by Kate Castle
We carried everything out to deck, where the crew were laughing and cheering, hoisting huge turtles out of the water with grappling hooks. Together, we tossed everything we required into the rowboats – still lashed astern in the haste of our escape – and the entire crew rowed to the nearest island.
We built a huge fire on the beach from driftwood and dried palm leaves and spit-roasted one turtle after another until we had had more than our fill of the succulent, rich meat. By the time darkness fell, three barrels of booze were empty, and Jack and the crew could not string a sentence together. They lay on the sand, giggling and hiccupping. It was only a matter of time, I knew, before they fell into a deep sleep.
I squeezed Mary’s knee in the darkness. “Come with me?”
We rose silently and walked along the beach, our fingers brushing against each other’s, until the orange glow of the campfire was well out of sight. I took a long swig of rum from a wineskin and passed it to Mary. When I watched her mouth cover where my lips had been, I felt a sudden flood of warmth. It bloomed deep within me, swirling and shifting pleasantly, like slow-moving honey. I stepped away from her and pulled off my boots, tossing them onto the sand.
“I need to bathe,” I said.
Slowly, I unbuttoned my breeches and pushed them off, kicking them to one side. Then I moved further away, stepping backwards into the warm shallow waters.
Mary grew entirely still as she watched me undress, as if she were sculpted in marble. Her eyes were intense, dark and wide – like pools of scalding hot oil in the moonlight.
My breath caught in my throat.
Mary wanted me. I had seen that look directed at me many times before and I knew it well. This time it felt different. Mary wanted me.
I held her gaze as boldly as I could. I took a deep breath to steady myself, and in one fluid motion pulled off my shirt. Despite the warmth of the evening, goosebumps prickled all over my bare skin.
My breath came quickly in short, shallow gasps.
I yearned for her to touch me.
Instantly, as if she had been reanimated by a sudden bolt of lightning, Mary flung off her coat and strode, fully clothed, into the sea, grabbing my face and kissing me deeply. I wasted no time unbuttoning her shirt and breeches, filling my palms with her warm, pliant breasts and cleaving my hips against hers. She felt wonderful to me. Strong and soft, powerful and gentle, all at once. I had a sudden, fleeting revelation: no wonder men desire us so ardently.
She moaned and swept her palms down my back, cupping my backside, dipping her fingers briefly into my centre, and lifted me so my legs wrapped around her waist. Robbed of breath, I pulled my lips from hers and latched my mouth onto her neck as she carried me further into the sea.
In that moment, it felt as though we were the only two people on that island, on the Earth. Somewhere outside of time. We were caught in the eye of a mighty squall, a swirling maelstrom of sensation.
“I belong to you now, Mary,” I whispered, my voice thick with emotion. “You, and the sea.”
12
We spent many happy months on the William after that. Mary and I did not reveal ourselves to Jack or the crew and we were able to steal moments together most days. Some nights, when the men had had too much rum and all passed out cold below deck, we even shared a bed. We would make love and talk for hours – gazing up at the stars through the windows – recounting our battles, loves, and losses, wondering at our shared similarities, our uncanny connection, and the serendipitous converging of our lives.
“I have never been so happy, Mary,” I said one night in bed, tracing her palm with my fingertips. “My life began with you on this ship.”
She linked our hands together, kissed me soundly on the mouth and began to sing:
Annie and me, Annie and me, born of the sea, always will be.
Annie and me of the sea.
Happy we’ll be, born of the sea, Annie and me of the sea.
Then she leaned over me, reached into her coat pocket, and pulled out a thin gold necklace. A single pink pearl dangled from the chain.
I gasped. “Is that a –”
“Queen conch pearl? Yes. I found one. On our island, Annie.”
She unclasped the necklace and carefully fastened it around my neck. She smiled at me. Kissed my mouth, my neck, the pearl, my chest. Then she moved lower.
