by T B Phillips
“No. This is like when you tried to kill Nevra. You need to calm down and use your brain not your heart, Alec!”
“She won’t be in danger.”
“It isn’t about the danger! Kids are like sponges. They see everything adults do, and it affects the development of their conscience. She’s watching and learning, Alec. She already saw you slit Captain Moran’s throat. Don’t make her a part of this, especially after what she witnessed in Atarax.”
Pogue looked thoughtful for a moment but shook his head. “We need her tonight. After this, I promise I’ll be more careful.”
An hour later the trio had scaled the wall around the manor and crouched behind a bush. Amash reiterated his concerns, “I don’t like this. We don’t know how many, if any, guards are inside. We also don’t know what rooms they’re in.”
“True, but we have Marita.” Alec pointed at two windows lit from within. “dearie, will you gently blow those tree branches against those windows? Don’t break them, just jostle them enough to get someone’s attention.”
“Are you daft?” Amash bristled. “The point is not to draw any attention at all!”
She nodded and did as she was told. The window furthest from the main hall showed movement, and a bare-chested teenager looked out into the courtyard. “Do it again, make it look like a storm is brewing.” The branch hit the window hard and the boy quickly threw it open to batten down the shutters. “It’s him. I’m sure.”
“Nice thinking.”
“I sometimes have good ideas, that’s how I became a captain, remember?” Still in a crouch he made his way to the window adjacent to their target’s. He pulled out a thin blade and tripped the lock. Once they were all inside, he whispered, “This is certainly the master suite, but Matthieu isn’t home.” They could tell that the room was used, but not currently occupied. “Amash, look around and see if you can find any ledgers or ship’s logs. If Esterling took his ship, then Dominique would have brought them here.”
The big man nodded and went to work. Alec smiled down at the grinning Marita and asked, “Are you ready?” She responded with another silly thumbs up. He eased open the door and peered out. “No guards. Give me a twenty second head start and follow me to the next room.” She nodded.
He slid into the hallway and tried the doorknob, turning it with satisfaction. As he pressed it open, he found three figures lying in the bed. Thankfully, the girls had fallen asleep intertwined with each other, so his target was alone on the near side. He crept quietly and drew a knife, placing it to the boy’s neck and placing a hand over his mouth. Adolphus awakened with a start, eyes shooting open and wide. As he did, Marita took over by gagging and binding him. His eyes betrayed panic.
In a whisper Alec ordered, “We’ll let your legs work so that you can get up and walk into the next room.” He nodded toward the girls in the bed. “Wake them and you all die. Nod if you understand.” The boy nodded vigorously. “Good, now go.”
Together they slipped into the room where Amash appeared defeated. “Nothing. It must be in an office.”
“I doubt it.” He pushed the boy into a chair. “Strap him in good and release his gag. Boy, if you scream it will be your last. We just want information.” The teen nodded his understanding.
“We’ll start with easy questions. Where are your father’s ledgers?”
Adolphus coughed as the gag released. “Back on the ship.”
“Bullshit.” Alec stepped forward with his knife, digging the tip into the boy’s tender thigh. Pogue ignored the trickle of blood and pressed. “They are in this room, tell me where.” The boy’s eyes shot to a painting on the wall. “Good boy.” To his friend he ordered, “Check it out.”
Amash moved the canvas to reveal a hiding spot. He held up three ledgers triumphantly. “Got it!”
Pogue removed the knife, leaning in and speaking deliberately, “And now for question number two. Where did you slave trading bastards take my wife and daughters?”
Eyes finally focusing on his captor, Adolphus smiled in recognition. “Oh, Captain Pogue. You should have asked for a smaller dowry and Daddy wouldn’t have taught you a lesson.”
Alec’s fist instinctively flew, connecting with the boy’s nose. Blood splattered the wall and gushed down his mouth before dripping onto his chest. “Where did you take them.”
“You broke my nose!”
