The Mosque Hill Fortune (The Sons of Masguard, Book One)

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven

The Albatross had been well designed.

Locks were not the problem. With the right tools, McKinley could pick each and every one of them in a matter of moments and make for the wheel with a full crew at his back. But it would serve them little to rush above decks when they were so thoroughly outmatched. For them to have any chance at all, McKinley had to take Marshall out of the picture. And before he could put his mind to accomplishing that, he first had to solve his current problem.

Location.

The orlop, where the prisoner cells were housed, was positioned near the bottommost section of the ship, just above the hold. It was topped by both the middle and lower gun decks, which were thoroughly active by day and populated by sleeping crewmen at night. Assuming he could slip through those two levels without notice, he still would have to bypass the night watch and cross the main deck under the noses of the ‘round-the-clock repair details. So, by design, the whole of the ship – and its crew – stood between him and his target.

The Marauder smiled in the hours before dawn.

He did so enjoy a challenge.

He waited as long as his patience would allow, carving crude figures in the wall and listening to his fellow prisoners tire and cease their brigand conversations. Then, when he was certain that most of the crew might be lost in slumber, McKinley removed his boots, parked his hat in the cleanest corner of his cell, and opened the door.

For several breaths, he paused, listening for signs of movement from above. When none came, he stepped from behind the bars and paused again over the slight rustle from a nearby cell. It was Father Faiz, kneeling in penance.

McKinley swallowed. He remembered the slowness in Faiz’s step, the hang of his head as he returned from the interrogation earlier that evening. There in the quiet, where his thoughts could be as loud as they wished, the Marauder felt a keen sense of regret for the way he’d distanced himself from the clairvoyant creature.

Whatever else he may have been, the warrior-priest was still his friend.

It seemed so horrendously wrong that he’d ever treated him as anything less.

“Father?” he interrupted quietly.

An ear pivoted gently in his direction, though the fox kept his eyes closed. “Yes, Captain?”

“Are you alright?”

He waited through the stillness for the reply that eventually came.

“Yes, Captain.”

After a moment, the Marauder looked away. Then he nodded and continued on his course, hoping the priest could sense the subtle gesture, even if he couldn’t see it. He hugged the wall on his way up the stairs like a mobile shadow, disturbing nothing in his path. Not the boards beneath his feet, not the breathing of the soldiers who tossed and turned occasionally in the night, and certainly not the illusion of security voiced by the thirty-minute whistle overhead.

No matter his skill in stealth, wandering openly onto the quarterdeck would have been suicidal. The gun ports would each be buttoned down, and trying to open them over the sleeping heads of Marshall’s sailors would have been equally foolish. His only option sat at the rear of the middle gun deck, past the surgeon and lieutenants’ quarters, where the stern windows of the wardroom opened directly beneath the captain’s cabin. Once there, he could climb to Marshall’s room – hopefully, without waking him – and remove him in whatever way became necessary.