Blending in might not be such a bad idea. . . .
In fact, blending in might be the most practical thing to have come out of Maybell’s mouth.
Ebba tried to memorize the wide branching halls as she trailed down a set of marble steps after the governor’s wife. She clenched the fabric of her borrowed deep purple dress, certain she’d trip on the blasted thing and crack her skull open on the white stone.
When they reached the bottom of the stairs safely, she dropped the dress and reached up a hand to pull at her hair; the twisted updo was threatening to tear her scalp off. But at least she wasn’t wearing rouge. Nothing, not even her plan to escape the mansion using this disguise, had been enough to allow Maybell to apply rouge to her cheeks.
After two hours in Maybell’s room, there now didn’t seem to be enough time to do what needed doing tonight. The temptation to bop the lady over the noggin had been hard to resist; however, busting her fathers out would be hard enough without a horde of navy men breathing down her neck. Her fathers were depending on her for the first time. Ebba couldn’t let them down.
“Just through here, my exotic flower,” Maybell tittered, making a flowing gesture toward ceiling-high double doors.
Ebba rolled her eyes and approached, glancing at the livery-clad servants holding the doors open. That was the problem with rich landlubbers, perhaps. They didn’t open doors for themselves any longer.
Soft music floated through the doors, and as Ebba traipsed through them, she darted her eyes to the sole harp player to her left. She inhaled and nearly choked on the cloud of floral perfume polluting the rectangular room. Finely dressed gentry and their ladies circulated around the outside of a large table that appeared to have been made to fit the room. Crystal goblets, cutlery, and silver plates glittered from where they’d been meticulously placed atop the table.
“La, now here he is. My husband, the governor.” The lady drew herself tall and waited until Ebba let out a half-hearted sound of amazement.
Ebba lifted her gaze and found that when Maybell said he was ‘here,’ she meant directly in front of them.
Governor Da Ville.
Ebba wrinkled her nose at the yellow and vomit patterned padded doublet he wore. Looked like fish guts to her. Ruffles exploded out of his doublet’s orifices, and a cravat erupted from the bottom of his chin like a pufferfish squeezed through a tight space. His breeches ballooned from his hips before tucking into the shiniest pair of boots she’d ever seen. Da Ville had occupied the position of governor on Maltu Island for years. Or, more accurately, the pirates had allowed him to keep his position. Somehow, he’d survived thus far and Ebba guessed it wasn’t due to a startling intellect.
“Barnabus, my love. I have brought a guest with me tonight,” Maybell announced.
Ebba stilled as the governor turned his shrewd eyes upon her. His wig was the largest she’d ever seen. The thing could probably swallow him whole at any moment, and maybe her, too. And was that a tiny crescent moon made of black fabric stuck beside the outer corner of his eye?
Blimey.
She met Da Ville’s pale eyes, wondering if he was taking in her beaded dreadlocks and golden hoop earring, all of which she’d flatly refused to take off. Despite the purple dress and hairdo, surely with one look he’d know she was a pirate through and through.
He spoke as if Ebba wasn’t there. “Are you sure she’s quite the kind of person we want on display tonight, Maybell?” He stressed the word ‘tonight.’
The sound of a dying horse came to mind when he spoke.
Lady Maybell pouted dramatically. Ebba eyed her. If that’s what Ebba looked like when she pouted, she was going to stop. Immediately.
The governor sighed, shaking back his ruffles. He held himself as though the entire realm watched him, gesturing with graceful, flowing movements, which, Ebba noted as he continued his sighs and waving, never failed to display the signet ring on the forefinger of his right hand.
“Oh, very well,” the governor snapped irritably. “She is to be put at the back with the prince’s servants.”
Lady Maybell spun twice. “You are so good to me, my love. I shall get you a rare treasure when I next go shopping.”
Governor Da Ville’s irritation disappeared with the magical words, and just like that, the mystery of his long reign as governor on Maltu was solved. The man enjoyed nice things, and no doubt had received a great deal of bribes from pirates over the years.
