Revenge of the Corsairs Read online

  She panted hard, the burst of physical activity winding her more than she expected. Elias Nash waited. He seemed to realize she needed a moment to catch her breath. He had a kind face.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  “You have nothing to apologize for,” he answered softly, squeezing her hand before letting it go. Laura’s eyes fell to the knife at his waist. How careless of her not to have realized that Yasmeen had taken the knife at meal time today. Sophia had noticed. She should have, too.

  “The knife? Would you like it?” Nash asked, reaching for the hilt.

  Laura shook her head. She was having trouble enough holding herself together, let alone entertain the thought of holding a knife and using it. It was better in his hands than hers.

  “This will be all over soon,” he assured her.

  She wished she had his faith. She wanted to believe it so much. Early on, she had lived in hope of rescue but, after the first twelve months of her captivity, Laura gave up daring of such a thing.

  Only when she was miles away from here – Palermo, perhaps, or even back in London – would she consider the nightmare behind her.

  “Are you ready to move off?”

  No, she was not ready. Nausea dogged her, but what choice did she have? She nodded instead. Nash smiled as though she’d made the bravest decision in the world. In some small way, perhaps she had. He settled the keffiyeh across his mouth but the look in his light brown eyes seemed to give her courage.

  “Stay close beside me,” he said. “We don’t want to arouse suspicions if we don’t have to, so we need to blend in.”

  Laura touched her head covering and nodded. They would be killed if they were caught – but better that than enduring another day of living hell in the harem.

  *

  Elias forced himself to slow his pace so Laura could keep up. Every part of him seemed attuned to her – the sound of her feet in slippers he guessed were not suitable for walking any distance, the rustle of the garments that concealed her from view. Even the very sound of her breathing seemed as loud to him as the bustling sound in the markets ahead of them.

  He was also conscious of the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads. He listened for the sound of alarm from the palace, and the march of armed men looking for them. So far there had been nothing.

  Their journey was taking them downhill toward the harbor. Their rendezvous was to be outside the casbah walls.

  Elias was aware of the knife in his belt and another strapped to his ankle. The atmosphere pressed down on him like a brewing storm. Even at sea, he always preferred the moment when he saw the first shard of lightning across the sky and, with it, the first fall of rain, rather than the oppressive expectation ahead of it.

  The fact there were no clanging bells or clarion blasts from trumpets was both a blessing and a curse. The alarm would be raised by a hue and cry, a call for all around to find them. The first they might know was a surge of armed men coming toward them.

  The storm broke and sooner than he’d have liked. The call to afternoon prayer started with its haunting familiarity, then changed in cadence and tone. He was too far away and not familiar enough with the language to understand the message being called out.

  Elias felt a pull on his robe from Laura.

  “They are calling the guards onto the street,” she whispered harshly. “Everyone is to go to their homes. They’re looking for us.”

  Elias nodded his understanding. “Let’s make sure we can’t be found.”

  The dock was only a few hundred yards away and, beyond that, the gate in the wall that connected the casbah to the fishing village around it.

  He glanced briefly at the warehouse where their cabin boy had been charged with setting an explosion to draw the attention of pursuers. Perhaps he should detour and warn Marco about their change of plans.

  Laura stumbled. She grabbed at his tunic but not quickly enough to stop her fall. Elias immediately crouched beside her. “Are you all right?” he whispered harshly. Laura nodded, although he could see blood from a cut toe and a graze on her left knee where the abaya had torn.

  Laura. Laura came first.

  Elias helped her to her feet. He hoped the lad could read the situation enough to know their plans had changed and find somewhere safe to hide.

  As news spread of an attack at the palace, it felt as though all eyes were on them. They were so close to escape. Elias made sure not to return any glances their way. One suspicion was all it would take to expose them.

  Elias spotted the harbor walls and the gates. He found the entrance in the wall, beyond which was their rendezvous point, now barred. The portcullis had dropped, locking them in.

