Falcon's Angel

by Judith E. French

  "Peace," Angel soothed as she stepped back out of reach. "Do not—"

  "Let me go!" he said. Solid iron links bound the metal cuff to an upright post at the foot of his bed.

  "Shhh." She put a finger to her lips. "Lie still. You will start your hurts bleeding again."

  "What game is this?" Will felt a tear and a sharp pain. Warm liquid dampened his chest, and he looked down to see the white bandage turning dark with blood.

  "See. What did I warn ye about?" she admonished. "It's a shallow gash, but even that could—"

  "Unchain me, I say!" He forced himself to sit up and wrenched the manacle with both hands. The chain didn't budge. "What treachery is this?"

  Angel folded her arms over her breasts and gave a small sigh. "I told them ye would be angry."

  "Angry? Angry?" Reason struggled with the red tide of fury that threatened to drown caution. "Why?" he demanded. "Why have they done this? I fought and I won. Now you—"

  "Not me, husband."

  He swore fiercely. "I never spoke the vows—" She retreated to the central fire and crouched beside it, shifting a kettle over the glowing coals. "Mayhap ye didn't repeat every word of the wedding lines, but you did clasp my hand and stand before the Brethren. You declared by your actions, before witnesses, that you meant to take me to wife." She shrugged. "'Tis all that is necessary for a handhold marriage."

  Shards of broken glass seemed to spear through him with each breath. Tight-mouthed, breathing hard, he lay back on one side, still glaring at her. "What now? Am I to let you sew me up so that I can fight two more of your crew tomorrow? And three the following day?"

  Angel wrapped the hem of her skirt around the handle of the kettle and poured hot water into a silver teapot that would have graced any fine parlor in Charleston. "No more challenges," she assured him. "Ye are chained because Cap'n does not trust you. A wise decision, wouldn't you say?"

  She rose and walked to a mahogany tea chest that sat on a gnarled section of driftwood against one wall. Rummaging through the box, she produced two small bags, opened and sniffed each one, then added pinches of the contents to the teapot. "If you don't wish to take strong drink, this will ease the discomfort and help you sleep," she said. "You'll be safe here, for now. Trust me. A day or two of rest and my potions will set you right."

  "Why? Why are you doing this?"

  She smiled. "I pulled you from the sea, outlander. I claimed you as my salvage, and it is in my interests to keep ye safe."

  "For what purpose? Am I to be your slave? A stud horse?"

  Shock registered on her face. "Do not speak so. You shame yourself and me. Can there be such talk between husband and wife? What will be, will be, and none of us can stop it. I knew that my life had taken a different turn when I first saw ye struggling to keep your head above water. When I pulled you onto the sandbar, and you opened your eyes..."

  She stirred the brew with a wooden spoon. "Deny it, if you can, Will Falcon. We are bound together. In what way, I do not know, but your life will never be the same. And neither will mine."

  For long minutes, he watched her in stony silence. As his eyes became accustomed to the firelight, he inspected the rough walls and crude furnishings of what he supposed must be a single-room hut. The floor was hard-packed earth, swept clean and free of litter. The single door, cut from a ship's hatch cover, was barred with an iron harpoon, and the window small and shuttered. The ceiling was low, and curving, causing him to suspect that the beams might also be salvage from some hapless vessel. The walls were lined with woven reed matting, and instead of a fireplace there was a pit dug in the center of the structure and surrounded by bricks. Baskets and leather sacks hung from the rafters, along with strings of dried clams and fish, onions, and herbs. Smoke from the fire drifted up to vanish through a small hole in the roof.

  His pallet took up the greater part of one wall, an inlaid, walnut writing cabinet and a gatelegg oak table with elegant, turned legs the far one. There was an ornately carved chair with leather-padded seat and backrest, and a single old-fashioned stool, which looked Dutch. Two sea chests, a wooden barrel, and a gilt mirror completed the crow's nest collection of furniture. "A pirate's lair," he murmured.

  "What?" Angel poured the tea into a blue and white pottery mug, tasted it, and nodded. "'Tis ready. Drink it," she urged. "And try to understand that the Brethren are not pirates. We are honest wreckers. We take what the sea gives us and make our living from—"

  "The deaths of honest men."

