Trajan paced the deck, oscillating between staring at the shore and staring at the pirate ship anchored in the distance. The pirates on deck of the Revenge had spotted Westley’s ship and were slowly gathering and pointing at it. Westley noticed and waved at them while speaking to Inigo. “It is taking a bit longer that I’d thought.”
“Let us give another hour. If we don’t see them by then, we shall all go ashore.”
Trajan moved next to Westley and watched the pirates. “I wonder now if Roberts was the one to strike the final blow, or if one of these men did it.” Westley was about to address him, but Trajan continued before he could speak. “Makes no difference, though. I wonder how many he killed before he died?”
He stared in silence pondering the thought.
“Well,” Westley said finally, “I’m sure any man of your lineage would have made his family proud.” Trajan continued to watch the figures on the other ship and said nothing.
“Might I suggest you lay down and rest a bit. Anxiety won’t help you any, you know.”
“I’m not the least tired.”
“No,” Westley said to himself, looking across at them also. “I suppose I wouldn’t be able to rest, either.”
“Bind him and take him back to the ship,” Kadir said to the pirates, referring to Archard, still unconscious. The pirates hesitated. “Now!” His voice shook the room and two of the pirates scrambled to obey, taking Archard’s sword and binding his wrists with fiercely tight knots.
“You dare not harm him,” Quidest said in a voice that gave everyone pause.
Most of the pirates gave her evil grins, but Kadir said nothing and took a step toward her. She didn’t budge as they stood face to face.
“He will not be harmed,” a voice said from behind them. “Nor will the lady.” It was the pirate who had just dispatched the merchant.
The men grumbled, but Kadir turned to the pirates. “As he says!”
The other pirate moved toward Quidest as he wiped his blade and sheathed it. He was shorter than Kadir, and older, but somehow more imposing. He was not at all like the pirates Quidest had known in her journeys with Inigo; he had no scars, retained all of his teeth, and gave an air of seriousness.
He spoke. “Not a hand will touch her, nor a man speak with her but myself.” He looked her up and down and Quidest took in a deep breath. “You will accompany me to my ship, along with your suitor there,” he motioned to Archard, who was being lifted from the floor. “There he may speak his business, and it is there that his fate will be decided. And yours, ma’am. Will it be necessary to bind you as well? I have no intention of doing so unless you resist.”
Quidest folded her arms. “He could have told you, Roberts, sir,” she exaggerated a curtsey, “that we came to request that very thing, had this brute brain enough to keep his fists at rest when grown ups were talking. Now a man is dead, and if you’re not more prudent,” she pointed a finger at him, “you will soon join him.” She turned. “Filthy pirates.”
“You should be more discerning…milady.”
“I will not resist, nor will I speak any longer with pirate scum.” Quidest followed the pirates carrying Archard out the door.
The Dread Pirate Roberts watched her leave, then looked at the merchant lying dead on the dirt floor. “Take this one and bury his body where they came ashore.”
“I arnt digging no grave,” one of the pirates grumbled.
Kadir grabbed the man by the tunic and shoved him to the ground. “You’ll do as your captain commands you,” he said, kicking at the pirate scrambling to move out of the way.
“What about that one?” another said, pointing to the other merchant who was now waking up and moaning.
“You will take him to his boat and leave him there,” Roberts said as he knelt by the first man and removed a money bag from the dead man’s pocket along with a small notebook. He flipped through the pages, then tucked both items into his own pocket and stood.
Most of the pirates started to leave, but two of the larger ones stood with their hands on their hips. “You never answered,” one of them said to Kadir. “Why did he call you Roberts?”
Kadir glared at them and stormed in their direction, but the pirates were not intimidated. “He was a fool,” he answered. “Do what the captain says and get back to the ship.”
The pirates were still.
Roberts unsheathed his sword again and swung it toward the obstinate pirates. It passed a fraction of an inch above their heads before they could even react and cut a tuft of hair off the tallest one. In the backstroke, he pulled his weapon around and stopped it with the point pressing against the pirate’s throat.
“You will do as you’re told or die here. Make your decision and make it now. I am the Dread Pirate Roberts!”
A glimmer of fear was evident in their expressions, but their body language continued to show two men who were not used to being intimidated. After several seconds of silence, they looked at one another, and then the smaller one said, “Of course…Roberts.”
The Dread Pirate Roberts withdrew his sword, sheathed it, stared at them for a moment, then turned away.
“Get going!” Kadir ordered.
The other pirates walked out together, but Kadir noticed the larger one smirking as he left.
Roberts and Kadir were now alone.
“Who on earth was that woman and her man?”
“I’ve never seen the woman before,” Kadir said, “but he was also once the Dread Pirate Roberts.”
Quidest was led to a different beach than the one she and Archard had landed on. The pirates piled into one of the boats and threw Archard into it.
“I see Roberts’ men seem to have lost that air of cordiality,” Archard said, checking his nose for symmetry.
“You’ve been ordered not to harm him!” Quidest hollered.
The pirates laughed. “This pretty boy ain’t harmed much,” one of them said before kicking Archard in the stomach.
