The Jezebel's Daughter (26 page)

It was over quickly, the tempestuous feelings of our brief fight lending themselves to a quick and brutal coupling. His shirt was torn and my nails had raised red welts on his shoulders and back. There were bite marks on my breast and his fingers had left bruises on the tender skin of my thighs and hips.

“America,” he panted into my shoulder as we coasted down from the mind-numbing climax. “We will go to America. We can start anew there.”

XXXI

Ambergris Caye, British Honduras

August, 1718

Predawn in the jungle was an eerie time. The thick, humid air was filled with the sounds of a thousand insects and jewel-toned birds, calling out to each other, marking their territories and seeking a mate. Their songs were punctuated by the occasional crack of thunder and the pitter-patter of rain as it dripped onto leaves and the roof of the little house Sebastian and I lived in. Far off in the distance, just as the eastern skies took on a pale pearl-gray tinge, a horrible sound began, like the howling of a horde demons as they bore down on us sinners, determined to carry us off to our afterlife in the Fiery Pits.

Although I'd been hearing the howling for months now, it never ceased to raise goose-pimples of fright all over my body. I laid awake every morning, dreading the sound and cuddling closer to Sebastian, who slept deeply, blissfully unaware of the noise. Mr. Rossing, the former buccaneer who had successfully guided us through the reef and into the deep, safe harbor just yards from my front door, had assured me that the noises were made by small black monkeys that were terrified of humans, but that explanation didn't diminish the terror I felt. Thankfully, the monkeys only howled before dawn and just before dusk; otherwise, I would have slept on the ship every night, where the creaking of the rigging and the soft lapping of the water would drown out the unearthly howling.

Since arriving on Ambergris Caye in early February, the
Jezebel
had been joined by four other ships, including Rackham and the
Kingston
. We had built some ten or twelve rudimentary shelters—no more than just basic huts with thatched roofs, but they all had sturdy framing in case someone wanted to make them into more permanent homes—plus a large warehouse with an office for our fence, a tavern, a whorehouse, a cooper's shop, a carpenter’s shop, and a small chapel. We had yet to attract a priest, but the five whores did a brisk business every night.

Rackham brought with him news of Vane. In May, Vane and the
Ranger
had sailed north to the coast of the Carolina colonies, where he joined with Edward Teach, who was now most widely known by the moniker Blackbeard. Vane and Teach had blockaded the Charles Town harbor, capturing and ransacking at least nine ships that tried to squeeze through. After capturing a ship carrying a group of Carolina colony dignitaries headed for London, Teach informed Charles Eden, the governor, that his fleet required medical supplies. If these supplies were not delivered to him, then he would execute his captives and return their heads to Eden. The medicines were eventually surrendered and the prisoners released. After the blockade broke apart, Vane sailed south to the Caribbean once more, while Teach and the rest of the flotilla sailed farther north, to Ocracoke Island, where they remained after receiving a pardon from Eden. The last Rackham had heard, Teach was set to sail south to join with Benjamin Hornigold to hunt pirates.

Although we had stayed on land for the greater part of six months, some of the other crews had gone out roving. They'd taken a few ships, enough to keep the construction afloat for a few more months and to quench their need to be on the water again. Our little settlement was approaching the size of Nassau, and still it seemed to be hidden and secret.

The unearthly howling of the monkeys stopped and the following silence was almost deafening. Sebastian stirred in his sleep, his arm reflexively curling tighter around me and drawing me in ever closer to him. I smiled and closed my eyes, feeling his heart beat beneath my cheek, slow and strong and steady.

“Are you awake?” he asked me, his voice ragged with sleep.

“No, I've been listening to the demons,” I answered lightly. I felt his chuckle through his chest and leaned up on one elbow to look down into his eyes. “It's early yet. The sun's not even up.”

“Are you giving me permission to be lazy?”

“I think so. But only if I can join you.”

“Why not?” he asked, reaching up to brush a lock of my hair away from my face. “It's Sunday, after all. Even God rested on this day. I have the perfect enticement, too.” He slipped from the hammock that served as our bed and moved silently across the dirt floor to a wash-leather sack he'd received from Ben the night before. Digging in it, he brought out two books and handed them to me with a smile.

I sat up and took the books from him. I glanced at their spines and saw
Les mille et une nuit, contes arabes traduits en François, par M. Galland
,
Vol. XI
and
Vol. XII
picked out in gold leaf against dark blue leather. I squealed with delight and immediately opened the first book to the table of contents. “Oh, look,” I said, holding it out him. “More of Sinbad's tales.”

