Chapter 2
After giving the woman to his crewmen so he could climb over the railing himself, Alister grabbed her wrist and started dragging her to his chambers.
“Unless those men want to fight to their deaths, tie them up,” he yelled to his crew as he towed her up the steps. He could feel her staggering and tripping over her own feet behind him.
Once he opened his door, he tossed her inside so he could make his own way in, closing it behind him. She stumbled but stayed upright on her feet before quickly turning around.
“Stay away from me!” Her voice was a high-pitched screech, making him wince.
“Calm down, lass,” he sighed, swiftly making his way over to her. He placed his hand on top of her head, bending over to be eye level with her. All the while, she uselessly punched her fists into his chest. “I ain’t gonna hurt you.”
She froze at his gentle touch and words. Her eyes trailed from where her hands lay on his torso to search his face, stark fear on her features.
“I don’t know what you’ve dealt with, but we won’t harm you, and the next time we port, we’ll drop you off.”
“P-pardon?” Her brows crinkled, and he noted the wild freckles splattered across her sun-kissed face.
“We may be pirates, but on this ship, we don’t take unwilling women.” It wasn’t his way, and he refused to allow his crew to do the same under his watch.
A flash of emotion crossed her face, a mix of confusion and, strangely, pensiveness. Her face screwed into a tight crinkle as she leaned her head against him, only to start pathetically weeping. Alister rolled his eyes.
Great. He now had a sobbing, fragile woman on his fucking ship. Where the hell is she going to sleep?
He wouldn’t let her have his quarters. He’d have to ask Derek and Pierre to empty theirs so she could rest without the prying eyes of men. He grimaced; the men would hate that.
“You.” He shook her. “Stop your weeping.”
It did nothing but irritate him. He felt little pity or sympathy for anyone, regardless of what they’d been through.
She clutched his tunic tightly in her little fists. He could only imagine what she’d been through if she was so desperately clutching him, a stranger, like this.
“I-I want to go home,” she whispered, a tremor in her voice.
“Where’d they take you from?”
“D-Dunecaster port.”
“Ha!” They’d taken her from a port frequented by pirates and criminals. “Looks like you’re in luck, lass. We’re heading that way.”
Alister had been sailing his ship to the port after running low on supplies and not finding many ships to raid in the process. He rarely made port if he had to.
He noticed her crying had started to settle already.
“So, would you like to point out which men hurt you so you can watch them drown?”
“Excuse me?” She stepped back to frown once more at him, and he noted her cheeks weren’t a tear-shed red. Must be one of those pretty criers. “Aren’t you going to keep the crew?”
“Oh, aye.” He folded his arms across his chest, turning his head to the side. “But I don’t want those who think it’s fine to hurt the weak. We may be lawless, but we aren’t dubious on my ship. Men like that turn on others easily. Last thing I need is a crew who will mutiny against me.”
Now that they were apart, and she wasn’t screaming and struggling, he was better able to take in her features.
No wonder they took her. She’s a pretty little thing.
Her wild freckles dusting her skin made her look feminine and innocent, almost like someone had sprinkled a pinch of brown sugar across her face. Her hair was a dark, muddy colour, but it was long and wavy around her face.
Her blue eyes were light, like when the sunlight hit the shallow waters of an island.
She looked as though she had a medium bust under her pale-yellow, frilly dress with elegant stitching. It was obviously a high-quality garment; since she was taken from Dunecaster, a generally impoverished area, the crew must have given it to her from their spoils.
She only came up to his chin, and her frame under all those frills looked small.
Alister hated women like her, women who were frail, broken, in need of saving. He was ill-tempered on the best of days, and he knew, looking at this kind of woman, she’d flinch if he so much as raised his voice in her direction.
“If you don’t want to watch them die, I can figure it out on my own.” Perhaps her heart is too gentle.
He turned to step away, realising he’d offered a meek woman the opportunity to see men die.
“No.” She grabbed his wrist to stop him. “I-It was only the captain.”
Figures, he thought. She must have been a prostitute he fancied.
“And I do want to watch him die, more than anything. Please, please don’t leave me by myself. I-I don’t want to be alone.”
He nodded, walking forward to open the door, leading her outside. At least she has some resolve.
