A Pirated Heart

Her Venom and Gunpowder

9 Years Later:

“I wonder, Bella,” a calm, collected voice drifted from behind Arabella as she pushed her waterlogged sleeves up her thin arms. Rain pelted everyone and everything until every article of clothing and every strand of hair was plastered against their owners. The rain didn't bother her but she frowned at the nickname only he and one other person seemed to use. 

“What do you wonder, Lockes?” Arabella’s voice was sharp and impatient. She had no time to dilly-dally with the Captain. The storm they were currently caught in rocked and lurched the ship in almost every conceivable direction. Arabella was watching two of the men hang, precariously from the rigging in an attempt to capture the flailing sails to keep them from ripping apart.

“How did you know about this storm?” the man’s voice brought Arabella’s attention back from the struggling sailors. She sighed and ignored the urge to turn and punch the man in the nose. He had always picked peculiar times to question her.

“I could smell it, Lockes. Couldn’t you? You wouldn’t be a very good sailor if you couldn’t,” Arabella answered in a bored tone as she ignored the rocking of the ship beneath their feet. She had learned years ago how to stay steady aboard the deck.

“I smelled it, but you judged the time…” Kaden was interrupted before he could add ‘with perfect accuracy’.

“And if you had listened to me, captain,”  Arabella spat out the word in annoyance before continuing, “we wouldn’t be trying to wrangle in three sails in a damn hurricane, now would we?”

Arabella had long since abandoned her filter that kept her from unleashing cruel and scathing words on whoever happened to earn her dislike. Arabella stomped away from her captain and jumped up onto the rigging, ignoring a nearby protest from one of the men. Protests against her always fell on deaf ears.  Kaden Lockes watched her as she climbed the mast and used a nearby rope to propel herself around the largest sail. With a grace that very few possessed, Arabella managed to lock up the main sail and slip back onto the deck before the men had finished with the other two smaller sails. She stomped past her silent leader and disappeared below deck, probably to change and sleep.

Captain Kaden Lockes’s eyes always followed the only female aboard his ship. She hardly acted like her sex. She wasn’t soft and fragile; she wasn’t full of sweetness. In fact, Kaden was sure the woman was filled with nothing but venom and gunpowder. She had easily made a place for herself amongst his crew no matter how new or experience the members were. And it was unnerving how simple she made her actions seem. He had watched her scale the rigging to tie the sail down with an ease that only she possessed. Half of his men wouldn’t have dared to attempt the move, not during a storm. Years of being raised by pirates had taught the woman exactly how to survive. He wondered briefly if she had lived another life before this one. Pirate women were rare and far in between. Most of them had been raised on ships by wayward fathers, but Kaden knew Arabella’s father was dead. She had told him so. So how had she come into piracy? Every time Kaden thought to ask her, she would dodge the question and spit venom in his direction.  He almost quit asking her, but sometimes she looked so thoughtful that he had to know what had filled her green eyes with such immeasurable pain.

“The girl has no sense of self-preservation,” a nearby crewman mumbled as Arabella stormed past him. And it was true. Kaden had seen it. Either her sense of danger was warped or she cared very little if she survived the day. He scowled at the thought.  While being a pirate was a dangerous existence, it was one that rife with preservation. Kaden swore to himself that he would get to the bottom of Arabella Cartridge and her mystery. 

***

Arabella ignored the breakfast Cook had set out for the crew. When he shot her a pointed look, she ignored him. The crew had gotten used to Arabella’s cold demeanor. Cook stowed away some of the food for later; he knew Arabella would come in and eat when no one else could see her. The storm that had pitched the ship fiercely the night before was gone and a light breeze filled the air. The deck was empty save for the Captain and Seamus, the lookout. The rest of the crew were either enjoying breakfast or sleeping.

“We’re getting low on provisions so we should make port soon,” Arabella’s voice seemed to startle the thoughtful captain as Kaden turned to face her. He noticed that she wore her long dark hair in a plaited braid. It was the one feature Arabella seemed to keep as feminine as possible. While he had seen many girls cut their hair short while at sea, Arabella never touched hers except to brush it and braid it.

“Jarrus said the same thing to me last night,” Kaden responded, annoyed they thought him incapable. Arabella smirked.

“He’s a smart man. Don’t know why he gave you the ropes,” She easily quipped before turning to head toward the helm, nodding her head at a limping older man with a giant scar across his eye. The man smiled at her as he headed toward Kaden on the deck. Once on the helm, Arabella gripped the ship’s wheel and directed the ship toward the nearest pirate’s port. She studied the sea for only a moment before her eyes dipped down and studied the men conversing on the deck. Kaden Lockes was a large man wrapped in sinewy muscles and blonde hair. She could understand why the crew feared and respected him as their captain. She had seen him in battle and he was magnificent. But he was nosy and asked too many questions about her past and her abilities. She knew the moment she let any sailor know about her curse, they’d throw her overboard. And while it may not kill her, it would be extremely inconvenient.

While she was lost in her thoughts, Kaden watch Arabella at the ship’s wheel, content to maneuver the massive vessel whichever way she wanted. It was another quirk of hers that Kaden hated. She, in all of her mystery, always seemed to know which direction in which to head. He sometimes wondered if she snuck into his quarters and studied the maps; he almost laughed. Arabella didn’t sneak anywhere, especially not aboard the ship.

“Lettin’ Bells get the best of ya again, Lockes?” Kaden turned to Jarrus, the ex-captain of Calypso’s Fall. The pirate was still every bit as intimidating and ruthless as he had been but he had taken to just being the ship’s medic and had passed on the ship to his protégé.

“I don’t let her do anything,” Kaden responded and they both knew it was the truth. Arabella was almost more of the captain than he was. Kaden often wondered that if she had been a man would Jarrus have handed over Calypso to her.  The thought vexed him immensely.

“She’s a good lass,” Jarrus excused as he glanced up at the dark haired woman manning the wheel. It had been during his captaincy that Arabella had made a place for herself. It was quite a feat considering most of his original crew thought she was a curse. However, her inability to connect kept her from making any friends or allies amongst the crew. The only people aboard the ship who cared whether she lived or died seemed to be Jarrus, Kaden and Cook.  

“How does she do that?” Kaden growled as he watched Arabella shift the ship’s wheel and change their direction.  Jarrus shrugged himself of his thought as he smirked. It was a question he had asked himself hundreds of times, but he never asked her. She had never steered them wrong.

“I’ve neva’ quite learned. But it’d do ya a bit of good not to pry,” Jarrus warned as he patted Kaden on the shoulder before climbing to stand on the helm with the dark haired pirate.