  "Nay," she protested. "'Tis not so. At least not under Cap'n. If Dyce Towser kills our captain and takes his place, who knows what will happen."

  "You're wrong, woman. Dozens of ships have been lured to their destruction along this stretch of shoreline. Many others have vanished. Can you deny that your people light fires along the beach to deceive the lookouts and—"

  "We do not! Those are ghost lights, the fires of Indian spirits, long dead. Sometimes they glow green and sometimes red. All manner of haints walk these—"

  "What?"

  "Haints. Ghosts. Those dead but still among us."

  He snorted in derision. "Superstitious nonsense."

  She curled her fingers and made the sign for warding off the evil eye. "You a saltwater man, and you can speak so?" She shook her head. "Have ye never seen water nymphs or blue flames dancing on the sea? Have ye not heard the long-drowned singing from the ocean depths? Witnessed the sails of a ghost ship in the fog? You are either a fool or a liar if you deny that things exist that cannot be explained."

  "Enough. Do you hear yourself? If you were peaceful wreckers, would your captain want me killed? Would anyone have worried that I saw your faces?"

  Her lips pursed. "We are a people apart. We do not trust the mainlanders, nor they us. And ignorant folk can expect faint justice from high courts and bigwigs. It is our law that we do not mix with your kind. And rightly, as I see it. For you find us guilty of murder and piracy without a spoonful of proof."

  Will shook his head. "Keep your witch's potion and sew up my wounds, if you will. Doubtless you're bloodthirsty enough to enjoy it."

  "As you wish, sir," she said. "And mayhap I shall take satisfaction in every tiny stitch."

  * * *

  Despite her shrewish words, Angel couldn't take pleasure in her task. Her needle was fine and sharp, her thread silk. But though she knew it must be done, she had always found that sewing a wound was painful for both patient and seamstress.

  He was brave, as she knew he would be. He clamped his teeth, set his jaw, and endured her ministrations without uttering a sound. Sweat broke out on his forehead, and his hands clenched into tight fists, but he did not cry out. When she was finished, his olive complexion was the color of old ivory.

  Making no effort to hide the compassion she felt for his injuries, she offered Will her special tea. This time, he drank it. As she'd hoped, he grew sleepy within a few minutes.

  "What have you given me?" he asked, struggling to keep his eyes open.

  "A bit of this, a bit of that. Ye need have no fear. Ye are safe here. Rest awhile. I will keep watch."

  Angel gathered up her ointments and bandages and busied herself until she heard the rhythm of his breathing steady and grow easier. Then, when she was certain he was in a deep sleep, she took a clean cloth, dipped it in the fresh water she'd warmed by the fire, and prepared to bathe him.

  Starting with Will's face, she gently wiped away the sweat and dust, then massaged a soothing cream into his skin with featherlight strokes. He tossed his head and moaned, but did not wake.

  It was curious how the simple act of washing a grown man should make her feel as though she'd been running in deep, deep sand. She tried to tell herself her discomfort was naught but foolish whimsy. Outlander or not, Will Falcon was her husband. There was no need for maidenly modesty. She would be failing in her duty to him if she didn't use all her skills to bring him back to full health, whether he approved of her or not. And it had been her experience that
wounds must be kept clean to heal.

  Still, she could not keep her fingers from trembling or her heart from fluttering as rapidly as that of the injured sandpiper she had found on the beach. Touching Will in such a familiar manner was both pleasing and more than a little frightening.

  With a fingertip, she traced the faint scar that ran from the corner of his left eyebrow to the center of his cheekbone. So bronzed was Will by sun and sea that she had not noticed the thin mark before. It looked as though it had been made by a thin, sharp blade, such as a dueling sword.

  Will's swollen and cracked lips were as goodly shaped as any she had ever seen on a man. His roguish mouth was neither over-wide nor too small for his face, and she could not help wondering if he would taste like seawater.

