Aware of the dangers that could be awaiting me inside the Spanish captain’s cabin, I tucked behind a barrel and quickly reloaded one of my pistols. Upon my slow and quiet entry, I got a glimpse of what the snake was up to. Ah, shit. He had a woman in there. But his flight had not been to protect her, no, he was yelling at her, viciously. Sitting on her knees, the pretty little thing hastily flipped through the pages of a book as he rushed her along with what seemed to be insulting shouts. Then he slapped her. Damn it. Spanish lady or not, I couldn’t allow that.
Just as I made my presence known, the trumpet sounding for surrender blew on deck. Like my victims, I jumped in surprise. Setting her sights on me, the little lady dressed in red shuddered in fright, holding the big book tight to her chest. The snake met my gaze with his pistol aimed. I fired first. My musket ball lodged in his chest long before he had a chance to pull his trigger. As he slumped over, the lady hopped to her feet—book in hand—and bolted for the stern windows.
Knowing that those bloody Dons would rather lose their important information to the sea than let it fall in the hands of a buccaneer, I figured her intention was to toss it overboard. That was enough to signify its importance. She had to be stopped.
I ran after her. Given my only choice to halt her plans to shatter my own, I used her momentum against her and shoved her past the windows. She fell to her face, squawking in Spanish as she slid across the wooden floor, “Eres un hombre horible!”
Stepping toward her with my second gun aimed at her face, I did something I hated doing, I spoke Spanish. “Dame el libro,” I said while gesturing for her to hand me the book.
Staring at me with sad, worried eyes, she shook her head no. “Por favor, no me duele.”
The fear in her expression weighed heavy on my heart. Why the hell did it have to be a woman holding tight to the item I desired? No. Damn it. I couldn’t let her get to me. This was business, and war, for God’s sake. I needed what she had and she would have to give it up or suffer the consequences.
Though I knew damn well I wasn’t going to shoot her—not only because she was a woman, but because my gun was no longer loaded—I pulled back the hammer to emphasize the threat.
Considering her fearful pose, I had expected her to surrender her cause, but rather, I watched her expression shift like that of a chameleon. No longer appearing to be afraid for her life, she steeled her eyes at me. I could tell she was sizing me up. Aye, measuring my character through her judgmental gaze. Was I the kind of monster who would harm a woman? Would I pull the trigger on her like I did on the man who had just slapped her?
Watching her eyes faintly tilt towards the window, I figured she was considering the odds of taking the leap. No matter what the hell she had been thinking, or debating, one thing was for certain—whatever was in that book was worth dying for, because the bitch took the risk.
Jumping to her feet, she bolted for the window again. This time, she chucked a dagger at me as she fled. Not expecting such a crafty defense from such a well-dressed woman, I was barely able to dodge the blade, but I did. Yet, my relief was brashly diminished by the sight of her pulling another knife from her bodice. Shit. Picking up the nearest chair, I held it like a shield and let out a desperate yelp, “Parejo, mujer! Parejo!”
She didn’t stop. Oh no. Next thing I knew the knife was flying in my direction. The sound of the blade thudding into my shield was quickly followed by her unearthly shriek, “Te mataré sí vienes mas cerca, un lobo de mar.”
Having no idea what she had said, and getting tired of this senseless fight, I stepped in her direction. “Just give me the book and I’ll leave you alone.”
She threw another damn knife.
How the hell many did she have? Taking my chances against her having another, I tossed the chair and charged in her direction.
Letting out a crazed cry, she tried to run from me but I tackled her to the ground. The book flew out of her hands. She tried to reach for it, but I pulled her towards me and flipped her over to her back. While I held her arms down, she kicked and flailed beneath me. I braced her legs with mine. Once she could no longer move, she finally silenced. She glowered at me at first, but once again the chameleon shifted shades. No longer looking like she wanted to claw my eyes out, she gazed deep into mine with an absurdly provocative expression.