  He felt Laura shudder beside him. He took her hand, once again, and squeezed it.

  If he were Kit, he’d have made a witty aside and have a new plan half-formed already.

  He drew a deep breath.

  What we can’t go through, we’ll go around. What we can’t go around, we’ll go over. What we can’t go over, we’ll go under.

  So far, the alarm hadn’t reached this part of the casbah. So far, so good.

  “Come on.” Elias grabbed Laura’s hand once more and pushed his way through the throng until he reached a second archway close to the start of the sea wall.

  Then their luck ran out.

  *

  Laura was pulled into a blind alley as a group of men came into view. Elias held her close as she fought the tremors.

  “Stay still,” he ordered. She did as she was told. His arm around her made her feel safe. The men passed by the entrance to the alley without stopping.

  “They’re looking for us,” she said, more to herself than Elias.

  “Everyone is looking for us,” he answered.

  Laura shook her head.

  “I heard them. They were ordered to find us by a man called Sharrouf.”

  She heard Nash’s sharp intake of breath.

  “Sharrouf? You’re sure of the name?”

  Laura nodded. She heard the start of a strangled curse before he let out a long breath instead.

  “Then we’ve no time to waste.”

  She chanced a glance at her rescuer. A muscle worked at his jaw. His mouth, which she remembered was usually upturned in a ready smile, was grim.

  He said nothing as they approached the docks. He was so focused on the activity around them, it was as though she were no longer there at all. Through one of the gates, she saw the azure blue beyond the walls and there, anchored off shore, just as Sophia described, was the Calliope.

  Nash’s stride lengthened. Laura struggled to keep up. She slipped once again thanks to her inadequate footwear. He hauled her to his side and kept moving, dragging her down another passageway. This one went beyond the walls. It went to freedom.

  Kunt hunak, tawaquf! You there, stop!

  Two palace guards stepped out in front of them.

  “Get down,” he ordered, pushing Laura between him and one of the wall buttresses. “Stay down until I say otherwise.”

  Complying with the order was easy. Her legs were shaking and she was surprised they could even hold her weight. She brought her hands to her face. They, too, were shaking. All she could do was hide and watch through her fingers.

  There was no time for Elias to pull out a knife. He ducked just as the first guard swung a scimitar at his neck and surged under, catching the man around the middle. He drove the man back into the wall. The guard’s head struck the stone violently with a sickening sound before he crumpled to the ground.

  In an instant, Elias relieved the man of his sword, grasping it firmly in his right hand. He pulled out his own knife with the other.

  The second guard, perhaps taken aback by how quickly his compatriot was felled, seemed more cautious, circling, looking for an opportunity to attack. He pitched forward suddenly, thrusting his weapon. Elias deflected it and swung his sword downward. Steel on steel clashed again as the guard blocked the strike but Laura could see he
had left himself exposed. Elias turned in under the man’s arm and thrust the knife in his left hand between the guard’s ribs. The man gasped and stumbled away, grasping at his wound.

  Elias dropped the sword and held out his hand.

  “Laura! Now!”

  Without thinking, she emerged from her hiding place and took his hand. Once more, they ran through the passage, to outside the walls of Al-Min.

  They hastened toward the shore. Elias let out a piercing whistle, attracting the attention of a group of fishermen mending a net beside a boat beached in the sand. One man raised his head and abandoned his task, immediately on alert.

  She recognized that face! It was Giorgio. And the rest of the fishermen were other sailors from the Calliope!

  They reached the boat. Elias swung Laura into his arms, dropping her into the craft like a sack of rice.

  “Get this thing in the water,” Elias ordered the crew. “Get Miss Laura back to the ship. Sharrouf’s here. We’ve been betrayed.”

  Giorgio released a string of curses that seemed to answer for the rest of the men.

  “Miss Laura, I…” Elias hesitated, then picked up her hand across the gunwale and brought it to his lips. “I’d hoped…”

  He shook his head and offered a wry smile. “Under different circumstances perhaps.”

