Heart's Ransom

  * * *

  Rafe stood at the stern end of the quarter deck, near the taffrails overlooking the sea. The bottom edge of the sun had just eased out above the horizon, leaving a molten backwash of brilliant color stained against the new morning sky. He held the smooth shaft of his quarterstaff between his hands, his feet settled lightly against the deck floor. He drew in a deep breath and stepped forward, sweeping the left end of the stave around in a sharp, precise arc. Another step, another swing; again and again, Rafe moved, seemingly dancing with the staff, drawing it swiftly, deftly through the air.

  The morrow was crisp, the air chilled, but he wore only a lightweight linen shirt with a doublet fastened atop. A coat would have impeded his movements, and he needed full range of motion to loosen his tired, aching limbs and joints, and to reacquaint himself with those quarterstaff techniques he had not employed in some time.

  Rafe had been forced to use the stave to defend himself from would-be thieves in Spain on several occasions. Each time, he had walked away from the encounter with his life, for which he was profoundly grateful, and in only one instance had he actually been bested and lost his coin purse. When he had been a boy traveling with Lucio, bandits had never fared as well. Although they often went after Rafe first, perceiving him in his lean, strong youth to be the greater threat, none had ever proven a match for Lucio.

  Rafe remembered the first such occasion. A band of three strapping men, one armed with a quarterstaff, another, a dagger and the other with a pistol had approached them on a narrow, deserted stretch of road in rural Spain. Rafe had been too terrified to even recall any of his tutelage with the stave; one blow from the bandit’s staff had knocked the shaft from his hands, and another to the side of his head had left him witless, crumpled against the ground.

  He had not fallen immediately unconscious, however, and remembered opening his eyes, watching in dazed amazement as Lucio had soundly dispatched the thieves.

  “Give us your money, old man,” the man with the pistol had said, leveling the gun at Lucio’s face. “Or you shall have a taste of the same we have given your boy.”

  Lucio said nothing. He simply stepped forward, whipping the left end of his stave about sharply. The iron tip slammed into the barrel of the pistol, battering it from the man’s hand before he even had time to react, and sending it flying. Lucio’s right hand swung out, bringing the opposite side of the quarterstaff around, smashing into the thief’s face. He cried out, his nose shattering with a moist, audible crunch, and he collapsed to the dirt, even as Lucio pivoted to greet the bandit charging him with a dagger. Two swift blows from the staff―one to dislodge the knife from the man’s grasp, and the other to plow the wits from his skull―and this one, too, hit the ground. The third man, armed with a staff of his own, had advanced, but within only moments and no more than a dozen exchanged swings, he, too, had fallen.

  Rafe remembered Lucio coming to him, kneeling beside him. His mind had been fading at this point, but he knew that the older man must have been terribly disappointed in him; all of his money spent on Rafe’s training seemingly wasted. “I…I am sorry, sir…” he had murmured, as Lucio gathered him in his arms, hoisting him over his shoulder, hefting him as a man might a sack of grain.

  “Quiet now, lad,” Lucio had told him, and Rafe knew that the gentle tone he seemed to recall must surely be nothing more than delusion.

  He heard Claudio walking across the deck toward him, recognizing the boatswain by his gait even though his back was currently turned in that direction. Again, it momentarily amazed him how much more attention he paid to such things―the sounds of them―now that he had come to know Kitty.

  Even thinking of her name brought his heart a heavy ache, and Rafe’s brows furrowed. He swung the stave sharply, imagining that he drove it into Abdul Aziz ben Malik’s face. He had no idea what the man looked like, but it did not matter. His face would be a battered and broken pulp when Rafe was finished with him if he had as much as laid a finger against Kitty.

  “What are you doing, Rafe?” Claudio asked.

  Rafe turned, drawing the quarterstaff still between his hands. “I am practicing,” he replied, somewhat out of breath with exertion.

  “You should not be up like this yet,” Claudio said. “It is too soon and you are too weak. Come back down below.”

