Traitor to the Crown (40 page)

The sound of the rain beating on the deck jerked him awake. He was covered with a sheet and a blanket, and Lydia sat in a chair at his side. The wind had whistled back to strength again. The waves dropped the ship like they meant to break it, and water ran everywhere.

“It’s not through,” he said.

Lydia, her eyes wide, simply shook her head.

Proctor struggled back up to the deck and once again prepared to fight the storm.

The tops of the masts were invisible through the sheets of rain above him. A lantern lit the quarterdeck, where two men, bundled in heavy hats and coats, stood at the wheel. A few other men hunkered at their posts on the deck or the masts, but Proctor couldn’t be sure how many. The rain combined with a wind-whipped mist that obscured even the bow and stern of the ship from his view.

“I can do this for another day,” he told himself, and he stood at the heart of the ship and tried to draw better weather toward them, tethering his spell to the mainmast the way one might tie a kite to a lightning rod.

But though the storm ebbed and surged, it did not break that day or the next.

For two more weeks, the storm pounded the ship, waiting for them to tire or make a mistake. Even the crew muttered how unnatural it was. Every time it lessened, they would see the lanterns of the
Lafayette
and the captured brigs bobbing nearby. During the calm, Captain Barry ordered the ships to stay within hailing distance. Every time the storm lessened, Proctor would go below to eat and rest. Every time he did, the storm came back at them from another direction.

Nor was he the only one exhausted by the trial. For all the work that Proctor did keeping the storm at bay, the crew worked just as hard to keep the ship afloat and aimed toward America. With the weather, it was impossible to take a sighting, and so they had no idea if they
had traveled a thousand miles or simply bobbed in place like a buoy. Every time Proctor thought he was spent, that he had reached the limits of his power, he would have to dig deep inside to find more will to fight.

During his breaks from the deck, Lydia would feed him and help him rest. He could feel her pouring healing strength into him, just enough to keep him going.

“Do you want to survive, even if the blood magic changes you?” she asked.

“Yes, I do,” he said. He found he wanted to live more than anything else. He needed to know what had happened to Deborah and Maggie. He needed to stop the witches who had tried to hurt them. Not just stop them, but kill them.

Lydia kept her face expressionless. Finally, she said, “It may not matter. I don’t think the storm will abate until we’ve sunk.”

Of course not. The storm was set on them by a spell. It wouldn’t let up until they had sunk. That’s why every time he brought them a respite, it renewed its power from a different direction.

Proctor scooped another bite of cold meal and biscuit into his mouth and handed Lydia the bowl. She had given him an idea. What if he could make the storm think that it had won? He rummaged below the deck, looking for the things he needed—a piece of wood from the ship, a strip of sailcloth, a length of rope.

Blood magic. He needed more blood.

He knocked at the surgeon’s cabin. Throughout the storm, the surgeon had been treating men injured by falls or blows dealt by snapped rigging, broken tackles, and the twice-sprung foremast. At least a dozen men carried fresh stitches on their faces and hands. A pile of bloody rags or bloody thread would give Proctor what he needed.

“I’m cleaning up,” Proctor said, looking around at
the empty corners. “Do you have anything … bloody rags …?”

The surgeon, a passenger volunteer like Proctor, was too green to speak and looked weak from days of not keeping any food down. He huddled in the corner and shook his head. “I couldn’t take the smell,” he croaked. “My mate tossed it overboard.”

“Thank you,” Proctor said, closing the door. Without blood, his spell wouldn’t work.

He saw the faces of the ordinary sailors, floating like pale ghosts in the dim light below the deck. They were watching him closely to see what he was doing. Proctor didn’t care. He looked for a familiar bearded face among the men. “Jack! Jack, are you there?”

There must have been a dozen men on the ship named Jack, but only one stepped forward, the huge brute who had traveled on the
Sensible
with Proctor. “Name’s not Jack on this ship, but yeah, what can I do for you?”

“I need your blood soaked on this piece of sailcloth,” Proctor said.

Jack licked his lips and looked over his shoulder. A murmur ran through the rest of the crew, and Proctor knew they were talking about witchcraft, but he could deal with that if they survived. The accusations would drown with the accusers if he didn’t save the ship.

