The Devil's Tide

by Tomerlin, Matt

  Dillahunt picked up his rapier. The thin blade was razor sharp, and the hilt was ornamented with gold accents and several red rubies. He moved around her. "I'll do it," he said, removing the hat from her head and placing it on his own.

  "Afraid I'd cut myself?"

  "Afraid you'd cut me," he replied. He gathered her long hair, pinching it at the base of her skull. "Are you sure about this?"

  "Just do it."

  He set the blade flat against her neck and sheared upward. She shuddered as the long black locks fell away, settling on the floor. When the deed was done, a dark swirling canvas surrounded Calloway's feet. She brushed strands from her shoulders and chest. Dillahunt circled her, eyeing his work. She ran her fingers through her hair, shocked at how little resistance she encountered. "How do I look?" she asked as she ruffled her hair.

  Dillahunt grimaced. "Like a boy."

  He left the room without another word, pausing only to sheathe his sword and adjust the feather of his hat. She would know where to find him, because he had taken her on a boastful tour of his ship last night.

  Calloway left the room a few minutes later, heading down the narrow spiral staircase to the bottom floor. She waved at the fat, jolly barkeep as she passed him polishing some mugs behind the bar. The tavern was empty, and it probably wouldn't get much busier later in the day without any pirates to fill it.

  Calloway stepped into the fresh morning air and wandered down into the market. She nodded to the various merchants, but no one recognized her without her long hair. The women gave her strange looks. Calloway hoped they were trying to determine her gender.

  She purchased a wide-brimmed brown hat from one of the vendors. It was very plain, so it wouldn't draw any attention to her. It fit snugly over her head and shaded her features. She would have to be careful about crewmen getting too close and noticing her thin eyebrows, pretty eyes, and petite nose.

  She passed Sassy Sally's tavern, and her nostrils caught an enticing whiff of turtle soup, but she didn't think she would have enough time to sit down and enjoy a meal. Sassy Sally's chef was notorious for taking his time, and he probably wasn't awake yet at this hour.

  She came to the docks and hesitated, staring at the ships as they bobbed gently in the water. A young man missing his left arm below the elbow was carted past her by two guards, his head held high. He was handsome, but the puffy circles under his eyes made him appear older than his years. He looked like he had been freshly bathed, clothed, and shaved. His sandy hair was slicked back, though a wayward lock fell over his brow. "I can walk on my own, thank you," the young man said to the flanking guards. They did not relinquish their grip as they marched him down the pier. Calloway wondered briefly who he was. Every person in Nassau had a story. His might be more interesting than most, but she doubted she would ever know.

  She still had a little time before Dillahunt departed, so she continued onward to the beach. The sun was already reflecting brightly off the white sand, causing her to squint. The rays projected a netted pattern upon the rippled sand beneath the water. A turtle was wavering in the current with no apparent destination in mind.

  Laughter skittered along the beach. A batch of grinning young boys sprinted toward Calloway, and she made no attempt to get out of their way. Lean muscles worked beneath their dark skin. They spared her with brief glances as they ran around her. She was nothing more than an obstacle in the path to imaginary adventure. They continued up the beach until their distant laughter was overpowered by a crashing wave.

  Calloway welcomed the approaching tide, stepping forward as it rolled over the sand. It washed over her bare feet, dousing her legs. She closed her eyes and smiled, an invigorating sensation rising from her legs into her torso. The water was warm and inviting, and she resisted the urge to keep walking until the ground dropped away. She wanted to swim into the horizon and keep swimming until she reached the ends of the Earth.

  "I birthed a fish," her mother told her after their first week in Nassau. Jacqueline had spent an entire day swimming. She had never known waters as warm as those of the Caribbean.

  "Perhaps my father was a merman," was Jacqueline's reply.

  "I assure you," her mother laughed, "he was a man." She then grew distant as she thought about him, and they didn't talk again until the next day.

  There was a time when Calloway wanted nothing more than to find her father and run away with him. There was a time when she hated her mother intensely, for reasons she could not explain. But now that her mother was gone, Calloway missed her terribly. It wasn't important who her father was. She never knew the man, but she knew her mother, and that was all that mattered. Her mother had not abandoned her. Unfortunately, she hadn't realized any of this until it was too late.

