Flight of the Earls (15 page)

“She looks weak,” she heard Pierce say, and then she awoke again in her cot as Seamus wiped a cool towel across her forehead.

“Shhh . . .” He brushed his hands across her cheeks.

Clare felt the toes of her feet curling into the moist grass of the fields at home and she was but a child and her ma chased behind laughing, gaining on her with every step. Clare turned and saw Ma's legs churning, her face spilling with joy.

“Don't leave us,” she heard Pierce say and saw him holding a candle as he leaned in and kissed her on the cheek. She felt his lips, soft and tender, and Clare blacked out.

This time she relived the banished sounds of hysteria and instinctively she knew what had happened. She dropped the basket of elderberries and the tiny black orbs tumbled to the ground as she ran, pulse pounding as she summited the hill. Then stopped. She found Seamus bent over Kevan's lifeless body and Pierce's shouts frozen in horror.

“I took my eyes from the boy, no more than a blink,” Seamus's shoulders shook as sobs ripped through him.

In a purity of thought beyond reason, in that moment of tragedy Clare could see the spirit sapping from her brother, and she knew with certainty what must be done.

She brought Kevan's cold, blue-lipped corpse to the house and watched as Ma glanced first with a smile, which transposed to terror as she sprinted toward Clare, screaming and clasping her hands to her ears.

When Clare looked down again, this time Lala, still and limp, was in her arms.

Clare choked on the pungent liquid in her mouth and opened her eyes. Muriel pulled a spoon from her mouth as her husband, Mack, leaned over her shoulder.

“Is she going to make it?” he asked.

“What if she hears you, you old fool?” Muriel replied.

The spinning and nausea returned, and it gyrated faster and faster and she fell deeper into the chasm.

And then it stopped.

Clare lay in the grass and, lifting her head, saw Caitlin, Ronan, and Davin just turning to leave.

Davin spun and looked back, his face red with anger.

“Come on.” Caitlin put her arm around her brother's shoulders. “She's never coming back. She's never coming back.”

Clare could only watch as they drifted away.

Chapter 15

Waves of Liberty

“You know about sea justice. They'll kill for this, you fools.” In near darkness, only a few flames flickered below, in the musty, putrid hull of the steerage. Muriel's face flashed in and out of the dim lighting as if oil flesh tones painted on a black canvas. Her anger and frustration contrasted with the gentleness of her hands as she tended to Clare, thin and frail, who lay beside her curled in a cot.

“Ah, Muriel, we've been through it with you several times.” Mack held the rusted bucket of salt water out for his wife, and she dipped in a cloth, squeezed out the drippings, and placed it on Clare's forehead.

“The plan will work just fine.” Seamus knelt beside Clare and placed the back of his hand on her cheek, which was warm to the touch.

“Where's the Tailor? Why isn't he here?” Pierce's expression was draped with concern.

Seamus couldn't remember ever seeing his sister in such a position of helplessness. She was always the one who bore the weight of the family, and the idea of her leaving him alone to fend off the cruelty of the world gripped him to the core. Clare was the only one who ever believed in him, even though he wasn't worthy of her belief.

“Can he be trusted?” Pierce's voice wavered. “He's an odd one.”

“The Tailor? Bah! Having a shady fellow like that to be part of your scheming.” Muriel stroked Clare's hand, which seemed ghostly even in the dimness.

“What you say may be true, but without him, the lock won't be picked.” Mack placed the bucket on the floor and put on his jacket.

“If we don't get Clare more fresh water and better rations, she'll surely die,” Seamus said. “And there's many lying here below suffering while they're up on deck fattening their bellies.” He rose, tucked on his hat, picked up an iron bar, and started to tap it in his open palm. Seamus was growing irritated with Pierce. “Are you coming or not?”

“I'm just asking questions, 'tis all.”

Muriel stood and embraced each of them, finishing up with Mack, whom she kissed on his broad lips. “You bring these lads back safe.”

Seamus glanced back to Clare. Would he ever see her again?

Muriel must have construed his thoughts. “She'll be well tended. I won't leave from her side.”

With a nod, Seamus turned and the two men trailed behind as he trudged his way past the sick, the discouraged, and the dying, and they extinguished any candles or lanterns upon passing. The Tailor was waiting for them at the ladder leading to the hatch, and even with a lack of illumination, his eagerness for their impending mischief was discernable.

His name was Brennan, but they all called him the Tailor because of the leather awl he carried with him wherever he went. As to his true profession, no one knew nor dared ask. Most conjectures were influenced by his shiftiness and the deep, black brows that roofed his darting eyes. Despite his ill nature, he managed to gain friends around the card table as his passion for gambling was far superior to his skill. Yet those who won often worried if the Tailor would recoup his losses one way or the other before the trip ended.

They crept up the ladder rungs and Seamus, who was in the lead, raised the hatch with care. With the lanterns and candles of the cabin silenced below, there was no escaping light to betray their assent. Instead, Seamus was surprised by the surge of cool air and a tuft of snow that fluttered by him to the floor.

This wasn't anticipated. As they stood on the deck and looked to their worn boots, which had sunk in at least six inches of powder, Seamus realized the flaw in their tactics.

“It's over,” Pierce whispered, sounding almost relieved. “We've got to go back down.”

