Page 30 of The Pirate Queen

Donal has chosen a set of pipes.

And she has chosen a compass.

Mother, 1554

“A Murder at Moycullen”

Grace is twenty-four years old

She is pregnant. Again. Thrice in four years. Her first child—a son—she named Eóin, after her own father. He was followed little more than a year later by a daughter who looks so like Grace, and therefore her own mother, that only the name Margaret would do. It seems to her that the child growing within her now is also a boy. Her belly has that shape to it, pushing out from her body, proud and round. Grace has never met a man who did not like to show himself off in some way—even in the womb. And if she were married to anyone else, she would name the boy Donal, after her brother. But she will not allow her husband to think that she’s done so to honor him. Therefore, she hopes for a girl—Nora, if she gets her way—but expects a boy and will call him Merrick.

Grace looks up when the cabin door swings open with a heavy thud. Her husband stands there, windblown and sweaty, cheeks red from the sun and salt, his muddy eyes pinched in concentration.

“We’re coming into harbor,” he says.

“Mo fhear,” Grace whispers, and sets one finger to her lips.

He looks to the bed where their children nap in a rectangle of sunlight that rolls across them in time with the gentle rocking of the ship. It is not a smile that lifts his face, but near enough. And there is some tenderness in it. The children please him. He wants more of them. Tells her this as often as she will listen. He wants as many children as she can give him, though Grace cannot fathom why. He spends so little time with the ones he has. But perhaps the O’Flahertys think of children like horses? A sign of wealth. No wonder they go through wives like broodmares.

“Wake them,” he orders.

“They only just fell asleep.”

“They’ll want to see the city.”

They’ll want no such thing, she thinks, and you won’t be the one to deal with them, anyway.

Grace considers his demand. If she wakes them now, they will be tyrants for the rest of the day—but at least she can leave this dratted cabin. It is not so spacious or comfortable as Niamh’s—only large enough for a small bed and a smaller desk—and keeping Young Eóin and Margaret occupied all day has driven her half mad. Her husband forbade her from being on deck during the journey.

“ ’Tis no place for a woman,” he’d said.

As if she has not spent half her life on deck. But Donal O’Flaherty is no more aware of her skill at the helm than her skill with a knife. So she chooses not to argue with him now.

“I’ll bring them out shortly,” she says.

Her smile is tight when he closes the door again, matter settled.

Most men name their ships after women—those they’ve known or loved. But that had not been good enough for the O’Flahertys. They’d gone with Scian Catha, a name that means “Battle Knife.” What it lacks in sentimentality, it makes up for in speed, however, and they have reached Galway Harbor in record time.

Grace looks to where the children lie, sprawled out, pink-cheeked, hair curling against damp foreheads. It is a strange thing to love a child yet despise its father. She had been afraid during all those long heavy months pregnant with Eóin that she would push her baby into the world and feel nothing when she saw it. Or, worse, feel hatred. Or disgust. Or the kind of numbness that swallows her when O’Flaherty reaches for her in the dark.

Yet all those fears were assuaged when the midwife set Eóin into her arms. She saw not his father, but her own in those blue eyes, and she knew love immediately. And yes, there are flashes of O’Flaherty in both of her children. But only flashes so far, put out easily, like a spark that jumps from the hearth onto one of the dry rush mats. Grace has only to snuff it out with a word or a firm hand. She watches closely for those sparks to show, unwilling to let them grow into flames. He might be their father, but they will be her children.

Above them, her husband stomps his way across the cabin deck, calling orders to the crew as they row into the harbor.

She sighs.

Such a shame to wake a sleeping child.

“Fecking Galway.”

Gutty has never been to Galway, has not been on a boat since his Bean an Tí took him on the water four years ago. He dreams of it nightly, however. The wind and spindrift. He can still feel the movement of waves in those seconds before sleep claims him. He strives to make himself useful on deck so that the young O’Flaherty chieftain will consider assigning him to the crew. He is tired of tending fires at Bunowen. He knows the only reason he’s going to the games at all is because Gráinne insisted. Fires will be needed at camp, she’d said; might as well take Gutty. He does not want to leave her service, but he does want a life beyond it.

The boy has taken two shifts at the oars, and even though his hands are blistered and his back aches from the strain, this is the second-best day of his life, surpassed only by his afternoon on Niamh. Though he is sixteen now, he cannot imagine loving a woman more than he loves a boat. He has listened and learned today. And now that the experienced crew has assumed the rowing once more, he stands out of the way and watches them guide the ship into Galway Harbor.

“Gutty, would you help me?”

His attention is pulled from the crowd of men along the seawall by Gráinne’s voice. The Bean an Tí holds a limp, half-sleeping child on each hip and—as she walks toward him—loses her grip on both. Gutty dives forward to catch Young Eóin before the boy falls to the deck.