  She opened her eyes as the water retreated, sand hollowing beneath her feet. Dillahunt's ship, Crusader, was the first thing she saw. It was a brigantine, recently commissioned. Everything about it looked new, with clean white sails, polished decks, and guns that sparkled in the sun. A beautiful mermaid decorated the bow, both arms spread above her head, grasping the bowsprit suggestively, large breasts dangling freely beneath tangles of wooden hair. Her face was elegant, with curved cheeks, full lips, a small chin, and impossibly large eyes with tiny pupils. Her human body transitioned at the waist into the scales of a long fin that stretched down the bow. Her tail dipped into the water.

  A man stood at the bow, arms folded as he watched the crew busying themselves about the deck. Calloway knew from the feathered hat that it was Dillahunt.

  "He sure paints a pretty picture, doesn't he?" she mused aloud. That was something her mother would say about men like Dillahunt. Her mother commanded a lofty fee, so she rarely took a poor man to bed. Calloway had remained equally stingy, which earned her the hatred of other whores but filled her pockets. She had branched out from the local whorehouse, The Strapped Bodice, after her mother died, choosing her clients rather than letting them choose her.

  She had chanced upon Guy Dillahunt in the market, where he was buying that feathered hat. Calloway was looking forward to sharing the captain's bed as often as possible. He seemed far more experienced than most of the younger men she had slept with, and he had actually worked to please her, which made her eager to please him in turn. She liked that.

  She considered turning to take in Nassau one last time. She had no idea when she would see this place again. The town had changed so much in so little time. It would probably be unrecognizable by the time she returned.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden commotion on Crusader's deck. Several of the crew rushed to the starboard rail, peering over the edge. The one-armed young man she saw earlier was being escorted up a long ramp onto the ship, but one of his guards had slipped and tumbled into the water. The young man made some sort of jest Calloway couldn't hear, and the crew broke into uproarious laughter. The guard cursed at all of them as he struggled in the water.

  Calloway smiled and started for the docks. Perhaps she would know this one-armed man's story after all.

  As she made her way up the pier toward her new home, she forgot to give Nassau a final consideration.

  KATE

  "Do you make your bed every morning, captain?" Kate asked, subduing a chuckle. The king-sized bed was freshly made, with several decorative pillows propped against the headboard, which was engraved with an impressive ship cresting rolling waves. The coverlet was a deep maroon with gold patterns that smoldered in the candlelight.

  "Only when I have company," Benjamin Hornigold replied between nibbles of chicken. He was mostly avoiding eye contact, studying the contents of his plate instead. He was a very prissy eater, tearing bits of meat off the bone with a fork and chewing rapidly like a rabbit. He washed it down with a sip of red wine from a polished silver goblet.

  Kate had long since finished her meal and was enjoying a third goblet of wine. Her fingers were greasy, and bones littered her plate. She sat with one arm over the back of her chair, legs crossed, watc
hing Hornigold barely make a dent in his half of the chicken.

  "Even men?" she said nonchalantly.

  "I'm rarely afforded the opportunity to entertain women in my cabin," Hornigold said. "I keep tidy quarters, and I find my cleanliness influences the men to do the same with my ship."

  "Their ship," Kate corrected. "You are pirates again. This ship does not belong to just one man."

  "Aye," he conceded with a scowl, setting down his fork. Apparently he had lost his appetite. "I suppose it doesn't."

  Kate had not once seen Hornigold smile since they departed Nassau as fugitives. She didn't know him very well, so it was possible that he was just a stern man, but she thought it more likely that he was regretting his hasty decision. Hornigold's history as a pirate ran deep, and the promise of treasure had awoken something in him that he could not deny.

  Kate was willing to bet Hornigold would have lived out the rest of his life as a pirate hunter had she not come along to alter his course. Perhaps Hornigold was realizing that as well.

  "Do you expect me to sleep in it?" she asked.

  "Pardon?"

  "Your bed. Do you expect me to sleep in it?"

  To his credit, he didn't feign ignorance. "It would ease my mind."

