Christine Dorsey - [Sea 01] Read online

  Sea Fires

  Christine Dorsey

  “A very special book... If this auspicious first book is any indication, the Charleston trilogy is destined to be a winner!”

  — Romantic Times Magazine

  With love to my firstborn, Ben, my only blond child—this golden haired hero is for you.

  And as always for Chip... my safe harbor.

  First published by ZEBRA BOOKS

  Copyright 1992 by Christine Dorsey

  Digitally published by Christine Dorsey, 2012

  Cover Design by Hot Damn Designs

  EBook Design by A Thirsty Mind

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Author, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  Prologue

  September, 1686

  Port Royal, Carolina

  “ ‘Tis a shame he sleeps so soundly. Perhaps a good prod would get him moving.” Jack Blackstone leaned out, balancing his body along the curved limb of the live oak that spread gracefully over the salt marsh. He and Nafkebee had shinnied up the trunk to get a better look at the alligator nearly hidden by the cordgrass below.

  A red-tailed hawk soared overhead, and Nafkebee followed its flight with his dark eyes. He was a Cheraw and, at fifteen summers, older and more cautious than his friend. “Be careful he does not use your arm to break his fast, Jack,” he warned in his native tongue.

  Swiping back hair burnished gold by the sun, Jack boasted with the cockiness of youth, “Yon gator would have a fight on his hands before I’d let him feast on my arm.” He squirmed around till he could reach the leather pouch slung over his back. He withdrew a handful of stones from inside and threw them within inches of the alligator’s head. Not even a flicker of movement showed in the animal’s eyes, which were all that was visible above the murky water.

  Shrugging, Jack sidled across the limb. “I best get back. Father thinks I’m chopping wood.” He had been, until he’d heard Nafkebee’s call, so near that of a wild turkey that all who heard it in the Scottish settlement of Stuart’s Town, save Jack, thought it was. But Jack knew the prearranged signal and with one last downward swipe of the axe, had headed toward the pine woods.

  “Elspeth caught me at the edge of the clearing,” Jack said as he leaped onto the spongy ground. “She wanted to come see you, but I assured her ‘twas too dangerous.” The boys shared a grin. Jack’s sister was only five, not much more than a babe, but she could be a pest. The one time Jack had brought her with him on his rendezvous with Nafkebee, she had nearly driven the reticent Indian crazy with her chatter.

  After leaving Nafkebee and arranging to meet him again in three days, Jack made his way back to the settlement along an Indian footpath.

  Since 1683, Jack had lived in Stuart’s Town. In that year his father, a Scottish nobleman, and Whig, fearing persecution at the hands of James II decided to leave his homeland. Along with nine other families they came to the southern border of Carolina. They were each granted twelve thousand acres in Port Royal and the chance to live free from an arbitrary government.

  Life in the colony was hard. Sickness weakened the body, and lack of promised protection from Charles Town disheartened the spirit. There was a constant threat from the Spanish to the south and pirates from the sea, but Jack’s father assured him the land was worth it.

  Jack had discussed his father’s philosophy with Nafkebee, who simply shook his head and stated that the land did not belong to man.

  Thoughts of his friend made the corners of Jack’s mouth curve up. But in the next instant his smile froze. Shots rang out through the forest, flushing a covey of doves into the blue September sky.

  Jack took off at a lope, then as the shooting intensified, ran faster. Branches tore at his clothes as he left the path seeking a quicker way to Stuart Town. His lungs burned, and he gulped air that tasted strongly of fear.

  He heard screams now, and as Jack broke into the clearing his own cry of denial escaped his lips. In the harbor were three ships, Spanish by design. Smoke hung over the village, acrid and stinging as Jack ran to his cabin.

  His mother lay in the doorway, her once white apron stained crimson. His own blood pounded in his ears as he dropped to his knees. A sob caught in his throat but was forced down by a burning rage. Jack sprang to his feet and raced toward the dock, toward the Spanish soldiers.

