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“What?”
“You heard me. Just get that look off your face. We’re not making love tonight.”
“Dearie, listen…”
“No. And don’t call me that stupid name.”
“It’s a term of endearment.”
“Uh huh. The answer is still no. Besides, you’re way too drunk.”
He opened his mouth to reply when there was a sudden, loud crash on deck. The whole ship seemed to shudder and suddenly lurch a bit to the left—or port, as Roxbury would say. Everything on the table slid to the floor and so did I. Roxbury managed to get to his feet as the ship suddenly righted itself, and I heard voices calling, “Sail ho!”
Roxbury was already running out as I managed to get back to my feet, so I struggled into my jacket, and began making my way up top, where everything was chaos. Men were running in all directions, and I could hear Roxbury shouting ahead of me. The first mate, Jarvis, came running past me, his eyes rolling in fear.
“Get below! We’re under attack!”
“I’m not going anywhere!”
Then a flare went up on the starboard side, and for a brief moment the sea was lit up clearly. Three heavy frigates were bearing down on us—one behind the other, with the wind in their favor at perhaps fourteen knots. The one in the lead was bringing its broadside to bear, as Roxbury was shouting orders for the Fancy Lady to do the same in desperate haste. A flare went up from one of the other ships. I could see there was no way to outrun them. In this wind, the frigates had the advantage, and they were already in full sail.
The one closest to the Lady was solidly built and well-rigged for battle, with iron chains reinforcing the rigging. Men were already pounding down to the gundecks on both ships. I could hear them shouting back and forth to each other. Roxbury was still barking orders somewhere near the bow.
“Stand by to repel boarders!” I heard him bellowing, and I could hear the sounds of men yelling from the other ship that had been brought around and was drifting nearer to us over the sea.
“Fire as she bears!” the captain of the frigate yelled, and red fire and black smoke spit out of their guns. The next moment, the ball hit and I was falling to the deck as I heard the sounds of splintering wood and loud yelling. Suddenly, Roxbury was beside me, pulling me up to my feet.
“I was coming for you,” he said, pulling me close. “Stay beside me.” I heard the guns on the Fancy Lady firing too in a loud explosion of sound, but we had gone too far, and the shells that were fired landed harmlessly in the water with loud splashes.
“Avast firing!” Roxbury shouted. “Come back around.” The Lady began to make her ponderous turn, which would give the other ships time to lower boats to come across and board us.
“What are you doing? Why don’t we try to outrun them?”
“We can’t. Not in this wind. We’d never be able to completely outpace them. They’re holding steady with us now, because we’re just floating in the water. Our only chance is to fight. I’m not going to simply hand over my ship!”
“But who are they?”
He glanced down at me grimly. “One of the ships is Igellan. One is Moravian, and the other is flying a Sudfarman flag.”
“What?”
“I believe it’s your cousins, led by Lex and Harrison. I figure they’ve come for you. A rescue mission.”
“Oh gods, Roxbury, if that’s Lex and Harrison over there, they’ll never stop. What if we can’t win this fight? What are we going to do?”
“Lose, I suspect. But not without a hell of a fight. On second thought, you need to go below when the fighting starts. It’ll be safer for you.”
“The hell with that!”
By this time, most of the crew were at the rails, cutlasses and pistols in hand, and I knew the pirates were going to fight it out to the death. I ran to the railing as well, and peered over at one of the other ships, the one that had fired at us. It was the one from Igella, but it was too dark to see on deck.
Then, as the two crews yelled and cursed at each other across the gap, a white flag of truce was suddenly slowly raised across the water.
There were loud gasps of shock as the pirate crew watched it going up. Someone on the Igellan ship jumped up on the railing as the white flag raised, and a few of the men pulled up their pistols to fire, but Roxbury shouted at them.
“‘Vast that! Lower your guns, you fools. They’ve raised a flag of truce.”
Most of them lowered their barrels, but Roxbury still had to walk along the line of men closest to us and lay about himself with his fists. “I’ll jam that barrel up your ass!” he yelled and cuffed more than one of the men on the sides of their heads before he had them under control.
