The Valkyrie Series: The First Fleet - (Books 1-3) Look Sharpe!, Ill Wind & Dead Reckoning: Caribbean Pirate Adventure

by Karen Perkins

  PART THREE

  Chapter 54

  GABRIELLA

  15th January 1687

  Two Leagues Southwest of St Eustatius

  I sat on the forward end of the bowsprit and enjoyed the peace of a calm morning. I was happier than I’d ever known and had loved every day of my nine months at sea, despite the salt and the cuts and the bruises. In that time, I’d learnt how to sail a ship and taken part in dozens of raids. I was now truly a sailor and a pirate.

  My attention was on the barely rippling deep turquoise water and the dolphins I could see playing around our stem, yet I concentrated my ears on the deck behind me, listening for Leo. It was hard to stay away from him, but the crew and ship needed his attention too, and I knew a growing number of men were grumbling about the amount of time we’d been spending together. It wouldn’t be long before they made their feelings more obvious, but Leo wasn’t prepared to do anything about it bar shout instructions to “¡Cállate y vela!”—Shut up and sail!—but I thought they had a point. He was neglecting them and Sound of Freedom, we both were, and whilst these past months with him had been wonderful, I wanted more. Being reliant on a man who professed to love me, a man whose crew was creeping closer to mutiny because of me, wasn’t enough. I had to be in control of my own life. I hadn’t escaped Erik to live looking to another as captain.

  “Sail oh, to the sou’west.”

  I looked up to larboard and strained my eyes, trying to pick out the smudge of white Juaquim had seen from the maintop. I couldn’t see anything but blue.

  “Twinmaster, with Bermudan rig on both masts,” Juaquim called down.

  I squinted again, and could just make out a dirty smudge against the horizon, then lost it in the glare of sun on water and couldn’t be sure I’d seen anything at all. Even so, this could be what I’d been waiting for.

  I swung my legs over the bowsprit to turn myself about, stood and ran down the wooden spar to the foredeck, my feet knowing from experience where to step to avoid the knotted lines and blocks secured around it. Back on deck, I tried to contain my excitement and walked aft to the main-ratlins where Leo was entwined, glass held to his eye.

  “She’s flying the red, white and blue of the Netherlands, but I’ve not seen fore-and-afters on both masts like that afore,” he called to the deck. “Heard of it though—a Dutch idea.” He looked down at me, loving the thought of taking another Dutch ship, just in case it belonged to Erik. We’d been haranguing his shipping interests continually and must have put a sizable hole in his business and pocket by now. “What do you think, querida, do you fancy a little sport?”

  “Aye, aye, Captain.” I laughed. A Dutch vessel was indeed likely to be connected to my husband, especially in these waters. I hated that I was still married to him and was grateful for every opportunity to destroy his property and ruin his day. Leo jumped down from the rigging, his excitement clashing with concern; I’d finally managed to persuade him to allow me to lead a raid from the front. I still felt I had to prove myself to this crew, but Leo found my ambitions reckless and unnecessary.

  “Are you sure you want to do this, querida? You don’t have to be the first aboard.”

  “Yes, I do, and you know that well enough.” I had other reasons for this being necessary, but this wasn’t the time to confide in him. “Remember what you said to me when I first came aboard? ‘There are no passengers aboard Sound of Freedom’, you said I owed a sailor’s fare.”

  “Yes, a sailor’s fare, not a pirate’s. You don’t have to put yourself in danger.”

  “Of course I do, this is a pirate ship, I’m a member of a pirate crew and take a share in the profits. I need to do a pirate’s work.”

  We’d been over this again and again, and he knew how determined I was—and that I was right.

  “On one condition.”

  “You can’t place conditions on me now, it’s too late.”

  “I’m the captain of this ship, I can put whatever conditions I please on any crew member I want to. I can do what I like aboard this ship, including having you locked up in the cabin or below, out of harm’s way. No, calm down, I’m not going to, but I could and you need to remember that—it’s my word that counts on these decks.”

