Winds of Fate [Books IV - VI]

Chapter 161: Overturned

"The dear Admiral Smith won't be too happy about your adventures, Missy. Imagine! 7,000 pounds for your capture—ALIVE!"

The dreaded, dull sound of rolling shots into the guns follow Agassi's words.

Admiral Smith. The father she has missed. The one they mourned. All this time...

Papa is alive.

"Unfortunately for you..." Agassi shrugs. "I have no use for gold now."

Eleanore takes a deep breath; her head spinning at the many barbs this annoying nemesis has—Fate might have taken Abram, but she sure did dispense Agassi to do the same and even more.

"You're lying!" She blurts, although she immediately regrets it, for her task here is to be a captain, not a daughter. "I don't care! Listen to me!" She steps onto the rail and addresses the ships. "If all of you end the Dutchman, the curse remains, unbroken, with a chance to become more vicious! Now, you only become monsters in the land of the living and retain your sanity here, but once Dutchman is gone, the curse will swallow you whole!"

"Better a monster than the Devil's slave," Agassi sneers, waving his pistol artfully, as he goads the murmurs to a hush, "better monsters than this bitch's soldiers!"

The corpses roar in agreement. Fritzl looks up at her, his fist tight and hope dimming in his ruby eyes.

"Tell her the truth, Fernandez!"

Eleanore stiffens. She glances at Fernandez, and even Mama scowls at him. Capitán Marques, however, keeps his attention on Agassi. But Capitán Fernandez bears their burning eyes and everyone else's curiosity.

"Tell her the truth!" Agassi berates his superior, utterly mad now. "That's why she failed, right?"

Her heart stops.

"Failed?" Mama frowns at them all, completely lost.

Eleanore purses her lips tight. Even Dutchman's crew eyes her. Even Fritzl sighs. He knows it too. She grips the sword handle tight, and Fernandez only shakes his head.

"In Tortuga!" Agassi screams to the ships. "That's why we all arose from Death! That's why these ships sailed and nearly massacred an island! You failed, Smith! You let Fernandez die!"

No. Her heart folds, but Fernandez holds out a hand to assure her, mutely shaking his head, like a father warning her not to cry. Eleanore wouldn't, but her own hope flickers dangerously within—

"You could care less, you hypocrite," Fernandez spits to Agassi, much to the Italian's surprise. And with a sorrowful gaze, he turns to her, "It is true, Leonor... Señora..."

He even looks on to Mama.

Mama gapes, turns to her.

But Eleanore doesn't know what to make of it either.

"It is true. The Admiral of the British Navy is a man named George Gordon Smith. He started serving as Admiral three years ago—"

"1717." Eleanore gasps. "I... I was still in Boston... Mama—" Their eyes meet, but Mama touches her temple, frowning aside. 1717, her mother has been dead for nigh seven years.

"Sí." Fernandez sighs, scowling at a smug Agassi. "Packard knew your father. They were once—

The English one. The former Navy captain. Eleanore trembles. "No..."

"Señora." Fernandez turns to Mama, who steps back, as if the captain had switched allegiance. "We cannot know for cert—"

"No."