  It was the first time in more than two years she had been looked at by a man as more than an object or with unbridled lust. But she feared the admiration and the yearning she saw in the officer’s eyes.

  He was risking his life for his friends, for Sophia… for her… what if this was the last time she saw him?

  The thought sent her into a panic. She kept hold of his hand.

  “Please, be safe.”

  This time, his smile was full. Elias jumped out of the vessel and slapped the side with the flat of his hand.

  “Tell Jonathan to prepare to sail. I’m going to warn Kit.”

  Giorgio protested. “Marco has orders to…”

  Boom!

  The sound of the explosion thundered over the harbor.

  Laura screamed but the sound of it was lost. A moment later, a cloud of roiling smoke and dust disgorged into the sea.

  As it began to clear, she saw two figures stumbling out of the debris. One of them was dressed head to toe in black, the other appeared at a distance to be a lame hunchback.

  Elias took off running toward them.

  “It’s the captain with Marco. He’s been hurt!” Giorgio sprinted after Elias.

  Laura watched Kit Hardacre stumble just as Elias reached him. The first officer took hold of the boy. She could see the lad was still. Too still. Around her, the sailors hurriedly pushed the boat into the water and readied to set sail.

  Hardacre limped badly, relying on Giorgio to take his weight. He then accepted the aid of the other sailors to scramble into the boat. The captain’s face was pale. He was injured. Sophia sat next to her, silent tears streaming down her face. Finally, Laura turned to Elias who, with the assistance of Giorgio, had lifted the limp form of the cabin boy into the boat. The boy’s face was waxen.

  Why didn’t he stir?

  The sails filled with wind, propelling them toward the Calliope.

  “I’m sorry, men,” announced Kit, his voice heavy with regret. “Marco’s dead.”

  Chapter Two

  Laura glimpsed the red silk and approached. It was just a thread, but it led all the way across the passage and into the women’s quarters. Strange – they were empty. They should be filled with concubines and odalisques.

  The length of silk was now the width of a hair ribbon and it stretched the length of the room. Laura followed it, the slap of her sandals echoing loudly. The brightly-colored cloth widened more. Now it covered the passage floor from wall to wall, until it disappeared under the closed door to Selim Omar’s suite.

  She merely touched the timber, and the double doors opened wide for her.

  Selim Omar lay naked on his bed, bare arms and legs spread. The red fabric stretched out in front of Laura like a carpet. It traveled up the steps to the bed and then gathered between the sheik’s thighs and extended up to cover his chest.

  Laura approached the man cautiously, mindful that at any minute he might grab her. But yet, he remained still.

  The red fabric was no longer shiny silk but glistening blood that welled from a hole in Selim Omar’s chest.

  “It is not for myself alone that I do this.” It was the voice of Yasmeen, the chief concubine, at her shoulder. Laura turned.

  The willowy, black woman stood like an Amazon – proud and defiant, the dagger in her hand dripping fresh blood.

  “Look,” said Yasmeen, pointing to Selim Omar’s body behind her. Laura turned back to Selim Omar. The blood was gone. She saw the rise and fall of the man’s naked chest. Then the knife was in her own hand, the ribbed grip on the hilt indenting her palm as she clutched it.

  Do it now!

  She drove the dagger down with as much force as she could muster. Red blossomed at the wound, becoming first a rose, and then the finest scarlet satin. It flowed down his chest, between his legs and off the bed down the steps below and beneath the closed chamber doors…

  Laura woke with a start and, for a moment, had no idea where she was.

  In a half-awake state, she waited in the darkness for the sound of the pre-dawn call to prayer. Minutes went by and she did not hear it. Instead, there was the sound of lapping waves and a muted cry of seagulls. Laura forced her eyes open, surprised her stomach didn’t roil as it had done almost every day for a month.

  “Sophia?”

