone in your body. Not one!” She was scarlet with rage, her eyes bright with sudden, unshed tears. “You hear me? Not one! You’re nothing but bilge rot, a vile, wretched traitor with as much honor as a slinking eel! Tomorrow I bring you to Nelson!”

  And with that, she spun on her heel, stormed across the room, and damning him to hell and beyond, slammed the gate in his face.

  Chapter 5

  He was forty-six years old and going blind. He loved little children. He’d lost an arm at Tenerife, the sight of an eye at Calvi, and had his brow laid open to the bone at the Nile, where the destruction of Napoleon’s fleet had earned him a barony and the love and adoration of his nation. Constant anxiety had taken its toll on his body, two years of blockading the French off Toulon had left him haggard and ill, and now, fears of failing the England that entrusted him to save it brought him nothing but anxiety and distress.

  Mighty Britannia’s confidence rested on small shoulders that seemed barely wide or strong enough to support the glittering gold epaulets that rode atop them. He was a little man, with a pale and sensitive face, a pointed chin, a compassionate mouth, and once-brown hair that had faded to gray. His good eye shone with fervor and intelligence, his nose was strong and bold.

  Slight in stature, kind of heart, irascible in temper, and suffering from all manner of illnesses both real and imagined, he did not evoke the image of a national hero, for the Right Honourable Lord Viscount Nelson—Knight of the Bath, Duke of Bronte in Sicily, Knight of the Great Cross of St. Ferdinand and of Merit, Knight of the Order of the Crescent, and of the Illustrious Order of St. Joachim, Vice Admiral of the White and Commander in Chief of His Majesty’s Ships and Vessels in the Mediterranean Station—was no bigger than a schoolboy. Yet there, beneath the empty sleeve pinned so carefully across a chest ablaze with the decorations of valor, lay the heart of a lion, the fierceness of a tiger—and a burning hatred of the French.

  But Horatio Nelson did not look fierce at all this morning, as H.M.S. Victory drove toward Barbados with the might of the Mediterranean Fleet spread in glorious array behind her. He had invited his little midshipmen to breakfast with him after they’d come off their watch, and on this bright morning in June, he was sharing in their childish, giggling jokes and behaving with youthful abandon, when calls from the masthead— and moments later, the appearance of his flag-captain, Thomas Masterman Hardy—brought him news that the returning frigate Amphion was hull up on the horizon and closing fast.

  Nelson, ecstatic, set down his tea and leapt to his feet. “Now, my young gentlemen, we shall learn what Captain Sutton has found out about our friend Villeneuve” —he pronounced it Veal-noove, for Nelson may have won mastery over the French fleet but never their language—”and whether or not he is indeed here in the Indies! May we bring the French to battle at last!”

  Cheers, all around the polished mahogany table, from a circle of children and a grinning

  admiral whose height could not rival the shortest of them.

  He saw the wild eagerness in their eyes. “Dismissed!”

  They fled topside, but a sharp reprimand from Captain Hardy reminded them to walk like

  young officers and not undisciplined children.

  It was all Nelson could do not to go charging up after them. He began to pace, and by the time the frigate was hove to under Victory’s lee and her grave-faced captain, soaked with spray and flushed with news, piped aboard and brought to his cabin, the admiral had worked himself up into a state of high excitement and agitation.

  “News, Captain Sutton!” Nelson said anxiously, seizing the officer’s arm and pulling him

  into the cabin. “You have news of the Combined Fleet, of Villeneuve?”

  Sutton looked at Hardy, and then at his admiral, and swallowed tightly. “I spoke with the governor of Barbados, milord, and delivered your dispatches to him.”

  “And?”

  “Our pursuit has not been in vain, sir.”

  “See, Hardy!” Nelson exclaimed, flushed with triumph. He pounded his single fist down on

  the table for emphasis. “By God, the French are here and I shall have them yet, you may depend on it!” He swung anxiously to the somber-faced captain. “And Admiral Falconer—he is prepared to assist me, I hope?”

  Sutton looked away, suddenly uncomfortable. He glanced at Hardy, as though for

  reassurance, but caught Nelson’s sharp and questioning look. Slowly, he said, “Admiral Falconer has a squadron at Barbados, sir, as well as a sugar convoy assembled there that is ready to sail for England. He has a frigate patrolling the Windwards, another stationed off Antigua, several seventy-fours at Jamaica—”

  “Thank God Falconer has the safety of that island in mind!”

  “Indeed, milord. Admiral Falconer had the safety of all his islands in mind.”

  Had?

  Nelson’s keen mind did not miss the implication of that single word. He saw the grave look on Sutton’s face, and felt the blood going cold in his heart. “What do you mean, had?” he demanded.

