She did as he’d commanded, and, one by one, her warts evaporated.
“I never meant to hurt all those people,” Gremma said. “Fortunata bewitched me. I feel so ashamed.”
“You know why she banished you from the palace all those years ago, don’t you?” he asked.
“Because I practiced spells on you and the household staff.”
“Because you were more powerful than she, and Fortunata couldn’t stand it.”
This seemed to surprise her. “But—”
“She sought you out to help her in her evil deeds. Probably promised you would be welcomed back to the soft bosom of our family.”
Her cheeks reddened. “Er. Ah. Something like that.”
He reached into his pocket and produced the black candle. “This candle, once it has burned down, will kill you.”
Gremma stared at him. “Why? How?”
“I know my sister told you that it had horse blood on it. Cillian’s blood, to be precise.”
Gremma’s gaze shifted from left to right. She’s mortified. She can no longer look me in the eye.
“But you made a grave error. She didn’t cut Cillian and make a spell to harm me. She did it to kill you.”
“That’s ridiculous. I’ve done everything she’s asked.”
“Yes. And the ultimate test was that you had no idea what Cillian was.”
She scrunched her nose. “A horse, wasn’t he?”
“Yes, and no.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“He was a descendent of the horse goddess, Epona.”
Gremma gasped. “And I killed him?” She blinked continuously as she tried to absorb this.
“I can help you atone for this, but you must listen to me and follow my instructions to the letter.”
Gremma cried, burying her face in her hands. “How could I not have known he was a special horse?”
Merritt grabbed her hands. “My sister cursed you. Controlled you. She took all your powers, as she did mine. She allowed you enough magic to help her with her spells but you couldn’t even see that she had hexed the land around you. I realize now that Cillian died after eating the grass outside your house.”
“My God. She’s ruined me!” Gremma cried.
Merritt tried to calm her. “I can help, I promise you, but we don’t have much time. Are you ready to be stronger than you’ve ever been in your life?”
She looked at him, and in that moment she seemed to pull herself together. “Yes. Yes, I can do this.”
He grabbed her hand and the cloak, and they ran outside as rain fell so hard it seemed the very sky was about to collapse. God. Fortunata was angry.
So was Merritt. They came to the spot where Cillian had died but the horse was gone. Merritt put his fingers to his lips and whistled. From a distance, Merritt detected the soft whinnying answering his call, followed by the uncertain clomp of hooves.
“Quick,” Merritt muttered and dragged Gremma through the rain.
“Merritt!” a female voice shouted. Fortunata.
In the distance, the shaky form of Cillian hovered into view. Merritt was so pleased to see the horse and to know he’d been able to undo Fortunata’s vile magic that, at first, all he could do was touch the magnificent creature. Cillian put his head on Merritt’s shoulder. Merritt received the message loud and clear.
“Come on!” he shouted to Gremma. “Get on his back. He’ll take you where you need to go, then tell him to meet me in the ha-ha.” He hoisted Gremma astride the horse. Most of her warts were gone and only half her hands were gnarled.
“You trust me?” She seemed stunned.
“No. But I trust him. One wrong move, Gremma, and I’ll kill you myself.”
Cillian turned gentle, trusting eyes on Merritt but walked away with Gremma clinging to his back. He would get stronger the longer they walked and the farther they got away from this place. Merritt closed his eyes and tried to locate his sister. All he saw was a wall of darkness.
Good.
For once, he’d blocked her and she couldn’t read him. It didn’t matter that it meant he couldn’t read her. He had places to go and a certain pirate’s court case to attend. He took the cloak that Gremma had woven and threw it over his shoulders. He would destroy it before he reached the court. Then, finally, the wretchedness Fortunata had wrought would be stopped.
Once and for all.
* * * *
Prison cell, Soriano Island…
The cell door jangled, and Denny opened an eye, unwilling to leave his beautiful dreamship. His hand was down his pants, so he quickly removed it. He glanced over his shoulder, surprised to see two Unseelie fairies there.
