“I fixed those, too. Pumps don't work without their handles.” He winked at Marjorie.
“You dove under the ship?” Marjorie's eyes grazed him, and they widened, noting his trews, the color darker with damp.
“Brilliant,” Aidan whispered.
“Not so far under,” Cormac replied with a crooked smile. “Come, now.” He took her arm, ushering her to the ladder. “Time for you to get off the ship.”
Though she felt her legs moving, she was having a hard time connecting thoughts with movements. Cormac had been in the water. Water that would soon be up around their ears if they didn't get off now.
“Can the girl make it?” Aidan's tone was condescending.
His scrutiny focused Marjorie. She was not weak. She would not be weak.
“I'm fine,” she said, gripping her skirts. But her fingers were ice cold.
The ship lurched again, and Marjorie's stomach with it. They were on a sinking ship far from port. The entire situation was unthinkable madness.
“The water will be coming fast now.” Cormac turned to the bailie. “Take the women ashore. Now.” There was a low groan, and water trickled in from the seam between floor and wall.
“The prisoners!” Marjorie's shout sounded hollow in her own ears. She remembered the prisoners. They were on a lower deck. They'd drown.
There was a sharp crack, and the trickle of water turned into a gush. Water seeped higher, swirling around their ankles. It lapped at the bodies strewn on the floor, casting the hem of her dress a ghastly shade of rust.
“Get me out!” Adele shrieked, shaking her husband's arm. Alarm thickened her accent. “You… you… sale con! You will get me off this ship!”
Marjorie watched the bailie, his face colorless as parchment, as he scampered up the ladder with his wife. But she could only stand paralyzed, unable to wrap her mind around what was happening. One of her feet was poised on the bottom rung, but freezing water churned around the other. She knew she should get out of there, but all she could think about was what would become of the body of her uncle.
“Ree, love,” Cormac said gendy. Cupping her cheeks in his hands, he gave her a slow, chaste kiss. It felt like good-bye, and her throat ached with anguish. “You must go. Now, Ree. The lower deck will be flooding fast now.”
“Wait.” Tears finally sprang to her eyes, spilling in a hot torrent down her chilled face. “What about you?”
“I'll bide a wee longer,” Cormac said. The corners of his eyes crinkled with a rueful smile. “I've a hold full of slaves to rescue.”
“As do I.” Aidan stepped up behind his brother, and Marjorie made a choked sound, somewhere between a laugh and a sob.
She stared at Cormac one last time, memorizing his eyes, the color of a stormy sky, and the furrow in his brow, visible beneath a dark swatch of still-damp hair. She would see him again in no time, she assured herself.
With a mute nod, she forced herself to move.
Next she knew, she was floating in a five-person dory, her body numb, wondering how, exactly, she'd made it up and off the ship. She spent the next agonizing minutes trapped in some dreadful hallucination, watching as the moonlit masts of the Oliphant — and Cormac — slowly sank beneath the waves.
Mayhem ruled on deck. There were two launch boats — the captain's gig and a whaleboat — each intended to carry only ten. Crewmen struggled to unhitch them in the darkness, lowering them into the churning waves. Some sailors clambered down the rope ladder, fighting to be first on board, while others simply dove from the railing in terror, attempting to swim ashore. It was rumored that the force of a sinking ship was enough to suck a man down to the bottom of the sea.
Cormac looked
landward. Aberdeen harbor was an inky black swatch in the distance, standing apart from the glimmering, starlit sea. They weren't so far from land — a strong swimmer with his wits about him would make it.
“Slaves are held aft,” Aidan said simply, shouldering by his brother.
Cormac nodded and followed close behind. “We need to get them before they drown. She'll sink fast now.” He attuned his ears, picking out cries from the prisoners trapped on the lower deck. Gauging by how low the ship rode in the water, the men would be chest — high in seawater.
They stood at the top of the companionway ladder, peering to the hold below. Water sloshed, shimmering in the moonlight like a black mirror.
“No time like the present.” Cormac nudged past his brother, descending the ladder. His legs were soon immersed, but he kept going, ignoring the sharp bite of frigid water stealing across the tiny bones in his feet all the way up to his thighs. “She's locked tight,” he said, jiggling the submerged latch. He slammed his shoulder against the door for good measure, but the deep water prevented any momentum.
The prisoners heard the commotion, and began howling and pleading with renewed intensity.
Aidan was right beside him, the calm on his face at odds with the water lapping against their torsos. “Quiet,” he bellowed, slamming his hand high on the door. Head tilted low in concentration, he held both hands underwater, blindly assessing the lock. He glanced up at Cormac, and said, “Your dirk.”