He smiled happily and stoked the fire, adding wood to it before putting the kettle on the fire dog to heat water for tea. He settled into a lean against the wall of the house and crossed his arms over his chest as he watched me reading. I looked up and quirked a brow at him and he smirked. “I was just thinking there is nothing more attractive than a naked woman reading a book while sitting in a hammock in the middle of a hidden jungle,” he said with a certain twinkle in his eye.

“That's an awfully specific fantasy.”

“Well, I'm an awfully specific sort of man.”

The kettle whistled and he made us cups of hot, black tea, sweetened with a bit of cane juice and a squeeze of a fruit that did not resemble the lemon, but somehow still tasted of it. He joined me in the hammock and we spent a few pleasurable hours sipping tea and reading from Monsieur Galland's Arabian tales.

The rains came back at noon, when we were finally driven out of our cozy house in search of food. We dashed through the downpour to the tavern, where we were greeted with the mouth-watering aromas of roasting meat and baking bread. Most of the senior crew of the
Jezebel
were gathered around the largest table, which was covered with plates and flagons and partially-consumed loaves of bread. I sat down next to Ben, who looked as though he had just woken, and stole a bite of meat from his plate, while Sebastian ordered food and of ale for us from the cook in the tavern's kitchen.

“Did Captain give you them books?” he asked sleepily as he pushed his plate and ale in front of me.

I nodded and made affirmative noises around a mouthful of bread. After swallowing my food and a bit of ale to wash it down, I said, “Yes. He did. Where did they come from?”

“One of the other crews—I think it be the
Greyhound—
brought back a large trunk of books. They be thinking to burn 'em, but Mr. Duquesne and I stepped in and rescued 'em. Saw them Arab ones and remembered you liked 'em.”

“Thank you for the presents,” I said and kissed his cheek. He made a happy grunting sound and took a deep draught from his ale before putting it down in front of me again. I hid a tearful smile behind a bit of bread as I was reminded of breakfast with Mattie and Gunnar. We often shared food like this and the amount of time it took Ben to completely wake in the morning was so like Mattie.

Sebastian joined us and chuckled at the presence of Ben's breakfast in front of me. I gave him a somewhat guilty look and he pushed my food in front of Ben. “You need to eat, too,” he said to Ben as he sat down next to me. “Don't feel you must always feed the baby bird first. Even if she does make sweet faces at you and pull at your heart strings.”

“I do no such thing,” I replied crossly. “I didn't even ask for this!”

Ben snorted and applied himself to the plate Sebastian had given him. “No, you don't be asking, girl. You just be taking.” The other men chuckled and I elbowed Ben in the ribs. We ate in companionable silence until all the plates were clean and all the bread consumed.

“Will we be returning to the ship soon, Captain?” Harris asked.

Sebastian nodded though did not reply until his mouth was empty. “Yes, I think in the next few days, if the rains let up. We've done just about all we can do here. There will be a meeting of senior crews in the morning—which I would like you all to attend—to discuss a rotating watch on shore while other crews go out roving.”

I finished the flagon of ale in front of me and then stood. “I'll go lay in supplies for you and I before we leave in the morning,” I said before leaning down to kiss Sebastian's cheek and leaving the tavern.

The rain had turned into a fine drizzle and the sun appeared to be attempting to peek out from behind the clouds in spots. It was already hot and the air felt thick and viscid against my skin. If the sun came out, the temperatures would soar up to unbearable heights. It was the perfect day for a swim in the clear waters of the bay.

I stopped in at the warehouse and bought tea, ink, and two blank books. I carried these back to our cabin, found a soft piece of flannel to use as a towel after my swim, and headed out to a secluded section of the bay, near one of the logging sites. I knew it would be silent and still and unmanned, since Sebastian had declared Sunday a rest day.

Ben was standing at the base of a very tall tree that would probably be the next to fall when work resumed in the morning. He was staring up into the canopy, one hand raised to shield his eyes, the other fisted on his hip.

I stood next to him and looked up. “Do you see it?” he asked quietly. “Just there.” He pointed to a black shape partially hidden by some large leaves.

I tilted my head and squinted into the branches. The leaves covering the shape shifted, revealing a black-furred humanoid shape with a long, grasping tail. I gasped softly. “Is that a monkey?” I asked.

“Yes. One of them demon howlers. It have a baby on it. You see?”

I could just barely make out a smaller shape, clinging to the larger monkey. It peered down at us with bright, intelligent eyes. I grinned at it. “It's darling,” I said. Ben nodded and we stood for a long, silent moment, watching the monkeys before they left, disappearing almost silently deeper into the trees, with only the soft susurrus of leaves marking their passing.

