of Maidens & Swords

by Melissa Marr

  And I failed them.

  Both Lucretia and Bridgette are lost to me—because of him. I was away too long, and my mother was too trusting. Lucy had married the pious Reverend Hayes in the winter, and by the following autumn, Bridgette had married the honorable Captain Hayes.

  They were the same man.

  I consoled myself that if they were dead, my sisters would either take shifts appeasing my mother or they would come to me with answers. Neither has happened, so I have to think they might yet live.

  I have come to Prudence to try a bolder plan than is strictly wise. Hayes is the devil who owns this cottage, and here, I will ensnare him. He is a man who collects brides, including both of my sisters. Through a liberal application of coins and the occasion blade, I discovered that the village of Prudence is the devil’s haven. He retreats here to a community of people so pious that they’ve doubled back around the edge again to reach sinfulness. The citizens of Prudence are holier-than-thou, and they accept Hayes as one of their own. The devil was born here, so they discount whispers of his heinous deeds. They dismiss word of his depravity as the slings and arrows of the damned tossed at the righteous.

  He is a defiler, a liar, and a murderer. He is, in sum, a devil among men.

  Before the moon grows full again, I will marry this devil. I will be his bride whether or not he consents. It is the penance my mother and I both think I deserve. After all, if I’d turned down that last job, I wouldn’t have been at sea so long that my sister’s letter was unanswered. It is that letter that damns us all.

  “I was a fool,” Mother whispers from behind me. “I trusted you, Adelaide. I was wrong.”

  “Go look for Biddy,” I urge her again, but her knitting needles clack louder, faster, and I am left grateful that she cannot end my life with her ghastly needles.

  As Mother glares at me and knits her latest shroud, a lovely thing in what looks like sea-blue angora, I review the plans in my mind. I must marry a devil, and once wed, I must learn of my sisters’ fate. And then, in the way of many a dissatisfied bride, I shall murder him quietly.

  Or violently if all goes as I dream.

  I examine the compressed herbs and assorted weapons I’ve gathered: Foxglove, belladonna leaves, castor seeds, and one precious vial of rattlesnake venom. Once they are all ready, I will sew the tiny packets folded into wax leaves within the thickest fabrics of my dresses. I will carry the means of murdering the man with me in every dress. I will wear his death in folded pieces of poison over my heart.

  It is not my way. I prefer the honesty of bullets, but an innocent bride does not carry a gun or sword. She brings a trousseau. And thus, each day, I wear a skirt hemmed with weapons, and I learned how to pretend to be a maiden again. Hidden in the seam of the newly-made merkin I have procured to wear for my wedding night is a small glass vial of blood. I have practiced in order to be most thorough in my ruse.

  Given my choice, I’d be back in familiar chaps and a good corset, sword in one hand, gun in the other, and cussing with the spirit that sparks a brawl far more often than my sainted dead mother should ever know. Instead, I’m trapped with my mother’s ghost in a daub and wood cottage that has a layer of dust over even the holy book. No man of good intent would leave that book under a thick layer of dust. My sisters were to be wed and bedded, by a good man, expecting to be brought here to the village of Prudence. They should’ve had babes in arms and been thinking of the next by now. Instead, they married the same man, and they never arrived here.

  My associate Blue-Eyed Bill swears he saw Biddy in a port a few months back. When last the devil’s ship was spotted, a woman was lashed onto the masthead of a ship like a garish totem. Tatters of dress and tendrils of fire-red hair made my sources strongly suspect that the corpse on the ship was my baby sister.

  Dead.

  Bridgette is dead.

  The man who’d offered for her, Captain Hayes, was no more a God-fearing man than I am a milkmaid. He postures now as a noble, a captain in His Majesty’s Navy, and he moves from village to village seeking a wife. Does he wed and murder them?

