Chapter 5 #2
“You’d be surprised what I can offer.”
She watched him calmly, seeming relaxed in the position she was in, and he noted just how dark the circles under her eyes were.
She looked exhausted, and her voice cracked like it was getting tired of functioning.
It reminded him of the deep voice a woman would get after a night of screaming and moaning.
Just as he was contemplating these thoughts, she dipped more bread into honey and nibbled on it, like she was mocking him and his hungry state as she stole from the very plate she’d apparently prepared for him.
She giggled at his dumbfounded expression, and he cleared his throat to regain his composure.
“Ah yes,” he projected purposefully. “I do believe I got a taste of what you can offer.”
“How impertinent. I may be seated atop your lap, but you are still treating me like a pitiful woman, rather than the person with the wit and skill to steal your ship. You lack the power here to continue your condescension. I have so much to offer.”
“Come,” he said with a chuckle. “Do let me hear your idiotic idea.”
“No.”
His jaw dropped a little at her defiance. She shoved the remainder of the piece of bread into his open mouth, and he chewed it with irritation.
She raised her hand behind her and Mr Smith placed the second chalice into her waiting palm. She tilted the rim of it to Alister’s lips and allowed him a sip of the grog water.
They added rum to their stale water in order to make it bearable; most sailors did.
“I realised yesterday you would reject it, and that if I removed your shackles to allow you to eat with your own hands, you would try to attack me.” She fed him a bite of meat with a dull expression, as if they were speaking of the weather. “Which is why we have to do it like this instead.”
“So yesterday–”
“Men are stupid when angry.” She threw him a smirk, one of cunning and pride. “They reveal things they shouldn’t in order to hurt, without realising they’ve revealed their intentions.”
His eyes widened. “You tricked me!” Again!
She tossed her head back and gave a horrid, bellowing laugh. This Rosetta didn’t have a feminine, sweet laugh; no, she had an annoyingly deep one.
She leaned to the side to face Pierre. “I told you it would work, didn’t I?”
“Marry me, please,” the blond-haired man replied with a laugh.
“Why should I? You wouldn’t give up your port girls to be faithful and would most likely give me a disease in the process.”
“That’s not fair.”
Alister could tell by his tone that Pierre was pouting. He couldn’t help thinking, once again: she’s right about that.
She turned back to Alister.
“So, if you had just shut up and behaved, I probably would have tried to speak with you over food, hoping to gain your trust so we could be of use to one other, and you would have tried to overpower me.”
She attempted to give him the last of the food, but he just stared at her, realising why she had tried to tease him the previous day.
Why she had purposely let Pierre and him speak.
It was so he could see the act right after it was played without realising why. She had tried to incite jealousy, anger, any ugly emotion that would make him react in truth, and she succeeded.
“You took away your chance to get at me by being witless.”
“You... You…”
He racked his brain for the worst insult he could come up with, but all he could think of was: you brilliant, annoying woman! She’d pulled the wool over his eyes, and that was rare for him.
She shoved the chalice against his lips and forced him to drink before shovelling more food into his mouth.
Then she stood, pointing to both him and Pierre, and demanded they be gagged for the remainder of their trip.
She disappeared into her chambers just as the sun finished bathing them in the last of its orange light.
The following day, he’d awoken with the sun in his eye and her already at the helm.
It wasn’t long after he’d stirred that he heard someone shout from the crow’s nest. “Land, ho!”
For the first time in months, he heard the squawking of sea birds that only ever flew near land. It indicated they’d arrived at Dunecaster Island.
Prisoners were ushered from below and told to climb down to board the rowboat prepared for them, guns and swords pointed at them as they did.
Rosetta wasn’t taking them to the port inside the inner crescent of this large island, but rather to one of the many sandy banks on the outer edges. He could see trees swaying in the distance, poking out from the hills and hiding the very few houses this far from port.
Mr Smith emerged from his chambers to take the wheel while Rosetta and Naeem called out commands to the crew.
Once everyone was in the boat except for Derek, Pierre, and himself, they were finally unstrapped from the mast and taken to the side deck railing. Swords were unsheathed as Derek was unshackled and told to climb down the side to the rowboat currently floating next to the ship.
“What about me leg? Ye think I can climb down the side of a hull with a wooden one? Are ye cruel?”
He eyed Alister as he spoke, who returned his look with a subtle nod of his head. He’s going to be a distraction.
There was no way Rosetta, a woman kind enough to let them live, would let a crippled man do something most would consider impossible. She will fall whim to his lie.
Alister had to stifle the urge to grin.
Derek had been a one-legged man for over ten years. He could climb, swim, run, jump, and do everything anyone else could. He knew how to use his body to his advantage, despite such a large part of him being missing.
