“Yes. But none were like those. I’ve prevailed since then. Small nicks and cuts, but none as bad as that one.”
Senga kissed each of his shoulders as she squeezed his waist. “I thank God for that. I’ve survived raids and even gone on them, but the thought of that battle makes it hard for me to breathe. To think I might never have met you.” They held one another in silence, once again unwilling to put into words what they both felt.
Chapter Nine
Over the next three days, Senga could sense the tension rising among the crew. It was a mixture of anticipation and trepidation. Everyone was eager for the thrill and profit of an attack. Ruairí handed Braeden’s training over to Senga, and she even began to train some of the other men who had used bloodlust as their only tutor. Ruairí made time to spar with Senga every morning, and the time spent bantering brought them closer.
In the evenings, Ruairí showed Senga the maps he used to navigate the North Sea, the Atlantic, and the Mediterranean. They’d had a smooth passage through the Bay of Biscay near France, but Ruairí regaled Senga with tales of choppy oceans and gale-force winds. They shared tales they grew up hearing that made them both curious and fearful as children. Ruairí told Senga more of his childhood than anyone other than Rowan knew. In turn, Senga shared the loneliness of being an only child. While she had her cousin Alfred, it was clear Senga and Alfred were nowhere near as close as Rowan and Ruairí. Senga learned they’d been born less than an hour apart with Rowan arriving first, making them more like brothers than cousins.
The fourth day changed everything for both Ruairí and Senga. The morning was overcast, and the crew was sure it was a sign of a storm brewing. Senga looked to the clouds but wasn’t convinced. She argued the clouds would blow over, and it would be warm. The morning clouds made it difficult for Braeden to scout the horizon, so it came as a poor surprise when Braeden whistled a warning of the impending attack. He spotted a Spanish carrack riding low in the water. Ruairí’s ship was armed with cannons, a new artillery device he had little experience with. His men ran to load the cannonballs and gunpowder as Ruairí bellowed orders for their black sails to replace their white ones. The clouds shifted, and the carrack came into view. The three cannons on each side were visible even from a distance, and Ruairí was thankful Rowan had convinced him to outfit his ship with them.
As his crew prepared to attack the merchant ship, he spotted Senga handing weapons to the crew. He stormed over to her and lifted her around the waist before hauling her toward their cabin.
“Haven’t you any sense? You see us preparing for attack, and you’re still standing on the deck. I told you, you were to go to the cabin and bar yourself in when the ship engages in a battle. Why were you still up there? A cannonball could land on the deck any minute, and it could kill you.” Ruairí burst through the door and dumped Senga onto the bed before spinning around.
“Oh no, you don’t. If you had the time to carry me down here, you have a moment to say a proper goodbye.” Senga grasped his elbow and tugged until he turned around. “I didn’t mean to worry you. I wanted to help and was handing over the last weapon before I planned to come below here. I don’t want to be a distraction to you, but I also don’t want you to fight without us saying goodbye.” Her unspoken words hung between them.
Ruairí pulled her into his arms, and their bodies pressed together as they had so many times before, but this time there was an urgency born of fear rather than need. Senga cupped his jaw and held on as she smattered kisses over his cheeks before they came back together for another searing kiss. Ruairí let go and looked at her for a long moment before stepping back. Just before he walked through the doorway, he turned back to Senga.
“Stay here where you’re safe. Senga, I love you.”
He closed the door before Senga could respond. She stood there stunned but jumped when she remembered to lock and bar the door. Once she sat on the bed, she felt her world tip. At first, she thought it was the shock of Ruairí’s declaration, but she realized it resulted from cannons firing from the holes along the side of the ship. The vibration rattled almost everything within the cabin, along with Senga’s teeth. She moved to the porthole and was glad it was on the correct side of the ship for her to see the impending battle.
