“Maybe you’ve been locked up not to keep you in, but to keep others out.”
His words froze her. They made sense. How many more of them were out there?
Lorcan tucked the key and chain back into his pocket. “Things are not always as they seem, Grace. But I have a suspicion you already knew that. The captain has ordered me to protect you. That’s why you’re in this cabin — that’s why you cannot go out yet.”
“But what does the captain want from me? I don’t understand.”
“That I don’t know, Grace. I’m just following my orders.”
A moment ago, she had felt safe, reassured. Now she felt more under threat than ever. Lorcan could talk the talk, but he had no real power. Her fate was in the hands of the captain.
“I want to see him,” she announced.
“To see who?”
“The captain. Will you bring him to me?”
Lorcan laughed. “Haven’t I already made that plain? Nobody but nobody summons the captain, Grace. He’ll see you when he decides he’s good and ready.”
“No,” Grace said. “I’ve waited long enough. I want to see him. Either ask him to come to me here, or take me to him. Now.”
Her breath was coming fast now. She had to find a quick resolution to this.
“Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t,” Lorcan said. “Not while it’s light. The ship sleeps through the day. When the Dawning Bell sounds, the decks clear and everyone takes shelter. Even the captain.”
“But the Dawning Bell didn’t sound. You said so yourself.” Grace was thinking on her feet.
“Yes, but it matters not. I don’t know why Darcy failed to sound it, but it doesn’t change anything. None but the captain can walk beneath the sun.”
Grace thought for a moment.
“You can’t go out there, it’s true, but I can. If you give me the key, I can go and find the captain myself. You said his cabin’s right next door.”
Lorcan shook his head.
“I’m not giving you this key, Grace. I’m sorry.”
She frowned at him and he stared back stubbornly.
“I thought you were my friend,” she said.
“That’s a low blow, Grace. I’ve done what I can for you. I’ve swum the icy waters for you. I’ve pleaded your case with the captain. And now I’ve risked my own safety and reputation by staying here with you. But now I must obey orders.”
Grace folded her arms across her chest and bit her lip in frustration. She tasted blood again. The rest happened in a blur. Suddenly, Lorcan was standing before her, his eyes gazing down into hers more intently than ever. His hand reached out for hers and she realized she had let go of the curtain. There was no escaping his grip now, as he turned her palm upward. Then she felt the coldness of metal as he pressed the key into her flesh.
“Go,” he said. “Go now, before . . . before I change my mind.”
He turned away and covered his eyes. His hands were trembling.
Grace felt the weight of the key and its snaking chain in her hand. She looked toward the door.
18
PUNISHMENT TO FIT THE CRIME
“And now let us unmask the villains,” announced Captain Wrathe to his excited crew.
The two intruders had been securely bound and led down from the devastation of Captain Wrathe’s cabin to the main deck. They gave little resistance, and Connor could see the fear and resignation in their eyes.
An attack on the captain was a major event, and the whole crew ceased their labors to see who had perpetrated the evil scheme. The pirates pressed forward noisily, jostling for position until Molucco Wrathe raised his hand and begged for silence. His request was granted immediately — no one was in a mood to defy the captain.
“Mister Connor Tempest, why don’t you do the honors?”
He gave Connor a gentle nudge forward, toward the two prisoners.
“Remove their hoods and let us see who these villains are,” continued the captain.
Connor stood before the two attackers. Their hands had been roughly drawn behind their backs and their bodies were tightly bound from their chests to their knees. How different they looked now from when they’d menaced him and Captain Wrathe with the dagger and cutlass.
“What are you waiting for?” cried a rough pirate voice.
“Get on with it, boy!” cried another.
Captain Wrathe silenced the crowd again. Connor stepped forward and lifted the two hoods, stepping back to give the audience a better view.
The faces revealed to the crowd at large what Connor had realized much earlier. His two attackers were young men, probably only two or three years older than himself. They’d had guts to board The Diablo and hide in the giant vases, biding their time. They’d done well to get past Captain Wrathe’s many protectors.