***
That was our last night on the William. Early the next morning the ship came under a devastating attack from an English warship, its plentiful cannonballs blasting our hull to smithereens, shocking us from our slumber.
Mary and I tore out from our quarters, barely clothed. The ship loomed above us like a pale mountain, a vast three-masted 120-foot sloop-of-war. As it drew alongside, I saw two-score of armed sailors standing at the taffrails, ready to lower their gangways onto the William. The men were smartly dressed in black greatcoats with gold buttons that gleamed in the morning sun.
Mary and I looked at each other, our eyes wide with fear and an unmistakeable sense of foreboding.
“I am not going down without a fight, Annie,” Mary said fiercely.
I kissed her, refusing to acknowledge that this might be the end. “I wouldn’t want it any other way.”
She ran her fingertips along my jaw. Then she turned and charged forwards with both her swords drawn.
“Jack!” I screamed. “LADS! Main deck, now!”
I stuck my head into the stairwell and hollered for them again, but there was no response. I whipped my head back towards Mary. Two gangways had already been lowered and men were beginning to make their way over. She positioned herself at the end of the first gangway and began to fight off the onslaught.
We were out of time.
I sprinted to the second ramp to defend against the other line of invaders.
Mary and I fought the men alone for as long as we could. Jack and the crew stayed below decks the whole time, most likely still drunk and scared. As it turned out, there was a good reason why Jack only took small ships.
These men were a different breed of fighter to any I had faced before. Mercenaries. Well trained and well organised, they swung their swords at me with such precision and strength that, soon, all I could do was dodge the blows.
Eventually, two of them managed to disarm and restrain me. Mary continued fighting valiantly for a while, her face showing the despair I felt, all the while screaming for the crew to come and help us. She even fired a pistol below decks in vain, such was her bitter disappointment. (Later, we found out that she had killed our boat swain. We were both aggrieved it was not Jack.)
Finally, when Mary was surrounded by men and it was all too clear we stood no chance, I pleaded with her – urging her to surrender, terrified she would be killed. In desperation, I cried out that we were both women. There was simply nothing else I could think to do to ensure her survival.
***
The entire crew were arrested by the warship’s captain, a privateer turned pirate-hunter named Jonathan Barnet, who had been hired to pursue and detain Jack and me, and our crew, thanks to a tip-off from an informant of Governor Woodes Rogers. That informant, I later found out, was none other than a bitter and revengeful James Bonny.
Mary and I decided to lie and “plead our bellies” – pretending we were both pregnant – to delay our own trials, at least for a short time.
Before his piracy trial in Port Royal, Jack requested to see me in the cell I shared with Mary, due to my reported condition and his apparent paternity. When the gaoler brought him, I could barely hold Mary back from strangling Jack through the bars.
“Woah. Steady, woman!” Jack leant back, keeping a safe distance from Mary’s clawing hands. “Well, well. Who’d’a guessed it…Mark Read, a woman, no less! Still canny believe that one, such a strong fighter. And, so I hear, a woman in no condition to fight me right now. Although I have been wonderin’ which of my crewmen managed to sneak you a stiff one.”
“You are a sorry coward, Jack,” Mary spat,
shaking with fury. “We could’ve taken on that warship if you had grown a pair.”
“Ahh, come now. Mary, is it? We both know I have more than you will ever have. Anne can testify to that, can’t you, Anne?”
Mary leapt against the bars, trying desperately to gain an extra inch to reach him with her fingernails. I placed a soothing hand on her shoulder, brushed my lips against her cheek, and walked calmly to the cell door. I knew it was no use trying to reason with Jack – he had valued bluff and charm above bravery all the time I had known him.
I stood face to face with him, knowing this would be the last time I would ever see him.
