Sicily awoke to a gunshot.
Her whole body jolted at the crack of the pistol. She immediately threw back her covers and leapt out of bed. Pulling on her trousers and blouse, she retrieved her pistol from where it lay on the shelf above her bed.
Running out of her room, Sicily dashed down the galley and up the stairs.
On deck, she cocked the gun.
Her father stood at the prow, shooting into the waves. BANG!
A helpless wooden barrel bobbed in the waves, splintered with smoking holes. Even when it was nearly swallowed by the waves, Father did not cease fire.
His shoulders jolted with each shot. BANG! BANG! BANG! Sicily frowned. Holstering her white pistol, she walked up the deck to her father. BANG!
She placed a hand on her father’s shoulder.
He flinched.
Sicily reached for the gun, but Father was quick. He jerked it away from her hand without looking and turned towards her, an unnamed emotion in his eyes. Perhaps anger, but Sicily knew better than that.
“What do you need, Sicily?”
“I want to know what’s gotten into you. You’re acting unlike yourself.”
Father stared out at the sea, the uneven waves reflecting in his eyes. He sighed.
“The world is complicated, mi vida. Best to not read into it too far.” With that, he patted her shoulder, and walked away. Sicily stood in the middle of the deck, speechless.
Fleance stuffed his belongings into his carpet bag. Tonight, he would escape.
The boat was docked at a port in the south of France.
He’d snuck out earlier and spoken with a sailor docked at the same port, named Oliver. He worked on a ship called the Mary, and said Fleance would be a welcome help, as most of their crew had been lost in a pirate attack.
Fleance felt grateful to find a ship that didn’t recognize him, even if they told tall tales.
Sicily lay in bed, her hair splayed out over her pillow.
The boat rocked steadily, the swaying motion keeping her eyes open. Father had hardly spoken at supper, while the other men whispered amongst themselves, slanting glances at each other across the table.
Sicily’s brow creased. Pirates were not people who whispered. Yelling, guffawing, maybe even snarling in a deadly tone was common, but whispering was not part of their vocabulary. And yet it seemed to be their primary language these past couple of weeks.
Something was afoot. And what was on with Father? Shooting into the waves, passing her in the hallway like he didn’t see her, growing more and more reclusive? He was not acting himself.
Sicily shifted onto her back, one arm over her forehead. Father had never kept secrets from her. He was keeping one from her now, she was sure of it.
Fleance’s arms and face ran with water, through his hair, down his back.
He leaned all his weight against the rope he was pulling. Sailors slid to and fro around him, yelling and trying to get the ship together.
The ocean was in a rage. Colossal waves slapped the ship, sending water spraying over the deck. One large wall of water rose threateningly and hit the ship with incredible force, sending Fleance flying.
He hit the deck and clung to a mast, struggling to get back up.
What would happen if he died at sea?
Tossing his hair out of his eyes, he got back to his feet.
He would have left no mark on the world but a wanted poster, and that was not the image he desired portraying him. Grunting, Fleance wrapped the rope around his hands again. The boat rollicked and pitched, determined to sink them.
He couldn’t help but feel like the storm was inside of him too.
Sicily slid quietly out of her cabin. The lanterns hanging on the walls swung recklessly. Determined, the red-haired girl ignored the way the storm was throwing the boat.
Father and all the sailors were on the deck, trying to get the sails tied down. If she could just get to Father’s study, she might be able to sort out what was going on. Father always wrote down his plans.
A particularly large wave hit the boat, throwing Sicily against a wall. Lanterns swung, their flames throwing wild shadows. She needed to get to the study. Only a few moments would pass before she would be noticed missing above deck.
Sicily got to her feet and bolted down the hall. The ship pitched so wildly she fell three times before she got to the door of Father’s study.
Bracing one arm against the frame, she twisted the doorknob. It was locked. She cursed. She needed to get in there, to find out what was going on.
They hadn’t been on a raid in weeks and father’s mood grew worse by the day. Sicily leaned her shoulder against the doorframe, pulling a hairpin from her wild mane.
