Chapter 10

CHAPTER TEN

L atham had docked The Serpent at the island called Mann before we had even woken. When I walked past his room this morning, I laughed when I heard him snoring loudly.

Poor Latham had been tasked with steering The Serpent all night as per the rota.

There was no need for me on the island, so I stuck around on the ship with Garth, who was currently going over how to work the sails with Roscoe and I. Jerrik, Odin, Hammond, and Manny had joined Viktor on the island as they completed the trade and hopefully brought us back some fresh vegetation–Gustav had rushed to join them as soon as he heard the last part. It could take anywhere between less than an hour and several hours, depending on the mood of the Chief. From what I had heard, he wasn’t the easiest of men to deal with. That left Caspian, Laurence and Dagfinn to clean the top deck, as it had rained for most of the night. If Garth hadn’t called me to learn how to work the sails, I would have offered to help them. I wasn’t the best at cooking, but cleaning was simple enough.

“The Serpent all but glides through the water when the wind is blowing,” Garth smiled, looking like he was in his element. Roscoe and I exchanged knowing looks, neither of us unable to hold back our giggles with how passionate he was about the sails. “Do both of you want to learn the way of the sail, or are you just going to stand there giggling like a bunch of babies?” Garth tutted, clearly not happy with either of us.

“Sorry, Garth,” I apologised sheepishly.

Roscoe nodded, but there was a slight twitch to his lips. “We do want to learn.”

“Great.” Garth turned around to continue. “Working the sails is not difficult to master, but there’s a knack in knowing which way the wind blows. You see,” he said, slipping his index finger into his mouth to wet the tip. “The wind is coming from the east right now. If I were sailing right now, I would put down these two sails.” He pointed to the two square sails mounted on the left and right. “The same goes for the West. The easiest is when the wind is coming downwind. That’s when the fore and aft sails do most of the work. You mess up the sails, and we’ll end up steering off course.”

My head was craned back to stare up at the sails. “It sounds easy enough,” I murmured.

“Far too easy,” Roscoe agreed with me.

“It’s the actual doing part, which is hard,” Garth chucked. “It’s a good thing we’re docked right now. You can play with the sails and get a feel of it all.”

We both watched as Garth stepped forward and patted the large wooden beam, which stood several feet tall and was connected to the fore and aft sails.

“You see this?” He asked us, pointing to what looked like a mini wheel. “Chip has installed two of these wheels to control the fore and aft sails. If you want to know how it works, you’ll have to wait until we return to Jorvik to ask him because I don’t know anything about it. What I do know is that if I turn it this way–” He turned the mini-wheel left. “–the sails are set for upwind. And if I turn it the other way–” He turned the mini wheel right. “–the sails are set for downwind. The same goes for this other wheel, which controls the aft sails.” He pointed to the second mini-wheel. “He didn’t get the time to install the same for the side sails, so we still have to climb up the beam to change them, but we don’t normally need to do that very often anyway. We mostly use the fore and aft sails, but during a storm, we need as much stability as possible.”

I gulped at the idea of a storm. Father mentioned more than a few stories of longships being flipped over and the entire crew drowning in a brutal storm. Whenever he left for the sea when I was younger, I would pray for his safe return each morning when I first woke up and each night before I fell asleep.

I was so grateful that he didn’t go out on missions anymore. Except, I had only gone and married a sailor myself. And a Captain at that, too.

“Astrid,” Garth called to me, his voice snapping me out of my thoughts. “I’m not going to make you climb the beams because Viktor will drown me if I do,” he chuckled, and even though both of us knew Viktor would do just that, I couldn’t help but join in. “But do you want to have a go at the fore and aft sails?”

I nodded eagerly and stepped forward, moving to the wheel that controlled the foresail. I curled my fingers around two spokes but didn’t get the chance to turn it.

“Since when did we allow whores to play with the sails?” An unfamiliar voice sounded from behind us. “Or is this some new kind of foreplay? Because if it is, count me in.”

“Who goes there?” Garth called out, his lips turning down into a deep scowl.

“No need to take that tone with us, old man,” the first man chuckled. His hair was short and golden, his face long, but the rest of him short.

“We come in peace,” the second man chuckled. He was the opposite of his friend–tall and bulky with dark, short hair.