“Like an offering to the sea?” Jack said, loud enough so the others could hear him.

Proctor could accept those terms. “Exactly.”

Jack nodded and stepped forward, pulling up a sleeve to expose his forearm. When he was close enough to Proctor, he said, “I saw what you did on the
Sensible
to keep the pump running. It warn’t natural.”

“Do you believe this storm is natural?” Proctor asked.

“No, I don’t.”

Proctor drew the knife across his arm and pressed the
cloth against it. “Which other sailors can I ask?” Proctor said.

“You need more?” Jack asked, rolling down his sleeve.

“Yes, as many as I can get,” Proctor said.

“All right.” Jack turned, bracing his legs and looming in the small deck where others crouched and stood bent against the violent rocking of the storm. “Get in line, all of you, and be quick about it.”

A few of them shuffled forward, but more held back. The waves beat on the ship like mallets on a drum, knocking it from side to side. When they had regained their balance, one of the men said, “What’s this for?”

“It’s just like the surgeon with his lancets,” Jack said. “It’s for your god-damned health. So if you don’t step over here and volunteer, I’ll bloody your nose and we’ll take it that way.”

Outside, the storm raged harder. The men fell into line, pressing forward one after another while Jack jerked up their sleeves and held their wrists. Proctor slid the knife across each forearm, soaked up the blood, and took the next man in line. Men averted their eyes while Proctor worked. Some made the sign of the cross on their foreheads while others said the Lord’s Prayer. Water sloshed around their feet before he was done.

“That should do it,” Proctor said. “Thank you, Jack.”

“Rupert,” the big man whispered. “My real name’s Rupert.”

“Thank you, Rupert.”

Proctor tied the bundle together, wrapping the blood-sopped rag around the wood, and tying it all together with the rope. He went back up to the storm, but Captain Barry stood at the hatch and tried to stop him from going onto the deck.

“It’s the worst blow yet,” the captain said. “You’ll be swept overboard—if we don’t all sink.”

“Is that a Bible in your hand?” Proctor asked.

“Yes, of course,” Barry said.

“Well, I’m going up there to pray, out in the rain where God can hear me,” Proctor said. He pulled away from Barry and climbed up the ladder onto the deck.

The wind slammed into him at once, knocking him down. The ship rolled, and he slid across the deck as a wave crashed over the side. The water hit him harder than the wind, dragging him toward the railing and the ocean.

He reached out and caught a rope.

With the bundle still tucked tight under the other arm, he pulled himself upright with one hand and slowly made his way across the ship’s deck. The bitter-cold fresh water of the rain stung him like hornets, while the salt water of the ocean grabbed him by the ankles and tried to drag him under. The wind buffeted him from every direction.

He reached the mainmast and the bloodstained deck.

With his elbow hooked tight around a rope, he lifted his bundle to the wind. “Sail and rope, wood and blood, let this sacrifice satisfy you.”

The ship dropped into another trough and a wave crashed over the deck like a fist meant to break it in two. It carried the bundle out of Proctor’s hand and over the side, while he held on with both hands just so he wouldn’t be washed away.

The wind howled in triumph. Instead of easing, the storm increased its fury, like a dog with a rabbit in its teeth, trying to snap its neck by shaking it. Lightning sliced the air around them over and over again, and thunder shattered the sky. A huge ripping sound came from the front of the ship. Proctor looked up to see that the foresail had split, and as the wind twisted and tore at the fabric it carried away the foretop mast. Another ripping
sound followed as the staysail split down the middle.

Proctor screamed back with equal fury, pushing back as he created a shield of safety between the ship and the storm. He was so immersed in magic after weeks of working the same spell that he merely had to think the thought to make it happen. The rain stopped falling on the deck, and the wind whistled around them though he was left standing in an eerie stillness. It was like looking at a storm through a window, safe behind the glass. Proctor felt the power course through him, more than he had ever felt before, as he held the storm at bay. He could not say how much time passed before it broke and he collapsed to his knees. He was kneeling, as if in prayer, when the clouds split overhead and the sun shone on them for the first time in weeks.

All around them, the sea was empty.

The captured brigs were gone.