Facing the door straight on, she jammed it into the keyhole.
“Argh!” A huge wave hit the ship and sent her flying. She slammed into the opposite wall, her head nearly crashing into a precariously swaying lantern.
Grunting, she crawled back to the door. The hairpin had fallen to the ground. Retrieving it, she held it in her teeth like a cutlass and struggled to get to her feet.
Slipping the pin into the lock once more, she carefully scraped it in a full circle.
Click.
Yes.
Sicily breathed a sigh of relief and pushed open the door.
Father’s papers were fluttering about the room. With a start, she realized a window was open. She ran, as best she could, to the window. Waves, black and hungry, roared outside.
Sicily grabbed the windowpane and with much effort, slammed it shut.
Breathing hard, she turned back to the room. Her father was not a neat man, but this was chaos.
She picked up the nearest paper, spreading her feet wide to brace against the pitching of the ship.
Scanning the water-soaked page, her brow furrowed. Only a few words were legible.
Raid
Mary
Her breath stuck in her throat.
Kidnap Fl
The rest was washed out. Sicily’s stomach sank.
Fleance collapsed onto a cot, arms aching, his whole body soaked.
When he had been living as a nobleman, wearing suits, taking rides through the countryside and standing in meetings with powerful men who sat around in horsehair chairs sipping red wine and plotting political matters, he’d never been prepared for this.
Thank God the storm was calming.
He had thought staying at home was dangerous. And it was, in a very political, smoking cigars in dark rooms, shiny pistol under his father’s pillow sort of way.
The ocean didn’t care who he was, or how much money could be collected for his life. The ocean was just a monster.
The next day the sea was calmer, but still choppy.
Sicily watched the dark waves crashing against the ship, way down below.
The paper from Father’s study haunted her mind. Kidnapping.
Sicily inhaled. Fighting and raids were exciting and brought wealth. She’d never questioned why they did it. But kidnapping. That was another matter entirely.
At least since she was born, they had never done such a thing.
Sicily rubbed her temples. She had to find out what was going on.
“Anthony.” Sicily strode over to where the youth was standing. His sharp brown eyes held her gaze as his mouth stretched up in a half smile.
“Top of the mornin’ Sis.”
Sicily returned his light smile and leaned back against the railing beside him. “How are you today?”
Anthony frowned, the jewel stud in his nose catching the sunlight. “Eh. Alright. Yer Father’s in a bloody mood.” He glanced at her. “Let me guess: ye aren’t here to tell me ye found a rat in yer cabin.”
Sicily laughed at his bluntness. “No. Although that would be exciting.”
Anthony squinted at her suspiciously. “Ye have never thought rats were excitin’.”
Sighing, Sicily faced him. “You’re right. I have something to ask you.”
“I ain’t killin’ the rat in yer cabin.”
Sicily laughed again. “Forget about the rat, will you? I have something serious to ask you.”
Anthony crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back against the rail. “Fire away.”
Drawing in a breath, Sicily blurted, “Is my father planning a kidnapping?”
Anthony’s expression changed slightly but he recovered and stared out at the sea. “I don’t know nothin’. Why would he tell me?”
Squinting at him, Sicily tried to see through his obvious bluff. “Are you certain he’s not going to kidnap anyone?” Anthony sighed, uncrossing his arms and stepping back.
“Look, Sis. Yer Father ain’t doin’ anything but what he always done. Protect ye and provide for ye.”
With that, he turned and walked away. Sicily stood there, alone. Abrupt endings to conversation were typical. Secrets were not.
That night, dinner was tense as usual, but father was even more in his head than typically.
Sicily cleared her throat. The sailors looked up grudgingly.
“Can you pass the salt pork?”
Alexander, a particularly robust and grisly member of the crew squinted at her.
“You can reach it yerself, wench.”
Sicily glanced at father. Typically, he would have threatened Alexander a broken arm if he didn’t show respect for Sicily. Tonight, he didn’t even look up.
Sicily narrowed her eyes at Alexander.
“Unless you want a broken arm and deck cleaning duty for the rest of the year, I’d suggest you pass me the bloody salt pork.”
