“Yet ye’d let—”
“We don’t have time for ye two to squabble!” Locks said.
Ebba swallowed before announcing, “I want to go, Peg-leg.”
He stared at her before giving a tight nod. “All right then. We’ll be seein’ ye at the ship then. More than half a day and we’ll come lookin’ for ye.”
Without another word, he hobbled away. Grubby hugged Ebba before turning to follow.
She inhaled a shaky breath, watching their backs. She hated when their crew split in two, and now they were split in three. At least Barrels waited safely on the ship and Peg-leg and Grubby would be back with him soon. But anything could happen to two pirates in the rainforest between here and the ship.
Unease spreading through her chest, Ebba wrenched her gaze away from their retreating forms.
With the others, she jogged back to the river and turned right toward the ocean instead of left to the mountain. They stayed as quiet as they could, silent but for their jagged breath, an occasional scrape of a boot on stone, or splash in a pool of water. Fear gave her new energy. She kept her eyes trained on the shadowy rocks under her feet. The moonlight made the river surface gleam—and their route a little easier to see—but an eerie sensation filled the black silence of the rainforest, and in her mind every tree hid a tribal warrior who sought to ambush their group should she lose focus for a single second.
Eventually, the rocks turned to sand under her feet. Ebba raised her head at the quiet roar of the crashing waves over the other side of the sand dune.
Locks rested his hands on his knees, panting hard. “This be the eastern beach.”
Stubby sniffed the air. “Get a load o’ that, lads.”
Ebba did the same. “Smells like gun pow—”
An explosion rocketed through the air. She threw herself to the ground behind the dune, covering her head.
Lying beside her, Locks shouted over the din, “What is it?”
She shook her head, trying to rid herself of the ringing in her ears.
Plank crawled to the top of the dune and pointed out to sea. “Sumpin’ to do with that, methinks.”
Ebba pushed at the sand, scrambling up beside him to peer over the top. Her jaw dropped.
A ship, a hundred yards from shore, was on fire. Flames licked its sails, curling the material into embers that flew high into the air. The screams of the crew were easy to hear over the churning rumble of the ocean.
“What ship is it?” Her voice trembled. She knew pirates did this, of course. But she’d never witnessed the sight firsthand.
“A navy ship,” Locks said grimly.
What was a navy ship doing all the way out here? They always stuck to the routes closest to the mainland. For one to be south of Maltu was unprecedented.
“Look.” She pointed.
Locks, Stubby, and Plank followed the direction of her finger. The flaming ship illuminated the beach, and with the help of the moonlight, it was easy to see the sandy shore for several hundred yards.
There, waving a burning torch in the air, was Jagger.
“Bastard!” Stubby shouted, ripping a pistol from his sash.
Plank pulled him down by the belt as he made to give chase. “I wouldn’t be doin’ that, matey.” He jerked his head. “Who d’ye think set the navy ship ablaze?”
Ebba hadn’t seen it before, hidden as the ship was by the fiery beacon of the navy wreckage.
Malice sat anchored in the sea not far behind the flaming ruin.
“Look smartly, they be sendin’ a boat for him.” Locks dashed a hand through the sand in front of him.
Sure enough, Ebba spotted the torch of a rowboat as it made its way to shore. “Could we still snatch him?” she wondered aloud.
Stubby shook his head. “Nay, lass, they be too close now. They’d see us.”
The rowboat bobbed just beyond the breaking waves.
“They’ll know it was us if they get Jagger, too. What’s there to lose?” she demanded. At least then they wouldn’t know the location of the treasure.
Her three fathers slid back down the dune the way they’d come. “There be our lives to lose, little nymph,” said Plank. “We’re not knowin’ how many pirates be in that rowboat. We don’t know what weapons they carry. We show ourselves and Malice’s crew will hunt us across the island—with their younger and fresher legs.”
“With Jagger, who knows Neos like the back o’ his hand,” Locks added.
