Page 24 of The Black Lion
“Courtesy of Captain Manning,” he spat. “The man seemed to take particular joy in abusing the lowest of his crew, and I was certainly considered below his regard. I was too angry over my impressment, too resentful of my place in the navy—something I never asked for or wanted. He took it upon himself to beat the defiance out of me. He and the other officers made our lives miserable. Within the first year of mine and Rory’s service, rumblings of discontent began sweeping through the crew. We were starving while the commander and his men ate like royalty every night. We were harshly punished for the smallest transgressions, and some of the officers … they were not averse to using the weakest of us for sport when their need for release after a long time at sea grew too strong to ignore. There were boys on board and … and one of the officers had unnatural urges toward them. The captain’s cabin boy threw himself into the sea rather than suffer such torment any longer.”
Tears sprang to her eyes at the horrors of his tale, the unimaginable suffering he had endured. “Did such things happen to you? Did those men …”
Drew shook his head with a disgusted snort, then took up his stool to sit behind her. Prodding her to inch forward, he began washing her back. “No, but it was a near thing. One of them caught me unawares with a blow to the head. By then, I was weak from lack of a proper diet and had just suffered yet another taste of the cat o’ nines. They had nearly succeeded in breaking me, but when that officer attempted to make use of me, something within me cracked. I was done cowering and simply keeping my head down so I could survive. I fought back, though I cannot tell you where I found the strength. It was as if some demon had taken possession of my body—one that would rather kill that man or die trying rather than lie there and let him defile me.”
His voice remained low and steady as if he detached himself from his own words. Reaching for his hand, Arabella stilled it on her shoulder and gave his fingers a squeeze.
“Another officer walked in just as I finished strangling his comrade. He attacked me, attempting to slit my throat. That’s where this came from.”
She looked back to watch him trace a wet fingertip along the scar on his throat, confirming her suspicion about how he’d gotten it. Tilting her head, he cupped water in his hands and doused her hair. Arabella let him lather the strands and remained silent while he continued his tale.
“He would have succeeded if Rory hadn’t happened upon us. He wrestled the second officer off me and snapped his neck. From there, the carnage spread like wildfire. The other seamen rose up with us, attacking the officers and imprisoning the captain in his quarters. We slew more than half of them and imprisoned the rest, chaining them together and throwing them into the bilge. Then, we dragged the captain out onto the quarterdeck and stripped him naked, giving him a taste of what he so readily dished out to us. We took turn lashing him with his precious cat o’ nines, until not an inch of his skin went unpunished. Then, we strung him up to the mainmast and left him there until he died.”
“My God,” she whispered hoarsely, stunned at the thought of such carnage and brutality. But what recourse did men have when the choices were degradation and starvation, or a mutiny?
His hands tightened in her hair and he pulled her back until his lips touched her brow. “I won’t lie to you or try to soften the reality of what I’ve become. The officer was only the first in a string of men I’ve killed. I am not who I was when you knew me, Bella, and I never will be again.”
That much she understood without him having to tell her. At least now she knew the extent of it, and realized she would have accepted him regardless. She loved him too much to believe that the label of ‘pirate’ somehow made him different than the boy she’d grown up with, the man she loved so dearly. “Tell me the rest. I want to know all of it.”
He leaned her head back to rinse her hair, his hands gently guiding the water through the strands that now fell in soaked, wooly waves between her shoulder blades.
“We spent those first days drunk on the gratification of what we’d done. We raided the galley and helped ourselves to the food we had been denied, and the rum the officers had enjoyed while we drank water from the scuttlebutt that had gone putrid. We feasted like kings and imbibed until we were three sheets to the wind. But, as the revelry died down, we had to face the consequences of what we’d done. We could never return home, or risk being hanged for treason. Some of the men had families, but no means of supporting them now that they’d taken part in a mutiny. We never really called ourselves pirates, not at first. We were simply men seeking our fortune, righting the wrongs of what had been done to us. When talk of who would be our captain began, Rory was the one who put forth my name. The vote to elect me was unanimous.”
