Angel Silver's ship, The Angel of Death, was a fearsome sight to behold. Bigger than normal pirate ships – tiny sloops or two-masted brigs – and smaller than a warship, The Angel of Death had the advantage of speed, weaponry, and the ultimate advantage – a figurehead that struck fear into the most courageous men's hearts and paralysed them into inaction, causing them to become easy targets for the frightful ship, Captain, and Crew.
This mere carving – ah! Mere carving, say I? Nay, no mere carving, but a dreadful promise of doom and destruction, and, yes, even death, to those who went too far and turned courage into foolishness. This figurehead, this promise of death, can be described as such, yet even the words I pen here shall not be able to fill your heart with the fear and dread felt by those who witnessed it with their own two eyes.
An angel leaned out underneath the bowsprit of the ship, its wooden wings spread out and melting into the sides of the ship. At first glance it looked like the churchly image of a serene messenger of God, but closer inspection revealed the carved flames dancing eternally in the angel's eyes as it brought it hands forward in not a gesture of prayer, but to hold out a wooden skull, its jaws open wide in a silent scream and its eye sockets open wide in horror as it looked out to the sea, warning and promising.
Now you may think that Angel was a vicious, ruthless, cold-blooded killer, but let me assure you that it was not so – well, not all the time. In truth, Angel wasn't much more than the next pirate, and though her success rate, compared to others, was extraordinary, her success was largely owed to the above-described figurehead, which did half the work for her by paralysing victims with fear.
Angel didn't pirate around for sport or for killing, she did it to survive. What she filched, she sold for money, and used that money to feed and clothe her crew, to repair her beloved ship, and if anything was left over, to spend on petty indulgences for the men. If she had family, she may have sent money or goods home, but as it were her mother – a black woman – had died during Angel's maiden voyage, and her father, Long John Silver, had passed away soon after. So it was that Angel was the last of the Silvers – but it didn't bother her. She was happy. She had her ship, and she had her crew. Her family. They were men she knew from childhood, surrogate fathers and uncles and brothers. And, though she didn't yet know it, a lover, who loved from near and yet a distance immeasurable.
And now a suffocating calm and heat hung around The Angel of Death, doing nothing to ease the stormy mood of Angel Silver. Prowling the decks like a restless lioness, she lashed out at her men with both her tongue and her whip, the latter held in her hand by a smooth wooden handle, the large emerald embedded inside the wood glinting like a snake's eye as the tail of the whip uncoiled with lightning swiftness to lash against one man's bare back, causing him to gasp with pain as he bent over his oar, a thin red line appearing on his brown back, the drops of blood gleaming in the dull light like smooth rubies. "Pull harder!" Angel roared, cracking the whip in the air. "Harder, ye miserable oafs, ye clownish fools! Harder, or feel this whip on yer back! Pull harder if ye wish to live to see the next dawn!"
Robin Morgan, at her side, lay his hand on her shoulder. "Angel, they can only go so fast in this calm. Even the waves are against them. Calm down, will you?"
Angel whirled on him. "And would ye like to taste the feel of this whip as well?" she spat, baring her teeth. "Calm down, is it? Shut yer mouth before I have ye tied to the mast and flayed within an inch of yer damned life! Curse you, tavern girl's son!" She turned away from him and stormed off into her cabin, leaving Robin standing where he was, lips pressed together tightly.
Slamming the door behind her, she slid into her chair and stared, fuming, at the papers that littered her desk.
They'd left Nassau weeks and weeks ago, near on two months, and had come across a few ships, but they bore no precious burdens of gold and silver and jewels, just petty merchandise that Angel had, to relieve the boredom, taken to a couple ports in France and England – she daren't show herself in Spain – and sold them to merchants. It was part of one of her rather more ingenious plans, which she was quite proud of. And since it provided her a few moments' relief, she allowed herself to think of and gloat over her own brilliance. Oftentimes when they were out searching for ships to plunder, but came across only mediocre merchant ships that carried nothing but spices and fabrics, Angel would have the crew take out their 'civilian' clothes – items stolen off the crew members of past victims – and take down their pirate flag, to rig it with the flags of either England or France, and then boldly sail into a port, announce their wares, sell them to other merchant companies, use the profit to fit them out again for another long stretch of cruising, and then go back to patrolling the seas like the blood-hungry, ravenous sharks they were. The only thing Angel disliked about this plan was that she had to hide belowdecks the whole time they were in the port, or dress up as the daughter of some non-existent governor of an island in the Caribbean to explain her presence. That she did not enjoy, but for the sake of the greater good of her crew, she bore it, although she did occasionally enjoy flirting with good-looking young Navy men and making them stutter and stumble over each other in their efforts to secure the gloved arm of "Adrianna, daughter of the Honourable Governor of Port Royal". And, of course, watching Robin glower at the arrogant Commodore as he escorted her to his cabin for a glass of wine was always enjoyable.
