smackenzie (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
smackenzie) wrote2013-11-10 05:27 pm
smackenzie) wrote2013-11-10 05:27 pm
Entry tags:
in which the two pirate ships go their separate ways
Besides that, there was the question of provisions. The slave ship had not carried nearly enough for all the men and women in the hold, and the provisions currently on the Cormorant and the Black Lightning would not last much longer.
"Find us civilization," Maggie told Severein. "We need to change course."
The other thing she had not counted on was nearly being voted out of the captain's chair. Yora was almost elected captain of the Black Lightning and it was a close thing. Maggie was furious - had she not acquired for them another ship? Had she not led many attacks on many merchant ships? Had she not accumulated a great deal of treasure for herself and her crew? Her very recent record was not good, this was true, but her past should speak for itself. Besides, the Black Lightning was her ship and she'd be damned before she lost it to anyone.
Barely two days had passed after they captured the slave ship before a consensus was reached that perhaps it was not in everyone's best interests for the Cormorant and the Black Lightning to sail together. Until the Cormorant could be refitted for piracy and loaded up with cannon, it was not as useful in a fight as the Black Lightning, despite the number of people on it, and if the two ships together could only really capture one, it was not fair or equitable to have to split one captured ship's booty among two ships' worth of pirates. Bernade thought this was a great plan - she was enjoying being captain of her own ship and full of confidence in her ability to track, chase, and capture ships bearing valuable treasure. She wished to go out on her own and wreak havoc, and as much as Maggie would miss her, she could not deny the attraction of being one's own woman and making one's own chaos under one's own terms.
But the question of provisions was still a valid one, and once all the supplies were divided among the two ships, there was barely a month's worth for each.
"We cannot head back to Port Doras," Maggie admitted to Doren and Yuna. She could not find Abna, the girl who had become quartermaster in Bernade's place, and she had always trusted Doren to tell her the truth and to give good advice. "We will have little to show for ourselves, and the crew's blood is up. We must find better quarry." She grabbed at someone walking past, recognized him as one of the men who had joined when they first captured the Cormorant, and told him to find Severein and bring him to her.
"We can still turn for home," Yuna suggested, "and seek any ships setting out from the port. They may have provisions if nothing else."
"We need more than provisions. We need treasure. I cannot keep a crew if I cannot lead them to gold. We do not have a pirate navy - we cannot sack a city."
In the Royal Academy, she had heard stories of a pirate navy, an entire flotilla of pirate ships under the command of a kind of pirate council, which terrorized the islands seventy or so years ago. This navy had plundered cities and sank the ships sent to capture them. But pirates were a fractious lot and the navy dissolved under the greed of its component parts, arguments over who would get what treasure, who could control which towns and cities, whose flag would fly over which important buildings. Maggie's lesson from those stories was that pirates, as any other group of people at sea, needed one firm hand to guide them if they were to do anything as a collective. In the years since, she had met few pirate captains who even wanted the job. They were by nature fairly individualistic people, disinclined to take orders from anyone, even one of their own.
She did not have any control over Bernade now that Bernade was captain of her own ship. How would it be possible for Maggie to control a navy?
But now that the thought had entered her mind, she could not dislodge it. It was not useful for her purposes under her current circumstances - her immediate needs were too specific to her ship - but if she could gather a navy, what power could she wield against the Usurper, and what power could she bring to bear in support of the king-in-exile? He would not want several thousand pirates fighting under his name, but there were ways around that. There were ways for Maggie to reach this one goal without compromising the man for whom she would do it.
"What are you thinking?" Doren asked, bringing her back to the issue at hand.
"I am thinking about gathering a navy." By Doren's expression, that was not at all the answer she was expecting. Yuna however looked thoughtful. "But not right now. Right now I am thinking that perhaps Yuna is right, and we could turn towards home in search of ships heading away from the islands towards the open sea. They will be carrying provisions and plunder just as any ships heading the other way. We may yet be able to salvage this voyage."
She had the message relayed to Bernade aboard the Cormorant, that the Black Lightning was going home to seek merchants closer to the island. Bernade replied that she was going to head west and try her luck that way, and perhaps they would see each other in Port Doras. Maggie would leave a message at Madame Lilyet's brothel if she returned first, and if Bernade reached port first, she would leave word at the inn where Maggie liked to stay.