Ebba brightened. She could bribe him to free her fathers. Her skull turned directly to Pockmark’s plunder. That wasn’t an actual treasure she had access to, yet, but if she gave Da Ville the details to find it, he may consider her proposal.
“Are ye into nice things then?” she asked him.
He jolted, as though his body was involuntarily revolted by her voice.
“I be knowin’ where some nice things are, if ye be inclined-like to do me a favor in return.” Ebba wasn’t entirely certain how the bribing process went.
Governor Da Ville glared at her, glancing furtively at the surrounding guests before taking two overly dramatic steps away. Maybell blanched, and grabbed Ebba’s arm, dragging her with surprising strength to one of the doormen.
She towed Ebba past more than a hundred settings. Polished silverware graced the main table, and the light from hundreds of candles bounced between that and the uniformly placed crystal goblets. Such wealth boggled Ebba’s mind. Money and heritage ruled Exosia and the Caspian Seas and, apparently, possessing a brain was not a prerequisite. Ebba shook her head, wondering what kind of backward world she’d fallen into.
“You nearly got yourself kicked out and embarrassed me,” Maybell hissed in her ear, gesturing to an empty seat right at the back of the room.
The woman stomped off, and Ebba watched her go, not particularly mournful that their friendship was over.
Apparently, Ebba shouldn’t make bribes in front of other people that maybe included the prince of the Exosian Realm. No problem. Ebba knew that now. For next time.
If she got a next time.
It had to be at least ten in the evening, maybe later. Da Ville hadn’t left his seat at the fancy table once. At this point, Ebba was beginning to think she wouldn’t get another chance to bribe him.
Where she sat with the servants, the plates were brass—as were the goblets and the pronged devices Ebba knew to be for eating.
Using the cutlery proved another matter, and after two attempts she’d given up and now ate with her fingers.
Realizing she was trapped for the time being with absolutely no plan, Ebba had decided to look and eat her fill. She’d save her strength and the advantage of surprise for when it was needed.
Except these people didn’t just eat one plateful. She’d lost count of how many dishes had appeared in front of her and been whisked away by servants once she’d finished. The sheer fact that they had servants to serve their servants was absurd.
“Fiutch!” exclaimed the governor. He talked so loudly, and everyone else sat in such a simpering silence that not listening to his every word was impossible.
“How I love fiutch,” he said. “‘Tis the rarest delicacy, Prince Caspian. I do think you’ll rather like it.” He winked at the prince, not quite managing to separate the movement of one eye from the other, though he did manage to flash his signet ring again.
Her eyes sought the young man seated to the governor’s right, who had arrived in the room without fanfare. The prince was as unimpressive as Peg-leg’s fish stew. That is to say, very unimpressive. Talk about disappointing. He’d sat red-faced so far, mumbling every so often in response to the governor’s butt-kissery. That was King Montcroix’s son, offspring of the man who had crushed the toughest of pirates to win the Battle for the Seas? One look at Caspian’s face was enough to decide that the mainland didn’t stand a chance once the current king was dead; the gaping codfish next to the governor would be overrun by pirates before he could stutter a single word.
Ebba watched
as the governor put a huge dollop of the black fiutch on a cracker and placed the whole thing in his gob.
He chewed once.
Twice.
Three times, before his face paled considerably and then turned green.
For all his exclamations about the delicacy, Da Ville didn’t seem to care for it. Had he even tried it before? Ebba snorted under her breath, slapping a hand on the table. “Sink me, what a friggin’ eejit.”
The rest of the table occupants stared at her in shock. Ebba ignored them, chuckling heartily as the governor, tears streaming down his face, swallowed the black mess, gagging twice. Funniest damn thing to happen all day.
“I take it you don’t like Governor Da Ville,” a quiet voice asked from her right.
She raised a brow as she took in the tall, russet-haired man beside her—probably a few years older than herself. Ebba had noticed him when she sat down, but he hadn’t spoken until now. “Never met him afore in my life.”
“And, pray tell, what are your first thoughts?”
