Archive of Our Own ^beta

George hadn’t even meant to drink that night. Honest! It was only that his shift had run long what with Thomas down at the warehouse insisting the ship be unloaded before the workers went home. And Ma would be furious with him as it was. Not that she ever yelled, she only got that quiet, sad look in her eyes that he hated to see. So when the sign for the Last Drop creaked on its rusty hinges in invitation, George really couldn’t have refused.

The pub was half-empty. Could’ve been the late hour but then the Last Drop was half-empty most of the time from what George knew. There were a couple sailors seated around a table in the corner - the grizzled, seaworn sort – playing a game of dice nobody seemed to be winning. A couple tables away from them the Drop’s singular employee was trying his hand at coaxing his hurdy gurdy into something resembling a tune. It sounded a lot like a cat being tortured out back. Bonny, owner, proprietor, and thorn in every watchman’s eye, was propped up against the bar top, whispering with a girl George had never seen before. Her bosom shook as she laughed.

“You look like a sad, wet cat got dragged in,” she called when she glanced over at him, still stood by the door. “Close the door, damn you, ‘fore the wind gets us all!”

George scratched a self-conscious hand through his red hair when he suddenly found the attention of both the sailors and the girl on him. It wasn’t that silence had fallen, but he’d never much liked attention being on him at all. The door protested as he closed it quickly, before sheepishly making his way over to the bar. He tried not to look at the girl leaned against it, he really did, but she’d turned around now, and she was the only thing to look at beside Bonny. That, and she was new. New things weren’t that uncommon in Portsmouth, but they were uncommon in George’s life, so attention needed to be paid.

She had propped herself against the bar, making her body into one long, slender line. Her dark skin shone in the lamplight, almost as much as the rings that glittered on her fingers when she absently swiped one of her black braids out of her face. He could feel her eyes on him.

“Sorry,” he mumbled to the bar top, and received throaty laughter in return. Bonny wasn’t a bad sort, whatever the watch might say. She was rough, rougher than any woman George had ever known, but probably you had to be to run a pub right at the edge of the docks even in a town like theirs. Not that Portsmouth was interesting, mind you, but it was right on the edge of the archipelago, and a prime spot to stop before going out into open seas or in to bring goods to the more wealthy islands.

Bonny’s fingers drummed against the wood. “Never you mind. It’s a little late for you, isn’t it?”

George could feel his ears heat up. He felt more than he saw the stranger cock her head in question. “Shift ran long,” he mumbled, “jus’ wanted …”

“I can guess what you wanted,” Bonny said, and turned towards the bottles lined up against the wall.

“Make it two.”

He looked up in surprise when the girl spoke. Her voice was clear, deeper than he would have anticipated but pretty all the same. Pretty like the rest of her. Her full lips lifted into a smile when she caught his gaze.

She offered him her hand. “I’m Ally.”

“Oh. Uh … George.” His palms were suddenly sweaty. Why were his palms so sweaty? He’d spoken to a girl before. Not much, mind, but enough that one introducing herself shouldn’t make him forget his words. Marcy, the miller’s daughter, sort of smiled when she saw him in the mornings, but that was the extent of it. And Thomas’s girl Anna loved to tell him what to do all the time. Neither of them had ever looked at him like Ally did right then.

“Nice to meet you, George. Care to share a drink with me?”

No girl had ever been interested in that either. George could feel his cheeks turn pink. Desperately, he grasped for the mug Bonny had put in front of him, and took a gulp. The rum burned on the way down, making his eyes water. Around his coughs, he nodded.

“Please,” he rasped.

To his utter amazement, Ally only laughed. She grabbed her mug with one hand, lightly took hold of his wrist, and all but dragged him over to a table. Before he could get his head around it, he was seated across from her, lamplight turning her eyes dark as coals as she smiled at him.

His tongue felt so heavy in his mouth not even the rum could loosen it. She was beautiful. The most beautiful girl he’d ever seen, he thought, and she was giving all of her attention to him.

“Are you from here?” she asked, and her finger traced the rim of her mug. Her hands looked rough. Rough like George’s own, not like any lady he’d ever seen. But the miller’s daughter’s hands were rough, too, and nobody minded that much.

Reluctantly, he nodded. “Born and raised, but …” He desperately wanted to be impressive. Working a warehouse floor wouldn’t impress a girl, would it? “I’m a sailor, really.” Close enough anyhow. His da had been a fisherman. When he was little, he’d been allowed to go out on his dingy with him. That’d been before the storm though.

Ally perked up. “Oh, are you?”

Eagerly, George nodded. He thought. “With the Cheriton. Or I was, anyhow.” It was the first ship that came to mind, and then only because he’d spent the better part of the evening unloading her innards. She wouldn’t know that probably, would she?

“Was?”

Would she come looking for him, after this? At the ship? The Cheriton was set to sail out bright and early but the danger felt too much. “Out of that work, for now. But I meant to visit Ma anyhow, you know?”

Her smile brightened but there was something in the way she looked at him that he couldn’t understand. Was it interest? Did a girl look at you like that if she liked you? He emptied his tankard to drown his flustered feelings in.

She reached for the mug almost before he’d put it back down. “Someone like you ought to find work again soon,” she reassured, “you  seem very … capable.” His ears burned at her assessing look. “Will you tell me of your last voyage? I’ll get us another round!”

He was left looking at the way her hips swung as she walked back over to Bonny, gaping and with a fluttering heart. His head swam in excitement. If only he had more than hearsay stories to tell.

Ally managed to make him feel interesting. She leaned her chin on her hand and listened to whatever tales he spun out of thin air. Probably, they turned too tall very quickly, but she didn’t seem to mind. Whenever he stopped, she hummed encouragingly and pushed his mug closer, like she wanted him to wet his tongue. Like she wanted to listen to him all night.

By the end of the third drink he was sure Ally liked him. She kept touching him, fingers on his wrist and arm. He was sure if she’d been better … endowed … she’d have shown that off for him, too. He’d seen the whores down at the docks and even Bonny do it sometimes. None of the “good” girls, mind, but then Ally didn’t seem like she had a father to take care.

The hurdy gurdy was finally wailing out something that resembled a tune when she grabbed his wrist again.

“Come dance with me,” she said sweetly, and George couldn’t possibly have disagreed. Really, she had a lot of strength when she dragged him out of his seat and pulled herself against him. This close, she smelled a little like wet dog, but her waist fit perfectly in his hands when she twirled them around. The lamplight blurred around them. George thought he saw stars in her eyes or maybe it was a trick of the light. When he leaned forward, she giggled sweetly and pushed him away. He stumbled, caught off guard, and her face swam.

“Feeling drowsy, sweetheart?” he heard her whisper, and he only just managed to nod before the world turned black around him. He didn’t think he found the chair.

≈≈≈≈≈

It was the gulls that woke him. Or maybe it was the pounding in his head. All George knew was that he was awake, and that he’d rather not be. Everything hurt. His skull pounded in time with the soft creaking around him, his arms felt like dead weight, his shoulders wrenched out of their sockets. When he tried to move them into a more comfortable position, he found that he couldn’t. A weak groan left his lips.

“You awake?” someone murmured to his right.

“Course he is, unlucky sod.” That came from his left.

With some effort, George forced his eyes open. He was greeted by wood. Wood and rope and – “Whu?”

The person to his right shifted. “Welcome back to the world of the living, lad.”

“Shitty world it is.”

Things came into focus and despair turned his stomach. He was on a ship, must be, tied securely against the main mast. He wasn’t alone in that fate. The two men to his left and right must have been awake for a while. One of them wore the mulish expression of the impossibly angry while the other seemed almost serene. None of them could move. His headache flared.

“Where am I?” he forced out, but only got a humourless laugh in response.

“Long story, lad,” right said and made a motion like he wanted to shrug his shoulders. The rope saw that he couldn’t. “Last thing I remember I was winning a load of some sailors. Now …”

It scratched at some memory in George’s brain. He’d been at the Drop, hadn’t he? But –

“Finally awake, are ya louts?”

George’s head shot up. He regretted the movement instantly. Someone towered over them, but it took a moment for her to swim into focus. When she did, left had already cursed under his breath. She probably wouldn’t seem so tall if George had been standing. As it was, she was a giant. The tricorn on her head helped sell that impression. As did the worn sailor’s coat that billowed in the breeze behind her. Her shirt must have been white once, but time and plenty of stains had taken their toll. It was untied low over her chest, low enough that George could guess the freckles covering her dark skin could be found all over instead of just on her face. Her lips were pursed as she looked down on them. One of her boots nudged against George’s thigh.

“Mad Mary,” left said. It sounded almost like a curse.

“Now, she don’t like that one,” right reprimanded.

Mad Mary’s lips twitched. “You’re right, Jonny, I don’t.”

George just stared up at her face. He’d heard her name before, but not the way some of the more notorious pirates were spoken off. No hushed whispers for her, no furtive glances. Still, it was enough. She was a pirate. With a pirate ship. He was currently tied to the mast of a pirate ship. If he’d looked, it might’ve been a sorry excuse of one, but the point remained.

Left spit on her boot. It landed mostly on George’s knee. “The fuck am I doing here?” he demanded.

Mary crossed her arms. Everything about her screamed unimpressed. “I was in need of crew. Congratulations on your new job. Welcome to the Vicious Magpie.” She turned away even as the man sputtered in indignation. “Get them to work!”

Spit was seeping into George’s trousers. He couldn’t move his arms to wipe it away. He blinked at it. “What did she mean?” he asked.

To his right, Jonny shrugged. “Sometimes a crew is missing a sailor. Or three. Guess we were in the wrong place. Or too gullible.” A rueful smile played on his lips. She’d known his name, hadn’t she? Maybe it wasn’t the first time he’d ended up here.

“That’s –”

“Kidnapping, yes. They’re pirates. Do you think they care?”

No. No he didn’t think they cared. “My Ma –” He didn’t get to finish the thought. His body pitched forward as the rope holding him upright suddenly snapped. He landed in a heap of limbs. Everything tingled. Mary’s boot, when it’d touched him, had been almost gentle. The one prodding his side now was anything but. Once he’d scrambled to get himself upright, he looked up at the burly man above him. He was thick enough to fit three of George, his shoulders as wide as a steering wheel and impressively tattooed. When he frowned at George, his moustache turned down in a threatening manner.

“Get up. You heard the captain, work to do!”

A wet rag slapped him in the face. Beside him, Jonny had already heaved himself upward and was trudging towards a bucket not far away.

“Be gentle with the lad,” he called back, “it’s his first time!”

Somehow, George didn’t think gentleness was in the cards.

