Storms of the Sea

Storms Of The Sea

Author's Note: As was the case with Sweet Stone Isle last story, the location that will feature heavily in this story will be fictional. For those that have mentioned some of my nautical mistakes, I apologize and will work to avoid glaring seafaring mistakes in the future. But I write for story and paragraphs of endless nautical details at the expense of advancing the story aren't for me. I will be avoiding historical inaccuracies as much as possible but I am not perfect so if some slip through, like last time when I mentioned Singapore during a time that was decades before it actually existed. I apologize in advance. I am doing my best. Thank you for reading.

Chapter 1: What Do We Do Next?

I entered my room and closed the door behind me. No sooner had I closed the door than she was on me.

"Took you long enough," said Cap'n Brianna 'Cold Eyes' Deckett as she kissed me furiously.

"I'm sorry," I said in the moments where her tongue untied itself from mine. "McGaragle wanted me to tell the story of revenge on my father to some listening ears."

"Like he doesn't know the story," she said irritably.

"He wanted me to tell it to impress the women on his arms," I said.

She laughed, then resumed kissing me. I love this woman with all my heart. And she loved me, Leonardo Sanfino, just as much. It was closing in on a year since we had first met. A year since this woman, Cap'n Cold Eyes, took my old ship and me prisoner with it. I had convinced her to let me launch into a scheme to steal fabulous silks from Havana, despite the protests of old bastards on her crew, particularly the late and unlamented McNally. After that score we had made love in this very room for the first time. I had fallen in love with her after that. Which had resulted in the problem of me not being able to pursue her due to the rules about the Cap'n and crew having not having sex while at sea. This was a major problem for me.

Following a beating from her ex lover and fellow pirate captain Solomon Kane, I had deserted her crew in order to make my name and give myself a chance at being put on equal footing with her. I had gone to Boston, gained the trust of a enough men to crew a newly built frigate class vessel, stolen said vessel after revenging myself upon British officer Major Fieldmen, who was supposed to head the ship's marines. Then we had built our own reputation of the ship, now named the Death's Hand. By a chance of fate, we had captured my stepmother and her son Donnie, which had led me to my next scheme of robbing and revenging myself upon my father.

My return to her in Nassau was not welcomed but I'd expected nothing less. Eventually I had won Lawrence, her first mate, to my side and gained their support for my scheme of getting revenge on my father. During that trip north I had finally confessed how I felt. She had rejected me but I would not give up, telling her to love me or kill me. We'd won the following battle, including me saving her life. Then I'd had my mother killed in front of Donnie, then tied my father to the top of the Death's Hand mainmast and let him freeze to death. Cold Eyes had come to me and confessed she was falling for me too, and we'd made love again.

Donnie stayed on my ship while my sisters were placed on her ship, the Defiance. We had taken some prizes working together. Building our reputations even further. Our next scheme had come in the form of Solomon Kane approaching both of us with a former slave named Celene. The two of them had laid out a island with a huge sugar plantation to raid. Eventually I had come up with a plan for it. We would tow a ship that Cold Eyes and I had just taken for the slaves while using the crews of my ship, her ship, and Solomon's ship the Silk Road. We had got to the island, freed the slaves, stole the sugar. Despite my disdain of Solomon Kane wanting to kill the master and his family, we made it back and sold the sugar.

We gave the ship to the freed slaves. Celene had said many words that had tugged on my heart and mind. I had attempted to break the cycle of violence by letting Donnie and my sisters go. Or trying to let Donnie go. But Donnie was blazing with a hatred I knew all too well. The same hatred that had fueled me to destroy my father and stepmother that had put Donnie in my care in the first place. He had vowed to destroy me utterly, take it all away from me like I had done to him. Donnie had the same fury flowing through him I had felt. Knowing full well how such hatred could lead to future ruin, I had made the hard decision to have Donnie murdered. Shay, a woman who sailed with Solomon Kane, had strangled him with a wire at my request in exchange for agreeing to help her rescue her remaining family someday.

