Salt sweat fell from her forehead in slender rivulets into her eyes, and she gasped for breath and tensed again to pull his weight along. “We shall make it, Robin.”
But they wouldn’t. The king’s men were almost upon theSea Hawk. A cannon suddenly boomed from the deck of the ship, slowing the tide that swarmed upon them, but not ceasing it. There were still more men.
The thundering repercussion sent Brianna sprawling to the gangplank, coughing and choking from the powder that filled the air. She struggled to her feet, tears falling as she reached desperately for Robin’s arms again. She would not make it. Already soldiers were engaging in hand-to-hand combat with the remaining sailors upon the gangplank. They drew nearer. And nearer. She stared with horror, then screamed aloud as a bearded soldier bore down upon them, his sword gleaming as it caught the golden rays of the brilliant sun.
“This way, gent!”
It was Sloan’s voice, and his cutlass teased the steel armor upon the man’s back and forced him to turn with a growl. “Soldiers should fight armed men, not defenseless girls and wounded boys!”
The soldier bellowed and charged at Sloan, who sidestepped him with agility, swiftly parrying the assault with a slash of his cutlass. The man let out a hideous shriek and careened over the plank to the water below.
Then Sloan was sheathing his bloodied cutlass and hunching down beside Brianna. “Get aboard!” he ordered her, ducking to take Robin himself. He grunted, and hefted the heavy seaman over his shoulder. Brianna coughed and whirled to obey Sloan. He followed behind her, shouting as they leapt to the deck, “The gangplank—drop the gangplank!” The men were all aboard, but so were more than two score of the soldiers. The bow of theSea Hawkwas alive with the curses and screams of battle, the clash of swords, the thud of steel.
Sloan propelled Brianna before him as he hurriedly carried Robin to the shelter of the forward companionway and deposited him there.
“How is it, lad?”
Robin grinned through his pain. “Not so bad, Captain. Not so bad.”
Sloan nodded grimly and patted Robin on the shoulder. He glanced briefly at Brianna. “Get yourself to safety, girl! Into the cabin, now!” he railed.
She could not seek out the cabin—not with Robin upon the stairs and the men who had so valiantly fought to save her still locked in mortal combat. Sloan, assuming she would obey him under the circumstances, had already turned from them to join the fighting.
If he dies, I shall not be able to bear it, she thought.
A groan from Robin reminded her of his presence—and of the tearing wound within his thigh. She dropped down beside him, ripping shreds of material from her dress. “Robin!” she whispered to him. “I’m going to take the arrow out.”
“No.” He groaned. “The blood…”
“I can stanch it,” she assured him, trying to smile her assurance even as she heard the groans of the men fighting just feet away. “Trust me, Robin,” she encouraged him. “I swear I’ll not let you die.”
She clenched her teeth and studied the arrow. Fortunately, the shaft had not fully penetrated the flesh. Brianna breathed a sigh of relief. No major blood vessels had been severed, she was certain. She placed her left hand upon his thigh and her right upon the arrow shaft, tensing with her determined effort to bring forth all her strength. The arrow stubbornly refused to give; she just as stubbornly refused to allow it to remain.
It gave so suddenly that she keeled backward. Robin screamed, and she scrambled back to her knees swiftly to wrap the wound in the fabric from her dress, pressing upon his thigh firmly and pulling her bandage tight to stanch the flow of blood.
Robin’s eye opened his pain-glazed eyes. “I’m the one who called you ‘whore,’” he confessed with whispered shame.
Crimson splashed over her cheeks and she lowered her eyes, then raised them quickly to smile at him. “It does not matter,” she said softly, “and you must not try to talk.”
He gripped her fingers with hot, dry hands. “It does matter,” he whispered. “It matters, for I wronged you. You are not a whore, but an angel.”
She was stunned. Witch, whore—and now angel. The pity of it was that she was just a woman, a terrified woman now as the hand-to-hand combat continued just steps away upon the deck.
A scream caught in her throat at the sight of Sloan. As he engaged in swordplay with a soldier, a black-clad figure was creeping toward his unwary back.
“Sloan!”
Her horrified scream rose above the din of steel and men.
Sloan ducked and spun just in time to allow Matthews’s blade to find its mark in one of his own men. With a stunned gurgle the soldier gasped, gripped his gut, and fell to the deck. Matthews’s eyes lifted from the dead man he had accidentally killed, and fell upon Brianna, who hovered within the shelter of the companionway. She returned his stare with wide, mesmerized eyes. She saw the mad hate in his eyes and she knew he would readily sacrifice his own life to take hers.
Sloan shouted the witchfinder’s name from his perch upon the boom of the mainmast. “If you would face me, witchfinder, do so now!”
Matthews’s eyes turned to the man who hovered near him with catlike agility, ready to pounce between him and his intended victim. “Son of Satan!” Matthews raged. But he spoke no more, for Sloan Treveryan bounded from the rigging to land before him, his deadly cutlass raised.
Transfixed, Brianna watched the swordplay. Her heart seemed to rise to her throat and constrict her breath as the two men parried one another again…and again.
And then she saw that Sloan’s grim features held a lethal grin. His eyes were narrowed and hard…glittering with deadly vengeance. He had been playing with the man all along.
