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PART III
AUGUST, 1780
LA ROCHELLE, FRANCE
CELIA LAY ON HER bed listening to the sea splash up against her windows and the rain fall gently from the black sky. She stroked Dindi absently, the cat’s purr as comforting as the rain. A lone lantern cast a small bit of light from where it swung over her bed, but Celia could not bear the darkness this night. Papadakos was at the helm and the rest of the crew went about their watches as usual.
Rafael was gone. Never again would he be able to pop up when she least expected him and satisfy—nay, indulge—most of her needs and wants. Never again would he be able to take her to bed and love her in spite of her scars. Never again would she be able to carry a child he had given her. No matter she would not have allowed him to; it was enough that he could not.
She closed her eyes and allowed the tears to roll down her cheeks. There was no one to see, no one who would comfort her except her mother, who was aboard the Iron Maiden, now hours behind them. And she had fared no better between her lovers anyway. If Mary had had any useful advice, she would have offered it long ago.
Avenge me.
Since she did not know in what state he had left his family and lands, she might have been persuaded to believe his command was meant for his family, but she knew better.
“Damn you, Rafael.”
It was a ridiculous request and she was no longer a spoiled miss who rebelled for its own sake. She was a sensible commander who refused to take an impetuous man’s demands seriously, no matter how much she loved him.
The Carnivale.
Her adulthood had begun when Dunham had put her down in Egypt and was set in stone in that pivotal moment when, at five and twenty, she’d beheaded Skirrow.
She hadn’t thought far past that act, assuming since she’d grown up on the deck of a ship, had sailed as an officer on the Iron Maiden, and was the ship’s master on the Carnivale, she would be more than capable of handling full command. She also knew that if she, Smitty, and their other few conspirators could hold off any contenders until Bridge and Solomon were freed, she would succeed in her quest.
What she hadn’t counted on was the amount of concentration and work required to command, sail, and navigate at once; to select targets wisely; to provision the ship with their prizes and what little Skirrow had left behind; to consider the safety of a hundred men and to pay those same men with … nothing.
They had been off the coast of Palestine when Skirrow had allowed her to be loosed from her bindings to weep over her husband’s dead body, but not for any reason of pity: The Carnivale was hopelessly lost and could not find its way home to Casa Blanca without her.
If it hadn’t been for Smitty, Bataar, Bridge, Solomon, the rest of her officers, and a few of the freed slaves, she would have been mutinied had they realized she couldn’t pay their shares for the voyage during which she’d taken command. Out of what should have been a full hold, there was very little left: Skirrow had spent it, eaten it, jettisoned it, or fucked it.
It had taken her sailing through an unexpected storm off the coast of Algiers that should have sunk them that had convinced the rest that perhaps they should stick with her. Strapped to the wheel and without sleep for forty-eight hours, she had earned their respect as more than some sort of horribly scarred, sword-wielding daughter of Lucifer.
But there was no luck, no magic, no sword, no battle axe, no scars, no voice that got them through that storm; just a desperate captain.
Rafael had ceased to exist for almost two years while she grieved Talaat and got her sea legs for full command. Following, she had put herself under the command of a fledgling government, and was obliged to learn how to hunt in an entirely foreign territory.
Then he’d navigated on the voyage that had chafed them both and culminated in her miscarriage in Sint Eustatius.
An odd—but oh so familiar—tickling between her legs caught her attention, then a wrenching pain knifed through her, making her curl into herself and whimper.
“No,” she whispered, her soul shattering into a million pieces. “Please, no.”
But the pain came again and answered her: Yes.
The blood would come soon, she knew, and she gathered the last of her strength and breath. “SOLOMON!”
She couldn’t mark time, as another pain, then another, then more—came faster and faster.
Bare feet pounded toward her cabin.
The door crashed open and bounced off the wall so hard it slammed closed again. He wrenched it open again and bellowed, “GEORGINA!” into the vaguely lamplit corridors.
In a trice, the physician had dropped to his knees behind her.
He wrapped his hand around her thigh, gently prying loose the knot she had made of herself, rolling her to her back and spreading her legs open.
“Jack,” he said urgently. “Do you feel the same pain you did after surgery?”
“The same,” she gasped, “but so very much worse.”
