“Blast it to Davy Jones’,” Stubby shouted, pulling hard on the wheel.
Ebba moved to help her three fathers, but Plank stopped her with a hand on the shoulder. She looked at him in question.
“Too late, little nymph” he called. “We missed our moment to get out. We risk goin’ into the cliffs if we exit now. We’re movin’ too fast.”
“We have to go around again,” Peg-leg yelled.
“Nay,” Stubby answered. “It be too strong. We have to get out after the cliffs. If we enter the second ring o’ the whirlpool, we won’t be able to get out.”
But if they completed a full circle and exited after the cliffs, they’d end up back in Selkie’s Cove where Malice would still be anchored and waiting. . . .
“Malice be there,” she reminded them, eyes wide.
Locks bellowed over the wind, “How much speed do ye think Charbydis has given us?”
Her six fathers stared at each other as she glanced between them in confusion. What did Locks mean?
“Let’s do it,” Peg-leg shouted.
Do what?
Plank turned to her, wind whipping at his raven curls. “We be movin’ on to plan B. Be ready to lower the sail with me as soon as the others get the ship facing outward. We’ll be blitzin’ past Malice with the extra speed.”
Blitzing past Malice? Her heartbeat thundered in her ears. “I don’t understand.”
“Imagine a rock in a stockin’ that you whip in circles over yer head and let go,” Plank said urgently.
That was plan B? Would that even work?
Scrambling for purchase, Ebba returned her attention to the rope in her hands.
A searing tingling sensation pulsed in her stomach and Ebba pulled experimentally, surprised when the sail above tightened almost effortlessly.
Plank reached her to lend his help, but only had time to glance at her curiously before Felicity surged again without warning.
Ebba cried out with the others, holding on for dear life as the ship threatened to overturn. It couldn’t be possible for Felicity to move faster, but somehow it was happening. The mast strained above, warning her too much more would see it split. The wind pushed at her cheeks and she knew without a hair of doubt that if she lost her footing—if any of them lost their footing—they were goners.
Nothing could have prepared her for the raw power of Charybdis; the terror as the sea and sky blurred before her eyes.
Her stomach lurched as they swept around, and she had no idea how her fathers at the wheel would be able to tell when the time was right.
“We can’t miss again,” Plank roared over the chaos. “The sheets won’t take it against the current and wind.”
“Neither will the winches!” Stubby bellowed back.
To get out, they needed to use the wind against the current. If they couldn’t point Felicity in the right direction, the wind and current would keep working together to push their ship into the center.
Ebba glanced over and saw Peg-leg and Locks had joined the other three pirates at the wheel.
“The cliffs are coming up,” Barrels yelled.
Plank panted. “Get ready. We lower the sail after they angle the ship outward.”
She nodded. Ebba trusted her fathers. She just had to focus on the task they’d given her.
“Aye,” she replied, clenching her teeth. Her knuckles were white as she gripped the rope, ready to lower the sails faster than she’d ever done in her life.
“Nearly there,” called Stubby.
“Here we go, lads,” Locks yelled.
“Lee-o,” Peg-leg boomed in a deep voice.
Felicity took a breath and began to tilt outward from the circling rings of the whirlpool.
Ebba released the sheet so quickly her hands blurred. She felt the shift in the ship as Felicity struggled to get her bow across the wind. But she knew immediately the change wasn’t going to be enough.
She had to do something!
She half slid, half threw herself into the helm, and wrapped her hands around the only free spoke on the wheel.
A searing tingling flared at her stomach as she pulled. As with hoisting the sail, the wheel spun toward her seemingly without effort. It upset the footing of the five of her fathers holding on, and they tumbled to the ground, latching on to what they could and leaving Ebba to single-handedly point the bow in the right direction.
Peg-leg called from the mast, “That’s it, lads!”
“Latch on, mateys. She’s heelin’ over,” Plank shouted.
Ebba screamed at Cosmo, “Get ready to run to the other side.”
A surging gale hit them without warning, pitching the ship from starboard to port side, and her feet left the deck. Ebba clung to the wheel with all her might, dangling from the helm as Felicity groaned and rolled.