So the Black Lightning set its course for Port Doras, with the understanding among the crew that they were searching for merchant ships fat with gold and local treasures, to try and make up for the disappointing voyage so far.
words: 950
total words: 16,076
"Find us civilization," Maggie told Severein. "We need to change course."
The other thing she had not counted on was nearly being voted out of the captain's chair. Yora was almost elected captain of the Black Lightning and it was a close thing. Maggie was furious - had she not acquired for them another ship? Had she not led many attacks on many merchant ships? Had she not accumulated a great deal of treasure for herself and her crew? Her very recent record was not good, this was true, but her past should speak for itself. Besides, the Black Lightning was her ship and she'd be damned before she lost it to anyone.
Barely two days had passed after they captured the slave ship before a consensus was reached that perhaps it was not in everyone's best interests for the Cormorant and the Black Lightning to sail together. Until the Cormorant could be refitted for piracy and loaded up with cannon, it was not as useful in a fight as the Black Lightning, despite the number of people on it, and if the two ships together could only really capture one, it was not fair or equitable to have to split one captured ship's booty among two ships' worth of pirates. Bernade thought this was a great plan - she was enjoying being captain of her own ship and full of confidence in her ability to track, chase, and capture ships bearing valuable treasure. She wished to go out on her own and wreak havoc, and as much as Maggie would miss her, she could not deny the attraction of being one's own woman and making one's own chaos under one's own terms.
But the question of provisions was still a valid one, and once all the supplies were divided among the two ships, there was barely a month's worth for each.
"We cannot head back to Port Doras," Maggie admitted to Doren and Yuna. She could not find Abna, the girl who had become quartermaster in Bernade's place, and she had always trusted Doren to tell her the truth and to give good advice. "We will have little to show for ourselves, and the crew's blood is up. We must find better quarry." She grabbed at someone walking past, recognized him as one of the men who had joined when they first captured the Cormorant, and told him to find Severein and bring him to her.
"We can still turn for home," Yuna suggested, "and seek any ships setting out from the port. They may have provisions if nothing else."
"We need more than provisions. We need treasure. I cannot keep a crew if I cannot lead them to gold. We do not have a pirate navy - we cannot sack a city."
In the Royal Academy, she had heard stories of a pirate navy, an entire flotilla of pirate ships under the command of a kind of pirate council, which terrorized the islands seventy or so years ago. This navy had plundered cities and sank the ships sent to capture them. But pirates were a fractious lot and the navy dissolved under the greed of its component parts, arguments over who would get what treasure, who could control which towns and cities, whose flag would fly over which important buildings. Maggie's lesson from those stories was that pirates, as any other group of people at sea, needed one firm hand to guide them if they were to do anything as a collective. In the years since, she had met few pirate captains who even wanted the job. They were by nature fairly individualistic people, disinclined to take orders from anyone, even one of their own.
She did not have any control over Bernade now that Bernade was captain of her own ship. How would it be possible for Maggie to control a navy?
But now that the thought had entered her mind, she could not dislodge it. It was not useful for her purposes under her current circumstances - her immediate needs were too specific to her ship - but if she could gather a navy, what power could she wield against the Usurper, and what power could she bring to bear in support of the king-in-exile? He would not want several thousand pirates fighting under his name, but there were ways around that. There were ways for Maggie to reach this one goal without compromising the man for whom she would do it.
"What are you thinking?" Doren asked, bringing her back to the issue at hand.
"I am thinking about gathering a navy." By Doren's expression, that was not at all the answer she was expecting. Yuna however looked thoughtful. "But not right now. Right now I am thinking that perhaps Yuna is right, and we could turn towards home in search of ships heading away from the islands towards the open sea. They will be carrying provisions and plunder just as any ships heading the other way. We may yet be able to salvage this voyage."
She had the message relayed to Bernade aboard the Cormorant, that the Black Lightning was going home to seek merchants closer to the island. Bernade replied that she was going to head west and try her luck that way, and perhaps they would see each other in Port Doras. Maggie would leave a message at Madame Lilyet's brothel if she returned first, and if Bernade reached port first, she would leave word at the inn where Maggie liked to stay.
So the Black Lightning set its course for Port Doras, with the understanding among the crew that they were searching for merchant ships fat with gold and local treasures, to try and make up for the disappointing voyage so far.
words: 950
total words: 16,076