  There are no bodies lashed to his ship’s prow when they’re in port, but sailors tell tales. Hayes spreads his money around at taverns and shops, makes donations to churches, and while it might not buy the devil a ticket through the pearly gates, it buys him sympathy as he shares some version of the same sad tale in village after village. Widowed. God-fearing. Lonely. The villagers offer up their maids for him to pick his next victim. Six villages. Six wives, including both of my sisters.

  I look at my map. I can see his pattern now. He’ll search villages for a wife, claim that he’ll have a home for her, but then he’ll come here. Alone. I don’t know where the wives are sent, but I’ll find out.

  This time, he’ll find me waiting.

  I look back at the parchment I’ve been drafting and read the first of many letters I’ve created for a defense after my eventual arrest. One can hope my future husband shall die easily, but I find that I need more. I want everything. Every coin and cloth, every ship or cottage, even the firewood leaning against a tree. All of it. That, however, means I must plan to explain my reasons for claiming his assets—and explain in a town run by men who must have some clue as to the true nature of the devil Hayes.

  * * *

  To the Good Citizens of Prudence,

  I was born to good people, raised with good values, and did intend to live a good and righteous life. It is my hope that upon finishing my tale, you will vote to acquit me. I am beset by a devil, and I fear for my very soul.

  In the spring, I found that the man I’d planned to cleave to was engaged in impure activities. He has taken wives before me, and those wives have perished. Such wickedness in this man! I did seek out and speak to several ministers, prayed to hope for a sign from Our Father above, and I did even consult with the schoolmistress for advise [sic] on this matter. Mistress Anne counselled me at great lengths, and if you consult the enclosed [Item 1, evidentiary supplement] you will see that I attempted to turn her wisdom to deed. Alas! The devil that plagues this village outwitted me. I am to sea with him, and I fear that I shall go the way of my dear departed sisters.

  In trembling regards,

  Adelaide Barbon

  Sister to Lucretia and Bridgette

  There is much truth in my words, as is the way of compelling lies. What I have failed to explain, of course, is that I sought the devil. The second letter, the supplement, is trickier.

  Item 1, Evidentiary Supplement:

  Dear Reverend Mister Kramp,

  I am writing to seek employment in your household as a laydies maid or cook. Please consider me for a position in your household, sir, as I fear devils will have their ways with me if I do not flee this village.

  Sincerely and in holy fears,

  Adelaide Barbon

  I will need to mail it to Nox, and then have it returned with a rejection.

  Nox,

  Rejection letter back to me. Regrets and prayers. Return it with my letter enclosed.

  Addy

  I lean over my desk and consider how many letters a proper defense requires. How much evidence must I accumulate in order to be thought innocent? It’s a sort of madness perhaps, but I’m not really a go-down-with-the-ship sort of fighter. Not that I wouldn’t. If I have to die in order to avenge my sisters, I will. If I have to sink Captain Hayes’ whole crew, I will. But, I do like to plan for the best, and a widow’s cottage in a meadow outside a small village seems like the retirement plan I hope to use one day.

  Of course, I also plan to take the man’s ship, stolen riches, and--if I’m able--his very soul. Vengeance, as the good men say, is the domain of a woman wronged, and I have been wronged. Bridgette and Lucy were the innocent ones, the daughters who had a fine dowry and a soft laugh. I earned that dowry, so they would be safe.

  Mother experimentally jabs at the letter.

  “The devil will get his due,” I assure her.

  “My
poor babies,” she wails.

  Waiting might make me as maudlin as her. Perhaps, I might admit that the other reason I have begun to draft these letters is simply that I am not suited for patience. Had I been the sort of woman to enjoy letters and stitches, I wouldn’t have been much use as a mercenary or pirate. I was, however, my father’s daughter in this. When he passed during my sixteenth year, Nox took me to sea, and at the side of the man I trusted most in this world or the next, I learned the sea.

  In ports, I learned of love, liquor, and licentiousness. I learned to gamble. I learned to duel. But neither my mother nor the man who had become my most trusted and beloved companion could teach me to be patient.

  “Dead. Like your father. Like me. Everyone dead,” Mother wails.