“Court is back in session,” they tittered in unison.
He’d expected to re-enter the courtroom with Ebba and Barthelmass. He hoisted himself off the bed, nervous again. The dream had seemed so real it was painful to have to leave it. He’d returned to his ship after that sensational adventure with Merritt only to find Fortunata waiting for him.
“My brother’s back in the sickbay. I fear he overdid it today.”
Stricken with guilt, Denny hadn’t been able to stop blaming himself. But Fortunta had seemed in buoyant spirits.
“I should check on him,” Denny had said.
“You should eat the wonderful meal I prepared for you,” she’d responded. She had made him a lavish dinner, plying him with rich red local wine and baked chicken with vegetables, the likes of which he’d never tasted.
Then, she’d attempted to seduce Denny, who’d rejected her. It had been horrible. He’d sprouted fairy wings and total panic in equal measure. Day and night, the dreadful scene played over and over in his head. Brother and sister had left the ship without Denny seeing or speaking to either again. All these months later, he had no idea how Merritt felt, or if Merritt missed him, too.
Now he was facing the courtroom again, that horrible place that would probably make him talk about what happened with Fortunata. With each new thing Ebba read aloud, it felt as though she was tossing knives into Denny’s heart. His thoughts flew to Polly. He’d dreamed of his long search for her. Being incarcerated, he feared he was missing out on updates on her whereabouts. He’d wanted to head to Australia himself and had put away enough money to make such a trip. Now it seemed as though it had all been for naught.
Denny felt stricken by his helplessness. He could never have predicted that hearing details about his mother could hurt so much. The court would pick apart every aspect of his life. He screwed his eyes shut. He couldn’t stand thinking about the things they said about his mother. Ebba knew more about her than he did. He’d had no idea she’d written to his dad, who had never mentioned it, but then Denny and his dad never spoke anymore. His life sounded worse when related by other people.
He allowed the fairies to fly him back to the courtroom and half hoped they’d drop him in the moat, but they didn’t. They were strong and tough little blighters and managed to get him safely to the witness box. Once again, the bars snapped into place, the box rose, and, feeling like a caged animal, Denny took a moment to scan the courtroom.
His heart gave a lurch. A man dressed in an unusual kind of cape with a hood covering most of his face sat in the far left corner high against the roof. Denny could keep looking up during the trial and watch him. The man in the habit didn’t move. Denny couldn’t see his face but he knew it was him.
Am I ever going to see or touch that sweet face again? he wondered, his soul feeling like it might tear in two.
Since everybody else was busy gossiping, he sat in his seat observing the crowd as they, too, once again, took their places. The jury came in, led by the twin seers. The elderly black man with the telescope followed them. He stood right in front of Denny and stared at him through the spyglass. He lowered it for a moment, and Denny was surprised to see that the juror’s eye had been sewn shut. There was no eye. The flesh around it had been slashed and scarred, but it was through this patch of skin th
at he studied Denny.
He bowed at Denny, who bent his head in acknowledgment, then scurried off to his seat. Denny wondered how the old man had managed to receive such a savage injury and, considering his advanced years, wondered if the man had dueled at dawn. His face appeared to have been cut by a sword.
The tall, thin, darkly dressed man with the necklace of human teeth came next, then a young African-looking woman in traditional garb. Denny recognized the textiles of her voluminous outfit as being Akwete cloth from the Igboland province in Nigeria. The fabric was made of hemp, which had intrigued Denny when he’d first transported the raw material to the Caribbean. It had interested him because of his early workhouse employment. There seemed to be constant reminders of it here.
He gazed at the woman, fascinated by her animated chatter with one of the twin seers. He had learned that the material was often used for masquerades and head gear for tribal warriors. The thought kept tumbling in his mind. Masquerade. Is she masquerading now? There was a middle-aged man who reminded Denny of a rooster with his cock’s comb-like red hair, but the person who most delighted him was the elderly woman dressed in bright pink, purple and lime-green. Her hair was a glorious shade of fuchsia. He couldn’t stop staring at it.