I had let my sisters go, paying for them to be brought to Kingston in Jamaica. Hopefully they were doing well. That had all concluded months ago and Solomon Kane had departed. Cap'n Cold Eyes had told me her past as British nobility from the Deckett family, and how Solomon had helped her escape an abusive husband. We knew each other's secrets now. Speaking of now, she was now undoing my pants and bringing my attention back to the present in the process. She got down to her knees and took my hard cock into her mouth, bobbing her beautiful red head up and down furiously. I groaned loudly. "Oh Brianna," I said. She looked up at me with her blue eyes, lifting her shirt up to expose her big breasts for me. That made me moan even louder.

She pulled back, slapping my cock on her tongue. "Give it to me Leo," she said before going back down and sucking even faster. I had been hoping to fuck her tonight but her monthly time had come right as we put back into port. What rotten timing! She had promised me something despite her time having come. My breathing was getting heavier and heavier, my moans getting louder. She somehow began going faster and I could take no more. I cried out and exploded into her mouth. She clamped her lips down and swallowed all of it like she was one of the whores downstairs. Except her eyes told no lie and she did love me and doing it for me. She pulled off and swallowed.

After that she got up and took a drink of rum. I pulled my breeches up and went to our bed. She laid down beside me shortly after, not bothering to pull her shirt back down. She liked to sleep with her heavy breasts unbound, something I had no trouble with of course. Sometimes I'd wake her up in the morning by sucking on her nipples. But tonight she rolled onto her side to look at me. "Have you had any thoughts on what we're going to do next?"

"What do you mean?" I asked her.

"I mean our next score," she said. "We've had a few takes since the sugar raid but nothing spectacular. Lawrence has told me the crew are wondering what Cap'n Sanfino's next plan is going to be."

I sighed. I had heard similar from Tomwise, who was my first mate. This was the problem that Lawrence had warned me of before I'd even left the Defiance. The crew believed I could pull anything off. My own crew believed it too. While that kept the from muttering about me and Cap'n Cold Eyes being together, it also put a burden of expectation on me that I doubt many other pirates have to deal with. I'd pulled the Havana silk scheme out of thin air when McNally was wanting to kill me. My plan to become a Cap'n myself was thought out but the part about ruining my father and stealing his riches had been sheer chance with me happening upon the ship that my late stepmother Angela was traveling on. The sugar raid wouldn't have happened if Solomon hadn't come to us! But the crews didn't think like this. They were simple pirates, waiting for the next grand scheme to bring them riches.

"Leo?" she asked when I failed to respond.

I shook my head. "I'm sorry M'lady. I was lost in thought."

"None of that 'M'lady' flattery. I've already sucked your cock dry tonight. Speak plain with me."

"As you wish. The truth is I don't know what we're going to do next."

"That won't fly."

"I'm aware of that," I said rolling onto my back. "We can't go out hunting again like we have lately. Their shares of the sugar raid money are all but spent. We've only taken two prizes worth taking. You and I have more and more offers of ship-less pirates looking for a crew to join. We need something substantial."

"That's why I brought it up," said Cold Eyes.

"You're ruining my post orgasm bliss, you know."

"Tough," she grinned. "You'll get plenty more of them. I expect your tongue's work as soon as my time is past."

"And you'll have it!" I vowed in my theatrical voice. She laughed and nestled closer to me. "But the current problem still remains," I went on.

"Sadly yes."

"We're in port for the next week. Give me time."

"I believe in you," she said. "I know you'll deliver something. But the crews don't have the luxury of being as close to you as me."

"You're worth more than all the money in the world."

"Sucking up for a second sucking?" she teased.

"If that is the result, I will happily accept," I said in my courtly manners voice. "But in that instance I was simply referring to what is the indisputable truth." She laughed again and laid on me now. No second sucking came as she soon drifted off. But now my mind was wandering. To come up with something that would satisfy the crews. They were expecting something at least equal to my previous ideas for prizes.

Another sugar raid perhaps? No, that would not work. By now what we had done on Sweet Stone Isle would have spread. All the sugar islands and plantations would be on guard. As would anyone who had slaves. Slave uprisings were among the most feared situations in the colonies and the Caribbean, where slaves did much of the work for their white masters. Thinking about it more made me think that our next prize probably shouldn't be in the Caribbean. But where then? Come on Leo, work that brain of yours! You can think of something!

I realized I was getting tired. I had a whole week to think it over so I decided to give up for tonight and go to sleep. Still, my mind wandered as I tried to shut it down.