“—Help the boom across—”
Shouting erupted from her fathers and Ebba clung to the wheel, desperate to keep the ship pointed away from the eye.
“—Check the sheets—”
Her knees hit the deck as the ship settled into the port tilt and stopped tossing forward and back. Ebba pulled herself up against the wheel, planting her feet, and dared to take a breath.
Glancing at her fathers, she found them staring at her.
“How did you do that?” Stubby asked. His gaze dropped to the wheel, then back to her. “Ye pointed the ship outward by yerself.”
Ebba stared at her hand on the helm. The searing tingle was still present in her stomach. “I don’t rightly know,” she said in awe.
Plank was eyeing their projected course with a critical eye. “Nicely done.”
Felicity was all but flying back out through the current. None of them spoke, waiting to see if they’d escape the whirlpool’s clutches and, if they did, whether they’d have enough speed left over to soar past Malice as initially planned.
Stubby inched to the side to study the waters, but it wasn’t long before they felt the change underneath the ship, the freedom in Felicity’s movement as she began to all but fly through the water.
“Five starboard!” Locks said.
She obeyed, pointing the bow toward Malice.
Felicity skimmed like a stone on a lake toward the narrow spot where the other ship lurked. Even more so when Plank and Grubby raised the topsail. Felicity brushed aside the waves as though they were pesky mosquitos.
“How quick are we goin’?” Peg-leg shouted over the tumult.
Plank’s expression was nonplussed. “Faster than I’ve ever gone. Seventeen knots at least, I’d say.”
Ebba looked between them, speechless. Seventeen knots. The very fastest Felicity usually went was twelve. Malice would take forever to accelerate to even half of their current speed.
Cosmo leaned into her ear. “How fast is seventeen knots?”
Ebba muttered under her breath, scrunching her face up. She had to times it by . . . she couldn’t remember how much.
“We’ll cross nineteen miles in an hour at that speed,” Barrels supplied, taking Grubby’s weapons and clothing as the pirate undressed. “It’ll have us soaring past them and out of Selkie’s Cove within fifteen minutes.”
Ebba frowned as Grubby began to undress. “Grubs, what’re ye doin’?”
Cosmo stared at Malice, which they were rapidly approaching. “That’s fast.”
Grubby now stood naked on the deck, except for his slops.
“What’s goin’ on?” she asked, eyes darting between her fathers.
Peg-leg clapped Grubby on the shoulder. “Ye best be off quick-like.”
Grubby’s face settled into determination. Without another word, he dove headfirst over the side of the ship.
Ebba rushed to the side. “Where’s he goin’?”
Plank called from the mast, “Off ahead o’ us to tamper with Malice.”
Tamper, how? “What—?”
Locks came up beside her, his green eye blazing. “Were ye always that strong, like with the wheel?” he asked. “Seem
s a bit out o’ the blue. Not that I’m complainin’.”
Ebba lifted a hand to shield her eyes and look ahead at Malice. “Don’t think so,” she said. The strange searing tingle pre-empted it both times, however. With raising the sail and turning the wheel. Ebba had a strong suspicion the dynami was behind her new strength, but she wanted to test it again before sharing the theory with her fathers.
He looked at her, perplexed.
“Malice ahoy,” Stubby called.
Their speed began to drop.
Holding on to the side, Ebba craned to squint ahead.
Felicity was close enough that Malice’s crew were visible. So was the word ‘Malice’ painted on the side, in the same crimson color as the sails—at least, she assumed the word said Malice. It could say morons for all she knew. Those of the enemy crew not on the cannons stood ready at the top guns in their black uniforms with the red sash.
They watched Felicity’s skimming approach, awaiting their captain’s command to fire.
“What do we do?” Ebba shouted to Peg-leg at the mast.
He gave a woeful tilt of his head. “We’ve done everythin’ we can, lass. The rest is up to Grubby.”
“Where is he?” she asked. She hated the thought of him getting hurt. It made her insides twist to the point of pain.
Something exploded from the sea at the lowest side of the ship. Water burst everywhere. And from the depths shot Grubby.
