He ran below, and I finally turned to Frazer and held out my hand.
“It’s good to see you on your feet, amigo.”
He grinned as I cringed, and leaned on his crutch to shake my hand. “I may be short of feet, but it looks like you could use all the hands you can get.”
I looked at his crutches and laughed. “Get back in the cabin, Frazer, you’ll fall over at the first shot!”
He glared at me and I knew he was on the quarterdeck to stay.
“Very well, but stay out of the way.”
He glared at me again, but I had no time for his pride. Alonso was back on deck and Freyja was drawing closer.
“Two strakes sprung, nearly patched, won’t sink,” he said in his broken English—the one language that everyone aboard could speak to some degree.
“Muy bien. Very well.” That was something, at least. The rock had stove in the strakes—cracked them and pushed them inwards a little—not splintered them into shards as had the earlier cannonball.
I looked forward; the first boat crew was aboard and knocking back their rum, whilst the pinnace was coming alongside. To the south, Freyja pressed on under full canvas. We barely had minutes.
“Larboard guns, stand by.”
I had eight nine-pounders to larboard, all bearing toward Freyja. She presented a narrow target, but I liked the odds of eight chances to hit her.
“Fire.”
Only two guns went off.
“What the bloody hell’s going on with you, you dozy buggers!” Frazer shouted from behind me. “Fire those bloody guns!”
Three more fired, then another two. I realized the gun crew for the eighth was still climbing aboard—their task made harder by the hull rolling in response to the cannonade. I looked at Freyja through my glass. Her jib was shredded, and her crew busy rigging fresh canvas, but her hull looked undamaged.
“Blackman!” I shouted as my bo’sun climbed up through the mainhatch. “I need more sail—I want the outer jib, spanker and forecourse set. Quick as you can!”
He nodded and moved forward to send topmen up the masts. I watched the normally nimble men drag themselves up the ratlins. They had worked through the night to finish the repairs, reload Freedom and put her to rights. Then we had used every ounce of muscle aboard to get her off the beach and through the reef. My entire crew was exhausted.
A boom and splash to my left had me raise my glass again. Freyja had started firing on us with her smaller guns, but she wasn’t yet in range and her ball had fallen short.
“Fire larboard cannon,” I shouted again and waited. And waited. Frazer echoed my order just as the first gun fired, followed by a staccato of seven more. It was taking too long, and I knew my men didn’t have many firings left in them. It took brute force to haul two tuns of iron inboard, load it, then haul it back out to fire. If I asked too much of them, I’d lose more men to accidents than I would to Hornigold.
Wait! We’d hit her—she bore off suddenly to westward and would soon be out of my line of fire.
“Get those sails set, Blackman. She’s running!”
The forecourse was sheeted home and Freedom responded, surging forward as wind filled her lungs.
“Set fore-topsail as well, quick as you can.”
Once the sails were set, we could make chase and give my gunners a rest before they were called back to action.
“Sail oh,” Juaquim called down. “Dead ahead, sailing northeast. Edelweiss. And Freyja’s coming back round!”
My heart sank. I couldn’t fight both of them with my crew in such a state, I’d kill them all.
“Captain,” Frazer growled.
“I know,” I said, my teeth grinding against the words I had to shout. “Helm-a-lee, round up to starboard.” Blake and Hornigold would have to wait for another day.
“Full press aloft, Bo’sun, let’s leave them behind,” I said, then went up to the poopdeck to watch astern. I now had two buccaneer ships on my wake giving chase, but at least I was heading toward Spanish waters.
As I watched, Freyja jibed, Hornigold must be damaged after all if he’d given up on the chase to head back to port. It was just me and Blake now.
“He’s fastest downwind, Leo.” I turned in surprise to Frazer standing next to me. “If we keep to this course or even tighter on the wind once we’ve cleared Sayba, we’ll soon leave her in our wake.”
I nodded. Blake might be able to catch a merchantman from that distance, but not another pirate ship, and certainly not the freshly scraped Sound of Freedom.
