The Ransom: Legacy of the King's Pirates

by Marylu Tyndall

Larkin froze. Within seconds, the laughter ceased, replaced by the cock of a dozen pistols and ring of a dozen blades. All pointed at Alex.

  “I’ll run him through before you fire a single shot.” Alex pressed the point, piecing Larkin’s jerkin.

  The man slowly turned around, hands raised at his side. “Then we’ll both be dead. And where does that put your lovely lady?”

  Sweat dampened Alex’s neck. The man had a point. “Then fight me. Man to man. For the brig and the lady. As it should be.”

  “But I already have both.” Larkin gave an insolent shrug.

  “I says he’s right,” one of Larkin’s mutineers shouted. “It be the way of the code.”

  Larkin’s face paled.

  “Aye, a fight to the death, says I, to see who’s fit to be captain!”

  Further shouts of agreement filled the air, from both sides.

  His lip curling, Larkin cast a quick glance over Alex’s shoulder at the approaching ship, then narrowed his eyes. Fear thundered across his face. But then it was gone. “Very well.” He shrugged out of his jerkin and shirt, and Alex did the same. One of Larkin’s men handed him a sword, and he took a stance and leveled it toward Alex.

  “To the death!”

  ♥♥♥

  Juliana was having a nightmare. A horrifying nightmare. No doubt she was still sound asleep in Alex’s cabin, dreaming of pirates and mutinies and sword fights. What else would inhabit her dreams on board a pirate ship? But then, why was perspiration sliding down her back? Why did her heart feel as though it might break every one of her ribs? And why did pain scream up her arms beneath the men’s tight grips? What a vivid dream!

  Trying to settle the blood pounding in her head, she watched as both Larkin and Alex stripped down to naught but breeches and boots. Sunlight glinted off their raised swords as they sized each other up with glares as sharp as their blades. The pirates began cheering and cursing and placing bets, including the two who restrained her as they loosened their grips slightly.

  Alex made the first move, thrusting his blade forward. Larkin stepped aside and gave a taunting chuckle as he swooped in on Alex’s left. But the Pirate Earl was too quick. Leaping out of the way, he swung about and raised his sword high. Larkin met the attack, and their blades rang together in an eerie chime. Both men groaned. Both expressions grew tight.

  The ship canted and the men parted. Larkin swept his cutlass through the air, slicing a line of red on Alex’s chest. Juliana squelched her scream. She didn’t wish to distract Alex as he slunk around Larkin like a panther on the prowl. Sunlight gleamed over his muscles surging from exertion, his biceps bulging, his stomach a rippling shield. Juliana had no idea the power this man had kept hidden beneath his clothing. Surely he could beat the thinner Larkin. Then why did Larkin already wear a confident grin of victory?

  A blast of wind struck them as Alex dove toward Larkin’s right. Larkin met his parry, and their swords clashed hilt to hilt. Jaws clenched, they both groaned, testing the other’s strength before Alex freed his blade and snapped it down to strike Larkin’s leg.

  The man gaped in horror at the red stain blotching his ripped breeches before raising his blade and blindly rushing toward Alex. The Pirate Earl met his advance calmly and the two began to parry back and forth. The chink and clank of blade-on-blade filled the air, joining the pirates’ cheers as they backed out of the way, giving the fighters room. Rays of burning sun reflected off the deck. Juliana squinted. Loose sails flapping above, the Vanity bobbed idly in the turquoise waters as if nothing of import was happening on deck.

  The skill and speed with which both men fought astounded her. She’d never seen the likes of it, even amongst the young upstarts of the nobility. No wonder these pirates ruled the seas. She glanced at the oncoming ship, unsure whether she should pray for it to hurry on its course or not. Regardless of whether ’twas Nichols in command, if it was the Royal Navy, their arrival would mean Alex’s certain death. But it would also mean she’d be spared from being ravished by these pirates. Instead, she breathed a prayer for God to intervene. To save Alex’s life and her purity. Though she truly didn’t expect him to do either. The Almighty had been so silent lately, it seemed he’d abandoned her like everyone else.

  Dodging Larkin’s strike, Alex dove and twisted around, swinging his cutlass down upon the unsuspecting man. Larkin met the blow with a shaky blade that Alex quickly shoved aside, sending Larkin scrambling backward. Catching his balance, he cursed and wiped sweat from his brow. “Death by my blade or by Captain Nichols’s. ’Tis your choice, Alex.” A slight ring of fear betrayed his otherwise pompous tone. “Either way, you are already defeated.”