“Yes, I did, and your cock is the next thing I injure.” He shoved the blade against the boy’s naked crotch. “Tell me now or those girls in the next room are the last you ever touch with this worm.”
Fear suddenly broke the boy. Tears ran down his cheeks and urine sprayed down his leg and onto the floor. “Southern continent.”
“I know that. Tell me where.”
The boy’s eyes pleaded for mercy as he answered, “We sold them to Charro Valencia.”
“Good, where’s his villa?”
“On the northern shore of Cargia.”
Alec pressed, “What else do you want to tell me?”
Tears continued to flow as the boy whimpered. “Nothing, Captain Pogue. There isn’t anything else. We delivered them to his villa and came to Eskera after we received Horn’s dispatch. You know the order to stay away from The Cove for a few weeks? By then Prince Robert had taken the city and seized Aggression. I swear to you that’s all!”
Alec pressed the tip into the tender parts of the boy and leaned in wickedly. “Did you enjoy using this on them, you little maggot?”
“Who?”
“My daughters and my wife, you little shit!”
Adolphus shook his head violently. “I didn’t! We didn’t! I swear we just sold them for coin and to teach you a lesson!”
Alec sheathed his blade and drew both cutlasses, crossing sharp edges against the boy’s neckline and holding them like a giant pair of glistening scissors. “Tell me the truth!”
“I swear, sir! That’s everything! I cared for Liza! I wouldn’t have defiled her like that!”
Amash called tenderly to his friend, “Alec.” He gently pulled back on his arms, taking the swords and placing them on the bed. With hands on Pogue’s shoulders, he turned him around to lock eyes. “Alec. That’s it. We know where they are and have the ledgers to confirm his story.”
“But I need him to admit that he raped them. I need a reason to kill him.”
“No, Brother, you don’t. If he’s a rapist, then we’ll get the girls’ testimonies and let the king or Braen deal with him.”
Pogue started to answer, but something in his friend’s face caught his attention.
Amash abruptly shouted, “Marita! No!”
Alec wheeled around and saw that the little girl had picked up his blades. She held them crossed along the boy’s neck, just as he had, before. She stood over the whimpering teen with her toothy smile glowing in the night. “Sorry, Mate,” she said through her smile, “we can’t afford to take prisoners after what you just saw.” With one fluid motion she drew the blades outward, slicing a red “x” where his throat had been. Blood spurt from both sides, spraying her grinning face as he died. Then, she turned slowly to the two men and gave a crimson covered thumbs up. Even her once white teeth were covered in blood.
Alec took the blades. “Marita, why did you do this?” But he knew the answer. She had spoken the same words he had said to Captain Moran.
The girl looked confused, inclining her head and dropping her smile. “Aren’t you proud of me, Captain Pogue?”
Alec did not know how to respond.
Chapter Nineteen
Mattie hurried across the courtyard to the manor house. The plantation was large, but thankfully the servants’ quarters were closer than those of the field hands. She preferred to call them servants and field hands over their proper title of slave. Since she and the girls arrived, Mrs. Pogue had learned to readjust to many differences on the s
outhern continent, including their abrupt change in status.
She had expected the worse when they departed The Cove, but Captain Dominique had ensured that they traveled fairly well. The journey was uneventful despite being locked in a stateroom for an entire week. At least he had provided protection and kept her and the girls free from his men’s pawing eyes and hands. She actually felt bad for his son, Adolphus. She could tell that the boy genuinely cared for Liza, and it pained him that he wasn’t allowed visits.
All in all, the trip went fairly quickly, and they weren’t sold at market. Rather, Matthieu had prearranged a private transaction on one of the larger plantations. They were loaded in a cart and driven directly to a manor perched on a coastal cliff. The view was spectacular and overlooked the ocean.
When they had first arrived, she stared across those blue green waters, praying that her beloved Alec would arrive with swift rescue. She had prayed that he would see through the letter her captors had forced her to pen. Surely, he would have assumed she was under duress and immediately search. But months had gone by without his arrival, and, until he did, Cargia made a beautiful prison cell.