  There was no answer. She stretched her arm out across the bed. Panic welled once more.

  Her eyes became accustomed to the gloom and, one by one, Laura started to see the things around her. There, near the door, was the mapping table. On a side wall was the cabinet with the locked doors, and, on the other side of the bed, a thick velvet curtain covered the mullion windows in the stern.

  The Calliope. Not Al-Min.

  And Sophia would be reunited with Kit Hardacre, wherever he had made his quarters. Laura closed her eyes and waited until her racing heart returned to its normal rhythm.

  She sat up, looked about the room, and spied two small trunks. The first she recognized as Sophia’s; the second was hers.

  Hers!

  The very fact that her trunk was here after two years brought tears to her eyes. That meant someone – these men – believed they could find and rescue her. She swallowed her emotion and went to open the chest, at last becoming aware of the movement of the ship. She found a day dress she had forgotten she owned. It even fit, if she didn’t tighten the stays.

  Laura emerged onto the deck. It was barely dawn. The light was grey and featureless, the sea calm. Fog surrounded the vessel. She looked up at the masts and couldn’t even see the top of the shroud for the mist. Perhaps she still dreamed and was on board the Calliope alone. Laura paused.

  No, she could hear soft, disembodied conversations somewhere on the deck, but it was the gentle strumming of a guitar that drew her on.

  In the lee of the quarterdeck steps, sheltered from the early morning cool, Elias Nash was slumped in one of the deck chairs, a guitar across his chest. He looked more familiar to her now that he was wearing European clothes – like the ones she had painted him in on that very first voyage on the Calliope.

  His eyes were closed, but his fingers found the fingerboard and strings unerringly. The tune he played was unfamiliar to her, but it was beautiful.

  Just yesterday, those hands held hers. Hands that created beauty now had also wielded a knife and a scimitar. It was a contradiction to be sure.

  His eyes opened. Their hue, the color of dark honey, met hers. For a moment, Laura allowed herself to fall into them. Had she ever noticed his hair was very nearly the same color as his eyes? She must have done and had forgotten.

  Was this a man she could be safe with? One with whom she could share her secrets? In this
half-light that was neither night nor morning, why should it matter what she confessed to him?

  Elias stopped strumming and rose to his feet.

  “Miss Laura…” He shook his head as though just coming awake himself. He set down the guitar and picked up a blanket. “Where are my manners? Here.”

  She took half a step forward and found the soft wool around her shoulders, the smell of bergamot and rosemary and a fainter odor of cedar. What would his embrace be like?

  At this instant, she craved nothing more than to be held by a gentle man. To be protected. To have someone completely erase the memories of the years stolen from her.

  Her stomach chose that moment to churn. Laura flushed hotly and felt faint. In a moment, the canvas of the deck chair was at her back and a damp cloth at her forehead.

  There were Elias Nash’s handsome eyes again. But instead of looking at her with adoring wonder as he had done yesterday on the shore, there was concern in the faint lines at the corners of his eyes.

  How would he feel if he knew the reason for her illness? Disgust? Anger?

  All of a sudden, she didn’t want to see pity born of misplaced chivalry; she wanted to see the truth. She wanted to see the horror and disgust she felt in herself mirrored in another’s face.

  This man would do as good as any.

  “I’m pregnant.”

  She held her breath and studied his face. His eyes never fell away from hers, those lips didn’t curl in anger or disgust. His only reaction was a reflexive swallow that moved his Adam’s apple. Elias Nash didn’t say a word.

  No, no, no!

  That’s not want she wanted. She wanted to see thunderous fury and angry declamations; she wanted to see the man lose his temper, to become violently angry as a proxy for the wrath and hatred that burned within her.

  And he refused to give it to her. So she sat up and turned her anger on to him.

  “It’s not really spoken about in polite society, certainly not in front of men, which I never really understood since they’re the ones who force themselves on to women and burden them with their odious lusts…”