Chapter 25
LEO
10th April 1686
One League South of Sankt Tomas Island
Freedom was sound again. Blake hadn’t caught us, and we’d put in at the small uninhabited Danish island of Sankt Jan, about thirty leagues northwest of Sayba, to carry out new repairs after our fight with the Sayban coast. I wanted Blake and Hornigold even more badly. Van Ecken too. I wanted to destroy the whole nest of vipers—I hated that I’d been forced to run.
For now though, I needed a prize. I needed replacement anchors and lead sheeting. Not to mention gold. The nearby island of Sankt Tomas had the largest slave mart in the Caribbean. Slavers leaving here would be loaded with coin.
I climbed up to the maintop myself. Juaquim had spotted half a dozen sail, and I wanted to get a good look before deciding which one to take.
Three-masters, twinmasters. That one had an enormous copper on deck boiling away—it was still full of people. No good. What about that one? Twinmaster heading southeast, but a sizable hull; fire under the copper out so probably empty. Wait a minute! I recognize that deck layout, that rigging plan—that’s one of the slavers from Eckerstad! One of van Ecken’s vessels. That’s the one I wanted. Taking one of van Ecken’s ships would go a little way to make up for the frustration of my visit to Sayba, and my failure to inflict any serious harm on my foes. Losing a ship might just make Blake and Hornigold’s life a little harder at the hands of their Dutch master. I caught hold of the backstay and slid down to the deck.
“Bear off a touch, Thomas. Bring that ship up.” I pointed. “She should cross our bows in an hour or so—make sure we’re close-to when she does.
“Prepare decks and guns for attack!” I ordered as soon as the sails had been trimmed for our new course. I wanted all the preparations made before we were in clear sight of that captain. Men ran to obey, clearing the decks of all unnecessary clutter and fetching casks of powder and buckets of water for the guns. Muskets and pistols were loaded and piled up on the maindeck; more were hauled up to the tops for Juaquim and Newton’s sharpshooting. Every man loaded their own pistols and hung them around their necks; and stowed cutlasses, daggers, boarding axes, marlin spikes and various other weapons in their belts. My crew looked murderous and desperate. We were ready.
I raised my glass to my target; she was still coming on and hadn’t realized who we were, and why would she? My gun ports were closed, my heavily armed men concealed behind the bulwarks and I flew a Cross of St George at the masthead. The only thing that could give us away at the moment was the rake of my masts—but that only suggested speed, not necessarily pirates—and there were a lot of vessels rigged for speed in the northern Caribbees, flying the flag of St George.
Nearly in range. Just a little more patience.
“Now!”
Jean-Claude fired a warning shot at their bows—clean through their jib—a point of pride for him, and Jimmy struck the English colors and broke out the square of black silk in their place.
The crew popped up from behind the rails as the gun ports opened in one slick move, and the quiet Caribbean afternoon was filled with the sound of blades smashed flat side down on wooden rails, and chants of “Blood!”, “Death!”, “Kill!”. I knew from experience how intimidating the noise and spectacle we created could be, and I kept my glass trained on the other quarterdeck. Would the captain show sense and heave-to? Or run?
His colors of red, blue and white dropped
, followed by his mainsail, and he turned his bows into wind to heave-to. She was ours, and we’d only fired one shot.
Thomas brought Freedom neatly alongside and my crew made the two ships fast, then jumped down to the prize deck. The surrender was an honorable one—no one was lying in wait with cocked flintlock to pick off my men. The crew had gathered on the maindeck and dropped what weapons they had at the first command. I had lost sight of the captain.
“Take a party below, Blackman, see what we’ve got,” I told my bo’sun.
“Alonso, keep a guard on these men, make sure they can see Jean-Claude at the rail.” Jean-Claude had remained aboard Freedom and manned one of the rail guns. Aimed into the heart of the group of slavecrew and loaded with small partridge shot, it would kill at least half of the two dozen men with one firing.
I took Phillippe and Rafael and dropped down to the lower deck after Blackman and his men, then quickly moved aft, holding both pistols fully-cocked and ready to fire. It worried me that the captain had not remained with his men.