Damn. Enemy or not, she was one saucy wench. Her light eyes were big and enchanting, her olive complexion was as smooth as her dark locks were silky, and her rose-red lips were plump and juicy like a ripe fruit ready to be bit into. I fell deeper into the spell she was casting as she licked those pretty lips, but as she moved in to kiss me I remembered what led us to this unexpectedly tempting position. The book.
Putting my hand atop her head, I shoved her downward and propelled myself towards the prize. Just before I reached it she managed her way out from under my weight, jumped on my back, and yanked on my hair. Shouting out as she pulled my head away from my destination, I reached behind me to grab her. She was too fast.
“Nunca!” she screamed as she raced for the book.
I darted for it as well. Small and wiry, she beat me to it. Before I could snatch it from her tricky little hands, she reached out and clawed at my face like a wildcat. Infuriated by the searing pain she left burning on my face, I roared like a madman. It took all the strength I had to keep myself from slapping her. During my pause, the chameleon, who now looked like a devil-blooded witch, ripped out a page in the book.
“No. No. Don’t do that,” I yelled as I tried to pry the possibly salvageable pieces from her claws. To my unpleasant surprise she shoved the precious pieces of parchment in her mouth. Being that my hand was mixed up in the pile, she bit down hard on my finger while she was at it.
Jerking my hand away as I shouted out in pain, I was forced to come to terms with my loss. She’d won the stupid game. I had kept the page from being swallowed by the sea, but a goddamn Spanish bonita ate it instead. Well, most of it. Watching her spit out the pieces she couldn’t swallow without choking, and noticing how the ink had smeared beyond recognition from the moisture of her saliva, my anger intensified. If she were a man I would have cut her treacherous little hands off. But she wasn’t. She was a pretty little woman in a fancy red dress and she would need to be dealt with otherwise.
Grabbing her by the arm, I flung her towards the table and pulled out my rope. The chameleon kicked and flailed like a child throwing a fit as I tied her to the chair. Though I couldn’t understand a word she was saying, I was horribly annoyed by her shrill little voice. Beyond just being bound, she would also be gagged.
Even with my sash wrapped tightly around her mouth she kept screaming at me. But her nattering voice was muffled enough for me to be able to ignore her. Glad to be out of the reach of her claws and fangs, I took a deep breath and wiped the sweat from my forehead. What a day it had been, but it was far from over.
Hurrying to the book at last, I picked the heavy thing up, and carried it to the table where I took a seat in the captain’s chair. Looking forward to finding out just what the snake and the chameleon had risked their lives to preserve, I opened the leather bound cover.
As I had hoped it would be, the book was a journal. It belonged to Juan Cabello, the captain of Mariposa de Oro, and the leader of the fleet which was guarding her. Naturally, all of his entries were written in Spanish. Though I never cared to speak Spanish, I had studied enough Spanish maps to understand a few crucial words. In this case, the list of passengers and provisions on board made sense to me. Above all else, the thing that instantly caught my eye, was the description of the one woman on board. Annabella Acosta, first born daughter of Don Acosta, the governor of Maracaibo. Sink me. Looking at the chameleon, tied and gagged, then thinking back on the hellacious violence she’d inflicted upon me, I laid my face in my hand and laughed. “So the plot thickens.”
Quickly flipping through the pages—that would, among other things, clarify the importance of us now having hold of Annabella Aco
sta—I grazed over the dates and general pattern of the notes taken. To my great fortune, Captain Juan Cabello had written nearly every day along this journey, and better yet, he was an artist. A mighty fine one at that. In these pages he had drawn every port they would have refilled their provisions at. The Spanish scribbling atop the drawings most certainly had to explain the features of the inlets and forts, but judging by the length of the passages on the following pages, I assumed them to state events that had occurred there.
This book was pure gold. The information here would surely give us inside details on our enemies places of business, and possibly their plans. I would need a translator. But not just anyone could be trusted with this knowledge. Knowing Reid spoke and read Spanish, and had an uncanny way of holding tight to secret information, I figured he’d be the best man to share this with. Half of me wanted to leap up and find him now, but I was too enthralled by the artwork, and too intrigued by the mystery of the words that were beyond my comprehension.
