The Iron Rose

by Marsha Canham

  His gaze shot back up to the face beneath the blue bandana and confirmed a rather shocking suspicion: it was a female. Her head was tipped forward in concentration and the light was directly above her, casting most of her face in shadow, but there was no doubting his instincts. The boy was female—the same female in the same tight breeches and leather jerkin he had seen fighting on the deck of the galleon!

  If there was the smallest doubt that this was the same person, it was dispelled at the sight of the elegant Toledo sword she still wore strapped about her waist, the tip of which bumped against the heel of her boot when she took a step around the desk. It was as splendid a weapon as his own blade, which had been made by a master craftsman and presented to him as a token of appreciation by King James himself.

  Varian willed himself to take another long, slow look around the cabin. This time, when he turned his head farther in an attempt to see what lay in the shadows behind him, such a violent stab of pain shot through his skull he could not stop a sharp gasp from breaking through his lips.

  “Oh! Faith and happy day!” Beacom’s shadow cut across the lantern light, blocking both it and the couple standing at the desk. “My lord his grace the duke is coming to himself again!”

  Varian attempted to speak but his throat refused to emit more than a dry croak.

  “Captain!” Beacom clasped his hands in an appeal directed across the room. “Might I trouble you for a dram of wine? I expect his grace is sorely in need.”

  “It’s there on the sideboard.” The burly man waved a hand. “Help yerself.”

  “I thank you, sir. You are too desperately kind.”

  A grunt acknowledged the compliment before he returned to his charts.

  A moment later Varian felt a few drops of sweet red wine trickle through his lips. He let it fill his mouth and run down his throat, and what he did not sputter out on a ragged cough he swallowed with avid appreciation. When the cup was empty he lapped the air insistently for more, but Beacom was cautioned against it.

  “Unless you want him puking it all up again,” said a feminine voice. “Wait a few minutes. If he manages to keep that down, he can have another. He has taken a stout knock on the head and if the skull is cracked or the brain is swollen, you will only be wasting my good Malaga.”

  “My skull is fine,” Varian rasped. “Where the devil am I? Where is Captain Macleod?”

  “Captain Macleod is dead, your grace,” Beacom explained quickly. “The Argus, I’m afraid, is lost. Gone. Sunk beneath the sea.”

  “Sunk, you say?” Varian frowned and struggled to squeeze out more memories.

  “We were attacked by a vile Spanish warship,” Beacom recounted. “You were injured when the powder magazine on board the Argus exploded. You knocked your head on a beam as you flew through the air and, ah”—he leaned closer and lowered his voice to a whisper—“your shoulder and left buttock were severely bruised. Right to the very bone, I dare say. The captain applied some dreadful concoction of oil and turpentine, claiming it would numb the flesh and help it heal faster.”

  “Nothing is numb, dammit,” Varian hissed through his teeth. “And you have yet to tell me where we are and who the devil that woman is that she should dare tell me I can or cannot have more wine.”

  The auburn head came up under the lantern light, causing the bandana to glow a pale, luminous blue against the darker shadows. “You are presently on board my ship, sir, in my bed, and as captain, I can tell you any damned thing I wish to tell you.”

  “Captain?”

  “Captain.”

  “Your ship?”

  “My ship.” She nodded. “The Iron Rose.”

  Varian closed his eyes and tried to concentrate. The name meant nothing to him yet he thought it highly preposterous—and unlikely—for a woman to be captain of any ship, much less one that had defied the might of a Spanish galleon.

  “If the accommodations fail to meet with your approval,” she murmured dryly, bringing his eyes open again, “Mr. Crisp, here, can always sling a hammock in a sail locker for you and your servant.”

  Since the pounding in his head did not allow an appreciation for either humor or sarcasm at the moment, Varian decided to savor the lingering taste of the wine—which he recognized as being a damned fine vintage and nothing at all like the sour claret the captain of the Argus had enjoyed by the barrelful. “You say this is your cabin?”

  “It is.”

