Chapter Text
Caitlin Snow knew how her life was going to go.
Her father was a physician, and a good one. He was sought after in the surrounding villages, was often gone attending to some serious illness.
Which meant that Caitlin was taught to deal with common ailments. With setting broken ankles and easing stomach aches and birthing children. It was uncommon for a woman to deal with such matters, but people trusted her father. And so they trusted her.
Ronnie especially trusted her.
She’d known him all her life, the farmer’s boy turned carpenter’s apprentice. He had gentle hands and kind eyes and loved her like nothing else in this world.
They would wed as soon as he finished his apprenticeship. Would use the dowry her father had carefully saved throughout the years for a home.
And then they would build a life together. Would raise children. Would love each other until the end of their days.
So yes, Caitlin Snow knew how her life was going to go. And she longed for it.
But none of it went as she had planned.
She’d been easing the miller’s son through a fever when his wife had run in. Told her to get to the village square, quickly.
For the miller’s wife had heard a rumor. Sailors from London were in town. Claimed a war was brewing with Spain, that they needed young men with strong backs to crew their ships.
So Caitlin had run, run the miles from the millpond to the square, run until blisters rubbed at her feet and they bled.
When she came to town, she was met by weeping wives and mothers.
The sailors were already gone.
With the least of her breath, she ran to the carpenter’s shop.
Ronnie wasn’t there.
“Do you know how hard it is to find someone once they’ve been pressed into service?” her mother scoffed as Caitlin packed a bag.
“It doesn’t matter how hard it is. I have to find him.”
“Caitlin, you know no one in London. You don’t know who to speak to. At least wait until your father gets back-”
“By the time Father gets back, Ronnie could be halfway across the sea.”
“Caitlin, just stop and think a moment. You cannot do this by yourself.”
Her jaw tightened. “I must.”
The journey was long on foot. She’d never spent so long away from her village, wasn’t certain of the way to the city. She slept in trees or in caves, hidden back from the road. She worried about herself, about kidnapping and thievery and murder.
She worried Ronnie would be gone long before she could find him.
When she finally reached London, she found the city a maze. She found herself laughed at, and scoffed at, and ignored. No one wanted to help a country girl with no coin to spare.
But Caitlin was nothing if not determined.
Finally, finally she wheedled someone at the docks into showing her some ship’s ledgers. And she found Ronnie’s name.
He was on a naval vessel called the Interceptor.
They’d sailed for Bermuda three days ago.
Caitlin walked in circles, feet carefully navigating cobblestone streets.
Three days was no time at all. If could find passage, she could meet Ronnie in Bermuda, find some way of getting him home.
But who would grant passage to a woman alone? One with no money or connections to speak of?
The only way people without resources traveled across the Atlantic was by getting a job on a ship. Women were not hired for such positions.
Caitlin glanced at a messenger boy running through the streets. She sighed.
The answer was obvious. If incredibly distasteful.
Caitlin adjusted her shirt, her hat. The breeches felt too tight around her legs. She’d never felt more awkward in her life.
She hoped this was convincing. These clothes had cost the last of her coin. If this failed, she wasn’t quite sure how she’d feed herself.
She tried not to choke on nerves as she approached the ship, tried not to think what could happen to her if she was caught.
Tried not to think what could happen to her if she wasn’t.
“Excuse me,” she said, pitching her voice low. “Is your surgeon in need of an apprentice?”
It was difficult to adjust to the roil of the sea, the spray of salt in her face, to ease the knots in her stomach that rose constantly.
It was more difficult to live a life in seclusion.
There were many things about living this secret shipboard life she had not considered. Or rather, had thought of briefly but had chosen to ignore, caught up in the need to bring Ronnie home.
It was nearly impossible to find a place to relieve herself in private. Her chest constantly ached from being bound, making it hard to catch her breath. Every word had to be measured and spoken and considered. She had to always remember to answer to her false name.
In truth, the best part of life was her work as surgeon’s apprentice. Even though the surgeon himself was a useless drunkard, even though the injuries were often gruesome. When she was working, she was able to set her mind aside, focus on the task at hand. Quell the nerves that ate at her every other moment of every single day.
She refused to let herself get close to the crew. Refused to speak at them, refused even to look at them if it could be helped.
Caitlin knew this marked her out, made her unpopular. That suited her fine. She didn’t want anyone noticing her, listening to her voice and staring at her face.
But there was one sailor who looked sometimes. Who watched the set of her shoulders as she ate, at her walk as she moved around the ship.
It made her uneasy.
She tried to avoid him, to spend as much time away as she could.
But ships are small places with few spots to hide.
One night she was emptying some unspeakable refuse off the side of the ship when she heard the pleasant strumming of an instrument. For a moment she basked in it, stared out at the stars, happy to find at least a moment of beauty.
Then she noticed what song it was.
She wasn’t the best at knowing music, it was true. But she could swear this one was about a maiden who, to save her love, dressed as a man and joined a ship’s crew.
Caitlin cut her eyes across the deck. There was only one other person in sight.
