We have come to the end of Book One of The Noble Pirates. Obviously, the story is not over. I am merely coming to a stopping point to afford me time to try and get it published. While I didn’t start off intending to publish, along the way I decided it was worth a try. Should my attempts fail, I will self-publish it in e-book form so that you may download it and read it at your pleasure.

In the meantime, I am taking a brief break from writing TNP. I have work that has piled up and been neglected so that I could feed my addiction to this story, and it needs to get done. I will recommence writing soon — the countdown timer will let you know when. As always, I welcome your comments. You are my critics, my fans. You are the advantage I have over other unpublished writers, and I will always take your thoughts to heart. As such, I have a few questions for you to help me with the trying-to-get-published process (which, incidentally, is AWFUL):

1. What “genre” do you think TNP belongs in? Adventure, Fantasy/Sci-Fi, Historical, Romance? A combination?

2. Many literary agents and publishers ask for “sample chapter(s).” If individual posts were chapters, which would you submit if you were me?

3. DO YOU KNOW ANYONE IN THE PUBLISHING INDUSTRY???? (Fine, this last one was a desperate attempt at putting myself out of my misery. I couldn’t help it.)

Any other suggestions or criticisms or encouragement you have is welcome. If this story ends up getting published in the traditional sense, I will include each and every one of you wonderful readers in my Acknowledgments. I’m not kidding. You people Rock.

And now, without further ado, Sophie (Post 4):

***

The day I left the hospital, there were no reporters, no camera crews waiting. My return to the civilized world, to the 21st century, went unnoticed. Noakes’ visit was foiled by Sophie’s presence, much to my delight. Still, his eyes conveyed the warnings, the promises to return. He would not let me be, of that I was certain.

And there was Sophie. My story had jarred her, disturbed her. I feared she thought I was crazy, but something in the way she gripped my hand as she helped me into the car reassured me.  She wouldn’t write me off as insane, thank God. Her desire to rebuild our relationship filled me with relief, with love.

When I closed my eyes, I still felt the rocking of a ship beneath me, tasted the salt on my lips. I still heard the creaking, the flapping of sails in the wind. When I drifted off into sleep, I still saw those blue eyes, that warm, mischievous smile.

He lives. Liberi.

I would not let him go, not yet.

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Now, as he sat on the edge of my hospital bed, he peered curiously, desperately, into my eyes. “Sabrina, what happened to you? Where were you? You couldn’t possibly have been on a cay in the Bahamas all this time.”

I couldn’t look him in the eyes. Noakes’ words echoed in my head: If you tell anyone the truth about where you’ve been, you are endangering yourself — and your family as well. “But I was,” I insisted, fidgeting nervously with my IV.

“You survived on a small cay alone for ten years?” Jake said incredulously. “Didn’t you see boats or planes or people? Didn’t you figure out how to build a fire? Didn’t you try to get off the island before ten years had passed?”

Sophie piped up. “Like that old movie… Cast Away,” she said.

Tanya came to my rescue. “Jake, for heaven’s sake, leave her alone! She just said that’s where she was. Give her a chance to recover before you start throwing questions at her.”

Jake heaved a deep sigh. “You’re right. I’m sorry, Sabrina. It’s just… You don’t know what we went through, after you went missing. And to think that you were right there… for so long…”

Sky spoke softly, putting her hand on mine. “What about what Sabrina went through? We should let her rest.”

“And bathe,” Tanya added, wrinkling her nose and smiling playfully at me.

Jake was not satisfied, but he nodded. “Okay,” he said. “The hospital is releasing you tomorrow, and we’re getting you out of here.”

I said, “Can Sophie stay with me tonight?” Everyone looked expectantly at Sophie, who shrugged uncomfortably. I smiled at her. “Will you stay with me, Sophie? Please?”

She considered for a moment, then answered, “Sure.”

Jake kissed each of us, murmuring to Sophie that he’d call her, and with some strained, awkward good-byes, Sophie and I were left alone in the hospital room. She pulled a chair up to my bedside, sat, crossed her legs, and stared silently at her hands. I noticed that her fingernails were painted a shimmery pink, that her jeans were high-waisted and belted. Huh. Was that back in fashion? Her hair was pencil-straight, and I wondered if she flat-ironed it. She certainly hadn’t inherited hair like that from me. I swallowed. What to say? I wanted to hug her tightly, to inhale her scent. What must I look like to her?