“Jagger, who knows where the plunder be,” she said through gritted teeth. They were the ones who’d defeated Ladon to get the fruit. And now Pockmark would get the answer after they’d done the hard work? Instead of revenge, they’d ended up helping him. Still, she couldn’t focus on that. Her fathers were right, they couldn’t outrun the Malice pirates if it came to a race.
“All we can do now is return to Felicity and make for safety.” Stubby’s next words were low. “And figure out what the hell we’re goin’ to do with this mess we be in.”
Eleven
Ebba dragged herself up the ladder, arms shaking with fatigue. It seemed like days since she’d last stood on Felicity, yet they’d only left for Neos Mountain sometime in the early hours of the previous morning.
Barrels squeezed her shoulder and leaned over the side to help Stubby over.
She stepped out of the way and immediately sank down against the bulwark. They were screwed.
“. . . They escaped the navy boat together. But the prince caught a bullet,” Barrels murmured.
Ebba yawned, her jaw cracking. A nice, cozy hammock summoned her from below deck. If only she could get to it without using her legs. Maybe if she fell asleep here, someone would carry her. That sounded like a plan.
The murmur continued. “He died a few hours ago.”
She frowned, her foggy mind perplexed at some small detail. She rolled her head to check on her fathers. All six were there, alive and well. She let out a sigh; their crew was together again and they would find a way out of this trouble. Everything would be okay.
There was a hammock at her fathers’ feet, she realized. Ebba studied the hammock through bleary eyes. It looked like it had something inside.
Curiosity overcoming her sleepiness and sore muscles, she clambered to her feet and shuffled toward the parcel. “What is it?” she mumbled.
Her fathers fell silent, but her mind wasn’t working quickly enough to perceive what that meant.
She stilled. The outline of a human body was clear within the hammock with the rope tied around the person’s ankles, hips, and shoulders. Ebba’s moss-green eyes were drawn against her will to the blood staining the hemp fibers of the rope around the shoulders.
“Come away, lass.” Peg-leg wrapped an arm around her.
The others fell into a frantic whispered debate. “What about the other one?”
Ebba shrugged off Peg-leg’s arm, now fully awake. “What other one?”
Grubby pointed to the mast.
Ebba pushed through her fathers to where the moonlight shone on a slumped form. The man lifted his head and amber eyes glistened through the dark.
“Cosmo!” she exclaimed, staring at the servant she’d left on Maltu and never expected to see again.
The young man jerked upright. “. . . Mistress Fairisles. Is that you?”
How did he know her name? Ebba had a moment of confusion before recalling he’d overheard Maybell saying it.
Her fathers crowded around the mast, their eyes darting between her and the servant.
“You recognize this young man, Ebba-Viva?” Barrels asked.
Ebba nodded slowly. “Aye, he’s the prince’s servant. The one who saved ye from the prison.” Her eyes fell on the body again. If Cosmo was here. . . .
Locks erupted, throwing his hands in the air. “We need to get rid o’ the prince’s body afore Montcroix comes lookin’.”
Barrels dipped his head. “Yes, but what to do with his servant? Leaving him here seemed like the best option befor
e. . . .”
Before Ebba recognized him?
“But. . .” Barrels straightened his cravat. “If we do leave him, it’s certain he will be taken, either by the crew of Malice or tribespeople. It was due to his kindness that we escaped the Maltu gaol. . . .”
“Aye,” Plank muttered. “We can’t be ignorin’ that.”
“Well, that’s sorted.” Stubby leaned down and untied Cosmo, who sat in silence, though his amber eyes were wide and blood-streaked.
Ebba spoke. “What be sorted?”
Plank clapped Cosmo on the back. “He’ll come with us. Probably to certain death.”
The remaining color faded from the servant’s face.
“Peg-leg,” Plank called. “Get the poor lad some food. He be lookin’ a tad peaky.”
Peg-leg grabbed Cosmo by the scruff of the neck and Ebba noted the dried blood staining the servant’s shirt. Cosmo’s eyes fell on Peg-leg’s wooden leg, and he shot Ebba a panicked look. She attempted a reassuring nod which didn’t help any, judging by his white face as he disappeared into the bilge.
Her fathers hunkered down.
