The Buccaneers' Code

by Caroline Carlson

  “Something dangerous,” the gargoyle said, hopping free of his cape.

  Hilary stood up, keeping her distance from the gravy boat. “The gargoyle’s right,” she said. “That magic piece is entirely unreliable—but if it’s all we’ve got, we’ll have to use it until we can find something better.” She squeezed Claire’s hand. “Please promise me you’ll be careful.”

  Claire laughed. “I’ll do nothing of the sort,” she said. “I am a pirate, after all.”

  Hilary wished there were time to search the Blunderbuss for more suitable magic pieces, but some of Blacktooth’s pirates were already climbing over the houseboat’s rails, and it would have been thoughtless to keep them waiting. She drew her cutlass and rushed over to join Charlie and Alice, who were already entangled in sword fights with two of the most fearsome pirates. “Thank you for entertaining our guests,” she called over her shoulder to them. “My mother would be proud of your hospitality.”

  The pirate she was dueling scowled at this. “Is your mother the woman with the lemonade?” he asked between parries. “She tossed a pitcher of the stuff at me a few moments ago, and now I’m chilled to the bone.”

  “Perhaps Captain Blacktooth will lend you a spare coat,” Hilary suggested, slicing a button from the pirate’s lemon-scented sleeve.

  “Ha!” The pirate clipped the top of Hilary’s hat feather. “The only thing Blacktooth ever willingly lends is his poor opinion.”

  Hilary dodged the pirate’s sword, hurried around behind him, poked him in the breeches, and watched with satisfaction as he jumped several feet into the air. When he crashed back down on the deck, she stood over him, holding her cutlass to his nose.

  “Well played, pirate,” he said in a quavering voice. “Are you going to send me off the plank?”

  Hilary glanced over at the Blunderbuss’s plank, which Cannonball Jack had transformed into an herb garden. Anyone who tried to walk it would have to step gingerly over the potted rosemary and mint. “I don’t think that would be wise,” she said.

  The pirate looked skeptical. “Captain Blacktooth would send me off the plank.”

  “I’m sure he would,” said Hilary, “but I’m not that sort of pirate. I’d rather lock you up inside the houseboat until the end of the battle.”

  “So you’ll take me prisoner?” The pirate nodded, being careful to avoid the cutlass. “That sounds suitable. Taking prisoners is enthusiastically endorsed by the League.”

  Hilary pulled the pirate up by his arms and dragged him into Cannonball Jack’s living quarters. “Don’t let this scallywag escape,” she told the greengrocer, who was carrying a sack of onions to throw at the Mutineers.

  “Aye, aye, Captain!” he boomed, waving an onion rather menacingly in the pirate’s direction.

  As the battle wore on, Cannonball Jack’s cabin took on more and more prisoners. Charlie defeated eight pirates in a row so convincingly that one of them asked him for swordplay lessons if they both survived the battle. Alice’s arm wasn’t entirely healed, but that didn’t prevent her from chasing several more pirates all around the Blunderbuss in a swirl of ruffles and lace. Most of the pirates Hilary faced were handy with a sword, so it was fortunate that the gargoyle had offered to bite their ankles whenever she found herself in a tight spot. By the time she’d fought off five or six pirates, she had nearly perfected the swordplay figure she’d used to slice up the drapes in Westfield House.

  One pirate had made the grave mistake of insulting Miss Greyson, who was now employing her crochet hook to dangle him upside down until he had learned his lesson. Fitzwilliam busied himself by pecking the enemy’s ears, Nicholas proved to be surprisingly handy with a borrowed sword, and Jasper ran through the crowd waving a net and shouting something about a parrot. Even Mr. Partridge and Miss Worthington were fighting admirably: Partridge confused two of the ship’s ropes and accidentally lowered the boom on top of half a dozen of Blacktooth’s men, and Worthington sent several others in confused circles by giving them poor directions. The crew of the Dancing Sheep was still locked in battle, and cannonballs from the Renegade were flying uncomfortably close to Hilary’s head, but she was beginning to wonder if it might be possible to beat the Mutineers after all.

  “Horsefeathers!” cried Claire.

  She stood behind the Blunderbuss’s long row of cannons—or, at least, what used to be cannons. “I should never have used that gravy boat,” said Claire miserably. “I wanted the enchantment to stick to the Renegade’s cannons, but it seems to have stuck to ours instead.”