“I recognize you two,” the captain said, drawing nearer. “There’s something familiar in those faces.”
“Cut off their noses!” cried one of the pirates.
“No, slit their ears!” shouted another.
Connor could see that one of the boys was saying something, though his voice was drowned out by the din.
“He’s trying to speak,” he said to Captain Wrathe.
Again the captain raised a hand toward the crew, though the calls to punish the intruders were growing more persistent and imaginative.
“Come on,” Captain Wrathe said, “if you have something to say, boy, spit it out fast. I can’t keep this mob silent for long.”
“We’re from Port Hazzard,” the boy said. “Our father’s the governor there. You pillaged our house and we came to teach you a lesson.”
Connor was impressed by the boy’s fire, even in such dismal circumstances. It seemed that Captain Wrathe was, too. “You came to teach me a lesson, eh? Tell us more. We’re all ears. Go on, boy, we’re all waiting.”
“Stick to the seas,” said the boy, fiercely. “You may have dominion here, but the land is ours.”
There were more cries from the mob. Connor could see that the other boy was close to tears. Clearly, he did not share his brother’s venom. Connor recognized him as the younger of the pair, the one who’d wielded the cutlasses. He had shown flair in his swordsmanship but his eyes had betrayed his lack of confidence.
“You had better let us go,” the older brother now told Captain Wrathe.
“Had I now? Why is that, I wonder? Do you have another dagger concealed in your sock or an extending cutlass behind your ear, perhaps? And if you do, how, pray tell, do you intend to reach them?”
“Dump ’em in the soup!” cried one of the mob.
“String them from the rigging!” Connor recognized Bart’s voice.
“If,” continued the boy proudly, “anything happens to my brother and me, our father will send out a force such as you have never seen before. You and your crew will be massacred. And even if you sail away up the Cape, we have friends in the northern territory, too. If you kill us, you will sign your own death warrant with our blood.”
The mere mention of death and blood proved too much for the younger brother, who threw up on the deck, narrowly missing the back of Captain Wrathe’s velvet coat.
“This is interesting,” Captain Wrathe said, stepping forward and keeping his attention on the cockier of the pair. “There may be something in what you say.”
The boy looked triumphantly at the captain and Connor. Connor remembered how the rubies had reflected in his unnaturally dark eyes.
“I don’t reckon I shall kill you,” Captain Wrathe said.
There was uproar from the crew.
“Hold on, hold on. I haven’t finished. I don’t reckon we’ll kill you just yet. I’m going to have to think about this one. And while I’m exercising my brain cells, I reckon we’ll follow Mister Bartholomew’s suggestion and string this third-rate pair from the rigging.”
A huge wave of cheering arose from the crowd. The captain called forward Bartholomew and some of his mates. As the nastier of the two broth
ers was roughly dragged away, he spat in Connor’s direction.
Then he disappeared from view, along with his brother, who seemed in danger of throwing up again. Connor felt a certain pity toward the younger boy. Odds were he had been bullied into the attack by his more forceful sibling.
It did not take long for Bart and his fellows to do their work. Within minutes, the boys had been trussed up and were swinging through the air upside down from the mast, like joints of meat in a butcher’s window.
The crew cheered and shouted insults at the pair as they swung back and forth overhead.
In their excitement, few were aware of the figure climbing the ladder on the side of the ship and leaping athletically onto the deck.
“What on earth is going on?” cracked a voice like breaking thunder.
It was Cheng Li — her face as dark as storm clouds, her eyes sparking like lightning. Connor had been too caught up in events to notice her absence before. He wondered where she had been.
“Ah, Mistress Li, welcome back,” said Captain Wrathe.
Cheng Li pushed her way through the crowd. “Go back to your business,” she shouted to the pirates. “Back to your tasks, I say.”
There was a significant amount of grumbling but the mob gradually began to disperse.
Cheng Li stood before Captain Wrathe, her face still flushed with fury. “Do you know who those boys are?” she said.
