Page 8 of The Sea Witch
“We signed articles like every other pirate ship.” She glanced toward a buccaneer seated at one of the tables, and the shaggy man immediately scuttled away, leaving her to sit at the now empty table. “Even with our magic, we obey the rules of the sea. Unlike you, Culver, we don’t double-cross anyone.”
Culver’s hand went to the handle of his cutlass. Alys didn’t touch her own weapon. Instead, she snapped her fingers.
All at once, every light in the tavern went out. Curses and swears rose up from the assembled pirates.
They fell silent when a single flame wreathed Alys’s fingertip. All eyes were on her as she touched the fire to the wick of a candle at her table. Smoke curled up from the wick, and she blew on it. The smoke formed into a sea serpent. At another gust of air from Alys’s lips, the creature writhed and dove about the room, until it exited through an open window.
Stasia, her second in command, would’ve rolled her eyes at Alys’s theatrics. Yet a point had to be made, and, judging by the silence that now ruled over the tavern, Alys had done just that.
Just in case, she kept her other hand loose and ready near her cutlass. It had seen her through some rough and vicious fights. For a woman who, one year ago, never so much as touched a blade longer than four inches to clean and gut fish, she’d quickly taken to the curved and deadly sword. Now it was her trusted companion, as much as her brace of pistols. And the spells that danced at her fingertips, glittering with potential.
When it comes to those that take their living from the sea,her second in command had instructed Alys and her company,trust nothing and no one.Stay armed and alert—with steel,andwith sorcery.
A moment passed, and then the red-clad mage moved through the tavern once more, relighting the candles and lamps and chandelier that Alys had extinguished.
“?’Tis a solemn occasion,” Culver mumbled. “Little George wouldn’t want a fight.”
“Ofcourse, Little George would want a fight,” Alys said. “And I’ll be happy to give him, or anyone, a brawl.”
“Ain’t fair for a witch to use magic in a fight,” Culver muttered. “?’Tis only fit for mages.”
“By all means, let’s soothe your worries.” Alys held up her hand, where a flame still danced on the tip of her finger. With a wave, the fire winked out. “I’ll still beat you from Bermuda to the Bay of Honduras, even without my magic.” She cupped the pommel of her cutlass.
Culver glanced from her hand on her sword, and then to the steely determination in her eyes. Slowly, his own scarred hand moved from his weapon.
“Ay, that’s the way of it.”
Alys turned toward Rodrigo Flores, sitting nearby. The pirate gave her a smile, revealing several golden teeth.
Flores continued, “If you, Culver, a man with the brainpower of driftwood, have a right to be here, then so does Capitana Tanner, who’s vastly more intelligent, and twice the swordsman you’ll ever be.”
Culver muttered but didn’t argue.
Alys sent Flores a quick nod of gratitude. Though most pirates tended toward suspicion, there were a handful who welcomed her into their ranks.
She turned to face the front of the room, where Little George’s final letter was being read. She kept her awareness on Culver, in case he decided to slip a dagger between her ribs. Or if he might give the mage a nod, and she’d be suffocated with a smothering spell. Here in the lawless Caribbean, anything was possible, and she had learned to stay nimble as a wheeling gull to keep herself and her company safe.
The fact that now over half her crew was comprised of witches made them even more hunted by militias and the RoyalNavy. She and her company had come to the Caribbean to find freedom, and they had. To a point. There was nowhere safe.
Nowhere, except on the deck of the now namedSea Witchsurrounded by her crew.
“If I be lucky,” the one-eyed seaman continued to read from the creased letter in his hand, “I’ll go to me Maker as I lay in the arms of a sweet and willing lass, but ’tis most likely that foul murder has sent me speedin’ to Hell, as I justly deserve.”
No one could argue that Little George Partridge had earned his reputation through acts of unequaled violence—though he always showed exceptional kindness toward animals, particularly cats. Alys had crossed paths with Little George only a handful of times, but when she received word that she was summoned to this tavern on this lawless island to hold a wake for the departed pirate, she made sail for St. Gertrude.
Little George wouldn’t request a simple wake. There had to be more to this gathering than that.
“For now,” the one-eyed man went on, reading aloud, hefting a sack of coins, “I command all ye gathered to drink a toast to me memory, paid for by none other than Little George Partridge.”
A resounding cheer went up in the tavern as the coin was thrown to the landlord, who began filling tankards as fast as he could, which were handed out by a trio of harried barmaids.
As she sipped spiced rum from a dented pewter mug, Alys took measure of who else she was drinking with. Every wanted pirate captain that sailed the blue waters of the Caribbean was in the Wig and Merkin. She recognized the majority of the men that filled the smoke-stained taproom. These were the most feared sailors known, infamous buccaneers, some missing body parts and most completely lacking morals. They were men who had come to these waters from every corner of the globe to seize a fortune in blood-soaked gold and treasure. Young men barely able to shave, craggy-faced veterans, and everything in between. Mages, too, flocked to the Caribbean, harnessing theiracademy-trained magical abilities to grab their share of wealth when it was well known that the Royal Navy and merchants paid far less for enchantments, curses, and spells.
A wicked collection of men, like an iron coffer filled with rotten meat. Here in the tavern, they carefully kept from meeting Alys’s gaze, and others glared with mistrust.
Some, though, were like Flores. Not precisely moral nor law-abiding, but they had a form of honor, and were willing to share the seas with a ship crewed entirely by women. They gave her a polite nod. Even these small gestures showed her more respect than any of the men back in Norham.
She didn’t finish her rum. Unlike the other pirates, she hadn’t the luxury of indulging in drink here. A witch pirate surrounded by hostile buccaneers couldn’t be at ease. Still, better a wary pirate with magic than a soul-crushed fisherman’s wife forced to keep her power hidden.
