Privateer (The Five Kingdoms #1)

by Robin Roseau

  She paged through it and selected another paper. "A prior inquiry from the same client wondering when I would arrive."

  I read it. It was three months old.

  "What else is in that folder?" I asked her after returning the paper to her.

  "More correspondence from the same client," I indicated. "I keep full correspondence with me until the business is completed, I have verified payment is received, and I have returned home. I have verified payment, but I did not clean out my satchel the last time I was home, so it is somewhat thicker than it might otherwise be."

  "Show me," I told her.

  "The nature of what I do for my clients is private. I absolutely vow this is private business, and none of these papers would indicate to you where you might find fresh hostages or other sources of income, unless you were to enslave me." She withdrew another sheet. "This job took me a week of travel and three days to complete, and then another two days of travel to my next assignment. The client housed me. This is the invoice I submitted."

  I glanced at it. She itemized travel expenses but then the only said, "services rendered" for her own time. The total was not large.

  "You are not well-paid."

  "I told you."

  "Can you prove to me the remaining letters are from the same client?"

  She frowned then gestured to the table. "May I arrange them carefully?"

  "Feel free," I said. She crossed to the table and emptied the papers onto the table. Then she invited me over. Every sheet was visible, but for many of them, the only thing I could see was a signature.

  "Put them away," I said finally. While she was collecting her papers back together, I pulled the next folder from the stack.

  "Captain!" she said. "Please don't."

  "It's too dim to read them. I just want to see if it is more of the same."

  She finished collecting her papers and returned them to the folder. She took the next folder from me and skimmed it briefly. "It is." She pulled out several sheets of paper and let me see them. I handed them back and picked up the next folder.

  "Are we going to do this with all of them?"

  "Yes," I replied.

  "I can make this go more quickly."

  I gestured.

  She grabbed the folder from me, rearranged the papers for a moment, and then said, "The front page will be safe to read. If you want to see more, I hope you will let me sort through them."

  "All right," I agreed. I took the folder from her and barely glanced at the contents. By the time I had, she was holding the next for me, then the next, then the next, and it only took a few minutes to go through three quarters of the folders.

  "The rest are different," she said. She handed me one folder. "Personal bills and bank statements."

  I barely glanced at it.

  "You're not more curious than that?"

  "Of course I am," I replied. "But you haven't offered to share, and I've verified enough to know you aren't lying. Next?"

  She took the folder from me, pawed through it for a moment, then handed me a single piece of paper. "My latest bank statement."

  The balance was about what I expected to receive for her own ransom, no more.

  "You have other accounts," I said immediately.

  "I do. That one is the largest. I have a small account in Southgate and another in Flarina."

  I raised an eyebrow. "Why in Flarina?"

  "I did business there once and was led to believe there would be more. There wasn't. I haven't been back to retrieve my funds. It's not enough to be worth the trip if a client isn't covering expenses."

  It took more time, but she showed me enough of her remaining papers that I was convinced she wasn't hiding anything beyond the details of what she really did. When we were done, I replaced all her folders in the satchel and slipped the pouch of money in with it.

  "You're keeping the satchel anyway?" she wailed.

  I closed it and handed it to her. She stared at me.

  "You need that money more than I do," I told her.

  "But you'll take my insurance bond from me?"

  "Well, yes," I said, smiling. "That's business. This..." I tapped the satchel. "This is personal."

  She hugged her satchel. "Thank you," she said finally.

  "I had to be sure."

  "I know." She looked at me. "Do you lock the desk?"

  "Yes."

  She thrust the satchel back at me. "Will you keep this for me?"

  "Yes," I said. "I will return it before you leave, or if for some reason I can not, I will deliver it to your brother in Southgate."

  "You would do that?" she asked.

  "It is important to you. Yes, I would do that. There might be a delay, but I would find an opportunity." I slipped her satchel into a drawer of the desk and closed everything, locking it. "Safe and sound," I told her.

  "Thank you, Captain."

  I stood up, towering over her. She looked up into my eyes. "Bed time, Ms. Karden. Do you typically need to escape the bed in the middle of the night?"

  "No," she replied.

  "I will be up a few times to check on the ship. I would prefer you not climb over me to return to bed, so I encourage you to remain in bed while I am away." I gestured. "You get the spot near the windows."

  She climbed across the bed, taking her place. I pulled the bedcovers over her, turned down the lamp, and then opened the rear curtain, letting fresh air more readily enter the cabin. "At no time are these curtains to be open when light may show. Do you understand?"

  "Yes, Captain," she replied.

  "I will be very angry if you make even a small mistake about this," I added.

  "I understand, Captain. I won't forget. Does that mean you close them before opening the door?"

  "If the curtains are open, then I slip through the door with it barely opened. The passageway is never brightly lit."

  I slipped into the bed next to her.

  She lay on her side, facing away from me. I lay on my side, facing towards her. I would have liked to be able to see her.

  I lay there for a while. She didn't move, not even to settle in more comfortably. I listened to her breathing, and it was not the slow, steady, quiet breathing of someone sleeping. Neither was mine, I was sure.