  “I’ll take neither,” Alex returned, barely breathing hard. “But your end by my blade is certain.” He swooped in and caught Larkin off guard, pricking his thigh. The sailing master groaned and batted Alex’s blade away, springing back. Pain lanced his eyes as sweat streamed down his bare chest.

  The pirates holding Juliana loosened their grip. She glanced at Jonas. He gestured toward something below her, and she followed his gaze to the hilt of a knife sticking out from one of the pirates’s belts. Fie! Even if she was able to reach it, what did the doctor expect her to do with it, surrounded as she was by pirates?

  The clang of blades continued. Alex leveled slash after slash upon Larkin, who met each parry with his own. Off the stern, the Royal Navy frigate loomed larger, along with a desperate choice within her: save her purity or try to save Alex’s life? Her heart knew but one course of action. And the revelation astounded her.

  She loved him. Alexander Hyde, Lord Munthrope, the Pirate Earl. All of him. And she would rather die attempting to save his life than try to save her own.

  Larkin leapt onto the foredeck ladder and Alex chased him, dipping and striking as the hiss of steel filled the air. The pirates cheered, releasing Juliana. Fear buzzed through every nerve. Her next move could quite possibly cause her death.

  Drawing a deep breath, she lifted her leg and kneed the pirate beside her in the groin. He yelped and doubled over. She grabbed his knife and dashed toward Jonas, circling around him. Some of the pirates chased after her, but Alex’s men clustered together in front of Jonas, shoving them back with their bodies. Her hands shook. A pistol fired. A man shouted. A thud sounded.

  She sawed through the ropes binding Jonas’s hands. He spun around, gave her a wink, and took the knife. “Stay out of the way.” Then turning, he cut loose his friends.

  The clash of swords, along with thunderous cheers, still rang through the air as Alex and Larkin continued their dance of death up on the foredeck. Blood pounded like a drum in Juliana’s ears. On wobbly legs, she backed against the bulkhead and strained to peer through the mob.

  Fortunately, only a few of the mutineers even noticed that Alex’s men were being untied. Spinning about, they drew their weapons, their shouts for help lost in the tumult. Within seconds, Jonas had freed the crew, and they stormed the mutineers in a tidal wave of savagery, relieving some of their foe’s weapons before they could react. One unfortunate soul cried out and dropped to the deck beneath a bloody sword. Juliana gasped.

  Alex and Larkin parted for a moment, both eyeing the mayhem below—one with terror, the other with a mischievous grin Juliana knew too well. Oddly, it brought her comfort. Alex said something to Larkin. Whatever it was, it caused the man to dash blindly at Alex, curses firing from his lips. The Pirate Earl turned him aside with a quick shove.

  A pirate flew toward Juliana. She leapt out of the way. He slammed against the bulkhead beside her and crumpled to the deck. Blood gurgled around the blade of a knife stuck in his throat. She screamed and inched away, only to be shoved aside by two battling men. The bitter stench of blood filled the air, joining the sweat of men and fear of death. Terror stole her breath and sent her heart into a panic. She should go below. But she’d have to run the gauntlet of twisting bodies, hefting swords and blades and pistols. Instead, she crept to the larboard railing, knelt and
hugged the bulwarks, wanting so badly to close her eyes on the bloody scene but too afraid to do so.

  The crack of a pistol echoed across the sky. Juliana jumped. A scream and a splash sounded. More men dropped to the deck, their bodies twitching in the throes of death. The brig tilted, and a stream of blood sped toward her. Nausea curdled her stomach. She scooted out of the way. More swords slashed, more knives hit their mark, and more men wrestled for victory. Juliana closed her eyes and prayed.

  Alex’s booming voice broke into her pleadings. The clamor of battle softened. She pried open her eyes to see him holding the tip of his cutlass to Larkin’s throat. Blood spilled from a wound on the villain’s shoulder as he tossed his blade to the deck and raised his hands.

  “Drop your weapons, or I’ll slice him through. And the rest of you with him!” Alex shouted, his chest pitching, his black hair dangling over his shoulders. The few remaining mutineers still fighting did as he ordered, and the air filled with the clanks and thuds of pistols and swords hitting the deck, and then with shouts of victory from Alex’s loyal crew.

