Page 27 of Maggie and the Pirate’s Son

“Finish that,” he said, and again she wanted to toss it in his face, except she suddenly felt a powerful thirst which had nothing to do with beverages. “You must drink,” he urged, his brows knitting with concern, and this time she drained it, maintaining eye contact just as he had done.

Throughout the rest of the day, she ran a few more messages to the captain and the quartermaster, but much of her time was spent clinging to the rail, gazing out to sea, trying to work out whether this impulsive act of hers had been the silliest thing she’d ever done or, in fact, the bravest.

Would she ever see her family again? Or would she remain a part of this pirate crew forever, pillaging gold from undeserving slavers like a sort of Robin Hood?

The thought made her more melancholy than she might have expected. She loved being able to see forever in any direction, but when she compared the wide-open expanse to home, she found she missed the mountains. The idea of never seeing Ellen or Jory again made tears spring to her eyes, and she even almost missed the patronizing way her father called her My girl and her mother managed to turn cooking into a lecture, but only because she wanted to show them both how well she was doing on her own own.

This was an adventure, that was all. An interlude, she resolved. She’d see them again one day, and with stories they wouldn’t half believe.

Peering over the starboard side, she observed the spaces where cannons would be manned in a battle, and she shivered at the thought of them firing one after another, splintering the hull of an enemy ship.

Maggie could well imagine the captain giving orders to attack another vessel. Would she be expected to swing aboard from some hiding place in the top of the rigging and steal away all that was precious to the other crew? Would she be expected to shoot a pistol or slice a man’s cheek with her rapier as someone must have done to Bash?

It was hard to even imagine such a thing, especially when there was nothing, not land nor ship, as far as she could see in any direction. How, amidst all this blue—above and below and on and on forever—could they find their way anywhere at all?

“Your face looks mighty fearsome, Magnus. You practicing your pirate scowl?” Bash asked, appearing at her elbow.

“Is it working?”

“Oh, aye. Were I to glimpse you through my spyglass, I would surely turn tail and run t’other way for dear life.”

Perhaps she ought to feel insulted, but she laughed instead. It felt good to laugh. She used to do it so often as a girl.

“How would you know which way you were running?” she asked, and his eyebrows seemed to shoot up in surprise at her question. “At home there are roads and landmarks,” she explained. “Hills and rivers and towns can be your guide, but out here…” She shook her head, marveling once more at the vast emptiness. “I know you have maps, but can you really map a whole ocean? How do you know you’re here until you’re there?” she frowned, unsure she was making any sense, but Bash’s lips quirked up on one side like he was pleased by her question.

“Out here, it’s a bit of dead reckoning, you’re quite right. Paying attention to your compass, the current, and the wind.”

She tilted her head, trying to decide if he was teasing her. “If you were a woman, they’d burn you as a witch for talking like that.”

Now he laughed. “Navigation is a science, not a sorcery.” He held up a shiny, circular object, about the size of a man’s watch. “Have you ever seen a compass?” he asked, turning the device in his palm so a needle spun around.

Maggie shook her head in awe.

“The tip of the needle will always point north,” he explained.

She stared at the compass, recognizing the same directional signs one might find on a map. “It’s pointing west right now,” she said.

“No, west is merely facing north in my hand.” He turned the compass until the needle, which she realized didn’t move itself, lay across the N, and a mark between the W and the S was aligned with the bow of the ship. “The compass is pointing north. We’re traveling southwest.”

“But how does it work?” she asked, furious with herself for admitting her ignorance. She was fully prepared to channel her rage back at him when he scoffed at her feeble feminine mind.

“Lodestone. And magnetite,” was all he said.

She stared at him, surely appearing the blankest of fools. Was he speaking in Spanish again, or one of his many other tongues, just to confuse her?

“No one really knows why exactly, but the lodestone magnetizes the needle, and a proper magnet always points north.”

“Always?”

She couldn’t decide whether to be more amazed by the things he was telling her, the fact that he was telling her, or his own admission of not understanding it all. Did Jory know about these magnets?

“Always.”

“How do you know it’s a proper magnet?” she asked. “And not an upside-down one?”

He chuckled and rocked back on his heels—not like a man giving a belittling lecture, but more the gleeful laugh of a little boy who was proud to share what he’d learned. “For one thing, because I struck it against the lodestone myself just last week. For another, because where is the sun?”

“Dead ahead,” she said, realizing her folly. “What do you even need a compass for then, if you can follow the sun?”