  Hilary looked down at the things that had been cannons. They looked back up at her. Then they ruffled their wings. “I don’t mean to be insensitive,” she said to Claire, “but why did you ask the magic to turn them into chickens?”

  “I didn’t! All I wanted was to stop Blacktooth from firing on our mates, so I told the gravy boat to make sure the pirates’ cannons couldn’t be used.” Claire stared at the chickens. “I suppose I should have been more specific.”

  “What’s going on?” said the gargoyle, coming up behind them. “Why are all these feathery things here? I don’t like the look of them.”

  One of the chickens made a noise very much like a cannon being fired.

  “What do we do with them?” asked Claire. “We can’t launch them at the Renegade!”

  “Never mind the chickens,” said Hilary. At her feet, one of them had laid a small, perfectly round cast-iron egg. “Run as quickly as you can and ask the others if anyone has a magic piece you can borrow. And for heaven’s sake, toss that gravy boat into the sea!”

  Claire nodded and ran off, nearly crashing into Jasper, who was running in the opposite direction with a large red parrot tucked under his arm. “Eloise!” he shouted as he dashed past. “I need a pen and an inkpot!”

  The gargoyle shook his head. “This battle is entirely too full of birds.”

  Hilary brushed the chickens out of the way and hurried to the stern of the houseboat. “Mr. Twigget!” she called. “How are you faring?”

  “Not too well, Terror,” Twigget replied from his ship. “One of Blacktooth’s cannonballs grazed us, and I think we’re takin’ on water. What should we do?”

  Hilary rolled up the sleeves of her pirate coat, breaking six different rules in the League dress code in the process. “Keep your cannons firing as long as you can,” she said, “and then climb aboard the Dancing Sheep. They should have room for you there.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” said Twigget. “We’ll get Blacktooth yet. Just you wait and see.”

  The air at the far end of the harbor had become so thick with smoke that Hilary couldn’t make out the queen’s ship or the ships her mates had taken to offer their assistance. She had no idea how their battle was progressing, but then again, she could barely keep track of the pirates who were fighting all around her. Blacktooth’s men were still tossing ropes over to the Dancing Sheep, but the schoolgirls on board were cutting the ropes with sewing shears and waving politely as their attackers splashed into the sea. Several girls confronted the remaining pirates with cutlasses and crochet hooks, while others bandaged up scrapes, mended torn breeches, and shouted loudly enough to crumble the walls of any finishing school.

  Aboard the Renegade, Philomena had gathered an entire armful of magic coins, and now she was conjuring up more problems than Hilary could count. A tiny whirlwind spun across the deck of Mr. Twigget’s ship, a respectably sized crocodile floated in the middle of the harbor, and a flurry of regretfully declined party invitations fell on Mrs. Westfield and her High Society friends. But Claire had found a magic piece in Cannonball Jack’s storeroom, and she hastily unwhirled the whirlwind, sent the crocodile home to warmer waters, and changed all the declined invitations to joyful acceptances. Philomena created a thick gray storm cloud; Claire ordered it to rain rose petals. Claire made Blacktooth’s mates trip over their bootlaces; Philomena made Hilary’s crew lose their boots altogether.

  “Doesn’t she ever stop to breat
he?” Claire said as Philomena changed the Royal Augusta Water Ballet’s music to a furious tarantella. The performers, who had been mounting an attack on one of Blacktooth’s smaller ships, suddenly lost their rhythm and flailed helplessly in the waves. “I’m not sure I can keep thwarting her much longer.”

  “Don’t worry, my dear!” called Mrs. Westfield from the next ship over. “We’ve concocted a marvelous plan.” She turned to one of the other ladies, who stood at attention behind the antique cannon. “Fire away, Mrs. Cathcart!” she cried.

  With a triumphant bang, Mr. Flintlock exploded out of the cannon’s barrel and flew through the air, landing heavily on the deck of the Renegade. Before Philomena could step away, he had picked himself up and begun to pluck the magic coins out of her arms.

  “Don’t touch me, you horrid pirate!” Philomena shouted. “I am a High Society lady!”

  “And I,” said Flintlock, “am a human cannonball.”

