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Uma paced the top deck of the Lost Revenge confidently. With Harry and Gil at her side, she’d assembled a solid squad—a bona fide pirate ship with a bona fide crew. No matter that Gil was so dim he often forgot not to call her by that horrid nickname; Harry and his wharf rats were ready to cut up anyone who stood in their way. She surveyed the work the pirates were doing to bring the ship up to task.
They were busy provisioning the ship, bringing on food and water from Ursula’s as she’d ordered, as well as a whole host of supplies. All sorts of things could go wrong at sea, and you couldn’t exactly head home if you had a problem, so they needed extra lengths of rope and sail, boards that could be used to fix the hull, and all the tools and hardware to make those repairs. Plus, Harry insisted that every inch of the ship had to be checked. Every length of rope was inspected for rents or frayed edges. Rats loved to chew on ropes, and they tended to choose the most undesirable places to snack on them. If the pirates didn’t check every inch of the ropes, their main sail might just sail free the moment the wind caught it, or their anchor line might snap in two just as it took hold.
The crew went over every length of sail, and they checked all the winches and pulleys as well, making certain that each was sound, replacing a few, fixing others. They checked the mast for cracks and the rudder for soundness, and made certain it worked in proper coordination with the captain’s wheel. Things seemed to be coming together. But there was one particular problem that caught Uma’s attention. Apparently the Lost Revenge had as many holes as the ship had boards. Wooden sailing ships always take on a bit of water, she knew. But the Lost Revenge took on water by the bucketful, and when they’d tried to push off the dock the problem had only increased, with more water rising faster, threatening to turn her sailing vessel into a gigantic bathtub.
“So what do we do?” she asked Harry, who, coincidentally, had experience sailing in a bathtub.
“Well,” Harry started, clearly excited that she had decided to consult him on the matter. “We should have her lifted out of the water, the hull scraped clean and repainted, then—”
“Stop. That’s not happening. We need to do something about the state of this ship, but we don’t have time to lift it or do anything major. Be serious.”
“Yeah, I guess. Okay, so then maybe it’s just a matter of resealing the boards. When the ship was built, the joints were all watertight, you know, fitted together closely so no water could pass through them. But ships age, and boards flex and rot and chip, and pirate ships have a way of getting rammed into or ramming into things, taking cannon shot, the usual stuff. It ruins the hulls and the boards that make them up.”
“Wonderful history of sailing, thanks, but I have no interest. Get to the point, will you?” she growled.
“We caulk the joints. There’s an adhesive that’s fitted between the boards and then it’s all slathered over with pitch.”
“Pitch? As in singing on key?” she asked.
“Pitch as in tar or mastic—what we call sludge: that black sticky stuff that water can’t penetrate.”
“Gotcha. Get on it,” she said, pushing at his chest.
“Me?” he asked, stumbling back.
She crossed her arms. “Well, you do seem to be the expert, and I recall seeing a barrel of something black and sticky down there in the hold. I reckon you’ll find all the supplies you need down there, so grab a few of the crew and get working.”
“Great. I’ll be covered in sludge for days.”
“It beats bailing water every time we sail.”
“It does,” said Harry as he headed down into the hold. “I’ll have this ship watertight in no time.”
When Harry had disappeared out of sight, she headed to the wooden bridges and trudged back to the fish shop. Her shift was up. It was time to put away her captain’s hat and put on an apron.
Later that evening, Harry, Gil, and the rest of the crew filed in. There was ferocious Jonas, with his cornrows and scar on his left cheek, Desiree, tiny but vicious in a ragged peasant dress, fierce Gonzo in his red bandanna, long braid, and blue pantaloons, crazy Bonny in her torn fishnet shirt and patched dungarees, and a whole host of others—all hardened mercenaries. They took one of the long tables in front of the kitchen window. “Recap. What do we know about Yen Sid?” asked Uma, drumming her fingers on the table.
Harry dumped a pile of documents on the table, pulled out a notepad, and paged through it with his hook. “Professor at Dragon Hall, but not a villain. Volunteered to live on the Isle of the Lost to, quote, ‘help the new generation of villain offspring.’” At this Harry snickered. “What a loser.”
“What else?” said Uma impatiently.
“Let’s see,” said Harry, having trouble turning the pages with his hook. Uma sometimes wished he would give up with the whole hook obsession and just use his hands, but she knew it would never happen.
“Here we go,” said Harry. “Keeps to himself, amateur lepidopterist.”
“Lepidop-what?” said Gil.
“Studies butterflies,” explained Harry. “You know, those bugs with the pretty wings?”
“I know what a butterfly is,” growled Gil.
“Really? Well, you learn something new every day,” said Harry with a smirk. He continued to read the list. “What else, let’s see…has never set foot in the Fish and Chips Shoppe, but is a regular at the Slop Shop, where he takes his tea.”
“Tea?” Uma made a face.
“Yeah, it annoys the goblins to no end, because they’re a coffee shop, and apparently he always insists on chai, which of course they don’t have,” said Harry. He kept reading. “No known acquaintances. No associates. An enigma, shall we say….”
“Hold on, what’s this?” said Uma, picking a paper off the top of the pile. It was marked with a golden beast-head stamp and signed by Fairy Godmother.