  Angry, I knew that was exactly why I needed to do what I was about to do. Whilst I loved Leo and had never been happier, it wasn’t enough. He was captain and I was crew. He controlled what I did and where I did it. He decided when I slept and woke, the work I was to do and on what part of the ship, even who I spent time with. If I disobeyed he could punish me as a mutineer, and he couldn’t afford to be lenient with me when the rest of the crew were watching. Erik had controlled me with violence; Leo controlled me with authority. Despite the name of the ship, I didn’t feel free, rather my spirit was still chained—anchored—to a place from which I wanted to sail away.

  I needed to feel free, to be in charge of my own fate; not to be told constantly what I was and was not supposed to do. As much as I loved Leo, I needed to make my own choices, my own decisions, but I had to be careful and keep my thoughts to myself for the time being. He must not guess my plans until I was ready to share them.

  “What’s the condition?” I asked, lips and voice tight.

  “I’m coming with you.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief and nodded. That wouldn’t spoil my plans, and might even show him that I was capable of looking after myself and doing this.

  “Can I have a look at her?” It was my only answer—let him think he’d won something. He handed me his glass with a smile and I took a good look at my intended prize.

  She was quite a bit smaller than Freedom and looked to have only a small crew—she wouldn’t need many hands to handle that triangular rig without square sails to make it complicated. The sun lit up her canvas, which glowed with its heat, looking like something an angel would choose to take to sea, and her figurehead caught my eye. Carved in the old style, she looked to have a unicorn leaping out of her bows below her high bowsprit. Perfect.

  “She’s dipping her colors,” I told Leo. Lowering the flag slightly and immediately re-hoisting was a customary greeting at sea, as well as a request to a ship to identify herself.

  “Send up Dutch colors,” he said to Gibson. “Let her think we’re friendly.”

  I kept my eye on the prize. “She seems satisfied, she’s altering course toward us—she must think we have news for her.”

  “Sí. Or she’s playing the same game we are. Don’t trust her actions, Gabriella, not until she’s ours.”

  I nodded, unwilling to look away. The closer she got, the more beautiful she became. “She’s sailing well for so little breeze,” I said to Leo. “If she runs, she’ll be hard to catch.”

  “Oh, we’ll catch her all right, so long as we’ve got her in sight. We’ll have her when the wind fills in,” Gibson said from the helm. “It’ll likely blow in from the nor’east’ard and she’ll be downwind of us. Even with that Bermudan rig she’ll not sail fast enough closehauled to get past and outrun us. Downwind we’ll get her easy. It’ll take time, but we’ll have her in the end.”

  “Gracias, Gibson,” Leo said. “But she’s lively—you know as well as I do she’ll be hard to catch unless our colors fool her long enough for us to get close-to.”

  “They haven’t,” I told them. “She’s hardened up again, she’s trying to sail past us to windward.”

  “Give me that,” Leo said, his hand held out for the telescope. “Sí, nor’east, clever. If he ducks behind us, he knows we’ll have no hope of tacking without more wind. It’s risky, but if he pulls it off he’ll have the weather gage to his advantage once the wind fills. Hard to larboard!” he shouted by my ear, taking me by surprise. “Haul those braces round, hard—we’ve only got the one chance to cut him off. Get the leeward bower anchor ready to loose, we’ll club-haul her if we need to, to get her round! And make sure he can see you do it, I don’t want him to miss our intentions.”

  I looked at him; h
is own excitement was building at the challenge of beating a captain whom he already respected. “There’s no point in pretending any more, break out the black flag and give him a look at the guns, let’s see if he’ll scare off and run. We can’t let him get past us.” He’d forgotten I was to lead the raid; the challenge of the hunt had taken him over.

  “If we can cut her off and force her back round to the south, we’ll get behind her and have a chance, especially if we can get a touch higher,” Gibson explained. “Our square sails’ll take a following wind better than them she has, and if we can get and stay ’tween her sails and the wind she’ll have nowhere to go. If she gets past us to windward, she’s as good as gone.”

  She saw our intent and didn’t risk sneaking past within gun range, but tacked and bore right round to the south in a bid to escape. We bore off as well and gave chase. I couldn’t help but admire how easily she’d tacked in the light airs and saw she was betting on getting far enough ahead to outrun us before the wind. We were both in the hands of the same wind gods. If they sent wind, and from the usual east or northeast, we’d have our prize; if they did not, she’d get away. It was that simple.