What was the plan going to be?

Chapter 2: The Next Plan

I'd done my best to wrack my brains for the last week and I had finally come up with something. So tonight Cap'n Cold Eyes and I had summoned the higher-importance members of our crews. We sat waiting for them to arrive. One by one they eventually did.

First to arrive was Tommy 'Tomwise' Haydenson. My second in command. The spindly-limbed looking man had figured out I was a pirate back in Boston and helped me find the people I would need to steal the ship that was now the Death's Hand.

Thomas McGaragle. The leader of my boarding parties. A Boston Irishmen with the typical love of drinking and equally typical hatred of the British. While he was a lout and a fool sometimes, he was possibly the best fighter on either ship.

Patrick Furgeson. The gunner expert who kept my cannons in tip top shape. He was an otherwise unremarkable man who always had a level head.

Arthur Morris. The old seadog who had provided his lifetime's worth of experience to me as I had become a Cap'n. The old man knew his sailing and pirating. So much that even Cold Eyes listened when he suggested something she could improve on. He helmed my ship when at sea, allowing me to manage the rest of the ship better.

Roderick 'Roddy' Banes. A former Royal Navy surgeon who had deserted when his old captain had flogged a friend who wound up dying from infection that said captain had refused to let Roddy treat. Roddy had murdered the cap'n, then fled to the Americas. Good surgeons were hard to come by and he had found her crew quickly enough. Now he kept both crews in shape.

Lawrence. Her second in command. I did not know his last name. If Cold Eyes knew it she would not tell me. Not that I asked. Lawrence was the one who was the calm behind Cap'n Cold Eye's fury. And the one who took it upon himself to keep me humble. He was the one from the start that knew the men thought I walked on water with my ability to pull off schemes that others thought impossible. He was also the one that helped her reopen to me after my defection. Both crews turned to him for anything that needed to be brought to either of us. As everyone sat down, Lawrence spoke first. "I take it we have something?"

"We do," I said.

"About time!" said McGaragle.

"What, don't you like being in port?" asked Tomwise.

"Of course I do! That was meant about something big and rich we can go pirate!" said McGaragle.

"I do indeed have something," I said before they could bicker. "Our next big haul."

"I'm all ears!" said McGaragle.

"Aye Cap'n," said Arthur. "What have you got?"

"I heard some talk about how it's tobacco harvesting season at the tobacco plantations coming up soon," I began. "I feel like this could be our next huge prize. More so than the sugar raid since we won't have to split these profits with two other ships."

"So we're headed to the plantations?" asked Tomwise.

"To pillage them!" said McGaragle.

"We will be. But not to pillage like you're thinking."

"Why not?"

"If you'd stop interrupting me, I'd explain!" I snapped at him. I waited for to fall silent McGaragle then continued. "The problem is that the tobacco plantations are not undefended. Most of those towns have some kind of militia. To protect the tobacco crop and keep watch for the Indians. So going in guns blazing isn't the best idea. What we're going to do is a little more ambitious but will ultimately pay off more at the end."

"Do tell," said Lawrence looking interested.

"It's a three stage plan. Stage one. We hunt down and take a third ship without destroying it."

"What for?" asked Cold Eyes sharply.

I glanced at her. We'd argued in the past about whether or not to add more ships to our group. She was against it saying it caused more problems, forced more splits in the shares of booty, and trust issues with new pirates. I understood all of this and I didn't argue with her about it any more. Now she clearly thought I was going back to it. So I spoke to her. "Not for the reason you're thinking. Nor are we going to be freeing plantation slaves," I explained.

She looked less cross. "Go on then."

"This leads us to stage two. We're going to use the ship as cover. You Cold Eyes, me, and a small group of those from our crews, including you Tomwise, will be going ashore to the target plantation. We're going to claim we're travelers from Europe looking to make a new home in the Americas. The third ship will be the ship we are traveling on, which we will say was set upon by pirates and forced to run aground. Those of us going ashore will claim to have run and hid in the woods while the pirates killed or took prisoner whoever else was left and stripped the ship of anything of value. The run aground ship on the shores south of our target will serve as fine proof that we're not pirates ourselves. The plantation's name is Danecrop. In what they call the Virginia territory. It's a town a growing town, growing more each year. Not as large as Richmond or James Town or Chesapeake but good enough for our purposes."

