Grace shrugged. “The last thing I expected to find on this ship was a kitchen.”
“Folks gotta eat, miss,” said Jamie.
“Yes, people do, but not . . .” She lowered her voice. “But not vampires.”
Her eyes met Jamie’s.
“Oh, this grub isn’t for them,” he said, slipping another couple of carrot pieces into his mouth.
“Then who?” Grace asked.
“Jamie! Jamie, will you stop distracting the girl and make yourself useful. Fetch that steak out from the icebox.”
“Duty calls,” Jamie said, slipping away before Grace had a chance to press him for an answer to her question.
The cook came over and patted Grace’s shoulder.
“That’s fast work, my girl,” she said. “I might have to have a word with the captain about you. Seems an awful waste when I could make use of you here in the kitchen. Could do with another pair of hands to make up for that good-for-nothing lump of a nephew of mine.”
An awful waste? What was she talking about? Grace remembered the words the cook had uttered before she’d fallen asleep.
The new ones are always the worst, aren’t they?
What was she talking about? A tide of panic was starting to rise. Beyond her, Jamie hauled a mound of beef out of the ice.
“What is going on here?” Grace cried, dropping her knife. “Who is all this food for?”
“Careful, missy,” the cook said. “Look, you’ve gone and cut yourself now.”
Grace looked down. Sure enough, the knife had made a neat incision into her finger and a small drop of blood was budding on her skin.
Before she knew it, the cook had grabbed her hand in a tight grip. “Quick, Jamie, move yerself. Move yerself, you lump. Oh, what a waste!”
Grace trembled but could not escape the cook’s vise-like grip. As she looked up, she saw to her horror that the woman’s face was changed. Her eyes were glassy and her whole expression was vacant, as if life had departed from the shell of her body and gone elsewhere. Grace thought how Lorcan’s features had distorted in her cabin. This was both the same and yet different. Was the cook another vampire? What about Jamie? Grace had thought she’d be safe here, in this warm, bustling part of the ship. How little she really knew.
Jamie joined his aunt and reached out toward Grace’s hand, wiping her finger clean and wrapping a small bandage neatly around it.
“That should stem the flow,” he said.
Numbly, Grace looked down at her bandaged hand.
“That was close,” the cook said. Suddenly all cheery business again, she released Grace’s hand. “A kitchen is no place for sloppy hygiene! I’d better get these carrots over to the pan. And you, missy, had better take a break. I’m not so sure you are cut out for kitchen work after all. Bit too highly strung. Maybe the captain’s way is best after all.”
“What is the captain’s way?” Grace asked. “Please stop talking in riddles and just tell me what’s going on!”
“I must say, you’ve woken up from your sleep in a nasty little mood,” the cook said, frowning.
“Just tell me,” Grace repeated.
“Surely you know the score,” the cook said, smiling at her with just a hint of malice. “You’re the new donor, aren’t you? Old Nathaniel’s being retired and you’re to take his place.”
Donor? Grace wasn’t sure what the cook meant but it didn’t sound good. She wanted to ask more but, as she opened her mouth, no words came. She remembered the sight of Old Nathaniel giddily making his way to the kitchen, his skin pale and thin as if thoroughly drained of blood. What was the malevolent cook telling her? That Old Nathaniel wasn’t a vampire at all? Then what?
You’re the new donor.
We have other ways to cater to the crew’s needs.
Things were starting to make sense. Maybe she had been wrong to place her trust in certain people. Grace found herself cold and trembling.
Then a bell began to toll.
“Is that the time? Quick, Jamie, back to work, or we’ll never be ready for the Feast.”
The Feast?
The bell tolled again.
“Is that the Nightfall Bell?” Grace asked Jamie.
He nodded, throwing a deep red apple in the air and catching it between his teeth. He had unusually sharp teeth, she thought, as he bit deep through the skin and into the creamy white flesh. But vampires didn’t eat food, did they? This was all so confusing.
“I have to go,” she said, feeling nauseous. “I have to get back.”
