Raised By Wolves 3 - Treasure (76 page)

Gaston stooped to raise our hammock with his shoulder, and slid the medicine chest beneath it next to the bulkhead. The netting rested upon the box, as our bed was suspended so close to the floor I felt our arses would rest upon the planks when we were both in it. After a quick inspection and some cursing, my matelot determined we could not raise the anchor points without a great deal of effort, and the ropes were already quite short. So it appeared we would spend the voyage with our feet resting upon the medicine chest. I supposed it was better that than our heads.

He stowed the rest of our gear near the windows, and bade me lie in the hammock. I did so gingerly. Then he joined me, and not only did our arses indeed touch the floor, the sagging brought us together – a thing I usually took much comfort in – and put a great deal of strain upon my shoulder and the wound.

My matelot quickly clambered from the hammock and helped me out of it. Then he cut the ropes holding it to the wall. He guided me to sit upon the medicine chest, and I leaned against the wall tiredly and searched his face for signs of the Horse or fury and found only resignation.

“The shops will be closed,” he said thoughtfully. “I cannot see how I can purchase a mattress before we sail. We will need to redo the bolts and rings, and you should probably sleep alone for now.”

“Non,” I said. “Go and steal one. Or borrow. Theodore or Sarah can buy another on the morrow.”

He smiled. “True. Let me find someone to help carry one. Will you be well here?”

I sighed and smiled. “I will be fine anywhere in my current condition.”

My matelot sighed. “I do not know if I should give you more or less.”

This set me to laughing; and though he sighed with annoyance, he at last smiled.

Striker and Pete joined us.

“We need a bigger ship,” Striker said, and I saw my dismay at our accommodations written on his face.

I chuckled. “And we wished to return to sea…”

“There will come a day when I will not,” Striker said with a tired sigh.

Pete’s lips quirked in a wry smile, and I thought he would speak; but then he looked about the little room and sighed as well.

“Will you help me carry a mattress from Theodore’s?” Gaston asked Pete. “Will cannot lie in a hammock.”

Striker snorted as he looked to the netting on the floor. “I told them that one was hung too low; but there was only one man in it.”

“Who?” I asked.

“Your Spanish friend,” Striker said.

I snorted. “All the more reason, then… Why was he in the cabin?”

“Cudro said the men didn’t trust him at first.” Striker shrugged.

I could well imagine that, and I sighed. I would not have wanted to be Alonso: sailing with men as bigoted as the buccaneers could be towards all things Spanish.

Gaston kissed my cheek and led Pete out onto the crowded deck, to go in search of a mattress.

“How is he, truly?” Striker asked.

“Who?” I asked, wondering if he still spoke of Alonso.

Striker grinned. “How drugged are you?”

“I feel no pain,” I said slowly. “In truth, I feel little but peace and faith.”

He laughed. “Your matelot: how is he?”

“As he appears,” I sighed, not wishing to discuss the matter.

“He does appear sane enough,” Striker sighed and smiled. “You, on the other hand.”

I laughed, and it hurt, which only made me laugh more. “Aye, me, I am the one to question the sanity of.”

He grinned, and then frowned with amused thought. “You do seem to cause all the trouble.”

His words seemed to sober him, and he busied himself stowing their gear and muskets.

“I am sorry,” I said. “I do not wish to leave them, either, but if we stay it may well be worse in the end.”

Striker shook his head. “That is not… I married her.” He stopped and turned to face me. “And I would not take that back for all the gold in Spain. It just…” He shook his head angrily. “It’s like God is making a mockery of me. I resolve I cannot have everything I want – both Pete and Sarah – and then I can. And now, I want to be both a captain and her husband, and it seems I cannot have both those things, yet… I…”

His frown deepened and he rubbed absently at a smudge on a wine skin he was stowing. “I hold out hope that I can. And because of that…” He looked up at me again. “I don’t want to resolve to have only one or the other just yet. I’m truly hoping something will happen soon that will…

So that I don’t have to step down or hide.”

I nodded with understanding. I had known how the idea of it would trouble him the moment it was conceived.

“Perhaps some strange event will occur that will make that possible,”

I said kindly.

“If I were a God-fearing man, I’d pray,” he sighed.

I smiled. “Sometimes it is sufficient to tell Th... Him, what you wish– without fear or even a bended knee. And, if you do not, how will He know?”