The
Lafayette
, carrying everything the Americans needed to win the war, was gone.

Proctor was carried to his cabin, exhausted, where he passed in and out of a fever for days that stretched into weeks. He heard the surgeon’s voice at one point saying, “It’s something in his blood,” and he felt the sharp end of a lancet pierce his arm and the blood drain from him.

A bright light and the smell of burning wood and flesh snapped him awake at one point. “What happened?” he croaked when he saw Lydia. His mouth tasted like it was filled with cotton, and his throat was as raw as sunburn splashed with salt.

“Lightning hit the mainmast,” she said. “Shattered the mainyard beyond repair and burned a dozen men on deck.”

He fell back. Was this just bad luck or was it another attack by Dee? Had Proctor’s spell failed, after all?

Before he had an answer to his question, he slipped back into his blood fever. He was trapped in a dream of storm and battle, where the orange flash of the heavy guns looked like lightning, the boom of the cannons sounded like thunder, and the screams of wounded men sounded like the cries of the drowning.

He came awake alone. Hearing the sound of cannons and the cries of men, he staggered up to the deck.

The sea was as still as a cup of water. The air had no more breath in it than a dead man. Black smoke hung over the sea like a fog, but through a gap in it, Proctor saw two ships flying British flags. They sat astern of the
Alliance
, in a position where the Americans’ guns could not be brought to bear, but where they could pound it with cannons and grapeshot. One ship had sixteen guns and the other fourteen, and Proctor ducked as shot whistled overhead.

He spun around as the shot hit the damaged masts, sending out a spray of splinters. The deck was a hopeless tangle of fallen rigging, spars, and sails. A musket ball whistled by and Proctor threw himself to the deck. The Englishmen were in their masts with muskets, picking off the American crew one by one.

“Where’s Captain Barry?” he yelled.

Brewer, the marine sergeant, stuck up his head to answer. “He was hit by a canister of grape. He’s below—”

His sentence went unfinished as a musket ball cracked his skull. Proctor crawled over to him, dragged the bloody body over to the hatch, and carried him below to the surgeon. “Help!” he called. “We need help over here!”

The surgeon stood over another injured man, tied to a table while he cut metal out of the shoulder. He nodded to his mate, who took one look at Brewer and then pried
him free of Proctor and carried him over to a corner where other men lay dead with their eyes and mouths still open. More bloody men lay propped against the walls, waiting their turn with the surgeon. Lydia moved among them, easing their pain. Her eyes met Proctor’s, and he saw exhaustion in them. The battle had been going on for some time. He still didn’t see Captain Barry.

Lieutenant Hacker, an earnest young officer whom Proctor might have felt a kinship with before the war, came down from the deck.

“Captain Barry, sir,” he said hesitantly. “The ship is in frightful condition. The rigging is damaged beyond easy repair, and so many men have been killed or wounded, I don’t know if we could repair it. Even if we did, without any wind, we’re at a distinct disadvantage. Do I have your permission to strike the colors?”

The man on the surgeon’s table undid the stay that held him there, threw off the surgeon’s drape, and sat up. It was Barry.

“Strike the colors?” he said furiously. “If the ship cannot be fought without me, then I’ll come back up to deck. Go do your duty, sir.”

Hacker saluted and ran back to the deck while Barry struggled to pull on his uniform. Proctor took one last look at Barry and followed Hacker. If all they needed was wind, he could provide that.

He crouched from one piece of shattered cover to another as the snipers in the British ships continued to pick off the Americans one by one. Proctor closed his eyes and reached out with his talent. There was hardly any wind to gather, but he felt a tickle of it coming from the south, and then another tickle, and he grabbed them as a man grabs a rope and reeled them toward him. He did not even have to think to draw on the power of the life’s blood already spilled on the deck. It just flowed into him.

Sails snapped above him. Those not rent to shreds by the British attack filled. The men on the deck cheered, and Hacker shouted orders at them. He could hear feet pounding to the cannons as the ship turned. Proctor lifted his head and saw both British ships still sitting dead in the water as the Alliance’s starboard broadside unloaded on them. The cannons were run in and out and blasted again, and the smaller ship’s flag came down. A third broadside and the second ship surrendered too.