She sighed in relief.
He lay on the deck for several moments before pushing wearily to his feet. He crawled to the mast and rested against it, eyes shut.
“Ebba,” Cosmo called, inching his way to her across the bulwark.
She eyed him. “Ye made it.”
The servant looked exhausted.
“Just,” he said shortly. “And perhaps not for much longer. . . .” He trailed off as their bow drew alongside Malice’s black stern.
Though Felicity moved faster than ever, each yard turned into five and each second to ten, and the size of Malice became suddenly and painfully clear. The dark ship dwarfed them by four times.
She swallowed. They were alongside the middle of the Malice ship. The deep-crimson sails of the vessel blocked most of the light, casting them all in shadow. Soon the cannons would fire, straight into the hull of Felicity, tilted as she was.
“Any words o’ wisdom?” Cosmo whispered in a shaking voice. He definitely spoke pirate when he was scared.
She cleared her throat. “Odds are ye won’t be hit by a cannonball. Peg-leg told me once that ye’re more likely to get hit by the splinters from the gun and cannon fire. So avoid those.” She tilted her head. “And the bullets.”
Ebba wasn’t sure if Cosmo answered because at that exact moment Pockmark came into view above them. The captain wore his gold-embroidered tricorn hat and his eyes were murderous.
Riot and Swindles stood to one side of him, and. . . .
“Jagger,” she hissed under her breath. “That filthy, malaria-ridden swine!”
If he hadn’t legged it back to Malice after guiding them to Neos Mountain, none of this would’ve happened.
“Ebba,” said Cosmo, slowly. “What are you doing?”
Ebba cocked her pistol and aimed it at Jagger, but he wasn’t even looking at her. The guide stared at Cosmo beside her, and she watched as the shock on his face hardened until hatred etched every facet and line.
She fired her pistol at him, grinning when all four of the spineless rodents up there hit the deck.
“Ebba-Viva!”
She straightened at Stubby’s reprimand.
Plank was looking past her. “Hit the deck,” he bellowed.
Flattening herself, Ebba dragged Cosmo down with her as the crew above them shot at Felicity from the deck. The tearing pace made their ship a harder target. But with at least seventy men shooting at them from above, many of the bullets hit their ship, whining as they whizzed overhead. They tore chunks out of the mast and bilge and the cedarwood splintered, exposing a lighter color underneath.
Ebba covered her ears, eyes scrunched as she tried to orient herself through the booming sounds around her. Her fathers shot back at Malice, standing and ducking down again. They had only two pistols each, with one shot per pistol. Their gunfire was nothing against the crew of Malice’s.
“Cannons ready,” she heard Pockmark shriek.
She and Cosmo stared at each other in terror at the call from the other ship. She grabbed for his hand, clutching tight.
“Fire,” Pockmark screamed from the other ship.
Ebba squeezed her eyes, waiting for the inevitable explosion of fifteen cannonballs. They’d only have once to fire. After that, Felicity would be gone.
How much damage could fifteen cannonballs do. . . ?
“Ebba,” Cosmo said insistently, telling her it wasn’t the first time he’d said her name.
She cracked open an eye.
“Let that be a lesson to ye, ye scurvy scupper rats,” Peg-leg shouted through cupped hands. He clutched his belly, snorting with laughter.
She dropped Cosmo’s hand, noting the nail marks on his palm.
“What happened?” she demanded. She peeked over the bulwark. They were past the black-and-crimson Malice, though a few of the crew still shot at them. “What happened?” she asked again.
“Grubby wet their gunpowder.” Plank beamed, clapping Grubby on the back.
Ebba’s face fell. That was what Grubby left to do?
She stomped her foot. “Ye didn’t think to tell me? Ye soddin’ curs. Me and Cosmo were half dead with fright.”
“Ye watch yer language, Ebba-Viva Fairisles,” Stubby scolded. But his grin echoed the expressions of her five other fathers. “There was hardly time to tell ye on the way.”
Ebba scowled. “I be rememberin’ a time or three,” she said.
Plank slung an arm around her. “We’re beggin’ yer pardon, little nymph. Sorry to have frightened ye.”
