Red Seas Under Red Skies: The Gentleman Bastard Sequence, Book Two (Gentleman Bastards 2)
5
They didn’t clear such a bad haul for such a little ship; obviously, Donatti had paid well to be carried around for his experiments and been unwilling to sail without many of the comforts of home. A boat laden with liquors, fine tobacco, silk pillows, books, artificers’ instruments, alchemical drugs and bags of silver coins was soon sent back to the Orchid, while ‘Ravelle’s’ pirates finished sabotaging the little ship.
‘Rudder lines disabled, sir,’ said Jean about half an hour after they’d boarded.
‘Halliards cut, braces cut,’ shouted Delmastro, plainly enjoying her role as an ordinary buccaneer for this attack. She strolled along the larboard rail with a hatchet, chopping things seemingly at whim. ‘Whatever the hell that was, cut!’
‘Sir, please,’ begged the captain, ‘that’ll take ages to fix, you got all the valuables already—’
‘I don’t want you to die out here,’ said Locke, yawning in feigned boredom at the captain’s pleas. ‘I just want to have a few quiet hours before this news gets back to Tal Verrar.’
‘Oh, sir, we’ll do what you ask. Whatever you want; we won’t tell no one—’
‘Please,’ said Locke. ‘Cling to some dignity, Master Pilchard. I want you to talk about this. All over the place. Use it to leverage sympathy from whores. Maybe get a few free drinks in taverns. Most importantly, repeat my name. Orrin Ravelle.’
‘O-orrin Ravelle, sir.’
‘Captain Orrin Ravelle,’ said Locke, drawing a dagger and placing it against the captain’s throat. ‘Of the good ship Tal Verrar is Fucked! You stop in and let them know I’m in the neighbourhood!’
‘I, uh, I will, sir.’
‘Good.’ Locke dropped the man back to the deck and stowed his dagger. ‘Then let’s call it quits. You can have your amusing little toy ship back now.’
Locke and Jean met briefly at the stern before boarding the last boat back to the Orchid.
‘Gods,’ said Jean, ‘the Archon is going to love this.’
‘Well, we didn’t lie to him, did we? We promised pirate attacks at every compass point. We just didn’t say they’d all feature Zamira as the major attraction.’ Locke blew a kiss to the city, spread across the northern horizon. ‘Happy Festa, Protector.’