Terrified faces shrank back from us. Damn it, the vessel wasn’t quite empty after all, but Blackman would sort them out. There were no white faces there, so I ignored them and kept going toward the stern, my eyes streaming from the stench of the hold. That wouldn’t help my aim, but I planned on getting close enough that it wouldn’t matter too much.
We reached the aft bulkhead and I stood in front of the door, Phillippe and Rafael either side, then booted it open. My two crewmen wasted no time, and I followed them in as soon as I regained my balance.
There were three people in the cabin. The captain, as I’d expected, but also two women seated on chairs before him: one white, one black. The bruises had healed, but they were the same two women I’d seen in Eckerstad. The captain stood behind them and held a pistol in each hand—one to each of their heads.
Chapter 26
“Let them go and you won’t be harmed,” I said. “Your crew is taken, you’re on your own. I have forty men, you have nowhere to go.”
“No. Do you know who this is?” He knocked the barrel of his gun against the white woman’s head. “This is Gabriella van Ecken! I couldn’t believe it when I spotted her face in the women’s hold. I’ve dined at her table many times and there she was, streaked with filth, huddled amongst the bitch slaves—I couldn’t believe my luck. You can have the ship and the gold and the cargo—you’ll take it all anyway—and even if you let me live, he won’t. But he will if I return his wife and his whore to him.” He knocked the other gun against the black woman’s head and grinned. The women held hands and stared at the floor. They looked resigned and exhausted. I wondered what they’d been through since I’d seen them at Eckerstad.
“You’re not taking them anywhere,” I said, and they looked at me for the first time. My eyes met those of van Ecken’s wife, then I jerked my gaze back to the captain.
“You’re not taking these women. I don’t care what van Ecken does to you, he’s the least of your worries at the moment. If you’ve hurt them, you’ll have to answer to me.”
The man threw his head back and laughed, then stumbled backwards. The women, taking advantage of his inattention, had shoved their chairs back, knocking him off balance, before throwing themselves to the deck. His guns fired at the same time as mine and my men’s. I was deafened by the noise in that confined space.
I rushed over to the man on the floor, my second pistol ready to fire, but he was dead. One lead ball had hit him in the face, obliterating his features, another had taken off his ear and part of his skull, and the third had hit him square in the throat. Blood covered the stern windows behind him, the deck and the two women. The women! Is it all the captain’s blood? Or did he shoot them when they threw themselves to the deck?
No, Phillippe and Rafael were helping them to their feet. I looked up at two fresh scars in the deckhead; the captain had fired wildly above his head as he fell.
“Are you hurt?” I asked.
Gabriella van Ecken looked at the other, then answered. “No, we’re well.” They crossed to the body, and I noticed they were still holding hands. She drew her foot back and kicked his ruined head. Her friend drove her own boot into his groin.
“Ladies.” I grabbed their arms, and Mrs. van Ecken screeched at my touch, ripped her arm away, and scratched my face with her nails.
“Gabby, hush,” the black woman said calmly, holding onto her upper arms. “It’s over, we’re safe. We are safe, aren’t we?” she added, looking at me.
“Yes.” I nodded. What else could I say? But how would I keep that promise? Nowhere in the Caribbees would be safe for these two.
“I’m Captain Leo Santiago.” I held my hand out to van Ecken’s wife, and to my relief she took it. I brought her hand to my lips in greeting.
“Gabriella van Ecken,” she said. “This is Klara.”
I offered my hand to the other woman, who gave me her own in surprise.
“You both look like you could do with some air. Phillippe will take you topside. Wait for me there.”
I wanted to ransack the cabin for riches, as well as charts and anything else of use. I could also use the time to think. The last thing I wanted was to take responsibility for those two, but to have van Ecken’s wife at my disposal—that could be useful.