  “No,” Rafe replied, even though he knew Claudio was right. Now that he was motionless, the adrenaline that had surged through him, envigorating him, began to wane, and he could feel the tremulous, damnable weakness in his limbs. He stumbled slightly, catching himself against the taffrail. Claudio moved to help him, but Rafe glowered at him, giving him pause. “No,” he said again.

  He did not want to return to his room. There were too many distractions there; everywhere he looked, he saw reminders of Kitty. It was too painful to think of her too long, to consider what horrors she might be enduring. Rafe wanted to keep topside, on the deck, with his eyes out on the sea.

  “Any sign of them this morning?” he asked, turning his gaze south, straining to spy even a fleeting glimpse of La Venganza ahead of them. “Have the lookouts reported anything?”

  “No,” Claudio said. He stepped toward the younger man, his brows lifted sympathetically. “Rafe, listen to me. If Cristobal did not brail canvas last night, he could have almost a half-day’s lead upon us by now.”

  “He brailed his sails,” Rafe said. “You told me every good captain does it―it is a standard precaution. Cristobal may be many things, but he is a good captain and he loves that ship more than anything.”

  More than me, he added in his mind, with a momentary sorrow.

  “Even if he did, we are still not drawing enough wind to catch up to him,” Claudio said. “I had hoped that by leaving La Coruna as soon as we did, we might have a hope, even with our bowsprit to slow us down. But we lost time last night, and Cristobal is too far ahead of us.”

  “No,” Rafe said, shaking his head.

  “Even if his lead was only by hours yesterday, it has stretched beyond this by today,” Claudio said quietly, gently. “And continues to grow even now. We do not have the sails to prevent it.”

  “Then give us the sails,” Rafe said, his brows narrowed.

  “That would tax the bowsprit,” Claudio said. “If she snaps, we will lose the rigging to the foremast―even the mast itself. Let us hold steady and get to port in Lisbon. Forget catching Cristobal―we know where he is going. We can find La Venganza in Lisbon. We―”

  “I said give us the rot damn sails, Claudio!” Rafe snapped, drawing the boatswain to a startled, abrupt halt. He brushed past Claudio, storming toward the binnacle. “We are not going to hold steady or forget about anything. Keep our stem pointed south and rig me enough canvas to catch La Venganza. I do not care how you do it. Just do it.”

  “You could cripple this ship, Rafe,” Claudio said.

  Rafe paused in midstride, turning to meet Claudio’s stern gaze with his own. “That is a risk I am willing to take,” he said. “I am the captain of this ship. It is my helm, my rules, and I damn well say to do it. I am not abandoning this―I am not abandoning Kitty. I have done that too often in my life, and it stops here and now. I will not fail Kitty, too.”

  He turned on his heel and walked away. He ducked down the companionway ladder and headed for his quarters. He would stow his quarterstaff and shrug on his overcoat. Then he would return topside and hold the helm of his ship.

  “Is that what this is about?” Claudio asked, following him down the hallway toward his room. “I have heard you say as much before―Rafe, stop and listen to me.”

  His hand closed firmly against Rafe’s sleeve, drawing him to a halt in the corridor. “Do you think you failed your father?” Claudio asked.

  Rafe frowned, shrugging himself loose. “I do not think it, Claudio―I know it. This is all because of me, all of it from the start. I am the one who hurt Cristobal. That is why Father began working with the privateers, to help pay for Lucio to
come from the mainland and tend to him. That is why Father sent me away―because it was my fault.”

  Claudio stared at him, stricken. “Rafe, Evarado loved you…” he began, his brows lifting as he reached for Rafe.

  Rafe did not want his proffered comfort, his empty words of compassion. He drew away from Cristobal, shaking his head. He was still frail from the poison, his mind and body exhausted and weak, and he did not want to confront his memories and feelings for Evarado; his ordinarily stalwart defenses would too readily crumble. “I do not want to talk about my father, Claudio,” he said with a frown, turning for his door again. “Leave me alone and tend to the ship. I―”

  “Do not speak to me as if I am nothing more to you than a crewman, Rafe,” Claudio said, his voice edged with anger now as he again caught Rafe’s sleeve. “I have known you since you were in swaddling, and your father long before that.”