≈≈≈≈≈

George scrubbed the deck until his fingers were wrinkly. Afterwards the burly man, who turned out to be the first mate and was awkwardly named Barnabus, sent him up on the rigging on the grounds that “Yer the slightest one here, lad, and Jonny’s had a bum leg ever since that last time”, to which Jonny had nodded sagely and leaned on his broom like none of this was a big deal at all. George didn’t want to admit he’d never been any good with heights. When he was halfway up, and felt like his stomach would lose its contents down towards the deck any moment, he blinked out across the endless sea. There was nothing surrounding them. Nothing but blue, horizon and water, no island, no other ships in sight. Portsmouth wasn’t even a shape in the distance anymore. Kidnapped, forced onto a pirate ship, and there was nowhere he could go. He leaned his head against the rigging and tried not to heave.

“Alright there, rat?”

George looked up. A girl was dangling above him, upside down on the ropes and looking at him like he was a particularly interesting insect. She was young, he thought, but he’d never been good with that sort of thing. Her blonde hair was like straw, tied into two braids on either side of her head and currently waving down at the deck as she cocked her head.

“I’m no rat,” George protested, but it came out weak.

The girl righted herself and nimbly climbed down  so that she was on a height with him. She grinned, “Naw, no offence. Land rat. That’s all. You are, right? Femi said there was a sailor with you lot but not you. You’re all green there.” She poked his nose and he recoiled, almost losing his balance.

When George had righted himself, his grip now iron on the rope between his fingers, he looked back at her. “I’m bad at heights,” he admitted.

The girl nodded in understanding and incomprehension. “’s fine,” she said, “You just don’t look down. See here …” Like a tanned little monkey she climbed over to the sail he’d been supposed to secure. She knotted her limbs into the rigging before setting to doing the task. “There, like that. You do the other one.”

George didn’t look half as graceful as her. Probably, he looked like a particularly nauseous worm, scooching himself to where he was supposed to go and securing the sail in a way that made her laugh. But it held, so that was enough, right?

The way down was worse. So much worse. His legs almost gave out when he finally stood back down on the deck, faced with Barnabus’ disapproving moustache. The girl, who’d taken half as long as he had, patted his shoulder. Standing, she didn’t even reach his chest.

“Well done, rat,” she said with a bright smile before skipping over to Barnabus and tugging on the ends of the ‘stache. “Don’t be so miserable, Barn. He just got to do it more.”

George’s stomach turned at the thought.

Barnabus didn’t seem to agree with her, either. He scoffed, his meaty arms crossed over his barrel chest, and brushed her off. “Get yer ass back in the nest, Crow.” But his voice was almost fond. Crow giggled and a blink later she was already halfway up the rigging again, giving a little wave in farewell. Barnabus shook his head with something that could be called a smile, maybe. If you also called a dog baring its teeth a smile.

He rounded on George. “What yer looking at, lad? We don’t pay you standin’ around!”

They weren’t paying him at all, but even George wasn’t stupid enough to point that out. Instead, he scurried away, back towards Jonny and the other ‘conscripted sailor’, whose name was Esa and who hadn’t stopped cursing ever since the rope binding them together had fallen.

At least they weren’t treated poorly. They were put to work, and hard, but George was used to that. Thomas was much worse than Barnabus, really. There was no whip cracking aggressively over his shoulder, and while Barnabus watched them with a fierce expression, he never threatened or insulted them. Finally, he called them to a halt.

“Get yerselves to the mess,” he growled, “Yer skinny asses’ll keel over, like.”

Much like the rest of the ship, the mess wasn’t overly impressive. It was cramped, and got more so with each sailor muscling their way close to the table. George sat squished between Jonny and Esa and blinked at the array of people crowded around him. He saw a lot of people coming in and out of Portsmouth, but never so many of them so different and still so friendly with each other. Men, women, small, tall, thick, thin, dark and light, laughing and howling. Suddenly, he felt small and utterly out of his depth. Neither of his companions seemed to notice. Jonny had a good-natured smile on his face that grew with each slap on the back he received, like an old friend returned home. Esa just scowled at the worn tabletop, and didn’t say a word. Between them, George shrunk. He wasn’t particularly small, but he was doing his best at making himself so when a mug appeared before him. Its contents steamed. George looked up and blinked.

The boy who smiled down at him couldn’t be much younger than he was, a year if that. His dark eyes glinted with amusement, his lips twitched in a way that almost seemed familiar. His long black hair was braided into many braids, held together with a piece of cloth at the back of his head. His shirt was grubby with oil but the hands he’d propped on his waist were slender and clean. George swallowed, suddenly hot underneath his collar. The boy felt like someone he’d met before, but here, surrounded by strangers, that thought felt silly.

“Drink up,” he murmured sympathetically, “it’ll do you good.” He looked away when someone called what must have been his name, but George took up the mug gratefully.

It was the worst idea he’d ever head. Well, the worst since the previous night. The grog burned down his throat in a way that dislodged something in his memory. And there it all was again. The creaking sign of the Last Drop, Bonny propped up against the bar with a strange girl, a drink, then two, then three all accompanied by dark eyes watching him with indulgent interest, fingers tracing across the back of his hand until George could feel them tingle, the smell of wet dog, and – “You!”

George didn’t even remember rising. His grog spilled over the table as he stared at the boy – the girl, no the – “You tricked me!”

The boy turned towards him. He was still smiling but his eyes narrowed. “Is the grog bad?” he asked.

George’s mouth opened confused, then he shook his head. “I don’t care about the grog! You tricked me! You kidnapped me!”

“Well …” The boy propped his hip against the table, so much like he’d leaned against the bar top the night before. All around them, sailors watched. Jonny’s hand was on George’s wrist but he shook it off.

He pointed a finger accusingly. “I thought you were a girl!” The boy’s smile turned into a grin. “I thought – But you – You – How dare you!” He scrambled across the tabletop. The boy retreated. Somewhere, a murmur started up.

“Now, I know that was … Well. No hard feelings, yeah?”

George spluttered. “No – I have a life there, and you just – You all –” He looked at the sailors surrounding him, met with amusement and sneers in equal measure, before he focussed on the boy again. “I have a job, a home, people who’ll come looking for me!”

He hadn’t. His Ma could never, and he doubted Thomas would care overly much. Maybe Marcy would wonder where he’d gone but she’d get over it right quick, probably. The thought that nobody would miss him for long made hot tears rise in his eyes.

The boy took a step forward, his hands up in a way that probably was supposed to be calming. His expression had changed at whatever was showing on George’s face. He almost looked sorry.

George didn’t want sorry. “You bastard! I had all that, and now I’m … what, a slave to some terrible pirates?!” He saw the boy flinch. “All because of a lying, no-good, degenerate n-”

A hand landed heavy on his shoulder. George’s mouth snapped shut. The faces surrounding him had turned unfriendly as one. When he turned, he swallowed. Mary stood behind him. For all the she only reached his chin, she might have been a giant. The way she’d towered over them in the morning, he realized suddenly, had been good-natured. This … this was dangerous.

“You’ll want to bite your tongue on that, lad,” she said.

George all but swallowed it in response.

“We don’t do insult here. Not that, and not anything else. Femi did the work, and I’m sorry for it if it’s you.” The grip she had on his shoulder turned iron. “Out.”

“But –”

She dragged him away without waiting for his protests. When he met the boy’s – Femi’s – eyes, they were hard as coals.

≈≈≈≈≈

Mary tied him to the mast again. Probably they didn’t have a brig. Probably, she wanted him to feel the full extent of his stupidity. He’d been so angry. Angry enough that he’d forgotten who he was, and who they were, and what careful even meant. His Ma had been right to never let him sail.

The sun sank below the deck, and then below the horizon. He heard sounds from down in the galley. Raucous laughter and friendly conversation. His stomach rumbled. When the stars came out, he hit his head against the mast at his back and cursed quietly. Noone came for him. The few sailors manning the deck gifted him with sneers if they gifted him with anything. He hoped they at least wouldn’t decide to throw him overboard.

He must have fallen asleep, or dozed, because he startled awake when a boot nudged softly into his hip. When he looked up, Femi was standing above him, hands behind his back. George felt his face grow hot. Femi dropped into a crouch by his side, revealing what looked like a crust of bread and some jerky in his hands. It looked graceful, the way he did it, and George was reminded of the girl and the long lines of her body beneath her dress. His body. She’d never existed at all.

“That was stupid,” he said.

George wanted to agree. He wanted to scream. Instead, he turned away.

Beside him, Femi sighed. George could feel him moving closer. The crust of bread nudged his cheek.

“I can’t untie you. Mary doesn’t like her punishments to be ignored, but … Come on, eat.”

When George turned, he held the bread out awkwardly. There was an almost tentative smile on his face. It fell, when George only stared.

He looked away. “I know you’ll have to eat it out of my degenerate fingers and all …”

George felt his cheeks go hot. He hadn’t meant – Well, he had, probably. Hadn’t he? That was what he was, dressing like a girl, tricking upstanding young men and all that. Only that nobody had ever looked at him like Femi had. So maybe it was mostly hurt.

“This is really stupid,” he said, and craned his neck.

Femi blinked, but moved with him. Together, they got the food into him in a way that didn’t make him feel too helpless. It was still bad. It was so bad. George wanted to be anywhere else. He wanted to be home, maybe, except home already felt impossibly far away.

When he was done, Femi sat back  on his knees. “I’m sorry it was you,” he said.

George looked at him. It was too dark to see much. Nobody had bothered putting a lantern anywhere near him. Without seeing his face, he couldn’t tell how the words had been meant. Was he sorry George had ended up here? Or was it that it was him?

“It’s only you said you were a sailor, and looking for work besides. It’s how Jonny ended up with us. Well, the first time. I think he just pretends at this point.”

“I lied,” George said to his knees. It was embarrassing to admit he’d wanted to be liked. Maybe Femi wouldn’t guess.

“I figured.” He sounded amused. “We try not to, with people who have something to lose, but … well.”

Well. Did he have something to lose? He wanted to tell himself that he did. His Ma would be hard up without the money he earned, and that thought sat hot in his belly, something like fear. Other than that … “Bonny let you.”

“She – yeah. She’s Mary’s friend.”

Bonny knew him. She knew his Ma. If she thought he wouldn’t be missed, then maybe he wouldn’t be. George closed his eyes. It didn’t make the shapes swimming in his vision any kinder. The tears stung, when he tried to hold them back.

“My Ma needs me,” he said, instead of any of that.

Femi hummed. “Talk to Mary. If she’ll listen to you, after today. But you can try.” Then he stood up. George, suddenly and sharply, didn’t want him to leave.

He couldn’t find the words for it. Not before Femi’s fist knocked against the mast he was tied to, a farewell, and he turned to descend back into the bowels of the ship. George pulled his knees close to his body and rested his head against them. Embarrassed, lonely, and inexplicably guilty. The creaking ship didn’t care.

≈≈≈≈≈

It wasn’t Mary who untied him the next morning. Jonny’s face was caught somewhere between sympathy and a deep well of scorn.

“That was mighty dumb, lad,” he said as George rubbed his aching wrists.

Everything hurt. Sometimes, when Thomas decided they were all too lazy for their own good and whipped them into shape, George felt like dying by the end of a shift. This was different but no better for it. His arms tingled down to his fingers, his shoulders protested every movement, and his bum felt dead more than alive. He didn’t look at Jonny.

