Blow Me Down (16 page)

“Ah. Is it? Well, then, ye’d best be answerin’ it, hadn’t ye? If it’s instant and all.” She heaved herself to her feet, hand on her back as she straightened up. “I’ll be on me way home. Will we be seein’ ye for dinner, or just supper?”

“Supper only, I think. I’ll have lunch with Bart, or do a bit of inventorying at the fruit stall for a few things.”

She nodded and scurried off before I could say anything else, which was just fine with me. I took a quick look around to make sure no one else was lurking in the wings, then ran my eyes over the letter quickly.

—Ibid, Act II

“Ahoy, lass,” Bart said as one of his ruffian pirates opened the door for me to enter the library. Standing around the room were Pangloss and four other men I didn’t recognize, but all of them wore the air of men who spent more time at sea than onshore.

“Hoy, Bart,” I said politely, giving Pangloss a little wave. “I understand that you wanted to see me?”

“Aye, we’re havin’ a council of war, and since Pangloss tells me ye be right at home on yer ship, I’ve decided to temporarily overlook the fact that ye haven’t yet fulfilled yer duties to the crew, and include ye in the council of war.”

“War?” I wasn’t about to touch his reference to my supposed assassination of Corbin. Bart could hold his breath until he was blue—it wasn’t going to happen. “What sort of war? The kind with guns and cannons and blood and people dying? That sort of war? Or a virtual pretend war where no one really gets hurt?”

The men all stared at me like I had toadstools sprouting from the top of my head. I sighed and scratched them all off my Potential Paul list. “Right. The bloody kind.”

“All war is bloody, lass,” Pangloss said grimly, and I knew he was thinking about the brother he’d lost in Corbin’s raid on the island. Despite knowing that none of the men who died were real, I was having more and more trouble separating my emotions for the people I met here from the emotions I had for the people I knew in real life. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for the survivors and made a mental note to have a talk with Corbin about the hostilities between him and Bart. A game with pirates was one thing, but when they started killing people . . . well, that was something else entirely.

“Aye, and this one will likely be especially bloody,” Bart agreed. He hurried through introductions of the four officers, all of whom leered at me in the best pirate style before passing around a bottle of rum. I declined the rum, slumping into the chair Bart offered me and watching as he unrolled a map on the surface of a lovely rosewood desk. “ ’Tis come to me ears that Black Corbin allied his crew with the Jolie Rouge.”

The four officers sucked in startled breaths. I leaned sideways a little and whispered a question to Pangloss.

“They be a powerful crew from the French Indies,” he answered softly. “Dangerous, deadly, and ’tis said their captain has made a pact with Beelzebub himself to rule all of the islands in the Seventh Sea.”

“Great, just what we need . . . another bloodthirsty, land-hungry pirate,” I grumbled.

“It may be just a rumor, since none of Henri Massant’s men have been sighted on Mongoose, but knowin’ that devil Corbin”—Bart paused long enough to shoot me a look filled with unspoken criticism, no doubt for the fact that Corbin was still alive; I made a face at him—“I’ll not be discountin’ it. So we’ve to prepare for an all-out blockade, mates.”

“What about Conard over on Ellipse?” one of the officers asked. “He’s an ally, ain’t he?”

Bart shook his head. “He’s by way of havin’ his own hands full with the Spanish attackin’ Ellipse. We’ll see no help from Conard. We’re alone in this, lads. I won’t lie to ye and say it hasn’t come at a bad time, but we’ll pull through it so long as we can hold the harbor.”

“We’ve the new guns,” Pangloss said, frowning.

“The thirty-two-pound guns, aye, but they’re not in place yet. If the devil attacks us afore the guns are secured, we’ll be left to rely on the sixteen-pounders.”

The men looked somber. I wanted to ask about the cannons but figured I was there on forbearance and had better keep my mouth shut until I knew what was going on.

Then I’d step in and organize things if their plans weren’t feasible.

“There be four guns on the leeward side of the island, just atop Careenin’ Cove, in case Black Corbin is up to his old tricks,” Bart continued. “We’ll divide our forces between that spot and the harbor. I’ll command the defensive land force. As for ships . . . Pangloss will be in charge of that. Ye’ll be responsible for battlin’ the blockade ships as best ye can, and keepin’ them from enterin’ the harbor.”

My eyes widened, but I managed to stop before I squeaked out a startled, “Me?”

Bart pointed to the map with the tip of his dagger. “They’ll be likely to bring in their big warships for the blockade—frigates and square riggers. It’ll be up to ye to harry them with yer sloops and barques. We’re short on men, so ye’ll have to do the best ye can, but use yer speed to damage the warships as much as ye can . . . without sinkin’, of course.”

“Of course,” I murmured, part of my mind screaming insanely, the other part feeling a strange excitement at the thought of taking my sleek, pretty sloop into a real battle. Pangloss had told me many a tale of how the small, fast ships could be used to damage the larger, slower, bulkier warships, and despite my protest, I felt pretty confident about my abilities to captain my ship.