  Juliana rose on trembling legs. Tension fled her body as her gaze sought Alex like a beacon on a dark night. His men made quick work of gathering the weapons and corralling the mutineers together on one side of the deck, while Alex shoved Larkin to join them. Then, wiping his bloody sword on his breeches, he turned to face her, such a look of love and relief on his face, it nearly made her topple to the deck again. He caught her before she did and swept her into his arms. Arms still rock hard and twitching from battle. She buried her face in his chest and drank in the smell of him, all blood and sweat and musk and man.

  Taking a step back, he gripped her shoulders and scanned her from head to toe. “Are you hurt?”

  She shook her head. “Just frightened.”

  “’Tis over now. You’re safe.” He drew her close again, barricading her with his arms, and for the first time in a long time, she truly believed that.

  Until a thunderous boom! quaked the sky.

  Chapter 33

  Releasing Juliana, Alex spun to see Nichols’s ship, HMS Viper, coming in under topsails just forty yards off their larboard quarter. A nearby splash revealed the shot’s resting place. Gray smoke curled from one of the two swivels aimed at the Vanity from the warship’s prow. A warning shot.

  The next one would not be.

  The mutineers cheered. Alex’s men gaped at their most feared enemy, eyes wide and faces stark. Releasing Juliana, he brushed hair from her face. Terror streaked across her eyes as she gripped his hand. He gave hers a squeeze and forced himself away, shoving down the realization he’d most likely never hold her close again.

  Jonas approached, his face streaked with blood and sweat. “Orders, Captain.”

  Before Alex could reply, a voice blared from the frigate. Nichols’s voice, magnified and distorted by a speaking cone.

  “This is the His Majesty’s Ship, Viper. Surrender immediately and prepare to be boarded!”

  Alex’s men crowded around him, defiance and fury shoving away the fear on their faces.

  “We can outrun ’em, Cap’n,” Riggs said, scratching the hair springing from his bandana. “I can ’ave main and fore up in no time.”

  “An’ I can load the stern chasers faster than Spittal here can spit,” Bait declared, thumbing toward the cook.

  “Do it!” Alex commanded, sending those men who weren’t guarding the prisoners across the deck and into the shrouds. Yet even before he returned his glance to Nichols’s ship, Alex knew he’d sent them on a futile mission. One more glance showed him the Viper’s bow tearing the sea into a wild foam and coming fast upon the Vanity’s stern.

  “They’ll get a broadside off before we can catch the wind,” Jonas said, rubbing the back of his neck.

  “And they’re perfectly positioned to rake us,” Alex added with a growl. Terror clamped every nerve—terror and anger. Curse Larkin to his grave!

  “Seems your fate has found you, after all,” the defeated mutineer boasted from where he stood pinioned by the barrels of several pistols.

  Nichols’s insidious voice echoed across the water. “You have three minutes to comply, Pirate!”

  Hot wind lashed over Alex, doing naught to cool the sweat streaking his back. A thousand possibilities spun in his head, none of them ending well. Above him, his meager crew sped to raise sails, while at his stern, Bait and his gun crew loaded the chasers that would make but a dent in the warship’s hull.

  The ship creaked over a wave, and Alex raised his gaze to Larkin holding his bloody shoulder but grinning as if he’d just plundered a ship full of jewels.

  “I’d wipe that smile off your face, Larkin, for if I decide to fight, you and your men will be blown to bits same as us.”

  The grin dropped from his face, followed by a bead of sweat as he glanced toward the warship, then over to where Juliana stood. “You wouldn’t allow your lady to die, would you?” He cocked a brow.

  Juliana. Brave, precious Juliana, standing where he’d left her, watching him with tremulous blue eyes and a lump in her throat. Surely Nichols had spotted her. Would he fire upon them and risk doing her harm?

  Larkin, no doubt noting the direction of his gaze, answered him. “Aye, he’ll risk the lady, Captain. He wants you that bad.” He snorted a laugh, then winced at the pain it caused his shoulder.

  “Two minutes!” the voice announced.

  “They’ve run out their larboard guns, Cap’n,” Bait shouted from the stern. “Permission t’ fire?”