It made him appear weaker to those who didn’t know him, since there was always a negative light cast upon a man without a leg.
People judged him immediately, despite not knowing he was stronger and faster than most. He often used his arms to assist him; it was one of the reasons he was so bulky and strong.
“I don’t care if you fall off my ship, just so long as you get off it.” Rosetta folded her arms and tilted her nose up at him in a haughty manner.
“What if it falls off while I’m climbin’ down? I’d lose me own leg to the sea!”
“Then give it here,” Naeem said, holding out his hand while stepping forward. “I’ll toss it down to you.”
Shit. They weren’t falling for his trick.
“Nay,” he grumbled, turning to the railing. “I don’t trust ye lot. I’ll just do me best.”
He started climbing over the edge, giving Alister a glare.
You tried, old salt.
He was still without a plan, and it was getting closer to him having to climb off his own ship. Pierre was next to be pushed forward, climbing over the railing without hesitation.
“I will miss you, my sweet, elegant rose,” he called to Rosetta from the other side, reaching his hand out to her as if he wanted her to take it. “I hope our paths meet so we may wallow in our passionate sorrows when you see my beautiful face again.”
She gave a laugh in return, and he began to climb down, shaking his head with humour at himself. Pierre often thought he was the funniest man on Old Gaia.
Then Alister was left standing alone.
More men surrounded him, as though they were aware that now would be his most opportune moment to fight back.
I’m alone. As much as it pained him to admit it, he knew there was nothing he could do. I’ve failed. He hadn’t come up with a single plan to escape.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t trust you enough to unshackle you,” Rosetta said as she loomed closer.
She emptied the coins from the bag around his waist into her palm to steal them before pushing the key for his bindings into it. He noticed, for the first time, the differences in their height. He hadn’t thought he was almost a foot taller than her.
How did such a small woman get the better of me?
She lowered his gag so he could speak.
“How the fuck am I supposed to climb down?”
The smile she gave him was haunting, and she came even closer, reaching up to hold both sides of his jaw.
Her lips found his, a hard, pressing kiss like before, demanding and rough.
He tried to retreat from her, his feet shuffling back.
Within moments, the backs of his legs found the railing and her hands slipped down to his chest. She shoved him over, and he went tumbling back.
His body flipped through the air before he crashed headfirst into the water.
Pierre was still climbing down and watched him fall. The man must have dived after him; after he hit the water and sank, uselessly kicking his legs since his arms were strapped behind his back, Pierre yanked him to the surface.
“Hoist the sails!” he heard her shout from above as he shook water from his head. “I want all hands on deck to get as far away from this wretched island as fast as the wind will take us!”
His prize warship was already on the move and Alister could do nothing. He knew she would maroon him on this island, but he still clenched his jaw in anger as he watched his own ship sail away.
I bloody failed!
“That was quite the farewell,” Pierre snarked as he dragged Alister towards the rowboat by the back of his jacket. He must have seen her kiss him.
“She stole my fucking ship!”
“I think she likes you.”
Alister turned his head so sharply and so swiftly, he felt his neck twinge painfully.
“I wish she would have kissed me farewell,” Pierre lamented.
He huffed menacing, quick breaths. “I’ll kill her for this!”
“Oh aye, I know you will, but first let’s get to shore.”
Alister started kicking his legs to help, snapping out of his dumbfounded state as determination filled him.
“Silly woman.” He laughed, almost throwing his head back as he was dragged through the water. “We’ll be back on that ship by the month’s end.”
Pierre grinned at him knowingly, while Derek grabbed him by the shoulder of his coat and unceremoniously hauled him into the rowboat.
On his knees in the small overcrowded boat with nineteen other men, he watched the stern of his ship, the Howling Death, catch the wind and fade away.
If they had been able to see the front, he would have taken a moment to appreciate the figurehead.
The forefinger bone of the cloaked grim reaper would be pointing the way, its arm outstretched while the other hand held a lantern.
With a howling, screaming face, its hollowed eyes would be watching the spray.
The sculpture at the front of his boat sent fear into all who saw it, and it had been a source of pride since the day he’d obtained it.
Alister knew, deep down in his bones, he would go after that woman. He would never forget her remarkably striking face, her blue eyes filled with cunning and annoying wit. The smell she gave off reminded him of his mother’s bedside table, and the way her mouth tasted...
He would also never forget what the bitch had done to him.
Once he had the handles of his wheel back in his large, calloused hands, he knew his outrage would fade.
He would make that woman pay for what she had done.
He gave a grin, surprising his crewmen staring at him – he was sure it was an expression that appeared pure evil.
I can make her pay in so many ways.