Ebba fought back a smile and lost. “I be thinkin’ he wears that shrewdness on his face to cover the fact he’s only got half a barrel o’ rum sloshin’ in his skull.”
The young man, someone’s servant she assumed, fixed his amber eyes on her. Ebba blinked at the intensity in their depths.
“You speak . . . differently,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve ever come across your accent before.”
With the way he spoke, similar to Barrels, Ebba would guess he probably hadn’t. “Ye wouldn’t have had much reason to speak to a pirate, I gather.”
Several of the chairs surrounding the table where she sat scraped back. She relished the horrified gasps that accompanied it, safe in the knowledge that it didn’t matter one jot what this table thought of her since Maybell and the governor were so completely dense. Honestly, it was nice to actually be treated like a pirate for once.
The man’s amber eyes didn’t shift, though Ebba perceived from their widening that he was taken aback.
“A pirate,” he said in disbelief. “Really? In the governor’s home?”
Ebba picked at her teeth with the pronged tool. Not as good as a dagger. Too blunt. “Aye.”
Apparently, that was all the man had to say. She turned back to continue watching the governor make an utter moron of himself, snorting at intervals. If it wasn’t him, it was Maybell. Their behavior was entirely missed by the fawning people surrounding them. But the governor was the top dog on Maltu—in the absence of royalty—so it made sense people would flatter him to get as much as they could.
Ebba’s smile faded from her lips and fear curled under the tight corset of her over-the-top ensemble. Here she was, sitting in a dining room laughing while her fathers were rotting in the stinking prison cell. A shot of despair ran thick through her heart and real dread pricked the corners of her eyes. If her fathers were taken, Ebba would be entirely alone. She’d been alone once and sworn it would never happen again. That her fathers could be gone from the realm if she failed to save them inspired only cold horror. She blinked, discovering Sherry might have been right after all. In this moment, Ebba felt like a child who needed her fathers to show her the way. She did feel crippled.
“Why are you sad?” the russet-haired man asked.
Ebba lifted a shoulder, clearing her throat of the rising lump. She glanced at the man. “My fathers are locked in the gaol. Tomorrow they’ll be shipped to Exosia and put on trial to be executed.”
The man’s amber eyes brightened and Ebba shifted her gaze. The intensity in his look unsettled her greatly.
“They are all pirates?”
She nodded and observed the rest of the table. Her plate was scraped clear of food, but many of the plates around the table still had half left. “Ain’t any of ye hungry?”
No one answered. Their fear didn’t bring her the same joy as before.
The same man replied, “They are saving themselves for the next three courses.”
“There’s more?” She’d eaten so much her gut was starting to take up the space where her breathers usually were.
“Much more, I’m afraid.”
The surrounding plates held enough scraps to feed another five people. “And what will be happenin’ to the scraps?”
“For the animals, I gather.”
Ebba shook her head. “They chuck away food, but keep all the shiny, gilded rubbish here? There ain’t enough sense at that table to rub together.”
She glanced away again. Did the man never blink? Heat rose to her cheeks at his prolonged stare.
“You are a pirate. Forgive me, but don’t you seek shiny rubbish for a living?” he asked.
Her fathers never did anything interesting like pillage rich abodes for jewels. Ebba straightened to try to draw in a full breath without her chest spilling out the damn corset. “Nay, amber-eyes. Not me and my fathers. We mainly deal in fresh produce, which we trade for materials, tools, medicine, and food.” She left out the part where they only paid for half of it and stole the rest.
“Cosmo,” the man supplied, lifting his gaze to her face.
“Cosmo, what?”
“That’s my name.”
Huh. Ebba liked the sound of it. Cosmo could almost be a pirate name.
“How many fathers do you have?” the man pressed.
“Six. What’s it to ye?” His questions got her back up in a way Maybell’s hadn’t. She perceived a great deal of book smarts in this man, and she knew from Barrels that quality shouldn’t be underestimated, even if book smarts couldn’t sail a ship.
