Ahoy there mates! How have we all been? Sad story for you all; I lost my writing notebook at a hotel when I was at a conference! To say that I was rather like Mcrage at the time would be an understatement... but never fear! Most of the recent chapter was already typed up! So, for you, from the frantic depths of my mind...
Pirate Captain
“Throw her in the brig!”
“No, no don’t! Gregory, I didn’t do it!”
“You expect me to believe you? You’re even stupider than I thought! Take her!”
“No, it wasn’t me! Please, I tell the truth!”
Katherine broke free from her captors to chase after her husband, but as she ran, her foot snagged on something. Her fall felt eternal. Looking back, she found Sarah lying on the deck, as unconscious as she had been in the jail. She crawled back to her, finding the bruises the salve should have healed. Her skin was that of a ghost, the blood completely contained in all her bruises. She began searching her dress for something, anything that could help.
Charles suddenly burst from the mist that had eerily covered the area. With surprising swiftness, he scooped Sarah up and began running. “Come, Katherine! We have to get out!” She pushed herself up and began after the fading figures of Charles and Sarah. A cruel laughter rang out in front of her, and shapes suddenly became clear. Sarah knelt weakly in front of a Naval man, who unwittingly slapped her to the ground. She let out a weak cry of pain. Charles was being pushed around like a rag doll from one soldier to another, all of them cackling manically as they did so. When this one kicked him in the stomach, the other punched him across the face, and the other hit him in the small of the back, a sick game of pass the potato. Kat reached for her cutlass, but found it missing. She watched on helplessly.
“Lawrence!” she cried desperately into the mist, but no emerald eyed knight burst from the shadows…
“Captain!” A series of knocks rang through her cabin, waking her abruptly. Her eyes shot open and she shook her head to clear it. It had been a long time since she’d had one of those dreams. There was a crick in her neck from leaning on the wall, which she attempted to pop out unsuccessfully. She made to stretch, but found her arm weighed down by something. Looking down, she saw Sarah resting against her, sleeping peacefully. She smiled softly down at her, but then remembered the circumstances that had led to her being here.
More impatient pounding came on the door. “Captain!” a crewmate’s voice yelled again. Kat grumbled slightly and shifted Sarah off of her arm. It was incredible that she hadn’t woken as well, considering they lay right next to the door.
She roughly opened the door to find any possible sunlight blocked by the hulking figure of one of her crew. “What is it, Mr. Ironhawk?” she bit out. “I was very much
asleep.”
Any other day, it would have amused her to see the tree heightened figure cringe before her, but right now she was too groggy to care. “Sorry Captain, but the shipwright’s men are here. They wanted you to oversee the repairs, make sure they had everything straight.”
“And where, pray tell, is Mr. Mcrage? Could he not have done this?” she practically growled.
“He went into town, ma’m. He said he had some things to manage.”
Kat sighed frustratedly. “Very well then. Go make sure the workers don’t do anything stupid, and I’ll be out in a moment.”
Chris left with an “Aye ma’m”, leaving Kat with her sister. She had woken in the time she had been speaking to Chris, probably due to their conversation.
“You’re a captain now,” she stated simply. No question to it, but Kat could sense that there wasn’t complete approval from her.
“Aye.”
Sarah stood. “A
pirate captain, no less.” There was a hint of disapproval behind her voice, a hesitation to accept.
“Yes.” Kat moved to take the door handle. “Look, stay on the ship, please? If anyone here does anything to make you feel uncomfortable, come straight to me, and I’ll make sure they’re taken care of. She made to open the door, but a chuckle from Sarah stopped her.
“It’s oddly reminiscent,” she said. “It’s somehow like childhood. I remember the first day of finishing school. You told me that if any of the girls made fun of me, just tell you, and you’d make sure their hair mysteriously disappeared in their sleep.” The sisters shared a smile. “Do you remember that, Katherine?”
Kat felt the smile on her face slide off. “Sarah… try to call me Kat when we’re around others. One has to keep up appearances, even in the Caribbean.” With that, she was gone.
She had slept well past midday. There was much activity on her ship. A group of unfamiliar men stood on her main deck, chatting with each other. She quickly made her way down to them.
“You’re O’malley’s men?” she asked as she approached them.