Alexander growled and shoved the pork in her general direction. Sicily took a piece and then froze as she felt her hairs on the back of her neck rise.
Rufio was staring at her with a foxlike expression. He let his gaze wander in a way Sicily didn’t find particularly gentlemanly.
She smiled back demurely, then mimed cutting his throat.
He shrugged, putting his arms on the table. Other than Rufio, the entire crew was guiltily quiet, not speaking. Father hadn’t even taken food for his plate. He suddenly inhaled, as though he’d dozed off and only now awoke, before leaving the table without speaking.
Sicily walked to her room, her mind still on Father’s indifference at supper. If Father didn’t speak up soon on the kidnapping matter, she’d have to get drastic.
Suddenly she heard footsteps behind her.
She whirled around, just in time to see Rufio before he jumped for her and grabbed her shoulders.
“What-Let me go!” He didn’t respond, just tossed her over his shoulder. She kicked and twisted, trying to break loose. When that didn’t work, she screamed. It momentarily distracted Rufio and she kneed him in the gut, shoving herself off of him.
Where was father?
Sicily tried to reach for her dagger, but the disgusting man grabbed her again, swearing.
With one arm crushing her neck, he used his free hand to throw open a door and shove her inside.
She crashed to the ground. Rufio slammed the door shut. She heard his footsteps running away.
Fleance startled awake. Crashes and shouts above brought him to his feet. Even for sailors, dinner didn’t usually bring such excitement.
He threw open the door.
Immediately hands choked his neck. He gasped for air, unable to breathe.
Looking at his captor, his blood went cold.
If there were such things as pirates, this was one.
He wore a long black coat with brass buttons. A large hat cast a dangerous shadow over his cold, empty looking eyes.
“I’m afraid this is going to be a long night.” The pirate’s voice was surprisingly quiet.
Sicily pounded on the door.
“Let me out! Help! Father! Juan! Anybody!”
That disgusting, weasel-faced, miserable, pathetic old cuss!
“Arrrragh!” She screamed in frustration, slamming her shoulder into the door again. She’d kill him!
Fleance sat stiffly in the bottom of a small lifeboat. A dagger pricked his back. Turning his head, he kept his eyes down.
“I am not entirely certain of your intentions.” He said this quietly, keeping his voice cold.
That sentence was pure fiction. He knew exactly what they wanted. He was a walking gold mine.
The dangerous looking man who’d captured him replied in an emotionless voice. “You will find out soon enough.”
Sicily grunted, digging her knife into the lock. The blade was bigger and harder to maneuver than a hairpin, but it did more damage. Almost there. People were going to pay.
The pirates forced Fleance to climb a rope ladder up the side of their ship. He tried not to think about the black waves below. One man climbed ahead of him and another behind.
There was no way to escape in the middle of the ocean.
The lock finally clicked. Sicily sighed in relief.
She slid her dagger back into the sheath hidden in her skirts, her relief replaced with a cold fear. Something was very, very wrong.
She burst out of the room.
A gruff, frightening pack of pirates stood all around him. Their torches threw dark shadows, making their faces even more menacing.
Fleance was tied to a mast in the center of the circle.
Each man had a sword drawn, except for the captain. He stood before Fleance, holding a short, sharp knife. One thing came to Fleance’s mind.
He was about to die.
Sicily ran down the hall and turned left towards the stairs. She began to clatter up the rotting steps. When she came to the deck, the scene before her slapped her in the face. She felt like an outsider. Careful not to give away her presence, she hid behind a crate. Every last sailor on the ship was crowded around the main mast. Every sailor but her.
What were they doing? Her father’s voice, carried easily on the night breeze, interrupted her confusion.
“Lord Upton, you have a large sum on your head, do you know that?”
Sicily’s blood went cold.
Fleance met the pirate’s eyes. “I am not surprised.” The man began to walk around him, his heeled boots clicking ominously. “Your mother, Lady Josephina, has issued a reward for you to be found alive. However,” He paused. “Your Father.”
