by Anne Gracie
“Ayisha, go and wait in the kitchen,” Mrs. Whittacker snapped. “You other children may adjourn to the dining room where the refreshments are being served.”
Distressed and bewildered Ayisha went to the kitchen, where Minna was waiting. The other servants stared at her. Nobody spoke to her.
Sometime later a servant came in and said to Minna, “Mistress says you’re to take that girl home, now.”
“I just need to fetch my music bag,” Ayisha said, battling tears, and ran back to the drawing room to fetch it.
There were several children in the hall, including the girl, Susan, who from the look of her eyes had been crying. Ayisha went up to her to comfort her—she, too, had been deprived of the moment of glory for which she’d practiced so hard.
“Oooh! Get away, you filthy thing!” Susan exclaimed. “Don’t you dare touch me.”
Ayisha recalled looking down at her dress, thinking she must have dirtied it unknowingly in the kitchen. But it was as crisp and pristine as when she’d put it on. She tried again.
“Go away!” Susan had shrilled. “We’re not allowed to talk to you. You’re not even supposed to be here!”
On the verge of tears, Ayisha pushed open the door of the drawing room and heard someone say, “Who did you say she was?”
And Mrs. Whittacker replied, “She’s Henry Cleeve’s bastard, his filthy little by-blow—and by a slave woman, no less. I was never so deceived in all my life.”
Ayisha didn’t even know what bastard and by-blow meant, but she knew from the way she spoke Mrs. Whittacker hated her. And so did everyone else.
Filthy little by-blow—it sounded like a blowfly, who laid eggs in rotting food and produced maggots.
Ayisha didn’t even remember how she’d got home. She supposed Minna had found her and taken her away.
Much later she’d learned what it all meant, that they all thought she was her half sister, Alicia, who had died. Papa had known it but had thought his presence would prevent it coming out.
It was a lesson she’d never forgotten: the music, the concert, the friendship—even the cakes had been intended for Alicia Cleeve, not Ayisha. Nothing was for Ayisha.
The offer of marriage from the man lying next to her on the bed was also for Alicia Cleeve, the daughter of a baronet and a lady.
Oh, he wanted Ayisha, she knew that, and he might even come to love her. Papa had loved Mama—she was his whole world.
But in Rafe’s world—the real world—the son of a gentleman would never marry the illegitimate daughter of a slave—not knowingly. Not unless she tricked him.
But if she stayed with him, if she gave in to him, he would make her his mistress—perhaps his beloved mistress. And her sons would be bastards.
But no child of hers was ever going to hear anyone say, “He’s Rafe Ramsey’s bastard, his filthy little by-blow . . .”
There was always the offer of the captain to marry them then and there. The Reverend Payne had also offered to marry them according to the rites of the Church of England.
But she would not trick him into marrying her. He would come to hate her for it, she was sure, and that would be unbearable. She would rather live without him than live with him, despised as a liar. Or as a millstone around his neck.
So she was going to have to tell him. And soon, or he’d be angry for having made a fool of himself over and over, offering to marry her, based on a false assumption.
She turned over in the bed and watched him sleeping, the broad chest rising and falling.
How was she going to share a bed with a man who knew she’d made a fool of him? What if he was furious? It was a very small cabin. She had no fear he’d hurt her physically, but it would be most uncomfortable to have to keep sharing a space so intimately with a man who despised you.
Or a man who was bent on making her his mistress.
She’d wait, she decided, until she was released from quarantine. Then she’d tell him the truth. And until then, she’d keep him at arm’s length. No more waltzing on the deck in the moonlight.
The following evening they were taking their customary evening stroll around the deck when a sailor shouted, “Sir, miss,” running toward them. “Capt’n’s orders, you’re to go to your quarters immediately and lock yourselves in.” Behind him the decks erupted with action, sailors racing everywhere, hoisting extra canvas—and rolling out the big guns.
“What’s going on?” Rafe asked.
The man jerked his head to the south. “Pirates, sir, coming up fast behind us. Now please, get below and lock yourselves in. It’s going to be nasty.”
