Free Voyage of Midnight by Michele Torrey Page B

the next eerie flash, eyes stared out at me from a doughy face. Pale. Sightless. Dead.
    It was the man I’d been after.
    I stood, muscles tensed, wanting to run, shrieking, back to Jonas.
    But at the next stroke of lightning, all thoughts of the dead man vanished. For I spied Pea Soup at the bow, dagger clamped between his teeth, climbing out onto the bowsprit. He glanced back. And in his eyes I saw it again.
    It …
    That dreadful, murderous hatred.

W ith a clarity as searching as lightning, I knew there was only one reason Pea Soup would be crawling out on the bowsprit with a dagger.
    Sabotage
.
    No doubt he was off to sever the tow-line that stretched from the end of the jib-boom to the longboat. And if it was severed, the
Formidable
would be dead in the water. We’d be finished in minutes.
    I understood this in the time it took me to leap over the dead man and dart to the bowsprit, heart pounding.
    I had to stop him.
    Lightning flashed every couple of seconds, illuminating Pea Soup in an eerie light display.
    Already he was several feet out over thewater, crawling like a caterpillar atop the gigantic wooden spar that thrust outward and upward from the bow of the
Formidable
like a sword.
    Light …
    Darkness …
    Light …
    Darkness …
    “Pea Soup!”
    He hesitated, then looked back, the shock of discovery registering on his face.
    “Pea Soup! I order you to return! Now!”
    Light …
    Darkness …
    “Now! Do you hear me? I—I demand you obey me! I’m your master!” I heard my voice, shrill, hysterical almost, punctuated by earsplitting cracks of thunder.
    Narrowed, hate-filled eyes glared back at me. Rain pounded and ran in rivulets down both our faces. Then Pea Soup took the dagger from his mouth, turned away from me, and continued to crawl into the darkness.
    I peered at the water below, remembering what lurked beneath.
    But I’d no choice. Not if I wished to save Uncle. Not if I wished to save myself and the
Formidable
.
    Taking a shaky breath, I climbed out on the bowsprit. My hands grasped and pulled, slipping on the smooth, wet surface. Water streamed into my eyes. And every few seconds, total darkness surrounded me, except for the images seared into my brain as with a hot iron.
    Images of a jutting bowsprit. Pea Soup in front of me, naked except for a loincloth, black as tar, inching along, dagger in hand.The myriad of ropes and lines arced beneath me, sweeping like evil grins—footropes, sheets, and stays, attached at both ends. Creek water, black with night, seeming to roil with shapes beneath. Dreadful, hungry shapes.
    By the devil, whatever you do, Philip Arthur Higgins, don’t fall now
.
    On I struggled.
    Desperate, I took a conciliatory tone, though I knew he couldn’t understand a word. “Pea Soup, come back, please. I promise I’m not angry. And if I’ve ever done anything to hurt you, I’m sorry. Tell you what, I’ll give you some extra food—I will, really I will—if you’ll just turn round. All right, several extra portions. Cook’s got some fine jam. You can have bread and jam. Really, I swear I’m not angry. I’m not even angry that you’ve a knife. A gigantic, bloody knife. Just please,
please
, come back. Pea Soup, Pea Soup, don’t
do
this.”
    And then he stopped. Or rather, he
was
stopped, by the tangle of spars, lines, and blocks, all coming together at the juncture of the bowsprit with the jibboom—the extra spar that stretched even farther from the ship, maybe forty feet, all told.
    I caught his heel.
    He kicked me away.
    I inched forward and seized his ankle.
    He grunted and flailed his leg, catching me in the teeth.
    I let go, tasting blood.
    Thunder cracked like a musket blast in my ear.
    On he crawled.
    No!
    I lunged for him, grabbing both his ankles.
    He kicked. And kicked.
    He’s strong
, I realized.
Far stronger than me
.
    And with that realization, a brilliant bolt of lightning dazzled my eyeballs and sizzled my spine, and Pea Soup bashed me in the nose