Striker grinned. “I’ll do that, then.”

Cudro entered. “A word, if you will,” he told Striker.

They began to walk out, and I asked, “Cudro, might I lie on your hammock for a time?”

He studied me for a moment, and then the remains of our hammock.

“I wondered where they went off to in such a hurry. Oui, lie down, before you fall over, you damn fool.”

I did, sinking into the netting with great relief that I could once again lie still for a time. I studied the patterns in the weave of the hammock above me, and told the Gods a great many things I would see before sleep claimed me once more.

I woke to Pete and Gaston wrestling a small mattress into position.

They were attempting to be quiet and cautious, and I surmised sluggishly that they were concerned with waking me. A ludicrous gesture, in that the deck and bulkhead wall reverberated with the sound of men, and I had surely been wakened by the distant roar of it entering the room in a great wave when they opened the door. I touched Gaston’s arm, and he regarded me with surprise and then relief. Pete grinned, and they shoved the unwieldy bag into place with less decorum.

“How are you?” Gaston asked as he knelt beside me. He appeared strained, and his eyes darted to the door as Pete opened it to leave us.

“Well enough,” I said. “What shall we do?”

Gaston took a deep breath and nodded to himself. “What we must.”

I chuckled, and he helped me to stand, and together we emerged from the cabin into the din and press of the deck. My shoulder soon ached as the laudanum ebbed and we were jostled about. I said nothing of it, and kept my good hand on Gaston as we were greeted by all we knew.

“So ’ow the devil did that ’appen?” one of the Bard’s sailors asked and pointed at my shoulder.

Gaston stiffened, and I was thankful the deck was relatively dim and the man could not see me blanch.

“His damn drunk wife shot him,” Striker said with a laugh from above us on the quarterdeck.

This brought a round of laughter, and I was clapped on my shoulder so hard I had to bite my lip to keep from crying out, as all made remark of how they had heard my wife was quite the drunkard and she had burned her house.

“But why’d she shoot ya?” the same sailor asked when some of the noise had died down. “She find out ya ’ave a matelot?”

“She knew that!” Striker yelled. “She found ’em fucking.”

This brought even more laughter, as all seemed to take it for the joke it was. I squeezed Gaston’s shoulder before the glare he was aiming at the floor could be directed at anyone – such as Striker. Thankfully, none seemed willing to ask more, and then someone told a tale of having a woman stumble upon his trysting, and we were able to slip to the quarterdeck where we were met by a ruefully shrugging Striker.

“You have a better tale?” he asked.

“Nay,” I sighed, as we stepped around him and Gaston shouldered us to the rail. “Yours is far better than the truth; and I am in no condition to lie cleverly,” I whispered as we passed.

“I thought that, which is why Pete and I decided we best do it for you,” Striker said with a grin and handed Gaston a bottle.

My matelot had calmed, and he took a small swig – though he held it long enough to convince anyone further from him than I that he drank far more.

I leaned on the railing and gazed across the canoe- and longboat-crowded water to the shore. It was now truly dusk; and all was awash in beautiful light tinged gold and pink and purple. It hid the ugliness, and made what I could see of Port Royal appear very inviting. I snorted at such falsity.

Gaston gently tapped my good shoulder, and I turned to find Farley standing with us. He greeted me warmly, and I returned it in kind, as I had come to admire his dedication to his craft when we sailed home from Porto Bello. He was a good man and fine physician, even if he had been trained in foolishness as Gaston said.

After we had exchanged our initial pleasantries, Farley found my matelot regarding him with consternation and his high pale forehead clenched into a frown. “What is it… my Lord?”

“Do not. I have no title among the Brethren. But thank you.” He smiled. “I wish to be physician on this voyage, but I do not wish for you to go without. I do not need the money the post pays.”

Farley frowned anew at that. “I… I am quite pleased you are sailing, and as you are the superior physician, you should, of course…”

Gaston spoke quickly; and just as quickly stopped. “I am concerned that I will suffer my madness and…”

“Oh,” Farley nodded. “So… If you should not be able to…”

“Fulfill my duties, oui, aye,” Gaston said with a nod. “It would be best for all if you are here. But, as I said, I would not have you deprived of the money that a man of your experience should rightly earn.”