“I know.” It was a mumble more than a reply. George hadn’t really fallen back asleep last night, after Femi left him. He’d had plenty of time to call himself stupid for what he’d done. Probably, he hadn’t been fair. He’d lied, too, right?

Esa’s heavy hand on his back made him bite his tongue. The slap rung down to his fingertips. “Boy was right, though. These fuckers needa be picked up.”

Jonny’s face did something George had never seen a man’s face do. It was like a leaky barrel of rum only the rum was humour. By the end of it, his eyes looked dead. Dead and dangerous.

He said, “Shut your trap.”

Esa didn’t flinch. There was a challenge in the set of his mouth. George wanted to shrink between them. He was almost glad when Barnabus lumbered over and yelled at them to get their asses moving. He was more glad when he was dragged away from the other two and down into the hold. The stench down there was terrible but at least it didn’t feel like it could be cut with a knife. He set to work and tried not to think about anything. It wasn’t so bad, if he wasn’t thinking.

At some point, Femi must have turned up. George only noticed when he heard his voice.

“Can I borrow that one?”

George looked up. Femi stood, dwarfed by Barnabus, with his head cocked towards George. Barnabus’s brows did something that might have been surprise but looked more foreboding.

“That one?” he growled, and glowered at George.

Femi only nodded. His hands were resting on his hips, one leg cocked out. He looked like someone who knew what he was about. “Need a peeler.”

Barnabus’s moustache twitched. “Femi –”

“He’s dumb enough to say anything again, you can throw him overboard.”

George flinched, but it seemed to have the desired effect on Barnabus. With a few steps, he was towering over him. He didn’t pretend George hadn’t heard. “Get.”

George scrambled up and stumbled after Femi. He didn’t know what to say. Awkward was what this was. At least when he didn’t know what to say to a girl, he knew it was because he thought she was pretty. With Femi, it felt more like dread at his own stupid mouth.

Femi didn’t seem to mind George’s silence. He led him into the galley and bid him sit on a barrel at the back wall. When a knife was pressed into his hand, George blinked at it in surprise. The potato that followed it was explanation enough.

He peeled. Soon, his hands started aching. He’d never had so much food in his hands in his life, much less worked with it, but he’d never had to feed a crew of a ship either. On the other side of the room, Femi was busying himself with pots and pans and a barrel or two, humming as he went. It was comforting in a tuneless sort of way, no set melody to it. Noise for noise’s sake. George felt his shoulders slowly unwind.

The galley was small, and stuffed with the both of them. Every surface was cluttered with utensils, jars, pots, anything that could fit on it. In a storm, this place would turn into a right mess. The smell of it reminded him of home. Ma didn’t cook so much anymore. Hadn’t, since his father had been swallowed by the sea. Said she couldn’t. Her hands had been swallowed too. George had never been good at cooking, though he’d done his best since then. But sometimes the neighbour would beckon him into her kitchen, and hers smelled like this. Fishy but spicy, warm. Something that sunk into you. Part of him liked it.

“Did you get kidnapped too?” he asked when he noticed he’d not said a word to Femi at all. The humming stopped and he regretted it instantly.

Femi turned to him, and his laugh unwound the tension that had snapped into George a moment before. “Nah. I … hired on with Mary two years ago. She needed a cook and I was just there; like a godsend, she said. I don’t know about all that but it’s been good. A good place to be.” His voice had grown quieter with the last words like they hadn’t been meant for George at all.

“That’s … good,” George said awkwardly.

Femi’s eyes focussed away from whatever distant place they’d been and back onto him. “It is,” he agreed, and suddenly there was an intensity in the air George hadn’t anticipated. “This is a good ship. Mary is a good captain, a fair one. We’re good people.”

“You’re pirates.”

“Gotta make ends meet somehow,” Femi shrugged.

George answered with a grunt. His eyes returned to the carrot in his hand. He didn’t know what to say to that. Make ends meet, sure. He’d been breaking his back slogging crates every day to make ends meet. His Da had gone out too close to a storm to make ends. Not all ways to do it seemed like good ways.

He could still feel Femi’s eyes on him. Whatever he was looking for, he wouldn’t get it from George. He’d have liked being a sailor, probably. A pirate, not so much. His fingers were taking on the colour of carrot as he peeled the skin away.

Femi sighed, like that was his way to admit defeat. Like an end to their discussion. George was almost glad for it. Eventually, he started humming again. They completed the rest of their work in silence.

Somewhere, a bell rang. Femi looked up from the bubbling pot he was bent over.

“Dinner,” he said. George took it as his signal to stand. When Femi looked at him, he looked almost sorry. “Not for you. Mary’ll tie you to the mast again.” His shrug was nonchalant.

George couldn’t help a wince. He’d hoped his punishment was done with. Apparently not so much. “Oh.”

Femi smiled. He seemed to do that a lot. “I’ll bring you something, later. Promise.”

His throat turned dry. “Oh,” he said again. “Thank you?” They looked at each other. Something about Femi was expectant. George didn’t think he’d known what was expected of him a day in his life. “I actually didn’t mean to call you a … well.” He coughed. “Yesterday I mean.”

“Which one?”

Femi’s smile had turned brittle. George suddenly felt like no matter what he said, he’d be digging his grave deeper.

He decided on, “You know …”

“Do I?”

His cheeks felt hot. He was doing this all wrong again. But … “You’ve been nice to me. Even after I … Sorry!”

He’d seen Femi smile. Femi smiled all the time, George could tell already. But the one he wore right then felt … truer than the other ones. Softer. George had to be as red as his hair at this point.

“Alright,” Femi said, which wasn’t acceptance. It wasn’t rejection either. “Now go, before Mary drags you out. Which she will.”

George went.

≈≈≈≈≈

The mast wasn’t so bad the third time around. He’d gotten used to the glowering of the crew. Jonny had thrown him a significant look when he lumbered by on his way to dinner, but mostly they left him alone. He busied himself counting the canons on deck, then the ropes lying about. When that turned out too many for him to count, he tried to come up with things that rhymed with rope. Unsuccessfully. Femi would turn up soon, wouldn’t he? He’d promised, even before George’s apology. He seemed like someone who kept promises. George didn’t know the first thing about him, mind. But he still seemed like it.

“Hey, numpty rat!”

If George could have fallen on his ass in surprise, he would have done it then. The mast held him fast. He craned his neck until he could see Crow dangling above him in the rigging. She was upside down, staring at the top of his head with interest.

“Uh,” George said. He couldn’t exactly pretend to be good with words.

Crow climbed down until she could settle in front of him, cross-legged. If it hadn’t been for the garish colours she was dressed in, she would have disappeared into the boards of the ship with how unassuming and small she looked. She’d probably make a pretty good spy, George thought. He started squirming eventually when she just kept looking at him. Her eyes were almost comically narrowed, her lips pursed like she was puzzling something out.

“You don’t look like an ass,” she decided finally.

“Uh … Thank you?”

“Mary says you’re an ass. Femi says you’re just angry and a numpty. Barn says we all talk too much. What do you say?”

“Uh …” He didn’t think he was an ass. Not usually. He’d made an ass out of himself, mind, but then he had been deceived and kidnapped. He blinked at her.

Crow nodded to herself. “Definitely a numpty,” she decided.

George didn’t know if he should be offended or not. “How’d you get here?” he asked instead, because he didn’t know what else to say.

“I climbed, numpty.” Her eyeroll was very dramatic, even in the near-dark they were surrounded by. He would have liked to ask her for pointers how she did that.

“No, yeah, I mean … here. The ship.”

If it was a merchant ship, or the navy, nobody would have let her hire on. She was a girl and a young one besides. Nobody would have given her a second look. If he’d ever thought about it, he didn’t think pirates took on many teenage girls either. He didn’t know that many pirates, mind, but this crew seemed … unusual.

“Oh!” Crow perked up. It rolled through her like a wave, like she was suddenly happy. If she’d been a dog, her tail would have wagged. “My Da used to sail with Mary. He … didn’t make it home, one time. Mary came and told us, all grave and towering like she is. And I asked her if I could go instead. Look for him, you know. She told me the sea had ‘im now, and I said I could talk the sea out of that if I had to. Ma said absolutely not, so Mary an’ I made a deal. If I still wanted, in two years’ time, she’d take me on. And here I am. Still learning to talk to the sea, but …”

George felt a familiar ache in his chest. It’d been there, sometimes, ever since he’d been a boy and watched the splintered remains of his father’s boat wash ashore. Since his Ma had shut herself in with her bed and her grief. He didn’t know if Crow had felt the same ache. Maybe it was different for her. But maybe it all felt the same no matter what.

“If you learn,” he said slowly, “ask her for my Da as well, will you?”

Crow scooched herself closer. Her hand on his thigh was warm in the sea breeze ruffling their clothing. She squeezed, once, before she grabbed the back of his head. The way she wrenched it down to rest her own against it was almost violent. George squeaked but he thought he saw her smile.

“Promise,” she agreed.

Then she moved again, and the space between them was back as if it’d never been lost at all. She looked satisfied, like she’d learned something, and probably she had. George didn’t know what it was, but he thought he liked her, so maybe that was enough. He almost wanted to protest when she stood. Probably she saw that, too. She ruffled his hair like he was a child, like she wasn’t half his size, and pointed upwards.

“Duty calls,” she said grandly, and didn’t wait for him to say goodbye before she climbed back up the rigging, nimble as a spider.

≈≈≈≈≈

Time on a ship moved differently, George decided. Waiting for Femi seemed to take forever. Maybe it was only that it was the only thing he could do. Wait. George didn’t think he’d ever been idle this long. Time spent idle would without fail be time docked from his pay, or from his hide. He’d never spent so much time alone, either. Even though his Ma was more a ghost than a person, she was always there. And the warehouse was never empty. He didn’t know what to do with the itch that spread through his shoulders or the sudden want to call out, to get someone to pay attention to him.

Yellow eyes blinked at him from out of the lamplit darkness. When it came, it came black as the night. George had seen cats before, of course he had. They were inevitable. He didn’t know if he liked them. The cat all but prowled towards him. Its right front paw was the only spot of white on its coat, like it had stepped into paint and forgotten to clean itself. It circled him, careful and curious, sniffed at his knee, and then made a little inquisitive sound like a chirp.

“Hello,” George said, because what was he supposed to say?

The cat circled him again before it put its white paw on his thigh. The others followed, slowly, warily, like it wanted to test him. By the time it’d climbed into his lap, George’s legs trembled from how still he’d been holding himself. It sniffed at his stomach one more time before, apparently deciding he was a good place to stay, it curled itself up on his lap and began purring.

The rumble inevitably relaxed him as well. He looked down at it, helpless, thankful, and a little unsure. He’d never thought of himself as a good place to sleep but the cat seemed to disagree. At least he wasn’t alone anymore.

When Femi came, he looked down at George and the cat, and he giggled. It was a nice sound, a sound that George wanted to hear again the moment it stopped.