“You want to go swimming with me?” I asked as I followed him to a tree stump and sat down on it next to him, back to back.

“No. I don't swim.”

“Oh, yes. That's right.” We silently for a moment before I rose and turned to kiss the top of his head. He grabbed my hand and held it tightly.

“One day,” he said, still holding my hand but not looking at me. Instead his gaze was over the water. “One day, you be just like that mama monkey. You have a baby hanging off you.”

“Did Mama Danto tell you this?”

He shook his head and looked up at me, a most serious expression in his eyes. “No. Tansy did. She be telling me this in a dream I had last night. She tell me you have a baby soon.” He grinned at me and squeezed my hand. “She be happy for you.”

I leaned forward and kissed his brow again before leaving, headed for the swimming beach. A baby. Sebastian's baby. Yes, I could almost feel Tansy's happiness and hear the song she sang to me in the breeze.

XXXII

Ambergris Caye, British Honduras

August, 1718

Nineteen men and I were gathered together in the caye's warehouse just after sunrise the next morning. The air inside the warehouse was dense with pipe and cigar smoke, the fumes of rum and ale, and the smell of roast pig. Sebastian, Jack Rackham, and I were seated around the head of the table, and the rest of the captains, quartermasters, ship's masters, and boatswains were seated with us, collected around a few tables that had been carried over from the tavern.

“The
Jezebel
and the
Kingston
should be the first ships to go out,” Rackham's quartermaster, Mr. Featherstone, was saying. “We are the biggest and best armed, and our crews are the most experienced. We stand the greatest chance of bringing back a lucrative prize, and that's not even mentioning the
Jezebel
's network.”

A quick glance around the room showed that it was split roughly in half over Featherstone's suggestion. The smaller ships, of course, thought they should be the first to go out in search of a major prize since they were faster and lighter than either the
Jezebel
or the
Kingston
, but the rest saw Featherstone's points more clearly. Both ships were large brigantines, each outfitted with at least twenty heavy guns a piece. Their crews had also been together longer and had taken more ships, and as Featherstone had pointed out, the
Jezebel
had the vast network covering most of the major ports in the area.

As the men broke into another round of shouting, a wave of nausea gripped my belly and I hurriedly stood up, rushing from the room and out the door, to vomit into the bushes that surrounded the place. I felt weak afterward, sweaty and clammy. I straightened and saw Sebastian standing in the doorway, watching me carefully.

“Are you alright?” he asked, coming to take my arm, letting me lean against him. I closed my eyes as the world swam around me. I felt him mopping at my brow and the back of my neck. “Let's go see Ferro.” The note of concern in his voice frightened me.

Soon after we had landed on the caye and cleared a portion of the jungle away, a handful of men had come down with a fever that was accompanied by vomiting and bloody flux. Three had died, but the rest had recovered, though it had been a long, hard-fought battle back to health. Sebastian must have been worrying that I had come down with the fever, too, and I found that I shared his concern.

“What of the meeting?” I asked. “Don't you need to be there?”

“It's sorted. The
Jezebel
and the
Kingston
will be going out as soon as possible. We'll head to Havana to see if the spy network has anything for us.”

We found Ferro in the whorehouse, where he was administering mercurial purges to one of the ladies employed there. Not wanting to disturb the surgeon while he was at his job, we agreed to wait for him in his cabin.

“We can wait until you're better before going to Havana,” Sebastian said at length after we'd made ourselves comfortable in the surgeon's cabin. “The
Kingston
and her crew are capable. Perhaps we could send the
Greyhound
, too. She's a tidy little ship.”

“No, you should go. The men are restless. If I'm bedridden with the same fever the others had, perhaps I should be quarantined until it's passed.”

“Let's wait to see what Ferro says before deciding for certain.”

Ferro eventually joined us and took some time looking me over. He looked into my eyes, at my tongue, he poked and prodded and eventually sat down in a rickety chair across from Sebastian and I.

His craggy, time-worn face split into a smile and he reached out to clap Sebastian heartily on the shoulder. “Congratulations, Papa!” he said. “I would say the lovely Loreley is two, maybe three months along.”

We stared in open-mouthed shock at first the surgeon and then each other. I tried speaking, only to find that my mouth was too dry to form words. Ferro offered me a sip of water, which I took gratefully. After drinking it, I tried speaking again. “Are you saying... that I'm... That we're...
I'm pregnant
?”

“Yes! That is exactly what I'm saying.” His face fell and he frowned severely. “You are not happy about this news?”

I looked sidelong at Sebastian, whose face had gone white as bone. His mouth was open and it didn't seem as though he was breathing. I reached out to touch his hand and he blinked, his eyes focusing on me. “We're going to be parents,” he breathed. “We're going to have a child.” A smile dawned on his face and he swept me up into his arms, standing and twirling around as he whooped with joy.