But now, after a venture in France, not a single ship had they come across, and now they had landed smack-dab in the middle of a storm. Well, not a storm yet, Angel acknowledged mentally, but these terrible calms were just as bad, if not worse. She could do nothing to quicken the pace of her men, who strained at the oars, trying to shift the massive bulk of the ship in the heavy waters. She felt guilty, too, knowing that she was being unfair on her crew, who loved her in their own manner, and she winced as she remembered the drops of blood evoked by the stinging caress of her whip. The look on Robin's face when she had cursed him and left him on the deck made her feel guilty too; the tiny glint of hurt in his eyes made her hate the words she'd said. He was her closest friend, loyalist crewmember aboard, and only he could make her feel guilty over such a thing as a few words. She'd have to make it up to him, somehow, without being too obvious. It wouldn't be good for her image if she suddenly broke down and apologized to everyone whose feelings she'd hurt.
Angel scowled. She hated them, these cursed calms before storms. The heat and the stillness got to her, grated on her nerves, made her itch for the action that the storm demanded. She pushed the chair back and got off, pacing the room with the quick, irritable steps of a caged wildcat, her blue eyes gleaming dangerously in the grey light that slid through the window's glass. Then suddenly the cabin lurched, and she was swung off balance. Cursing, Angel grabbed her swinging hammock and straightened herself before striding for the door.
As she emerged onto the deck, she could feel the difference in the air. It was no longer heavy and calm; now it was cold and wind whipped at her face as rain came splattering down. Thank the Lord, she thought as she headed for Robin; the storm was coming, the calm was gone. Let the winds and the rains pit themselves against her! She would prove no match for them. She lifted her head as she strode out to her men, bellowing out orders as she went. "Ship oars! Reef th' sails! Batten down th' hatches an' nail everythin' down! Prepare fer a storm straight from Hell!"
As Dr. Thomas Livesey, ship's surgeon on the Hispaniola, doubled over the bulwarks, retching and gagging and his face literally green, he appeared to be in dire need of his own services. Elizabeth Hawkins, now called Jim Hawkins as she assumed the identity of the Hispaniola's cabin boy, had her arm around her friend to support him as his body sagged, weak from the exertion of returning the morning's meal of hardtack and salted fish to the sea from whence the dead fish came.
It had been a week since they'd left Bristol, and so far the winds had been fair and their speed swift. And while Elizabeth had adapted wonderfully to the new living conditions, Dr. Thomas had no such luck. The first day he'd done well as anyone on board, but the next morning, as the ship crested a particularly large rolling wave, he'd become suddenly and violently seasick.
Captain Smollet and the rest of the well-seasoned crew seemed to find this rather amusing, and assured him that he'd be over his seasickness soon and that he'd be better off with it, but Elizabeth, who as cabin boy had to attend to the ship's surgeon, felt rather more sympathetic towards her friend's condition.
Now she slipped her arm around his waist and waited till he settled his arm over her shoulder before slowly hobbling towards his cabin.
"Poor Thomas," she said sympathetically as she kicked open the door of his cabin, "But the Cap'n says you'll be fine in a day or two. Bear up, Thom, you'll be fine as a fiddle and healthy as a horse in no time!"
Thomas groaned. "I don't feel fine or healthy," he moaned. "I just feel sick."
Depositing him on his bed, Elizabeth turned to leave. "Just stay put in bed, and take a nice long nap," she told him, "And don't come back out on deck unless you're doing better, you hear? The deck needs swabbing, and I won't have you interrupting me for the hundredth time."
"Thanks, Elizabeth," Thomas murmured, his voice slightly muffled as he pulled the covers over his head. "You've been a jolly great help."
Elizabeth smiled and shrugged, "All part of the duties of Jim Hawkins, cabin boy," she said, and left the cabin, closing the door behind her.
Hours later, Elizabeth wiped the sweat from her face, panting slightly as she resumed scrubbing the forecastle deck. An oppressing heat had settled over the sea, snaring the Hispaniola. The winds had withdrawn and vanished, and now the sails hung limply against the masts. After a while of uselessly heaving at the oars, Captain Smollet ordered all the men to leave off, and now the crew was scattered all over the ship, wandering around restlessly and fixing things up, oiling pulleys and testing ropes.
Thomas, who had begun to feel better, staggered out of his cabin and tottered around the deck, keeping a good hold on the bulwarks.
"Ahoy, matey!" he called out to Elizabeth. "What's with the weather?"
Elizabeth paused to look out over the still waters surrounding them. "Cap'n says it's the calm before a storm."
Thomas squinted in the dull, metallic light that the sun cast through the veil of misty grey clouds. "Doesn't look too bad to me," he said, "In fact, I'd say it's a jolly load better than what we had earlier!"
"Shows just how much you know," a grim voice said from behind him, and Thomas swung around unsteadily to see Captain Smollet, his face stony. "Calmer it is, the worse the storm'll be," he continued. "This' un's sent from Satan himself, it is."
The words were no sooner out of his mouth than a blast of freezing air threw itself at them, making them all jump and lose their balance.
"Speak of the Devil," commented Captain Smollet, as he grabbed hold of several ropes, and then he raised his voice, calling to the crew, who were already gearing themselves for action.
"All hands on deck! Reef the sails! Secure all lifelines!"
As the rest of the crew, including Elizabeth, jumped smartly to attention, Thomas Livesey staggered back to his cabin and locked the door.