He released a soft string of vile Arabic curses and turned away while her eyelids drifted closed in between waves of pain. The rain tinged against the windows.
How fitting it should rain this night.
Solomon wadded her linens into a ball and pressed them hard to her quim, already warm and sticky. The stench of copper assaulted her nose. “Close your legs as tightly as you can as long as you can. I need time to make the proper paregorics and prepare my instruments.”
She nodded.
The door opened and closed several times as George and two cabin girls came and went, fetching and carrying with an impressive calm and speed, delivering what seemed like endless buckets of hot water. Normally the girl would have commandeered every boy on the ship to assist in the carrying, but seemed to understand that this was something women must attend.
Soon Celia felt an arm under her head lifting her and pressing a cup to her mouth. She drank the vile potion dutifully. She then suffered a damp, malodorous sponge pressed against her nose, knowing she would awaken tomorrow evening slightly worse for wear and, for the fifth time in her life, no longer with child.
• • •
A WHISPER OF SILK and the barely discernible pad of bare feet across the deck
lantern light seeping through her eyelids
gentle rocking, and a clanging ship’s bell
These things, so familiar to her as to be part of her soul, told her almost everything she needed to know.
Almost.
There, next to her side, safe in the curve of her waist, the tiniest of bundles, so small she might not have noticed it but for the fact that she had expected it to be there when she awoke. And, as she had also expected, curled around it was Dindi, in a futile attempt to keep it warm.
“How?” she croaked, her heart aching for oh, so many reasons. But she was too spent to weep, in too much pain to move, and too exhausted to care if she was begging.
She heard Solomon’s sigh, then felt the edge of the mattress depress. The rag, when it was pressed gently to her forehead, was cool and tinged with lavender. “We waited too long,” he murmured. “When we do this again, you will need to be abed for the entirety of your course.”
She remained silent, as she had so many words swirling in her head and could not put them together. She kept her eyes closed hoping they would all go away.
But they refused, so she opened her eyes and cupped the bundle no bigger than her palm to painstakingly bring it to her chest. She gently unwrapped the gauze bandages and looked at the tiny but almost perfectly formed face, equally perfect fingers, then examined further.
“My little earl,” she whispered when she saw that Elliott had given her the first son she had carried. She laid her hand protectively over the babe, but she could bear to look no longer because her eyes hurt. “Solomon, is—is God punishing me for—for disposing of the first one?”
“No,” he said. “The woman who attended you did you no harm. Had you waited any longer, it would have happened anyway. To my mind, you made a wise decision because you placed yourself in the care of a skilled midwife before you were forced to find one urgently.”
“But I didn’t know that then. I was only sixteen and the Señora Rector arranged for it.”
“Jack!” he snapped. “Your womb is defective and always was. I will not allow you to speak of God’s punishment in this manner, as by that logic, Khersis must have done something truly evil to deserve the manner of his death—and no one, not even his enemies, would be able to think of a single evil thing he had ever done.”
This was true, and she released the small breath she had not realized she was holding. Tears stung her eyes and traced paths down her temples and into her hair. “I love you, Solomon.”
“And I, you.” He smoothed her forehead. “There are many people who love you, who would mourn your death, and none more than your father.”
She had the strength to snort.
“He is not a man of words, but of acts. His acts with regard to you are clumsy and born of ignorance and confusion, but one must judge a man according to his capabilities and he has done for you everything he can within his.” He paused. “I cannot say I would have done any better with a she-child suddenly thrust upon me, as I am no more given to sentiment than he is. He also does not have the advantage of knowing women as I have had.”
This Dunham, the one Solomon described, was one Celia had only begun to understand in Amsterdam. He had claimed her finally, given her his name, though he had not gone so far as to use her female name.
“Look to this, Jack,” Solomon said gently, interrupting her thoughts. “Your husband is alive and well, and will fight to remain so as long as he believes you to be. There is promise there, the promise of making another life with him. Orlando and I will be with you to assure that promise, if only once.”
She slowly opened her eyes to see him there, in his ubiquitous white tunic and trousers, his familiar bald head gleaming dark in the lamplight, looking at her with an expression anyone would call “stern,” but was, in fact, concerned.
“Truly?”
He nodded. “I find Judas to be an honorable man, insofar as my measurement of honor is warped beyond repair. But more importantly, he loves you the way you must be loved. I would that you have something of him if that is your wish.”