The sky was filled with falling giant flakes that drifted down like chicken feathers. Seamus held out his hand to something he rarely witnessed in Ireland. “This will surely cover our tracks. We just need to be quick about it.”

This made little sense, but Seamus moved forward, hoping they would follow and they did. The windless nature of the storm created an eerie calm, and only the crunching of their steps in the snow could be heard above the lapping of waves and creaking of brittle masts.

It was almost too quiet.

The clouds sealed out the moonlight and stars, and they were fully cloaked in the blackness of the evening. To this point, they had committed no crime or conspiracy. They were merely passengers seeking fresh air.

But with each step closer toward the front of the ship, they were angling toward incrimination, walking into the arms of a death sentence. Seamus feared turning back, to show any weakness or doubt in his intentions. Yet his ears were perked for the sounds of footprints trailing, and he was comforted to know he was not abandoned.

Finally, as if they had traveled a hundred miles, they arrived at the trapdoor to the bulkhead and strained to peer through the heavy snow and darkness in search of interlopers among the sails.

“Have they spotted us?” Mack rubbed his hands together and scanned the ship with straining eyes.

The Tailor hadn't waited for confirmation. He sunk to his knees into the snow and wiped away the white powder from the hatch. Then he pulled a couple of tools from a leather pouch dangling from his belt and began to work the padlock. His experience in these kinds of pursuits was confirmed when after only a few seconds, the lock snapped open, which sounded as if it were artillery shot from a cannon.

The plotters froze to absolute stillness, and they heard shouts in the distance. They stood, unwilling to move, for almost a full minute until they were certain the voices faded.

“They're just adjusting the sheets.” The Tailor opened the hatch, and for the first time Seamus felt the noose tightening around his own neck. The deed was done and they would have no excuse other than the truth of their actions.

Apparently comfortable with such chicanery, the Tailor assumed the lead and stepped down below with Seamus now content to follow.

Seamus probed each rung of the ladder with his foot, the task made more difficult by the quivering of his knees and the hurriedness of his breath. He felt safer when Pierce, the last to descend, sealed the hatch above them.

There was the sound of a match being struck, followed by a burst of flame ripping through the darkness, and Mack's face peered from behind a freshly lit lantern. The cramped space around them seemed barren, although there was a scattering of stacked barrels, burlap sacks of food, and a few other provisions perched on cobwebbed shelves.

“They'll see the light through the cracks of the floorboards.” Pierce jabbed at the ceiling.

“The snow should shield it well enough, I suppose,” Mack said. “It won't serve us at all to be blind.”

“Then let's be done with it,” Pierce said, the panic rising in his voice.

“Settle yourself, boy.” Mack's voice was terse. “Let's finish what we came for, calmly.”

“Just grab something.” Pierce reached down and hoisted a sack of oats over his shoulder.

The Tailor was fumbling his way to the back of the storage area.

“What's he doing?” Seamus asked of Mack.

“Oh. The Tailor's seeking the captain's prize.”

“He's here for whiskey?”

“I believe he's joined us for amusement, if you ask me.” Mack picked up a bag with his free hand.

“I think I heard something.” Pierce's face in the lantern light splashed fear.

Mack blew out the lantern, and they stood motionless to hear any creaks from above. That was, everyone except the Tailor, who continued to stumble in the dark, obviously refusing to give up his search.

There was a clatter, and with his eyes adjusted to the dimness, Seamus saw Pierce scurrying up the ladder.

“Wait!” Seamus tried to reach for Pierce's ankle, but with a kick Seamus was eluded and the redhead burst through the hatch, abandoning all efforts at stealth. With only one way out, there was nothing left to do but chase behind in haste.

Seamus knew something was amiss when the hatch lifted to reveal a glow from above. Just as his head cleared the opening, he saw many of the ship's crew forming a circle around the opening, bearing lanterns, pistols, swords, and saps.

He recoiled, but arms reached down and yanked him through the hatch. His lip ruptured as it collided with a hinge, and with everything spinning around him, he was tossed facedown on the frigid deck and a cold, wet boot pressed on the back of his neck, suffocating him in the snow.

In a frenzy, Seamus struggled to lift his head to free his airway, and then pain seared through his skull, and it all turned black.

Chapter 16

The Plank

The ship tilted deep to its side, and for a moment Seamus could glimpse the yolk of morning lifting above the night's horizon. Then the waves returned the wooden beast to level and the ocean vanished from his obscured view.

But the morning air was warming and he was alive, which considering the evening he survived, was no small miracle.

Seamus tried to determine how many hours he had been in this outdoor prison, shackled against the side walls of the
Sea Mist
. Only now as dawn began to saturate the sky did he realize his snowy tomb was brightly splattered with crimson, as if before him lay a freshly slaughtered lamb. Was it his blood? He tried to raise his hand to touch his throbbing head, but the clanking of his rusted irons reminded him of his fettering.

It pained him to do so, but he turned to his side and saw Pierce bent over, his red hair crusted with snow. Billows of steam rose with each exhale from his blue lips. Pierce stared vacantly at the ground while rocking back and forth in sways of madness.

Seamus craned his neck to his other side to see Mack appearing lifeless, leaning forward while manacles held his arms behind him in grotesque fashion.