  Alex grimaced. If they didn’t stand down, Nichols would rake them with a broadside that would wound them severely and scatter the deck with their flesh. ’Twas a suicide mission.

  Hot daggers of sunlight speared him. Topsails fluttered above, snapping in the wind. The ship lurched. But it wouldn’t be enough.

  “Orders, Cap’n?” one of the gun crew bellowed, desperation charging his tone.

  “Better to fight than be captured!” one of his topmen shouted from above.

  “I’d rather die like a pirate than dance the hempen jig!” another man announced.

  Alex’s sentiments exactly. He’d always known he’d die at sea, fighting, plundering, in command of his own destiny.

  “One minute!” Nichols’s voice thundered over the deck and clamped Alex’s spine like a vise.

  His gaze sped to Juliana, and his choice became clear. To die, and watch her die with him, or to be imprisoned and hanged? He’d always sworn he’d rather fall on his sword than be locked up like an animal, only to then be hanged in dishonor for all to see. But not if that meant the death of the woman he loved. She was an innocent in all this madness, caught in the web of betrayal and wickedness.

  And all because of him.

  He’d rather be hanged a thousand times then see one hair on her head singed.

  “Cap’n?” Bait shouted, but when Alex didn’t answer, he ordered his men to fire on the upsweep.

  “Belay that!” Alex thundered across the deck. “Lower our ensign!”

  Curses flew at him like grapeshot. Defiant scowls faced him. Men continued in their tasks.

  “Do you wish to die?” Alex leapt up the quarterdeck ladder and clung to a line. Wind whipped around him as he shouted across the brig. “To fight when one has a chance, even slim, is bravery. To fight when death is assured is foolishness. Much can happen between now and the noose, gentlemen. Who knows? Perchance Lieutenant Governor Beeston will grant us pardon.” Alex had heard he was soft on pirates.

  “Or we kin escape,” one of his men agreed, rubbing his neck.

  As the men studied the oncoming frigate, more “ayes” tumbled over the deck.

  Still a few of his men defied him. “I’m not fer havin’ the crows peck me flesh!” one of them shouted, approaching Alex, hand on the pommel of his cutlass.

  Alex leapt to the main deck and drew his sword. “Will you fight me now?” He swept the point toward their enemy. “While the frigate blows us to bits?
Come now, use your head, if you’ve still brains within it.” Alex stood his ground. “I said lower the ensign.” He swept a hard glare toward Riggs. The man backed down, and Riggs finally complied.

  Sheaving his cutlass, Alex’s eyes sped to Juliana. Perspiration glistened on her forehead. Golden hair tumbled to her waist and danced in the wind. Admiration shone from her eyes—warming every inch of him—before worry darkened her brow. For him? He would have thought she’d have been relieved to be spared a battle at sea. Regardless, he drew a deep breath. Nichols would not allow Larkin and his men to touch her. She’d finally be safe.

  ♥♥♥

  Juliana paced the tiny cabin that was no bigger than a wardrobe. Two steps forward, two steps back. “Ouch!” Her toe throbbed, and she glanced down to see she’d bumped into the side of her bunk. Yet the pain was naught compared to the despair in her heart. No sooner had Nichols’s ship come alongside the Vanity, than he’d ordered his men to bring her aboard. Her last glance at Alex had been of him being harshly clamped in irons by one of Nichols’s marines. But his eyes had been on her. He’d smiled as if to reassure her all would be well.

  But she knew better.

  Since then, she’d heard the pounding of several boots and thudding of feet above, along with the shout of orders and the thunder of sails as they glutted with wind. The ship had lurched, and water purled against the hull. They were underway. To where, she had no idea.

  One thought kept penetrating her fear. Alex had sacrificed himself for her. As his men argued to fight, she had seen the agony lining his face at the thought of surrender. He was not the type of man to submit to anyone. Not the type of man to quit, to give up, and hand himself over to be locked behind bars. Yet, he had done just that. For her. To save her from injury. To keep her safe. The thought caused tears to fill her eyes.

  A knock rapped the door, followed by the clank of a lock, and a thin man in a crisp blue uniform poked his head inside.

  “The captain requests your company for tea.”

  Wiping her face, Juliana pursed her lips. She’d like nothing more than to reply that he could drown himself in his tea for all she cared, but she was desperate for news of Alex, so she allowed the steward to lead her to the main cabin.