“I see you’ve met Mitten,” Femi said.

George looked at the cat in his lap. It hadn’t moved much since it’d decided on him as a convenient sleeping spot, but it’d occasionally dug its paws into the meat of his thigh, a pinprick sort of pain he thought was affection. “It seems comfortable.”

“I bet.” Femi folded himself down next to George. He held a bowl in his hand, complete with spoon. So this would be awkward then. “Mitten is our mouser. If he likes you, that’s a good sign.”

A good sign for what, George wanted to ask, but Femi offered him the spoon. The chowder he’d brought, the one that George felt fair to say they’d made together, was only lukewarm at this point. It still tasted wonderful to George’s empty stomach.

“Crow said you called me a numpty,” he said between bites. He didn’t want to get used to being fed. It was humiliating. It also felt … nice. Caring. He hadn’t been cared for overly much in a good while.

“I called you stupid,” Femi corrected. “Numpty’s her word.”

It didn’t feel like much of an insult with Femi smiling like that. Besides, “Guess I am.”

“You’re tied to the mast, and technically supposed to go without supper. Take a guess.”

Femi didn’t move away once the bowl was empty. He set it down by his side and leaned forward to idly stroke Mitten’s fur. It brought them closer together. George’s heart gave a lurch he didn’t know what to do with.

“I won’t do it again,” he said.

Femi glanced up at him. “You better not,” he agreed, and there was no humour in his voice. “Mary will throw you overboard. And I won’t stop her again.”

Again. Like he’d done it before. Like he’d saved him without George even knowing. He swallowed. “I won’t.” It felt more like a vow than a promise.

Femi stopped looking at him. George wasn’t sure he liked that. “You know why I like being here?” he asked George, but he didn’t seem to be expecting an answer. “I can be honest. Mary runs a ship like she wants to build something. It doesn’t matter to her, what you are. What you were before. That makes you feel right.”

George didn’t know what to say. He shuffled a little until Mitten hissed in warning. When Femi looked up again, there was a shadow in his eyes that had nothing to do with the darkness.

“That sounds nice,” George said, and didn’t look away. He watched when Femi  bit his lower lip, and he watched when he tucked an errand braid behind his ear.

Femi said nothing else, but he stayed for what felt like forever.

≈≈≈≈≈

After that, Mary didn’t tie George to the mast again. It was a blessing, not waking with every bone in his body aching, but it was a bit of a curse, too. The hold, where most of the crew slept, was cramped and stank of a mass of people that hadn’t had a bath in too long. Like wet dog. Probably that was how he smelled like too now, so George tried not to let it bother him overly much. Mary had her own cabin, of course. So did Femi. He tried not to be jealous about that either. Still, he was free, sort of, and Femi had accepted his apology, or else just told everyone to stop being mean to him. George was grateful either way.

But nobody had told him what the bells meant, yet. He almost fell out of his hammock when they started clamouring. Mitten, who’d taken to using him as a pillow whenever he could, made a displeased sound and sprang away. Around him, a storm of activity started up almost before George had blinked himself awake.

“Wha –” he asked around a yawn, of no one in particular.

Crow dug her elbow into his hip on her way past. “Ship sighted,” she explained. “We’ll be proper pirates today.”

George swallowed. He’d almost forgotten, with all the deck scrubbing and vegetable peeling he’d been doing, that that wasn’t really what pirates did. That sooner or later they’d have to raid a ship. The realization settled heavy in his stomach.

He stumbled after the others up to the deck, where Mary stood like a general, calling orders. She looked like she’d had that first morning, with her billowing cloak and the hat she’d donned, with the pistols and the sabre at her belt.

Femi appeared by his shoulder, making George jump. He seemed different, too, the soft curves of him a little more honed. George eyed the pistol at his belt with some trepidation. Femi smiled and held out a sword for George to take. It was a cutlass, he thought, or at least he guessed. He’d never seen one up close.

“You won’t get a pistol yet,” Femi said, “but it won’t do to leave you without defence.”

George stared at the weapon, then at Femi’s expectant face, and swallowed again.

“Uh … I’ve never …”

Femi blinked. “Not at all?” he questioned. “Pistol?”

George shook his head.

Femi’s sigh was heavy. “Captain! George don’t know how to use a weapon!”

Mary glanced their way. Her eyes landed on George, and the disdain in them was heavy. George knew he wasn’t useful for much but that knowledge hurt now.

“Have him help Libby then! He can carry at least.” She didn’t wait for Femi’s nod before she turned away again.

Femi took hold of his wrist. “Don’t worry,” he said, and it was almost soothing, “it’ll be fine. Libby’ll make sure you don’t do anything wrong. Just do what she says. It’s all carrying and loading.”

George took a deep breath. Carrying and loading he could do. The cannon still made him blanch. Femi squeezed his shoulder reassuringly and left him with the grizzled looking woman manning the cannons. She was older than Mary, he thought. She might be older than his mother. When she looked at him, her milky eyes measured him for what he was worth and clearly found him wanting.

“Make yourself useful,” she said with a voice like a whip, and George scrambled to obey.

≈≈≈≈≈

As far as sea battles went, his first one probably wasn’t overly interesting. George still felt faint by the end of it. The ship, a merchant vessel from the Empire, put up little fight before surrendering. But he’d seen the black flag fly. He’d helped shoot a cannon. His hands shook a little. But piling loot into the belly of the ship, he could do. He was good at carrying.

It was mostly merchant goods. Textiles and rugs and similar non-perishables. Expensive but boring in a way. If they’d had any gold, it was in Mary’s pocket now. But George didn’t think so. When they’d secured their new cargo and drew away from their victim, which was surely now licking its wounds, Mary gathered them on deck again. She stood in the middle of their circle, arms crossed, and turned once around herself.

“Nice work,” she said, and a cheer went up.  “Clean. Respectable. And a decent haul. We can sell in the next harbour, and then you’ll get your cuts. It’s time we head home.”

The cheer grew deafening. George didn’t know exactly where home was, but he had a vague idea what it might be. He startled when Femi appeared by his side again. He had the same knack that Mitten had, appearing anywhere and everywhere George didn’t expect. But Mitten did it to climb into George’s lap. For some reason he felt his cheeks grow hot.

“Come on,” Femi said, “they get grumpy when they have to wait for the rum.”

He tugged on George’s hand, and helplessly he found himself following, found himself filling mug after mug of rum in the sticky air of the mess, surrounded by smiling, exuberant faces. Femi beside him doled out like a king to his courtiers, at home in their middle. Every time his eyes found George, he felt his stomach swoop.

He’d never received so many pats on the back in his life. So many smiles. Not just for the rum. Libby seemed satisfied with how he’d done. Crow all but climbed him like a monkey. And Jonny had a quietly satisfied smile on his face when he looked at him, like he’d expected George to do well. It made all of him tingle in a way he didn’t know what to do with. He didn’t see Esa anywhere.

Mary came through when most of the crew was already sloshed to the Empire and back. She laid her hand on Femi’s shoulder and whispered something into his ear, to which he nodded. Then, she stood in front of George.

He wanted to shrink back a little. Not because she was imposing, mind. She just had that air about her that made him want to be smaller.

“Good work, lad,” she said. “Your first cut’ll be worth it.”

George blinked at her back when she stalked out. His mouth hung open. It must have, because beside him Femi laughed, low and warm.

“I get a cut?” George asked of the air where Mary had been.

Femi answered for her. “Duh.”

“But …”

“We made you lot sail with us. The least we can do is pay you a decent wage.”

“Oh.”

Nobody was paying them any attention. At least half of them had probably fallen asleep on the table by now. So when George turned, Femi was already looking back at him. They stared at each other while George tried to sort the thoughts in his head out.

“Do you think – I mean – Is there a way to …”

Femi stepped closer. “George …”

George squeezed his eyes shut and took a breath. “Do you think Mary would send my part back home? To Portsmouth?”

When he opened his eyes again, Femi was staring at him. He’d cocked his head to the side, like he was trying to puzzle something out. It made the braids tickle at his neck where his shirt had fallen open. George’s fingers itched.

“Probably. Why would you want to?”

“My Ma,” George said, and it ached in his throat. “Without my wage she has nothing at all.”

Femi’s mouth shaped into a toneless ‘Oh’. His dark eyes softened. “She’ll find a way,” he reassured. Then, as if remembering something he’d forgotten, he shook himself. He found two mugs that hadn’t been used yet, and filled them up.

“Come on,” he said, and closed George’s fingers around one of them. “We’ve earned a little celebrating too. And I’ll teach you how to use that cutlass. We’ll make a sailor out you yet.”

He didn’t look away when he clinked his glass to George’s. George couldn’t look away either.

≈≈≈≈≈

They hit land about three days later. George didn’t know much about any island beside his own, aside from the snippets of gossip picked up from the sailors, but from the deck of the Magpie this one didn’t look too different from Portsmouth at all. A few bulky warehouses in the harbour shadowed an array of squat houses behind them, little streets winding in between. The clamour of voices and sounds reached them before they reached the harbour.

When they’d been tied down, Mary’s voice rose above it all.

“This is a decent port, so be decent about it. Be back by morning, or we’ll leave without you! Not you three.” The last had been addressed to George, Jonny and Esa.

George turned to them, but Jonny still had the serene expression of someone more than used to the treatment he was receiving. Beside him, Esa’s face was dark. He spit on the deck and turned on his heel.

“Don’t mind it overly much, lad,” Jonny said and threw an arm around his shoulders. “Flight risk, you understand.”

George did understand, sort of. He couldn’t imagine finding his way home from here, without knowing anyone or any coin in his pocket, but that was him. He didn’t much mind not having to navigate foreign streets filled with foreign faces either. It all sounded very intimidating.

But staying aboard was, most of all, boring. There wasn’t much to do without anyone around. Even Barnabus, who’d stayed behind to watch over them, seemed unwilling to order them around. He bothered Mitten first, and when the cat disappeared, he tried to bother Barnabus. All he got was a glare in return.

“Go annoy Femi,” he grunted.

George must have perked up a little too much. The sound Barnabus made when he scurried away was almost a chuckle.

Femi wasn’t in the mess, or the galley, or even in storage. When George cautiously pushed open the door to his room, he found him standing in front of a dusty mirror, eyeing himself critically. George stopped.

“Uh,” he said.

Femi turned. There was something different in his smile when his eyes locked on George. He was wearing the same loose trousers he always wore, but the grimy shirt above it, the one he always rolled up to his elbows but tied to his neck, was missing. Instead … well. George didn’t know much about anyone’s undergarments. But he’d seen his mother’s corsets before, and they looked a lot like this. The fabric hugged his torso, seemed to accentuate every movement he made. Femi always seemed fluid, but this was different.

“Didn’t your mama teach you to knock?” Femi asked, but the amusement was deep in his voice.

George startled. He felt himself go red. “S-Sorry.”

Femi waved him off and turned around again. “Do you like it?” he asked, and met George’s eyes in the mirror.

