The King's Mercy

by Lori Benton

  Hope stirred like a wind gusting through the smithy. Alex turned his face from it. They spoke their pretty words, the English, made their promises, then did as they wished.

  From the satchel Reeves removed a corked inkwell, a quill, and the sheet of foolscap upon which the terms of his indenture were writ.

  Captain Carey hadn’t taken his gaze from Alex. “I’m told you didn’t come peaceably after you were informed of your purchase.”

  “Informed? I was hauled from my berth, told I was sold, manhandled onto deck, then gi’en a loundering by that—” Alex broke off, realizing two things: his speech was doubtless growing impenetrable to English ears and the big African who’d been his guard upriver hadn’t accompanied Reeves and Carey to the smithy. “Demas,” he finished curtly.

  Carey grasped a candle and held it high, gaze going to the knot on Alex’s brow, the bruises over his torso and neck, the residue of dried blood his hasty ablution had missed. He swung toward Reeves. “Does he speak truth? This is Demas’s work?”

  Reeves grimaced. “I cannot say he lies, sir. But someone has.”

  This didn’t please Severn’s master. “You gave me to understand all was in order.”

  “I’d hoped MacKinnon had resigned himself and it would be of no matter. I’ll tell you the whole of it, if you wish.”

  “I do wish,” Carey said.

  Reeves launched into his narrative readily. “I boarded the Charlotte-Ann to choose among the indentures, as per your instructions. When I counted but five, MacKinnon was pointed out. Bingham was of a mind to retain him as crew, but he being my choice, I was assured MacKinnon would be prepared to disembark upon my return that evening. I was later than anticipated coming to collect him. It isn’t often I’m in town…”

  “All right,” Carey said. “You’ve your society in Wilmington. I don’t fault you availing yourself of it once you’d seen to my concerns.”

  Reeves’s face brightened in that disarming smile. “When I sent Demas and a couple of the ship’s crew to fetch MacKinnon from his berth, he came up protesting—so vehemently as to prevent conversation. I bid Demas settle him, an action carried out with more force than necessary, alas. Still, he’s here and in one piece and…Shall he do, sir?”

  Carey wouldn’t be rushed, weighing all he’d heard. “So Captain Bingham failed to inform you of Phineas’s choice?” he asked and, before Alex could reply, added, “What would you have done, MacKinnon, had you been so informed?”

  The question startled Alex into honesty. “I’d have begged him to reconsider. Failing that, jumped ship and swam for it.”

  Surprise, and wariness, flashed in Carey’s blue-gray eyes. “Have you plans to abscond with yourself now?”

  A question fortuitously worded. “This isna where I want to be, but I’ve no such plans.” For now, he added silently.

  “One might call that generous,” Carey said, “were you free to choose in the matter. You aren’t—the price of rebellion against His Majesty. His mercy spared you a hangman’s rope. Mister Reeves’s choice granted you a future better than you deserve. Content yourself with both.”

  Alex opened his mouth to say something he likely would have regretted, when the forge inexplicably drew his gaze. He envisioned it fiery, himself before it, hammer in hand, glowing iron under his power, its secrets opening to him. With visceral memory he recalled the weight of his broadsword that icy April morning it was last knocked from his grasp.

  A forge could allow for the creation of all manner of useful things.

  Carey turned to Moon, silent since his master’s arrival. “Well, Elijah. You’ve had a chance to look him over. Has he the makings of an Hephaestus?”

  Moon had been standing in shadow. He shifted now, bringing his disfigurement into candlelight. “If ye can keep him fed, sir, I’ll see he earns his bread.”

  Edmund Carey glanced at the tray atop the anvil; Alex had the impression the man knew who had, and hadn’t, consumed the fare from his kitchen. “I’ll say it again, Elijah. You’re needed here. What’s more, Severn is your home, as long as you wish it to be.”

  Moon’s lips clamped tight as he nodded.

  Alex grudgingly approved Carey’s show of concern, but he knew it hadn’t reached that yawning pit within that told a man all he’d known was lost, who he’d once been shattered beyond repair, whatever he might yet make of himself obscured in the rubble of present ruination.