She spoke first. “That must have been… really hard. Being alone like that.”

I said carefully, “It was hard being with out you and your dad. I missed you guys so much.”

She looked briefly at me, then scanned the walls, the bed. She didn’t know how to respond. “Dad missed you a lot. He was depressed for a long time.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Yeah,” she replied. “I missed you too, but it was a really long time ago.”

“Of course.”

“I was really young.”

“Yes, you were.”

There was a long pause of silence as we both fidgeted, trying to think of things to say, when Sophie reached for the tokens that sat on my bedside table. “What are these?”

“Oh,” I said, trying to arrange myself to face her more directly. “I found them on the island.” A thought suddenly occurred to me. “Hey, Sophie, do you think you could get me a laptop with internet access?”

“Why?” she asked.

“I wanted to try and find out what these words mean,” I said, indicating the scratched letters on the tokens.

Sophie casually pulled what looked like a cell phone — identical to the one Noakes’ sidekick had used to look me up (except this one was pink) — out of her small handbag and began tapping away at it at lightening speed. She examined one of the tokens as she typed. “L-I-B-E-R-I.”

I tried to sit up. “Are you Googling it?”

Sophie looked up at me and raised an eyebrow. “No. Google is ancient history.” She looked back down at her pink gadget and read, “‘Italian municipality… in the province of Caserta…region of Campania…’”

I made a face. “That doesn’t… fit. Try putting in ‘Liberi’ and ‘pirates.’”

Sophie grinned. “Pirates? If you say so.” After a few seconds, she read, “‘Pirate utopias… Pirates built the utopia of Libertalia in Madagascar during the 18th century… Called themselves Liberi.’”

I sat very still. A tingling sensation crept along my spine. What did it mean? Was it a message? I thought back on when Sam had given me the talisman, on how he had been watching me strangely, how he had insisted I wear it. I pointed to the other token. “What about that one? I know it’s not English, so just try typing it in the way it is.”

Sophie read, “O-B-I. Right? Is that one word?”

I shrugged. “I have no idea. Just try typing it in as one word first.”

When that yielded no (reasonable) results, I said, “I’m pretty sure it’s in Igbo, an African language. Do you think you could narrow the search?”

Sophie sighed. “Why didn’t you say so in the first place? Which language did you say it was?” She tapped away for a few seconds, and then said with a victorious smile, “O bi means ‘he lives’ in Igbo. Man, I rock the Web.”

My vision blurred, my heartbeat boomed in my ears.

He lives. Liberi.

Sophie’s smile disappeared. “Are you okay?” She shifted in her seat. “Do I need to call a nurse?”

“No,” I said. “He lives. Oh my God, he lives.” I covered my face with my hands, willing myself not to cry. After a moment, I looked up at Sophie and tried to smile. “I’m okay, really.”

Sophie watched me quietly, then asked, “Mom, what’s going on?”

Mom. Powerful emotions bubbled within me as I reached for her hand and grasped it tightly within mine. “Sophie,” I whispered. “Can you keep a secret?”

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I couldn’t stop thinking about Sophie. She’d be all grown up now. I’d missed everything. I tried reminding myself that I was lucky to see her again, to be given the chance to develop a relationship with her at all. I was a shitty mother to the child Sophie, but maybe I could be a good friend to the woman Sophie.

I fidgeted restlessly, wondering where the remote control to the television was.  There was only so much All My Children (Christ! Was that show still running in 2020?) I could take.  Strange, how sedentary people’s lives were these days. How so unbelievably different their priorities were. How would I get used to this again, particularly with Noakes and his Navy cronies on my ass? How would I keep myself from slumping into a deep, dark depression?

I twisted my head to the side in frustration, willing myself to think of something else. That was when I saw the neatly folded clothes and leather pouch. The talisman sat atop my dirty, ratty slops, its strings carefully coiled on top. I leaned carefully from the bed, my hand outstretched, and grasped it. As I pulled myself back, grunting from the effort, the tokens that had been inside the pouch fell to my lap. I looked at the pouch in surprise to see that it had been cut open. I cursed aloud. Those jerks! They’d cut open my talisman.