  "Oh," she laughed mockingly. "Are you worried for me?"

  "Do you prefer sleeping out there with the men?"

  "They don't bother me."

  "With your looks, I find that hard to believe."

  "I am unspoiled," she replied with a smile, spreading her arms.

  Hornigold tweaked at his moustache with thumb and forefinger. "I would think it difficult to sleep when you might be stirred at any moment by a man crawling aloft, weighting you down. You might scream, but sounds are easily quashed below decks. The deed would be done before anyone could come to your aid, assuming anyone apart from me would bother to save you."

  "Maybe they fear I would do more than scream," she said, narrowing her eyes.

  "There is very little these men fear," Hornigold replied.

  "I spent a year in Captain Griffith's bed, and look what happened to him. Are you certain you want me in yours?" She was not ignorant to his errant gawking. More than once she caught him stealing glimpses of her breasts beneath her loose shirt, which she never laced all the way because she enjoyed the sun on her chest. His eyes promptly lifted when he realized she was looking at him. When he agreed to let her lead him to Griffith's buried treasure, he had probably assumed she was part of the deal.

  She knew she should have fancied him, but the attraction stubbornly refused to muster. He had a natural, distinguished manner that commanded respect. He was tall and handsome, with a trim mustache that was finely pointed on each end. He typically wore a long maroon coat and a black hat, but tonight he was absent both. Tonight he wore a black shirt, ruffled at the neck and wrists, with dark brown breeches and polished leather boots. His thick black hair was slicked back, collected in a ponytail.

  Kate felt a bit absurd in his presence. She was suddenly very conscious of her messy red hair, her shirt that was too large, and her dirty bare feet. A year ago she wouldn't have been caught dead looking like this, but she had grown fond of casual clothing. The skinny pale girl from London was no more. She had grown lean muscles, and her skin was darkened by the perpetual Caribbean sun. She no longer ate like a bird. She heartily finished every meal, and her breasts and hips had filled out.

  "Why should I fear you?" Hornigold said. "Unlike Jonathan Griffith, I have not brought you here against your will."

  "Nor I you," she countered.

  He scowled at that. "I go where I please."

  "That's a relief. I was concerned that you blamed me for abandoning your new station."

  He chortled without smiling. "You flatter yourself. I am responsible for my own actions. No one else."

  "That epiphany has yet to occur to most pirates."

  Hornigold's right eyelid flickered at the word. "In truth," he said, waving his hand carelessly, "I have more important things to worry about than you in my bed."

  Men are as quick to lie as women, Kate mused. They just aren't as good at it.

  "Like what?" she replied, deciding to play along.

  "Like the crewman that has mysteriously gone missing, with naught but a few drops of blood at the stern to mark his passing."

  "I heard something about that." She swallowed too much wine and winced as it went down bitterly. "I would think that mystery easily solved."

  "Pray tell," Hornigold said, raising an eyebrow.

  She shrugged. "I've developed a taste for rum on this journey, and I can safely say the waters of the Caribbean can seem positively inviting under its influence."

  "If rum influenced men to leap to a watery grave," said Hornigold, "none would remain to crew the ship."

  She reached across the table to retrieve the wine bottle, which was nearly empty. She poured the last few drops into her goblet. "Murdered?" she suggested offhandedly, recalling Bart's dumbfounded expression as he toppled over the rail and plummeted into the black water. The dirk she had used to stab him had been easy to dispose of, but the blood on her shirt was problematic. She couldn't exactly take it off, throw it over the side, and return topless to her bunk in the hold, with dozens of pirates ogling her. Bart had left a red smear in the fabric at the stomach. She tried scrubbing it with rum, but it wouldn't come out. So she returned to her bunk with the bottle of rum clutched over her stomach. She quickly changed shirts and, the next day, tossed the blood-saturated evidence over the side when no one was looking.

  In the days since Bart's disappearance, very few crewmembers made eye contact with her. They knew he had gone after her that night, and now he was gone. None of them could prove a thing, of course, but they all suspected her. If Bart hadn't been notoriously hotheaded, they might have held a grudge.