  As Flintlock tossed handfuls of magic coins into the sea and Philomena conjured up a swarm of hornets to sting his ankles, Hilary turned her spyglass toward the far end of the harbor. The glass had cracked during the battle, and she felt as though she were squinting into a spider’s web. “I still can’t see much through all the smoke,” she said to Claire, “but . . .” She lowered the spyglass and blinked. “Look! Isn’t that the Benevolence?”

  Claire hurried to her side, and both of them looked out across the waves, where a badly battered ship was limping toward them. It sat perilously low in the water and looked as though it might fall to bits at any moment, but its singed flag bore the queen’s emblem. Behind it sailed two pirate ships captained by Mr. Stanley and Captain Wolfson. The smoke had begun to clear, but the false Pigeon was nowhere in sight.

  All of Hilary’s mates were staring in the same direction now. So were all the Mutineers. Even Mr. Flintlock, who had dived into the sea to avoid the hornets, kept his head above the water to watch. The crowd on the shore had begun to cheer, but most of the pirates grew silent. “What’s this?” shouted Mrs. Tilbury from the Renegade. “How has the queen survived? It’s impossible!”

  “Where’s that fool Sanderson?” Captain Blacktooth scanned the horizon.

  “He’s gone home,” said Jasper happily. His hands were splattered with ink, and bright red parrot feathers clung to his sleeves. “But you mustn’t blame him. He was only following your orders.”

  Blacktooth glared at Jasper. “I never gave any such orders.”

  “And I didn’t expect you to,” said Jasper. “That’s why I had to capture your parrot, forge a letter in your handwriting calling off the battle, and convince the parrot to deliver it to Mr. Sanderson. You should know that your Polly’s loyalties can be bought for only three pieces of shortbread.”

  As the Mutineers looked on in disbelief, Jasper took a bow. Miss Greyson appeared to be in danger of kissing him right then and there.

  “I don’t think the queen is likely to be pleased with you when she finds out what you’ve done,” Hilary called up to the Renegade. “What do you say now, Blacktooth? Will you turn yourself in?”

  Captain Blacktooth buried his head in his hands.

  “What are you doing, Rupert?” said Mrs. Tilbury. “Of course we won’t turn ourselves in! We deserve to rule the kingdom!” She turned to Philomena. “Your uncle may be useless, but perhaps you’re still good for something. Hurry up and sink the queen’s ship once and for all!”

  Philomena looked down at the coins she’d managed to keep from Mr. Flintlock. “But I don’t have enough magic—”

  “Never mind that,” Mrs. Tilbury snapped. “Use the cannons, then!”

  Hilary grabbed Claire’s shoulder. “Can you stop her?” she asked.

  Claire had turned pale. “I’m nearly out of strength.”

  “Magic . . . ,” said Philomena. Her voice trembled over the word, and she paused. “Magic, please . . .”

  “Wait a moment!” said Hilary. “You don’t have to sink the queen just because you’re told to!”

  Philomena hesitated. She looked from her mother to Captain Blacktooth and back again. Then she glared directly at Hilary. “There are plenty of things I can’t do,” she said, “but I can do this.” She straightened her spine, lifted her chin, and walked up to the Renegade’s long row of cannons. “Load these weapons,” she said to her magic coins, “and prepare to light the fuses when I give the word.”

  “Hurry!” Hilary shouted to her mates. “Sail in front of the queen’s ship! Block the Renegade’s line of fire!”

  Cannonball Jack nodded and began to steer the houseboat toward the Benevolence. “Won’t Philomena just sink us too?” Alice asked. “There’s got to be something else we can do!”

  The shouts from the crowd rang in Hilary’s ears, and the gargoyle was nudging her foot with his snout, but she didn’t have time to think about anything other than the queen and Philomena’s cannons. “If we scraped together a few magic pieces,” she said, “then maybe—oh, very well, gargoyle! What do you want?”

  “I can do it,” he said quietly. “I can save the queen.”

  Hilary wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly. “But you hate to protect people!”

  “I do,” the gargoyle agreed.

  “It hurts you!”

  The gargoyle nodded. “It’s certainly not pleasant.”

  “And I promised you I’d never let anyone use you.”