I lifted the two tokens gently and examined them in my palm. They were oval-shaped and made of a soft stone. Both were inscribed with roughly-scrawled Latin letters, which caught me off guard. One token contained an inscription that was unintelligible to me, while the other read: Liberi.

I stared. That’s odd. That wasn’t an Igbo word. What had Sam said? Magical words to protect me… Their existence, and not my ability to see them, made them powerful. I scratched my head. This didn’t seem to fit, for some reason.

As I pondered the tokens, the door opened. I looked up to see the faces of my past: Jake, tall, dark, and handsome as ever, even if he was a bit softer around the middle and a bit grayer around the temples; behind him, Tanya and Sky, both still attractive, Sky a bit too pudgy, Tanya a bit too cosmetically-enhanced; and finally, peering timidly around her father’s shoulder, a beautiful young woman with large blue eyes and soft brown hair.

Sophie.

My throat constricted. No one said anything for what felt like an eternity. They thought I had died ten years ago, and yet here I was, looking dramatically different but, oddly enough, much the same. What did they think? What had they been told? As I stared into each of their dumbfounded faces, I heard their questions.

Sophie stepped forward and smiled at me — a stunning, radiant smile, and I saw the little girl I had left behind. “It’s her,” she said. She nudged her father. “Dad, it’s her.”

Jake looked as though someone had slapped him. “Uh,” he said, crossing his arms, uncrossing them, putting them in his pockets, removing them. “Sabrina. I don’t know what to say. You’re alive.” I saw the tears shimmer in his eyes.

“Well, I do,” Tanya muttered, dropping her handbag and rushing to me. Before I knew what was happening, Tanya and Sky were hugging me, crying, saying things about guilt, about miracles, about God.

As I began to cry myself, unable to utter a coherent thought, I looked at my husband and daughter from behind my tears. Jake stood stock still, his eyes fixed on me, while Sophie held her hands behind her back, glancing curiously from her father to me.

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What was that smell? No, it wasn’t a smell… It was a lack of smell. How strange. The air was so… sterile.

“What has Roberts done?”

“Stop asking that. It hardly matters now. The important question is, ‘Who is she?’”

The voices were American. That was a good sign. I opened my eyes and several anxious faces came into focus, all hovering around me. Two men in uniform. A woman in a lab coat. The walls a blinding white, the bed a ridiculous soft. I looked at the closer of the two men, a bald  man in his forties with bushy eyebrows and an impatient expression on his face. I whispered, “Is it 2020?”

The man bent toward me, his eyes wide. “Yes. Yes it is. What year did you come from?”

The other man approached excitedly. “Where is Roberts?”

The first man spoke again, his voice louder. “What year are you from?”

I flinched, and the woman in the white coat squeezed her way between us. “Give her a chance to recover, gentlemen. She’s been through a lot.” The woman was Asian, with thick black hair and a soothing voice. She smiled at me as she took my vitals. “You have three broken bones in your left leg.  You are malnourished, underweight, have anemia, mild scurvy, scabies, fleas, and lice.” The doctor shook her head. “It’s as thought you’ve been living…”

…among pirates? I thought, raising my eyebrows.

“…in the wild,” she finished, glancing at the two men behind her. “Now gentlemen, I realize that you have many questions for her, but please remember that she’s sick and probably in shock.”

“I’m not in shock,” I croaked, licking my lips and attempting to shift myself. Ouch. Major ouch. I winced and continued, trying not to hold my breath. “I’m Sabrina Granger. I… went missing in 2009.”

The men exchanged looks. “Where have you been?”

I narrowed my eyes at them. “Who are you? You know Roberts — are you SEALs as well?”

After ensuring that the doctor and her nurses were gone, the bald man approached my bed. “How much did Roberts tell you?” he asked.

My leg hurt. I said, “He told me all of your classified information. P54 and all that.”

The bald man glanced back at his colleague, who was tapping away at what looked like a cell phone. “Yep, found her,” the second guy said. “Sabrina Granger, born Sabrina Beauchamp, 1978. Attorney at Cotts & Beaker, LLP. Husband Jake Granger, daughter Sophie. 2009, fell off a yacht in the Bahamas during a storm, probably in a drunken stupor, body never found. Presumed dead.”

I scowled. “What! Drunken stupor? Who said that?”

The bald man gazed at me in wonder. “Where did you go?”

I sighed. Screw it. It didn’t matter who he was. “1718. I was there until August of 1719.”