“My dirk?”
“Aye… No,” Aidan said suddenly, “not the dirk, the scabbard. Give me the scabbard.” Raising a brow, he stuck his hand out. “Unless you'd care to bide here a wee longer?”
Scowling, Cormac retrieved both the weapon and its scabbard from his belt. Water lapped at their armpits now, and his fingers fumbled in the icy water.
Taking the scabbard, Aidan slid open an outer pocket, pulling out the tiny knife and fork kept for eating. He replaced the knife, handing it all back to Cormac except for the fork, which he levered against the door, splaying the two tines wide. “For the lock,” he grunted.
“Impressive, Aid.” By the time his brother was through, Cormac had clumsily reattached the weapon at his waist.
He put his hand out for the fork. “I can do it.”
“No.” Aidan shouldered his brother aside. “I've some experience with locks and shackles.” Aidan's expression was strained, and in it Cormac glimpsed the ghosts of his brother's past, saw how they haunted him. “By all means,” Cormac told him quietly, stepping back to give him the most of what meager moonlight seeped down the hatch.
Aidan ducked under water, and Cormac found himself holding his breath in sympathy. The ship moaned incessantly now, complaining about the watery grave that was subsuming them all.
His brother popped up for a breath of air, then went back down again, until finally the door cracked open. They shoved hard, the thick wood moving sluggishly against the water. The rank stench of penned men swirled out to them.
“Easy,” Aidan growled, as the first of the prisoners began to push his way out. They were panicked, like trapped animals, clawing over each other for freedom.
“Easy, lads.” Cormac pushed past his brother, deciding he'd be the one to usher the men free. The haunted look on Aidan's face spoke to memories too tortured to bear. “One at a time… that's the way.” There were just fourteen men in all, and he and Aidan quickly got them on deck and off the ship, where they jammed into the boats going ashore. A few of the sailors spared contemptuous glances for their former captives, but most seemed occupied with saving their own hides.
Relief swelled through Cormac. The first boat — the captain's gig — was already overloaded and bobbing its way back to harbor. The whaleboat was ready and waiting.
They'd saved the men. It was what Ree had wanted. What he'd wanted, too, if he were being honest.
It was a foolish impulse, but even though he knew Marjorie was safe, Cormac wanted to see where she was, to imagine he savored the moment with her. There was one boat smaller than the others, a dory, its clean white paint glowing gray in the black water. Eyes adjusting, he made out the figures on board — a few men, and two smaller silhouettes, the women.
He smiled. Forbes had been desperate to return to shore, but she'd made the bailie stay to watch. His smile grew broader still, imagining what that scene might've looked like.
“When you're done goggling like an ape, we should get ourselves off this tub.” Cormac shot his brother a look, expecting to find a glare to match the spiteful words. But instead, Aidan had a playful expression on his face, and in it Cormac saw the ghost of a ten-year-old scamp. He cuffed Aidan on the shoulder. “You first, if you're so skittish.”
Cormac turned back for one more glance of Marjorie, and his heart jumped in his chest. The crazed lass was standing now, and the dory bobbed wildly as she struggled for balance. One of the men was trying to pull her back down before she capsized them, but she was staring stubbornly, gesturing wildly.
Dread snaked through his chest like a chill fog. He looked up, frightened by what he might see. Cormac heard it now, in the way that sight aids hearing. The little moorish boy was tangled in the radines, crying quietly. Though the child appeared stoic, Cormac saw terror in the tension of his small body, in his rigid grip on the lines.
“You go,” he told Aidan. “I've one more to save.”
His brother squinted at the masts, and Cormac pointed. “There, by the topsail.”
“God's bones,” Aidan exclaimed. “You always get to play the hero. Not this time.” He strode to the mizzenmast.
“We're in this together.”
Cormac had to chuckle, despite the danger. He tossed the rope down to the whaleboat, shouting, “You're under way, lads.”
There was a sharp crack, and the brothers staggered, grabbing onto the base of the mizzenmast as the Oliphant tilted wildly. White spume swirled on deck. Cormac and his brother shared a grave look. “She's going fast now.” Aidan leapt up, scrabbling like a spider up the web of lines. “I'm ready to get out of this water anyhow.” Cormac climbed beside him, until they reached the boy, perching on either side of him. “Hold him.” Weaving his legs in the radines for stability, Aidan grabbed the boy around the waist. Though the child had a clawlike grip on the lines and was tangled besides, they couldn't risk him falling to the deck below. “Got him. Cut the lines.”