  “Then I shall assume it is the best the ship has to offer and accept it graciously.”

  The girl lifted her head and her eyebrow at the same time. She set the stick of charcoal she had been writing with on the desk and stared at Beacom, who instantly wilted against the wall.

  “Your man informs us you are a duke.”

  “The twelfth Duke of Harrow to be precise. Varian St. Clare at your service, mistress … ?”

  “Captain,” she said, correcting him. “Captain Dante … to be precise. The twelfth duke, you say?”

  “We tend to live short lives,” he snapped. “Dante?” Though he whispered the name, it set off such a violent hammering in his head that he had to set his teeth against a shiver. “Do you pretend to tell me the infamous rogue known as the Pirate Wolf is a mere woman?”

  The question and his manner of asking it brought her out from behind the desk this time and Beacom’s eyes rounded almost out of their sockets. His face engaged in a flurry of contortions, most of them intended to warn Varian, by means of elaborate movements of the mouth and eyebrows, not to test the patience of the woman who was now slowly crossing the room and approaching the side of the bed. When she threw a scowl in his direction, the frantic pantomime ceased and he looked up at the ceiling, but when she looked away again, he laced his fingers together in a desperate plea for his master to hold his tongue.

  “I pretend nothing, my lord. My name is Juliet Dante and the rogue to whom you refer so capriciously is my father, Simon Dante.”

  “Your father?”

  “So he told me,” she said evenly, “and I have no reason to disbelieve him.”

  “Well of course that was not what I meant.” Varian raised a hand to massage his temple. “It was merely a response to the astonishing notion of a woman such as yourself captaining a fighting ship.”

  “You English do appear to be having a difficult time grasping the notion,” she agreed wryly. “But I am curious to know what you mean by ‘a woman such as myself.’ Just what kind of woman might that be?”

  He stopped rubbing his brow and stared at her a moment. It was her eyes that warned him—eyes that sent the fine hairs across the back of his neck standing on end. Aside from the extraordinary silver blue color, they were bold and direct, inviting him to expand on the insulting platitude only if he had absolutely no desire to see another sunrise. They were situated above a nose that looked almost as if it had been broken at some time, for it tipped ever so slightly to one side. The face itself, although wanting a good scrub, was a surprising blend of characteristics, from the large, expressive eyes to the firm chin, neither of which suggested she was someone to be trifled with.

  No helpless, blushing dove, this one.

  “Young,” he said carefully. “I was about to say you looked too young to bear such a burden of responsibility. I meant no disrespect, I assure you.”

  His bad attempt at a feint put the hint of a smile on her lips.

  “In that case, to save you any further consternation, the gentleman standing over there trying to pretend he can make calculations in his head is my quartermaster, Nathan Crisp, and he is as old as Beelzebub.”

  “Not by half,” Crisp objected.

  Varian was still studying the girl’s face. He had read every scrap of documentation with the Dante name on it before he departed England. He’d read the English, the French, the Dutch, even the Spanish reports dating back some thirty years and knew there were two sons who had followed in their father’s footsteps. Nowhere had he found a reference to the Pirate Wolf having a daug
hter, much less one who commanded her own armed privateer.

  He must have winced under the weight of his thoughts, for without warning, she reached out and laid a hand across his forehead. Her fingers were long and cool and although they were withdrawn after a moment or two, he continued to feel their imprint long after.

  “You have no fever and we’ve not seen the wine again. I suspect, apart from the ringing in your left ear, nothing has been too badly damaged.”

  “How do you know my left ear is ringing?”

  She reached out again and this time when she touched him, it was to scratch a small fleck of dried blood off his neck. “You were fairly close to the explosion. You’re lucky you didn’t lose your hearing entirely.”

  “Beacom said you tended my wounds. You are the ship’s surgeon as well as the captain?”