The man moved closer, his eyes on me but his mind clearly elsewhere. “1718. My God. What did you do there for a year?”

“I hung out with pirates,” I replied. The second man snorted, as if I’d said something funny. I tried to move again, felt the sharp pain race through my leg again. I winced. “Please,” I said. “My family… Can you tell my family I’m here? I need to see them.”

“Yes,” the bald man said, coming back from his thoughts. “But first… We need to discuss some things.”

His name was Dr. William Noakes, and he was the Director of Research for the Naval Research Laboratory. He had been one of several scientists working closely with John Roberts on P54. Roberts, he said, had left an audio recording in which he said he would return at the next P54 occurrence, so the Navy had been waiting that day I came crashing back to the future.

“For some reason, he didn’t come back,” Noakes said, “but sent you in his place. You, Mrs. Granger, are now a walking piece of highly classified information.”

They’d been expecting Roberts. Roberts had sent me. I let my head fall back against the pillows. What a fool I was, thinking Roberts had sent me back from the kindness of his heart. He’d sent me back to finish his job for him. “I want to see my family,” I said again.

Noakes frowned. “Mrs. Granger, I don’t think you realize what’s happening here. This is a matter of national security. If you tell anyone the truth about where you’ve been, you are endangering yourself — and your family as well.”

My body tensed, my leg throbbed. “Is that a threat?”

“Call it what you like.” He tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. “What you know, where you’ve been… It’s knowledge over which wars are fought, power over which innocent men die.”

I glared at him. “What’s your point?”

“My point,” Noakes replied, “is that you would serve your country well by helping us, by telling us what you know. And, at the very least, by keeping quiet about this entire experience to everyone else.”

I closed my eyes and cursed Roberts to hell in my mind. For the third time, I said, “I want to see my family.”

“I understand,” Noakes said with a smile that he probably intended as kind, but came across as forced. He turned and stepped toward his colleague, and the two of them conferred in low voices for a few minutes. Then Noakes looked back at me and said, “Your family may come and visit you. But I’ll be back before the hospital releases you, Mrs. Granger.”

I turned my head away. “Oh good,” I said dryly. “I was afraid you’d go to hell.”

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“I won’t last fifteen minutes on that thing,” I finally said, aware that he was nearly done.

Roberts dusted himself off and replied, “You only need it to get you into the portal. After that, not even a yacht could help you. That’s what the life preserve is for.”

I stared blankly at the small raft, my eyes glazing over. “I’m scared,” I said softly. “I’ve been in the 18th century for a year. I have no idea what’s on the other side, if I even belong there anymore. Do I belong in any era anymore?” He didn’t stop working, and I said quickly, my tone insolent, “Yes, I’m a woman and I’m scared. Men get scared too. The difference is that women aren’t too proud to admit it.”

Roberts straightened and smiled at me. “I’m never scared.”

I rolled my eyes. “That’s not courage, by the way. Courage is overcoming your fear. What you are is completely, utterly deranged.”

To my surprise, Roberts laughed. And for once, it wasn’t that sardonic chuckle he’d given me before — it was a real laugh, complete with snort.  I stared at him, my eyes wide, and said, “Oh my God. Are you laughing? The man may have a soul after all!”

Roberts composed himself and mumbled, “The things that come out of your mouth…” His brow furrowed, and his expression returned to one of pensiveness. “You’ll likely have to remain on the raft for several hours, waiting for the portal to open. As you know, P54 opens under certain weather conditions — in the form of a thunderstorm — and remains open for a very short amount of time. Maybe an hour, at most.” He paused, then gestured to me. “Help me carry this to the beach.”

Although I held one end of the raft, I wasn’t carrying it at all — Roberts bore the weight of everything easily. When we reached the seafront, Roberts pointed to a tower of rocks that was clearly manmade. He said, “You will see the clouds begin to gather. They’ll come at you fast, so you need to be ready to go as soon as you see them. Using the compass, you will want to head due east, 400 meters from the stack of rocks. Be sure to continually orient yourself to the shoreline in case the currents take you off your course.”

I nodded. “What do I do if — when — I’m knocked off the raft?”

Roberts smiled. “Try not to drown.”

I shut my eyes. “Great. Thanks.”