George didn’t know what to say. And if he did, he didn’t know how to say it. His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. In the mirror, Femi’s fingers whispered over the fabric.

He managed, “It’s … it’s very nice.”

In the mirror, Femi’s lips pursed. “It doesn’t fit me right,” he said, half to himself, before his eyes strayed to George again. “It was one of Mary’s, but the shape is all wrong.”

George didn’t think he agreed with that. Really, he didn’t agree at all. The shape looked … fine. Fine was a word.

“With the haul I thought I could buy a new one. You could help me.” His eyes looked wicked.

George had no answer to that. “I … I don’t know nothing about … that,” he stammered out and felt himself go redder still. His heart hammered against his ribcage as Femi bit back a smile.

“Course,” he said, absently. He turned away from the mirror and began untying the laces that held the fabric to his skin.

George couldn’t decide if that was better or worse. Femi didn’t seem to mind him being there at all as he wiggled out of the corset, hips shaking a little with the movement. The expanse of his back was long and marred with scars, raised and knotted. The sight of them shivered through George in an entirely different way.

“Uh,” he said, and Femi glanced back at him. His eyes held a challenge George couldn’t bring himself to meet. “Do … Do you … I …” He didn’t really know what he was trying to ask. Probably, he’d forgotten how words worked the moment he’d walked into the room.

The familiar shirt fell over Femi’s back, hiding it from view. He turned back around to look at George, but something tense had come over him. Something that made it look like he was waiting for George to open his dumb mouth and put his foot in it again.

“I … I can help look at stuff, if you … if you want me to?”

Femi’s shoulders sagged. Relief coloured his smile when it returned. His pretty fingers laced the shirt up to his neck until George could barely remember the expanse of skin underneath it.

But he didn’t look at George when he said, “Sure. You’ll need company where we’re going anyhow. And that and a dress won’t be too hard to find, I reckon.”

Somehow, even with the image of Femi in front of the mirror still fresh in his mind, that smacked him like a board to the head.

“Dress?” he squeaked.

Femi looked amused again. He hummed in agreement. “This ol’ thing won’t do me much longer, I think.” He plucked at the heap of fabric on his bed that George hadn’t noticed before now. The colour was familiar, even unstained by the Last Drop’s smoky lamplight. The memory didn’t sting half as much as the last time he’d thought of it.

“Does Mary make you?” George asked, because he just couldn’t wrap his head around any of this.

The fabric slipped from Femi’s fingers as he laughed. “Nah. I just do it the most convincing, I guess. And it’s fun.”

Fun. George imagined it might be fun, playing coy while boys fell all over themselves for you and knowing how embarrassed they’d be all the while. How stupid they were for a little affection. He turned his face away.

Femi’s steps whispered against the wooden floorboards. He was like a cat that way, too, quiet were everyone else lumbered around, easily distinguishable. He tucked on George’s collar.

“It’s nice,” he murmured, “being someone else for a while. Having someone look at me and like it. Yeah?”

George didn’t know what he was agreeing to, but Femi was closer than he’d ever been. Close like that first night. And his smile looked almost hopeful. “Yeah.”

≈≈≈≈≈

Albergrave wasn’t a place ever spoken of in polite company. Mind, George mostly kept company with dock workers and sailors, so polite had never been on the cards. But even they only spoke of the bay in hushed whispers. It was a lawless place, a haven for cutthroats, pirates and their ilk, and a place no sane man entered in the hopes of ever coming out again.

“It doesn’t look so scary,” George said, and Femi swayed into him with a laugh. He’d been doing that a lot lately, he’d noticed. Like having George close was a thing he enjoyed. It set something scurrying off in his belly every time it happened.

When Femi righted himself, one of his braids had slipped from behind his shoulder. George’s fingers itched with the urge to brush it back. “It’s scary,” he said, and tried his best to sound ominous, “You’ll see.”

George didn’t believe him one bit.

They anchored in the bay and piled onto the rowboats. A precaution, Barnabus called it. More like a truce, Libby had added immediately. George didn’t know if it was either when they came upon the shore.

Albergrave’s harbour was filled with tied down rowboats, some smaller, some larger, and stank like any harbour George had ever smelled. It was busy, the landing already crowded with all manner of people. They looked a sight different than any people George was used to seeing. Sailors were a rough bunch as a rule. Pirates, he learned quickly, were that and a heap more. Faces were rougher, clothes more threadbare, voices less controlled. He felt himself shrinking.

Mary gathered them around herself when they’d all scrambled from the boats. She’d handed out pouches of coin before they’d disembarked from the ship, a cut for each of them including the prisoners George felt were less prisoners than crew every day. George’s had been lighter than the others but she’d laid a heavy hand on his shoulder and told him the rest had gone as he’d requested. Now, she told them in now uncertain terms to enjoy themselves.

“Don’t find landlocked graves,” she said, and while George still tried to puzzle that one out, the others were already scrambling away, disappearing into the raucous crowd.

Beside him, Femi asked, “Ready?” and smiled when George blinked over at him.

He led their way into the cramped alleys, and noise crashed over them like he’d never heard before. He’d never thought himself worldly. Portsmouth was small, and he’d never seen more than the inside of it. But it was a trade town. It was nothing compared to the chaotic maelstrom of Albergrave. Before they were two streets in, he’d already seen at least three fights break out and a woman probably twice his age had all but pressed her breasts into his face. When Femi offered his hand, George grasped onto it gratefully, and held on for dear life. It was easier, knowing Femi was there. He kept close until he was steered into a shop, the bell tinkling over their heads.

Around them, fabric bulged and swished. George looked around, unsure what to make of the mess of a shop. It was small and overfull, all manner of clothes, undergarments, shoes and hats clogging the place up until he didn’t even know where they’d come in from. It smelled like lavender and sea salt, the smell less overwhelming than the riot of colour surrounding them.

“Come back, have ya?” A voice called, and a woman followed it. She was small and bent, older than any George had seen out in the streets yet, and her eyes were huge behind the pair of spectacles perched on her beaklike nose. Her skin was darker than Femi’s even, almost inky in its richness. She squinted up at George. “Him too?”

Femi shook his head. “Just me,” he said, “he’s here to help.”

That made the frown on the woman’s brow deepen. “Help,” she mimicked, her accent taking on a mocking tone, “I know what help he is. You help him otherwhere, I tell ya!”

George watched in fascination how Femi’s cheeks tinted red as he shook his head hard enough his braids flew everywhere. It looked a lot nicer on him than it did George.

“No!” Femi protested, and for reasons George couldn’t comprehend his voice broke on the word. “No, he won’t. I swear. Just a friend helping out, nothing else.”

The woman scrutinized them for long, breathless moments. George hadn’t even noticed they’d still been holding hands until Femi let go. He felt the loss of contact immediately. But reaching out would be stupid now, wouldn’t it? George stuffed his hand into his pocket instead. Finally, she made a noise that was both annoyed and deeply weary.

“I hear an inkling –” she began, but Femi nodded before she’d finished.

“Nothing, I swear. We’ll be good.”

She said, “Better be.” And cocked her head towards the back of the shop.

George wasn’t sure what any of that exchange had been implying. He followed Femi through the cramped space until they hit what he assumed was the back wall. It was stuffed with dresses up to the ceiling. Femi’s fingers whispered over the row of fabrics, pausing now and again as if in thought.

“What’s all this then?” George finally asked, because he felt a little lost and a little strange, watching like this.

Femi half-turned to catch his eye. “Loot,” he said, lips twitching. “Not many tailors around here, so we make do. It’s a lot cheaper than getting something sewn, but then you have to be lucky with the fitting and all.”

George blinked up at the linens and silks and brocades, non-plussed. “You steal people’s clothes?”

“Wardrobes, more like. And not me. Although …” His interest wandered back to the dresses. He tugged one down from the row, then another, a third. It wasn’t long before George found himself with his arms full of rustling fabrics. The attention Femi paid didn’t feel much like someone just looking for a fitting disguise.

It was worse with the undergarments. Oh, it was so much worse with the undergarments because George found he could imagine what Femi might look like in those. He’d never had much of an opinion on what anyone wore. Mind, he didn’t now, either, it was just …

“That’d uh … fit. Probably?”

Femi’s smile was sly. But he laid the corset on the mound in George’s arms. It was a dark sort of red, sewn with golden thread. It’d fit, that was all.

“Trying on now,” Femi decided.

George stumbled after him under his mound of fabric and tried to will his blush away before he’d have to emerge from it. They received another warning glare from the woman before Femi pushed him into a tiny room and closed the door behind them. It barely had enough space for both of them and all the things Femi had decided he liked, so George didn’t complain when he was pressed onto a stool in the corner. He didn’t even squeak much when, without ceremony, Femi started stripping.

He tried not to look. He really did. It felt weird to look at the way Femi wriggled out of shirt and pants then pulled a pair of stays around his torso. It felt weirder to watch the deft way his fingers found the laces and clasps, tightening them until they looked like they were made to be on him. George’s fingers itched. His face burned. Femi looked at himself in a mirror that had been haphazardly hung opposite the door, nodded, and then set out to undo all that he’d just done. George hid his face in his hands and tried not to bite his tongue too hard. He lifted his head again when Femi hummed.

“You were right,” Femi said absently, watching his reflection in the mirror. “It fits.”

George blinked and tried to say something. The red fit Femi well. It fit him so well it almost made his skin glow. But the rest of it fit, too. Whoever had been the original owner of the corset had not been well endowed, and it worked in Femi’s favour now. The bottom flared out in little curves, accentuating and filling in his hips in a way his body didn’t. The honeycomb-like detailing on the front panel begged for eyes to travel downwards, the golden thread a guiding light. Femi’s undershirt was threadbare if it was anything. George hadn’t much noticed, with the first pair of stays. This time, though, he thought he saw too much. Femi turned, and the back lacing made his fingers itch even more.

“Uh …” George said.

Femi licked his lips. His smile was knowing. George wanted to ask what he knew but he didn’t think he had any words left in him. The air in the room stuck to his shirt, made his fingers sweaty where he’d clenched them into the fabric of his trousers. Outside was an ancient woman with disapproving eyes. He wished she was closer. Femi watched him a moment longer before he hummed again and turned away, but the smile stayed on his face.

After that, the dresses were almost easy to bear. All they did was remind George of how blind he must have been. Because Femi in a dress was still Femi, even if he looked very pretty in it. Femi teased words out of him eventually, opinions even. George didn’t feel very opinionated on anything after what he knew was underneath the fabric, but he did admit Femi looked particularly pretty in the powder blue day dress he’d picked out. It was cut high enough in the neck that it was easy to forget the parts he didn’t have, and the corset and some clever padding helped with the other parts.

“Do you want to be a girl then?” George asked finally as he watched Femi swish the skirts around.

Femi finished his pirouette. “Huh? Nah. I just … like it, I guess. Sometimes.”

He should, George thought, and bit his tongue. He looked prettier than any girl he had ever seen.

“Okay,” he said instead, and tried not to think too hard anymore.