  Bodies lay everywhere. As his gaze skimmed across the scene of horror, he spotted his father. Jack stopped only long enough to grab the musket from his limp, lifeless fingers.

  He burst onto the Spanish soldiers with a fury that shocked them. His father had died before reloading the gun, so Jack used it as a club. He swung repeatedly, feeling the satisfying crunch of flesh and bones.

  Words were yelled at him in the heathen Spanish, but he didn’t stop. He fought like a man possessed, not like the lad he was.

  Someone grabbed him from behind, and Jack swirled about. And saw his young sister. She was crying hysterically, struggling with her meager strength in the arms of a burly Spaniard. Jack lunged toward them.

  But this time his attack was cut short. Pain exploded through his head. He hit the sandy ground with a thud. A booted foot rolled him over, and just before Jack’s world went black he looked into the face he would remember through hell and eternity.

  Chapter One

  “I am a free prince and have as much authority to make war on the whole world as he who has a hundred sail of ships...”

  — Captain Charles Bellamy, pirate

  May, 1699

  “Look at them flyin’ the Cross a St. George, Cap’n. It’s just like the bloody Spaniards, pretendin’ to be somethin’ they ain’t.”

  Lowering his spy glass, Captain Jack Blackstone dragged his attention from the brigantine dancing on the white-capped south Atlantic to his quartermaster. Phineas Sharp, his expression indignant, stood beside Jack on the Sea Hawk’s quarterdeck. Jack gestured toward the red and white flag flying from the yardarm of the vessel they pursued. Pursued across an ever narrowing span of sea. “We’re hardly in a position to fault that ploy,” he chuckled.

  Both he and Phin knew England’s red ensign snapped smartly above the deck of their own sloop.

  And the British Admiralty would be the first to confirm the Sea Hawk was not an English vessel.

  “That’s different, Cap’n, an’ ye knows it. Rules ain’t for the likes a us.” Phin screwed up his walnut brown face at the word “rules” as if the very act of saying it was bitter on his tongue.

  “ ‘Tis true enough.” Jack leaned bronzed forearms on the polished rail. Rules were something he’d given up years ago. No, not given up. Been forced to give up. He took a deep breath of salty air. “But as it happens yonder ship is flying its own colors.”

  “She’s English?” Phin’s tone was incredulous. “Aye.” Jack pushed away from the rail.

  “But”—Phin scurried after his captain down the ladder to the main deck. Here the noise and bustle of the crew as they positioned cannon through gunwales and piled extra shot drowned out the whip of the wind in the square-rigged sails.

  Phineas caught up with Jack near the thick pine mast. “
But if she’s English, then why—”

  “No rules, Phin. Isn’t that what you said?”

  “Aye, but, Cap’n, ‘tis different. Not that I care, mind ye. I mean, I’ve attacked me share a British ships, I have. But ye —”

  “Drew the line at pirating the British,” Jack finished for him, then raked lean, tanned fingers through sun gold hair. Phineas had a right to be surprised. From the moment Jack became captain of the Sea Hawk he had insisted they steer clear of the British. Spanish galleons they hunted with relish. French privateers fell prey to their pirate guns. But never the British. Until today.

  Jack looked down at his quartermaster. The man, for all his fierce looks and gravel-rough voice, had a soft streak a league deep, especially where Jack was concerned. He’d first shown it eleven years ago when Jack, frightened and alone, had scurried up the side of the Sea Hawk and stumbled unceremoniously to the deck. He still showed it in the concern of his deep-set black eyes.

  “ ‘Tis rumored there’s a Spaniard on yon ship, bound for St. Augustine.”

  “Ye think it might be de Segovia?”

  Jack’s fingers tightened into a fist. “ ‘Tis possible. According to Nafkebee, he’s expected to return from Spain to take charge of the garrison at the Castillo de San Marcos.” He spoke calmly, belying the turmoil inside him. Could revenge possibly be at hand? After all these years?