When everything seemed ready, Roberts put his hands on his hips and took a deep breath. “Well, it looks like I’m done here…”

Don’t leave me, for the love of God! I wanted to shout. But I swallowed the words and looked around frantically. “Wait…”

“Sabrina,” Roberts said softly. “Control your fear. It was either meant to be, or it wasn’t.”

I felt the tears forming, despite my best efforts. I nodded. “You’re right.”

“Then,” Roberts said, looking uncomfortable and ready to leave, his eyes scanning the horizon, “I’ll be off. Take care of yourself.” Without another word, my black pirate turned and trudged back up the rocky beach, his strong legs carrying him with purpose.

That’s it. I was alone now. I looked at the raft, at the bundle of supplies I’d be carrying with me. I sat down on the ground beside it and drew my knees to my chest. Sam’s talisman pressed against my thighs comfortingly. My eyes focused on the sky and the delicate clouds that floated within it. I was exhausted now, having spent all of my nervous energy over the course of the day. The breeze had died down, and the mugginess made me drowsy. My eyelids drooped.

It didn’t look like there would be a storm anytime soon…

I’m not sure how much time passed before a rumble awoke me with a start. A single ominous patch of clouds was approaching, and I nearly jumped out of my skin. Shit, shit, shit! Am I late? How long is it going to take me to row 400 meters? Wait, how far is 400 meters? What the hell? Am I just supposed to know that crap off the top of my head?

As I struggled to get my little raft into the open sea, the winds began to pick up. I clutched the compass in my fist, the notched bevel pressing into my fingers. As I struggled against the undertow, I looked back at the landmark Roberts had made. From a distance, it looked like a… Ha! A phallic symbol. How utterly appropriate.

The rain began coming down, slowly at first, then hard. 400 meters. Due east. I could barely hold on long enough to peer through the rain at the compass. I couldn’t see the phallus anymore. What had Roberts been thinking? Christ, what had I been thinking? I wasn’t going to be able to do this.

The compass flew from my hand and disappeared in the darkened waves as I dug my fingers into the sides of the raft. The sky above was that other-worldly sky I remembered, the clouds reaching down to the earth, obscuring my view of anything but their own supernatural incandescence.

It was then that the raft flipped over, and I watched, with surprising resignation, as the rough, tightly-bound beams came down on me.

This was it.

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The crew knew they were here on account of me, and Roberts reassured them that it would be a quick stop. A quick stop — to unload me. I suspect the men thought Roberts intended to kill me, but they couldn’t understand why such effort was going to it. Somehow, Roberts had convinced them that this was in their best interest, and if only out of respect for their captain, no one questioned it. Anchored in a hidden cove, the pirates of the Royal Rover watched tensely as Roberts, Sam and I boarded a boat. Time was of the essence — no one wanted to run into a Royal Navy frigate, least of all me. God knows I’d be blamed for the catastrophe. I’d have rather perished attempting to cross the time portal than at the hands of some angry pirates, or worse yet, dangling by my neck at the end of a rope.

No words were spoken between us as we cut through the waves toward Salt Cay. I barely blinked in the salty wind, abruptly aware that this was one of my last days in the 18th century, maybe even on this earth. 350 days from Time Zero. Today was day 349. This was it.

This is it.

I looked back at the Royal Rover on impulse, but the ship was already hidden by the reefs, tucked protectively in the curved arm of some nameless islet. Howel’s ship. Howel’s men. Howel’s world. I was about to leave it forever. If tears escaped my eyes, they were immediately lost in the wind, instantly dried to my cheeks along with the spray of the sea. I reassured myself that it mattered little — he was gone. All that was left of him was the stuff of legends. I squeezed my eyes shut and grit my teeth. May my memories of him never fade, so long as I live!

I turned suddenly, feeling his eyes on me. Not Roberts’s eyes, but Sam’s. They glided from me to the horizon easily, and for a moment I believed he hadn’t been watching me at all. He, like the other pirates, had avoided speaking to me more than was necessary. I was afraid I’d lost his friendship by betraying him and by getting his leader killed, but he showed no signs of resentment or anger, merely indifference. His scarred face was impossible to read, and I resigned myself to a friendless existence until my return to the 21st century.

While every fiber in my being yearned to go back to my time, however, something indefinable nagged me. Something… And now, as I sat in the boat, wondering if Sam had been watching me, that something became louder behind the noise of my thoughts.