  All gazes shifted to Alex, keen with expectation. Reeves’s lips parted in an eager smile, as if the man was confident of this coil he’d set in motion aboard the Charlotte-Ann ending satisfactorily, yet his eyes burned Alex with such intensity it seemed he meant to make it so by force of will alone. He held out the quill, but it wasn’t for Reeves that Alex at last stepped forward and took it.

  5

  “Might I have a word, Miss Carey?”

  Joanna grimaced before turning toward her stepfather’s study, down the passage at the back of the house. Miss Carey. She loathed the address or at least how it sounded on Phineas Reeves’s lips: miscarry.

  “Yes, Mister Reeves?”

  He stood in the doorway, dressed in a suit of brown linen she’d never seen. Purchased while in Wilmington, no doubt. His gaze fell to her burden—folded homespun, scuffed shoes. “For MacKinnon?”

  Apparently he’d paid no heed when she mentioned needing to finish the man’s clothing that evening, though he and Papa both took note during last night’s supper when she’d inquired why the man had arrived like a runaway towed home. “He behaved himself civil enough in my presence. Why was he bound?”

  Papa looked up from their course of pork cutlets. “You’ve seen him?”

  “Me too,” Charlotte piped, engendering a parental frown.

  “You took your sister to the smithy before I could inspect the man?”

  “No, Papa. Charlotte saw him from a window as he came off the boat.”

  “He looked like a pirate,” Charlotte added, blue eyes sprung wide.

  Papa’s frown melted.

  Mister Reeves threw back his head and laughed. “He does, at that.”

  “Is there cause for concern?” Joanna persisted.

  “There was some misunderstanding about the arrangement on MacKinnon’s part. But he’s signed the indenture. Elijah says he’ll do.”

  “The man ought to take a knee in gratitude.” Mister Reeves raised his glass, meeting Joanna’s gaze. “But I dare say a year on a prison ship has curbed his rebellious tendencies.”

  A year on a prison ship. In her estimation, such punishment might well cement such tendencies. But Mister MacKinnon’s indenture was a fait accompli. She must do her part to see the man blended into the rhythm of Severn with as few discordant notes as possible.

  “I thought you’d wish to know,” Mister Reeves said now as she approached the study. “Our Jacobite in the smithy isn’t the only item of interest I brought upriver. There’s a letter from that clergyman with whom you’re acquainted. I just remembered to pass it along.”

  “Reverend Pauling?” Joanna hurried to the study. In the center of the room, which held their library of some three dozen books, Papa sat at his enormous desk. Cluttering its surface were ledgers, documents, and nautical mementos—including a singularly large and perfect conch shell she’d found during the only trip she’d ever taken to the barrier islands lining the colony’s coast.

  Papa looked up at her entering, the letter spread before him. “David writes we may expect him in less than a fortnight. He would spend some days with us before venturing into the backcountry to preach. He mentions Elijah.”

  That meant the reverend had received her letters sent to his sister’s home in Pennsylvania—the nearest he had to a permanent residence, for which Joanna was selfishly glad; being far upriver from Wilmington, isolated by miles of pine barrens from neighbors, they were forced t
o rely on itinerate preachers for their spiritual sustenance. Preachers like Reverend David Pauling, unwelcome in half the homes of New Hanover County for his radical New Light views, though the exhortations Joanna had heard from his lips were but Holy Scripture, clearly taught.

  Already in the back of her mind she was planning for the visit. Like-minded neighbors who could spare the time would travel to hear the reverend preach, needing accommodation. “I’m so glad, Papa. I’ll read the letter when I return to the house.”

  She felt Mister Reeves’s gaze on her as she left the room. “You’re glad of this preacher’s coming, or that he takes an interest in Moon?”

  “Both, of course,” she said, pausing at the back door, but when he made no further remark she hurried out.

  It was nearing sunset as she reached the oak-shaded smithy, the very hour she’d approached it yesterday, yet how different it felt. She’d heard the occasional ring of hammering since midday; Mister MacKinnon’s training had already begun.