  "Are you awake?" she asked very quietly, some time later.

  "Yes," I replied.

  "Will I be allowed to see my niece tomorrow?"

  "You only care about the one?"

  "I care about them all, but only the one cares about me. Lindora and Jorek would prefer to have nothing to do with me."

  "Are you shrill with them?"

  "I have been, yes. Not often, and they had earned tongue lashings, but perhaps not as sharply as my tongue lashes."

  "Were you shrill because they said something you disliked?"

  "Yes. I disliked the things they said about Minori."

  "Minori is youngest?"

  "Yes."

  "What did they say?"

  "They were taking turns taunting her. I waited for her mother to stop them. Finally I did instead."

  "What were they saying?"

  "They were calling her names. They called her stupid, idiot, feebleminded. More, worse words."

  "Is she?"

  "No!"

  "I have not talked to her other than to accept her parole. It is a fair question."

  "No, she is a lot like me. She is very bright, very precocious. But she sees things other children don't see, and they come out in ways other children don't understand."

  "Ways I wouldn't understand?" I asked.

  "No. Ways that would make you think."

  "She sounds to be very much like her aunt."

  Ms. Karden didn't respond right away to that, and we lay quietly. Then she said very quietly, "Thank you. That's the nicest thing anyone has said to me in some time."

  "You will have duties," I told her. "I don't know what they will be. You may spend whatever time you like with your family, but I will not arbitrate betwe
en you and your sister-in-law."

  "Glora won't interfere," she replied. "She's happy to have one less child to manage."

  "Does Minori require that much management?"

  "No. But she asks a lot of questions. Oftentimes they are very uncomfortable questions."

  I chuckled. "And do you answer?"

  "Yes. Every time, if I know the answers myself. And she understands. She is exceedingly brilliant. I fear for her."

  "Why?"

  "She will be lonely."

  "Why?"

  "What man wants a wife smarter than he is?"

  "A smart man. But perhaps she prefers women as her aunt does."

  "She is too young to know either way," Ms. Karden replied. "But my experience with women isn't so great, either."

  "Your niece is welcome to join you in your duties," I offered, "subject to one stipulation."

  "What is that?"

  "The two of you will join me for meals, or at least as much as her mother allows."

  "Do you vow you have no ill will towards her?"

  "What is that supposed to mean?" I asked.

  "Do you?"

  "I have no ill will towards anyone aboard ship who follows the rules. Will your niece follow the rules?"

  "As well as her aunt does."

  I paused before responding. "Will I be forced to gag her?"

  "No. She will remain polite. But you won't like her questions. And she won't stop asking if you refuse to answer. If you yell, she will grow quiet, but she'll come at you from another direction later. Would you gag her for that?"

  "No. If she frustrates me, I will send her away. That is the worst she can expect, if she obeys the rules."

  "She wouldn't, but what would you do to someone who broke a rule?"

  "It would depend on the rule. A stern talking to, confinement to quarters, or the brig would be the escalating punishments for anyone guilty of mischief."

  "How often do you put a child in the brig?"

  "You understand the children we frequently kidnap are spoiled by their parents."

  "That's not an answer."

  "It's an explanation."

  "So, often then?" she asked.

  "Yes. Would you prefer I treat them like a seaman engaged in the same actions?"

  "What would a seaman receive for punishment?"

  "In increasing order of severity, a stern talking to, extra duties, and a lashing. Thieves are evicted from the ship."

  "That doesn't seem so severe," I said.

  "While we're still at sea. I've never had a murder, but I had an attempted murder over a dispute that grew out of hand."

  "The intended victim survived?"

  "Not when I was done with him."

  "What?" She asked hotly, turning to face me.

  "I was forced to do something exceedingly cruel to the would-be murderer. I do not care to tell you what. Her dispute was justified, but she should have come to me."

  "And to the other?"

  "He went overboard. I baited the sea for two days first."

  "Baited?"

  "Blood in the water draws sharks. We put a life jacket on him, bound him hand and foot, cut him enough he would bleed slowly, and tossed him overboard."

  "What had he done?"

  I rolled away from her.

  "Captain, please. What had he done?"

  "He raped her."

  I felt her hand on my shoulder. It was a tentative touch. "Please tell me the rest. What happened to her?"

  "I will not tell you, Ms. Karden," she said. "She is dead, that is all that matters."

  "You killed her for attempting to kill the man who raped her?" I felt the venom in her voice.

  "I can not allow vigilante justice on board ship," I explained. "No matter how justified. She should have come to me. I would have handled it. And she knew that."

  "Why didn't she?"

  "She didn't want me to know."

  "Why not, Captain?"

  "No more, Ms. Karden."

  There was a rustling behind me as Ms. Karden settled back. We were both silent or a while before she said, "Her name is Mori."

  "Whose name?" I asked.

  "The woman whose letters I cherish."

  "But she left you."

  "She wasn't just my first, Captain. She has been my only."

  I rolled back to face her. She lay on her back, staring at the ceiling.

  "Her name was Perra."

  "You were lovers," Ms. Karden guessed.

  "Yes."

  "I'm sorry."