She had a raucous laugh when court wasn’t in official action and slapped her knee constantly, rocking back and forth with mirth at anything anyone said to her, even when it didn’t seem to be funny. Denny loved her hair. He’d always wished he’d had a grandma, a loving, kind lady who would tuck him into a soft, warm bed and make him cocoa. This lady seemed just the type to do that. He bet she made a good porridge too.
But his family wasn’t like that. They weren’t warm, touchy-feely types. His mother lacked the maternal gene, his father preferred his ‘other woman’ and Denny had never met any of his grandparents.
“Be lucky,” his mother had said to him one time. “You would hate them. Your pa and I do. Royally!”
The jurors seemed animated and quirky in their own ways. He made up little histories for them in his mind. I really should write, I have such a fertile imagination. He looked around for Ebba and Barthelmass. They were standing in the middle of the courtroom and seemed to be in the middle of a heated discussion. That was not encouraging.
Suddenly, Pegasus snorted and pawed at the ground. Everybody stopped talking and rushed to their seats. After everybody had settled, the judge restored order in the courtroom with his gavel. Ebba stood and asked her first question of Denny.
“We haven’t yet discussed your mutiny. Is it true Captain Lester Piggins was a cruel man?”
“He was. And I daresay he still is. I believe he’s endured no less than three mutinies.”
“What is it about him that’s so terrible?”
“He rapes, plunders, pillages, all while pretending to be an honorable man.” Denny paused. Thinking of Piggins made his blood boil. “He let me and several of my senior officers languish in a prison in Tarragona. I later found out he was involved in a high-stakes game of mountebank, a Spanish card game. Piggins had perfected a kind of scam of the game and wanted to keep in the good graces of the jailers so he left us there.”
“And what happened there?”
“I was sexually abused. It was known to Piggins, but still he allowed it to continue.”
The twin seers shook their heads in unison. Denny kept his wits about him. Yes, he’d learned much at Christoph’s hand, but the fact remained, Piggins had known that Denny was being taken daily to Christoph’s office but had done nothing to help.
Denny tried not to dwell on the subject and found it hard to look people in the eye.
Ebba cleared her throat, making Denny catch her attention. “When you staged your mutiny, what did you do to Piggins?”
Denny looked at her. “He had swindled some sailors in a game of mountebank in the same sea port where he’d let his crew suffer. These were young lads who could ill afford to lose their wages. I took command of the crew and the ship when Piggins refused to return the money he’d falsely won. I handed him over to the authorities there.”
A handful of courtroom watchers burst into applause until the judge banged his gavel. “Enough!” he cried.
“And as far as you know, he’s no longer in prison and has moved on to captain other ships,” Ebba said.
“Yes.”
“We talked earlier of your many rescues of slaves. Would you say the portions of oceans known as the Triangular Transatlantic Slave Trade is a popular target for pirates such as yourself?”
Where is she going with this? “I guess so,” he said, warily.
She gave him an odd look he interpreted as ‘Go on’.
So he did. “Cargo ships traveling from Europe to the African coast, as an example, would trade manufactured goods and weapons for slaves. The traders would then sail to the Caribbean to sell the slaves. They would return to Europe with sugar, tobacco and cocoa. Some of the ships heading to Europe would carry raw materials such as different metals, stone and wood, in exchange for things like manufactured goods, preserved cod and rum. Some of these would then be taken to the Caribbean, where they were exchanged for sugar and molasses.”
“So it is a profitable business.”
“Yes. A hard business. Some ships struggle with storm damage and food shortage, but yes, it’s a profitable line of work.”
“And your ship, the La-Di-Da, made money?”
“Well, yes. Ships that traded in the Triangular Transatlantic Slave Trade were able to make money at each stop.”
“And being a pirate ship, you were able to make money this way, too?”
“Yes. We didn’t hoist the pirate flag when we pulled into port. Only on the high seas.”