  “Necessity dictates that everyone learns to do a little of everything. Unfortunately, we don’t have the luxury of a surgeon. The carpenter has some skill with a saw and auger; thus he usually handles the serious wounds. If you had a cut or a gash, the sailmaker would ply his trade, but a cracked head and a bruised rump hardly seemed critical enough to warrant special attention despite the”—she paused to glare at Beacom—“incessant and interminable wailings of your manservant.”

  Varian attempted a smile, one that showed a lot of straight white teeth and cost very little in effort. “You must forgive Beacom’s enthusiasm. He served my father and my elder brother before me and has very rigid standards to which everyone—including myself—must aspire.” And although she did not ask, he added, “I had two older brothers, actually, but neither had the foresight to produce an heir before they died, and so here I am, the twelfth Duke of Harrow by default. It is a tiresome and annoying responsibility, but it is mine and I must bear it as best I can.” He paused, sweetening his smile with a small, seductive curve, one that rarely failed to soften a woman’s heart and limbs. “May I say, Captain, since we are discussing merits, that I was impressed by your display of swordsmanship on board the galleon. I warrant not ten men of my acquaintance could have conducted themselves so admirably.”

  “I do not fight to impress anyone, my lord. I fight to survive a day longer than my enemy.”

  “Nonetheless, for a woman—” He stopped, feeling another warning thud inside his chest as she turned the full power of those remarkable eyes back on him.

  “For a young woman such as yourself,” he amended slowly, “I would perhaps have suggested a lighter blade. Your left shoulder tends to droop somewhat when you tire and a more diligent foe might be able to take advantage.”

  Her eyebrow arched. “You say that as if your expertise goes beyond knowing how to choose your plumage to match your founts of lace.”

  Beacom let out a gasp that sounded like it had remained strangled in his throat too long. “Good gracious heavens, madam! Milord his grace the Duke of Harrow is one of the most renowned swordsmen in all of England! His reputation is legion among the very masters of Europe. His sword, madam, was a gift from His Most Gracious Majesty King James, bestowed by his own hand. Moreover, for these past many years that selfsame sword has been at the king’s right hand, there but to answer the crown’s call at the merest hint of peril. His grace is a former captain of the Royal Guard, as well as a loyal and—”

  Varian shot the spluttering Beacom a look that squeezed the valet’s throat shut, reducing the last few accolades to soundless movements of his lips.

  But the words that had already been spoken could not be unspoken and Varian saw Juliet Dante’s head tilt slightly to one side as if she had caught a scent of something foul in the air.

  “So.” She crossed her arms over her chest and frowned. “We are in the company of a trusted confidant of King James. A former captain of His Majesty’s garters.”

  “Th-that would be guards, madam.” Beacom held up a spindly finger to protest. “C-captain of the king’s guards.”

  Juliet did not take her eyes off St. Clare. “Mr. Crisp. If this wretched little man says one more word, take him out onto the gallery and drop him overboard.”

  “Aye. With pleasure,” Crisp grinned. “Mayhap, if he swims fast enough, he can catch up with the Spaniards.”

  Varian looked shocked. “You threw the Spanish prisoners overboard?”

  “In a manner of speaking,” she said dryly. “We landed them a hundred yards off an atoll, in water shallow enough for them to walk the rest of the way. What business brings you to the Caribbee?”

  “My own,” Varian replied curtly. “And none of yours.”

  For the briefest fraction of a second her hand moved toward the hilt of her sword.

  “Lieutenant Beck said the Argus was a courier ship, bound for New Providence. An odd choice of vessels for an English duke to go adventuring on … unless of course you have come to deliver copies of the king’s new Bible in an attempt to cleanse our heathen souls and mend us of our larcenous ways?”

  Crisp guffawed, Varian glared.

  “Some might regard it as an adventure to sail halfway across the world in a leaking wooden bucket, madam, but I assure you, I considered it nothing shy of hell.”

  “Then why are you here? And spare me the further insult of denying that you are another of the king’s lackeys sent to spout dictums of peace.”

  “I am no man’s lackey, madam.”