I had no time to dwell on it. We hopped out of the boat and into the shallow waters around the cay, clambering over the jagged coral in our thin-soled shoes. Roberts instructed Sam to wait by the boat while he took me into the sparse foliage further inland.

“May I speak to the nwanyi for a moment, Captain?” Sam asked before we could venture away from him.

Roberts nodded, folding his arms and waiting. He was not going anywhere. Sam seemed unperturbed by this, and looked upon me kindly. “Nwanyi, I know you are leaving us, and I wanted to give you something for your journey home.” He handed me a worn leather pouch in the shape of a square. It was sewn shut and hung from two knotted strings, like a necklace. As I took it from him, I heard the clinking of several small objects within the pouch.

“What’s inside?” I asked, looking for an opening to the pouch.

“It is a talisman,” Sam replied. “Sealed within are magical tokens and words to protect you. It is their existence, not your ability to see them, that makes them so powerful.”

I traced the tokens beneath the soft leather with my thumb, feeling myself choke up. It was one of the nicer things anyone had done for me. I felt the guilt for tricking him wash over me, and I met his eyes anxiously. “Thank you. I… I’m so sorry…”

Sam interrupted me firmly. “Wear it.” As I tied the talisman around my neck, Sam turned to Roberts and nodded, then stepped away.

“Come then,” Roberts said to me, clearly eager to be done with this whole business. I stumbled behind him, dragging my feet through the thick underbrush and trying to keep up with his brisk pace. Roberts stopped in a particularly dense area and began clearing away the shrubs. I watched as he pushed aside a large rock, then, on hands and knees, began to dig. After a moment, he looked back at me, lifting an eyebrow quizzically. “Some help would be appreciated,” he said dryly.

I got down on my knees and grabbed at the earth and sand with my fingernails. “What are we looking for?” I asked, unable to keep the annoyance out of my voice.

Roberts flashed me a lopsided grin. “Buried treasure.”

Buried treasure indeed. Roberts’s Navy SEAL gear began to emerge from the sandy earth, piece by piece. I found myself feeling frenzied before all of this cutting-edge 2020 survival equipment: utility rope, first aid kit, small flashlight, compass, blanket, matches (dear God, matches!), pocket knife… I looked at the man beside me in dazed wonder. He’d had all of this invaluable equipment here, all of this time. And yet, he had lived and struggled like one of this era, simply to see if he could.

Roberts met my gaze, his eyes as unreadable as ever. “Now,” he said, wiping the sweat from his brow with a sweep of his wrist, “we build you a raft.” He smiled humorlessly. “And then I am nearly done with you.”

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With a speed that was uncharacteristic of pleasure-loving pirates, Roberts had the men stock up and set off for the coast of Brazil. Roberts would not waste any time, for he had one stop — one very important stop — to make before he and his men could begin their plunder of Brazilian gold.

350 days from Time Zero…

I did not want to look at him, let alone speak to him, but since Roberts was my ticket home, I could do nothing but rely on him for help. I could not stand to remain in the 18th century — and on a pirate ship — without Howel Davis. I spent my days deep in thought, partaking in some menial labor. I had to get back to the future as soon as possible, before I went crazy.

“So where is this portal?” I asked Roberts one evening, trying my best not to let my dislike of the man show in my voice, my mannerisms. Most of the men were taking their rest, and it was the only chance I had to get some of my numerous questions answered.

“It’s not the where that’s critical,” Roberts responded, removing his hat and relaxing a bit against the railing of the quarterdeck, a steaming mug of tea in his hand. “It’s the when. The where is easy — 400 meters due east of the easternmost part of Salt Cay. When I came through the portal and finally reached the shore, I made a distinctive marking at the vegetation line, since I was fairly certain that the navigation devices of the period in which I found myself would not be sufficiently developed.”

“And you kept all of your SEAL gear, right?” I asked nervously. “I’ll be able to use them?”

Was it my imagination, or did Roberts try to stifle a smile? He replied, “Yes, you’ll be able to use the gear. You will have a fair chance of surviving.”

A fair chance. How utterly uninspiring. I took a deep breath and then asked, “So, do you have flying cars in 2020 or what? Any major, world-changing events I should know about? And what is your deal with women, anyways? Do you hate us because we’re better than you?”