  “We’re running alongside, sir.”

  Jack acknowledged his head gunner, King Tabrue, with a nod. King, his sweat-slicked muscles bunched beneath ebony-black skin, turned back to tightening the cannon tackle.

  Jack raised his arm, then hesitated. He could feel Phin beside him, watching him, his body tense. A coil of doubt in his own gut tightened Jack’s jaw. What was he, a pirate with a conscience? Jack almost laughed at the irony.

  The ship might be British, but if there was a chance that she carried Don Diego de Segovia, a chance Jack might find him at last...

  Unbidden came the echo of screams. His mother’s... his father’s... Elspeth’s... his own. Jack swallowed and shut his eyes, trying to force away the time-faded images. When he opened them again his green stare was piercing.

  The decision to attack was simple—as simple as it had been when he was a lad of fourteen years.

  Jack’s arm sliced down through the tension-filled air as his order thundered across the sand-strewn deck.

  “Fire!”

  “So Newton is saying the centrifugal effect causes an equatorial bulge on all heavenly bodies.” Miranda Chadwick chewed on the end of her quill a moment, then glanced up from the Volume of Principia spread before her on the rough-hewn table. Don Luis de Mancera sat perched on the edge of a sea chest in the cramped cabin. The expression on his deeply lined face made her smile. It was so similar to Grandfather’s.

  Not that the Spaniard looked anything like the man who had reared Miranda. Grandfather had been tall and spare, with thin gray hair that stuck out at odd angles and clothes that neither fit well nor fluttered with bows and lace.

  Don Luis stood under five feet and seemed nearly as wide. His long curled wig framed a face folded with flesh, and he dressed more like a court dandy than the earnest scientist he was. When seen together they had made an odd-looking pair, Don Luis and her grandfather. But despite outward appearances and different nationalities, they’d been the best of friends—colleagues of the mind.

  “Excellent, Miranda!” Don Luis clapped sausage-like fingers together, sending the rows of ruffles that hid most of his hands flapping. “Your understanding of Newton’s theory is superb. Your grandfather would be very proud.”

  Tears sprang to Miranda’s eyes, and she quickly bent back over the book, skimming her finger down the heavy parchment to find her place. Her grandfather had been dead six months now, and reason dictated she should stop mourning. After all, he’d explained everything to her in the most modern of terms.

  She understood that the body was simply made up of muscles and bones and blood that changed color as it picked up air from the lungs. She knew from reading Halley’s “Mortality Tables” that the death rate was related to age. And Grandfather had been in his eighty-third year when he succumbed to a disease of the lungs.

  “Everything can be explained scientifically.” Grandfather had repeated that line often. And over the years, as Miranda first tagged along with him to his laboratory near London, and later helped him with his experiments, she came to accept it as the underlying truth of the world.

  But it didn’t seem to help her grief.

  Miranda sighed and, trying to ignore the smells of bilge water and tar that permeated the below decks, squinted at the page. By the oscillating light of the swaying lantern overhead, she translated the next line of Newton’s book from Latin to Spanish. For all his mathematical genius, Don Luis’s knowledge of languages was limited to his own.

  “Do you suppose Newton thought of —”

  A thunderous explosion widened Miranda’s dark eyes and stifled her question. The cabin and everything in it tilted precariously, and she grabbed for the book before it slid to the deck. “What was that?”

  Don Luis lumbered to the door, yanking it open. The passageway was full of noise and confusion as crew members rushed toward the hatch. Slamming shut the door, he leaned heavily against it. His breath came in deep gulps.

  “What is it, Don Luis? Are you all right?” Miranda, still clutching Newton’s Principia to her breast, fell against the bunk as another blast rocked the ship.

  “We’re under attack.” The Spaniard dragged his perfumed handkerchief down his sweaty face.