My interest deepened when I turned to the next drawing. It was a view of Nombre de Dios from the shore. The fortified walls and the buildings showing beyond them were shaped just like they were the day I had last set sight on them…the same day I’d last laid eyes on my father. All those painful memories came rushing through my mind as I eyed the stone walls rising from the shore. Gazing upon the living quarters in the drawings, I remembered how that area looked surrounded by blazing flames. Judging by this drawing, the Spaniards had rebuilt their little town after we’d destroyed it, and it looked comparable to what it was before that day. But I was nothing of the same. That day had changed me—marred me—forever. The boy who had sailed into that war alongside his father, was left behind in the dirt he died in.
Hearing the chameleon groan in discomfort, I remembered where I was and what I was doing. Snapping back into my current reality, I turned the page. More writing. Three full pages of it. There were a few sketches doodled along the margins. One was of a pretty native girl, with the name Dulce written beneath it and there were flowers and stars and swirls all over the place. The old bloke must have had himself a romantic little visit in Nombre de Dios. It was while chuckling about that, that I turned to the page the chameleon had eaten.
The drawing beside the missing page was of a large wooden door. The surrounding wall was made of stone, dark stones, and there were vines covering a good portion of the planks that were secured by a mighty lock. The words explaining Cabello’s reason for drawing this door were now laying wet and unreadable before me and swimming in the pits of the chameleon’s stomach, but I allowed the symbol that was burned into the wood to seer itself in my mind. There was something of great value hiding behind it. Something Captain Cabello didn’t want anyone to find. Aye, he must have sent the snake in here to rid the world of this information, and for some reason the governor of Maracaibo’s knife throwing daughter also understood the value of this mysterious prize.
Hearing the door creak open, I tucked the book away in my coat, and grabbed my sword. To my relief, it was Black James Reid. Flynn was behind him, but stopped for a moment to say something to Joseph Rolland before entering.
“Mister Bentley,” Reid nodded as he sat down at my table.
Shooing Rolland away, Flynn shut the door behind him and came in to join us. “Ah, glad to see you’re still up and breathing, Bentley. I saw you run in here after that bloke, but I was too busy slicing through those Spanish dogs like fresh cheese to come to your rescue.”
Fanning my hand past my victims, one dead and one tied, I grinned. “As you can see, I handled myself just fine.”
Reid lustfully eyed the wench in the red dress. “Fine indeed. Who is this saucy little doxy?”
“I’ll tell you all about her in a bit, but first, update me of the outcome on deck.”
While sifting through the cabinets, Flynn said, “We won. This bitch is ours and our men are forcing the Spanish survivors in their longboats. But Reid here told the men to wait to cast them off until we figured out what was going on in here.”
“Good. Where’s my Black Rose?”
Pulling out as many wine bottles as he could carry, Flynn said, “Your Black Rose is all right. That was Rolland at the door asking how you were so he could tell her. I told him you were fine and dandy reading your books, and commanded him to keep her out of your hair while we work.”
Relieved that she was alive, I was happy to relax in my chair and accept a bottle of wine. After taking a massive swig, I belched. “I needed that. Now, to answer your question about the doxy.” I waved my hand around to showcase the lovely, but dangerous lady. “Looks like we’ve got our hands on the governor of Maracaibo’s daughter.”
Rubbing his hands together greedily, Flynn said, “Well, that ups the value of our prize now, don’t it?”
“Indeed it does.” Reid twisted the tip of his blood covered mustache, then looked at me like I was a child in trouble. “Which leads me to ask why you have such a fine and important prize tied and gagged like a hog.”
Using the finger imbedded with her teeth marks, I pointed at the scratch marks she’d left on my face. “Because she clawed me up like a hellcat, bit me like a dog, and tossed more blades at me than I’ve seen in all my pitiful days.”
I let them laugh at me for a moment, then pulled the book out of my coat. “She was defending this.”