The sailor who looked too long too often leaned against the rail, plucking at a small guitar.
Her heartbeat began to quicken, she tried to control the breath coming fast in her lungs.
He knew.
He couldn’t know, she’d never spoken to him. Had done nothing to give herself away.
But he knew.
The sailor glanced up at her before turning back to his guitar.
Caitlin didn’t know what to do.
Should she confront this man? But what would he do to her if she did? What would he do to her if she didn’t? Would he hold it over her head? Blackmail her? Tell the captain and have her arrested?
She couldn’t live that way, with the constant stress that a confrontation may happen at some point in the future.
So she made a choice that she hoped wasn’t rash and marched herself across the deck, her footfalls thundering against the wood.
The sailor glanced up when she reached him, his dark eyes expectant.
Caitlin cleared her throat. “I’ll thank you not to play that song,” she rumbled, voice pitched as low as she dared.
The sailor hummed. “Why not? I think it’s quite lovely. Sailor's clothing she put on, And went to a board a man-of-war, Her pretty little fingers-”
Caitlin slammed a hand against the strings of his guitar.
The sailor flinched a bit before recovering into an infuriating smile. “You know this guitar actually isn’t mine, I borrowed it off Smithy, so it’d be great if you’d be careful.”
Caitlin glared, trying to make her face as scary as possible. “Shut up with the music, alright?”
The sailor shrugged. “No problem Carl. Or wait, is it Carl or Charles?”
And suddenly Caitlin, increasingly flustered, couldn’t remember. She sucked in a panicked breath, then tried to disguise it under a growl. “Never mind what my name is. I don’t know what you think you know-”
“There’s something to know?”
“But you should shut up about it.”
Now confusion was written across the strange sailor’s face. “Wait…are you keeping some kind of secret? Are you using a false name?”
Caitlin looked at the sailor’s expression, at bewilderment that looked genuine.
Her heart stopped. “No!” she exclaimed, then flinched at how high pitched her voice had been.
The sailor’s eyebrows hit his hairline.
Dread was crashing over her like a wave. What if he hadn’t known? Hadn’t even suspected? What if he’d just been singing a random song on the deck and she’d just given herself away for nothing?
The sailor was looking far too closely now, eyes moving up her body as comprehension dawned in his eyes.
His voice was choked with shock as he spoke. “Oh my God, are you a woman?”
Caitlin’s stomach sank to the bottom of the sea.
The sailor began babbling, going on about how surprising and shocking this was, how he never would have guessed, but Caitlin barely heard him. The stress of the past months was becoming too much, too tight, was squeezing her lungs and making it hard to breathe.
She was mortified to realize tears were rising in her eyes.
The sailor noticed, and his face went a bit panicked. “Oh no no, hey, don’t do that. I promise it’s okay.”
The words meant nothing. She couldn’t believe she’d been so careless, had given herself away so easily.
After a moment, she noticed the sailor was guiding her somewhere, sitting her down.
“No one ever comes this close to the bow this time of night,” he was saying distantly. “We should be able to talk without being heard.”
Caitlin wouldn’t, couldn’t look at him. “So when will you turn me in to the captain?” She was proud that she kept her voice steady, even it it sounded rough as stone.
The sailor made a surprised little noise. “Wha - I - I wasn’t planning on turning you in?”
He had the gall to sound almost offended. “Of course you were,” Caitlin said defeatedly.
“I’m not that kind of person!”
“You don’t have to lie to me. I always prefer the truth over comforting lies.”
“Look, I promise I won’t tell anyone about you. I’m not sure how to make you believe me unless…”
There was silence for the barest moment. Then the sailor snapped his fingers. “How about this. I know a very intense secret about you. What if I told you a very intense secret about myself?”
She couldn’t help but scoff. “What secret could you possibly tell that would-”
“The Spanish crown has a price of 100 ducats on my head.”
Caitlin froze and looked at the sailor. He was biting at his lip, his eyes wide and almost vulnerable.
It took a moment to find her voice. “I’m sorry?”
“I’m a wanted man. Anyone who turns me in to Spanish authorities will get a nice little pile of gold.”
She searched his face again, finding nothing but honesty there. “Why would you tell me this?”
“You were worried I’d turn you in. Now you know something you could use to turn me in. So we’re even.”
She supposed that was one way to look at it. “What did you even do to get a price on your head?”
Caitlin regretted the words the moment they left her mouth, worried that he’d find them rude. But the sailor just shrugged. “I burned down a mission.”
Her jaw fell open. “A Spanish mission like…like a church? You burned down a church?”
The sailor nodded casually. “But don’t worry,” he clarified. “No one was inside when I did. I was careful about that.”
She sat back a bit against the deck, somewhat stunned. “Why?”
The sailor’s face darkened for the briefest moment before he smiled again. “Well, I usually wait until people get to know me a little better before I tell that story.”
He stuck out a hand. “Francisco Ramon. But call me Cisco.”
Slowly, she reached out and shook the offered hand. “I’m Caitlin Snow.”
And suddenly, she found she couldn’t help but smile in return.