“You gave them what they needed to rise up and fight back. By killing that officer, you showed them they didn’t have to cower or be tread upon. Of course they made you their captain.”
“I didn’t see it that way. I was simply angry and desperate and had taken more than I could stomach from my superiors. I became their captain because it was the only way I could think of to get back to you. I had one simple plan—ravage as many Royal Navy ships as I could and earn myself the ability to establish a life somewhere else—someplace away from Jamaica and the navy and your father. I had every intention of returning to Falmouth and making off with you. I didn’t want to endanger you by writing, so I held on to the hope that you would wait.”
She lowered her eyes in shame, angry with herself for giving in to Will when all she’d only needed bide her time. As if sensing the path of her thoughts, he tipped her head back so she looked at him, pressing a kiss between her eyebrows.
“You were misled, just as I was. We decided to forgive each other, remember? I know now that if you had known I was alive, you would have waited. In the end, that is all that matters.”
He urged her to stand so he could wash the rest of her, gentling his touch as he ran his palms over her belly, her breasts, his calluses abrading her tender nipples
“Word came to Falmouth that theHannibalhad gone down with the crew,” she said. “No word of your survival reached us.”
“It wouldn’t have. We were the ones who sank it, you see. We’d been pirating for a year by then, our holds filled with goods stolen from British merchantmen and navy vessels. But then, our mutiny came back to haunt us. We had elected not to slaughter the other officers, choosing instead to maroon them on an island in the Bahamas. They were eventually rescued by another navy vessel, and word quickly spread of what we’d done. The Caribbean Sea became a dangerous place for us, with all Royal Navy vessels ordered to retake the ship should they encounter us. So, when we came upon this schooner carrying tobacco and sugar cane out of the West Indies to England, we seized on the opportunity. We took it for ourselves and sank theHMS Hannibal. I suppose the Admiralty didn’t want it known that a lowly group of seamen had defeated its officers and stolen one of its finest ships, so the tale of our loss in a storm was spread about. They refused to admit they’d been bested by us.”
“Naturally,” she said with a disdainful scoff.
“We’ve spent these past years making our fortune on the seas. Every man who has a family to support has found himself able to either send his wealth home, or have brought their wives and children to live with us onÎle Saint Marie.”
“Île Saint Marie?”
He smiled. “It is an island off the eastern coast of Madagascar, and is known by some as ‘pirate island’. There are several pirate captains who have claimed territory there, including myself. Various navies have tried to ferret us out, but have all but given up. We’ve made it clear that we won’t go down without a fight, and it isn’t worth it to them trying to invade. Their chances are better on the open sea, and they know it. My crew and I have our own compound of sorts, on a hill overlooking the most beautiful valley. You should see it, Bella … miles and miles of green palms and lush forest, clear lagoons with rushing waterfalls—my own home overlooks such a place. I had always planned to take you there.”
Arabella heard the longing in his voice, a subtle note underlying the gruff tones.
“You will,” she said, cupping his face and running her fingers along his smoothly shaved jaw. “Won’t you?”
He straightened, having finished rinsing her of the last of the soap. “Yes. That has always been my plan; to take you away to my piece of the island and make some sort of life. I’m a wealthy man, but a wanted one, though I cannot pretend to be ashamed of it. I did it all for us, for you.”
She frowned “What stopped you from coming until now? How did you find out Father and Will had something to do with your impressment?”
His jaw flexed and clenched tight, his nostrils flaring at the mention of his half-brother. “I wasn’t certain at first. But hindsight will make a person aware of things they did not see before. I always knew Will wanted you. I’d have been a fool not to see the way he looked at you. He did not mask his desire or his envy well. I think he was counting on me not being able to purchase those shares in the shipping company so I could wed you.”
Arabella shook her head, still in disbelief at this revelation. “I never noticed. I was so wrapped up in you, I only ever saw him as my friend.”
Drew reached for a thick sheet of toweling, wrapping it around her and then lifting her from the tub. “Everyone else knew, your father included. I was a fool to think he would ever allow us to wed, whether I could support you or not. I now know the lengths he was willing to go to keep me from having you.”