“I ran away from him,” she whispered, once again ashamed at how she had treated Elliott, her lover, her husband, the father of this child who lay so cold and dead upon her breast. “He will not believe I have not repudiated him, that I simply needed time to grieve.”
“He is not so ignorant of you as you suppose.” Solomon shrugged. “But even if he is, we know that as long as the war rages, he will be at sea because he cannot go inland until it is decided. We also know he will not make for Argentina unless Britain wins the colonies back. And so, once we have finished our errands, we will find him rather than expect him to find us, just as you told him we would. In that manner, he will know that your heart has remained true.”
Celia licked her dry, cracking lips, then sighed when Solomon applied an unguent to them. It burned but soothed, and the pungent aroma wafted up her nostrils and cleared some of the jumble of words out of her mind.
“Shall I take the child?”
“Put him in the kimono, if you please.”
Solomon made a sound of approval.
“Where are we?” she asked long after Solomon had found the bundle of tattered red silk, wrapped the babe, and given him back to her.
“France. La Rochelle. Smitty has taken over command so that you will have no recourse but to rest and heal. We can bury the babe once you are able to walk.”
After the weeks and months and years of constant fear and worry and war and doubt, after losing her mentor and the love of her youth, a babe, and her husband in a single day, it was the sweetest gift she could have been given at the moment.
Tired. So tired. “Thank you,” she whispered.
“You are most welcome.”
She sighed, though, because no matter Smitty would captain for the nonce, she was still its owner and commander. She wanted to return to Elliott as soon as possible, and so decisions must be made apace. “Bid him again refit the ship as the Rose and acquire or sew more uniforms. We can then cross Gibraltar freely as if we are about the King’s business and dock in Málaga. Condadó Covarrubias is thirty miles inland, just past Antequera. We will take a river barge—”
“Horses,” Solomon said flatly. She was surprised he had not protested the rest of her orders. “It will take too long by barge, and you now have no excuse not to ride.”
“I do not like horses,” Celia whined.
“Cries she who chose a future that will require her to work with the beasts.”
She ignored that and went on matter-of-factly. “Once we are there, ’twill be a simple enough matter to see to Rafael’s estate. A sennight at most if he has freed and affixed his tenants. A fortnight if he has not.”
“On horseback.”
She sniffed haughtily. “You have made your point. And then— Then we go to Algiers.”
He started, and the sight of hope on this man’s face gave Celia some pause to realize she had never seen that before. “Oh?” he asked carefully. “Engaging in British interests along the way?”
“I am not so prideful I will not fight as a Royal Navy vessel to achieve my own ends.”
The corner of Solomon’s mouth curled up in a reluctant smile.
“We will not fail,” Celia said simply. “I have a husband to find and a pig to cook.”
If you don’t want to wait 2 years to get to the end, you can buy it here.
Pirates!
“Skirrow had spent it, eaten it, jettisoned it, or fucked it.”
Ah, sailors. (If a mindful one, that… could be just one purchase. It’s rather polite to clean your own plate.
“..gently unwrapped the gauze bandages and looked at the tiny but almost perfectly formed face, equally perfect fingers..” — I can’t imagine thinking about making the choice to look or not. That closure might not be good. I’m also glad I’d never have to make that decision, directly. My ignorant self thinks it might be too psychologically, emotionally, ‘much.’
Thanks for these, MoJo.
I take it giving up the sea will assist in her carrying to term?
She has to be bedbound to do it, so she pretty much takes up *spoiler alert* knitting and reading recipe books.
I told you sometimes a woman has to grieve alone.
…and sometimes a man needs to do the same thing , alone…
…that’s a way grievin’ too, ya know…
Something like that was literally inevitable. The extreme radical Islamo-fascist left cannot help themselves, and there is an endless supply of assholes willing to pull shit like this in $currentDay.
Pretty tame compared to a lot of shit that was running through my imagination most of today especially now that I am back in town, sort of.
Oops. Mucked that reply up.
Wow! Good episode!
❤️
88 yard blocked field goal return!!
OT least surprising news of the day…
A fan just ran onto the field with a Palestine flag. The time he ran on the field 9:11 PM.