  We lay quietly for several minutes. "Will you tell me about Mori?"

  "Would you like to laugh?" she offered immediately.

  "I would like that very much," I admitted.

  "All right." She proceeded to tell me about a wager, and about the results. And she was right; I laughed.

  "She was your first?"

  "Not my first lover, but the first that lasted more than a night or two," she admitted. "I helped her to win the wager, and she stayed with me much longer than anyone else would have."

  "She was that grateful."

  "Maybe I'm just that good," she retorted immediately.

  "Maybe you are."

  "Or maybe she was just that much more patient. It wasn't gratitude." She rolled to face me. "I am not vain. Nor am I falsely modest. I am beautiful and I am intelligent."

  "Yes, you are," I agreed.

  "That is why she tolerated my mouth as long as she did. She liked having me on her arm. She liked looking at me. She liked what we did in bed. And she liked talking to me most of the time."

  "Sleep now," I said. And we each rolled over, our backs to each other. I slept. I did not know if she did.

  * * * *

  Rani Karden

  I lay awake in the dark, listening to the unfamiliar sounds of the ship. The captain snored, very lightly; I almost couldn't hear her. I lay as still as I could, trying not to wake her. I think I dozed, but I wouldn't have called it sleep.

  She woke, and I knew the moment she did. She lay still for a moment, and then I felt a hand reach behind her and touch me, perhaps to remind her she shared a bed. Her hand withdrew, and she climbed carefully out of bed.

  "May I come with?" I asked her.

  "I do not wish to wait for you to dress," she replied.

  "Just the breeches?" I rolled over. "I understand if you would rather I stay here."

  "No," she said after a moment. "Hurry, but this is a brief visit. If you need to use the head, do that instead."

  "No, I am fine." I scrambled from the bed and pulled the breeches from the closet, slipping into them quickly.

  The captain didn't pull anything on. She was dressed only in her under things and a nightshirt.

  "Do not open the door wide," she said. She opened it a crack and slipped through, then I followed her, pulling it closed behind me. She padded down the passage and I followed behind her. She stepped onto the deck, and I stood next to her. She looked up at the sails.

  "What are you doing?"

  "Checking the set of the sails," she said. She pointed and named them to me. "Can you remember?"

  "Can you go slower?"

  "All right," she said. "The ship is a brig."

  "I thought that was where you kept me last night."

  "Confusing, isn't it?" she said. "Shall we bow to the bow of the ship?"

  "I understand. So a brig is a type of ship?"

  "It has to do with the number of masts and how the sails hang on it," she explained. "We have two masts. There is a foremast." She pointed towards the forward most mast. "And the mainmast."

  "All right," I replied.

  "The sails on the mainmast are, beginning at the bottom, the mainsail, the main topsail, and the main topgallant sail."

  "Mainsail, topsail, and topgallant," I echoed.

  "Main topsail and main topgallant sail," she corrected then continued to name sails. "Behind the main mast is the spanker. Between the foremast and the mainmast is the trysail."
<
br />   "Spanker and trysail," I said, pointing to the spanker and gesturing forward for the trysail, which I couldn't see from where we were standing.

  "Good. Can you guess the names on the foremast?"

  "Are there the same number?"

  "Yes."

  "All right. Foresail, fore topsail and fore topgallant?"

  "Excellent. In front of the foremast are three jibs called, from front to back, flying jib, outer jib and inner jib."

  I repeated them. "Excellent," she said. "Now, repeat them all again." I ran through all the sails."

  "You missed one," she said. "Between the fore and mainmast."

  "I can't see it," I explained. "It's the trysail."

  "Good. In different weather conditions, we may fly other sails. But this is enough for now." She turned to the ladder leading to the aft quarterdeck and climbed the ladder. I followed behind her, but when my nose poked over the top, I saw her bare feet immediately in front of my nose. I looked up, and she was looking down, frowning.

  "Return to the cabin, Ms. Karden. Immediately. Wait for me there."

  I didn't hesitate. She had the sound of command in her voice, and she sounded irked with me. I descended the ladder as quickly as I could and moved directly to the cabin. When I glanced up before entering the passageway, she was watching me. I made sure to open the door only a crack before slipping into the cabin.

  I sat on the edge of the bed, fretting that I had done something wrong, but I couldn't imagine what. It seemed like a long time before I heard the door to the deck open, then a second later, the cabin door. She slipped into the room.

  "Stand up!" she ordered.

  I rose to my feet immediately. "Yes, Captain. I don't know what I did wrong!"

  "What are the limitations to your travel?"

  "Your cabin, the head, the main deck, laundry, galley, mess, and points in between," I said. "Plus anywhere ordered or invited by a ship's officer."

  "And where in that list is the aft quarterdeck?"

  "You invited me!"

  "When?"

  "When you said I may go with you, and you in turn went up the ladder."

  "In the future," she said sternly, "you will consider invitations to join me very conservatively."

  I stood quietly, absorbing what she said. "You set me up."

  "Yes," she admitted.

  "Am I in trouble?"

  "No. But I want to be sure you are clear."

  "It won't happen again."

  "Go on," she said. "Get in bed."