  Chapter 55

  “Here, take the helm, querida. Being a pirate isn’t all guns blazing and bows foaming, this is the hardest chase there is at sea—chasing your prey whilst chasing your wind. One lapse in concentration can lose both, and the whole day and effort will be for naught.” I sighed in frustration at his lecturing tone, but he hadn’t finished. “Keep your eye on the wind behind—what little there is—the sails, and the prize ahead. Trust Frazer on the main, Blackman at the mizzen and Newton on the foremast to trim the sails well, but it’s up to you to make sure they don’t work against each other on the different masts. All we need to do is keep the prize in sight until the wind fills in, and she’ll do everything she can to prevent that.” I nodded. “It’ll be an interesting contest—what little wind we have is behind us, so we control it, at least for the moment. But that boat with that rig can maneuver quicker and easier than we can, and will gain every time she can force us to wear ship. She’s smaller, lighter and faster. This will not be an easy contest. I’m going to put the boats off, maybe we can warp her to a bit more speed. Until I get back, concentrate on your helm and sing out when you change course—advance warning of a luff or loose will help the men find the set of their sails quickly.”

  At last he left me to it. This was my chase, he had remembered. We were barely moving, but my stomach was a nest of mosquitoes as if I were facing a battle through storm-whipped Cape Horn graybeards, not a slow drift about the Carib Sea.

  The prize luffed and picked up a little more speed as she sailed closer to the wind. “Bearing up to windward!” I called and pushed the tiller over to starboard to turn Freedom’s bows a point to larboard. I wanted to show the other vessel that we were watching and would respond to everything she did—I would not let her go.

  The men grunted and chanted and forced the heavy yards round to their new positions, all of us infected with the thrill of the crawling chase. The rigging creaked and protested, the sails flapped lazily to catch what little wind there was on offer, and the bows slowly, slowly swung round.

  “Bearing off!”

  Everything reverted to where it had been as the prize swung back to starboard and I followed. Her rig was much easier to handle than Freedom’s; it looked like her tactic was to tire us out.

  “That’s it, querida¸ let her know we can match her every course change.” Leo was back, and I looked forward at the longboat and pinnace rowing out ahead of us. The warps between the boats and Freedom slowly tightened, and I felt a jerk shake out what little wind filled the sails as the ship responded to their oars and moved forward.

  “It’s times like this I think we should have sweeps after all, despite that they get in the way of the guns.”

  I shrugged. Sweeps were large oars fitted to the lower deck of a ship, but I wanted to sail, not row—surely warping would be enough? Anyway, every man was on a line or oar, who would man the long sweeps if Freedom had them?

  “She’s jibing. Stand by to wear ship!” Leo shouted.

  *

  Three hours, no change. Luff, bear off, wear ship. Luff, bear off, wear ship. It was exhausting work, interspersed with long periods of inactivity while we waited for the twinmaster’s next move, and we didn’t know what reward we would win, if any. We were dead in the water after the last wear. Again. The men in the boats had changed once more, but they were running out of strength and Freedom barely moved. The chanting on deck had hushed and each course change was greeted with groans. We needed wind. Leo had brought a cask of rum punch on deck after the first two hours, but that was long gone and it would be another hour before he would permit another one—it helped to keep the crew working and talking of gold aboard the prize, but it wouldn’t help them shoot straight once we caught her.

  Leo took a trick at the helm to give me a rest. Everyone else was on a sheet, brace or boat’s oar. I was exhausted, despite not doing any of the hard work in trimming the sails. I went to the stern rail, just in case the ripples alongside our boards were lying. I wanted to see the wake we left behind us, knowing that would prove beyond doubt we were moving. I needed to know we were at least drifting in the right direction, but I got more than I bargained for. It took me a moment to realize what the shadows on the water meant, then:

  “Wind! We’ve got wind!” I shouted, excited, and most of the crew ran aft to see for themselves.