≈≈≈≈≈

Supposedly, the pub was a reward for allowing Femi to drag him clothes shopping. It didn’t feel much like it, at first. If pirates knew anything, it was how to make noise. The pub Femi led him to was loud and overfull, filled with spilling drink, raucous laughter, and loud heckling of any newcomer that stumbled through the door. Someone played a discordant tune on a harmonica, that broke off in parts. Probably, they were just laughing into the thing. George felt himself grow sweaty again, and for worse reasons than before. Femi pulled him through a pair of heavy brocade curtains into a quieter part of the room.

Here, only a few tables were placed, all but one of them filled with no more than three people each. The curtains drowned out the noise from the other room enough that the quiet murmur of conversation could be heard. Femi pressed him into a seat, and squeezed his shoulder.

“I’ll get us something to drink,” he said and turned.

George watched him go, suddenly reminded of that first night. Watching didn’t feel so different now than it did then. He pushed down on the nervous giggle that threatened to erupt from his throat at the thought. Even the grog Femi put in front of him burned the same.

Femi sipped from his mug while he watched the way George gulped down with amusement. “Thank you,” he said, finally, “for coming along.”

George put his mug down. “Course,” he said, and he didn’t know why he shouldn’t have.

“I know I get carried away.” Femi’s eyes dropped to the table. “It’s just I never could, before Mary. And now …”

“Could like the dresses or could like the buying?”

Femi’s lips twitched. “Both.” He looked up. “I was a slave. Like my father was. Mother too, I guess, but I’ve never met her. I think she died. Father never said.”

“Oh.” George didn’t know what to say. He never knew what to say. He really wished he knew how to find the right words for once.

“It wasn’t the worst, I suppose. I’ve heard stories.” Femi’s finger traced circles in the condensation his mug had left on the table. He still wasn’t looking at George, and George found he didn’t like that at all. “But it was still slavery. I ran away, when I was seventeen. Made it, despite everything father said. And then –” He suddenly became rigid, like he’d realized all at once what he was saying, or maybe who he was saying it to. His big eyes blinked up at George.

“We hadn’t much either, growing up,” George said quickly. Femi looked like he wanted to stop saying anything, and all he wanted in that moment was to keep him talking, to know more. To know everything, probably. “Da was a fisherman, ‘fore he died. The sea ate him. After that, it was only me got any coin in. Ma just … couldn’t anymore. I was lucky Thomas even took me on at the warehouse, but it wasn’t much, so …”

Femi’s eyes were dark with curiosity and something else. Maybe he was glad George had thrown himself into the conversation like a man desperate to drown. Maybe he wanted to know more, too. That thought made George feel warm all over.

“Unlucky, aren’t we?” Femi said, almost absently.

George looked at him. “I don’t know ‘bout that.” He’d felt unlucky, for a lot of his life. Working, working, trying to get Ma to eat if she did anything at all, and then stepping into a pub at exactly the wrong time. He didn’t feel so unlucky right then.

Femi smiled, but it was a different sort of thing. Quieter, more hesitant, like he thought he shouldn’t be smiling at all but couldn’t help it. Then he looked away again. His hand was still resting on the table, tempting something from George.

“I always thought, if I ever had enough money, I’d buy myself the prettiest jewels. Like what the girls up at the manor house used to wear. And then I wore some, once, and they were so heavy I couldn’t keep them on for even a day.”

He seemed almost proud when George giggled. “I always wanted a boat, a big one. All for myself. And a proper hat. Ma never would’ve allowed it, mind.”

“And now look at you,” Femi said, and his voice was warm like a good hearth. “We can get you a hat, if you like.”

It was tempting, so, so tempting. But – “It’s silly, though.”

Femi leaned forward. “Why?” he asked. “I bought things I like. Why can’t we buy things you like?”

George wanted to protest that money was for important things. Things like food, or a pair of boots that wasn’t old enough the hole in the sole was permanent. Nothing so silly as a fancy hat that, knowing his luck, would blow away in the wind before he’d worn it a day. Femi’s hand lay on his wrist.

“We can buy a hat?” he heard himself say, faint, a question.

Femi’s smile grew. “We can buy a hat,” he agreed.

The smile dropped away a moment later, when heavy hands landed on his shoulders. They were rough, hairy and weatherworn, and they belonged to a rough, weatherworn sort of man, when George looked up. He was dark, but not in the way Femi was. His clothes were dyed almost entirely black, fitting with the black hair falling down to his shoulders and the black beard surrounding a black sort of smile he wore on his face. He looked down his sharp nose at Femi, who’d started shrinking in a way George had not seen from him before.

“Look at you, pretty boy,” the man said. His hands kneaded into Femi’s shoulders, but it didn’t look pleasant. “It’s been a time.”

Femi swallowed. “Just drinking with a friend,” he said. His voice was faint. When he glanced at George, his dark eyes were screaming.

The man didn’t pay him any attention at all. “Got a room upstairs, darling.” He didn’t even have the decency to make it sound like a request. Impossibly, Femi’s eyes widened further.

“Hey,” George said, and realized it’d been louder than he wanted when eyes suddenly turned on him. The murmur in the room quieted. “Hey, that’s not – you’re supposed to ask!” It sounded weak, even to his own ears. It wasn’t the done thing was what he’d meant, maybe. He knew there was people what did it, furtive trysts in darkened corners and eyes not meeting afterwards. Maybe this was a place things like that saw the light of day, but Femi didn’t seem to want to agree to the man either way. He shivered a little, when the sharklike smile turned onto him.

“Ask who?” the man said. “You?” The thumb of his right hand pressed against Femi’s pulse until George could see it fluttering underneath the skin. “Olufemi won’t object. Will he?”

There were tremors running through Femi’s limbs when the man’s nose rubbed into his hair. His eyes were pleading; for what George didn’t know. He found himself standing anyhow.

“I think you should go,” he said, and tried to make it sound firm. He failed, probably. He’d never been good at sounding anything other than timid.

The man laughed. When he rose, he was shorter than George would have thought. His presence was an overpowering thing that his height didn’t match. “Or what, lad?”

George swallowed. The only weapon he had was his mug, and that’d break over the man’s head right quick. He still had nothing more than an inkling of how to use any weapon at all. But – “Or I’ll make you.”

Femi sucked in a breath.

“Oh, will you?”

George tried to square his shoulders. He knew he didn’t look like much. But more certainly he knew that he needed the man to take his hands off Femi. He tried to figure out how stupid it’d be to lunge across the table. Very, probably. Femi was between them.

“He won’t. But I will, Nyle, if you don’t stop bothering my crew.”

All three of them turned as one. Mary stood between the brocade curtains, hands on the pistols at her hips. George felt his shoulders sag. He watched as the man’s, Nyle’s, fingers tightened around Femi’s shoulders for a breath before releasing.

“This is none of your business, Mary.”

Mary’s steps were slow, almost ominous, as she made her way towards them. “My crew, my business,” she said shortly. “Now get your hands off Femi and get out.”

“We were just talking,” Nyle said. His fingers kneaded. George suddenly, with clarity, wanted to cut them off. The blinding heat of the thought left him breathless.

Mary was close enough now to grab Nyle’s collar. She dragged him down until they were eye to eye. “Get. Off.”

Nyle looked like he wanted to fight her. For a moment, George thought he would. Then, slowly, he raised his hands. Mary pushed him away.

“Stay away from my crew, Braxton,” she said again, with enough emphasis that George shivered.

Nyle grinned his sharklike grin at her. Hands still raised, he walked backwards, eyes on Femi until he reached the doorway. Then, with a wink, he turned on his heel and disappeared. It felt like the entire room held a collective breath until the curtains fell in place behind him. The murmur that started up after had a distinctly different tone to it.

“Who was that?” George asked, confused and upset and unsettled in equal measure.

Femi’s voice was thin. “Devil’s Grin,” he answered, before he curled himself into a ball in his chair and broke.

≈≈≈≈≈

Nyle Braxton, George learned afterwards, was the sort of pirate nobody wanted any part of. He’d heard the name Devil’s Grin whispered before, but Portsmouth was the kind of place not even a pirate like Braxton would look at twice. Cruel, the whispers said. Violent. Completely insane. He left the sea red in his wake, and danced with corpses.

“Not all true,” Femi whispered. “But a little.” He’d curled himself into a ball again, small against the heavy frame of the bed that took up most of the room.

Mary hadn’t dragged them out. Not exactly. She’d solved the problem of Nyle’s presence with the efficiency she usually reserved for sailing her crew through high seas. The inn she’d bundled them into was small, homelike, and featured the heavy presence of Barnabus in the room next to theirs.

George settled himself down on the edge of the bed, careful not to get too close. Femi hadn’t even let Mary touch him, after. He probably didn’t want George anywhere near him. But Mary had told him to stay put. That, and the thought of leaving Femi alone felt like a yawning chasm.

“You know him?” It was a stupid question. George wanted to hit his head against something as soon as it left his lips. But it was out there now.

Femi pressed his forehead to his knees. “I met him,” he said slowly, “after I escaped. Didn’t know any better and joined up with his crew. And he … liked me.”

George shuddered. The way Femi said those words suggested a whole lot more than he would have liked to hear. “But you’re not with him anymore.”

When Femi laughed, there was no trace of his usual humour left. “No. I got … too much, I think. He dropped me overboard. Mary saved my life.”

“Too much?”

“I didn’t much like staying chained up to his bed. And I didn’t much like keeping quiet about it. Silly me.”

“Femi …”

The ball that was Femi uncurled a little. He reached his hand out until George took the invitation and met him halfway. He curled himself onto the bed, captured Femi’s fingers between his. It still felt too far away.

“You tried to help,” Femi said faintly. “You threatened Nyle Braxton. Thank you.”

George murmured, “It wasn’t a very good threat.”

Femi’s dark eyes blinked at him from across the bedspread. He slipped his fingers between George’s until it was no longer just George holding on.

“Thank you,” he said again, and his voice sounded thick with something unnameable.

George wanted to tug him closer, until he could wind his arms around his back, curl them over the scars he now could guess the origin of, and make them both feel safe and warm. He didn’t, but Femi inched closer until the space between them didn’t feel quite so insurmountable anymore. He would’ve lain there forever, he thought, with Femi’s trembling fingers caught between his, if that was what it took, to make him feel safe.

≈≈≈≈≈

The next morning felt like the worst kind of hangover, only without the pounding head. They dragged themselves back to the ship in silence. Femi’s back stayed bowed, his confidence gone. But he squeezed back when George took his hand again. And he stepped closer, until there was almost no space left between them. Barnabus’s heavy steps behind them were a comforting resonance, even his grumble at having to drag the crew away early was reassuring.

Femi slipped away from him when they stepped onto the Magpie’s well-worn deck. George tried not to feel the loss. Instead, he looked around and realized they must’ve been some of the last stragglers coming in. Around them, the crew milled, some more bleary than others. Nobody said anything about their early cast-off. Nobody said anything to Femi at all, George noticed. Mary was having a murmured conversation with Barnabus by the main mast. Like she’d felt his gaze, she stepped away.

