Chapter Two: Whatever the cost, dear Acheron.
Dressed in our whaler costumes, I stole a moment for myself the morning we attacked the Acheron. I cursed her in my mind for the destruction she had caused this crew, this ship, and momentarily, this friendship. But I also promised her that she would be taken a prize today.
"Whatever the cost?" she mocked me. A smile crept to my lips.
"Oh yes, dear Acheron. Whatever the cost."
I suppose I didn't fully mean it. I said it for Jack because...well, because he needed me to. "Whatever the cost" still sounds careless to my ears. But when Captain Aubrey says those three words, he is imagining himself as the first to die.
That was the first time I really understood. I backed away from the rail, suddenly not so bold with the Acheron looming larger and larger before me. She meant to take whomever she could. And Jack was willing to be one of them.
For the second time on this commission, I prayed. I had prayed that dope Higgins would keep his hands off of me; now I prayed that the Acheron would keep its bloody clutches off Jack Aubrey. He was laughing with Bonden at the helm as I ducked beneath the deck.
I waited patiently—nervously, but controllably so—for the battle to begin. Consumed by the quiet ticking of my watch, I started when the Captain's boom declared, "Let fly!" The larboard battery exploded, the deck shuddered, and I waited.
But I could not wait. Not this time. Battle after battle, patient after patient, relieved when the next body laid before me wasn't the burly form of Aubrey. I was on deck, watching, crossing the boarding plank, all the while following the small golden ponytail. Jack was agile and fast with his sword, accurate with his pistol. He took on the ambience of a young boy, playing pirates or the like. This wasn't war for him now; this was just fun.
The first Frenchman that lunged at me was all it took. Fury blazed inside—fury that became a thrill. Survival. When they decided I wasn't crumbling easily, four, five, six of them came upon me at once. Jack was nearby. Jack was ending them. Jack had not hesitated.
Jack was brutal. He didn't stop. They fell to his feet; he stabbed again. And again. I, somewhere between shock and horror, could not even tell him to stop. The gentle giant who could make a tiny wood carving sing praises to Heaven, who rarely raised his voice to a yell, was relentlessly slaughtering those bodies. Blood poured out around my feet. He looked at me, breathing hard, blinking vacant eyes. Slowly, Jack backed away as though confused, turned and nearly ran off.
I almost stopped him, almost grabbed his arm, almost told him it was okay. But he disappeared before I could almost act. He needed me in that terrible moment when my eyes had been so full of judgment. I had been the one to hesitate.