  Hornigold went to his cabinet to retrieve another bottle. He kept a large supply of wine in his cabin. "Bartholomew was talented with the sails," he said as he searched for a specific vintage. "And he was equally talented at making enemies amongst his peers. It's very possible someone tossed him over the side in a fit of anger."

  "How dreadful," Kate muttered.

  Hornigold returned with a new bottle, popped the cork, and filled both goblets. He leered sideways at her as he poured. "The crew is uncharacteristically mum on the issue."

  "Maybe you'll never know," Kate teased, picking up her glass.

  For a long moment he looked at her. She stared coolly back at him. "Something on your mind?" she asked when she grew weary of the game.

  "Why did you not return to your husband's family?"

  She blinked. She hadn't expected that question. Over the past week she had pushed all thoughts of Thomas and his family out of her mind. She had last seen Thomas in a dream, in which she promptly ran from him. After killing the man who had murdered her husband, she saw no reason to dwell on the past. "What exactly would I be returning to?"

  "Safety. Security."

  Those words, which emerged so easily from his lips, sounded alien to her. "I thought I had those things once. And then my husband was killed, and I was taken."

  "So why squander a chance at freedom?"

  Laughter bubbled out of her. "This is freedom, right here! The two of us, seated across from one another, neither with any power over the other. Those other words . . . safety? Security? Those are illusions that may be stripped of us at any moment."

  "Was your freedom not stripped of you by Jonathan Griffith?"

  "No!" she said, slamming her palm on the table. A bit of wine dribbled over the rim of Hornigold's glass, which he hadn't touched since refilling. "Griffith could not take what I didn't yet possess."

  "So you've discovered freedom in the Caribbean, amongst pirates, and now you want to be one yourself, is that it?"

  "Call me whatever you like," she said on a sigh.

  "You'll never be a pirate, Katherine."

  "Kate," she glowered.

 
"Ah yes. Kate. I'm sorry."

  "No you're not."

  "Well," he continued, "you'll never be a pirate, Kate. Those men will never accept you as one of them. They come to sea to escape your kind."

  "My kind?"

  "Women, if I must be precise."

  "We are a scary lot, aren't we?" she grinned.

  "Life is simpler without you," Hornigold said. "Women complicate matters beyond necessity. If I present you a red flower, you will complain it's too bright a color. If I buy you an orange flower, you will say, in retrospect, the red wasn't so bad. If I bring the red back, you might accept it, but secretly you won't be happy with it, because the truth is no color is good enough for you."

  She gawked at him. "Is this anecdote based in fact?"

  His jaw tightened. "That's not the point. The point is women are unhappy with normalcy."

  "Pardon," she said, again having to suppress a laugh, "what is normal? Murdering and pillaging? Is that the lone alternative to giving women flowers?"

  "The sea is the only place you are not," Hornigold said in a condescendingly slow drawl, as though she wouldn't understand him if he spoke too quickly.

  "And here is a woman, infiltrating your glorious sea."

  "That's how they feel," he said, tipping his glass. "It is a subconscious thing, mind you, which they would never express even if they came to a miraculous comprehension of it overnight."

  "I don't blame them. It's an embarrassing sentiment."

  An awkward silence followed. Hornigold shifted uneasily in his chair, pretending to take an interest in the opposite wall. Kate hadn't decided what she thought of Benjamin Hornigold yet, but he was far more interested in her than he wanted her to believe. After narrowly escaping a perilous relationship with one pirate captain, she wasn't eager to jump into another. As far as she was concerned, this was a business arrangement and nothing more. When she finished her wine, she thanked him for dinner, bid him goodnight, and allowed him to stare at her ass as she took her leave.

  A harsh wind greeted her on the main deck, threatening to tip her over. The full moon was partially obscured by a cloud that was moving fast. Patches of stars peeked through gaps in the clouds. The deck wobbled more than usual, and at first she wondered if she'd had too much wine. She stumbled to the port rail, setting a hand on one of the cannons to keep from falling over. The ship rocked this way and that, cresting huge rolling waves. The cannon trembled beneath her hand, breeching tackle stretched taut. She looked aft and saw a black mass trailing the ship, threatening to engulf the stern. Lightning flashed somewhere within the clouds.