The Following Sea (The Pirate Wolf series) (26 page)

“I…don’t think so. I scraped my arm when I fell, but nothing is broken.”

He helped her stand, which elicited another whimper as she rubbed a bruised rump. Her shirtsleeve was torn and bloodied where a layer of skin had come off on the rocks, but she seemed otherwise fine.

“Wh-what happened? Where are we?”

“Good question.” He looked around, partly shocked to realize he could see perfectly well even though there was no visible source of light within the cavern to cause the reflections off the walls. Behind them was the sheer slide of rock and sand they had tumbled down, far too steep and high to attempt to climb without ropes, though he gave it a few moments of concentrated effort. There were no hand or footholds in the rock, nothing to aid them in climbing back up.

He turned in a full circle, looking to see if there was a tunnel or opening in the walls. There seemed to be a dark gap on the opposite side of the pool that suggested a space barren of the glittering creatures and he took Eva by the hand.

“Stay close. Put your feet exactly where I put mine.”

This last precaution came as he realized they were standing at the lowest point of the cavern and the rock was slimy with wet moss, which meant a larger part of the cavern would be under water at high tide. Just how high the water would rise was not something he wanted to wait to discover.

They picked their way carefully around the edge of the pool. Gabriel left her on her own for brief moments while he explored indents of darker shadows but none proved to be deeper than arm’s length or wide enough for a body to squeeze through. Eva was intrigued by the glistening rocks, for the blues and greens constantly changed hues and intensity. She touched a finger to a stalagmite and dragged it downward, leaving a dark streak behind on the rock.

“Look,” she said, smiling in awe as Gabriel returned to her side. The tip of her finger was shimmering like the walls.

He grunted to express his extreme fascination and snatched up her hand again, leading her upward toward the darkest end of the cave. As they approached, he was somewhat relieved to feel a gentle flow of cool sea air on his face and pleased to see that he had guessed correctly: there was a wide opening in the wall that led into what appeared to be a tunnel.

“Stay here,” he ordered. “I’ll see where it leads and come right back.”

She clutched at his hand, refusing to let go, and he paused long enough to brush her cheek with the back of his fingers and give her a reassuring smile.

“I will come right back.” He gave a loose strand of her hair a reassuring tug and smiled. “Play with your little sea creatures, Mermaid, until I return.”

She listened to his bootsteps crunching off into the shadows and took a moment to check the condition of the scrape on her arm, fearing Dante might use it as an excuse to leave her behind when the march continued in the morning. Thankfully there was not much blood, and the scrape could hardly justify abandoning her, but the wound itself stung badly. To distract herself, she touched the rocks again, this time splaying her hand on the surface. When she lifted it again, she saw that she had left a clear imprint behind. When she wiped her fingers on her sleeve, the color glittered for a few moments, then slowly faded away.

The head of the creature was twice that of a normal man. It stood well over seven feet tall and was built as solid and thick as a tree trunk from shoulders to thighs. Eva recalled Eduardo’s tale of the monsters that lived in the blue holes and she jumped back a step. She tripped over a ridge in the stone and fell hard against the stalagmite, banging her temple on the rock. After that, she saw nothing at all.

CHAPTER TWENTY
-ONE

Five miles away, Estevan Quintano Muertraigo was pacing the floor of his cabin on board the
San Mateo
, his fury unabated since the first broadside had been fired from the
Endurance
. Since then he had ordered a dozen men, most of them former lookouts, bound to the shrouds and lashed until the skin hung off their backs in bloody ribbons. He had shouted orders and threats until his voice had gone hoarse and foam had formed hard crusts at the corners of his mouth. The portwine stain on his face had darkened like a splotch of ink, and twice he had shot men out of hand for merely looking at him the wrong way.

The object of his initial fury had been presented to him by a crewman who had dived behind a capstan to avoid an exploding canister shot. When the shell split open on deck, instead of spraying an array of razor-edged shrapnel, it had sent a flag luffing into the air. It was crimson with a pair of wolves depicted in black silhouettes crouched on either side of a cannon.

Muertraigo had clutched the pennon in his fist and screamed a stream of obscenities that could be heard above the roar of cannon fire. There were few captains of any nation who did not instantly recognize the Dante colors, fewer still who could say they’d had the upper hand on one of the Hell Twins but squandered it. Knowing he’d been duped set every vein in his body on fire. One of his ships,
La Asuncion
, was now crippled and useless. The temporary repair on the main mast of the
San Mateo
would likely not hold in a strong wind… not that there had been anything above a breeze to test it. The third galleon,
El Gato
, had half of her battery of guns rendered useless and was now burdened with the extra crew from the
Asuncion
.

As soon as the morning sun had burned the fog away a wind had allowed the
Cormorant
to pull up closer and cross the reef into the bight. By late afternoon a jolly boat had been lowered away to bring Lawrence Ross across to the galleon, where he had spent most of the evening listening to Muertraigo rant and rave and berate his officers one after the other in his cabin.

While he listened and sipped inferior wine, Ross managed to piece enough of the story together to grow almost bored with the Spaniard’s fury. Muertraigo had admitted to presenting himself under a fake name; the Dante fellow had done the same thing. Touché. Muertraigo had fully intended to open fire with first light; Dante had lit his fuses first, thus gaining the upper hand. The only misstep, Ross rather recklessly pointed out, was going on board Dante’s ship instead of insisting that Dante row across to the
San Mateo
.