“Ta ta, then.”
Jamie smiled at her, his mouth opening up as he crunched the last of the apple down — pips, core, stem, and all.
25
RAID
Connor waited with his team for the cannon to signal the start of the attack. His heart was thudding with anticipation. Only about half of the pirates would take part in the raid. The target galleon, which they were fast gaining on, was smaller than the pirate ship, so sixty men and women were assigned to do the job.
There were three teams of twenty — each further divided into three smaller teams of four, eight, and eight. Hence the 4-8-8 formation Cate had talked of before. Connor was experienced enough at team sports to quickly grasp her strategy. It was pretty simple. The “four” was a team of four broadsworders who would go in first to scare the defending crew witless, to wield their hefty swords and do what surface damage they could to the rigging and other parts of the ship. Only surface damage. The ship was not to be significantly wrecked, on the off chance that Captain Wrathe decided to sequester it for his own use.
Once the broadsword teams had caused chaos and fear on the deck, they would be followed closely by the first teams of eightsmen. Equipped with the smaller, lethal weaponry of rapiers, épées, and daggers, the first eightsmen identified their human targets and closed in for the attack. As Cate reminded her team in her final briefing, the idea was to get the defending crew to submit and yield their cargo, not to kill them for sport.
The job of the teams of second eightsmen, to which one Connor Tempest had lately been drafted, was to support the first attack. The first eight had senior status and could order around their support. Each of the first eight was paired with one from the second; Connor was honored to find himself designated Cate’s second.
“It’s the safest position in the team,” Bart told him. “Cate does enough for three men. But you’ll get up close to the action, make no mistake about that. And listen to her. Do everything she asks and we’ll all get home safe for the party.”
Bart slipped on his leather gauntlets and shook Connor by the hand.
“Best of fortune to ya, Mister Tempest.”
“And to you,” said Connor.
Smiling as ever, but all business, Bart rushed off to join the other three hulks who made up his team of four.
Connor rejoined his team, who were psyching themselves up for the attack, much like the sports teams Connor had played on since he was a young kid. Some of the pirates were limbering up — lunging forward to loosen their legs or twisting from side to side to ensure they could achieve the maximum range of motion. Others were practicing stabbing and slicing through the open air with their rapiers. Thinking of the swords in real action made Connor shiver and feel somewhat nauseous.
He brushed his fingers against the hilt of the rapier that now hung at his own hip. Cate had gone through Connor’s role within the attack and told him that it was highly unlikely he’d be called upon to use the sword for anything more than intimidation. But this was not a game. Nothing was guaranteed. Connor felt the weight of the sword. It was heavy, but heavier still was his growing sense of dread at using it. Maybe he wasn’t cut out for the life of a pirate after all. But it was too late to step away now — the others were depending on him.
Suddenly, Cheng Li appeared at his side. He had thought for sure she’d have been one of the first eights. Perhaps she was just coming to wish him luck.
“I’m joining this team,
” Cheng Li announced. “Johnna — go and take my place in the first eights. You’ve been promoted. I’m staying back to keep my eye on Tempest.”
The other pirate — Johnna — was clearly delighted. She saluted Cheng Li then raced over to join the rest of her team. Connor looked at Cheng Li. Had she actually chosen to step back, he wondered, or had she been demoted? Her dark eyes warned him not to even think about it further.
Suddenly, there was a deafening noise from right above Connor’s head. Looking up, he saw a heavy metal grid falling toward him. Instinctively, he jumped out of the way. As he did so, the narrow grid swung down but came to a halt at a forty-five-degree angle. Two similar structures had appeared at intervals farther along the deck. They jutted out menacingly like half-raised drawbridges.
“What are those?” Connor asked Cheng Li, already suspecting the worst.
“How do you think you’re going to get over from our ship to theirs?” she replied.
Connor looked up at the narrow grid that hovered above his head, as the ship rocked from side to side. It looked far from stable.
“When the cannon sounds,” Cheng Li told him, “it will swing down until it’s flat and make a bridge.”
