3. Chapter Three

Chapter Three

T he sun was setting, casting a golden-orange glow across the Mediterranean sea as Captain Rafael de Silva stood on the deck of his ship, the wind blowing through his dark brown hair as he scanned the horizon for any sign of trouble. Born into a noble Portuguese family, he'd fallen on hard times when the Peninsular War had destroyed his ancestral home. Now his vessel was part of a squadron patrolling the seas in search of pirates and corsairs preying on innocent people.

Rafael leaned on the rail, watching a school of flying fish burst out of the water. A seabird swooped down to catch one of them, scattering the remainder in all directions.

"Captain!" One of his crewmen shouted up from the main deck, startling him out of his thoughts. "Sail sighted off the starboard bow!"

Rafael turned to look in the direction indicated, squinting into the distance.

"I know that ship," he said after a moment, recognising the sail plan. "Ghazi Khadra, up to his old tricks." The other vessel was close to the North African coast, probably hoping to avoid the patrols which operated further out to sea. He barked orders to his crew, turning his ship to intercept the corsair.

"Bring us alongside that ship," he commanded. "And train your weapons on her."

"Heave to!" his bosun bellowed, repeating the order in Portuguese, English and Berber when the men aboard the other ship pretended not to understand.

Rafael grinned as the corsairs looked at each other nervously. Flying the Algerian flag, they could hardly pretend not to understand their own language.

" Qewwed !" one of them shouted back, with a rude gesture.

"Fire a shot across the bows," Rafael ordered. His gun crews already had the cannon loaded, and there was barely a moment's delay before the deck shook beneath his feet, the boom echoing across the water. The shot skipped across the waves, splashing down barely fifteen feet in front of the corsair's bow.

"Do you think they will return fire, Captain?" his first mate asked.

"Ghazi Khadra isn't stupid," Rafael replied, still watching the other vessel. "He knows we outgun him. I imagine he's below decks right now, hiding his ill-gotten gains and praying we don't find his secret compartments."

"Not throwing it overboard?" the first mate asked, looking at the water behind the corsair.

"No, he's too greedy. If he thinks for one moment he might be able to keep it, he won't throw it away. He does not know who captains this ship; does not know we have met before." Rafael smiled, showing his teeth. "Last time we met, I was aboard a British Navy ship, and we had to break off, let Khadra go, because a French warship hove into view. This time? This time, I'll have that thieving slave-runner in irons."

The corsair was lowering sails now in obedience to the bosun's increasingly irate shouts, and the first mate turned away from Rafael to order their own sails lowered.

In just a few minutes, the two ships lay still in the water, side by side, and Rafael stepped up to the rail.

"Where," he said, in his own language, "is Ghazi Khadra?"

He saw the shock run through the men facing him. Saw the bluster go out of them, as his men sighted down their rifles at the corsairs. There was no pretending they were honest traders if Rafael knew Ghazi Khadra was their captain.

" ?adremt! " a deep voice bellowed. "Fight, you cowards!" but the corsairs were woefully under-prepared, most of them armed only with pistols and rusty blades. A few of them rushed forward, there was a brief blast of gunfire, and five corsair bodies fell to the deck.

"Would you like to try that again?" Rafael said urbanely, "or shall we just stop wasting time, Khadra?"

The corsair captain sidled out from behind his men, his ugly, scarred face a mask of fury. "Who are you, whelp?" he hissed in bad Portuguese.

"You don't remember me?" Rafael switched smoothly to English. "How about now?"

Khadra's eyes widened, and he looked in puzzlement at Rafael's coat.

"Indeed, the last time we met, I wore the coat of the British Navy," Rafael enlightened him. "Now I sail for my own King and country. Keeping the Mediterranean clean of corsair scum."

Khadra spat on the deck. One of his men spoke to him in a low voice, gesturing to Rafael and his men, obviously trying to reason with Khadra.

"You are outnumbered and outgunned," Rafael said calmly. "Lay down your weapons and you'll live."

Weapons were clattering to the floor before Khadra opened his mouth to give the order, making the corsair captain's expression turn briefly even more murderous, before Rafael's men began crossing to his ship to secure it.

"Search him thoroughly," Rafael warned. "He's probably got more knives on him than you've got fingers. Toss every one of them overboard, secure him, and start searching the ship."

"You have no authority to detain us, or to search my ship!" Khadra blustered angrily as rough hands searched him, pulling knives from his sleeves, boots and even a thin blade from his long beard.

"The letters of instruction I'm carrying from seven different governments would seem to argue otherwise," Rafael returned blandly. "Including the Dey of Algiers, incidentally. Since that's the flag you're flying today… I do indeed have authority over you."

"We are a legal trader," Khadra attempted to claim.

Even his own men looked sideways at him, and Rafael laughed aloud. "Of course, you are. Pure as new snow fall."

"Captain!" His men were already coming up from below, beckoning to him. "We have found something you should see."

A dozen young boys and girls were the sad sight that greeted him in a small room in the ship's hold, each with an iron collar locked about their neck and chains securing them to the wall.