Everyone was nodding at my words, looking curious. So I went on. "Of course you are probably all wondering how we can take a huge tobacco plantation's crop with such a small group. Well that's because we're going undercover. Cold Eyes and I will be posing as a wealthy couple from England. Those with us will be our servants who survived. Once we're inside Danecrop all of us will begin gathering all the information we can about the plantation, state of the crops, shipping times, and so on. We'll spend a maximum of a week gathering information."

"While we're in the city," I continued. "A smaller group of men from both ships is going to land further down the coast and make camp in out of sight. Once we have enough intelligence on the warehouse where they are storing the tobacco we will send someone to bring this group into the city. McGaragle, you'll be in charge of the camp. Keep everyone ready and kill anyone who approaches that isn't from our group on the inside."

"I can do that," he said.

"And sober," I added sternly. "No drinking on land."

"That's going to be harder," said McGarage. "Nothing to do for a whole week? The men will get bored."

"They'll keep themselves in line if they want their share," said Cold Eyes.

McGaragle nodded. "Point taken."

"The Death's Hand and the Defiance," I said. "Will come in at night. The same night as McGaragle's men come into the town. We secure the warehouse, steal all the tobacco, and are off before the sun rises. Hopefully without having to fire a shot."

"The timing will have to be perfect," said Lawrence.

"You'll be on the Defiance. Arthur on the Death's Hand. The two of you will make sure the timing is perfect," I said. Lawrence nodded. So did Arthur. "Stage three is simple enough," I said.

"We come back here and unload the tobacco. Obviously! Right?" said McGaragle.

I shook my head. "No. That's where stage three differs. We go north. We go north to New York and sell the tobacco ourselves."

"Cap'n," said Tomwise. "We're pirates. They won't buy from us."

"The won't know we're pirates," I said. "Down here in the Caribbean yes they'll recognize us. But those rich merchants in New York won't know our ships by sight. Especially if we dress the up a bit. In my ship's case, we'll have to change the sails. Once we're in New York, Lawrence and I will pose as the tobacco sellers and sell the stolen crop. Those merchants are waiting for tobacco from the south to ship off to Europe. They won't ask questions. They want to get shipments out before winter so they can increase this year's earnings!"

"Why do we need to sell in New York?" asked Patrick.

"Because we'll get paid full price in New York," said Cold Eyes picking up on my line of thought.

"Exactly!" I said emphatically. "Whether it's Tortuga, Nassau, or somewhere else we always get sold short. Imagine if they had paid us full value for the sugar we brought in. Even if we split it four ways we would still have enough to have another few months before we had to take a real prize. But because we're pirates we get short changed. The sellers down here pay us a third of what it's worth because they know we can't sell to anyone else! Then they turn around and sell the stolen cargo through their black market contacts at full price! So the selling in New York is cutting out the middle-man."

"All that money? The boys will be kept in line for that," said McGaragle.

"You two are probably going to have to socialize among Danecrop's elites. Especially if you are posing as a rich couple from England," said Lawrence.

"M'lady Cap'n Cold Eyes and I will have that covered," I said. "I know how mercantile works in England too thanks to my late father. So I can handle the merchant's in New York."

"If you're going to act like a rich couple," said Tomwise. "You're going to need to have something to show for it. Unless you plan on saying the pirates stole it all?"

"No," I shook my head. "That would get us sympathy. But little else. We're going to have to take the rest of the money that's left over. That'll be enough to flash around."

"The crews will really not like that," said Tomwise.

"The massive payoff they will get at the end of this should be enough to sustain them," said Cold Eyes. "I'm more concerned about finding that extra ship. If it's close to harvest season, we may not have the time."

"If we can't get the ship needed quickly enough," I said. "We will resort to saying we swam away in the battle."

"That's far less believable," said Tomwise."

"Then why don't you go find a rumor of an easy take?" I asked. "In fact, that's all of your jobs starting tomorrow! Both crews are to cease their drinking and whoring and prepare the ships to cast off. While you lot find an easy take we can take in time to pull this off!" There were grumbles at that but they didn't protest. As Cold Eyes and I retired to our room an hour later I spoke to her. "Do you think my plan will work?"