  “Attack! But who would —”

  “Pirates!” Don Luis pushed himself away from the door. “I may understand very little English, but that word I do know.”

  “Pirates.” Miranda’s voice was little more than a whisper. She knew there were such things, of course. But they seemed so foreign to her orderly life that the possibility of tangling with any had never occurred to her. What did one do with pirates?

  “I should never have brought you on this voyage.” Don Luis had regained some of his composure, though his breathing still wheezed from his grim-set mouth.

  “It was my decision to come,” Miranda reminded him. She tensed for another deafening roar of cannon, but none came. “Perhaps they’ve gone away.”

  Another sudden lurching of the ship made her realize how naive her words were.

  “I think they must be boarding us.” Don Luis’s eyes shot to Miranda. “Quickly, you must hide.”

  Hide. Of course, that would be a solution. Miranda turned full circle, her heavy skirts whipping around her ankles. “Where?” Don Luis’s cabin was small and filled with crates of equipment and books, but there was no way she could squeeze between them and the bulkhead.

  Loud footfalls in the passageway drew their attention. With a flourish Don Luis swished his sword from the scabbard hanging from his ponderous waist. “I swore to your grandfather to defend you to the death,” he announced as the cabin door banged open.

  Miranda’s mouth opened, but the scream died on her lips. Shock momentarily overcame her fear. The blood drained from her face, and her nails dug into the Principia’s leather cover.

  The pirate was huge. He dwarfed the doorway—the whole cabin—as he stood, booted legs braced apart. His breeches were sin black and skin tight. Above them he wore nothing but a leather doublet that revealed a broad expanse of sweat-slick chest and equally bare, muscled arms. His hair was light and wind-tossed and his face hard and fearsome. Miranda had never seen anyone so large and threatening. She didn’t even know people like this existed. The pirate didn’t seem to notice her as his dark scowl focused on Don Luis.

  Miranda could tell his size intimidated the Spaniard, too, for Don Luis swallowed compulsively, his jowls quivering before he lifted his sword.

  The movement jolted Miranda, and the scream she suppressed before came out as a blood-curdling screech. The sound caught the pirate off guard. He swung his head
, seeing Miranda for the first time, and riveted her with such a hard stare her mouth clamped shut.

  The pirate glared at Miranda, and she could do naught but glare back for what seemed long minutes. Then movement beside her made Miranda turn. At first she couldn’t believe what was happening. No one in their right mind would start a fight with this pirate—No one except a man who’d vowed to protect her to the death.

  Don Luis lunged forward, trying to simulate the lethal movements of his youth. But age and pastries had taken their toll, and his attack was awkward. Though he aimed for the heart, the tip of his sword did no more than graze the pirate’s arm. A slender line of crimson welled on the sun-bronzed skin.

  “Ouch! Damnit!” Jack feinted to the side, knocking into the woman. He’d barely gotten over his disappointment that this runt of a Spaniard wasn’t de Segovia when the damn fool decided to split him open. Now all he wanted to do was get out of here. But the little Spaniard was yelling at him, and though he’d tried to forget the Spanish he’d learned while a captive, he recognized a few words like “kill” and “bastard.”

  Jack tried to lift his hands but his arm ached like hell, and when he glanced down he saw blood streaming into the blond hairs on his forearm. Jack swore again and jumped back as the old man tried to make good on his threats. This time he eluded the cool bite of steel but struck his head on the bulwark in the process.

  God, he detested the Spanish.

  Jack resisted the urge to yank the pistol from his belt. Instead he sidestepped the next thrust and, catching the little man overextended, delivered a fight-ending right to the older man’s jaw. The sword clattered to the wooden deck, followed by the mound of ruffle-covered flesh.

  With the tip of his boot Jack rattled the old-fashioned basket-hilted sword across the floor. He was reaching down to help the old man to his feet when he heard a barrage of Spanish behind him, and then a sliver of pain shot through his other arm.