Ebba sank to her haunches with them. She didn’t know what kind of internal grog was helping her to stay awake—maybe seeing a dead body did that to a person. Or maybe she’d gone through the tiredness and come out the other side.
“From what I understand,” started Barrels, “we are now in a position where Mercer Pockmark is aware of our involvement in pursuing his treasure.” He waited for a few grunts of affirmation before continuing. “Then we have but two options I can think of.”
“Yer fancy words will make my head explode one day,” Locks said grouchily.
Barrels smiled. “I apologize, dear fellow. The captain and crew of Malice rule the Free Seas, in absence of the navy’s presence south of Kentro and Maltu, so we are certainly in a pickle. Continuing our regular trade without harassment from Malice is unlikely, considering he’s searched for this treasure for four years.”
They constantly traded. Malice would put out the order for their heads. There was no way they’d be able to trade as they had.
“Aye, but we can just go to Zol for a while,” said Grubby, twisting his cap.
Barrels shook his head. “We could go there for a time, yes. Our retirement plan still requires five more years of trade until it is financially viable long-term. Simply put: we don’t have the material to survive there for long. After several months of hiding, we’d be required to emerge and return to trade.”
Peg-leg folded his arms. “Which takes us back to square one.”
“Indeed,” he answered. “I see but one option.”
“Aye?” she asked, leaning forward.
Barrels opened his mouth, but Stubby interjected with a heavy sigh. “We go after the treasure.”
“Be that wise when Malice will be doin’ the same?” Ebba asked. Sure, after hearing the treasure’s location, not pursuing the plunder would be a bitter tonic to swallow. Very bitter. But she’d rather her first quest be cut off short than for her fathers to go up against Pockmark’s cannons.
“From what Ebba overheard, the treasure is worth enough to finance our retirement plan, and much more,” Barrels said. “Instead of years of trading with the threat of Malice overhead, we would take this plunder and trade for everything we’ll need in one burst to survive in Zol.”
Ebba withheld her sigh. Her fathers were fixed on this retirement plan, all of them ready to part ways with the sea as soon as could be. She wanted them safe but didn’t want to achieve that by spending the rest of her life on Zol. Weren’t there other adventures to be had? Places to see? She was seventeen. Retirement plans were for people over thirty.
Plank added, “We saw magic up on that mountain. If somethin’ is changin’ in this realm, we need to get to the bottom o’ it.”
Stubby exclaimed, “Bah, matey. Not our problem. If magic the likes of Ladon be returnin’, the sooner we plunder the treasure and get back to Zol, the better. Let the king’s territory fall apart. It ain’t our mess to fix.”
“Will it be our mess when it comes to Zol?” Plank challenged.
Their crew fell silent. They were rarely at true odds with each other, and the tension didn’t sit right with Ebba. Or poor Grubs.
Barrels pressed back a strand of his peppered hair into the leather tie. “I propose this: Our ship is both faster and smaller than Malice.” He turned to Stubby, Locks, and Plank. “Is it possible we’ll be able to navigate the cliff passage south of Kentro and get to the treasure before Malice?”
The three looked at each other, grunting and pulling faces without actually speaking a word.
“There are those who’ve made it through the Syraness,” said Plank finally. Dubiously.
Stubby nodded. “Aye, it’s been done. Not my path o’ choice, as ye know.”
Barrels smiled. “This is good news. Malice—a larger ship than ours—will be forced to follow the coastline of Kentro, to enter Selkie’s Cove from top. The whirlpool and Syraness form a wall that prevents them entering anywhere else. Is this correct?”
“Aye,” Locks answered after a pause.
“How long would following the Kentro coastline take?”
“Thirteen or fourteen days,” Locks replied, looking to Stubby and Plank for confirmation. They nodded.
“And how long would it take us to navigate the Syraness to exit far closer to Portum?” Barrels asked.
“Nine or ten days, thereabout.”