Fleance lowered his head.
“Your father has issued his own reward that your mother doesn’t know about. He wants you brought home dead.” The man looked at him, dark eyes reflecting the torches flames.
Fleance swallowed, flicking a glance around. “I imagine I know which of my parents you are siding with.”
The man half smiled with no humor. “You may be wrong.”
Sicily listened in horror. Who was up there?
“I doubt that.” The voice sounded young and hard.
“My father is far richer than my mother.” There was a sound like someone spitting on the deck.
“I’m sure you will be paid handsomely to run a blade through me.”
Sicily leaned her head against the crate, her eyes falling closed. Her ambivalence warred inside.
The pirate smiled. Fleance glowered at him.
“I am aware of that.”
The pirate lifted his eyebrows. “I didn’t capture you for the money.”
Fleance lifted his hateful eyes. What sort of pirate didn’t care about money? “Then why am I here?” He forced himself to meet the man’s eyes. The short knife in the pirate’s hand glinted sharply.
Sicily risked peering around the crate to get a look at the owner of this scared and angry voice, to get a look at the reason she’d been shut out from her father’s plans.
A young man, with unusually long hair and a clean face. But his eyes were scared, filled with dark hate.
He must be a couple years older than her.
Rufio slashed the rope holding the young lord to the mast.
The young man stood, not moving, hands at his sides. His clothes were finer than any she’d ever seen. Sicily’s stomach was clenched. What were they going to do to him? And why?
“Rufio,” said Father, sounding exhausted. “You know what to do.”
Rufio kicked the viscount in the back, knocking him to his knees. Immediately he grabbed the viscount’s long hair, yanking it up.
The viscount’s face was stony, though a sharp wince was not missed by Sicily.
Rufio’s face was a sneer as he sawed off the viscount’s hair, letting it fall to the deck in handfuls.
At last, his hair was only long enough to fall in his eyes as he kept his head bowed.
He looked younger now, a boy with hatred in his eyes.
Father had his back to her. He slowly raised his arm. A short knife glinted in his hand.
Sicily jumped up and ran out of hiding. “Stop!”
All the pirates turned at the loud cry.
Fleance lifted his head.
A girl stood before them. His breath caught in his throat.
She was stunning. She wore trousers, which was enough to startle him, but her wild red hair captivated him. Her wide blue eyes pierced him clear through. She had a wild look about her, a fiery sort of beauty.
An image flashed through Fleance’s mind, of a woman in a dark veil, with deep red lips and blue eyes. Odd.
The captain’s face looked so different than before.
“Sicily.” His voice was raspy. “Please. Go back to your room.”
The girl looked furious.
“Put the knife down, Father. What is wrong with you?!”
Father?
The skinny man with slick black hair and an earring who had cut Fleance’s hair moved to the captain’s side.
“I will take her back.” The captain nodded. When he turned back to Fleance, his eyes were empty, but a shininess to them glinted in the moonlight.
Fleance could hear the girl fighting the slick man, cursing him up one side and down the other.
He couldn’t help the smile that twitched at the corners of his mouth. The girl swore like a sailor.
“Look at me, boy!” shouted the captain.
The smile left Fleance’s face like it was never there. He lifted his head, still on his knees. Heart pounding in his ears, he met the man’s gaze.
Immediately the knife slashed through the air.
Sicily twisted out of Rufios grip and dashed back up the stairs just in time to see father’s knife slit a long cut down the boy’s face.
She half choked, hands flying to her mouth.
Father’s hand lowered slowly.
The viscount’s face was pale, the dark blood startling against his skin.
Sicily’s heart was tearing right in two. She wanted to clean the blood off the boy’s face, slap her father hard across the face and grab him, demanding he tell her why he was doing this.
She was numb as Rufio dragged her back down the stairs.
Fleance stared at the bars around him, cursing himself. He was trapped. What would Father think of his new haircut? He’d always said it was too long.
He roared, leaping up and slamming his shoulder into the bars. The pain slowly subsided, but anger still burned. How long would he keep seeking his father’s approval?