Senga didn’t have to wait long before Ruairí’s crew was swinging grappling hooks onto the deck and rails of the Spanish boat. She grasped the table behind her when she made ready for impact. Once the boat stopped rocking more than normal, she returned to the porthole. She watched with fascination as the crew laid planks from their ship to the Spanish deck and began running across. She saw Ruairí lead the way as he swung from ropes on the Lady Charity to the ship he was about to commandeer. The battle became a blur as Spaniards tried without success to board the Lady Charity. She strained to follow Ruairí as he moved about the deck, but she often lost sight of him. Senga forced herself not to panic when she couldn’t see him, and she convinced herself to have faith that he’d survive this battle just as he had countless previous ones. As she watched the gruesome scene unfold, her mind echoed Ruairí’s last words.
I love you.
Senga knew in her heart she loved him too, but the thought of saying it out loud terrified her. She knew it should be easy for her to respond. After all, she felt the same way, but the words lodged in her throat every time she thought about telling Ruairí when he returned to the cabin.
The battle felt interminable as it raged on now moving between both decks. Senga could hear the pounding of feet and the screams of pain from above. She walked to the corner where she kept her falchions. Ruairí had gifted them to her. Senga still had the two dirks she kept in her boots, along with the one strapped to her thigh. She pulled off the skirts she still wore whenever she wasn’t sparring, then unstrapped the knife before kicking off her boots. Senga changed into the leggings and replaced the knife along her thigh high enough to be covered by the leine she pulled from Ruairí’s chest. She swam in it, but it hid the knife. She pulled on her boots and found another belt in Ruairí’s chest. When she began digging, she’d hoped she’d find the type where she could sheath more daggers. She breathed a sigh of relief when she found one, even though she had to improvise fastening it since she was much narrower than Ruairí. She knew where Ruairí kept more blades, so she sheathed three more dirks into the belt. Then she waited.
Senga heard feet clomping down the stairs, then boots stomping in the passageway before the sound of an ax struck the door. She would’ve pushed the table or chests against the door, but they were all anchored to the floor. When a second ax joined the first, Senga knew the door wouldn’t hold forever despite being thicker than normal. Unsure of what type of weapons the enemy held, she was certain she didn’t want to be visible when they opened the door. She crept across the cabin to hide behind the door. It wasn’t long before the door splintered from the force of the dual attack. It swung open so hard, it nearly hit Senga. She held her breath as the first man rushed in. She counted to three to make sure he was in line with her before she launched two dirks at him, one sinking into his neck and the other between his shoulders. The man staggered before pitching forward. Senga pulled two more dirks out as the door slammed shut behind the second attacker. Senga leaped forward before the man turned all the way toward her. She aimed once more for the neck, and when she felt that blade wedge into the man’s throat, she thrust the second dirk just below his sternum. She twisted as she levered the hilt down and pushed the blade up. Senga intended to do as much damage as she could. Despite having two knives embedded in him, the second attacker swung at Senga, coming too close to her right cheek. She recognized the sword as one Ruairí had called a scimitar. While it had a longer reach, it was hard for the man to maneuver in such close quarters. Senga pulled the dirk from her thigh and slashed at the man as she fumbled to reach one from her boots. Once armed with both, she slashed and struck with such ease, the man paused for a moment. It was just the time Senga needed to bury the two blades i
nto his chest. His face showed his shock before his eyes turned sightless, and he fell to the ground.
Senga didn’t move. She waited to see if anyone followed the men or if there was anyone else in the passageway. When she heard nothing, she pulled all her knives free and placed them back in their sheaths, not bothering to wipe any clean. Now that they’d breached the cabin, she knew she wasn’t safe in such an enclosed space. She’d be safer finding somewhere to hide on deck. The hold was where the Spaniards would attempt to reach, so she had no intention of being in that enclosed space either. Senga pushed her braid beneath the collar of the leine she wore and tore a strip from the bottom to tie over her head both to keep her hair from her eyes and to hide it. She hoped it would make it less obvious at first glance that she was a woman. She grabbed both of her falchions before slipping from the cabin.