  “Get back to your braces!” Leo shouted. “This is where the real work begins!”

  Teams of men ran to the larboard and starboard of all three masts, ready to haul on yards and sheets again to make the most of each new puff of air. Each extra knot of speed would be hard won, and I grabbed the Dutchman’s log to record it, then dropped it. We didn’t need to know how many knots we made, we only needed to sail faster than the ship ahead.

  Now we were moving! Slowly, true enough, but we were moving. If I listened carefully I could just hear the gurgling of flowing water under our keel—Leo’s sound of freedom, although it did not signal freedom for the sails still on our horizon. We were lucky, the wind had filled in behind us as hoped and, when it reached the prize, it would bring us with it. It was only a matter of time now, and time had just sped up with the wind. I could smile again. We would get her. I would get her.

  Everybody came back to life: where there had been men lounging under the awning shading the maindeck from the sun, enjoying their pipes and grumbling while they waited for the next shout to man the braces, now there was organized activity and shanties. The yards were braced yet again, their gear coiled down and cleared; the guns run out once more, and their gunners ready and waiting. As usual before a fight, buckets of sand and water were positioned around the decks in case of fire; pistols and muskets were hauled to the tops. The decks were cleared for battle and black silk streamed from the masthead instead of hanging limp. We were hauling her in now. I could see her getting closer and closer.

  “Frazer,” Leo called. “Load grapeshot in the bow chasers, if we can shred her sails, she’ll be dead in the water. And get the boats back in, the men’ll be needed on deck.

  “She’s regretting her run downwind now,” he added, almost to himself.

  The sun was setting off our starboard bow by the time she was in range. We’d spent the whole day on the chase, yet had barely covered any water. No matter, she was almost done.

  *

  I could see her more clearly now. A large twinmasted sloop built of red Jamaican cedar, she didn’t look like she’d been afloat long—her woodwork still gleamed and her sails were still whitish rather than dirty brown. I took my eye from the glass and handed it back to Leo with a smile.

  “She’s beautiful. It seems a shame to fire on her.”

  “That’s up to her captain,” Leo said. “We’ll do what we have to, to take her after all the effort we’ve put in. There go her colors, maybe we won�
��t have to fire, but I’ll not be taking any chances.”

  I could see her without the glass now and gripped the tiller. We were catching her quickly; she’d put up a valiant resistance, but had dropped her colors; she seemed to know she was beaten. Or did she? Leo seemed fairly certain her strike was a ruse. We’d see. If it was a trick we still had our chance and it was up to me to take it. I had to keep our sails between the new wind and the sloop. As long as she was in our wind shadow, she wasn’t going anywhere. It was up to me on the helm to haul her in.

  Closer.

  Closer.

  Oh no! She’s heeling! She’s caught the wind. Panicking, I looked up at Leo. I’d failed. I hadn’t kept the wind from her. He burst out laughing.

  “Don’t look so worried, Gabriella. Calm yourself, the wind was always going to get to her. We’ve delayed it well, as long as anyone could. She may be moving, but so are we and we still have the weather gage. We’re not done yet.” Then, louder: ‘Prime the guns! Juaquim get aloft, we may need your sharpshooting very soon. We’ll have our reward yet, men!”

  A cheer went up as the crew filled with energy at the thought of the coming fight. We’d kept her in sight. Despite all her maneuvering, we’d kept her under our control. It was now time to take her for our own.

  Chapter 56

  I stood at the rail, screaming threats with the rest of the boarding party to intimidate the small crew. We—I—needed them to submit and be too scared to put up a fight.

  I had a coil of strong line in my left hand, and the grapnel in my right would give the signal to the others to throw. Jimmy’s guns were draped around my neck and my belt held my falchion and an extremely sharp dagger. I had to judge this perfectly. Are we close enough yet? I took a deep breath and threw. My grapnel, chased by a dozen more, hurtled into the rigging of the smaller ship, and yet more caught her bulwarks. I backed up, grabbed the line with both hands, and jumped, still screaming as I flew down to her decks. As soon as I crossed her sides I dropped to the deck and scrabbled for my guns. I needed my weapons—now.