The man stormed the field during the seventh inning of the Yankees-Mets game in The Bronx, waving the flag as the crowd erupted in anger. Some fans broke into chants of “USA! USA!” while others could be heard yelling “f–k you” at the man.
—
Fucker’s lookin’ for a beatin’, and I don’t mind if he gets a harsh one. This provocateur shit will only stop when beatings for such are public and broadcast live for shame. (I know this means never, but I’m eating pizza. Let me enjoy my thought.)
I only tuned in a couple times, saw the Mets were hopelessly behind as expected, and tuned out.
One would have thought there would have been a bat around to fix this guy.
We are in such a fascist country that these useless little twats feel completely safe to do something like that on this day of all days. Couldn’t tell the ethnicity of our doofus here.
“The man, who wore a baseball jersey with ‘No Kings’ written on the front, sprinted onto the field waving the flag, sparking anger from the fans in attendance.”
WTF was that a reference to? ” In her sharply worded dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote: “In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law.”Shortly after, congressional Democrats (led by Senate Leader Chuck Schumer) introduced counter-legislation officially titled the “No Kings Act,” aimed at reaffirming that presidents are subject to federal criminal law and cannot claim monarchical immunity.” Okay.
I do wonder who the political marketeers really are, slogan-makers and such.
It’s definitely twin lights, again tonight.
For the first time since I moved here a couple weeks ago I wandered out at night (to pick up some Shake Shack) and the streets around me are hopping with revelers. It feels very appropriate tonight. The other side of the buildings visible in the link is a pedestrian street which I had no idea got so busy at night. Glibs’ worst nightmare. 😝 I hear almost nothing from my place, except what I think is barbacks rolling out new kegs every once in a while.
Glad it feels right. Neighborhood safe? Outdoor people are fantastic in proper numbers and in good spots. Food. Possible hanky-spank material. ‘Lifeless’ is really goofy in cities. It’s nice away from ’em, but in ’em? Eh. I suppose I’ve never really done it in America. Not properly, at least.
*jovial shrug+shucks*
I don’t feel unsafe in any way so far. It’s like walking through a Benetton commercial. I felt less safe in Ithaca where the streets at this hour are populated mostly by junkies and mental patients. But I like crowds and I get it – a lot of people don’t.
I spotted several restaurants and other businesses I want to investigate – having not actually walked around the block before now. I have some medical issues to take care of but the eventual goal is to walk to my office building that I’ve been playing hooky from for 3+ years.
I think we’d have fun hanging out, even if I don’t know what Benetton is. That area sounds perfect. Especially with that balcony. Thought I’m having out loud, a nice pipe with actual, nice tobacco. Not too much, but enough for to enjoy a leisurely, say, 30min outside without ash accumulating, no rush to the burn.
I’d have to learn how to properly smoke, methinks. Keeping a cherry just lit, and so forth. This boy will keep dreaming, cuz I didn’t like smoking on my balcony in Kokomo. Neighbors right there, or rather, *could* be right there. There’s a reason smoke spots are away from people. *frump*
Weirdly, it’s not a balcony. I’m on the 2nd floor and there are 2 floors above me but they don’t have an outside.
And shit I want a cigarette. Badly.
LOL I… can’t even.
Picture all hues of humanity, smiling in harmony.
United Colors of Benneton.
Check the boxes.
“And shit I want a cigarette. Badly.”
This is thought of when I said that thing the other day and everyone wondered why I was cagey with it!
*adds checkmark to list, grimaces.. understandingly nods*
Ha! Girl with horizontally striped boots and plaid leggings…? Reminds me MST3K The Movie (IIRC?) when someone comes out in a goofy costume. Servo: “Two kinda of plaid?! I’m a naked robot and even I know that’s a no-no.”
She’s also the cutest. I’m sure I’d be pilloried by Frog-Haired TRANSformers for liking whitey, but Asian chick is #2, and they’re at least 3/5ths white, so they’re still bad.
Jews and Asians, both minorities hated cuz they tend to be successful. I’d say the same for Indians, but hotels, then vague computery, may have vibrated their status a bit.
Benetton.
Bad 80s memories come flooding back.
So I just went outside to find a cigarette. My usual convenience store was closed but I found another one a block away and purchased. Some chick was singing on a little stage outside with a dude and a guitar and I enjoyed a lazy smoke watching them.