  The unhappy captain shuffled his feet and looked up. “I’m sorry, sir. Admiral Falconer is . . .

  dead. I went aboard one of his ships at Barbados and spoke to a Captain Warner, who confessed it was the result of a duel, sir.” Sutton paused, as he saw the look of shock and horror washing over his beloved leader’s face. “Falconer’s flag-captai
n has been assuming the admiral’s duties until a new commander in chief can be appointed in his place. He—he sends his regards, sir.”

  The words devastated Nelson. For a full minute, maybe two, the little admiral stood staring at the hapless Sutton as he tried to absorb the shock. His single hand reached for the back of a chair, gripping it as though it was all that kept him on his feet. Without speaking, he turned toward the window, his slight body looking very frail in its glittering uniform, his face in profile, his lips pursed in visible pain, and only his throat moving, up and down, up and down.

  The cabin grew deathly silent. Hardy glanced worriedly at his admiral, and Sutton developed a sudden, embarrassed interest in his coat sleeve. “Captain Warner said the duel had something to do with . . . um—with a woman . . . sir,” he added, lamely.

  Nelson took a deep, shuddering breath, his excitement about the French fleet suddenly

  forgotten. Turning from the window, he bent his brow to his hand and collapsed in a chair. He was aware of Hardy and Sutton moving protectively toward him; darkness swam before his eyes and he took a deep, shaky breath to ward it off. “Damn you, Falconer,” he cried suddenly.

  “Damn you and your confounded philandering; I warned you it would come to this!”

  “Sir?”

  “I suppose the duel was fought with cutlasses, wasn’t it, Sutton?!”

  “Captain Warner did not say, sir.”

  Nelson raised his head, his cheeks streaked with tears he made no effort to control. “Leave me,” he said hoarsely. “I wish to be alone.”

  Sutton beat a hasty exit, but Hardy lingered a moment. He reached out, tried to lay a

  comforting hand upon the admiral’s shoulder; but Nelson got to his feet once more, moving to the great, panoramic windows and staring out at the bleak expanse of the endless sea. He

  remained there for a long time. Then he turned, his face melancholy. “Forgive me, Thomas. You would think that after having so many friends fall in battle, such things would grow easier to bear, but they never do. . .

  “I’m sorry, sir,” Hardy said. “I know he was a friend to you.”

  “He was a friend to England. What a shame. What a goddamned, bloody waste.”

  “Such is war, sir.”

  “Aye, such is war. You lose your arm, you lose your life, you pray God someone remembers

  you back home. But do they, Thomas? Do they? Or does anyone really care?”

  Hardy looked down at his big hands, at a loss for words. “I am confident, sir, that when you catch up to Villeneuve you will give him the thrashing he—and Napoleon—deserve. And,” he

  added solemnly, “a victory for England that will never be forgotten.”

  ###

  Shouts, cheers, and dancing figures on a lantern-lit deck; curses, harsh breathing, steel

  ringing against steel, and the singing whoosh of thrusting, slashing cutlasses. The sounds cleaved the night as Enolia—once a planter’s concubine until her master’s ship had fallen afoul of the Pirate Queen’s—practiced her fencing skills with her formidable liberator.

  The two were well matched, both honed with muscle and sleek with sweat, and while rapiers would have been far more manageable than heavy cutlasses, neither captain nor lieutenant was willing to make the trade. Slash and parry, thrust and pivot and slash again: fencing with cutlasses was an exercise in strength and endurance, essential qualities for lady pirates wishing to hold their own on a lawless sea ruled by men.

  “Captain, I know he angers you”—Enolia swung her blade, had it deflected upward as the

  Pirate Queen expertly parried her attack—”I know he’s a deserter, a traitor, a spy, but before you go rushing off to Nelson with him, think about what you’re doing.”

  Cheers erupted from the pirate crew at their captain’s expert defense.

  “I know what I’m doing!” Maeve cried, the sweat sheening her brow. She swung for

  Enolia’s unprotected ribs and, at the last moment, the other woman danced away, the tip of Maeve’s cutlass catching her shirt and tearing it from waist to shoulder. The hit decided the match, and Maeve, her lungs heaving, tossed her damp ponytail over her shoulder, saluted her lieutenant, and then clashed her cutlass against Enolia’s in a handshake between steel. “Besides, he’s no Gallant Knight; he proved that to me when I visited his cell.”

  Breathing hard, she tore the kerchief from her brow, mopped her face with it, and strode to the rum barrel, her shadow long and black in the orange glow cast by the flickering lanterns. She filled her tankard, downed it. Filled it again. Drank the sweet fire more slowly this time, letting it filter down and out into every cell in her body. Her pounding heartbeat begin to steady, and she felt the trades kissing her hot and sweaty skin, drying her face and arms and torso beneath the loose shirt she wore.