  Before she reached the doorway, Marigold stepped from the smithy with a tray. She crossed the yard to Joanna, who noted with a glance that every dish was picked clean. “You’ve served supper, I see.”

  “Yes ma’am. They finished it off quick.”

  Joanna lowered her voice. “Elijah?”

  “Ate his share,” Marigold whispered back.

  Male voices rumbled from the smithy, then a sound she hadn’t heard in months. Elijah’s laughter, low and subdued, but it was his, no mistaking it. It rooted Joanna where she stood.

  Marigold misread her hesitation. “That new man look fierce enough to scare a bear up a tree, but I see kindness in him. He…Well, maybe you’ll see too.”

  “Papa wouldn’t have approved a man we need fear,” Joanna said, more sternly than intended.

  Marigold’s expression dimmed. “No ma’am. I best get these to the wash kettle.”

  They parted, though Joanna paused to glance back, regretful. Marigold hadn’t lingered, but Joanna did, catching the conversation from within.

  “Aye,” came the Scotsman’s voice, a deep rumble with the swell of sea waves in it. “Ye’ve worked me so hard, I may actually sleep tonight.”

  “Something wrong with the bed?” Elijah replied.

  “Besides its ending at my knees? No. It’s the sounds of this place. They’re all wrong to my ears.”

  “Ye cannot hear the sea,” Elijah said.

  “Aye. Now ye say it, that’s it. Ye canna even smell it here.”

  “Ye’ll grow used to it. I did.”

  “Ye were at sea, then, a blacksmith?”

  “Not a smith. A cabin boy aboard Captain Carey’s last command.”

  “Reeves mentioned serving with Carey. He didna say ye were with him.”

  “No surprise.”

  An ache swelled in Joanna’s chest. Here was Elijah talking freely with a man come among them only yesterday, as she hadn’t heard him do since his injury, despite the months of patient coaxing, praying…

  She closed her eyes, wincing at the resentment springing up in her soul. Was she so small of spirit as to feel slighted by Mister MacKinnon’s effortless success, rather than rejoicing at it?

  “Thank you,” she whispered, finally heeding Azuba’s admonition.

  Elijah spoke again. “What made ye do it? Not that ye’d a choice…yet I think ye did choose.”

  Joanna frowned at the change of subject, awaiting enlightenment.

  “I’d meant to serve my indenture aboard the Charlotte-Ann,” came the reply. “But I can make my living at sea already. I didna need seven years to learn. The forge, though, that’s a skill to stand me good wherever I fetch up next.”

  “So the mind of a man may plan. Perhaps ye ought to say if God wills, it shall be so. He may have other notions.”

  Joanna hoped Mister MacKinnon knew what to say to douse the bitterness that smoldered beneath Elijah’s words.

  “D’ye still believe there’s a God?”

  “Do ye?”

  Stung by the bleak—nigh blasphemous—turn of their talk, Joanna marshaled herself and stepped into the smithy. The shop was high-ceilinged and commodious, yet Alex MacKinnon, on his feet, seemed to fill the space.

  “I’ve brought your clothing, Mister MacKinnon.” Though she kept her gaze on the Scotsman, she was aware of Elijah moving off to shutter the windows that had been open throughout the day. The place smelled like a smithy again, earth and fire rolled together, nose-stingingly acrid and sweet.

  Mister MacKinnon stepped forward to accept her offering, dressed in those ragged trousers cut off mid-calf. His hair was tailed back, bare feet dirty, the day’s sweat still a gleam across his chest. “I thank ye, Mistress,” he said with a slight bow.

  Struck by the formality of his manner, in contrast to yesterday’s, she put the garments and shoes into his hands, feeling the warm brush of his fingers across the backs of hers. “Some items are folded in. A razor and strop, soap and the like. Would you care to try the clothes?”

  The lofty blue eyes sharpened. “Now?”

  “I’d like to judge their fit. Especially the shoes. They’re the best I could find.”

  “Aye, Mistress. I’ll be but a moment.”

  As Alex MacKinnon ducked into the back room, Elijah closed the last shutter, plunging the smithy into shadow save for the dimming light from the yard. “How did it go today?” she asked, with a nod toward the door through which Mister MacKinnon had disappeared.

