Burning Bright (11 page)

Ramsay. He’d introduced her to his officers, and then to the crew, and such was the force of his personality that there had been silence from the former and a subdued murmuring from the latter. But Elinor was certain none of them believed she could do what she claimed. She pounded her fist against the sliding door. If she could only prove herself—but there was no practical way to do that, not without damaging the very thing that kept them all alive. She could ask Ramsay for a solution to her problem, but she would…she would be
damned
if she kept crawling to him for help. Ramsay didn’t permit profanity on his ship, but that didn’t stop the men from swearing when they thought an officer couldn’t hear, and Elinor was surprised at how many vulgarities she’d picked up in her walks around the deck. Just thinking the word made her feel sinful. It was a good, strong, hot feeling that countered the griping ache below her stomach.

No, there
was
someone she could speak to, wasn’t there? She’d met the Extraordinary Shaper Peregrine Hays once, that first day, when she shook hands with each of the officers and he had given her an absent smile. He had a room on the deck below, a place Ramsay had forbidden her to go, but surely he could not expect her to abide by that rule under these conditions? She had a medical problem and needed assistance. Ramsay would simply have to accept that.

Passing through the main deck, even for the short distance from the great cabin to the stairs of the companionway, never failed to make her feel like an outsider. A breeze from outside, carrying the odor of salt and damp canvas, only made the fug of the deck stronger, and she tried to pinch her nostrils closed without actually putting a hand to her face.

The source of that fug, the muscular, barely clad men smelling of sweat and tart-bitter blacking from the guns, paused in what they were doing as she passed. Most stepped well out of her way, refusing to meet her eyes, but a few moved only enough that she had to brush against them as she passed. Their grins told her they knew exactly what they were doing, and she had a brief but vivid daydream of setting their grimy trousers or shirts on fire, seeing those leering grins turn to terror. It made her sick to think herself capable of even imagining such a thing. So she ignored them.
They aren’t hurting you,
she told herself,
and you have endured worse than this.
At least none of them had ever offered her violence.

She went down the companionway to the deck below—if only people would talk to her, she could learn the names of things!—with her spine stiffened and her eyes fixed straight ahead, followed by the sounds of unintelligible commands and the soft chime of the bell on the quarterdeck, marking out time according to some system she still didn’t understand.

In contrast to the warm, crowded, noisy main deck, where cannons were everywhere underfoot, this deck was practically bare. A few hammocks were strung and occupied, but at nearly noon most of the sailors were elsewhere, their hammocks rolled and stowed in nets in the rigging on the weather deck. Ramsay had told her this provided more protection for the crew during the battle, with the rolls of heavy canvas deflecting the sharp spears of wood flung up by cannonballs plowing the length of the deck. The image had made Elinor queasy, but she had controlled her reaction rather than let Ramsay believe her a coward.

Above her head were the cleverly devised tables that lowered from the beams at mealtimes, and Elinor moved more quickly, because it was only a few minutes until the sailors’ noon meal and not even Ramsay interfered with that. Ahead of her, and to her right, were three doors set into the same kind of movable partitions that formed the forward wall of the great cabin. She hesitated for a moment, then knocked at the nearest. No one answered.

She was about to knock at the next door when the first opened and a man leaned out. He was entirely bald, his reddened scalp speckled with brown, and he wore a dingy white shirt half tucked into his trousers, which he was holding up with one hand. The other was pressed to his stomach. “You,” he said, sounding surprised. “Wot deck we on then?”

“I—” His question made no sense. “I am looking for Mr. Hays,” she said, trying to regain her equilibrium.

The bald man blinked slowly, then clapped a hand over his mouth and ducked back into the room. Sounds of retching and the stink of vomit drifted through the door. Elinor put her hand over her own mouth to hold in a completely inappropriate laugh. Shortly, the man reappeared, somewhat paler than before, and said, “You want the surgeon?”

“Yes, please, if you’ll just—no, I can find him myself if you’ll only tell—”

The man was fastening up his belt and tucking in his stained shirt properly. “Time I was seein’ him meself, missie. Don’t think I got no more o’ they thunderations pent up in me belly, like to see me own innards next time.” He opened the door to her right and indicated she should enter.