  “Much appreciated,” said the gargoyle, “but if someone doesn’t hurry up and do something heroic, we’ll all be belly-up in the harbor as soon as those cannons go off. It wouldn’t be a very nice fate for the kingdom’s most intrepid gargoyle.”

  Hilary had an uncomfortable feeling that he was right. “If you’re sure about this,” she said, “I’ll get Claire to do the wishing, or perhaps Miss Greyson, and—”

  But the gargoyle was shaking his head. “They’re both exhausted,” he said, “and anyway, I’d feel much safer if it were you. Please, Hilary, can’t you do it?”

  Hilary looked down at her toes in their wet socks; her boots still hadn’t reappeared after Philomena’s enchantment. “I’ll try,” she said at last. “What’s the worst that can happen?”

  “Well,” said the gargoyle thoughtfully, “we might both explode.”

  Hilary swallowed. “A good pirate doesn’t mind exploding,” she said. “Or at least she doesn’t complain about it afterward.”

  Charlie had been watching them from across the deck, and now he came over to join them. “What are you doing?”

  “Saving the kingdom,” said Hilary. She picked up the gargoyle. “You’ll probably want to stand back.”

  “Light the fuses, magic!” ordered Philomena. There wasn’t even a trace of hesitation in her voice any longer. A dozen flames sparked to life on the Renegade, and Hilary stared down the barrels of a dozen cannons. Somewhere in the distance, a chicken squawked.

  “Gargoyle,” she said, holding him so tightly that she thought he might crumble, “please protect Queen Adelaide from the Mutineers—and protect the rest of us, too. The pirates, I mean, and Admiral Curtis, and all the spectators on the shore.”

  The gargoyle’s eyes widened. “Hold on!” he said. “You want to protect everyone? Not even the Enchantress is strong enough to do that!”

  But the magic was already pulling Hilary’s breath away and knocking her backward against the houseboat’s rails. It crashed through her arms and rolled out of her fingers; she nearly dropped the gargoyle.

  “It’s not working!” he cried. “We’re doomed!”

  Hilary tried very hard not to think of cannon fire, or sinking ships, or the Pestilent Home for Foul-Tempered Pirates. She tried not to imagine the queen’s flag washing ashore, or how pleased Captain Blacktooth would look when he plucked the gargoyle from the wreck of the Blunderbuss. “We’ll just have to find a way to be stronger, then,” she said. “We’re pirates, aren’t we?”

  “Of course we are,” said Charlie.

  Before Hil
ary knew what was happening, he’d placed the palm of his hand on the gargoyle’s back. Then he sucked in his breath as though he’d run straight into somebody’s cutlass. “Pirate Dove,” Hilary said, “whatever are you doing?”

  “Helping you save the kingdom.” Charlie’s teeth were gritted, but he smiled at her. “It’s my duty as the Scourge of the Northlands.” He took another long breath and raised his voice. “Claire!” he called. “Miss Greyson! Jasper! Come here and help the Terror!”

  Claire and Miss Greyson gathered up their skirts, and Jasper skidded across the deck in his stocking feet. “Hold on to the gargoyle,” Charlie ordered them, “and think protective thoughts.”

  Hilary thought she could feel the magic beginning to pull at the others as they placed their hands on the gargoyle, but it kept on tugging at her, too. “Do you really think this is going to work?” she said in between breaths.

  “Honestly?” said Charlie. “I’ve got no idea.”

  “Are you crazy?” the gargoyle cried. “This is no time for experiments! We’re about to be turned into gunpowder soup!”

  Then the cannons went off.

  A DOZEN CANNONBALLS soared through the air. They passed over High Society ladies drinking lemonade, water-ballet performers with their arms extended upward, pirates lifting their eye patches to get a better view, and Miss Pimm’s girls with their hands clasped to their chests. Then they curved toward the sea, toward a houseboat with cheerful checked curtains and a royal ship with tattered sails.

  In Hilary’s arms, the gargoyle blinked.

  “Well,” he said, “what do you know?”

  As the pirates onboard the houseboat watched, the air above their heads began to shimmer. A noise like a thunderclap echoed over the harbor as the cannonballs collided with the shimmering stretch of air. For a moment, they seemed to stop entirely. Then, as gracefully as waltzing schoolgirls, the cannonballs reversed their course and curved back toward the Renegade, picking up speed as they flew.