Senga inched her way toward the stairs and then crept to the deck. She waited and watched before moving forward slowly. She looked around and could see Ruairí’s crew still had the upper hand, even though there were bodies strewn across the deck. Senga spotted Tomas a moment later, as he was a mountain of a man. He fought two Spaniards at once while Kyle kept another man from reaching the wheel. Senga looked toward the other boat and tried to find Ruairí. When she spotted him on the other ship, she ducked behind a stack of barrels and peered around, never taking her eyes off him. She felt like she was crouched there forever before time slowed to a stop, and her vision tunneled to where Ruairí fought two men. There was no way he could see the third man approaching from behind him. Senga was out from behind the barrels and across the deck before she thought about what she was doing. She leaped onto the rail and a plank as she pulled a knife out. She hurled it across the divide and watched it land in the man’s throat, but not before the now-dead man’s sword cut across Ruairí’s ribs. Senga saw blood spread through the material of Ruairí’s leine as he continued to fight the men in front of him. He didn’t slow despite the wound, but Senga knew he couldn’t keep up his defenses forever now that he was bleeding. She watched in horror as Ruairí stumbled backwards and a sword pierced him below his ribs. Senga’s battle cry would be one the crew would talk about for years to come. Senga was across the planks and onto the Spanish ship before any of her victims realized what was coming. She struck without mercy as she fought her way to Ruairí’s side. Senga cut down men twice her size with the confidence that years of training brought. She hadn’t sparred during her time on Canna, but the few days spent practicing aboard the Lady Charity had been enough to remind her body of what it could do.
Ruairí’s crew would later say she fought like the shieldmaidens they were sure she was descended from. Senga felt the nicks and cuts from the various encounters, but she never received wounds like Ruairí’s. She reached him as he sank to his knees, his neck wide open for attack. She swung her cleaver falchion down onto one of Ruairí’s opponents as he raised his arm to attack. The man’s forearm landed on the deck with a thunk as blood sprayed onto Ruairí’s face and chest. Both the enemy and Ruairí turned to look toward her, stunned, as she parried with Ruairí’s other opponent. She cut down both men and stood over Ruairí’s body daring anyone to come near her. Many of the enemy took one look at her bared teeth, the blood splattered on her, and the determination in her eyes and chose other prey.
Ruairí could feel nothing but the searing pain along his ribs. He felt as though someone had cut him in half, and he wasn’t sure he was actually still in one piece. He saw Senga jump in front of him and tried to reach for her, but his body was unwilling to cooperate. His head felt as though it floated a mile above him, and he shook it to clear the dizziness. He tried to call out to her, to tell her to hide rather than fight, but no sound came from his mouth as he lay prostrate at her feet. He turned his head toward her, so he could see every attack she warded off and every man that fell dead at her feet. He wanted to both praise and punish her for taking such risks. He’d told her to remain locked away in their cabin, and she’d disobeyed him. Now he couldn’t protect her. The ironic thought she was doing a fine job protecting him crossed his mind before everything went black.
Chapter Ten
The battle lasted less than an hour, but Senga was sure it lasted the entire day. By the end Ruairí’s crew was victorious, but suffered serious casualties including their injured captain. As Kyle issued orders for the men to empty the hold and transfer all the booty to their ship, Senga issued orders for four men to move Ruairí to their cabin. He groaned enough while they carried him to convince Senga he wasn’t dead. She entered before the men carrying him and swept the table clear before ordering him placed upon it.
“Get me any and all alcohol you can find. I need a candle lit and boiling water. Now.”
She didn’t look around to see who carried out her orders, she just heard running feet and the murmur of voices moving away from the cabin. Senga tore open Ruairí’s shirt and wanted to heave when she saw how deep the wound was on his front. She stepped around him and managed to pull him mostly onto his side so she could see the wound to his back. That wasn’t as severe as she imagined, even though it still bled profusely.
She pulled clean linens from the chest where Ruairí stored them and began cutting varying lengths of bandages. Snake Eye returned with an armful of jugs and bottles Senga knew contained whisky and ale. She glanced over at him before looking back at Ruairí.
“Thank you. I’ll look at that gash on your head when I’m done with the captain.”
Snake Eye only nodded as he stared at Ruairí. He moved aside when another man arrived with two pots of boiling water. While she waited for someone to light a candle, she said a prayer of thanksgiving that she’d brought her sewing kit with her. Until then, she’d darned some of Ruairí’s clothes, but otherwise it sat unused in her chest.
