If you haven’t read Ocean Without End, the first book in the Swashbuckler trilogy, here’s a sneak preview.
In this chapter, Lily (the nickname the crew has given her is Cygnet or “Cyg”) witnesses her first battle, as the pirate ship Gisella goes into attack…
The little sloop had been blasted by cannon, fouling the rigging and smashing the tiller. A tangle of shrouds and canvas lay across her stern and dipped into the sea. There was an odd group of men near the bow, wrestling and pushing each other like schoolboys, and the sound of swords clashing somewhere below decks.
All over the ship were men, lying in the strangest positions, staring straight up into the sky, or collapsed face down on the boards, or curled into corners, moaning. There was blood everywhere.
“Hey there, Cyg. Bring the swabs!”
Miller was crouched over someone near the mast. He waved to me, urgently. I tucked the linen and bottle into my shirt, threw myself over the side and slipped down a rope to the lower deck of the captured ship. I ran over to see who was wounded.
It was Max, slumped over someone else’s dead body. He had a hole through his blouse, and blood coursing down his side and onto the deck, where it mingled with other people’s blood.
“What hit you?”
“A sword slash. Blasted thing. There were two of ‘em at once, I couldn’t take ‘em both. Got ‘em in the end, though.”
I peered at the gash in his side. It was clean, and the bleeding seemed to be slowing.
“Seems all right,” I announced, as if I’d been a surgeon all my life. “I’ll just wrap you up and we’ll get you back aboard Gisella.”
It was all right, compared to Harry or any of those other poor sods lying about. Miller ran off, cutlass in hand, to rejoin the attack.
I was tying the bandage at Max’s waist when there was a clash of swords quite near to us, and Max cried out, “Look out behind you!”
I spun around to see Carlo trapped in a strange embrace with a man in a blue uniform. Their swords were locked together, faces close and both grimacing, pushing each other backwards, first one way, then the next.
The soldier grunted, shook himself free, and landed Carlo a thump on the head with his sword pommel. That decked him. His face went white and he dropped like a sinker. The soldier stepped quickly over Carlo and raised his sword. Above me.
“No!” I shouted.
I pushed Max to one side and I rolled to the other. The sword came down on the deck between us with a thwack. I kicked out at the soldier’s knees, hitting him hard and knocking him off balance. As he steadied himself I reached for Carlo’s sword and scrambled to my feet.
The blue-coat turned to face me. Everything I knew about sword-fighting, every thrust and parry Flynn had taught me on those hot afternoons in the piazza, seemed to vanish from my mind in an instant. I drew the sword up before me. We were standing close, a sword’s length perhaps, face to face. He smiled.
“Mademoiselle,” he said, bowing ever so slightly. I didn’t take my eyes off him.
He lunged, so fast I only just blocked it in time. He was strong, far stronger than the boys in Santa Lucia. A few more blows like that, and I wouldn’t be able to hold him. But I was fighting for my life. Before, I had only fought for fun.
I watched him. He was scared, twitching his coat nervously with his left hand. Another breath, and he’d try again. Now! A slash towards my head, parried high across my face, then another, weaker, thrust down low. I smacked it away hard. There! His arms were longer than mine. I had to keep out of his reach.
He wasn’t thinking clearly. I took a quick step forward and feinted, the point of my blade flickering close to his shoulder. He panicked, stepped back, and then once more. He wasn’t prepared for this, I knew it. He blinked. Blinked again and I lunged, fast, aiming just above his hand. He saw me coming, jerked his guard up.
My blade circled his and slid under his fist, and I lunged again.
