Free Pirate's Wraith, The by Penelope Marzec

obliging.” Her small tongue licked along the side of his manhood and he nearly burst.
    “Sorceress.” He growled, half in fear and half in an agony.
    She stopped and he caught the spark of anger in her eyes. “This is sex. There’s nothing magical about it. It’s hormones. Get over the devil demon witch stuff.”
    A third scream shook Harlan from the grip of the spell. He swore as he threw on his shirt. He held his jacket in a strategic position before he left the cabin.
    On deck a small group stood staring upward. Harlan followed their gazes and saw one of the crew suspended by his ankle, caught in a tangled ratline damaged by the battle. The unfortunate man hung upside down at the end of the mizzen topgallant.
    “Grab hold, you blasted cully !” Mr. Hooper shouted. When the man made no response, Hooper let go a long list of crude invectives but the victim did not respond.
    From the corner of his eye, Harlan noticed Lesley slide silently out onto the deck. Though she had donned her fresh clothing, heat sizzled along his skin. However, he struggled to ignore the sensation and focused instead on the man’s body swinging awkwardly back and forth with the movement of the ship.
    “Quit wasting your breath, Mr. Hooper. He has blacked out.” Harlan stated the obvious.
    “Damnable worthless son of a—”
    Harlan cut off the quartermaster’s profanity. “Send up another man to bring him down.”
    “I’ll not be losing two men, Captain.” Defiance lay in the hard line of the quartermaster’s mouth.
    “If he remains there, buzzards will be picking his bones apart when we come into port, Mr. Hooper.”
    With visible anger, barely restrained, the quartermaster turned and pointed to one of the spectators. “Cut him down.”
    The man paled but obeyed the order and scrambled up the rigging.
    Harlan closed his eyes for a moment. When the rope was sliced, the victim would either fall to the deck or into the ocean, depending on the angle of the ship. In any event, the loss of another man would be the result. He hoped there were men in New Providence waiting for a berth.
    Opening his eyes, he turned to go back to his cabin. Lesley clutched at his sleeve and he thought he would burn to ashes right there on the deck.
    “Shouldn’t two men be sent to rescue him? I don’t see how one can do the job.”
    “He is already senseless.”
    Her eyes widened in horror. “So what does that mean? He won’t feel a thing? That’s savage.”
    He brushed her hand away. He must get away from her. He must break the spell. “Go below and help Gilroy.”
    Her eyes pleaded for a moment longer before she obeyed. “Aye, captain.”
    He watched her go. A short time later, the victim fell into the sea. Harlan went back to his cabin.
    * * * *
    Lesley sat with her knees up against her chest on a crate in a corner of orlop deck and stared at the blood-stained floor. She nearly gave herself to the captain with no protection. No condom, no form of birth control. Worse, her hormones had gotten all fired up over a cruel, unfeeling pirate. He had sent a man to his death without blinking an eye.
    Had she lost her mind?
    What if she became pregnant? How many women survived childbirth in this god-forsaken era? Half? Less than half? The captain had lost a wife and child already.
    Lesley had longed for a baby, but to give birth without a hospital, without sterile conditions, without knowledgeable doctors and nurses bordered on madness.
    Obviously, people did it anyhow. Having sex or getting drunk must be the most notable momentary pleasures in the dismal 1700s. She hid her flaming face in her arms. 
    “Ach. I’ll be needing some help with this potion.” The doctor called to her.
    The fetid odors of the dying filled her nostrils. She tried not to gag as she made her way across a deck littered with the unfortunate men who had been wounded in the battle. Most slept, some were delirious, some had already passed away.
    The doctor dropped a handful of