  Without realizing she was doing so, Angel moistened her own lips. Nervously, she swallowed and took a long, slow breath. What had she done? What if the old ones were right? What if taking someone from the sea brought disaster to the rescuer? Could the odd sensations racing through her be the start of some dreadful plague?

  And what if this beautiful stranger was as hard in his heart as Dyce Towser?

  By marrying him, she had given him the use of her body. She shivered as a sheen of ice slid over her skin. What if Will was not kind when he took his husband's right? She had seen beasts... wild horses and dogs... even dolphins. The dolphins seemed gentle and loving, but the others had been wild, even cruel in their mating. Would Will use his man root like a weapon to cruelly tear her tender flesh?

  The shivering became worse, and she locked her teeth together to keep them from chattering. No, Will Falcon wasn't like that, she told herself. Hadn't she always been a good judge of men and weather? Will might be hard, but he would be fair. He would use her lightly. She could bear the pain of losing her maidenhood. She was no coward, but...

  "More spinster's fancies," she murmured. How many husbands had Bett had? Surely, if tupping were unpleasant, her mother wouldn't be forever on the watch for another man. It must be that once a maiden was breached, she grew tough and callused down there, so that she could perform a wife's duty without complaint.

  Will Falcon was as hard-muscled as any saltwater sailor. Lying asleep as he was, she'd expected some softness, but he was all bone and sinew without an ounce of fat. How did a gentleman come by such broad shoulders or such a flat, ridged belly? Seen in a ruffled shirt, waistcoat, and dress coat, a casual observer might have thought Will slender, almost boyish in form. When she'd pulled him from the waves, she'd not guessed how well formed he was beneath his clothing.

  How strong these arms would be... how powerful his callused hands. If he turned his might on her, what chance would she have to protect herself?

  Yet, she had done what she had done. There was no turning back, and no unsaying the wedding lines. A Brethren union might not last more than a few months, but while they were together, it was a marriage.

  Angel laid down the cloth and loosened her laced bodice. It was suddenly too warm in her hut. Ordinarily, both the door and window would stand open, but she had wanted to be alone with the outlander.

  She had so many questions she wanted to ask him about the world beyond these islands. She could count on the fingers of one hand how many strangers she had seen in the last five years. Two of those had been drowned sailors, and the other one she had barely glimpsed in the darkness, a mysterious man who bought the booty the Brethren gathered from the sea.

  Angel carefully washed each long finger. On his right hand, Will wore a wide gold ring with a single design carved on the flattened top. She thought the mark might be the letter F, but it was as curved as an angry snake, and she had never learned to read or write. She sighed, knowing that Dyce would not have missed seeing the ring, no doubt wondering how it would look on his own hairy hand.

  Angel had never owned a ring, never wanted one. Sometimes the sea yielded all manner of baubles: jeweled rings, necklaces, brooches, and crosses set with precious stones. But such fripperies were not for common folk. They were packed up and sold along with other valuables. Such money as they brought could be traded for black powder, lead, flour, and other necessities that the Brethren could not come by otherwise.

  She inspected Will from tousled mane to the sprinkling of ebony hairs just above the waistband of his expensive breeches. The task was finished. There was no need to do more. Rest and food should put him right in a few days.

  But she could not soothe the mischievous curiosity that bubbled in the dark corners of her mind. Will had a respectable amount of black hair on his chest and arms and none on his back. She wondered about the parts of him she hadn't examined. Were his legs heavily furred? His loins?

  A grown man's bishop was generally decently covered, but she had seen a few pizzles, three to be exact. Tom was apt to wave his in the wind when he was drunk, and Dyce had deliberately exposed himself to her more than once. She'd not been impressed. Dyce's eel had been thick and purple, Tom's rather puny with a definite lean to starboard. The third man had been dead, so his shriveled root didn't count. You couldn't expect a corpse to amount to much.

  She hoped that Will's pizzle wasn't purple.

  Getting up, she disposed of the water, washed her hands, and started a clam stew for supper. But somehow, her heart wasn't in the cooking, and her eyes kept straying to the mound in the front of Will's breeches.