"Greek," the bosun said quietly as Rafael scowled at the sight. "From Athens, taken from their families in the night. Destined to be sold on the block in Algiers."

"Enough to hang Khadra, even without whatever else he's probably smuggling. Get them loose, and over to the Santa Dorotéia." Turning on his heel, Rafael climbed back up the narrow ladder to the upper deck. He paused before exiting the hatch as something on the rough wooden floorboards caught his eye—a scrap of white lace.

Stooping, Rafael picked up the scrap, rubbing it between his fingers. Very fine lace indeed, he thought, and his eyes narrowed. Turning, he looked around. A door stood open to his left.

Looking inside, he saw nothing out of the ordinary—a tiny, empty bunk with a rough blanket on it was the only furniture. The smell of an un-emptied chamber pot assaulted his nose, and he made a face, stepping back.

"Captain?" the bosun came up beside him.

"Someone was imprisoned in here." Rafael pointed at the lock on the door, a rarity on a ship. There were just two aboard his own ship, the Santa Dorotéia, and they were on his own cabin and on the liquor store cupboard. "A high-value prisoner, I think. Maybe a woman." He showed the bosun the scrap of lace. "Perhaps that was what Khadra was taking the time to hide, before showing himself."

"If she's here, we'll find her, Captain," the bosun vowed, before turning to shout orders to search the ship again.

Where would Khadra hide a woman? Rafael rubbed the scrap of lace between his fingers again. In his own quarters, he suspected, and turned his steps towards the captain's cabin.

It was all Clarissa could manage to get enough breath into her lungs to stay conscious. One moment, she was lying on the hard bunk in her prison, the next the door had been slammed open and the corsair captain had stood over her, his eyes wide with panic.

"You will not make a single sound," he vowed.

Immediately wondering if rescue might somehow be at hand, Clarissa promptly opened her mouth and screamed at the top of her lungs.

A powerful backhand across the face made her dizzy for a moment, and then a thick lump of cloth was being shoved into her mouth, the gag secured behind her head, and she was tossed over the corsair's brawny shoulder and carried out. She kicked and screamed, flailing madly; felt her nightgown catch against a splinter of wood and rip as she struggled, but the corsair did not stop. She was carried through the ship, tossed unceremoniously down and her hands and feet tied together, and then stuffed into a trunk, the lid slammed shut.

She could barely move, and barely breathe through the gag. It was utterly dark inside the trunk, and she wasn't sure if the black spots swimming in front of her eyes were in her imagination, or due to a lack of air.

A loud boom close by made her eyes widen. A cannon? Were they under fire? Please, don't let me die tied up in a trunk!

Silence.

The rocking of the ship eased, and she sensed they had slowed, perhaps come to a stop. Distant shouts sounded, then a brief volley of gunfire, then booted feet on timber.

Rescue? She tried to shout through the gag, but the effort made her feel dizzy.

Wait , she thought. They'll search in here. Wait until you hear them.

Boots clattered nearby, and she tried to scream. Tried to get any sound out at all, but could only manage the faintest of moans. She tried to kick against the side of the chest, but couldn't move more than a few inches in its cramped confines; her bare feet made no sound against the heavy wood.

The booted feet tramped away again and Clarissa couldn't help herself; she began to cry. Tears streamed down her cheeks as the boots of her potential rescuers faded away. She tried to gulp in air, but the blackness closed in around her.

Rafael looked around the cabin with a frown. There was nowhere here large enough to conceal a woman, unless… his gaze fell on the heavy sea-chest beside the bed, half-draped with blankets. Stooping, he flipped open the lid, and gaped down at the beauty within.

Sun-streaked hair tumbled around a pale, tear-stained face and a slender form that was barely half-covered by a torn nightgown trimmed with expensive white lace. Young, beautiful, blonde and well-born from the look of her, no wonder Khadra had kept this prize locked up and tried to conceal her. She would be a worth a fortune in the slave markets of Algiers.

"Where the hell did he find you?" Rafael murmured, leaning down to lift the girl out of the chest. She didn't seem to be conscious, and Rafael swore as he pulled the too-tight gag from her mouth and leaned in to check that she was still breathing. It would be just like Khadra to smother the girl by accident while trying to conceal her. He cut the bonds securing her ankles and wrists together, cursing the corsair under his breath.

The girl's chest rose and fell as she took a deeper breath, and Rafael tore his gaze away from her form, grabbing at one of the blankets to cover her more properly before backing away. Waking up to find a strange man looming over her was likely to terrify her half to death after what she'd doubtless already been through. "Captain?" he turned to find the bosun at the door.

"I found the woman." Rafael gestured to the girl on the bed.

The bosun took one glance and whistled, long and low. "No wonder Khadra tried to hide her!"

"Precisely. I don't want to frighten her any more. I'll stay here and guard her; secure all the corsair crew and get both ships under way for Valletta." They should make Malta before morning, and the Maltese government was one of the signatories to the anti-corsair agreement under which Rafael was operating. They'd take custody of the corsairs and their ship, and arrange for the return of the Greek youngsters to their homes.

What was to be done with the beautiful young woman remained to be seen.