Chapter 27
Blackman and Gaunt were supervising the lading of anchors, spare rigging and other gear we were running short of by the time Rafael and I arrived on deck lugging a chest full of coin and charts. I was pleased with the haul for a twinmaster—there was definitely enough to cheer the crew after our disastrous and unprofitable stopover at Sayba. Alonso hurried to take my end of the chest, and I turned my attention to the people milling about the maindeck.
Apart from my own crew there were a couple of dozen sailors from this boat and about the same number of slaves. And the two women. I took a deep breath and walked forward. I already knew from the captain’s papers that he’d sold the African women and half of the men at Sankt Tomas, and had been heading south with the strongest of the men, hoping for a higher profit.
“Do you speak English?” A couple of dark heads nodded. “I’m looking for volunteers for my decks. I can offer you a life as free men with equal shares of the plunder we take, as much meat and rum as you want—and no irons.”
I waved Blackman over and pointed at the fetters binding the men. He called for his tools and started to prize open the manacles.
“And if we say no?” one of the men asked.
“You’ll keep this boat and a few of her crew to sail her, and take your chances.”
“Where would we go?”
“I’d advise St Vincent. There’s a colony of Black Caribs settled there and no white man is welcome. It’s a hard life, but you’d be your own masters.” I waited whilst my words were translated for the benefit of the others.
“With a vessel you may be tempted to sail east to Africa. I wouldn’t advise it. Too much can go wrong on an ocean crossing, even with an experienced crew and master, and that continent put you aboard a slaveship to begin with. Your best bet is with me. I need the hands. You’d be well treated.”
I waited whilst Blackman finished releasing everyone and handed his tools to Smith, who took them back to Freedom for him.
“Well?”
The man who had translated my words looked at the man next to him and they both looked at Blackman, then stepped forward. Another half dozen followed their example. I looked them over and nodded. They would do. They’d soon learn to fire a gun and set a sail.
“Anyone else?” I asked. Nothing. Then a couple of the crew stepped forward. I nodded and jerked my head. They joined the others, looking nervous. The Africans glared and stepped away from them.
“Who are the ship’s officers?” I asked the two ex-slavecrew, and one of them—Cartwright—pointed them out. Davys motioned with his flintlock toward the boats. I’d set them adrift and let them take their chances. Blackman led my new crew across to
Freedom and started to get them organized. They’d need to make their mark on the ship’s articles to sign onto our account.
“The rest of you are now under the command of these men. Get them to St Vincent in safety and, if you’re lucky, you can go on your way. I hope you haven’t mistreated them on the passage so far.” I grinned.
I gave the remaining Africans the weapons the slavecrew had dropped to the deck earlier.
“There’s a body in the cabin you may want to deal with fairly soon—they start to smell quickly in this heat. Good luck.”
They had a lot of challenges ahead, but it would be up to them to meet them. I turned to the women. They were my problem.
Chapter 28
“What about us? Are we free too?” Gabriella asked. I noticed she was looking at the marks her nails had left on my jaw. I resisted the urge to put my hand to my face. I sighed. What about them? If I controlled her, I controlled van Ecken, and he controlled Blake and Hornigold. But the ship’s articles were clear: no women aboard the Sound of Freedom. She’d be useful, but she’d also be trouble. I grew aware of my crew staring at the three of us.
“Please help us. If my husband finds us, he will kill us slowly and painfully.”
The words were stated calmly and I had no doubt as to the truth of them, but she wasn’t begging. I looked at her with more interest. She reminded me a little of Magdalena with her wild curls, and she seemed to have an inner strength to match my former sweetheart. She still stood tall, after whatever she’d endured on Sayba, her escape, and time in the hold of a blackbirder. I made my decision.
“You’ll be safe enough aboard my ship,” I said. “But you’ll have to earn your keep.”
She stiffened and scowled.
“Not like that! The only fare due aboard Freedom is a sailor’s, and I want to know everything you can tell me about your husband—and Captains Blake and Hornigold.”
The Valkyrie Series: The First Fleet - (Books 1-3) Look Sharpe!, Ill Wind & Dead Reckoning: Caribbean Pirate Adventure Page 29