But each day the passing months of captivity worked to convince her that he would never find them. Surely, he wouldn’t believe that I’d leave him, she often thought, he knows that I love him, doesn’t he? But then she would remember their last conversation. She regretted hounding him to leave The Cove for a life on a farm. Well, I got my farm, after all. Albeit as a slave to a sugar plantation.
The first time she had seen the property owner she had been worried about hers and the girl’s roles in the manor home. But he had proven to be a fair and gentle man, and, thankfully, one obviously disinterested in female company. Charro Valencia was flamboyant and dressed as colorfully as the parrots flying around his villa. His head was cleanly shaven and his dark skin without blemish. When he smiled, his brilliant white teeth unnerved the others in the room. The man was perfection and standing in his presence felt like you were standing the home of a god.
She hurried to the kitchen where the steward, Mrs. Pritchet, lorded over the other women of the house. “Where have you been, Mattie. Do you want the lash?”
Mattie didn’t think Valencia allowed her to whip slaves, but she shook her head and kept her eyes lowered when answering, “I hung the laundry as you instructed, Mum.”
The older woman’s eyes narrowed. “So, it’s my fault?”
“No, Mum, but my chores are finished, and I thought I’d clean and organize the kitchen before preparing the midday meal.”
“What’s wrong with the way my kitchen is now?”
Mattie could tell that she hit a nerve but pressed. “The storeroom is a mess and Nannette thought she saw a rodent yesterday. We can never find anything we need because there’s no method to the storage. And these cutting boards need to be sanded and refinished or the lord will get sick one day.” After a pause she added, “and it’ll be on you.”
Pritchet snarled, revealing several rotted and missing teeth. Instead of menacing it gave her a comical appearance that invoked more humor than fear. Mattie couldn’t help herself and chuckled. She quickly brought up her hand to cover a smile.
Pritchett raised a plump finger and waved it in Mattie’s face, “The lord will hear of this, for sure. Defiance from a slave is always punished.” She moved in closer, the java beans strong on her breath, and said, “I hope he lets me beat it out you personally.”
Mattie stood taller, looming over the disgusting woman by an entire head and added, “Oh, yes, and your floors are disgusting. I’ve seen kennels that I’d rather wade in when cooking.”
A loud crash interrupted their exchange, and both women looked to the servant stairs. A copper chamber pot tumbled down with a series of bangs, spilling its contents and spraying it on the walls and landing below. A few moments later a young teenage girl poked her head around with a look of horrified guilt. Her arms were full of pots and apparently one had slipped from her stack. “I’m sorry, Mum.”
Mattie’s heart sank for Alexa, but it was clearly an accident. Knowing her sweet daughter, she would clean it immediately. She started to speak encouraging words when the kitchen steward flew into a fury. Aghast, she watched Mrs. Pritchet grab a wooden spoon and run at her youngest daughter.
The horrible woman grabbed Alexa’s raven hair and swung her into the wall, rubbing her face in the feces. Then she threw the girl down on the ground, looming with the spoon raised high. She brought it down with force, striking the cowering child across her hands. Again and again the utensil pounded flesh until it broke with an audible snap. Finding herself without a weapon, the steward reached her fist into the air. Mattie caught it.
One advantage of being the wife of the Captain of the Cove’s City Guard is extensive training in self-defense. She reacted in an instant, twisting the woman’s hand into an awkward angle until the portly woman knelt before her on the ground. Mattie stood above Mrs. Pritchet with the offending hand securely locked into place. With a hiss she addressed the woman, “This is the first and last time that you or anybody else touches a member of my family. Slave or not, we’re not property that you can trash about.”