What was I thinking? I didn’t want war! I wanted Corbin and Bart to work out their issues in a reasonable manner. War, even virtual, was not good. While Bart went over specifics of what he wanted the officers to do, I spent a few moments alternating between panic about what he was asking of me, until recently the landlubberiest of all landlubbers, sharing the growing excitement and grim determination that the men exuded, and listening to the sane voice in my head as it told me the solution to the problem was not force, but an amicable end to hostilities worked out with logic and organization.

“Ye’ll be needin’ a flag,” Bart said to me, interrupting my musings.

“A flag? Oh, a pirate flag? Skull and crossbones?”

“Nay,” Bart said with a smile, opening a drawer in the desk and tossing me a yard-long rectangular bit of black cloth. I held it up to admire the image on it: the white silhouette of a man standing on a red heart, which had been stabbed with a knife. The letters BC were written on the handle of the knife. “ ’Tis me own design. That’s Black Corbin’s bleedin’ heart I’m standin’ on, stabbed with his own knife.”

“Eh,” I said, folding it up. “Very . . . um . . . vengeful.”

“Aye, it is. Ye’ll be flyin’ me flag so the devils know who ye are as ye blast their ships full of lead.”

“Cap’n,” Pangloss said, looking at me thoughtfully. “I’m thinkin’ there’s somethin’ we’re overlookin’ with the lass’s ship.”

The ship, nothing. They were overlooking the fact that I was the least experienced person in the room. I squished down a sudden spurt of disappointment at the thought that Pangloss might talk Bart out of including me in the attack team.

You’re not really a pirate
, the sane part of my brain pointed out.
You’re a financial analyst who is going to have to have the carpet cleaned in a few short hours (or weeks, depending on your reality) if you don’t find the guy responsible for trapping you in the game.

“What’s that, Panny?”

Pangloss took the flag and held it up. “The lass is sailin’ one of Corbin’s own ships. A distinctive one, what with that garish paint.”

I frowned. I thought the glossy maroon trim on the ship was pretty. “The
Saucy Wench
is not garish. She’s just colorful,” I said with a touch of hauteur.

Pangloss flashed me a grin. “Me apologies, lass. Colorful, aye, that she is.” He turned back to Bart, who was lounging on the edge of the desk. “Me point is that Black Corbin’s men are sure to recognize her as one of their ships.”

“Yeah, but I won her off Corbin,” I felt obligated to point out . . . with a smile of warm satisfaction as I remembered my moment of triumph. “Surely they’ll know she doesn’t belong to Corbin anymore?”

Bart frowned in thought. Pangloss shook his head slowly. “I’m thinkin’ they won’t. ’Tis not the sort of a thing a man likes bandied about by the swabbies—that he’s lost a ship in a duel, and to a woman, yet.”

I rolled my eyes and let that statement go without the comment I wanted to make.

“Ye’ve got a point,” Bart said. The officers murmured their agreement. Bart sent me a speculative glance. “We could use the lass’s ship to infiltrate the blockade fleet. There’s no end of damage she could do then. She might even be able to get to Corbin that way. Killin’ two birds with one stone . . . only it won’t be a bird’s guts which’re spilled. Aye, ’tis a good plan, Panny. We’ll send the lass in to kill Corbin, and do what she can to destroy blockade ships from within the fleet.”

“Yarr!” the officers shouted.

“Oh, Lord,” I muttered, wondering how I got myself into these situations. The only thing that kept me from walking out of the room right then and there was the fact that I needed to hear the rest of Bart’s plans so I could judge how to deal with the situation.

“Here, ye’d best take this. ’Tis Black Corbin’s flag. Ye’ll fly that to get into the fleet, then raise me flag.” Bart handed me another rectangle of cloth. I opened it up to see the design, looking at him in curiosity.

“There’s nothing on it.”

“Aye. Corbin’s flag is a field of black only,” Pangloss said, his face hard. “ ’Tis a symbol of his black heart.”

“Ah. So, exactly what am I supposed to do?”

By the time I staggered down the hill to the town, my brain was spinning with terms like forlorn hope (volunteers who made the first assault on a place of fortification, such as a manned harbor),
masse de décision
(troops or ships kept out of a battle until a decisive moment), and redoubt (someone who is in an independent defensive position . . . in other words, me).

“Man, what a mess. Whom do I think I’m fooling? This whole thing is doomed.”

“Hoy, Cap’n,” Bas said, suddenly appearing at my side as I walked past the graveyard. “What be doomed, other than me life now that ye’re riskin’ me early death with those baths?”

“Hoy, Bas. Stop picking your ear with your hook; it’s not polite. And I’m not a captain. I’m just a . . . er . . . well, I guess technically I’m nothing, since I’m not even really a member of the crew, but we’ll let that go. You can call me Amy.”