Barrels stared around their circle. “Accounting for a day restocking the ship at Zol, we can reach Portum at least three days before Malice. We can retrieve the treasure, return through Syraness, trade as much of the treasure as we can, and successfully retire in Zol,” he said, adding, “Malice will be unaware we’ve beaten them there until they enter the cave and discover the treasure gone. By the time they get back to these waters, we’ll be hidden away.”
Ebba’s mouth dried. They were really continuing the quest. That a magical fruit existed had been a huge if. Then the apple was real but too dangerous to pursue. Yet Barrels’ plan made sense. In fact, despite the slight twinge in her gut, his plan seemed like the only safe path forward. Most of her other fathers were nodding with him, too. Could they race Malice there and snatch the riches from under Pockmark’s very nose? If they didn’t, they’d be stuck trading under constant danger for the rest of their, most likely, short lives. Ebba thought of the dagger Pockmark had dug into her cheek, and her fists curled. Nothing would give her more pleasure than thwarting him.
“I dunno,” Grubby hedged. He twisted his Monmouth cap in both hands. “I’m thinkin’ we should just go hide.”
“We’d have to come out sometime, Grubs,” Locks reminded him.
Stubby gripped Grubby’s shoulder. “I understand yer misgivings. I do. But we be involved in this. The only way out o’ the mess is to head deeper in.”
Plank scratched at his stubble. He dropped his hand. “Ye know I think we should be goin’ anyway. Not just to secure the plunder, to figure out why a creature like Ladon be back in the realm. I say aye.”
“Aye,” added Locks.
Ebba forced back her eagerness with difficulty. “Aye,” she said casually.
Barrels cast her a wry look. “At least someone is looking forward to this.”
She battled a grin. And lost.
Stubby looked east. “Unless Pockmark be stupid, he’ll have left already and will be makin’ for Portum like Davy Jones himself is whippin’ his back.”
“And if he ain’t, we’d best be far from here,” added Locks.
Plank stood, making for the sheets to ready the sails. “If Pockmark be that stupid, Jagger is certa’nly not. They’ll be makin’ for Portum already, no doubt about it.”
Locks groaned, and Ebba hurried to help him up.
“Who be on first shift?” he asked.
Ebba glanced toward the bilge door and slid one foot in the direction of their sleeping quarters. A whole day’
s caulk in her hammock cuddling Pillage sounded about perfect.
Barrels raised a brow at her and she froze. “I think it’s only fair for Peg-leg, myself, and Grubby to give the rest of you a few hours of rest,” he said.
Ebba smiled, shoulders sagging.
He continued. “. . . Except for Ebba here, who is probably too excited by our venture to sleep right now. To the helm, my dear. There are those with older bones needing their rest.”
The others cackled. Evil buggers.
Muttering under her breath, she changed her trajectory mid-stride and placed her foot in the direction of the stern instead of the bilge.
Once there, Ebba gripped the spoked wheel tight.
“Weigh anchor,” she called across the night to her crew of fathers. Grubby and Barrels circled in the heavy anchor, and soon the mainsail was inching up the mast, directed by Peg-leg.
Ebba looked over her shoulder at Neos, unable to see the mountain peak in the night, but in the shadows and the dark, recalling the terror when she first saw Ladon was all too easy.
The choppy waves slapped at the sides of Felicity as the ship shifted. Feeling the tug as the mainsail filled, Ebba directed the ship to face south, releasing an uneven breath—the more space between her crew and Ladon, the better.
Despite her misgivings about retirement, there was nowhere safer in all the seas than Zol.
Twelve
Ebba stood beside Cosmo as, lacking a cannon ball, two sandbags were tied to Prince Caspian’s feet. Locks gave him a pirate’s farewell, sewing the hammock ends together with four looping rope stitches, one stitch each for north, south, east, and west. That way, his soul wouldn’t be torn into pieces as he journeyed to the oblivion to face judgment. At Cosmo’s insistence, Locks didn’t make the final stitch through the prince’s chin to make sure he was dead.
“Aye, well if he still be alive, that’d wake him up smartly,” Locks grumbled at Cosmo. “Always good to check these things.”
Ebba-Viva Fairisles: Immortal Plunder (Pirates of Felicity Book 1) Page 12