After a brief, startled look, Roberts opened his mouth to answer, only to be interrupted by a clatter and the disapproving murmur of voices. We looked down to see a small gathering of men on the deck, apparently quarreling. Roberts set down his mug, placed his hat back on his head, and descended to the deck slowly but purposefully. His eyes were fixed on one particular pirate, an intoxicated, skinny fellow who was struggling to break free from the restraining arms of the others.

“Roberts!” the drunken pirate yelled, stumbling as he pulled away. He swayed before Roberts, a froth of saliva dribbling from his lips, a look of distrust swimming in eyes. “Of the Devil, ye are, sir,” he said, pointing an accusing finger at Roberts. “I know not who ye be, but ye ain’t the John Roberts of Casnewydd-Bach. I knew George Roberts meself. Who could ye be, then, but the Devil? Look at ‘im, brothers. Tell me he ain’t got a black soul!”

We all expected an argument would ensue, that Kennedy, as quartermaster, would have to intervene and call a meeting. Perhaps the man would be punished, perhaps the majority would reconsider their choice of captain. As all these possibilities floated through my mind, Captain Roberts settled the issue immediately — by drawing his pistol and shooting the man dead where he stood.

The sound of the gunshot drowned in the humidity, and as we all stood in shock, watching the blood gush from the fallen pirate’s body, Roberts turned to the others. “Is that all?” he asked calmly, brushing gunpowder from his sleeve. When no one, not even Walter, said anything, Roberts cast a cold, deadly look at his men and then strode to the cabin.

I quaked at this display of sudden, unnecessary violence. Wasn’t anyone going to say anything? Were they all so afraid of him? Blinded by rage, I hurried after the Black Captain, tearing the cabin door open and very nearly slamming into his chest.

His eyes bore holes into me. “Is there something you wanted, Sabrina?” he asked, his jaw flexing.

“How could you do that?” I yelled. “I thought you admired the system, the advanced laws of these pirates. How could you kill a man for saying stupid things under the influence? You’re from 2020, for God’s sake!”

He laughed. “And what does that have to do with anything? Tell me you are not so naive to think we men are any more humane or civilized in 2020 than we are in the 18th century. Regardless of era, men respect one thing, and that is their own fear. Tell me you are not so stupid –”

I felt another misogynous remark coming, and before he could finish his thought, I punched him in the face. Yes, that’s right. Punched — with closed fist — squarely in the jaw. I imagine it hurt him no more than the sting of a horsefly, but the look on his face, for just a split second, was priceless. I relished it, even as he grabbed my arm and yanked me to my tiptoes. He brought his face close to mine, our noses barely touching.

“I can’t get rid of you fast enough,” he thundered. “You’re lucky I don’t just throw you overboard and feed you to the sharks.”

“Do it, you pompous son of a bitch!” I growled back. “Don’t let a woman show you up!”

In retrospect, I really was playing with fire. Nothing stopped him from dragging me out before his crew and making an example of me. But as we glared at each other nose-to-nose, both panting like wild dogs, it occurred to me that he wouldn’t do it. It also occurred to me that, whatever Bartholomew Roberts was, he was not gay. Nope. Definitely not gay.

He released me and pushed me away. “Stay out of my business, woman,” he said, regaining his composure quickly. “If you want to live to see your family again, keep out of my way.”

I watched him walk coolly out of the cabin and thanked my lucky stars that I was, in fact, a woman. Had I been a man, surely I would have been killed several times over by now.

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Pleasedonthurtme. {Sheepish grin}

I apologize for the delay. Being someone who demands instant gratification, I know how hard it is to wait for something, particularly when it was promised earlier. It sucks. So… sorry. I swear, however, to make it good.

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But even though Roberts was an unwilling, recalcitrant pirate recruit, he couldn’t help but notice that Howel Davis and his band of sea dogs were different from what he’d expected. These “Golden Age” pirates were racially and ethnically diverse, and while prejudices still existed, Roberts was startled to find that they had formed their own sophisticated democratic societies, complete with constitutions. And this fifty years before the Declaration of Independence. It helped, of course, that Howel Davis himself was a particularly tolerant pirate, with an obvious distaste for violence. While revenge and the desire for social justice may have been an issue for some, the main goal, of course, was profit. Cost-benefit concerns shaped the ways in which the pirate ship was run — the flying of the black flag to encourage surrender, the equality of the men regardless of race, the cruel torture of the worst merchant captains….