“Alright, you lot,” she called. “Seems Albergrave won’t have us this time. We’ll aim for a different harbour soon, but for now, get ‘er back to sea!”

George looked around again. “Where’s Esa?” he asked.

Jonny stepped up to him, and pulled him in. “Failed the test, that one,” he said, not entirely sympathetically.

“Test?”

Jonny’s shrug went through his shoulders, too. “We go ashore. The ones that really think they’ve the worst of it can try find home from here. The ones with their heads on right, they come back.” He took hold of George’s hair and shook.

George frowned. “So we’ll just leave him?” he asked.

“He made his decision. Come on, anchor aweigh an’ all.”

George followed him. Everything in him wanted to turn, to search out Femi, who’d disappeared below deck, to make sure he was alright. But Femi had let go. He needed time alone, probably. Or maybe he was embarrassed. Maybe he wanted to forget the whole of the last day. Something in George really hoped it wasn’t that.

He could taste the salt on the air as the ship took up speed, making its lumbering way out of the bay and towards open sea. The taste had become so familiar, he’d stopped noticing it, somehow. But it was heavy now. He thought it tasted a little like tears.

He thought he did well keeping himself focussed on the task at hand until Barnabus grabbed him by the back of the collar. George squeaked, but Barnabus only shook him a little and sighed heavily.

“Get,” he rumbled. “Can’t have you getting underfoot of everyone else.”

George didn’t need to be told twice. He scurried away, taking the steps down below deck two at a time. It was pure luck that he didn’t stumble and crack his head on one of them.

Femi sat in the galley, his hands twisting in his lap, staring at nothing in particular, when George all but fell into the room and tried not to look like he’d been too eager. Worried was what he’d been. The Femi he’d gotten to know was easy-going, confident and fluid in a way George was a little jealous of. He wasn’t that cowed creature that he’d been ever since Nyle Braxton had laid his hands on him. He just needed to know Femi was okay, was all.

Femi startled. The smile he tried to conjure up at seeing George was weak at best, a grotesque imitation at worst. There was no relief in it, none of the hidden warmth that made George’s insides squirmy for reasons unknown. That alone made him falter.

“Hey,” he said, and tried not to fidget.

Femi blinked at him for a moment before shaking himself. “Something the matter?” he asked, and stood. If he’d ever successfully pretended to be busy, it wasn’t right then.

“Uh,” George said, and cursed himself right after. “I just wanted to – Well, I …”

Femi turned his back on him. His hands slid over jars on a shelf, as if that might do anything.

“Are you alright?” George finally asked.

Femi’s hands paused. “Just making sure we have everything,” he said, which was a silly lie and senseless besides. They were already out of the bay. Whatever they’d be missing would be missing until they could next make harbour or luck spilled it into their laps.

George took a step forward. When his Ma had stopped living, he’d tried. He’d tried so hard to keep her from slipping away, with gap-toothed smiles, loud excitement, with quiet hugs. None of it helped. This wasn’t that, but the shell looked the same. “Femi.”

Femi whirled around. His eyes glistened. “What do you want me to say?” he yelled. “That I thought I’d never have to see him again?”

George sucked in a breath, but he didn’t cringe away when Femi advanced on him. He couldn’t.

“That I still have nightmares of what he did to me? Or that it’s worse, now I can feel his hands on me again? Is that what you want?”

“Femi …” he tried again. Femi’s eyes were wild, his breathing laboured.

“Or maybe you want to know. What he did. Want me to tell you how he made me get on my knees and suck his cock the first night. As gratitude! Or how he got tired of dragging me into his bed, so he just chained me to it, so he could plough me whenever he wanted. Sometimes twice a night. How it hurt. Is that what you want, George?”

They were standing nose to nose. George couldn’t swallow past the lump in his throat. He looked at the way Femi’s limbs trembled. Then he dragged him into his arms. Femi held himself there, stiff as a board, for a moment longer, before he went limp. George wound his arms tighter around him.

“Should’a decked him after all,” he mumbled, and pressed Femi’s head into the crook of his neck, so his shirt could soak up the tears.

Underneath his hands, Femi chuckled weakly. “He’d kill you.”

“Eh,” George said, “I get by.”

Femi’s arms wound around his waist until it was a proper hug, a proper hold, and George tried not to feel too warm about that. He let Femi’s braids slip through his fingers as he swayed them both. It was nice. Not nice in the way of Femi’s tears, but nice in the closeness, nice in the shared space. George hadn’t had many people to hug, before. He felt the tremors of Femi’s bitten-off sobs, and he wanted nothing more than to make them stop. Wanted to make it better. He didn’t know if he could erase the memory of touch with his own hands, but he tried his best.

Then the bells started to ring.

By the time they stumbled onto the deck, the crew had already gathered, staring at the horizon. Against the climbing sun, the silhouette of a ship could be seen.

“What’s going on?” Femi asked, because George couldn’t find the words.

Libby turned towards them, eyes still glued to the horizon. “’s following us,” she said, “ever since we left the bay.”

George could feel Femi stiffen next to him. He’d loosened up, in George’s arms, but now he was as tight as before. More, probably. The fear was clear on his face. “It’s not –”

“It’s the Devil’s Plunder, cap!” Crow called from her nest. She was leaned out far enough that George thought she’d fall out with the next gust of wind.

The crew took the news like an indrawn breath. Femi’s fists clenched at his side. In front of them, Mary stood against the railing, her arms crossed loosely over her chest. She exchanged a glance with Barnabus by her side, her face drawn.

“What flag?” she called.

A moment of silence, then … “Red, captain!”

Mary cursed. A murmur started up around them, but George felt like he could only hear the little choked breath Femi failed to hide. He could relate. Even he knew what a red flag meant. It boded slaughter. No survivors. Most pirate ships never flew a red flag at all.

“Braxton always flies red,” Barnabus grunted. It seemed like an attempt at reason, but it didn’t help any matter at all.

“And he’ll adhere by it. Bastard. We’ll try to outrun her. Wind might be on our side.” Mary’s face didn’t look like she believed her own assessment.

Still, Barnabus nodded in agreement. He turned to the crew. “Get,” he barked.

The resulting scramble almost took George right off his feet. In the weeks he’d been on the Magpie, he’d seen the crew weather storms. He’d seen them prepare for an attack. He’d never seen them running for their lives. Femi stood still as stone for another breathless moment, before he shook himself.

“All hands on deck,” he mumbled, and took hold of George’s wrist. George felt dread twisting his guts.

≈≈≈≈≈

They didn’t outrun her. When the Devil’s Plunder drew up beside them, it was with cannons blazing and cries of war. George dove flat on his stomach as above him, a cannon ball whizzed past, taking out half the railing with it. Beside him, Libby’s face had become a grim mask. She lit the fuse and a moment later, cannon fire deafened them. George didn’t even stop to watch whether the shot hit. There was no time. Loading. Ducking away to give Libby room to aim and fire. Cover his ears. Repeat. His heart was in his throat.

He only blinked back to conscious awareness when the cries of the crew took on a different sort of tone. By that time, the Plunder’s crew had already boarded. He still wasn’t any good with a pistol. Femi had given him some lessons with the cutlass he now nervously drew, Barnabus a few more, but he didn’t think he could hold himself against any of the men now swarming onto the Magpie’s deck. He wished he knew where Femi was.

A man came up on him, and George recognized him a moment too late. He squeaked and stumbled backwards. Esa’s eyes were dead, when they locked with his. Dead and filled with a hatred George didn’t understand. The edge of a cutlass cut his cheek but in the same moment, a bloom of red sprouted from the man’s throat. He blinked, as Mary dispassionately watched him crumble. Her coat was already spotted in red.

“Try and hide,” she told George, her eyes serious.

George wanted to protest, wanted to help. But he was useless. He wouldn’t help anyone by making them look out for him. So he ducked and scrambled towards the stairs below deck. He’d almost reached them, when he heard it. He didn’t know how, the noise was too quiet, too cut-off to ring over the sounds of battle, but he did.

Above him, pressed against the railing, Femi struggled against Braxton’s hand around his throat. The man’s grin was manic as he bent him backwards and almost in half. He brought his face close, whispering something in his ear. George didn’t know what took him. Protectiveness, maybe. It felt more like stupidity. Before he’d thought of it, he’d risen from his crouch and took the steps up to the quarterdeck. He gripped the cutlass tighter.

“Let him go!”

When Braxton turned to him, his grin could have frozen any man’s blood. George tried to stop himself from trembling. His stance was almost lazy, self-assured.

“Oh, it’s you,” he said. He glanced at Femi, slowly growing slack in his hold, before looking back at George. Then, he shrugged. “Fine.” With that, he pushed him overboard.

George thought he yelled. His throat felt raw as he watched Femi disappear from sight. It wasn’t a conscious thought when he followed him down.

The water pressed all the air from his lungs. Around him was the churning sea, debris and wave and blood in the water. He didn’t know which way was up or down. Desperately he grasped for anything, anything at all that could be the body he’d followed. The sun broke through the waves, reflections dancing in front of his eyes until he had to squeeze them closed. There. His fingertips met something. When he grasped on, he was sure it was a hand. George had no air left. With nothing but hope he propelled himself towards what he thought was up.

When he broke through the surface, the air around him was filled with noise and smoke. Beside him, Femi came up with a coughing gasp. George dragged him close, treading water for them both as best he could. There was no way they’d stay afloat for long like this. Not with Femi clinging to him weakly, coughing water into his shoulder.

He tried to find something, anything, that could hold them up, could stop the ships from dragging them under again.

“Ladder,” Femi gasped.

George blinked, before turning them around. They paddled towards the hull, waves crashing over them. He almost lost grasp on Femi, knotted his hand into his shirt until he was sure his fingers would fall off. It’d be worth it, probably. If only they survived this.

The Magpie’s hull loomed before them. And there, feet away that felt like miles, the wooden ladder on its side. They could hold onto it, at least, even if they couldn’t drag themselves up. If they could reach it. George’s arms ached. His lungs ached. Held to his side, Femi treaded water weakly. He took a deep breath, and swam.

Spots danced in his vision, but finally, the wood bit into his fingers. He dragged them both closer, tried to drag himself up but his arms trembled with even that little. On the other side of the step, Femi looked at him.

“Why did you –”

Yells from above. George looked up. More yelling, a scramble. Was the Plunder disengaging? Was that possible? A wave crashed over them, almost dragging them away. Femi’s voice broke on a cry. George heard the rapport of gunfire, echoing against the hull. Beside them, a rowboat dropped into the water. When he looked up again, Crow was half-hanging over the railing. She waved her arms, frantic, gesturing. George looked back at Femi.

“One last time,” he said, and reached out his hand.

When they’d heaved themselves into the boat, George thought he’d pass out. Everything hurt. Everything was weak. Femi more fell than moved on top of him, wet and cold and grasping onto his shirt like his life depended on it. With trembling arms, George pulled him close and closed his eyes. He didn’t even feel the boat jerking upward anymore.