  “Well enough,” Elijah said.

  She waited for him to say more, until the silence grew unbearable. “Papa has a letter from Reverend Pauling. He’s coming to visit soon.”

  Elijah grunted. Silence stretched again, aching and awkward, until Alex MacKinnon stepped from the sleeping quarters. He wore the new breeches and shirt, tails tucked, neckcloth tied, shoes on his feet. He’d washed his face and retied his hair. Though he was still bearded, it made for a startling transformation.

  “Shall they do?” he asked.

  “Very well. And the shoes fit?”

  “Aye, tapadh leibh.” When she blinked, uncomprehending, he added, “I thank ye.”

  His long calves were bare. She snatched her gaze up, pinning it to his face. “Were the stockings unsuitable?”

  “They’re fine, Mistress. But I didna wash my feet.” He started to smile, but she flinched. “Did I speak amiss? I was told to address ye so.”

  “Mistress is fine.” At least it wasn’t miscarry.

  “But ye’d rather I called ye different?”

  “I’d prefer Miss Joanna.”

  The man did smile, then, a singularly crooked smile, one corner curving up, the other down. “Aye, Miss Joanna. I can do that.” He rubbed a hand across his bristling beard. “I ken ye’re glad to see me covered decent, but I thank ye most especial for the razor.”

  Unexpectedly disarmed, she returned his smile, then glanced at Elijah, trying to think of something, anything, to say to engage him as Mister MacKinnon had done before she entered.

  Elijah wouldn’t meet her gaze. To her mortification, Joanna felt tears threatening.

  “You’re welcome, Mister MacKinnon,” she said, and took her leave with what was surely betraying haste. She wanted to run back to the house, throw herself across her bed, and weep—for the loss of Elijah’s friendship, his hand, his future, his hope.

  She forced herself to smile through the day’s remains, until the last candle was snuffed and Charlotte slept beside her, and she could let the darkness see her heart.

  * * *

  Even under the thinnest sheeting, he was too miserably hot to sleep, yet the mosquitoes were too relentless to lie uncovered. Alex slapped away a sting on his neck. Across from him, Moon rustled the cornhusk ticking as he heaved over on his cot. “Get used to it, will I?” Alex muttered.


  Moon’s voice issued gruff in the inky dark. “Sounds of ye stewing in your juices are no sweet lullaby.”

  Alex glowered. “Aye. Sorry.”

  “I’d not be sleeping anyway.”

  Moon’s disposition had lightened over the day as he’d set about familiarizing Alex with the lay of the shop, the tools and their usage, the heating of the forge. While Moon manned the bellows, he’d set Alex to practice with hammer, tongs, and iron bar, past the point his back and shoulders screamed in protest. They’d finished for the day as the kitchen lass, Marigold, brought supper. Moon had so far unwound as to speak to her without being coaxed. Then Joanna Carey had arrived with Alex’s clothing and the man had drawn the shutters across his soul.

  “Does she trouble ye so that ye canna sleep?”

  “Who?”

  “Miss Joanna. Ye go away inside yourself when she’s nigh. What is it about her puts ye off?”

  He sensed Moon’s bristling before he sputtered, “She—I never said—Joanna Carey is the kindest, truest soul the length of the Cape Fear River.”

  Alex hadn’t expected such fervent defense of the woman. “Ye’ve an odd way of showing her how ye feel.”

  “She knows how I feel.”

  “Oh, aye? I’ve seen the look of her both times she’s come here. The look of a woman whose heart’s being broke.”

  The bedtick across from him crackled. Alex sat up, braced, but Moon merely sat on the edge of his cot.

  “Ye know nothing of her. Of us.”

  The raggedness of the words almost put Alex off, but if he was to survive in this place with its web of humanity stretched in sticky intricacy across race and station—and hearts, apparently—he needed to grasp its pattern before putting another foot wrong.

  “Fair enough. But listen. I’ve been taken from everything and everyone I do ken, put ashore in this place to learn a trade I never thought to need, among a people I canna begin to fathom. Will ye help me, man? Help me get my feet under me?”