She wrenched the hand further, convincing the woman that her arm would dislocate. She added additional pressure on the thumb to emphasize her resolve and Pritchet whined mournfully, clutching her right shoulder with her left hand. “If anyone threatens or touches us other than the lord, I assure you that you’ll lose the rest of your teeth while you sleep. Is that understood?” The woman nodded furiously. “Good, now clean up this mess for Alexa while we clean out the chamber pots.”
Charro Valencia stared at the woman kneeling before him. He noticed, as he had on the day Dominique had delivered her and her daughters, that she was astonishingly beautiful. He also observed that she held herself with a bearing of a lord’s wife instead of a scullery slave. Although she humbly knelt before him, her eyes revealed her true feelings regarding her crime. They were cold and dark without remorse.
He sighed, “I know that you are new to my continent, but do you realize how many laws you broke this morning?”
“Not as many as if I had broken her thumb, My Lord.”
Despite himself, he laughed at her obstinance. “She says that you attacked her unprovoked, is that true.”
“No, My Lord. That woman is horrible. She beat a chambermaid over an accident, and I intervened before she did further harm.”
“A chambermaid who happens to be your own daughter, I believe. Is that true, as well.”
The woman stared directly into his eyes, not with anger, but with confidence and bearing. “Yes, My Lord, but I would have done the same regardless of the child’s origin. No one will harm a child in my presence.”
“Fair enough, but I cannot have slaves attacking my paid staff. By law I’ll have to pay for her injuries and suffering. I must give compensation for her sustaining them in a work environment.” He watched the woman closely and added, “You realize that those costs will be added to your indentureship?”
She nodded, eyes never leaving his. “Yes, My Lord.”
“That woman is vital to my household. She maintains order over my kitchen and staff and procures all food supplies and stores.” He returned to a chair behind his desk and added, “I need her. She keeps this manor house running.”
“That woman is robbing you blind, spending your money on inflated prices and splitting the profits with her cronies in town. The kitchen is unsanitary, and the pantry disorganized. You’d do better to hire a new kitchen steward.”
This one is so bold, he thought, I like her. Changing the subject, he asked, “What’s your name?”
“Mattie Pogue.”
“Why did you choose to come to the southern continent, Mattie? Did your husband die, and you hoped for opportunity for you and your daughters? Because you’re going about it the wrong way
if that was the reason.” He genuinely liked the woman. He had seen slave attacks before, but never one so calculated. She had used appropriate force, and the situation was one he would have probably interfered with himself.
“We were kidnapped from The Cove and brought here against our will by Captain Dominique.”
“I see. Well, that claim is made by many a slave, although it is usually a ploy to end their indentureship early.” He had heard enough. The woman was obviously intelligent and found a new way to play an old con. He started to rise, but her words stopped him.
“My husband is the Captain of the Guard for Artema Horn. He is Alec Pogue, proven by battles on the sea, and taker of many of Cargia’s vessels before he retired from a life at sea.”
Charro sat back into his chair, amused by her commitment to her lie. “And he serves him currently?”
“Yes. Up until the day we were stolen.”
“Can you prove this?”
Her eyes grew wide with hope and she reached shaking hands into a pocket sewn into her dress. “Yes, My Lord. I’ve carried this with me since the day of my capture. Artema Horn gave it to my husband just the night before, and I found it while ironing his uniform.” Tears filled her eyes and she trembled. “At the time I thought nothing of it.”
“And now?”
“It’s the only memento of him I possess.” She wiped away her tears and held it toward him. “Besides my girls, it’s all that I have in this world.”
Normally Valencia would not have allowed the conversation to go on this long, but the woman intrigued him. He read the words on the letter. He was surprised to see that the signature truly resembled that of Horn. They had exchanged many business transactions in the past, and the mark was easily recognizable. The letter was brief and merely thanked a Captain Pogue for his many years of service. “This looks in order, but I’m sorry. It proves nothing. You may’ve stolen it from another woman, or found it lying about.”
“It’s true, I swear on the gods.”
“Regardless, Artema Horn is no longer in charge of The Cove. There have been recent… How do you say? Developments.”