The Swashbuckling Yarn of Milady Vixen Read Free

bristled at this comment despite his speaking in a matter-of-fact tone, a statement instead of an insult. She watched as her dame’s shoulders stiffened. Like her mother, she stared daggers at the insulting knave.
    The young man’s untamed red hair was as wavy as the ocean and about as wild. He wore no shoes, had a red sash for a belt and a small cutlass stuffed into the scarlet material encircling his waist. His blue eyes danced with inner merriment. Violet judged him to be around sixteen or so, a gangly youth who smiled at them both. This didn’t make his statement any more tolerable.
    “Yes,” Suga answered.
    “Welcome onboard the Dancing Dolphin , then!” he cheerily called out.
    “Come, Violet.”
    As her mother towed her up the gangplank, Violet tried to take in every detail her brain could handle. Men worked diligently upon the decks and on the spars and entered and exited the cargo hold’s opening. The man who had greeted them bowed and led the two women to their cabin.
    “Captain Roebuck told me ye were to have the best accommodations possible,” he commented. “Although ye be exiled from Effingham, the master of this vessel believes the two of you were done wrong by the courts.”
    “He is a wise man, then,” Suga noted blandly.
    “Aye, that he be!”
    Escorting them into the small cabin just to the port side of the stairs that led to the poop deck, he flung the door wide and ushered them in with a bow and sweep of his arm.
    “If’n ye need anything, just sing out.” He grinned. “My name’s Tom, but everyone calls me Ginger Tom for the color of my hair.”
    “I will do so if necessary,” her mother stated.
    Shutting the door behind him, the strange sailor left the two exiles alone. Violet surveyed the cabin and found it contained a trio of hammocks, a table—bolted to the deck—and a pair of chairs. In addition, there was a footlocker standing just below the porthole on the port side. She scampered atop of it only after dumping her belongings—all except Mister Snookums. Peering out of the open portal, she watched the milling flocks of people on the docks with anger, occasionally glancing sorrowfully up to where she knew her father to be buried. Hearing the cries of the gulls, the slap of the water against the sides of the vessel and the general hubbub of the folk made her grief even more acute.
    “Take a last look,” her mother said unemotionally, “for we shall never return here.”
    “I will never forget it, Mama,” she said with a choking sob.
    “Other sights will soon be ours. My father is a great juju man in my village, and we will be welcomed as honored guests. You will learn many new things and have pleasant playmates in the jungle. I am sorry I ever left.”
    Turning around, she saw the impressive woman’s countenance crack for the first time in her life. Her mother’s calm and unshakable strength was legendary in the keep. Nothing seemed to bother her. Now faced with an ocean voyage, the death of her beloved husband and the cruel exile, tears began to well up in her deep brown eyes. Violet noticed with great pride her mother didn’t wail and beat her breast like many of the other females she had seen grieve. Instead in proud silence she cried, without false fanfare but with no less intensity and honest feeling.
    She is a warrior, Violet thought, and she would never show a loss of dignity. If I am to take my vow seriously, I should learn from her.
    After a few minutes, the tall and elegant woman took up her walking staff and sat down cross-legged on the deck. Violet watched with interest. From her sack her mother unveiled a sharpened and well-honed flint spearhead. Singing a song of the hunt in her native language, her dame lashed the dull, dark object to the staff.
    Mama is going to practice! Violet gleefully thought.
    Suga began kicking off her shoes and tossing the last remnants of civilization out the porthole. Violet watched her mother motion to her. With a haughty