“Yes, Mistress Li, I do. They are evil little beggars who but one hour ago had their swords trained on young Mister Tempest and I and, but for the lad’s ingenuity and bravery, might have sliced our guts out.”
“Is this true?” Cheng Li turned her face to Connor.
“Don’t turn away from me!” thundered Molucco Wrathe. “Forgive me, Mistress Li, but have I missed something? Have you taken over command of The Diablo? Because, when I last looked at the ship’s log, it still read Captain Molucco Wrathe.”
Connor was shocked at Captain Wrathe’s fury. Evidently, Cheng Li was, too, for when she next spoke, her tone was much softer. “I apologize, Captain. I spoke in haste. But for your own good — for all our good — those boys are Governor Acharo’s sons. Acharo has always been lenient with pirates in the waters adjacent to his land. Any harm we do to them will come back to us a hundred-fold.”
“I’m fully aware of this, Mistress Li, and I do not intend any lasting harm to be done. We shall give them a scare and then we shall dispatch them — though the crew are justly baying for their blood. Strangely, it seems my crew take issue with their captain being attacked in his own cabin.”
Cheng Li opened her mouth to speak again but Captain Wrathe had not finished.
“And it certainly calls into question our security measures, Mistress Li, doesn’t it? I seem to remember when you drew up that rather tedious workbook on shipboard security that it was to be your responsibility.”
Again Cheng Li began to speak but Captain Wrathe cut her off, as brutally as if he’d sliced a sword through her words.
“It is because of this boy,” he said, throwing his arm about Connor, “and this boy alone that I am alive and standing before you. While you were off having tea and biscuits and a bit of a chin-wag at the Pirate Academy, this lad risked his life to save mine. That’s what being a pirate is about. I feel sure your father would have agreed with me. Now you wait until those lads up there are feeling just a little too giddy and then you send them packing with a warning to Governor Acharo and any other have-a-go heroes along the Cape: Attack Captain Molucco Wrathe and his crew and there’ll be hell to pay.”
Cheng Li closed her mouth. Clearly, this was no time to talk back to Molucco Wrathe. Instead, she nodded so low it was almost a bow and made her exit.
Once she was out of hearing, Molucco Wrathe turned to Connor and gave him a wink. “I’ve been wanting to say some of those things for a long while now. I feel purged, my lad, purged!”
Connor couldn’t help but smile.
“As for you, young sir, what bravery, what instinct! Now you must name your reward. Whatever your heart desires shall be yours.”
There was nothing Connor wanted more than to find Grace. He needed to find a way to trace the Vampirate ship — rather than just waiting and hoping. The captain hadn’t taken him seriously before but now perhaps he would. But it was a gamble. He didn’t want to see the captain unleash on him the fury he’d directed at Cheng Li.
“Come on, boy, out with it. Anything your heart desires.”
Connor’s heart began beating faster. He was scared but he had to give it one more try.
“Please, Captain Wrathe. I need your help to find my sister.”
“Your sister?” Captain Wrathe frowned. “But, my boy, your sister cannot be found. I wish she could, oh I wish it with all my heart, but alas . . .”
“I know you don’t believe that there’s a Vampirate ship,” Connor said, unable to let this chance go. “But even if there isn’t, Captain, I feel she’s still alive. We’re twins and we’re close. I can’t explain the feeling that I have but I just know she’s alive.”
Captain Wrathe looked at him sadly. “Mister Tempest, are you sure that you feel it? Or is it perhaps that you just wish it to be so?”
The captain’s tone was incredibly gentle. It brought Connor up sharp. Suddenly, all his excitement and determination drained away. He’d got through these days on the pirate ship, clinging onto the belief that Grace was alive — that somehow he’d find her. But what if she wasn’t? What if she really had drowned that first night? Maybe he had only hallucinated that ship with the strange winglike sails — as clear as the vision had seemed. Perhaps it was time to accept that Grace was not coming back and to get on with his life. His life as a pirate.