“It was a chivalrous gesture,” Muertraigo spat, “an attempt to spare discomfort to the captain’s wife. Had I insisted he come alone, he might have become suspicious sooner, and at the time, I still had hopes of taking the ship as prize. The armament she carried was impressive and could have added considerably to my fleet.”

“Jonas Dante has hair as red as the devil himself and a volatile nature to match. This one was dark-haired and refined, with the golden eyes and the calm bearing of a panther lying in wait. He spoke flawless Castilian, as did his wife… if, indeed, she was his wife and not just another of his whores. She seemed to be too well spoken and refined, however, for him to have found her lying on her back in a brothel.”

Ross chuckled dryly and brushed a fleck of dust off his cuff. “You see, my friend, how a pretty pair of breasts can addle a man’s mind?”

Ross glanced up, startled. He stared at the Spaniard so long and with such a stunned look on his face that Muertraigo’s hand drifted toward the hilt of his pistol.

“What is it? Who is she? Do you know the whore?”

Ross turned his head briefly to glance at the doorway where Augustus George was standing like an enormous stone statue. “Green eyes, you say?”

“As green as the rarest of emeralds, hair so pale a yellow it was almost white; the face of an angel, the soul of a devil’s spawn.”

“And you said her name was—?”

“I did not say, but I doubt very much it was Carmelita. She wore a locket with the letter E engraved on the silver and when I questioned it, she blushed through the lie and said it had belonged to her mother.”

Lawrence Ross’ grip tightened on his wine cup. “A silver locket with the letter E? Was it oval and mounted with jewels?”

Muertraigo’s face flushed to show his increasing impatience. “No. It was round and plain though I am hard-pressed to understand why it should make a difference if it was shaped like a pig’s ear.
Who is she?”

But Ross was staring at Augustus George again and when he spoke, he switched to English and his voice came out a dry rasp. “You told me she was dead.”

“I shot her. There was blood and when she fell she couldn’t get up again.”

“Was she alive when you left the house?”

Augustus licked his fat lips nervously. “Aye, but she couldn’t move. She were bleedin’ an’ beggin’ for help to get out o’ the fire. She couldn’t move on her own.”

“And now you think the cub’s supposed wife is this Chandler girl? How can you be certain they are one and the same?” Muertraigo asked, switching back to Spanish.

“I can’t, of course, but you have described her perfectly. Wait--!” Ross patted the goffered ruff at his throat, his fingers finding and unpinning the jeweled brooch he wore at the top of his doublet. It had been a gift upon his thirty-third birthday and contained an enameled portrait of his erstwhile fiancé. He had forgotten all about the miniature and never looked at it; he wore it mainly because the filigreed edging was crusted with diamonds and because, frankly, he had forgotten to pry the little disk out.

He flicked the brooch open and passed it across to Muertraigo. “This is Evangeline Chandler.”

Muertraigo studied the portrait and nodded, the rage darkening his face again. “This is also Senora Carmelita Padilla. There could not be two faces so much alike.”

For a full minute neither man spoke or moved a muscle.

“And so,” Muertraigo growled. “We seem to have another ghost we must deal with… if, indeed, the daughter of William Chandler was ever meant to be a ghost.”

“I don’t know what you are implying, Estevan, but surely you can see this is as much a surprise to me as it is to you.”

“I am not implying anything. I am merely wondering how the supposedly dead and buried daughter of the man who claims to have found the wreck of the
Nuestro Santisimo Victorio
suddenly appears, very much alive, on board a ship belonging to the Dante band of cutthroats and thieves. I am also wondering if, perhaps, you made two deals, senor: One with me and one with the Pirate Wolf.”

“Why in God’s name would I do such a thing?”

“So that once the treasure was recovered, you could watch us destroy each other, then blithely sail away, keeping all of the bounty for yourself.”

The shot was explosive in such close quarters and Ross ducked, nearly tipping over in the chair. When he dared to raise his head again, there was a haze of smoke drifting around the muzzle of the pistol. Ross glanced at his chest first and neither saw nor felt any holes blasted into his flesh. When he looked again, he realized the barrel was pointed over his shoulder and he whirled around in his seat.

Augustus George had been stopped in his tracks. A small red hole had appeared in his forehead and as Lawrence watched in horror, a trickle of blood leaked out and ran straight down the slope of his nose and dripped onto the bullish chest. A moment later, George crashed forward like a felled tree, dead before he struck the floorboards.

“Good Christ, man!” Ross shot to his feet, shocked. “Why did you do that? Why did you kill him?”

“Because I am surrounded by liars and fools!” Muertraigo screamed as he drew a second pistol out of his belt. “And the next ball will be for you, my friend, unless you can convince me this was not all part of your plan.”

“
My
plan?” Ross was still stunned by the unexpected violence. “My plan was exactly the one I proposed to you from the outset: to meet up with William Chandler, let him lead us to the treasure, then kill him and take equal shares of what we found. When Evangeline broke off our engagement, I could not afford to leave her behind to cry foul, so I sent Augustus to the house that night to find the letters and the coins and to silence the little bitch once and for all. The fire was set to make it look like an accident. My only
plan
after that was to leave Portsmouth as soon as possible after the funeral to avoid having to play the part of the grieving fiancé any longer than necessary.”

“You had a funeral, but did you have a body?”