Ayisha scooped up Cleo. Rafe took her arm and they hurried below.
While Ayisha put the kitten in her basket, he checked his pistols quickly. He turned to Ayisha. “Have you ever used a pistol?”
“No, but I can learn.” White-faced but outwardly calm, she held out her hand to take a pistol.
“Good. The pistols are loaded. You just cock the hammer—carefully—pull it all the way back—like this . . .” He demonstrated on one pistol and she imitated him on the other. “Yes, that’s it. And then you point it at a man’s chest and squeeze the trigger. And don’t hesitate to kill; a wounded man can still fight on. Right?”
She nodded. She looked scared to death, but her jaw was set. She was magnificent.
“Good.” He replaced his pistol in the case, threw open his trunk, and drew out the sword of Damascus steel. “Now, lock yourself in. I’m going up to fight pirates.”
She caught his arm. “But you’re too weak to fight with a sword—you’re barely over the fever. Take the pistols.”
“No, you keep them. I’ll be fine—I’m a soldier, remember?”
“Then wait, I’ll come, too!”
“No.” He wrapped an arm around her and gave her a hard, possessive kiss. “It’s too dangerous. Stay in the cabin.” He went, slamming the door shut behind him. “Bolt it,” he yelled and ran toward the companionway.
Sixteen
Ayisha stared at the closed door. Bolt the door? Hide in the cabin? Wait and see what happened?
She leaned out of the porthole. The big pirate vessel was bearing down on them fast. Pirates swarmed all over it, hanging from the riggings, lining the gunwales.
She shivered. But she couldn’t, she wouldn’t just wait. Not while Rafe was on deck fighting for his life—for both their lives—all their lives.
Once pirates took over the ship, she and everybody else on board were done for. Rape, slavery, or murder.
She hadn’t spent the last six years fighting for survival on the streets of Cairo only to wait tamely for pirates to come and get her.
She looked at the two pistols. Two shots. She didn’t know how many pirates there were, but two shots could surely make a difference.
Boom! An explosion reverberated through the ship. Boom! Boom! The captain was firing at the pirates. The ship shuddered and shook with each explosion.
The pirates came on, undaunted. Boom! They returned fire.
But in minutes they were too close for either ship to fire cannons. She heard shouts overhead. The pirates were boarding.
Terror momentarily froze her. She wanted to dive under the bed and hide from the danger, as she had when she was a child. But hiding was not an option.
She tied a shawl around her waist and jammed the two loaded pistols in the waistband. It would have been easier in her boy’s clothes, but she didn’t want to be mistaken for a pirate in them, so her dress had to stay. She fetched her knife from her luggage and jammed that in the shawl, too, then headed for the deck.
“Where are you going?” a voice shrilled. It was Mrs. Ferris, peering out of her door. “We’re supposed to stay in our cabins.”
“And wait until it’s too late to do anything?” Ayisha told her as she hurried past. “Not me. I’d rather go down fighting.”
Or would she? At the top of the steps the sight made her recoil in horror.
Pirates were swarming onto the ship, b
oiling onto the deck in a savage, screaming horde. The ship’s crew, Rafe, Higgins, and the soldiers were fighting desperately, with pistols, guns, swords, knives, belaying pins, and long hooks. The air was thick with smoke, gunpowder, shooting, yelling, and the clashing of swords.
She froze, too frightened to move, horrified by the sight before her but terrified to look away.
Rafe was fighting a big, black-whiskered brute, his elegant sword clashing fearsomely against the huge curved blade of the pirate. The pirate swore and snarled, both hands slashing at Rafe, sword in left hand, long-bladed knife in the other.
Rafe looked cool and strangely calm, his sword flashing, his blue eyes blazing. She’d seen that cold blue blaze demolish a gang of thugs, but armed pirates? She winced as the pirate’s knife slashed through Rafe’s shirt. Was he hurt? The pirate shouted and suddenly another villain came at Rafe from behind.
Without thought, Ayisha pulled out a pistol, cocked it, aimed, and fired. The pirate lurched, staggered a few steps, and collapsed on the deck. A pool of bright red blood spread from beneath him, but she had no time to dwell on it; a third pirate was hurtling toward Rafe. She fired, and that one was down, too.