“When I was elected captain,” Roberts told me, his eyes lit with a fervor I had never seen them display before, “Kennedy stood and spoke on my behalf, stating that I was the candidate best able to protect them from ‘the dangers and tempests of an unstable element, and of the consequences of anarchy.’” Roberts met my eyes and smiled, as though the words still caught him by surprise. “These pirates may be outlaws, but they have highly advanced laws.”

I considered for a moment, watching Roberts carefully. “You like that, huh?” I asked.

“I like order,” Roberts replied. “I like a well-oiled machine. I like a challenge.” He stared at me for a second before adding, “I like to win.”

I scratched nervously at a patch of scaly skin on my forearm. Who knew what that was. Could be anything from dry skin to scabies. Probably the latter. I asked Roberts, “Do you think you’ll stay here? Rather than go back to 2020?”

Roberts squinted into the sun. “Yes.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “But why? You have an amazing life in the future, an amazing career with so much promise. Why on earth would you stay here to become an outlaw and suffer the same fate as every other pirate? There’s no fortune or glory in this, man. Surely you know that.”

“Do not pretend to know about my life,” Roberts answered curtly. “And the men who failed at this did not have my knowledge, my ability. I can go down in history as the pirate. The Long John Silvers and the Jack Sparrows will be fashioned after me, the greatest pirate of them all.”

This gave me pause. Was it possible he knew his own future? I said carefully, “Do you know for sure what will become of you?”

Roberts shook his head. “No. I’m not much of a historian, unfortunately. I know very little about this era, let alone its pirates. I’ve heard of one or two, of course… Captain Morgan comes to mind…”

“But wouldn’t you have heard of yourself if you became a famous pirate?”

“Perhaps,” Roberts replied. “And perhaps I have heard of myself. As I said, I’m not much of a history buff.”

“You can’t change history, you know,” I said, thinking inadvertently of Howel. My heart lurched, as it did every time I remembered. “If you impact history, you would have been able to find yourself in the books in 2020.”

“I know,” Roberts said, fixing his eyes on me. “You proved that to yourself, didn’t you? It makes little difference to me. I don’t know what will happen, nor do I want to know. I will make the decisions that feel right, and what will be, will be.””

I couldn’t help myself. I said, “You are nuts. Do you realize how nuts you are?”

Roberts smiled, apparently not offended in the slightest. “Am I? Would you be going back if Howel Davis was still alive?”

I became tense, my hands in fists on my lap. “I don’t know. I was going to try… I don’t know.”

Roberts sneered. “That was why he failed. That was why he would never become a great pirate. Because he let a woman get under his skin.”

I stood, stumbling backwards a bit from the suddenness of it. “You dare speak badly of Howel Davis?” I hissed.

Roberts’s smile didn’t fade. “I’m not speaking badly about Davis, although I think what he did was foolish, at best.” Roberts raised his eyebrows at me in disdain. “‘He seldom errs who thinks the worst of womankind.’”

I stared. No, he wasn’t speaking badly about Howel Davis so much as he was speaking badly about me. My lower lip quivered, and Roberts just about rolled his eyes, turning his head away and muttering, “Just like a woman to start crying.”

I wish I could have that moment back — oh, I would make him cry. Unfortunately, at the time I was still emotionally fragile, still recovering from the malaria, and simply at a loss for words. I turned and hurried back to the cabin, lest the big Navy-SEAL-turned-pirate (and insensitive asshole) see the tears streaming down my face.

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The very talented Abigail Larson has agreed to provide The Noble Pirates with illustrations. When I contacted Abigail, I thought it would be neat to have more visuals to accompany the story. This is a serial, after all, and what could be better than a great story? That’s right — a great story with pictures! I was inspired by Sidney Paget‘s illustrations of Sherlock Holmes, which accompanied the text by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in the Strand Magazine. Abigail read the first few chapters of TNP and, to my delight, loved it.

Abigail’s style is fresh, unique, and like the story itself, darkly magical. I am honored by her interest and hope my readers enjoy her interpretations of the characters. I will post her illustrations as she provides them, in their proper places in the story. And don’t worry, I will notify my readers of their existence and their locations.

Without further ado, Abigail’s Sabrina. Click on it for a full-size image.

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