  “Good match, Captain. I thought she had ye there,” Karena remarked, drawing her knife and paring a mango.

  “And here I had my money on Enolia tonight.” Tia flung a coin into a wooden bucket.

  “Should’ve known better!”

  Maeve’s lips curved in a grin. “What, you think I’ve lost my touch, Tia?”

  “Nay, captain, merely your heart to that handsome rake. I knew we should’ve shot him the moment he crawled onto our beach!”

  Tia’s observation hit too close to the bone. “Have a care for what you’re saying,” the Pirate Queen growled, “or you’ll be the next one I challenge to a sword fight.”

  “Well then, in that case—”

  “Belay it, Tia,” Maeve said, waving her off. “I’ve had enough for one night.”

  Tia, her eyes dancing, gave an elaborate sigh, for she, like her crewmates, considered it a privilege to duel with their formidable leader. After all, the Pirate Queen had learned to fence under the tutelage of her father, and seven years in the Caribbean had only honed her natural aptitude for the skill into one that few men dared challenge—let alone survived.

  But sword fighting was the last thing on Maeve’s mind. She sat down on the deck and

  leaned against the truck of a cannon, feeling her little ship rising on a swell, settling, rising again beneath her. Even the fierce energy she’d put into her match with Enolia had failed to drive the image of the pirate’s face—or the memory of his kiss—from her mind. She quaffed the rum in fierce, angry swallows, seeking to drown her torment in tipple instead.

  “That black-haired devil again?” Orla asked quietly, discerning the reason for her captain’s sour mood.

  Maeve stared mutely out into the darkness without answering.

  “So, he tried to take some liberties with you,” Karena said. She stabbed the mango peelings with her dagger and flung them over the side. “What man hasn’t?”

  “Aye, you’ve got to give ’im credit for trying,” Jenny pointed out.

  “He’s your Gallant Knight,” young Sorcha cried, from her seat atop one of the guns. “I’m

  sure of it!”

  “Aye, Majesty,” her sister echoed, “your Gallant Knight!”

  “He is not my Gallant Knight!” Maeve retorted, slamming her mug onto the varnished deck and staring down each face in turn. “My Knight—God, how I loathe that word—will be a brave, noble officer, someone honorable and upstanding and good. This ‘Gray’ is naught but a traitor and a spy, the both of which I have no use for! Besides,” she added, glaring sullenly off into the night, “he’ll only break my heart. ”

  “But Majesty, he’s not like those other men who’ve tried to court you, can’t you see? None of them were worthy of you.”

  “He’s a spy!” Maeve cried, in frustration. “He’s a traitor! He deserted his navy!”

  Only Enolia, leaning calmly against the rail and backhanding the sweat from her brow,

  seemed to be on her side. “And if he could desert his navy,” she said pointedly, “he could desert you. “

  No one spoke. They all knew their captain had been deserted enough. She was not to be blamed if sh
e didn’t trust men. She was not to be blamed for not trusting this man, with his wicked smile and dangerous charm. And she did have the Sight—who could know what it had shown her?

  Enolia stalked to the barrel, drew a hefty measure of rum, and, lifting it to her lips, faced the crew. “I’m with the captain,” she said. “Let’s bring him to Nelson. The British’ll pay a hefty sum for him, if only to keep him from spilling his guts to Villeneuve.”

  “And we can do far more with British money than with a British deserter,” Maeve added, in triumph. But it was an empty triumph, for, deep down inside, she did not want to relinquish her captive. Despite his treatment of her, despite the fact he knew just how to raise her ire and seemed to delight in doing it, he had made her feel like a woman again, not the hardened pirate she was.

  Imagine, chastising her for her unladylike language!

  But no. She had learned her lessons too well. He would only break her heart, and it was

  better to get rid of him now.

  Gaining her feet, she put her mug down and went to the rail, there to stare down at the waves curling against Kestrel's black hull. Turlough was down there, drifting on the surface. She could see the dolphin’s pale belly as he floated on his side, one flipper free of the water as though waving at her. Then he dived beneath the schooner and emerged on the other side, blowing out his breath on a rush of sound that was melancholy in the darkness.

  She gazed across the water, the beach, and toward the old storehouse, barely discernible in the gloom—where he was.

  Then she shut her eyes, and, as her father had once done in another time and place, quietly placed her hands on the rail of her ship, listening. But Kestrel was unusually silent, and instead, it was her father’s presence that Maeve sensed. She could almost feel the warmth left by his hands, as though he had stood here just moments before and not all those years ago; she could almost hear his voice again, his laughter, as he’d taught her to sail this very schooner. Her father, her beloved daddy, the dashing privateer captain who’d become legendary in the American Revolution . . .