More doors lined the walls of a sizeable room illuminated dimly by a bulbous glass lamp hanging above a polished wooden table, around which were arranged several spindle-backed chairs—this must be the gunroom, where those officers who hadn’t been invited to dine with the captain ate. It smelled musty, like a room infrequently aired out, which made sense since it was probably often below the water line. Ramsay’s table was elegant, set with a linen cloth and silver and crystal that to Elinor seemed completely out of place, and the food was excellent, so Elinor had felt some pity for the officers who didn’t receive an invitation.

Now, taking in the excellent craftsmanship of the furniture and the beautiful lamp of pale amber glass, she realized they did not need her sympathy. Possibly their dinners were more lively affairs than the captain’s, though it was likely, even probable, that her presence had had a chilling effect on the conversation at the captain’s table these last three evenings. Or perhaps Lieutenant Beaumont and Mr. Worsley, the purser, who’d joined them on those three occasions, were both naturally taciturn. They had been the three most uncomfortable dinners Elinor had ever endured, and considering her relationship with her father, that made them very uncomfortable indeed.

The bald man went around the table and opened a door without knocking. “Mr. Hays, yon missie’s got business w’ you, and I needs summat to still this pit o’ mine,” he said.

“Mr. Bolton, I told you I cannot dose you further—oh, Miss Pembroke,” Hays said, stepping through the door and peering at her as if he had forgotten his spectacles, which surely a Shaper had no need of. “If you are suffering from
mal de mer
, I am afraid I have no Healing for it. Mr. Bolton, return to your room and do try to sleep this time.”

“Man can’t sleep w’ this fire gnawing at ‘is innards,” Bolton said, putting a hand over his stomach for emphasis.

“Then perhaps you should not eat meat that has gone off, even on a dare. I have given you plenty of water, and do not make that face; it’s clean and will help your system recover from the Healing. Go now, and remember—sleep.”

Bolton made a face, but left, nodding at Elinor as he went. His unexpected… it was almost friendliness, and it had startled her so much she had nearly forgotten why she had come seeking out Hays in the first place. “Mr. Hays, I have a somewhat delicate problem,” she began.

“Ah. I expect your menstrual cycle has begun. If you are suffering from the attendant physical complaints, I believe I can help you, though, alas, even Extraordinary Shapers cannot change the laws of biology in this respect.” He smiled and tapped the side of his nose knowingly.

“How did you—”

“It was evident in my initial assessment of your physical condition. Have a seat, please.” Hays guided Elinor to a chair; she pulled away from his hand, anger growing in her.

“You intruded—how
dare
you invade my privacy in that manner!”

Hays was at least six and a half feet tall, a crane of a man who had to bend far over to keep from hitting his head against the low ceiling, and now his eyes, which had previously seemed unfocused, came to rest on her with an unnerving firmness.

“Miss Pembroke,” he said, “you must know little of the Royal Navy, and I beg pardon that you were not informed of this, but it is Navy regulation that officers and crew submit to a physical examination by a qualified Extraordinary Shaper before embarking on any voyage that will take them out of British waters. It is a practice that has eliminated some of the worst medical disasters that in the past were distressingly regular. Your arrival was so irregular I unfortunately had to perform that examination in an ad hoc manner, but now—”

“I see,” Elinor said, her cheeks still flushed. “I… you’re correct, I did not know. I apologize.”

He waved it away and drew up another chair. “No need to apologize. Give me your hand.” His own hand was unexpectedly soft for someone who treated battlefield injuries, and whatever he did when he closed his eyes, Elinor felt nothing, except, eventually, a lessening of the ache in her belly.

“You are in perfect health, Miss Pembroke,” Hays finally said, releasing her hand. “And your talent is remarkable.”

“Thank you, Mr. Hays, but I do not understand how you can say that when you have never seen me use it.”

He smiled and patted her hand as if he were much older than the fifty-odd years she estimated his actual age to be. “Your talent is written throughout your body,” he said. “They all are, you know, bred in the blood and bone, but Scorchers are all ash and char, and you are living fire. Perhaps that is a bit too poetical, but Shaping is a kind of poetry, did you realize?”