Cosmo pursed his lips. “Don’t you find it ironic you judge the governor for throwing away food when you steal and kill for a living?”
He was accusing her of being all talk? Did she need to remove her hoop earring? “My crew don’t kill,” she withered. “Aye, we evade the king’s tax—who doesn’t—but we stick to the old pirate ways. We have mercy and honor. Unlike these young pirates. . . .” She trailed off, realizing she was quoting Stubby word-for-word.
A small smile graced Cosmo’s mouth. “How old are you?”
He sure sat upright for a servant. The man had a bearing she couldn’t fail to notice. Nor could she fail to notice the rest of the table listened to his every word though he made no move to include them in the talk.
“Whose servant are ye?” Ebba demanded, ignoring his question.
Cosmo’s eyes widened. “I’m the prince’s servant.”
Ebba stared at him. Drat, if she’d known that beforehand she would’ve given him the stink-eye and the silence of her back. It seemed hard to do, now they’d spoken a little. She made a non-committal sound.
Three more courses. . . She had to get out of here. Who knew how long it would take to finish eating, and then she’d be in Maybell’s clutches again.
The waiting servants streamed in and out of the doors in a constant line. Maybe she could slip through that way. Her gaze fell to her lap, resting on her gaudy purple dress.
. . . Or not.
Ebba pursed her lips. “What’re the odds of me slippin’ away through that door unnoticed?” she asked Cosmo.
The servant followed the tilt of her head and his eyes fell on her dress. “Next to none in what you’re wearing.”
“That’s what I be thinkin’.”
“You will try to save your fathers then?” His deep voice was wondering.
Ebba scolded, “’Course I will. I ain’t standin’ by dressed in a mountain of fabric and eatin’ black gunk while they’re gutted or put in those cages for birds to peck their bones.”
The man winced and put down his pronged eating instrument. He stared at his brass plate, which still held a large portion of the goopy fiutch. He stared for a long time with those intense eyes of his. She was surprised the plate didn’t melt.
He looked up at Ebba and leaned in close. The fresh mint of his breath reached her, making her skin erupt in bumps. Blimey, Grubby could use some of that for his breath. And she c
ouldn’t help noticing how smooth and unblemished Cosmo’s skin was. Probably never spent a whole day outside in his life, and yet he didn’t appear weak—for a landlubber.
“I can. . . .” Cosmo frowned and cleared his throat. “I can help to free your fathers.”
Ebba was struck dumb. They blinked at each other, Cosmo seemed almost as surprised by his offer as she.
“I can help to free your fathers,” he repeated in a stronger voice.
She scrunched her face. “Aye, and how’re ye going to do that, servant boy?”
“Prince’s servant,” he corrected.
Ebba made a derisive sound. “That red-faced prince is just goin’ to go along with it? I don’t reckon so.”
“He will,” Cosmo argued. “We’ve been friends since we were young. He has unwavering faith in me. I . . . saved his life once. Trust me. He’ll do it.”
There was that odd demanding tone again. It added a quality to his voice that Ebba nearly did trust. What had he done to show her that he wouldn’t screw up and foil her only chance to escape? Nothing. And what had she done to convince him, a prince’s servant, to help a crew of pirates?
People didn’t do stuff for free—that, she did trust.
Ebba darted her eyes around the marble room full of people. How much time had passed? How long would this damn thing go for? She bit her lip, indecision warring within her.
“Why?” she blurted at last.
Cosmo looked at her.
“Why do ye want to help them?” she clarified.
She held her breath as he ran his amber eyes over her hair and hoop earring, lingering on her puffy nose. His expression was riddled with curiosity, yet he didn’t ask about any of the things he clearly found so interesting.
“Because your crew only takes from the land,” he said.
The answer didn’t make sense to her head, but it made an odd kind of sense to her heart, and Plank always said she should be trusting that.
Ebba clasped Cosmo by the hand and gave it a firm shake. “Then aye, prince slave, I’ll accept yer offer.”
Ebba-Viva Fairisles: Immortal Plunder (Pirates of Felicity Book 1) Page 5