  “And I am no man’s dupe, sir. The king has been sending a plague of messengers here for the past five years and they all bring missives demanding the same thing. They want us to stop attacking Spanish ships; they want us to leave the Caribbean entirely. They—and I must presume it is not entirely the king’s idea, for he holds his royal hand out readily enough when we send his percentage of the prize monies back to London—they presume to think that if we cease to harass the Spaniards, Philip III will happily open the ports to honest trade. The last buffoon who came brandishing his sealed and beribboned documents even threatened to rescind all letters of marque. A threat, I might add, which had us trembling in abject terror, as you can imagine.”

  Despite the contempt in her voice, Varian could not help but be intrigued. The pale blue of her eyes was sparked with azure flecks, changing their character entirely. Where there had been amused indifference and disdain a few brief moments ago, there was now a depth of anger and passion that almost took his breath away. The heat had moved into her face as well, burnishing the already lusty effects of the sun and sea, suffusing her skin with enough of a ruddy glow to make him wonder what she would look like if she removed the scruffy blue bandana and let her hair loose about her shoulders.

  “Well?”

  He blinked. “Well … what?”

  “Do you honestly believe the Spanish would ever honor a treaty with England? Can you even pretend to believe it after your own ship was attacked without provocation? Hah! No, you cannot. There has been no peace beyond the line for a hundred years, and the fact that your king and his ministers now send a duke in fancy plumage to deliver more of their puling threats changes nothing … except, perhaps, the method of your removal from my ship.”

  Varian’s temples throbbed anew. She had the distinct advantage in this duel of wits and words for he was wounded, naked, lying flat in a bed with no recourse but to let her flay him with her contempt. In spite of the way she fought and talked and looked beneath all the grime and dried blood that stained her clothing, she was still a woman, for heaven’s sake, and he had never met a woman he could not seduce with a smile and a silky word. Yet this one appeared to be completely immune. She was not afraid of him, not impressed with his title or his position as the king’s emissary, nor did she seem to be concerned in the least that she had just threatened to drown a peer of the realm.

  Some of what he was thinking must have shown in the sudden tightness in his jaw, for she leaned forward and smiled. “Indeed, my lord, you are not in London now and there are no courtiers present. You have no friends on board this ship, no power, no authority, no influence over so much as the low
liest seaman. On board the Iron Rose, I am the only authority. I am the queen, the duchess, the countess, the high priestess, and the only one who decides whether you remain here as our guest, or become fodder for the first school of sharks we see swimming past. Had we not happened along when we did, the Spaniards would have sunk you and left no witness behind to the deed. Make no mistake, sir: it would not cause me a moment in lost sleep to do likewise.”

  Varian stared up into eyes as implacably cold as ice and had no reason to doubt her. He did not believe in coincidences, and while he might have been persuaded to believe at first that it was by the greatest stroke of good fortune he had wakened to find himself in the presence of the daughter of one of the men he had indeed sailed halfway around the world to find, nothing could convince him he had not simply wakened into another kind of hell.

  He was not given to blushing like a shy dove either, but nothing in his experience had prepared him to do battle with this blue-eyed Amazon and he could feel the blood rising warmly beneath his skin.

  Her point made and her position clear, Juliet Dante turned without another word and walked back to the desk. Crisp, whom Varian had already recognized as a man of few words, smirked at him with the belligerence accorded idiots and annoying children.

  The duke drew a slow, calming breath. The wine he had enjoyed earlier now rolled over in his stomach with an audible gurgle and raised a sour bubble in his throat.

  “Excuse me, Captain, but may I at least ask where we are and where we are bound?”

  Juliet answered without glancing up from her charts. “You are about twenty leagues distance from where you were, and you are bound for wherever we take you.”

  “Are you by chance thinking to hold me for ransom? If so, you should know the king is exceptionally … penurious. I doubt he would pay much for my return.”

  “If I had the time to drop you off at a British port, believe me I would, sir, and not ask a farthing for the pleasure of doing so.”

  “In that case, Captain Dante, I would be verily obliged if you would take me to your father.”