Farley nodded thoughtfully. “Thank you, I appreciate the sentiment, truly. I have a wife, now, and… What do you suggest?”

“So do I,” Gaston said dully with a frown that transmuted to bemusement. He shook his head and met Farley’s gaze again. “I will simply give you the money I would earn as surgeon.”

“That hardly seems…” Farley began to say, and then he looked to shore and nodded to himself. “I will accept your generous offer. And feel that I am doubly blessed in that I will be paid to learn at your side again.”

Gaston smiled with relief. “Thank you.”

I stood there in my drug-induced limbo, unsure whether I felt relieved or dismayed that I did not seem to be needed this eve: Striker was lying for me; my matelot was speaking for himself; what good was I?

“When was he shot?” Farley was asking.

My matelot was frowning. I was not sure if it was in regard to Farley’s question, or because I was becoming oddly shorter. The next I knew, they had their arms about me and I was being half-carried, half-dragged back to the cabin and placed upon our new mattress, which smelled pleasantly of lavender. They soon had my tunic off and were examining my wound. Farley’s face held little beyond curiosity, but he did not meet my gaze. Gaston appeared concerned.

I grabbed my matelot’s arm. “What?”

“You fever,” he said quietly. “The wound is inflamed. I must drain it.”

Fear gripped me, despite the drug and – what I now guessed to be the other culprit of my feeling of peace – a fever. From a medical perspective, putrefied wounds killed more men than blades or balls ever did. Prior to seeing Gaston treat wounds, I had viewed the fevered death of a rotting wound as the natural end result of dueling: sometimes it simply took a man days or weeks to die; sometimes he lost a limb. But now that I had seen firsthand the how and why of it as a physician sees it – that the wound becoming inflamed was not always necessary – I realized I did not wish to pass in that manner, and it seemed horribly unfair that I should survive the ball only to be felled by a fever.

“It is not so bad,” Gaston said quickly in French, his eyes upon my face and his brow creased with a different form of concern.

I sighed. I supposed it was not. He was not crying or appearing desperate.

“You need to rest, though,” he said calmly. “I do not want you to move from this bed.”

“I do not wish to die,” I said, knowing it a stupid thing to say.

He smiled grimly. “I will not allow it.”

Gaston gave me another dose of the drug, and I passed into peaceful oblivion as he began cutting the stitches.

I woke to the lovely feeling of fingers massaging my scalp. My shoulder did not ache so very much. The room reverberated with Pete’s and Cudro’s familiar snoring. Pleasant golden light streamed through the open windows. I lay between my matelot’s legs: my head upon his inner thigh. He was staring off across the cabin, seemingly lost in thought. The deck was slanted up away from me. I could feel the ship roll through waves, and almost envision their direction and that of the wind; but, the knowledge was elusive. And it sparked a deeper concern: we were under sail.

This knowledge bit sharply, and I started so that the fingers in my hair stopped and emerald eyes gazed down into mine.

“What day?” I hissed.

He smiled. “Only the next.”

My thoughts were now quite clear; and regrettably, so was the pain in my shoulder. We were sailing west to Cow Island, thus the golden light was the sunset.

“Elections?” I asked.

He nodded. “I am surgeon.”

The strange mix of dismay and relief that I was not needed returned.

“That is wonderful,” I said.

He was frowning at me. I sighed. Could I truly hide nothing from him?

“You do not need me,” I said. “And I am pleased, but dismayed.”

His hands closed around my throat, and I saw past the apparent calm of his eyes and into the turmoil of his soul.

“How am I?” I asked.

He closed his eyes and sighed, but a true smile played about his lips. “You will live,” he whispered when he met my gaze again.

“And you are pleased, yet dismayed…” I teased.

He growled, and gently shoved my head off his leg so he could quickly maneuver himself to lie beside me with his head upon his arm.

He leaned down to kiss my lips.

“The wound is draining nicely,” he said with a grin. “The inflammation is not deep within the muscle. I have been sitting here for hours thanking the Gods that They blessed you with a constitution that makes your other attributes nonexistent in comparison. And this morning, I stood on the deck before the men and thought how I must become surgeon… because of you.” He looked away and pursed his lips thoughtfully. “And… Then…” His smile returned as he gazed upon me again. “I thought how I must do it for me. It is my rightful place: my knowledge is tenfold Farley’s.”