Steel

“Here.” He took hold of the coils and lifted them off her. Gratefully, she extricated her arms from the tangle.

With more strength and ability than she would have managed, he swung the gear, putting his whole body, broad shoulders and muscular arms, into the move, and threw them over. They fell on a clear spot on the beach.

“That makes it easier, yes?” Abe said, his smile teasing. “Go on, you’re next.”

Leave it to Jenks not to tell her the easy way to do a job.

Everyone was disembarking. Abe handed her a line—and she went for it. Holding on to the rope dangling from the mast, she jumped over the side and looked down to see frothing waves under her. She was smart enough not to slide—the rough rope would have taken off her skin—but instead lowered herself hand over hand. With a few feet left to go, she let go and dropped into the water, sending up a splash.

Above her, Abe cheered, “That’s it, Tadpole! Soon you’ll be a proper frog!”

She smiled back at him. After the hot days on the ship, the just-cool-enough water swirling around her legs felt wonderful. She stood there for a moment, enjoying it.

Then it was time to get back to work.

Most of the crew landed on the beach in the next half hour, with more armloads of ropes and pulleys, which began to come together in a mechanism. They rigged a pulley system between the ship and a couple of tall, strong palm trees on the beach. When that was in place, they used it to lower cannons off the ship. Jill watched in awe as part of the crew worked to lower six of the huge metal guns to the sand, and another part piled up mounds of sand to mount them on. The remaining two stayed on board as counterweights. They turned the beach into a miniature fort, with cannons resting on mounds of sand, facing outward, toward the water and any ships that might be foolish enough to approach. Jill helped dig when Henry handed her a shovel and pointed.

The Diana rested at a steep angle, her hull exposed, especially now that the tide was going out.

Henry seemed pleased at Jill’s awe at the whole process. He joined her while she stood on the beach, staring. “When the tide’s out, we’ll start cleaning,” he said.

“Cleaning?”

“Scrubbing the hull. Don’t worry, you’ll get to help—you should be good at scrubbing by now.”

He led her down the beach and a few steps into the water, until the sloping hull of the Diana came into view. The part that was always underwater was black, slick with slime, dripping with fronds of seaweed, and jagged with barnacles.

“We have to clean that?” she said, despairing. And she’d thought the deck was bad.

“Three times a year or the hull would rot through.”

So. They cleaned the hull.

A dozen of them, led by Abe, climbed back aboard the Diana. Literally, since it was now impossible to simply walk across the deck. They anchored themselves to the side with ropes and made their way down the sloping hull. A few went first with steel blades and rakes, scraping off barnacle shells, which cracked and oozed over the wood, dripping into the water below, turning the wooden surface into a slippery, gooey mess. A few of the others, Jill among them, followed with brushes and brooms. Scrubbing the deck had meant polishing something that was already mostly clean, removing a film of salt water and daily wear. This was completely different. A salty, rotting stench rose up from the slime that they scraped, shoved, and swept back into the sea. Some of the others tied scarves over their mouths; Bessie gave Jill a blue square of cloth so she could do the same. The scarf over her mouth made it hard to breathe; the air she took in was hot, stifling. It was a trade-off—which was worse, not being able to breathe well, or smelling the full force of the rot they peeled off sixty feet of hull? She kept the scarf on.

The water immediately around the ship turned cloudy, filled with debris. Small fish and crabs swam in, darting back and forth, nibbling on bits of barnacle and seaweed.

When she started, Jill was still sore and tired from days of scrubbing the deck. Then she stopped thinking about being tired at all as her movements became mechanical. This was only one side. They still had to roll the ship over and do the other side. She’d have to tell Tom and Mandy how much time pirates spent cleaning. They’d never believe it.

Assuming she ever saw them again and got to tell them anything. She never thought she’d miss them so much.

They didn’t finish that day. The sun set, the sky grew dark, and the hull still had to be examined and damages repaired. That couldn’t be done by the shadowy, flickering light from the fires and torches lit onshore.

The evening routine went on the same as it did on the ship, except dinner included fresh fruit—mangos, papayas, and others that Jill had never seen before, incredibly tart and juicy, so full of flavor they almost burned her tongue. She’d never tasted fruit like this, so fresh, eaten moments after being picked. It made her ration of rum and water taste smoother, brighter. So this was where rum punch came from.

The group of freed slaves stayed together at the edge of the camp, sharing a flask of water and eating food. They had started talking among themselves more, as if waking up,

coming out of a nightmare. They looked around with wondering gazes and seemed content to sit in the open air. Among the pirates, they only ever talked to Abe.

The doctor also sat alone, watching the proceedings, not showing any inclination to run away—because where would he go?

Captain Cooper set watches, guards to look for lights and listen for the sound of ships on the water, or anyone approaching from the interior of the island. Watches on land seemed more tense, more fraught than they did on the water. At sea, anything that approached was visible for miles; nothing could surprise them, and they could run in any direction. Here, they were stuck. There were far too many ways to approach them in secret, and not enough ways to flee. And Jill worried along with the rest of them, no matter how much she told herself she didn’t feel safe with the Diana’s crew, that she didn’t care. They weren’t her people, she didn’t belong here, she didn’t feel any loyalty to them. Let the Royal Navy catch them—even Henry—then she could run away. But that wouldn’t work, either, because Emory was right. As far as everyone was concerned, she was one of them. And she didn’t want to get arrested, captured, hanged, or any of the other possible nightmares. So she worried.

The captain assigned Jill to a turn standing watch. More looking out over the water, searching for enemies that might or might not appear as phantoms in the distance. It was a wonder they didn’t all go blind, doing this day after day.

She went out to a spit of land, a sandbar extending from the natural harbor, and found the trunk of a fallen palm to sit on. If she didn’t fall asleep, she’d consider her job done. Not seeing anything dangerous come along needing her to raise an alarm would be a bonus.

Back at the camp on the beach, some of the pirates were still awake, singing and drinking in the shelter of the campfire’s light. They made Jill grouchy; they’d spent all day working their butts off, they ought to be exhausted. How could they be happy here?