Half of them stopped talking, and she knew they were sizing her up. “Aye. And who are you?” a brash looking young man asked.
She held out a hand. “Kat Crestshot, captain of the wood you so happen to be floating on.”
The man laughed. “Captain? Come on, girl, where is your real captain? It can’t be a woman!”
A few of the men began shifting nervously. “Easy mate,” they muttered.
“No, no, let me speak,” the young blonde said. “Come forward sir!” he shouted to the ship. “Who is the real Captain?”
He began turning as he yelled at her ship. When his back was to her, Kat swiftly kicked him in the small of it, making him fall on his face to the splintered deck. She placed a boot on his rising form and shoved him back to the ground. With a foot on his back, she drew her sword and leaned, catlike, over his body to place it on his neck.
“I could kill you, you know,” she whispered menacingly in his ear. “Just a quick flash,” the blade moved a millimeter on his neck “and you would be dead. Your blood would not be the first to be spilled on this deck.” She grabbed his long hair and forced his head up. “See this ship? It could be your last sight, sir! However!” Her voice had reached a yell by this point, but she paused and quieted. “However… O’malley is a good repairman. I’d hate to lose his services over something as insignificant as your death.” She released his hair, removed her boot, and sheathed her sword. “Besides, my blade was made for the likes of you.”
The man gingerly pushed himself up off the deck. He touched his lip, then his neck, where blood trickled down, and looked at Kat with fear and the respect she was used to seeing from her crew.
Something in Kat made her look up to her cabin. Standing there by the railing was Sarah, looking down at her in shock. For a moment, the hard face of the pirate softened into something that was almost an apology. At another glance, though, the pirate captain, the scathed lady of the Caribbean Sea, was back. Appearances must be kept.
It was later in the day before Kat figured out what had happened to her first mate.
Lawrence, Charles, and Luckie warily walked up the plank about an hour before sunset. O’malley’s men had been hard at work all day, without any outstanding instances. Kat had been overseeing the repairs when Ironhawk shouted out a greeting to Lawrence.
“Ahoy, sir!” His booming voice carried to below decks, drawing Kat’s attention. There was only one person Chris would call “sir”. She ran to the top deck and saw the three of them sitting wearily on a set of stairs.
“Where have you been all day?” she asked huffily, her hands on her hips. Luckie raised her tired head.
“Tha’ would be my fault,” she told her. “Go’ a few hours sleep below decks, bu’ we must’ve woken before ye. I woke Charles ‘ere an’ told ‘im I wanted to see me shop. We ran into yer mate ‘ere while leavin’, and he insisted on comin’ with.” Her voice lowered as she muttered, “Bloody good thin’ too…”
Kat’s eyes narrowed at them. “Why? What happened?”
Luckie and Charles shifted uncomfortably while Lawrence spoke. “The Navy was waiting there, Kat. They noticed us the moment we approached the bakery. We would have stayed to fight, but I only had my dagger, and they didn’t have anything.”
“You went into Tortuga without cutlasses?!” Kat thundered at Charles and Luckie. “Are you both
mad?! Even if the Navy wasn’t floating around, you both know to have something on you
at all times!”
“Easy, Kat,” Lawrence said, standing and putting a comforting hand on her shoulder, immediately relaxing her. It forced her to take a deep breath and get her logical mind back.
“Very well,” she murmured, her eyes still hard. “Where have you been all day, then?”
Luckie snorted. “Wha’, did ye think we was gonna lead ‘em back ‘ere? Had to outrun ‘em in the swamp!” She stuck out her leg to reveal a muck covered boot.
Kat, though, had suddenly stopped listening. A thought had sprung to her mind and begun to bloom. It was something that was so far-fetched, she wasn’t sure it could be pulled off herself. Perhaps she’d had too much rum today. Yet still…
“Kat?” Lawrence asked, as he had seen her fading from them.
Her head snapped towards him. “Feel like doing something stupid, Lawrence?”
I'm rather fond of the relationship between Kat and Sarah. I'm loving building it.
Thank you to Luckie for letting me run her through a swamp. I don't know how much rum (or Maple Syrup, as the case may be) I owe you now.
Well mates what do ye think? Haha, reviews of any shape and size are appreciated and welcome, and of course, thanks for the ones already left. Check back next Friday for another chapter! Thanks for reading!
-Kat Crestshot