“I’m sorry, Connor. Truly I am. I can make inquiries about this Vampirate ship, if you wish. But I’d be lying to you if I said I thought there was any purpose in that, and I don’t lie to my friends, my brothers.”
Connor nodded, once more having to bite back tears. This was it, then. He was alone. His father and Grace had gone. He was an orphan. A pirate orphan. Suddenly, he had a flash of inspiration.
“Captain Wrathe, I’ll tell you what I’d like as my reward. I would like sword-fighting lessons.”
Molucco Wrathe beamed. “A fine answer, my boy, a fine answer! I sensed the blood of a pirate in you the first moment I clapped eyes on you and then again in my cabin back there. A lesson, it is. And from our finest tutor — Cutlass Cate. I shall inform her immediately.”
Molucco Wrathe strode off purposefully, beaming from ear to ear.
Connor walked up the guardrail and looked out to the distant horizon. Truly it seemed to stretch out toward infinity.
“I’m doing this for you, Grace,” he said softly, “and for you, Dad. I’m going to make you both proud of me. I’m going to be the best pirate that ever sailed the sea. And I’m never going to forget you. I’m never going to forget either of you.”
As he stood there, desperately trying to say good-bye, he felt his sister’s presence more strongly than ever. Then something strange happened. Inside his head, he heard a voice. His dad’s voice.
“Don’t let her go, Connor. Not now. Not now when she needs you the most.”
“It’s too hard,” Connor said, as though his dad were standing next to him. “I want to help, but I don’t know how. I don’t know what to do or how to find her.”
His eyes were streaming. Furiously, he blinked away his tears. Then he heard his dad’s voice again, even clearer than before.
“Make yourself ready, Connor. That’s all. Make yourself ready. Trust the tide.”
Make yourself ready. Trust the tide. What did he mean? Why was he talking in riddles?
“What do you mean, Dad? What do I have to do?”
He waited, wanting to hear him again. Could it really be his father? It had to be, thought Connor. It didn’t even matter what he said — just hearing the soft, familiar voice was reward enough. How he had missed it. But try as he might
to summon its return, all he heard now was the rumble of the ocean and the cawing of gulls overhead.
At last he turned and walked back across the deck. His head was spinning but, for now, he had chores to do. The afternoon’s events had kept him from his pirate duties.
19
THE CAPTAIN
Grace opened the door only a touch, to contain the amount of light coming into the cabin. As quickly as she could, to reduce Lorcan’s discomfort, she wriggled out of the small gap and closed the door behind her. Being out in the air, after so long cooped up in the cabin, was a heady sensation. She closed her eyes as she inhaled deep breaths of fresh air, made even more refreshing by the smell of sea salt. Even before she opened her eyes, she could feel the heat of the sun on her face — as gentle as a feather at first, then stronger.
Glancing from left to right, she saw the red-painted decks were quite empty, just as Lorcan had said they’d be. She walked up to the guardrail and looked out to the horizon. It was perfect weather. The sea was calm and its crystal surface seemed to dance with light as it reflected back the sun’s rays.
At first it seemed a magical sight, made all the more so by having it to herself, but then Grace’s thoughts turned. The sea might be calm and majestic in the morning light, but when she’d last seen it, it had been a very different story. The waters that appeared so restful and alluring now were the same waters that had roughly broken her and Connor’s boat in two and hungrily dragged her and her brother down into its depths.
Feeling suddenly giddy, Grace turned away, leaning against the guardrail for support. As she opened her eyes, she caught her breath. She was standing before the cabin next to hers. Her heart missed a beat. Was this the captain’s cabin? It must be, for these two cabins were separated from the others. As she looked at the heavy wood door, it opened with a creak. She found herself frozen to the spot. She had wanted to speak to the captain for so long. But now, suddenly, she felt unsure of herself. She knew that this was no ordinary ship, so what did that make the captain? What demon lay beyond the dark gap in the doorway?
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