  “Yes, and you let him send me away!” Rafe snapped, whirling to face the older man. Again, he wrenched himself away from Claudio’s grasp, his brows furrowed deeply. “You never said anything to prevent it because you knew it then and you damn well know it now―I failed Papa!”

  At this word, the term he had not used in reference to Evarado since his boyhood so long ago, Rafe felt his resolve completely crack. His voice choked with sudden tears; he felt nearly fifteen years of grief, shame and anger suddenly well upon within him, shuddering through his form. “I failed Papa,” he whispered again, tangling his fingers in his hair. “He sent me away. Lucio asked for me in remittance―he said I was of no use to Papa anymore, and that I would only bring more trouble for him, and he was right.”

  Claudio blinked at him. “You heard that, hijo?” he whispered, looking pained.

  Rafe nodded. “And later that night, I heard Papa weeping in Cristobal’s room. I know he blamed me, and rightly so.”

  Claudio stepped toward Rafe, reaching for him. “Oh, Rafe,” he said gently. “Evarado wept because he had just given away his most precious possession.”

  Rafe looked at him, bewildered.

  “Lucio did not offer to take you in remittance, Rafe,” Claudio said. “He wanted to bring Cristobal back to Madrid with him.” Rafe recoiled, his eyes flown wide in stunned disbelief, and Claudio nodded. “Lucio felt your brother’s injury would leave him unable to help your father, that his life would be ruined for it, and he would always be dependent upon Evarado. He thought it would ease the burden on your father to take Cristobal away, to offer him a proper education, training as a physician in Madrid. He had offered his services to your father at no charge, but Evarado was too proud to accept charity. Lucio had hoped this might be a suitable barter, but again, your father’s pride would not let him accept. He had no coins, no jewels, nothing of worth to offer Lucio…save for the one thing he knew that Lucio would value as greatly as he did.”

  Claudio touched Rafe’s face, his palm pressing gently against his cheek. “His first-born son, Rafe. The one thing Lucio could never have of his own―the one thing your father treasured more than any other, and that money could never replace. You, hijo.”

  Rafe shook his head. “That is not possible,” he said, his voice strained.

  “He never blamed you for Cristobal’s leg, Rafe,” Claudio said. “He only ever blamed himself―for that, his pirating, sending you away, everything. He hated himself for it, Rafe. He never forgave himself.” He smiled gently. “He was proud of you, hijo. Lucio would write to him, tell him of your accomplishments, and he would swell with such pride. He felt that Lucio had given you all of the things that he never could have―that you became a much better man than you ever might have had you never left.”

  “I…but I thought Cristobal was his favorite,” Rafe said, stricken.

  “He had no favorites,” Claudio said. “No father ever loves one son more than any other, Rafe. But Evarado knew Cristobal. He saw which direction Cristobal’s life would head, just as he saw yours. I think he always worried for Cristobal, but never for you. He always trusted in you.”

  Rafe said nothing. He stared at Claudio, all of the beliefs that had filled and sustained him for so long seemingly shattered. He stumbled back until his shoulders hit the wall. Evarado had loved him. Evarado had been proud of him; he had sent Rafe away with Lucio, not out of punishment, but because he had been precious to his father.

  The strength in his knees waned, and Rafe slid toward the floor, his legs folding beneath him. He sat down hard, his eyes flooded with tears, his throat choked with the strain of trying to suppress them. When Claudio squatted before him, his expression filled with gentle sympathy, he did not need to say another word. Rafe pressed his hand over his face and began to weep. Claudio’s hand, as strong and kind now as it had ever been in Rafe’s youth, hooked against the back of his neck, drawing the younger man into an embrace.

  “It is alright,” he said quietly, as Rafe wept against his shoulder. “Hush, now, hijo. It is alright.”