Ebba nodded. “That’s why you were able to get away with piracy for so long.”
He thought for a moment. “Yes. We’d also switched routes. A lot of piracy had left the North Atlantic Ocean—”
“Why?”
“They are notoriously tough waters. Bad storms that sometimes last for days. We were all experienced seamen and took advantage of the dwindling pirate trade.”
“So even though you were making money, you still saw fit to attack other vessels and kill the people on board?”
Some of the courtroom watchers gasped. Denny flicked a gaze up to the hooded man who twitched in his seat.
“That’s what pirates do,” Denny said, “though I took pride in not killing men. I have personally killed less than ten.”
“But didn’t you have a crewmember you rescued from a ship that sank in Honduras who went mad and shot seventeen people at sea?”
Another collective gasp.
“That never happened under my command. That was before we staged our mutiny. Our captain was a cruel man, a drunk. He took on a rigger who said he needed work. I’d heard he was part of a gang that had stolen a sloop and had pirated all over the islands, but the captain wouldn’t listen to me. The first ship we encountered, Jackson Garfield—that was the rigger’s name—he grabbed some guns and started shooting. We were able to restrain him, and when we landed in Honduras, he was forced to leave the ship. We learned his gang had pirated another ship and had stolen a container of logs that had been destined for Boston.”
“So these were bad men.”
“Yes.”
“But you didn’t kill any of them.”
Denny smiled. “No.”
“But you killed a very good man. An Italian explorer you and your pirate crew picked up in Seville.”
Denny hated her in that moment, more than he had ever hated another living being. He breathed deeply, ready to scream with the pain and unfairness of having to kill such a wonderful man. He fought tears and looked down at his hands. In that moment, he understood where she was going. This was one of his worst memories. It had destroyed him to take the life of Giovanni Ricci. It had been such an ordeal that he recalled every second of it and regretted the necessity to end his life to this very day.
“Yes,”
he said, his voice coming out a whisper. He blinked back tears. He’d always suspected he’d never get over what had happened, but now he knew for sure.
“Please tell the court the circumstances of this killing.”
Denny sighed. “Our ship stopped in Seville and we discovered a few crewmembers from an Italian ship that had been damaged in a storm. The Rigoletta was in such poor condition, it required months of strenuous repair. The Italian explorer, Giovanni Ricci, who had led the expedition had sailed far off course and told me that his crew had sickened during their voyage. Some had died. He wanted to return to Bilbao, another town in Spain, where two of his remaining crewmembers had been taken in by monks who were caring for them. He was worried about them. I gladly took him and the three crewmen accompanying him. He was enamored of canned food, as many seamen are—”
“Why is that?” Ebba asked.
“One gets sick of rancid meat that is salted to preserve it. With canned food, you can enjoy things like New York oysters, or French sardines canned right there in the beautiful port of Nantes. Nothing is more delicious than canned Italian fruit.” He grinned at the memory of his first bite of canned peaches. “Pennsylvania tomatoes are other foods we seamen adore.”
“So what happened?” Ebba drew him away from his reverie. Unfortunately.
“Signore Ricci was trying to be as unobtrusive as possible. He didn’t want special meals cooked for him, though I became aware very quickly that he was quite ill. His crewmembers seemed to be starving and fell upon the food we gave them. Signore Ricci refused to be a burden. He had a few remaining cans of food and ate one. Have you ever seen lead poisoning?”
“No,” Ebba said. “I have not.”
“I have,” the twin seers said in unison, raising their hands.
Every head in the courtroom turned in their direction.
“’Tis a cruel death,” they said as one.
Denny became choked up and struggled to continue. “This poor man had no idea that he was making himself sick. When he opened one of the cans, my cook realized it smelled bad. The food was gray in color, but Signore Ricci insisted on eating it. He had no clue that the contents were poisoned with lead because of cheap manufacturing. He became extremely ill on board. He fell into delirium. We could not get him to Bilbao fast enough.”
The Pirate Fairy Page 12