≈≈≈≈≈

Mary had shot Braxton. They learned that later, after a thorough examination by the ship’s doctor and an even more thorough application of grog to both their bellies. He wasn’t dead, probably. At least nobody thought so. But his first mate had sounded the retreat, and they’d dragged him back to the Plunder. It was the sort of thing legends started out as. The time Mad Mary scared Devil’s Grin into fleeing a battle. That time she gave him a scar to remember her by.

George felt mostly dead about it all. He was curled up in Femi’s bed, at Femi’s insistence, and trying not to fall asleep then and there. Femi, beside him, didn’t seem much better off. He kept blinking eyes that were getting heavier and heavier, biting his lip like he wanted to say something. At the foot of the bed, Mitten purred loudly, rolled into a ball between their legs. He’d followed them in like it was the only place for him to be.

Finally, George felt slender fingers curling around his wrist.

“George?” Femi whispered.

He turned his head. He couldn’t fathom turning his body right then, not with how heavy his limbs were. Even looking felt like an enormous effort.

“Why did you do it?”

George blinked. “Do what?” he asked. His tongue was heavy in his mouth, sticking to the roof. Too much salt, maybe.

Femi pressed his face half into the pillow. “You jumped into the ocean. In the middle of a battle. Why?”

“Because you needed me to.” It was such an easy thing to answer. He didn’t know why Femi’s eyes were suddenly large and unreadable, glistening. There hadn’t been much in his head then, beside the image of Femi disappearing over the edge of the railing.

There wasn’t much else but Femi in it now. Not when the grip on George’s wrist tightened. When he leaned forward and pressed their lips together. George blinked, heart beating out of his chest.

“Oh,” he said when Femi drew back. “Oh.”

Femi’s cheeks were tinged dark, but there was something wary about him. Poised like he thought George might be a snake waiting to strike. “I didn’t mean –”

“Can you do it again?” Was he supposed to ask? Was he supposed to just do it? He’d never even thought that far ahead, with the girls he’d thought he’d fancied. The idea seemed laughably stupid in the face of now. It had never felt like this, like currents bubbling in his belly and tingles in his fingertips. Like the urge to touch.

Femi’s eyes were unsure but he leaned forward. It felt better when George kissed back. Clumsy, probably, and doing it all wrong, but Femi made a little noise in the back of his throat, and his hand threaded into George’s hair, and maybe it was alright. Maybe learning this wouldn’t be so bad.

A cough sounded from the door, startling them apart. When they’d righted themselves, dragged themselves upward, Mary was leaning against the doorjamb, arms crossed in front of her chest and amusement plain on her face.

“Don’t mean to interrupt,” she said, and walked in anyway. She stopped a few steps from the bed, eyeing them critically before she turned her focus onto George. “I’ve got an offer for you.”

George blinked. “Me?”

“Yes, you.” She didn’t roll her eyes, but the disdain was implied. “For all you’ve done so far. And for savin’ my cook. You have a place on this ship, if you want it.”

Next to him, Femi made a noise like a plea. George blinked again. “Uh …”

“Your decision, of course. We’ll set you down in Portsmouth, with enough gold to have you sitting pretty, if you’d rather. But I think you know where you want to be.”

He hadn’t, was the thing. Not until she’d said it. There was the Magpie, and there was George, and he didn’t belong here anymore than he did anywhere else. Except maybe he did. He looked over at Femi, who’d tricked him. Who looked so pretty in a dress and an oversized shirt and anything else, probably. And, past him, at the endless blue sea outside the porthole.

“I do,” he said, and it was easier than he ever thought it’d be.

≈≈≈≈≈

When Portsmouth appeared on the horizon, he wasn’t so sure anymore. It was dark, lamplight and fires turning the town into a beacon in the distance while stars twinkled in the sky above them, as George leaned against the railing. It was still so far away, but he felt every league in every inch of his body. Longing mixed with reluctance until he felt a little nauseous.

“What if I can’t leave her?” George asked.

Next to him, Femi leaned against his shoulder, his braids tickling George’s neck. “Mary said, she’s taken care of. She doesn’t lie about things like that.”

He knew, was the thing. Mary had shown him the letters. Not that he could read a single word, mind, but she’d very patiently told him Bonny had been taking care, and then she’d given them to Femi to confirm. It still felt wrong. He’d had no choice in leaving, but coming back and saying goodbye was another thing altogether. They wouldn’t reach harbour until morning, so he had plenty of time to tie himself in knots yet.

“Will you come with? To meet Ma?”

Femi had been absently drawing shapes into the back of his hand. At George’s words, he stilled. The silence lasted long enough that he regretted even asking.

Finally, Femi said, “You’d want that?”

“Yes?” George hazarded. Was it wrong to ask? Wasn’t that what you did, with someone important to you?

Femi’s sigh was a gust of warm air on the breeze. “George …” His tone was patient, like every time he explained something George had been too stupid to think of. Not this time, though.

“Not … not as … uh. But you’re my friend, too.”

Femi rubbed his cheek against his shoulder. His fingers started dancing, tickling up George’s arm. “Would your Ma be fine with that? With me?”

His fingers splayed over George’s, dark against light. “Oh.”

Femi waited.

“I’m not sure,” he said.

“Then … Maybe not yet. I’ve only just got you.”

George frowned. “But –”

“Next time,” Femi said, and turned his head to kiss him.

When George looked back, Portsmouth’s lights were slowly being swallowed by a growing fog. Before long, it was like it’d never been there at all.

≈≈≈≈≈

“Let’s get,” Mary said, the next day, when the ship had been moored.

George blinked at her. She still scared him a little, every time she talked to him directly. But surprise won over this time. “You’re coming?”

She nodded. “You’re my crew, George.” As if that was any explanation at all.

Still, George probably wouldn’t have been able to dissuade her if he’d wanted to. He felt strange, as they walked through the dusty streets of Portsmouth together. Nothing looked any different. The same houses slowly turning more ramshackle around them. The same people trudging along beside them. He felt like he stuck out like a sore thumb, belonging here but not. Different. Sunburned and salt-cracked and not one of them any longer.

When the little house came into view, he had to stop for a moment. Beside him, Mary waited patiently. She hadn’t said a word since they’d left the ship, only matched his steps, her gait crisp, assured. He wished she could give him some of that confidence.

There were flowers on the windowsill. That was the first thing he noticed. When he’d left, the windows had been grimy with long-forgotten dust. He’d never had the time to do anything about it, and his Ma had rarely left the bed at all. Now, a vase sat on the sill, an explosion of colour behind clean glass, and his throat closed up.

He flung the door open too hard, making it crack against the wall, and winced immediately at the noise it made. Ever since his Pa died, this had been a house of silence. It wasn’t a house he recognized now. The parts were all the same, but it was clean for one. And brighter, somehow. His Ma was seated at the kitchen table, a mug of something in her hands. She looked up when he came crashing in, and there was a shine in her eyes he hadn’t seen in years.

Around her, a girl bustled. A young woman, really. She had to be George’s age at least, and the way her dress curved over her belly was telling enough, even if it was probably a long time away yet. She tutted at them but broke off when the mug clattered to the table, spilling liquid everywhere.

“George,” his Ma said, and a moment later he was on his knees beside her chair, pulled against her chest. She let him go and took his face in her hands, lifting his chin. There were tears in her eyes.

“So you’re George then.” The woman had come around the table, her frown now an indulgent smile. She wiped up the spilled tea as if it was nothing at all. When he only blinked up at her, she offered him her hand. “I’m Johanna.”

Awkwardly, George rose and took her hand. “George. Uh … I mean, you knew that. I … Who are you?”

Johanna’s brows rose. “I help around the house,” she said, “you pay me.”

George blinked. Heavy steps told him Mary had finally come into the kitchen proper. She took a chair across from his Ma without asking and sat. Then, she cocked her head at George.

“You said she needed someone to look after her,” she murmured when George had sat beside her. “Bonny made sure of it.”

“Oh.” He’d never thought of hiring anybody else. He couldn’t have paid anyone, mind. Some days, he couldn’t even pay for bread. But now … “So …”

“Everything ‘round here has been going fine,” Johanna said blithely, as if reading his mind. “We’ve been doing well, haven’t we, Agatha?”

His Ma’s eyes had never left him since he’d stepped through the door. Now, she reached out. George caught her hand between his and squeezed.

“You came back,” she said.

George swallowed. “I never meant to leave.”

“But you mean to, now.” Her eyes turned to Mary, who leaned forward, elbows on the table. There was something soft in her gaze, understanding. George hadn’t seen that from her before, not quite like this.

“George is a valued member of my crew. I’d be loath to see him go.”

The words tingled down to his fingertips. Something in his chest expanded. Belonging, that was what it felt like. Something good.

“You’re a sailor?” Agatha asked.

Mary’s lips twitched. “Something like it. Mary Arlin.” She didn’t offer her hand, but he thought it was only because Agatha still hadn’t let go of him.

Agatha frowned. He didn’t know if the name meant anything to her. It had to him, but he’d been at the harbour more often, talked to the sailors coming in. Maybe she didn’t know.

But Agatha said, suddenly weary, “Pirate, then.”

George felt how her hand clenched in his. He didn’t know what to say, to reassure her. Was there even anything to say at all?

Probably, it wasn’t the first talk Mary had had like this. She definitely seemed like it. “We do what we must,” she said, “and we take care of our own. Johanna will be here, as long as you need her. And George will visit, as much as he can.”

“And once he can’t anymore?”

“If he can’t anymore, you will know, and you will be taken care off.”

That wasn’t the shape of it at all, and George knew it. She’d never thought of herself when she forbid him from going near the shore. At least not in the way Mary thought of.

“Ma,” he said, “I need to.” He wanted, was the thing. More than anything he wanted to sail, to be part of something like Mary was giving him. He couldn’t fathom staying here.

“So did your father,” Agatha answered, and burst into tears.

He held her, but no promise, no wage in the world would make this better, he suddenly realized. There was a future to him, and there was the past to her, and maybe they were one and the same. Maybe he wasn’t looking for absolution at all.

“I will be back,” George promised, and it was all he could give her. He didn’t think she’d ever believe him.

≈≈≈≈≈

This time, when they sailed out of Portsmouth, George stood at the railing. No rope binding him but the one that tucked at his chest. Jonny had been standing on the pier, arm laid around a woman George had learned was his wife, waving. He was nothing more than a figure in the distance now. The houses got smaller, a haze that disappeared over the horizon. A place he didn’t belong to anymore.

Femi’s arms came around his waist. George leaned back against his chest with a sigh.

“Ready for your next adventure?” he asked.

George turned in his hold, looked out over his shoulder at the Magpie’s deck, at the crew bustling around them. When he craned his neck back, he thought he could see Crow, hanging too far out of her nest as always.

“Yeah,” he said, and no matter the heartache, it was true.

THE END