She cocked a hip out. “I’d be inclined to forget the whole thing if ye get me another bead.”
He kissed her temple. “Aye, that can be arranged.”
She should have asked for three.
“We made it,” Peg-leg roared.
The crew of Felicity cheered.
Her guilt over causing mostly all of the trouble aside, she could still celebrate a triumph. Ebba cupped her hands together and shouted as loud as she could in the direction of Malice, “Screw ye, Pockmark. Ye butt-faced, toothless whore o’ a drunk fisherman’s rottin’ grandfather!”
Perhaps, despite the bleak odds at many points throughout, the quest would work out okay. They had the plunder after all, not Pockmark. Whether he’d been hurt as much as she and her crew were while searching for the dynami wasn’t certain, however. The dark ship was tacking to give chase, but a small smile played on her lips. There was no way Malice could catch up to them from a standstill. Even with the damage Felicity had suffered.
“Ebba,” came a weak voice.
Smile still on her lips, she turned to Cosmo and her grinning celebrations screeched to an abrupt halt. Ebba stared at the blood oozing from his chest, cold horror freezing her to the spot.
Twenty-Two
“Locks, help,” she cried, falling to her knees beside Cosmo.
Cosmo smiled weakly at her. “You warned me about the splinters.”
She tore open the top laces of his tunic as Locks crouched beside her.
“Not how I imagined you undressing me for the first time,” Cosmo slurred. Locks whacked him upside the head and Cosmo jolted awake again.
“Locks,” Ebba scolded. “He’s bleedin’ heavy.”
Her father located the source of the blood at the left shoulder. A wooden wedge as thick as her thumb was lodged in there.
“Aye, that’s a good one,” Locks said grimly.
Cosmo gasped. “Wait. Aren’t you the ship’s carpenter?”
Ebba drew the tunic gently down Cosmo’s arm, careful not to jostle the wound. “
Oh, aye,” she said reassuringly. “But sometimes he doubles as the surgeon.”
“Just another set of tools, lad,” Locks said. “Though I’ll admit my hands ain’t made for the fiddly work.” He poked at the wound and Cosmo turned chalk white.
Locks didn’t raise his head as he spoke, “Clean rags, a needle and thread from Barrels, and a bottle o’ Stubby’s strongest brandy. Smart-like.”
He pushed once more on the wound and Cosmo’s amber eyes stopped focusing on Ebba’s face and rolled back into his head. He slumped in a dead faint.
She raced below deck, hurdling the objects strewn about by their passage around Charybdis.
Stubby kept his brandy in the back of the hold and thought she didn’t know about it. She trawled through the bottles, checking the tiny numbers on the side and located one that was ninety percent. Ebba tucked it under her arm, weaving around barrels and buckets and cabinets filled with their supplies.
She threw open the door to Barrels’ office, rifling through his desk drawer to grab the needle and thread he used to fix his cravats.
She stopped. What else had Locks asked her for? There was a third one. She was sure of it. Her eyes fell on her stained slops. Rags! Flinging open one of the small cooking drawers, she found Peg-leg’s cleaning rags.
. . . Clean. Her heart fell at the grimy appearance of the cloths. Minutes later and with four of Barrels’ cravats tucked in her pocket, she raced back to Locks, who still knelt at Cosmo’s side.
Her other fathers watched from afar, but were occupied with manning the ship and evading the danger at their stern. A quick glance told her they’d passed out of Selkie’s Cove. The west end of Kentro loomed in the distance.
Locks took the brandy she offered, staring at the label, and sniggered loudly. He stared at the cravats in her clenched fist and sniggered again. Taking the needle and thread, he popped the cork of the bottle and poured the brandy over the needles, thread, and his hands, taking a long swig himself.
He passed the needle to her. “Only touch the blunt end, mind.”
She took it gingerly.
Locks sighed and wiped his hands on his dirty slops. “Now that I be a‘hygiened,” he said. He leaned over and yanked the wedge out of Cosmo’s shoulder.
Ebba-Viva Fairisles: Immortal Plunder (Pirates of Felicity Book 1) Page 21