Senga looked at the wound to Ruairí’s back and decided that was the better one to start on. He’d have to rest on either his front or his back when she worked on the opposite side. She would rather he rested on his back than his stomach since that wound was far worse. Senga grabbed a jug and pulled the stopper loose. Senga looked at Ruairí as she took a long drag of whisky. She poured hot water into the wash basin and scrubbed her hands with soap. She had no idea why it mattered, but she learned from her mother that she should never tend a wound with dirty hands. Senga also knew she would have to put Ruairí in far more pain before she could ease his pain.
“Hold his arms and legs,” she ordered anyone and everyone. She folded a strip of linen and put it between Ruairí’s teeth. “He’ll buck even if he doesn’t awaken. You cannot let him loose.”
Senga gritted her teeth as she rolled him back onto his side and the men took hold. She didn’t even look to see who helped her before pouring a liberal amount of whisky into and around Ruairí’s wound. He writhed in pain and groaned, but his eyes never opened.
“Keep holding him,” she ordered as she wiped away the blood and grime from near the gash with linen she dipped into the boiling water. Senga spotted the lit candle and pulled a needle and thread from her sewing kit. She held the needle in the flame until it glowed then she passed the thread through the flame, too. She paused and tilted her head to the ceiling, eyes closed as she prayed. Without a word, she began to sew Ruairí closed.
Ruairí felt a burning unlike anything he’d felt since his battle with the corsairs years ago. He knew it should not have surprised him, since the ship they encountered was Spanish, but the crew were Barbary pirates. They were the same sort of men who had attempted to kill him years ago. Apparently, they were back to finish the job.
Ruairí struggled to open his eyes, but they refused to cooperate. He sensed people moving around him, but it was as though he had wool in his ears. He couldn’t hear or see anything. The burning wouldn’t stop, and his body tried to pull away, but something pinned him down. He willed his body to fight the weight so he could escape the pain, but both the weight and the pain were unrelenting. He tried to yell, but he was su
re nothing came out besides a groan. Ruairí tried to focus on what was happening, but nothing made sense. His mind seemed to be telling him to float away as if on driftwood. As he tried to fight against it, he smelled the lilac and rose scent he’d forever associate with Senga. It wafted to him, and his mind won. He drifted into blackness.
Senga sewed as quickly but carefully as she could. She poured whisky over the wound several times as she created a row of even, small, and tight stitches. When she finished stitching his back, she placed a stack of bandages on the table and told the men to roll him back over. She wiped her brow and took another long swig of whisky before she moved onto the wound below his ribs. “Hold him tighter. This time will hurt even more. The wound is far deeper.”
As she poured the whisky over the gaping hole, she could see further into the gash. She was sure she could see the tip of his rib. She swallowed the bile that wanted to rise in her throat. With no medicinal flowers or herbs, there was nothing she could do to pack the wound and prevent infection. She had to decide how she would stitch the wound closed. She knew it wasn’t enough to just stitch the top layer of skin, leaving an open tunnel to his insides just below the surface. However, she feared sewing it so tightly that the flesh couldn’t grow back properly causing his body to rot at worst or diminish his range of motion at best.
Senga once again tilted her head back as she looked to the ceiling. This prayer was far longer as she asked God to guide her in how to heal the man she undoubtedly loved. She pushed the thought of love out of her mind as a wave of regret tried to consume her. She wished she’d stopped him before he left and said it back to him. Now he might never know.
She worked through the afternoon as she took care stitching together what she could within the wound then the surface. When she was done, she fell into the chair Tomas rushed to push beneath her. He, Kyle, Snake Eye, and a man she learned they called Rollo had helped her throughout the surgery, doing any and everything she asked. She swept her tired gaze to Kyle before swallowing the tears that wanted to force their way out. She’d save that for when she had privacy.
The Dark Heart of the Sea: A Steamy Fated Lovers Pirate Romance (Pirate of the Isles Book 2) Page 8
