her two escorts fell to the deck.
Breaking free in the confusion, Alice scrambled close to the side rail. She tripped over a body but used the dead man’s cutlass to slice at the ropes binding her wrists. It took several passes to cut through the rope. A rush of freedom filled her veins. She spoke to the dead man as she stole his blade. “I need this more than you. Sorry.”
“There be the witch who’s brung the plague down on us.” Rasher lorded over her.
“The Olivia Grace wasn’t carrying the plague.”
Rasher pointed his dagger at the attacking ship. “That bloody barge is. Ye cursed us.”
The mysterious vessel loomed large and ominous. It was bedecked with tattered black sails. Great strips of sickly green hung from the yardarms. The decks stood empty. Not a soul could be seen. Were the guns firing on their own? It looked possessed, and abandoned.
Better to take her chances with spirits than pirates. Alice pointed her cutlass at him. “You’re right. I am a witch, and I’ve cursed you all to the fiery pits of hell. There’s only one way to save your sorry hides. Release me. I have the power to stop the devil ship. Let me go, and you can be rid of us all.”
Rasher glared at her. “I be as damned as I plan to git. I’d ratha kill ye.”
Alice slashed out with her cutlass. Rasher growled and lunged at her. She swung on him once more as the Delmar caught another round of fire and lurched beneath her feet. Alice lost her balance and caught Rasher’s hip with the end of her sword. Blood bloomed down his thigh, and he slashed out in anger, missing her as she ducked low to the deck. Rasher moved toward her with his dirk raised high.
Gripping her weapon with both hands, Alice rose to catch Rasher just below his breastbone. She surged upward. Hot blood coursed over her hands. She released the grip as if burned. Rasher’s eyes, wide with shock, looked to the cutlass protruding from his front before crumbing to the deck.
More cannon fire shattered a section of rail. Something ripped across Alice’s upper arm. She cried out and clutched at the burning pain.
Blasts fired all around her as the approaching ship came alive. The black and green rags fell away as bright red sails rose along with a grinning skull emblazoned on a black flag. More than thirty men materialized out of voluminous clouds of red cannon smoke. It swirled about them as they swarmed the deck of the Delmar, looking as if they were arriving from the very bowels of hell.
Alice picked up a pistol and a boarding ax. If the gun wasn’t loaded, at least it would buy her some of time. From behind, a hand came down to crush her shoulder. Jones. The man who’d stolen her ring. A gaping wound upon his forehead had covered half his face with blood.
He hauled her against him. “Cap’n won’t be savin’ ye this time, will ’e. Ye’ve seen to that, ain’t ye?”
Struggling against his hold, she spit, “I won’t be needing the captain.”
With the pistol trapped between them, Alice said a quick prayer and squeezed the trigger. The ensuing blast knocked her hard against the rail, punching the air from her lungs. Powder burns singed her clothes. Jones clawed at the hole in his chest before he died at her feet.
Alice shook her head and struggled to regain her senses. A painful ringing in her ears deafened all else. Dropping to her knees, she began a frantic search of Jones’s body.
Holding the ax poised, Alice reached into bloodied pockets until she found what she sought. With a satisfied grin, in the middle of a hell storm, Alice Tupper pushed Annalise’s ring firmly back upon her finger.
Chapter 2
The fierce blow of a cutlass knocked the ax from Alice’s hand as another pair of strong men subdued her and wrestled her across the watery gap to their waiting ship. She thrashed and screeched and caught one man with a vicious punch of her elbow. No doubt winning him a beautiful blackened eye to remember her by if the blue-tongued