  I do not point out that I’m quite living, as it never benefits anyone to argue with wailing women. Or dead ones. Or my mother. She was a stampede in motion at her most elegant, and now that she is free of society, she’s only become more difficult.

  I hold the letters I’ve written up to the evening light. They look more recent than they ought to look and not nearly tear-stained enough. Honestly, the holier-than-thou men who run the village of Prudence are about as bright as the sky on a New Moon. Nonetheless, if I am to continue to be free, I must learn to seem meek. I dip the feathered end of my quill into my tea and shake it over the pages. Tea will create prettier stains than tears.

  I am, of course, as meek as a whore at dock, but I cannot avenge my sisters if I am jailed again. And honestly, the last of the lice from my most recent stay in His Majesty’s care are finally gone, so I’d rather not resume such quarters. The village of Prudence sits only a half day’s ride from the docks, and the Fitcher’s Bird will dock here this month.

  It would serve my needs best if the captain thought I was innocent, vulnerable, and susceptible to sin. The captain has a type. I am not it, of course, but I have been studying the man long enough to learn how to mimic it.

  He likes girls. Not women, but girls.

  He prefers the daughters of poor men. The more desperate, the better.

  He prefers the sort who are dreamers. The more trusting, the better.

  He prefers no brothers who might come after him. The more isolated, the better.

  He was not expecting an angry sister.

  I have no idea where he takes them, but I have theories that he earns a fair penny for their souls. If I had tears left to shed, I’d stain every page with them. As it is, I spent mine when he destroyed my sisters.

  I have paid for the cottage’s thorough cleaning. My bright hair has been bound and hidden under a scarf. My preferred long-knife is lashed to my knee in a modified holster. It limits my knee’s bend and gives me a limp that makes me ever-so-slightly more vulnerable.

  Night as fallen when I hear movement outside the cabin. Not creatures, but man. Do I play the innocent in case it’s the captain or do I prepare to defend myself? I’ve been assaulted in the past. I didn’t care for it.

  A tap at the window is followed by a loud whisper, “Addy?”

  Nox stands outside, his skin as dark as the shadows he uses for cover. His clothes are likely darker still.

  I motion toward the door and pace toward it.

  In our business—the sort best hired in dim taverns—his ability to move with stealth is a highly prized skill. Neither of us will ever be greeted in fine homes; we are limited by his skin and my failure to behave as a proper woman. If that life was appealing, we might mourn, but Nox and I were made for better lives, for open seas and loyal bonds.

  When I jerk open the door, I have to work hard to sound irritated. “What are you doing here?”

  “Brought your letter, Addy.”

  If I step forward, he’s going to brush his lips over my forehead. My height makes such things possible.

  “They’re dead!” Mother calls to him.

  His smile is a slash of white in the shadows. I’ve never met anyone else who lived on a ship and managed to keep his teeth so bright. He tells the gullible that he made a bargain with Old Scratch for those pearly white teeth. Of course, I tell my own lies. We are a well-matched team, Nox and I.

  “I don’t need you to come,” I mutter.

  “I hear that your mother is still with you.” Nox smiles again. My lies never do work on him. I think it’s because he loves me. He claims it’s because the sea taught him to hear truths.

  “She could go look for my sisters,” I call loudly.

  Mother ignores me.

  “Trembly and Mick are signed on the man’s ship,” Nox says.

  “That was the plan,” I remind him.

  “I thought you’d want to know in case you were worrying that sweet head of yours,” he says mildly.

  I snort.

  But Nox is here with me, a fresh bottle of liquor in hand, and I admit that what he doesn’t say in words is often as important as all the rest. He was worried, and he knows me well enough to know I’m terrible at waiting.

  So, I open the door and motion him in. I’ve never turned him away when he’s come to my door, and he’s never turned me away. Sometimes, I swear, we’re no different than any old married pair.

  “He’ll dock tomorrow, Addy. We could just kill him.” His objections to my plan have been vast and frequent. Murder is easier. Murder meets my objectives. Murder is safer.