Connor was unconvinced.
The pirate on his other side nudged him. “We calls ’em the ‘Three Wishes,’” he said, “cuz all you can do is wish that you make it over to the other ship and safe home again.”
“Thanks,” said Cheng Li testily, “that’s very helpful.”
Connor felt really sick.
The cannon sounded.
The pirate ship had drawn up alongside its target, easily outrunning the smaller craft, like a shark closing in on a dolphin.
The vessels clashed.
The noise in Connor’s ears was deafening as the cannons sounded again and, at the same time, the Three Wishes were lowered to a ninety-degree angle and positioned to make bridges from The Diablo to the other vessel.
As the metal grids clattered into place, the three teams of broadsworders lost no time in racing over the fragile structures, high over the churning sea. Connor saw that each bridge had a thin guardrail on either side, but even so they looked anything but sturdy, lurching up and down as the two ships rocked in the rough water.
“I can’t do it,” Connor said, panic spreading through him like ice.
“Of course you can,” Cheng Li said. “The trick is to run over as quickly as you can. The slower you go, the more unstable you’ll feel. And whatever you do, Connor, don’t look down!”
But Connor couldn’t help but look down right now. Far below the metal grids lay the churning ocean, waiting hungrily to receive him back into its cold embrace.
He trembled. He’d never been keen on heights — even living in a lighthouse hadn’t conquered that. He felt a heavy sickness and a frightening swell of adrenaline in his veins. One moment, his whole body felt as heavy as lead, the next as fragile and vulnerable as a feather. There was no way he could set foot on the bridge. One slip or missed footing and he’d plummet into the icy depths. He wanted to crawl away and take shelter. Why had Captain Wrathe chosen him to take part in the raid? He couldn’t do this.
“Yes, you can.”
It was his dad’s voice once more. Right inside his head.
“You can do this, Connor.”
The calmness and certainty in his dad’s voice reassured him. The flow of adrenaline slowed and Connor felt a momentary calm.
“First eights in,” cried Cate, suddenly breaking from the pack and darting over the wish.
And now three teams of eight pirates ran off across the metal bridges like racehorses, jumping from one ship to the other, running down their prey.
Now Connor and the others on the second team of eightsmen stepped up, in a line, to the ship’s side. He was last but one. Cheng Li stood behind him.
This was it. The moment. He couldn’t tell how the battle was going. It was impossible to see what was happening on the deck of the other ship.
In front of him, the wish rocked up and down. Though he’d now seen twelve pirates safely run across it, he still feared the worst. But what option did he have now? He was part of a team and Connor Tempest never let down his team.
“Second eights,” came a cry.
The pirates in front of him shot across the wish, their hands not even reaching for the guardwire. Suddenly, Connor was at the front. He hesitated for an instant, but Cheng Li gave him a firm push forward.
“Do it, boy. Prove to me I didn’t rescue a coward.”
Taking a deep breath, Connor jumped up onto the wish and, not looking down, not reaching out his hand, propelled himself forward. Just a few steps and he landed with a thud on the wooden deck of the vessel. He’d made it.
“Excellent, boy!” cried Cheng Li as she jumped down beside him. There was no time for further chat. Connor parted company with Cheng Li. His job was to seek out Cate and follow her instructions.
Around him, the first eights were engaged in one-on-one combat. He was so full of adrenaline, he might have been tempted to join in, but Cate’s instructions had been crystal clear. There was a system and it must be kept to. Ahead, he saw Cate, signaling him over. He ran to her side. Cate’s rapier was held over two men, whose faces told of surrender even if their bodies had not trembled like reeds in the wind.
“Hold them here, while I go deeper,” Cate instructed.
Connor drew his own rapier and extended it toward the men, hoping that they could not sense his inexperience. Judging by their whimpering, they did not.
“Don’t mess with Tempest,” Cate told them. “He’s one of our most bloodthirsty.” Winking secretly at Connor, she moved on.