“Despite reports to the contrary, I do not carry your child,” I said. I could scarcely contain my disgust at the notion. “I’m sorry to see you here, Jack. But it is richly deserved. If only you had fought like a man, you needn’t be hanged like a dog. And outfought by two women! Ha! Soon, every soul alive will know the legendary Calico Jack was a cowardly dog when it truly counted. And a cowardly dog is always how you shall be remembered. Even you can’t talk yourself out of it, this time.”
He had no response to that. He could not even summon the courage to look me in the eye.
“Take me back to my cell,” he growled at the gaoler.
That was the last time I set eyes on Jack Rackham. He was trialled and executed along with the rest of the crew the very next day. I heard later that his hanged body was put on display in a gibbet cage at Deadman’s Cay outside Port Royal, to serve as a deterrent against a life of piracy.
Well, every dog deserves a cage.
***
Mary and I spent several weeks together in that cold, dark cell. There was no natural light and the walls were mouldy and damp, but we made the best of it for a time; talking and singing to each other. We knew that sooner or later it would be plain as day that neither of us was quick with child.
Before long, Mary began to get sick.
“Annie,” Mary whispered, light and delicate as a feather against my throat.
“Yes, my love?”
I held her feverish brow to my chest and stroked my fingertips through her wet hair.
“Promise me…you’ll get out. Your father…or James…will come for you. Promise me…you’ll do whatever it takes…to escape.”
“I’m not leaving you. I’m never leaving you.”
She shifted between my legs and the scrape of her boots rang around the cell. She tipped her head just enough to look at me. In a face contorted with pain, her blue eyes were still a calm pool of strength in the darkness, as they always had been for me.
“I’ll be leaving you soon enough, Annie. There’s nowt we can do about that.”
“No,” I said, fiercely. “You’ll be fine. You’ll pull through and we’ll both get out.”
Her eyes crinkled like water boatmen’s tracks. She dipped her head back onto my chest and we stayed that way for a while. Then she took a deep, rattling breath and sang our song, weakly, almost imperceptibly:
Annie and me, Annie and me, born of the sea, always will be.
Annie and me of the sea.
After that, she was lost in her fever for three more days. No one came to help. I held her desperately close, willing her to return, waiting to hear her voice again, to feel her strength, her warmth, hoping for a miracle that never came.
13
My name, in those days, was Anne Bonny.
These days, I go by the name Annie Read.
Some days, I dream of my life as a pirate. I wake looking out to sea; sometimes in bed, sometimes tucked into my rocker with a tweed blanket, and feel that old familiar excitement still fizzing in my belly. I remember those days from long ago with a strange mixture of pride and regret.
Some days I wake with no memory of dreams at all, simply grateful for the life I have been able to live out in Charles Town, surrounded by family.
Every now and then, I dream of Mary.
These dreams bring the sweetest ache to my fragile, elderly body. When I wake in these precious moments, I try to hold on to that fleeting feeling of pleasure-pain, that sharp prick of desire, that brief, transcendent moment before the crushing grief arrives, when my body awakens remembering what my mind cannot; still suffused with the memory of her warmth, her voice, her mouth, her love.
Thank You!
Thank you so much for reading my novella. If you enjoyed it, please consider leaving an honest, fair review on your preferred site, or recommend it to some friends. It really helps – one short review or a good recommendation via word-of-mouth makes a massive difference to independent authors like me.
If you like my style, you can read more about me or sign up for new releases, giveaways, and other news at www.kate-castle.com. My debut full-length novel, Girl Island, is being published soon.
I am also on most social media platforms @katecastlebooks. Get in touch – I would be absolutely delighted to hear from you!
You can turn over a few pages here, too, for a little bit more about me and my writing.
Thank you, again.
Kate x
Are You Ready for More?
Look out for Girl Island, Kate’s debut full-length novel, coming in Autumn 2021:
‘Mean Girls meets Lord of the Flies…I loved it.’
‘Fans of The Hunger Games will love this book.’
Six teenaged girls survive a plane crash on an uninhabited island. Removed from civilised society, can they overcome class divide, prejudice and toxic femininity to pull together and survive?
