Vampirates 4: Black Heart (13 page)

Sally turned, her bare feet burning on the wooden rail. "But it's against the rules!"

"Do it!" Shanti repeated more forcefully.

Suddenly, Sally was diving off the side of the ship into the wonderfully cool, clear ocean. As she surfaced, she smoothed back the strands of her hair and got her bearings. She saw the ship, and the girls high above giving her the thumbs-up and laughing to themselves. Then she turned in the water and looked over at the rock where Dexter had been sitting. There was his red-and-white-striped towel, but he was no longer on it. Sally frowned. Then she saw that Dexter was swimming toward her, a powerful freestyle stroke bringing him ever closer. Smiling, she decided to meet him halfway.

They met in the middle of the ocean.

"Hello," he said with a smile. "I'm Dexter. Dexter Tempest."

"And I'm Sally," she said.

"Is that your ship?" he asked, nodding toward it.

"I'm traveling on it," she said, skirting around the full story for now.

"How glamorous!" he said. "I'm traveling, too. All over the place. I'm the lighthouse keeper of a small town called Crescent Moon Bay, but lately I've had the traveling bug. I just knew I had to take off and see something of the world."

She smiled. "I know just what you mean. I had the exact same feeling."

Dexter smiled, his eyes boring deep into hers. "Maybe we were both given the same feeling so we'd come here to this place at this very moment. So that we'd find each other."

It was a bold thing to say. Sally's first thought was to smile and dismiss it. But there was something about him -- such an honesty and openness in his eyes -- that she did not dismiss it. His words made complete sense to her. She smiled back at him and nodded.

"Come on!" he said. "Come on, beautiful Sally! Swim back to my rock with me and share my lunch."

They swam back to the rock and dried off from their swim, then Dexter opened up various packages of food and offered them to her. Sally was too excited to eat much, and anxious, too. On the one hand, she felt a deep happiness. But mixed with it was a dark sense of foreboding.

Dexter had a pair of binoculars with him, and he picked them up and looked back at the Nocturne. "That's a very beautiful figurehead on the front of your ship," he said, lowering the binoculars.

Sally stopped eating midbite.

"But she has the strangest expression," he continued. "It's as if she's frowning at us! Aren't most figureheads painted with smiles?"

"Yes," Sally nodded, her heart beginning to race. "But she's no ordinary figurehead. And it's no ordinary ship." Suddenly, she stood up, flustered. "I shouldn't have come. I have to get back."

"Wait!" he implored, but she had already dived back into the water and begun swimming toward the Nocturne.

She heard a splash behind her and knew Dexter was following. There were tears in her eyes, and she shook her head. "Don't follow me!" she warned. But he ignored her and soon caught up. She hoped he wouldn't notice her tears.

He swam with her to the ship. "I'm afraid you mustn't come up," she said, reaching for the ladder. "I wish you could but you can't. I'd be in trouble. Big trouble."

"It's all right," he said. "I don't want you to be in any kind of trouble." He smiled. "But I must see you again, beautiful Sally."

Her hands and feet were on the ladder. She shook her head. "We mustn't," she said. "I told you before. This is no ordinary ship."

"No," he agreed. "It's an extraordinary ship. It brought me you."

Once more his words filled her with a bittersweet sense of joy and sadness. Shaking her head, Sally began climbing the ladder. "I'm sorry," she said. "I can never see you again, Dexter Tempest. You have to forget about me."

"Forget about you? Impossible!" he cried. "I'll follow the ship. I'll do whatever I can. But I will see you again."

She continued to climb, but as she did so, her vision grew blurry. Suddenly, Grace found that her eyes were open and she was back, fully back, on the bench in the Sanctuary gardens, her heart pounding from what she had seen. What an extraordinary thrill to have experienced her parents' first meeting!

She turned to Sally, whose eyes were also open again. "Did you see it?" she asked Grace.

Grace nodded. "Yes," she said. "Right up to when you climbed back onto the ship. I can't wait to see what happened next. How he found you again."

Sally smiled. "That's a whole other story," she said. "We'll come to that."

"I wish Connor was here," Grace said. "I wish he was able to hear or see this, too."

"It will be your job to tell him," Sally said. "When he's ready to listen."

13COMRADES

"Hey, Connor!"

"Jacoby," Connor stretched out his hand. "Congratulations on being made deputy captain."

"Thanks, man." Jacoby grinned at him. "I'm so stoked you've joined the crew. Best news we've had all week. Isn't it, Min?"