Maybe it wasn’t so hard being a pirate, after all. Connor let out a deep breath and smiled at his captives. This seemed to unnerve them utterly.
“Just being friendly,” he shrugged, cheekily moving the tip of his rapier closer to the pair.
He felt a tap on his back. He spun around. One of the defending crew had broken free and was hovering before him — a rapier in his hand. He must have taken it from one of The Diablo’s crew. He wore no protection, but his eyes were full of hatred.
“Bloody pirates,” he said. “Think we’re easy prey, do you? Well, think again.”
He struck out at Connor with the sword but Connor saw the move coming and darted out of the way.
The man came right back at him, and this time the rapier grazed his shoulder. Connor felt a searing pain. But it was okay — it was better than okay. The pain was like a wake-up call. It pulled Connor together. Now they stood opposite each other, weighing the possibilities. Connor brought himself to focus, summoning up the lessons he’d learned from Cate and Bart.
“You’re just a boy,” sneered his opponent. “Are they running out of proper pirates and taking on youth trainees?”
He mustn’t rise to the bait. The man was trying to throw him off his guard. Connor kept his gaze fixed on the man’s eyes. It paid off. As the man took another swing at him, Connor predicted the move and blocked the blade with his own. Then he used all his strength to force down the attacking rapier. As he did so, pain shot through his shoulder. The effort had been too much. He could feel warm blood seeping from the wound.
He mustn’t let himself get distracted. He’d have to get in the next attack first. And he did. He pulled his rapier away and dived toward his opponent, roaring with adrenaline. His eyes boring into the man, he plunged his rapier toward his chest. But the deck had become wet with dirt and blood and Connor slipped. The rapier did not make the man’s chest, but the attack threw him backward and his head bashed against the mast. He slumped to the floor, blood instantly gushing down over his head and face like a waterfall.
Connor’s heart was racing as he reached down and tore the rapier out of the man’s limp hands. When he brought his hand away, it was soaked in the man’s blood. He wiped it dry on his trousers.
He didn’t want the man to die. He wanted to protect himself but
he didn’t want the man to die. He looked around the deck. The battle was ending. The pirates of The Diablo had won. But Connor didn’t feel like a winner.
He raced over to the two prisoners Cate had asked him to watch over before. They had seen his duel and reared back in fright as he returned.
“Be merciful!” one of them cried.
“Take off your scarf,” Connor rasped. “Take off your scarf. NOW!”
The man’s shaking hands unraveled the scarf.
“Come with me!” Connor commanded him.
“Please — be merciful!”
“Just come.” Connor was almost out of voice now.
He grabbed the man by the wrists and pulled him over to the mast, where his erstwhile opponent was now covered in blood from his head wound. Taking the scarf, Connor pressed it to the man’s skull, holding it there to still the flow of blood.
“Here, you take over,” he said, placing the other man’s hand over the blood-soaked scarf. “Keep it there and keep the pressure strong. It’s a bad wound but it won’t be fatal.”
“You are merciful! Thank you!” the man said, smiling through chattering teeth.
Connor stood there, breathing in quick bursts. He felt a hand on his shoulder. He couldn’t fight anymore. There was no fight left in him.
He turned.
“Good work, boy,” said Cheng Li. “We may need to work on your killer instincts, but good work all the same.”
Cate came running over.
“Connor, I heard what happened. Well done! Brilliant stuff. And Cheng Li . . .”
“Yes?”
Cheng Li and Cate faced each other, their swords in their hands.
“Fantastic work, Mistress Li. As usual. Thanks for looking after Connor. But I want you back at the front of the attack next time. You put the other eights to shame. Beautiful precision wounds. You’ll have to show me some of those moves with the katanas sometime.”
“If you wish,” Cheng Li said nonchalantly, but Connor could see that she was pleased.
Cate ran off to make official news of the ship’s surrender. The Diablo fired two cannon shots to signal victory and the defeated ship sounded the solo cannon of surrender. And so it was over, as swiftly as it had begun.
Vampirates: Demons of the Ocean Page 14