I feel a little dizzy now.
NICE! I swear, I’m not trying to be a dick about it, but those are little moments smokes are perfectly suited for. (Not the dizziness.) Outside and can chill, observe and enjoy the world, and no one really wonders or looks, cuz no reason to question ya! You’re out having a smoke! Also exudes a powerful aura (and odor) of Don’t Approach, which is often nice.
To be fair, this worked really well in Asia, likely more than here? But I’m viciously paranoid and I assume everyone else is, too. I probably shouldn’t, but that’s just what they want you to think. Sneaky sneaky, they are. (Yes, all of them.)
The biggest worry in the US is attracting some vagrant wanting to bum a smoke from you. I had already decided “no fucking way” given how expensive they are now.
But yeah, lighting up back in my smoking days was like a signal drawing flies from every direction.
Yeah, I wouldn’t smoke in public in a city, here. Wouldn’t want to stand still in a city, more simply. And no smoke-bummers, yuck. Asia was just different. I don’t believe I ever saw a homeless person in Korea. (Benefit of a homogeneous society? Certainly never saw any in Singapore.) I saw plenty of business-suited men drunk-sleep in alleys, but that’s not the same.
I don’t smoke in Carmel cuz I fear folk think it’s icky. Tarnishes the image of the pristine, and wealthy, suburb. Smoking is almost wholly a while-driving activity for me, now.
Shit I was just relaxing outside and on my way back in, I looked over and saw the lights have gone out.
How far is the trade center from you?
2.2 miles, or about 10 minutes by train.
A world I have never been in.
I’d be the country hick gawking at the tall buildings.
Most of us like country hicks too, and appreciate their dollars. I have always tried to be helpful to tourists.
The stereotype of unfriendly New Yorkers is largely BS – as long you use your street smarts.
Parisians on the other hand….
Paris is a toilet. Only place I have ever been mugged – and that was decades ago.
Ha! Even better! The NPC’s won’t know which laser flashes are most powerful:
“The holdout juror who caused Lindsay Clancy’s mistrial has a history of alleged domestic violence such as grabbing his wife by the throat and punching his nephew, according to a report.
The still-unnamed juror, only described as a black man in his 30s, faced a criminal charge in September 2021 for allegedly assaulting his wife, NBC10 Boston reported.”
The MSM/The left is going to absolutely destroy that guy. As if any normal person needs another reason to avoid jury duty at all costs.
Oh, yes. ‘Black’ does not trump Domestic Abuser + hitting a kid (totes m’goats bad for a dude) in the Clancy insanity.
“Janette MacAusland is charged with strangling her 7-year-old son Kai and 6-year-old daughter Ella.
The Wellesley woman was arrested in Vermont after her kids were found dead in their home in April. She had attempted to kill herself.”
So April, 2026. Clancy’s murders were in Jan. ’23. Huh. WTF is this shit? I looked it up. Men have done it, too, and pretty recently. They all got life. One trying to escape marriage, another escaping from financial shit, one for revenge. (Hate to say it, plots I can at least kinda understand. I don’t know why/care why Clancy did it. Well. I guess that’s the bullshit we’ve just witnessed. When. Yeah. I can’t get over the… vicious murderin’ of kids bit. *hands up*)
*poorly phrased: His Guilty isn’t trumped by anything. He’s a nasty person who expects accountability. Bastard.
I’ve been called to one jury duty.
They never sent me a summons but tracked me down at work and were pissed off about me not showing up. I was out running parts in my coveralls with my name on them and as it was summer the only thing I had on under them was socks and underware. I no doubt didn’t get selected due to being late (their problem) and having my name on me.
Like clockwork my wife gets the summons every two years but has never been called to even interview for a jury pool.
No social media.
Female.
Only two traffic citations both of which were BS no proof of insurance when the rigs were insured but the cops were stupid.
We fully expect her to get on something high profile eventually.
I haven’t been called in years but the last time when they found out I work in the insurance industry they immediately dismissed me LOL.
I think I could easily get out of jury duty, if I wanted. Not sure if that’s a good thing, but, eh.
Just tell the judge that you come from Canada and that you’re a little slow. Eh.
If that was an obscure Simpsons reference, I done seen it.