Or will they descend into savagery?
About the Author
Kate Castle has a degree in English Literature and lives with her husband and three children in Essex, England.
Kate’s books fall into the New Adult and Young Adult romance and adventure categories. She is passionate about representing young queer females in mainstream literature and writes about strong, independent, fluid young women – the kind of characters she wished she could have read more about growing up.
She is a proud representative and vocal champion of bisexual fiction (affectionately coined by Kate as ‘BiFi’) as an up-and-coming genre and continues to write in this exciting and original domain.
Read more about Kate and sign up to her mailing list at www.kate-castle.com.
Follow Kate on social media @katecastlebooks.
Author’s Note & Acknowledgements
Although a work of fiction, Born of the Sea is based on the (unbelievably!) true story of trailblazing pirates Anne Bonny and Mary Read and was developed through my lifelong fascination with pirates and these two buccaneers in particular. These were two women way ahead of their time – I have always wanted to tell their story. During my research, I came across many sources which report that Anne and Mary were most likely lovers. This very real possibility, together with the inseparable duo’s widely reported scandalous gender-bending, cross-dressing, fighting, looting, boozing and eventual imprisonment – in a world of men, no less – was all the inspiration I needed to write an unconventional, passionate love story between these two remarkable women. A story which, so far, seems to have been untold – at least in romance fiction. It has been a pleasure and a privilege for me to tell Anne and Mary’s tale. I hope you fall in love with them, too.
A very big thank you to my earliest supporters who loved what they read and encouraged me to finish the story and take it through to publication; especially Timmo, Miriama and Lottie. Thank you to my brilliant editors, Carrie O’Grady and Nick Taylor, for their encouragement, sage advice and total enthusiasm for Anne and Mary’s story. Thanks too to my beta and ARC readers for all their feedback and reviews. Especially my Earper gang – I froggin’ love you guys.
To my wonderful children: as I am always saying, never be afraid to be who you are, or to love who you love. Conformity is for wimps. There is only one you for all eternity. Fearlessly be yourself, and you will find your people. This story is a good reminder of that.
Finally, my deepest
thanks and devotion goes to Tim for his unwavering support and love. Thank you for understanding and loving all the parts of me. A lesser man would have bailed years ago.
Glossary & Fun Facts
Avast: an exclamation, interjection, or command, meaning to stop or cease.
Barrelman: a sailor stationed in the crow’s nest of a ship.
Cribbage: a popular card game, often played by pirates.
Furlong: an eighth of a mile, approximately 220 yards.
League: approximately 3 miles.
Pettifogger: an inferior legal practitioner, one who used dubious means to get clients.
Pleading the belly: a common law practice whereby a woman received reprieve of a death sentence until after she bore her child.
Roger: slang for the Jolly Roger – a black and white flag, often featuring a skull design, flown from many pirate ships.
Swiving: having sexual intercourse.
Pirates designed their own version of the Jolly Roger as a kind of individual brand. But Jack Rackham is credited as its original creator. The original Jolly Roger flag flown from Jack Rackham’s ship is shown below. The pair of crossed cutlasses was said to represent Anne Bonny and Mary (Mark) Read. The skull represented Calico Jack. Our infamous trio sailed the Caribbean seas together for many months under this flag before their eventual arrest and trial in November 1720.
Pierre, the dressmaker, was a real person and was widely known among pirates as “Pierre the Pansy Pirate”. His real name was Pierre Bouspet. He is reported to have owned a café, a hairdresser’s and a dressmaking business and was a popular figure with pirates throughout the Caribbean.
With no women around, homosexual relationships were thought to be commonplace among pirates at sea. Indeed, matelotage was a kind of pirate gay marriage – a same-sex civil partnership where two men agreed to share their wealth and belongings and, if one should die, the other would benefit by inheriting their partner’s property. The word “mate”, used commonly on board ships, was most likely derived from the French word “matelotage”.