She grasped the part of that speech she did understand. “Living fire?”

“Did I say that? Sometimes I am carried away by beauty,” Hays said. “It’s true I know nothing of your talent, but I imagine you must feel great joy when you are surrounded by your element.”

Elinor nodded. “I do.”

“There you are, then,” Hays said, patting her hand again. “If there’s ever anything else I can do for you, Miss Pembroke, please don’t hesitate to ask.”

“Actually, Mr. Hays, I was wondering if you had something I might use for rags,” Elinor said, flushing again. Why she should be embarrassed to ask this of someone who had seen her most private inward parts, she didn’t know, but embarrassed she was.

Hays felt no such embarrassment. “Of course,” he said, and Elinor followed him out of the gunroom, down the steps to an even lower deck—she felt wickedly pleased at her disobedience—and to a storeroom, where he gave her an armful of rolled bandages. “I keep many on hand, so please ask if you need more,” he said.

“Thank you, but I think this will suffice.” Elinor bobbed a curtsey and made her way back up the stairs.

The noise of the main deck made an unpleasant contrast to the quiet below. Elinor clutched her bundles to her chest and tried not to look furtive, feeling certain every man there knew what she was about. She turned to go to the great cabin and bumped into one of the seamen, dropping one of the rolls in her surprise. Over the man’s shoulder, she saw Lieutenant Livingston standing near the companionway to the quarterdeck, watching the interaction, his face expressionless. “I beg your pardon,” she said to the man, and bent to retrieve the cloth.

She felt a sharp twinge in her rear end, and stood upright with an outraged squeak, rubbing the place where the man had pinched her. More rolls fell. “How dare you!” she exclaimed.

The man grinned at her and winked. “Rub up ‘gainst me any time, bob-tail.”

Elinor looked over at Livingston, who hadn’t moved. More men stopped to watch, men coming from behind, men’s heavy footsteps on the companionway. “Step out of my way,” she said, and cursed the quaver in her voice. The sailor’s grin became wicked.

“Stand aside
now
,” said Ramsay, descending the last few steps at speed and taking in the situation with a glance. He grabbed the sailor’s shoulder and shoved him in Livingston’s direction. “Confine this man pending his punishment,” he said. “The rest of you, back to work unless you want to join him. Miss Pembroke, my cabin. Now.” He took her elbow and dragged her toward the great cabin, past the Marine sentry; she was too shocked to protest his rough handling. She clutched at her remaining bandages, unable to remember why she held them.

Ramsay slammed the door behind them and turned on her. “I told you that space was off limits,” he said in a low, furious voice. “What the devil were you doing? You are
under orders
, Miss Pembroke, though you don’t wear a uniform, and I do not make suggestions.”

His anger snapped her out of her confusion and roused some anger of her own. “I needed the surgeon, Captain, on a feminine matter I’m certain you’d prefer I didn’t elaborate on. I did nothing wrong. It was that man who offered me insult.”

“Had you not been there, he would have gone about his work and would not now be facing punishment.”

“You blame
me
for his coarse behavior?”

“These are not the sort of men you’re accustomed to. They know I expect them to behave honorably, and most of them live up to that expectation, but there are always some who lack the will to discipline their baser instincts, and changing that is beyond my power. Blame is irrelevant, Miss Pembroke. What matters is that you disobeyed my instruction, and now I will have to have a man flogged for it.”

Elinor’s mouth fell open. “
Flogged?”

“Discipline must be maintained, Miss Pembroke. I’ve gone three years without having to resort to the cat, but I cannot allow these men to believe you are vulnerable to that sort of familiarity.”

“But surely—it was unpleasant, yes, but such a harsh—”

“If that man had showed that sort of disrespect to an officer, the punishment would be the same. This is a ship, Miss Pembroke, a floating community of three hundred men crammed together in a space half the size of my cousin Harry’s mansion, and we officers maintain our position by virtue of our skills and our leadership, which includes enforcing obedience to the laws and regulations that govern us. Those men will not follow weakness, and every one of them will witness that flogging and know it’s a just punishment.”