Her pistols were empty. She looked around desperately for another weapon, feeling sick and helpless and terrified. Rafe was hard-pressed, fighting with savage efficiency, Higgins a couple of yards away. It was every man for himself—and still the pirates kept coming.
From the corner of an eye she saw a pair of grimy knuckles appear on the gunwale. A pirate climbing aboard? She darted forward and, holding the pistol barrels, she smashed the pistol butts down on the knuckles, as hard as she could. There was a yell and a splash.
Thank God. The pistols were still a useful weapon. She could do this. No one seemed to be taking notice of her. She darted back and forth along the side of the ship, smashing pistol butts down hard on knuckles, hands, and heads whenever they appeared over the side of the ship.
“Ayisha, duck!” She ducked automatically as—swish!—a blade missed her by inches. The owner of the blade snarled something at her, grinning through blackened teeth—then stiffened and arched. Blood gurgled out of his mouth.
It was Rafe, hauling his sword from the man’s side and shoving him away with his boot. “What the hell are you doing on deck?” he yelled at her. “Get back to the cabin!” He turned to parry another attack.
But there was another head rising over the gunwale, so she smashed down as hard as she could. The head dropped from sight. Judging from the yells that followed he’d landed on others.
“Get below, Ayisha, dammit!” Rafe shouted. “Go!”
“Behind you!” she shrieked, and he whirled as two pirates came at him in a rush. At the same time, a skinny bald man with a gold earring jumped on Rafe’s back, locking an arm around Rafe’s throat, choking him. The pirate’s other arm rose and Ayisha saw the silhouette of a slender, curved blade about to descend.
“No!” Yelling like a banshee, she leapt up and stabbed Gold Earring in the neck. He screamed and the curved blade clattered onto the deck. Blood gushed all over her hands and soaked Rafe’s shirt as she pulled the dying man off Rafe’s back.
Rafe, free of the man’s weight, slashed a cutting blow at one of his attackers and kicked the feet out from under the other. The man tried to rise groggily from the deck. Ayisha used her pistol’s butt and whacked him over the head.
“Good work!” Rafe told her, panting as he parried a thrust from the other. “Now, get the hell below.”
“When you do,” Ayisha yelled back and returned to bashing pirates. She whacked heads with eye patches, head scarfs, ringlets, and skull caps, hands with five fingers and fewer, knuckles with an assortment of tattoos and rings.
Rafe positioned himself behind her protectively, yelling at her whenever he had a moment, “Get below, you little fool!”
She took no notice; her tactics were working. With him keeping her from attack from behind, she was able to whack any pirate trying to climb aboard.
“Take that, you beast!” she heard a genteel voice on her left shriek.
Ayisha almost dropped her pistols when she saw Mrs. Ferris thump a pirate over the head with a large mallet. She’d positioned herself a short distance from Ayisha and was imitating her, repelling the boarders by bashing at hands and heads.
Ayisha had no time to call out encouragement—pirates were everywhere and she barely had time to breathe. She bashed and smashed at hands and knuckles, thumped heads, and occasionally slashed at the more persistent holders-on with her knife.
It seemed to go on forever. Ayisha could hardly hear Rafe’s voice, there was so much other yelling, screaming, gunfire, and clashing of swords all around her. But she could feel him there, and hear him fighting, and whenever she had a second, she turned to check he was still standing.
God knew what she would do if he fell. She would protect him somehow, she vowed. If only he weren’t still weak from the fever.
Soon she could hardly see, her eyes watered so much from the smoke, but she focused determinedly on the side of the ship, defending her six feet with every shred of energy at her disposal, knowing that Rafe was at her back, still standing, and—amazingly—Mrs. Ferris was by her side.
The number of heads and hands appearing slowed, and then suddenly there was the sound of a horn coming from the pirate ship. What did it mean? She looked around, reeling with exhaustion, to see what the next horror was to be.
But instead of the new tactics she feared, the pirates scrambled to leave the ship. They jumped, they dived into the water, they swung from ropes and dropped onto their own decks.