  Nox and I settle in at the small fire I’ve built in the hearth. As he settles back on the wretchedly uncomfortable floral settee in the room, I wonder at the thoughts that he’s not sharing.

  “What if Biddy is alive?” I ask.

  “Addy . . .”

  “A woman with red hair. That’s all they saw.” I pull out the cork and drink. “I’m a red-haired woman. My bones would look no different. Same as with the whore we met in Belfast. Or the one over in . . . that city with all the well-fed rats.”

  I hold out the bottle.

  Nox accepts it and sighs. It is the sigh of a man who’s known me in all my moods, my hopes and my violences. It is the sigh of a man who will likely be standing at my side at some gallows in our future. Some day between now and then, we’ll wed.

  Not that a marriage between pirates is legal.

  Not that a marriage between races is legal.

  And not, most truly, that I think we’ll find a wee hamlet and become crofters.

  But someday, we’ll die back-to-back or dangling side-by-side from the hangman’s nooses. It makes a woman think about exchanging rings.

  “Biddy’s not alive,” he says softly after a few swigs of whatever liquor is in the bottle.

  Mother appears at his words, a shrieking cold harridan if ever there was one. Nox shakes his head, but he does not respond to my late mother. Neither of us are that mad.

  “Well, I need to know for sure, don’t I?” I reach for the bottle. “And if I marry the bastard, I’ll lay claim to all his things when he dies.”

  The look Nox gives me is filled with disapproval. Not the possessiveness of so-called nobles over their daft wives. Not the doubt of merchants when their wives make suggestions. Nox looks at me with a kind of worry that makes me pronounce, “And we’ll use it to plan our wedding. If I’m lucky, I’ll rescue Biddy, and she’ll be there.”

  He laughs as he always does when I speak of our inevitable wedding. “My blushing bride, the pirate’s widow.”

  “Pirate and widow,” I say. “Thank you kindly for remembering my achievements.” I stand and curtsy. “Business-woman, Nox, and my business is filling my coffers.”

  “This one isn’t business,” he reminds.

  “Not only business,” I amend.

  “The boys are there. Just . . . try to be safe, Addy.” Nox stares at me like I am precious. It’s a look I’ve only ever seen him give the sea herself.

  I don’t want to lie, though, so I stand and offer him my hand. His hand in mine, I lead him to the bed where I will trick my sisters’ murderer. It’s not enough, but I hope he hears my unspoken words, too, tonight. />
  When morning comes closer, Nox kisses me and slips into the last of the night’s shadows. Someday, no one will think askance at skin not matching skin, or women taking lovers, or any number of things that so-called civility finds troubling in our age. For now, both Nox and I risk lashes—or worse—for the same things we do on ship. The sea only judges whether or not one can survive her wrath. The laws of the land are not for us.

  Land laws, power and religion’s laws, and their worry over propriety has allowed a devil to take my sisters away.

  When evening comes, I’ve aired the cabin, so no scent of liquor or lovemaking will ruin my lies. I feel stronger with my letters carried away in Nox’s trusted hands, and I feel purer somehow for having spent the night with him.

  The devil arrives at sundown, and I would be remiss if I did not note here that he is exactly as I expected. No more. No less. If I survive, it will be a sign that there is yet a god who hath not forsaken me.

  “Be bold,” Mother urges from the shadows.

  Hayes is tall, easily a hand or more taller than I am—and I am an uncommonly tall woman, seeing eye-to-eye with most men.

  “I was not expecting a guest,” he says.

  I curtsy. Bow my head. Hide my initial rush of hatred. “My father said you spoke to him about my hand?” I lift my voice to indicate doubt and fear. “He sent me here when he passed on.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss, Miss . . .?”

  “Adelaide, sir.” I lift my gaze briefly. “I’m called Adelaide.”

  “What if I’d found another wife, Miss Adelaide?” He studies me, as if he’ll find a detail to spark his memory. He clearly doubts my story, and in this, he is right.