Jasmine Peacock stepped forward and nodded. "It's going to be great working with you, Connor," she said, giving him a little hug. As he held her in his arms for the briefest of moments and smelled her sublime coconut-scented hair, Connor felt that this was his instant reward for being magnanimous toward Jacoby.

"Here you are, guys," cried a familiar voice. "A round of dark and stormies!" Connor turned and saw Sugar Pie setting down the tray of drinks. Seeing him, she rushed over and gave him a hug. "Connor! You look great!"

Grinning, he took her in his arms. He noticed to his intense satisfaction that Jacoby's eyes were filled with jealousy.

"Hello, Sugar Pie," Connor said. "Meet my new comrades, Jacoby Blunt and Jasmine Peacock. It's their very first time at Ma Kettle's!"

Sugar Pie beamed at them. "Any friends of Connor's are friends of mine. Welcome to Ma's. Anything you need, just holler for Sugar Pie!"

"Could you define 'anything'?" Jacoby couldn't help but ask. Jasmine grinned and dug her elbow sharply into his ribs.

"Nice work, girl!" Sugar Pie grinned, high-fiving Jasmine. "I think you're gonna fit in very well around here." She turned back to Connor, tucking her arm around his waist. "So it's really true? You've finished with Captain Wrathe and his crew? You've signed up with Mistress Li?"

Connor nodded. "It's complicated," he told her. "But I know it's the right decision."

"Well, for goodness' sake, stop looking so worried!" Sugar Pie smiled. "And remember what I told you the last time we met. You'll always be welcome around here, whichever crew you're on. You're good people, Connor Tempest." Her kind words touched him more than he could say. "Well, I'd better get going. It's a thirsty crowd tonight. And I just might be doing a new song-and-dance routine dressed as a mermaid later." She winked at Jacoby.

"Wait!" Connor said. "Before you go. If you see Bart and Cate -- I mean, when you see them -- will you tell them ... tell them I said hi?"

Sugar Pie grinned. "Tell them yourself," she said, nodding toward one of the VIP booths. "Looks like the Diablo and the Typhon are in for the night."

Connor looked across the bar. He saw Ma Kettle leading Molucco Wrathe into his favorite booth. They were followed by Molucco's brother Barbarro and his wife and deputy, Trofie, who was, as usual, dressed to kill. Connor looked over, his heart hammering, to see if Bart and Cate were with them. He really ought to go and say something, but he didn't want to risk an encounter with Molucco. He couldn't see Bart or Cate in the crowd, but just his luck, Molucco looked straight over at him. The captain held his gaze for a moment but didn't smile or make any gesture of familiarity. Connor remembered what his former captain had told him when last they had met. "You're nothing to me now." The words sent a fresh chill down Connor's spine as Molucco simply turned his head away. Evidently, those words held true.

"Hey, Connor," said Jasmine, appearing at his side with a drink. "Try one of these dark and stormies. They're heaven in a glass!"

Connor turned and saw that Jacoby and Cheng Li were also close at hand. Cheng Li winked at him and raised her glass. "To new comrades," she said.

The others echoed her toast and they all clinked glasses before sipping Ma's delicious new concoction.

Inside the VIP booth, Barbarro and Molucco Wrathe were deep in conversation. Trofie sat beside the two captains, deaf to their words, locked in her own dark thoughts. On the table in front of her, an untouched glass of oyster champagne bubbled away furiously, but Trofie felt as flat as stagnant swamp water. She knew that fundamentally nothing had changed in terms of her wealth, power, or legendary beauty. And her family, which she treasured above all else, was safe. Nevertheless, she felt deeply self-conscious about her missing hand and was wearing a stunning silver dress with exaggeratedly long sleeves so that both of her arms were completely covered. In spite of the superb cut and exceptional expense of the dress, she felt as dowdy as a nun. If only she could find some way to lift herself out of this grim mood.

"Hello, Mother," said Moonshine, grinning amiably at her as he stepped over the velvet rope into the booth.

The appearance of her darling son, who seemed to grow taller and more handsome with each passing day, was just the thing to make her smile. She lifted her face for him to kiss. As he drew back from her, she saw that his long fingers were looped through a string bow connected to a brown paper package, which he swung back and forth in his hands.

Trofie nodded toward the parcel. "What's that, min elskling? Have you been shopping?"

Moonshine smiled. "It's a gift, Mother. For you."

"For me? Whatever for? It's not my birthday, or even a pirate's name day."

"It's to make you feel better," Moonshine said, extending the package toward her.

Trofie waved her excessively long sleeves in front of him. "Perhaps, min elskling, you would open it for me?"

Moonshine nodded, beaming as he began untying the string.