Once on the main deck, he noticed she’d grabbed the back of his black canvas doublet coat with thick brown cuffs and seams. It was the most expensive thing he wore, and it came down to the backs of his knees.
He figured she was afraid and didn’t want to be separated from him. Alister sneered at the idea of being a knight in shining armour when he was nothing but a bloodthirsty criminal. He hoped she didn’t come to idolise him; he hated clingy women.
When he tried to enter the crowd, she pulled on his coat. She didn’t want him leading her into the middle of it.
Sighing with defeat and a shake of his head, he stood on the edge of the throng, his crewmen stepping out of the way to reveal their prisoners.
They were bound with their hands before them, standing in two neat rows along the deck.
“I’ll ask you all again. Who is your captain?” He eyed them roughly. “I’ll start slitting throats if I don’t get an answer.”
“Who says ye won’t once we tell ye?” one of them snapped.
He gestured to the sails of his grand warship.
“If you haven’t noticed, this is a frigate, and you’ve killed much of my crew.
You will either join it, or find yourselves at the bottom of the ocean.
Thank the sea gods I’m offering to spare your lives.
” Then he twisted his face into a sneer before he uttered his next words. “Since you broke the code.”
Pirates didn’t attack pirates.
It was an unspoken code – they all had the same goal and respected their commonalities. If they had raised a black flag, Alister wouldn’t have attacked, would have diverted his direction completely.
“You attacked my ship under your captain’s command. Therefore, only he has to die.” He placed his hand on the hilt of his sword to seem more menacing. “Unless you want to join him? I don’t keep prisoners.”
Too many useless mouths to feed. He wouldn’t waste his supplies for such a stupid reason.
“So, I’ll ask one last time.” He opened his mouth to continue, but as if on cue, they all stepped away from one man.
A thin yet strong-looking brown-skinned man was left by himself.
He wore a brown doublet coat similar to Alister’s own black one.
Like many who sailed, he wore a tricorn hat to shield his face from the harsh sun that often bore down from above.
He could see the drops of sweat beading on the man’s forehead beneath the hat, glistening against his dark skin.
The man greeted his gaze with a glare before spitting on the ground near Alister’s black boots. “Traitors.”
“Nay. They’re just smart enough to save their own necks.” With a large grin splitting his face, Alister shouted, “Alright, onto the railing.”
He bumped into the woman behind him as they shuffled out of the way. A bigger space was eagerly created by his crew so they could watch the man jump to his own death. It was one of their favourite sources of entertainment and would be spoken about with much humour later.
Did they scream? Did they cry? Did they toss themselves with courage, or did they eventually get pushed off because of their cowardliness?
Much about a man could be deciphered in his final moments.
Alister could cut his throat, but he knew this was a much better way to make the pirate suffer. He’d spend days out at sea, alive, starving, dehydrated, burned by the sun, before either dying or being eaten by a monster from the depths below.
It was cruel, and it would show just how sinister he could be as commander of his vessel. It should ensure the newcomers fell in line.
Alister unsheathed his sword and pointed it at the man, now forced to stand on the railing, his hands unbound so he could hold onto the netted rope of the shrouds.
“Jump!” He chuckled loudly, poking the man’s belly with the tip of his cutlass.
The precariously balanced pirate smiled wide with white teeth. “I think not.”
Something cold and round pressed against the back of Alister’s head. His eyes widened while gasps of surprise echoed around him.
We missed one?
How could his crew not notice one of the men standing with them wasn’t one of their own?
Just to make sure they all knew the owner of the gun to his head was serious, they cocked back the hammer with a clicking sound that resonated in his ears.
“If anyone moves,” said the man on the railing, “she’ll blow your captain’s brains across the deck.”
She? He tried to turn his head to look over his shoulder with his good eye, but the barrel of the pistol was shoved against his head, pushing it forward once more.
“Get off the railing, Naeem,” the woman behind him said. “Before I have to fish you from the sea.”
This Naeem threw his head back with a jolly laugh, grabbing his hat with his free hand so it didn’t fall from his head.
“Aye, Captain.”
He nodded as he jumped down to the safety of the deck, his feet thudding against the timber.
“Captain?” Alister said in disbelief.
There couldn’t be. There was no way this weeping, crying, fragile woman was actually a pirate, less so a captain.