“Your disgusting choice of words certainly doesn’t suggest that you come in peace,” I snapped, unable to hold back my tongue from the way they leered at me. Despite my words, they peered at me, standing behind Garth like I was a piece of meat, and they hadn’t been fed in weeks.

What was wrong with them? Had these men never seen a woman before?

“The whore speaks,” the dark-haired man snickered.

“What’s your name, whore?” The light-haired man asked, stupid enough to believe that he would ask so disgustingly and I would answer him.

“Stop calling her that!” Roscoe growled, matching Garth’s stance as he stepped forward. With both Roscoe and Garth standing in front of me, the disgusting men couldn’t see me anymore.

“That’s the last time you call her that,” Dagfinn growled as he joined us at the sails, a crazed look on his face. He must have rushed over here because he was still holding the wet mop, and it dripped dirty water over this part of the deck, which they had already cleaned.

When Caspian and Laurence flanked me from both sides, my heart overflowed with love and respect for these men, who quickly defended me. But now was not the time to get sappy—not when we needed to teach these two men a lesson about how to speak to a lady.

“I understand that you’re all protective of the ship whore, especially since she’s your only source of entertainment out on the water, but what if we pay you?” The dark-haired man asked, having the audacity to reach into his pockets and count his measly pennies.

“Or perhaps we could trade something for an hour with her?” The other man was quick to ask after stealing a look at all the money his friend had. Or lack thereof.

“How dare you speak to As-her like that!” Garth growled, quick to catch himself when he nearly used my name. “You will speak to her with respect!”

“I don’t know how things are where you’re from, old man, but whores don’t deserve respect here. So, take our money and hand her over. We promise to show her a good time and return her in one piece. We won’t even need an hour if she’s any good.” The light-haired man was on a real rant and looked like he had so much more in his argument about why he and his friend deserved even a moment of my time but didn’t get the chance to get the words out of his mouth. I would imagine it was difficult to say much more when Roscoe’s fist landed in his mouth and Dagfinn’s in his friends’.

“Don’t you dare call her a whore again!” Caspian spat as he stepped forward to punch them both, the smile on his face telling me that he enjoyed this far more than he probably should have.

Even though Garth was the voice of reason in most situations, he stepped aside and encouraged Laurence to get a punch in while the men were down.

“I think it’s my turn now,” I declared, stepping forward once Laurence had his go.

Dagfinn and Roscoe were kind enough to hold each man down for me. Caspian and Laurence were stood on either side of me, ready to step in if I needed help. It was sweet, but I didn’t need it.

I stopped in front of the light-haired man, grinning down at him. He had been forced onto his knees, his hands restrained helplessly behind his back by an outraged and disgusted Roscoe.

“How dare you speak to a woman like that!” I spat. “Did your parents not teach you any manners?”

“My parents taught me that whores don’t deserve respect,” he sneered at me, but before one of the others could react, I reared my first back and slammed it into his cheek. Even though my knuckles throbbed at the impact, I refused to show it. My hand would be sore for a day or two, but I didn’t care. This moment was worth it.

The man’s head snapped to the right at the impact of my fist against his face, hard enough that he bumped his face into that of his friend. But the best part was when everyone cheered me on.

“Don’t forget about this one.” Caspian all but danced on the balls of his feet, pointing at the dark-haired man now looking up at me with fear shining in his eyes, begging me to spare him the pain and humiliation. Too bad he hadn’t extended the same favour to me when he got out his pennies and attempted to buy an hour of my time.

“I’ll have you know that I’m not a whore,” I spat at him, punching him just as hard as I had done to his friend.

“She’s part of the crew,” Laurence piped up, a proud look on his face. “Now apologise before we set her husband on you both.”

“Husband?” They both asked, their eyes slowly widening as understanding dawned on them. It was scarce for a woman to be aboard a mission, especially one as long as this one. It was even rarer for this woman to be married to a crew member, but if she was, then there was only one person she would be married to.

The Captain.

“Let’s go and find out what her husband has to say about this,” Garth announced, moving around the men to lead the way off The Serpent. “I’m sure he’ll be thrilled to hear how you two have been talking to one of our crew.”

“We might as well share this story with your Chief, as well,” Dagfinn chuckled as he forced his dark-haired captive to his feet, and Roscoe did the same to the other one.

“That’ll teach you to call me a whore,” I huffed, eagerly following everyone.

Watching these two imbeciles get ashamed in front of their people was not a show I was willing to miss.