  Suppose he had a hurt she wasn't aware of? The woolen cloth was torn in one spot. What if Dyce's knife had cut Will there? A puncture wound could kill a man quicker than any other. Some took the lockjaw sickness and died in agony.

  Angel wondered if she was neglecting her duty to Will in not examining all of him to make certain he wasn't injured. "No need to make such a fuss," she murmured. The best thing to do was put her mind at rest about her new husband's health.

  She went back to him, knelt beside the pallet, and began to gently untie his breeches' lacing. He grunted and shifted to one side, startling her. She froze, holding her breath.

  Will tossed his head, muttered something she couldn't understand, and lay still again. She waited, sweat beading between her breasts, until it seemed safe to continue.

  Heart racing, Angel reached out with trembling fingers to loosen the strings of his garment.

  Will's powerful hand clamped around her wrist.

  "Ahhh!" Her shriek of fright strangled in her throat as his fierce eyes snapped open and his gaze locked with hers.

  "Lost something?"

  Chapter 5

  Angel tried to jerk loose, but Will held her fast in an iron grip. Her cheeks flamed.

  "What exactly were you looking for?"

  There was no missing the scornful amusement in his words as he fumbled with the flap on his breeches' front with the fingers of his free hand. "I'll be happy to show you—"

  "Nay." Mortified, she averted her face. "Let go of me. I was not—"

  "If this is a game, I need to know the rules."

  "Please."

  He released her, and she fled to the far side of the fire. "I saved your life."

  "And you think that gives you the right to—"

  She shook her head. "I wasn't—"

  "Damned if you weren't."

  The flush spread until the roots of her hair felt ready to burst into flame. She felt like such a fool. She wanted to run away, to get far from his taunting voice, and breathe in cool sea air. But the blood pulsed hot in her wrist where his fingers had pressed against her skin, and her heart pounded.

  "Why?" he asked.

  She blinked back the moisture that clouded her vision as anger replaced shame. She wanted to salvage her wounded pride, to sting Will Falcon with words as fierce as a nest of riled ground wasps.

  It was on her tongue to shout, "I should have left you to drown!" But that would be untrue, and she'd had no experience at lying. Instead, she remained mute, letting the silence stretch between them until she felt she would shatter into a hundred pieces. "I wanted to see what it looked like," she
confessed, her words rushing over one another like foam on a cresting breaker.

  "What?"

  "Your pizzle. Dyce's is purple and thick like the neck of an old sea turtle."

  Will's lips curved into a near smile before he forced a scowl. He thought he knew women, but he was at a loss of what to make of this one.

  Angel was no girl, but a woman grown. Yet she seemed both wantonly bold and innocent at the same time. She lived among bloodthirsty pirates and seemed unaware of their acts of violence. He wondered if she was possessed of all her senses or simply hiding a nature as vile and criminal as the rest of the Brethren.

  "Ye were awake," she said. "While I washed you."

  "I was."

  "Cod's head!"

  "Deceitful wench."

  "I was not the deceitful one. You sailed under false colors, pretending to be asleep when you were not."

  "Can you deny you tried to drug me? To take advantage of a helpless prisoner?"

  "Helpless?" she scoffed. "You're about as helpless as a six-foot shark."

  "I thought it best to learn firsthand what you were up to." He chuckled. "It turned out to be a pleasant experience." No need to tell her how enjoyable he'd found her touch, or that her herb tea had dulled the pain of his injury.

  "Fie on you!"

  "Fie on me? I don't mean to be ungrateful, but you have dragged me here, chained me to a post, and made free with my body. You can't expect me to—"

  "Nay, I cannot." She wiped her hands on her skirt. "I want us to be friends."

  "Friends don't hold each other prisoner."

  "I have asked ye... you... to trust me. In time, mayhap—"

  "You'll help me escape to the mainland?"

  "Shhh. Folks here find it wise to hold their tongues when others may be about. The walls be thin, and some are fond of listenin' to what they should not." She crouched by the fire and cut slivers of bacon into a simmering pot. "Chowder will be done soon."

  He nodded. He'd thought he wasn't hungry, but the smell of the clam broth was enticing. "Thanks, I'll—"