Ayisha watched them go with a dazed feeling of disbelief. Was this some new tactic, or were they truly leaving?
Where was Rafe? Ayisha turned to look. Sailors were tossing any remaining pirates overboard to be picked up by their comrades, or left to sink—and there was Rafe, filthy and blood-soaked, but standing tall and strong as he seized a dazed pirate and hurled him effortlessly overboard. He grabbed another and another and tossed them in the sea.
Thank God! Relief and joy filled her. Despite his bloody shirt he was all right. The way he was tossing pirates, he’d come through it unscathed. They’d both survived, thank God.
“We did it—we beat them!” Mrs. Ferris exclaimed beside her. Ayisha turned and stared. Mrs. Ferris was filthy and blood-spattered—and beaming from ear to ear. “We beat them off! I’ve never been so terrified in my life!” And the woman embraced her, laughing and crying at the same time.
At that moment a ragged cheer went up from the ship’s company. The pirate ship was sailing away. Sailors crowded along the gunwales, shouting and jeering, jubilant in victory. It was infectious; even Mrs. Ferris cheered, though in a genteel, hip-hip-hoorah manner.
Relief and exhilaration bubbled through Ayisha, and she joined in the chorus with that most eastern sound of female triumph and celebration: a high-pitched, trilling ululation.
“That’s enough!” Rafe cut off the sound abruptly by slinging her over his shoulder and marching toward the hatch that led to the companionway.
“What’s wrong? We beat them, we won!” She squirmed to get down. “We beat them off!” All along the gunwales people were hugging each other and shouting after the pirates. The noise was deafening.
“Did you see Mrs. Ferris? Isn’t it amazing that she came up on deck and fought? I wonder what came over her?”
Rafe made a sort of growling sound. Keeping her clamped over his shoulder, he shoved his way through the mass of people crowding to the rail to watch the pirates retreating.
And then she saw the carnage, the bloody decks, the wounded men being carried below, and the joy drained out of her. Bodies were being laid neatly in a quiet corner of the deck. She tried to count them, but they’d reached the hatch and he was climbing down the stairs and she couldn’t see anymore.
He opened the cabin door, which was unlocked, kicked it shut behind him, dumped her on her feet, slammed the bolt
shut, and turned on her. His blood-smeared, smoke-begrimed face was grim, his blue eyes burning with icy fire.
“I told you to stay in here!” His voice was low, but it throbbed.
“But we won!” She stared at him in surprise.
“I ordered you!” he grated. “And you disobeyed.”
She stared at him in disbelief. How could he carp about orders when they’d just survived a pirate attack? “I told you before, I don’t take orders from you. I’m not in your army—and neither are you, anym—”
He grabbed her shoulders and gripped hard. “You little fool, you could have been killed!”
She pushed him away, annoyed by his tone. “So could you. And you—” She poked him in the chest. “You’re barely off a sickbed and in no state to fight!”
“I did all right,” he growled.
“And so did I. We just beat off a horde of vicious pirates.” She couldn’t help but smile. She hadn’t stayed cowering in here—she’d been terrified, but she’d gone out there and fought. And she’d made a difference. And so had Mrs. Ferris.
His frown grew blacker. “Will you stop grinning!”
She considered it briefly. “I don’t think I can,” she told him. “I know people have been killed and I feel terrible about them, but when you think you’re going to die—and you don’t—doesn’t that make you want to smile?”
“No.” His fists clenched. “I’d rather spank you for disobeying instructions.”
“Pooh!” she said. “If you tried, I would whack you over the head with my trusty pistols.” She pulled them from her waistband and, holding them by the muzzles, held them up in a playfully threatening gesture.
He snatched them from her and flung them into the corner. “Don’t be so bloody flippant! You were supposed to use them to defend yourself!”
“I’m not being flippant and I did defend myself—and you.” She turned on him, suddenly blazingly angry. “It made no sense for me to stay down here, shaking in my shoes, a ready-made victim, waiting to see who came through that door next—you, or a bunch of pirates bent on rape and slavery, or murder!”