My heart felt as though it was going to explode with happiness. Laughter and tears of joy burst out of me and I clung to Sebastian, surprised and very touched to find him crying as well. I distantly heard Ferro excusing himself, leaving us alone with the news.

We eventually took our seats again, though we sat close enough to touch and our hands were clasped together tightly. “You know what this means, right?” Sebastian asked. I shook my head. “You're no longer allowed to go out roving. You must stay here, where it's relatively safe.”

My face fell and I sighed. He was right. I did not want to risk the safety—or the life—of our unborn child. “I'll stay. But I'm not happy about it.”

He chuckled and pulled me into another hug. “I didn't expect you would be.” He stood and drew me to my feet. “Let's go tell the others. I think Ben will be very happy to hear that he's to be an uncle.”

* * *

We found Ben, Duquesne, Harris, and Weiss the gunner in the tavern, discussing the earliest they believed the
Jezebel
could sail. We sat down at the table with them and waited for them to fall silent before Sebastian said in a most casual tone, “We need a new quartermaster.”

The others exchanged confused looks and Ben finally asked, “What's wrong with the one we got now?”

“She'll be out of commission for the next six or seven months.”

Weiss was the only one who caught the reference—probably because the man had a wife and children somewhere in the world. He popped up out of his seat and hugged me tightly after pressing warm kisses to both of my cheeks. “
Herzlichen Glückwunsch zum freudigen Ereignis!
” he crowed, congratulating Sebastian and I on the baby, much to Sebastian's confusion.

“
Ich danke Ihnen, Herr Weiss
,” I responded as Weiss kissed both of Sebastian's cheeks and grasped his hand, pumping it rapidly up and down as he shook it.

“What's going on?” Harris asked Duquesne.

“She be having a baby,” Ben said and stood up. He moved to stand next to me and took both my hands. He drew me to my feet and caught me up in a rib-crushing hug. “I be so happy for you, girl. You and your man.” He kissed my cheek and smiled softly. “She would be so happy for you, too.” I nodded and hugged him back, tears flowing freely as I thought of our loss. He was right; I could almost hear Tansy's excitement over the news and for a brief moment, I could feel her stroking my head.

The tavern's owner had a single bottle of good claret, which he generously gave to us so the others could toast Sebastian and me before we got down to discussing a new quartermaster. The men ultimately decided to promote Duquesne, which I thought was an excellent suggestion and the other men agreed. To take over his spot as boatswain, Ben suggested Mr. Rossing, and the recommendation was seconded by the rest of the men immediately as well.

I tuned out the rest of the conversation as I thought about being a mother. We certainly had enough money saved up to move to America whenever we wanted, between our shares and the money we'd made selling lumber to passing merchants. We could no doubt buy a large plot of land and farm it, or perhaps purchase two or three ships and set up a merchant company.

I folded my hands over my belly and tried to imagine the tiny life inside. Would it be a girl or a boy? I hoped for a boy, a strong, beautiful boy who had his father's eyes and jaw line. What would we name it? Andrew for his father? Or maybe Geneve for my mother?

“Loreley?” Sebastian's voice broke through my thoughts as he gently touched my elbow. “What do you think?”

“I'm sorry. What do I think about what?”

“I be asking if you be wanting me to stay behind,” Ben said. “While Captain is away to sea. Do you be wanting me here? With you?”

“Oh,” I said, blinking with shock. “Well, I hadn't thought of that. Only if that's what you want, Ben. I know Graves made you stay ashore with me to punish you and I don't want you to stay if that's what it would mean to you.”

He shook his head and smiled. “Not no more. Now I stay because I want to. Because you and the baby be needing me.”

“Then yes. I would love for you to stay.”

“Good,” Sebastian said with a sincere smile. “That's settled. When will we be leaving?”

“We can have everything ready to go in three days' time, Captain,” Duquesne responded. “We need only load in supplies and water, appoint Mr. Rossing as the new boatswain, and we can go.”

“Excellent. Then I will see you once more in three days' time. If you'll excuse me, gentleman. I am taking my child and his mother to bed.” He stood, swept me off my feet, and carried me off to our cabin.

“'His'?” I asked once he'd put me down in the hammock and closed the door behind him. “You're certain we're having a boy?”

He nodded, slipped off his boots, and joined me in the hammock. “Yes. I'm certain. And we'll name him Andrew. For my father.”

I smiled and leaned my head against his shoulder. “Andrew Sebastian MacIsaac,” I said. “Sounds perfect.”