Chapter 9 Rats and Rogues #2
Releasing his hold on her, Caleb pulled the Ring from his jerkin pocket and slipped it on his finger. His breath came hard and fast. His eyes briefly met hers, frustration, fear, and angst raging with them.
After a moment’s hesitation he said, “Be gone, vile vermin.”
It was not a shout. More of a whisper, really, but one that held the authority of a judge.
The rats halted, frozen in place around them. Then one by one they disappeared in a puff of black smoke.
Just like that.
Desi’s heart refused to stop thrashing. What just happened? She looked at Caleb. At first bewilderment traveled over his face—the same bewilderment she felt inside—but then a smile curved one side of his lips and a gleam of confidence returned to his eyes.
Shouts of both surprise and glee rang over the deck before one sailor yelled, “Hole in the hull!”
Leaping to his feet, Caleb extended his hand and pulled her up beside him. Then releasing her, he marched across the deck, barking a string of commands.
So shocked, she couldn’t breathe, Desi retreated to the railing, wondering what planet she’d been transported to. A planet with magical Rings and ferocious rats that disappeared like a mist upon the sea. No way this was Earth. No way.
?
“Damage report!” Caleb shouted, raising the scope to his eye and scanning the black seas for their phantom enemy, but she’d retreated into the darkness again.
“Larboard bulwark smashed, foresail torn,” Liam shouted. “And a hole large enough for a dolphin to swim through below the waterline on our starboard side.”
Curses fired from those of his crew who weren’t still staring in shock at the places where rats had disappeared.
“Rot and Ruin!” Caleb added his own curse, anger stiffening his jaw. “Back to work, men! Get below and shove sailcloth into the hole! And Shorty, two points to larboard,” he ordered the helmsman. “Alden, prepare to tack aweather!”
Flying down the quarterdeck ladder, Caleb leaned over the railing. The scent of gunpowder and charred wood flooded him. He couldn’t see the rent in the hull, but he could hear the sea sloshing into the hold with every dip of the ship.
His crew finally snapped out of their daze and pounded across the deck, topmen racing up the ratlines to adjust sail that remained intact.
In this condition, they’d be unable to fight should the ghost ship reappear.
A burst of light snapped his gaze off the starboard quarter.
Ah, there she was. And in that brief glimmer, he saw that her main gaff dangled loose from the peak halyards, and her broad sail crumpled.
The vision lasted a mere second, but it proved that Caleb’s broadside had done enough damage to keep them from pursuing the Sentinel.
He could also determine from the angle of the flare that their shot would miss its mark.
And so it did, splashing impotently off their starboard beam, more a parting gesture of enmity than anything.
Breathing a sigh of relief, he gripped the railing as the Sentinel luffed alee then came even on her keel to initiate the tack. Sails flapped above as a blast of night air, filled with hope and promise, swirled about him while the silken rustle of the sea against the hull brought a soothing relief.
He fingered the Ring. It did have power, just like the stories his sister and Blake had told him. Not purely evil as his father had warned, but good too. Besides, it felt right on his finger, a perfect fit. Like it was meant to be.
The Sentinel continued its tack, tilting to larboard, sheets snapping as they luffed and then filled with wind. Caleb should go below and check on that hole.
Liam marched toward him, his green eyes firing as he gripped the stone around his neck. “By the saints, Cap’n, what just happened?”
Alden joined them as several of Caleb’s crew crowded around, their shocked expressions twisting maniacally in the moonlight, their wary glances scanning the deck where the rats had been only moments before. The stench of the beasts lingered, however, an omen of a future Caleb dared not imagine.
“Where did the rats go?”
“They was ’ere one minute, gone the next!”
“Vanished into smoke! I saw it wit’ me own eyes.”
“Ne’er saw the likes o’ it.”
“Sweet Mary, mother o’ God, this ship be cursed!”
“Ayes” along with grunts rumbled over the men.
Alden raised his hands. “There’s no curse here. Not anymore. God protected us.” He gave an approving nod to Caleb. One he didn’t deserve.
Ayida stepped from the companionway, her gaze sweeping the men like a tide creeping in.
“There’ll be no talk of curses,” Caleb said in his most authoritative voice. “Whatever those creatures were, they’re gone now. And, despite them, we won our battle. Good work, men!”
Three of his crew popped on deck from below. “Hole’s plugged as best we can, Cap’n,” Blair said.
“Won’t last long,” Craden added, “Water’s still seeping in.”
As Caleb expected. He rubbed the back of his neck, noting blood splotches spread across the deck.
Were there injuries? Not from cannon shot.
But from the rats. Particularly on those men who wore no shoes.
Yet now as he looked closer, bloody cuts sliced across bare arms and chests.
Cursed specters or not, their bites were real.
He snapped his gaze to the quarterdeck where he’d left Miss Starr.
She remained leaning against the larboard railing, staring at the sea as if she longed to return from whence she had come.
He should go to her. Ensure she was unharmed, but Brandt shoved through the crowd.
“Make way, lads. Make way. I see I’ve got my work cut out for me.
” He gestured to their bloody feet. “Come down to my cabin, and I’ll dress your wounds there. ”
Ayida stood amidships, arms crossed over her waist. “When vermin vanish in smoke, it be no work of mortal hand. The sea’s marked dis ship… and all who sail her.”
Shorty frowned. “Marked for what, woman?”
“For what’s owed,” she purred. “The deep always takes its due. First de plague, den de vanishin’, den”—she snapped her fingers—“de black water calls ye under.”
Alden stepped forward. “You speak poison, Ayida. The ship’s no more cursed than you or I. The rats are gone, and we’ll be rid of the rent in our hull soon enough. Superstition won’t mend a sail nor keep a man afloat.”
Ayida’s eyes glinted as a slow smile raised her lips. “Aye… gone, like dey was commanded. But a command that don’t come from steel nor shot… only from somethin’ older. Somethin’ dat answers to de one who holds it.” Her gaze flicked toward Caleb before she turned away.
Caleb stared after the woman. She’d never spoken in such riddles before.
Did she know about the Ring? Regardless, a metallic taste filled his mouth.
“There’s no curse here. Only a ship in need of repair and a crew with work to do.
Fear’s the only sickness I’ll have aboard.
Now, one by one, go see the doc. The rest, to your stations! ”
He charged toward Ayida, intent on ordering her below. That’s when he saw no bites, no cuts, no blood marred her bare arms or her shoeless feet.