of chain, a splash, and the Ciara Morganse was at anchor. The decks, which had been so alive under Cate’s feet, went motionless for the first time in months. It was a novelty and a quite disquieting sensation.
She strained to see the little town nestled between the island’s mountainous backbone and the sea. It was the closest land since leaving England. Not having pondered it earlier, she now longed for the solidness of land under her feet, to walk on a surface that didn't pitch and roll at every step.
“When are we going ashore?” she asked Nathan, close on his heels.
“As soon as the boats are away, but you’re not going,” he said, wheeling around on her.
Cate rocked back on her bare feet as if she had been struck. She gaped at him, wondering how she could have been so radically mistaken. Her anxiousness had allowed her to forget her tenuous status. She bristled. Worthless as a hostage, now she was simply his possession to do with as he chose, kept in reserve for the best opportunity to turn a coin.
“Why not?” she asked. Even if she was to be shackled, to touch land again would have been worth it.
His hesitancy gave brief hope of second thoughts. “It's not safe.” And then he spun away.
“So I am a hostage then?”
“No,” Nathan said with maddening evenness over his shoulder. “A hostage implies there would be someone to pay for you. And, since by your own admission there is no one, then you’re not said hostage.”
“Then I’m a prisoner.”
“No, prisoner implies punishment. You’ve committed no crime, so there would be no punishment.”
“Then I’m being held against my will.”
“No, protective custody.”
Skidding to a halt, she balled her fists. “Protected from what?”
He stopped. His back still to her, he looked to the sky, and then the deck. Heaving a patience-seeking sigh, he said, “As I said, it’s not safe,” and set off once again.
“Safe! What’s safe have to do with it?”
Nathan drew up, again without turning. A number of responses being disposed of, he ultimately opted for “Everything.”
And then, he was gone.
Cate stood at the rail while the longboats were roused over the side, still prickling at Nathan’s denial. She wasn’t bound or confined, but she was imprisoned, just the same. The ship was a floating gaol, with over a hundred keepers. She looked longingly across the water to the little town. The yearning became a driving need now that she could smell greenery and dirt. With eyes accustomed to the deep hues of the ocean, the vivid mosaic of aquamarine, azure, lapis, and cobalt of the island’s waters had made her squint, the sight of green, absent for so long, almost painful. It struck her with an impact that rendered her near breathless: she was in the West Indies, the tropics, with palm trees, warm water, sun-dazzled skies, with new wonders at every turn.
So near, and yet so far sat the fairyland, within her reach, but unattainable, all because of one capricious pirate.
Cate's senses had been sharpened by weeks at sea. Along with earth and greenery came other smells of civilization, ones conveniently forgotten: animal dung, cooking smoke, privies, tobacco, and the sharper fugue of squalor. Wrinkling her nose, she considered the possibility that she had developed a new appreciation for the sea.
Whether in the Highlands or elsewhere, isolated towns possessed the same sleepy air, resting with the placidity of a cow chewing its cud. This one was bracketed by two lone, brick buildings, representing the opposing powers that controlled its life: the spiritual marked by a cathedral’s bell tower, and the secular, with the flag of Spain. The skeletal remains of a garrison peeked through the trees, along with the rudimentary beginnings of a defensive wall around the town, both long since abandoned. A not-much-better-tended wharf lined the water’s edge, bearing out Nathan’s conjectures regarding the infrequency of visitors.
Before the anchor was set, Nathan stood surveying the town. Now squatted over a piece of canvas, a chunk of charcoal in hand, he drew it out for the men circled around.
“We’ll assume the flag marks where we’ll find whoever the power-on-high might be. Bear off for there first, and then fan out. With any luck, whomever is in charge will…”
“Hoy! Cap’n! Lookit!” came a cry from the rail.
Nathan rose, following the look-out’s point. “What the bloody hell…?”
A small flotilla of barges, catamarans, and boats had embarked from the ramshackle wharf and bore toward the ship. Flags of truce, mostly in the way of