The room fell silent as they gazed upon Captain Juan Acosta’s journal.
Turning back the cover, I said, “By the way the lady and her friend fussed over this thing, I reckon we’ve got our hands on something big.” Suddenly remembering the visual of the snake slapping her face, I said, “Hell, it could be even more valuable than she is.”
Drinking the tasty wine, I told them all that had happened since I’d set sight on the snake, and then took my time explaining what I had discovered within the book itself. Reid quickly took to translating the passages. It turned out I was right about the personal experiences, and there was indeed a great deal of information offered on the Spanish ports, but it was especially amusing when Reid dramatically expressed the artist’s passionate feelings for his beloved Dulce.
Our laughter halted when he came to the missing page.
“She ate it,” I informed them.
“Ate it?” Reid asked as if he didn’t believe me.
“Aye. Chomped it up like a tasty treat, she did.” I laid out the few worthless pieces she had spit out.
Flynn started laughing. “I would have paid to watch the show that took place in here today.”
I laughed, too. “Hopefully this information eventually pays me enough to one day think it was worth the trouble.”
“Well, gentlemen. We’re about to find out what she was so hungry to protect.” Reid stood up and walked towards the chameleon.
“Watch out, she bites.” I chuckled as he removed the band from her pretty face.
Before she could spit out a foul word, Reid offered her a compassionate greeting. “Hola, Senorita Annabella. Lo siento que mi navegador le trato en la manera terrible.”
Though I couldn’t understand all the words they were saying, it was rather amusing watching them talk. At first, she was defiant as hell—like she had been with me—but she eventually loosened up under his sultry charm. Before long that old man had the saucy young vixen who was tied to a chair giggling like a lover he had under his sheets.
Looking at Flynn, I let out an exhausted laugh. “You know, my father often told me it would be wise to learn to speak Spanish. I can read some of it and can say a few words, but occasionally I regret not taking the time to become more fluent in the language. Like today. It would have saved me a lot of trouble had I been able to speak sweet to her en español.”
After laughing at my shitty attempt of the Spanish accent, Flynn said, “Ah, I’ve wooed plenty of foreign girls without speaking their language. It’s all about the charm.” He went on to tell me a handful of tales about the times he’d conquered the language barrier with pretty
ladies around the world. Of course, I shared a few of my own success stories as well.
We amused ourselves with this subject until Reid came back to the table. After taking a deep breath and a slow sip of wine, he shared the news. “Well, she told me everything.”
“Everything? Just like that?” I chuckled, thinking back on all the hell she had caused me.
“Oh yes. Much more than she needed to. It’s all about the charm, mate.” Reid flashed a cocky grin. I heard Flynn snicker as Reid went on, “It seems that Captain Acosta had found a fancy for Annabella and while sharing his bed with her, he shared his secrets as well. So after I informed her that Acosta had…passed, her face flushed with worry.” Reid’s dark eyes lit up with a mischievous grin. “Understanding her sad and helpless predicament, I promised her security, and comfort in a room of her own at my mansion until these matters are resolved. I also guaranteed her safe passage home if she would share with me what Acosta did not want us to find.
Wishing to return to her father, the lovely Annabella confessed that she had seen what was behind that door in the drawing. In fact, she was there when he drew it and the map of the tunnels leading to it—which of course, was on the sheet she ate. Apparently, Mariposa was not capable of carrying all the gold awaiting her in Nombre de Dios, and now, double the weight of what we just acquired is currently locked away behind that door, under heavy guard.
It was Juan Cabello’s job to send word to Maracaibo about this miscalculation, but now that we have taken his ship, Spain will not be receiving this very important message. This gives us the current advantage, but time is of the essence. To help raise our odds of retrieval, Annabella said she’d be willing to draw us a map showing the quickest route through town and one that will guide us through the series of underground passages, cutting our time and effort in two. That is, if we agree to take on this mission.”
Gunpowder & Gold (Justified Treason, Book 4): Endless Horizon Pirate Stories Page 19