Quidest grabbed him by the beard with one hand and with the other gripped two of his fingers, twisting them in a clockwise motion that sent the pirate off his feet and planted his face in the sand. The other pirates chortled as she let go and stepped into the boat.
“Got some spunk, the lady does,” one said.
“Yeah, missy, can’t wait see what else ya can do.”
Quidest sat next to Archard and placed a tender hand to his cheek.
“Go on milady, I’m quite well,” he said still struggling to catch his breath.
“You’re far from it.”
“Yes,” he whispered, “but we must put a brave face on it.”
Quidest patted the blood from his nose. “Yes, such a brave face indeed.”
The pirates filled the boat around them, and as they were about to push off into the surf, Kadir approached in a hurry.
“Make room.” Kadir pulled the pirate nearest Archard and Quidest by the collar and threw him into the water. He looked down at Archard and shook his fist in his face. “Now keep your trap shut, you French dandy, unless you want to lose those pretty teeth. Roberts will deal with you.”
The pirates laughed encouragement. Kadir gave Quidest a look that only she and Archard could see.
On shore, Roberts supervised the pirates refilling the hasty grave. He walked over to the merchant’s boat where the survivor was conscious now and weeping, braced for the worst.
“Dry your eyes, I’m not going to kill you.”
“But…I thought,” he sniveled, “…you never leave anyone alive?”
Roberts pulled the fallen merchant’s money pouch from his vest pocket. “Your partner sealed his fate the moment he dared to pull his sword on me.” Roberts threw the money bag at the merchant. It spilled open and coins chimed around him while he scrambled to pick them up. Then he stopped short and refocused on Roberts, scared, and confused.
“Yes, keep his money. I want it not. By it you live your miserable life and by it you, like he, will die a pitiful death alone and unloved somewhere. It gave me no pleasure to end him, though no doubt he deserved that and worse, but nonetheless…” Roberts pulled out the small notebook. “You have a chance to regain some small degree of honor with what’s left of your miserable life,” and he tossed it, too, at the merchant. “Someone out there cared about him, see they get that. And if there remains someone in this world who cares about you, find them, and tell them you’re sorry for only being half a man.”
Roberts turned and boarded his own boat, leaving the stunned merchant gripping the money bag in one hand, the journal of a fallen acquaintance, now six feet below the surface of an unmarked grave, in the other.
“I see him,” Inigo exclaimed. “There, in that lead boat. Quidest is with him.”
Trajan jumped and ran to Inigo’s side. “Where? Let me see.”
Inigo watched Kadir stand when the boat was beside the Revenge’s rope ladder. As his massive frame ascended the ropes, Inigo handed the spyglass to Trajan. “That must be him. He’s not so gigantic as Archard said.”
Trajan saw Kadir reach the deck and stand to his full height as he barked orders to the other pirates.
“No, he’s not gigantic at all,” Westley said as cheerfully as he could. “Intensely muscular, imposing to be sure, a full head taller than everyone else on board…but not a giant, anyway.”
Trajan took a deep breath and watched Kadir, only Kadir. The pirate turned and eyed Inigo’s ship, put his hands on his hips and leaned forward as if he were trying to look through the other end of Trajan’s spyglass. Trajan felt the pirate’s gaze from across the expanse and a chill went down his spine. He lowered the glass from his eye, then put his hands on his own hips.
Inigo watched Quidest about to take the rope ladder. She turned, blew a kiss toward Inigo’s ship, and began to climb. Inigo smiled and turned to Trajan. “Well, it shouldn’t be long now. Are you ready?”
“Hold on now,” Westley said. “It appears our friend looks a little worse for wear.”
Inigo took the spyglass and saw Archard was still bound and sat in the boat as it was raised by pulleys to the deck. At the top, two pirates reached in and grabbed him out, then threw him to the ground. They could see Quidest shouting as Archard slowly rose to his feet and stumbled with his hands tied behind his back. They closed their spyglasses.
“Well, she appears to be unharmed in any case,” Westley said, “What do you make of Archard?”
Inigo smiled. “Ah, I wouldn’t worry about him. Archard can talk his way out of any danger. He talked me out of killing him, remember.”
Kadir moved off toward the captain’s cabin with Quidest and Archard in tow. Trajan turned around and paced. He didn’t see the other pirates gathering on deck, most of which were now staring at Inigo’s ship and pointing. Nor did he see the pirate who started shouting violent orders before also ascending the ship’s ladder to the captain’s cabin.
Inigo and Trajan started another impromptu lesson. Westley raised the spyglass once again and surveyed the length of the Revenge, and the pirates who scurried along it. He paused when he noticed two on the foredeck speaking to a gathering crowd. The taller one gestured toward the captain’s cabin, the smaller one nodded in agreement. Some shook their heads in disgust, others spat on the deck, still others listened with no outward emotion at all, but gripped their sword hilts.
Westley closed the glass and stroked his chin in thought. Inigo noticed his contemplative look.
“What is it?”
Westley didn’t look up. “Probably nothing.”
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