Sighing, he rubbed his eyes, then looked around. He was all alone, the only prisoner in the whole gallows.
It was alright. Truthfully, the quiet suited him.
A soft rustling came from the other end of the gallows.
Fleance’s head snapped up. He wanted to yell, “Who goes there?” But if it was a pirate, they’d be inclined to cut off more than his hair, and if it was a rat, he’d just feel ridiculous.
So, he held his breath, heart hammering.
The rustling paused, and there was the sound of a door closing, ever so softly. The person coming in either wasn’t supposed to be there or was going to try and sneak up on Fleance.
He licked his lips, heart pounding.
The rustling became more of a swishing, and it was growing closer. Fleance stepped away from the bars.
Slowly a form emerged from the shadows, dressed in loose trousers and a white blouse.
The breath whooshed out of Fleance in relief.
The girl finally reached his cell.
He cleared his throat. “Hello.” The girl’s face flickered with a hint of a smile. She did not speak.
He watched her as she took a hairpin from her long red mane and inserted it into the lock on the cell. Skillfully, she moved it in a full circle, and it clicked.
She kicked open the door.
Entering the cell, the girl held a rag and an orange in her hands. Setting them down, she faced him.
“Fleance.” Not a question. She was bold. Still unsure as to whether she was here to help him or kill him, he met her gaze hesitantly.
“Uh yes. Lord Upton. Actually. If we are getting specific.”
She was expressionless. Her eyes flitted from his eyes to his hair to his chest then back to his eyes again.
“You are that viscount.”
Oh dear. Fleance silently hoped this girl wasn’t planning on killing him and collecting the reward herself. One would think it would be easy to not be prey when they had done nothing wrong, but evidently it was not.
“Uh, I don’t believe I’m a viscount of any particular… value.” The girl, who he remembered was named Sicily, snorted.
“You don’t have to lie to me. I know who you are. There was a poster about you in the southern port.”
Blast it.
“Uh, yes, I’m that viscount. I would have been able to participate as one in a month.” Sicily picked up the rag she’d brought with her and stepped closer to him.
“Would have?” His face was feeling unnaturally hot.
The girl’s head barely reached his chin, but she didn’t seem to notice. Her eyes pierced him as she began to clean the cut on his face.
Flinching as the rag touched him, Fleance was painfully reminded of his recent wound.
“Hold still, you ninny.” The girl ordered.
Ninny?
“I’ve had much worse. Don’t be such a wimp.” The insults kept coming. He squinted at her.
She removed the rag from his face and pulled back her hair, revealing a long white scar by her ear. “This was from a raid on a ship called the Renegade. I stole a great deal that day.”
This girl participated in illegal activities. Good to know.
She smiled while she dabbed the blood off his chin.
“That time my father had me pretend to drown a bit away from the boat. They were all so distracted they didn’t see the boat coming.” He tried to hold his head still for her, but his eyes flicked over her face.
“Your father puts you in such danger just for some treasure?”
The girls face hardened. She took away the rag and set it down.
“That is none of your business.”
“But you just told me yourself.”
“I did not know you would be so condemning of me and my father!”
Anger rose in Fleance. “Your precious father kidnapped me, cut off my hair and slashed my face! That seems slightly worthy of condemnation!”
The girl glared at him, her face growing redder by the minute.
“Oh, I’m so sorry your pretty looks have been ruined! For your information, my father has never done anything like this!”
“Your father is a lunatic!”
“And you are a helpless fool who doesn’t know a good man from a lump of seaweed!” With that, she spun around, her wavy red hair slapping his face.
As the cell door slammed closed, Fleance yelled, “You forgot your orange!”
Sicily didn’t look back. “Eat it! It might help you not die. But that is unlikely!”
Sicily stormed away, clattering up the stairs, not caring who heard her. That moron! His disgustingly handsome face and the way he seemed to know it was. How dare he judge her father! She walked so fast her hair lifted. Why had she helped him? She should have let him deal with his own injuries.
Maybe he’d have to clean off his own blood with that tailored jacket of his. She savored the thought. It was beautiful.