Chapter 137: Blow Ye Winds Home
Couple days out of Nassau, with the low green back of Andros finally lifting itself over the flanks, the Rose’s crew remembered they’d all been born with voices. They’d been silent ever since the tide pushed them out of harbor, but now the ship was making up for lost time.
Off the Rose’s quarter, the Fortune kept a steady course under Bonnet’s hand. Beyond her, the Revenge and the Marianne followed the channel close enough that James could make out Thatch’s broad shadow pacing his own deck. The man walked like he couldn’t wait to see whether Concordia was everything folks had been making it out to be.
Kit had claimed the lead singer and an overturned bucket near the foremast, standing there with the confidence he had been elected for the office.
"Come all you young sailor men, listen to me, I’ll sing you a song of the fish in the sea."
"And it’s..." the crew thundered back.
"Windy weather, boys, stormy weather, boys."
"When the wind blows, we’re all together, boys."
James kept his hands easy on the wheel and grinned through every bit of it without joining in himself. A captain who spent all his breath singing generally found himself short on the kind needed for steering, and there was still enough reef ahead to remind a man of his duties.
Grey stood nearby with his chart tucked beneath one arm. Judging by the set of his eyebrows, he found a sight less joy in the occasion than everybody else.
"Four fathom beneath her keel."
He pitched his voice low enough to slip beneath the singing instead of wrestling with it. "She’s ridin’ deeper than I like, Captain. All that new iron’s pushed her farther into the water than she’s ever been."
"The lass’ll manage, Grey."
"I sure hope so, else she’ll be kissin’ coral she was never introduced to."
James nudged the wheel a hair.
"Aye, then we’re fortunate she never pays much mind to what she’s supposed to do."
Grey looked no more convinced than usual, as he seldom did where reefs were concerned. He bent over his chart again with some old scowl, waiting for the soundings to prove him right or wrong.
Meanwhile, Greasy Pete snatched the next verse before anybody else could.
"Blow ye winds westerly, blow ye winds, blow."
"Jolly sou’wester, boys, steady she goes."
"Up jumps the eel with his slippery tail."
"Climbs up aloft and reefs the topsail."
That drew a laugh loud enough to nearly swallow the chorus. Pete looked as proud as a rooster and rewarded the crew with a bow nobody had requested.
Near the mainmast, one of the older sailors took his turn. The verse he’d prepared wandered into stranger waters than the rest.
"Then up jumps the shark with his nine rows of teeth."
"Saying, ’You eat the dough boys, and I’ll eat the beef!’"
Little by little the reef slipped behind them.
The water changed from that uneasy shoal color into a deeper, steady blue, and the shanty faded with the anticipation.
James let his thoughts drift, since his hands had precious little left to do. They wandered back to one bit of business he’d finish before leaving Nassau.
Cudjoe had pointed out two important empty berths aboard the Rose, the master-at-arms and cook. The men had been lost in the fighting, and neither job looked likely to be filled by the next loud fool claiming he’d whipped Hornigold bare-fisted for the price of a berth. James had looked over Nassau’s applicants once, decided he’d seen enough, and spent Fate instead.
⚓ [FATE SHOP — PERSONNEL]
The Black Corsair
A former African slave turned killer. Trained as a warrior before his capture, he earned his freedom with blood and has survived ever since by spilling more of it. Ruthless, seasoned, and presently in need of a captain.
Cost : 65 Fate
A Disgraced Continental Chef
Formerly master of the kitchen in a minor European household, until his skill with the stove proved less troublesome than his skill with the maids. Talented enough to make salted pork taste fit for nobility. He departed in considerable haste and left most of the silver behind.
Cost : 25 Fate
That had seemed a bargain before, and it seemed one now. By the voice explanation, these men should already be or end up in Concordia by the next week.
Anne had also managed a little business of her own during that crowded final day ashore. She’d caught him by the shirt outside the chandler’s, informed him she intended to deal with that empty brothel before they sailed, and answered every question afterward with nothing but a wink and a promise he’d appreciate it later.
James had a fair notion what a woman like Anne might accomplish inside Nassau. Whatever she figured out was aboard the Fortune instead of the Rose, simply because Bonnet had room to spare and James certainly did not.
The bay appeared before them not long afterward. The reefs drew back on either side of the narrow passage, and Concordia came into view looking changed enough that James had to remind himself it belonged to him.
He remembered leaving behind little more than a couple dozen rough buildings, a few dusty streets, and a stone at the crossroads with a couple hundred names carved into it, as though determination alone could make a town permanent.
The place waiting for him had grown well beyond that.
Rows of timber-framed houses stood in straight rows beyond the old street, their roofs shingled, their doors hung square, and the whole town looked built for years.
Beyond the homes, cleared fields stretched toward the trees in neat furrows where corn and cane stood green over ground that had been nothing but scrub six weeks ago.
Down by the shallows, a fisherman’s dock reached beyond the old pier. In there, nets hung drying along the pilings while little boats rocked at anchor. It was exactly the sort of honest work Mateo had sworn he understood better than anyone James had ever shipped with.
Smoke climbed from more cookfires than Concordia had ever needed before, drifting thin and gray into a sky turning the tone of a ripe peach as evening came.
The territory borders still showed the hurry, with canvas lean-tos crowding the forest where houses hadn’t caught up yet. Some half-finished timber frames waited naked for walls and roofs, with fresh mud churned thick between them by recent rain.
The place still had the hungry look of a harbor growing faster than its own hands could build, and James found that bothered him a good deal less than he’d expected.
He stood at the wheel and took in the whole bay before the shimmer appeared in front of him.
⚓ [ALLIED TERRITORY — CONCORDIA]
Faction : None (Independent)
Status : Proto-Republic
Population : Approximately 500 (Civilians and Sailors)
Stability : Strained (Rapid Growth)
Harbor : Sheltered Bay, Protected by Reefs
Facilities : Careening Cradle, Freshwater Cistern, Raised Timber Storehouse, Wooden Pier (Expanded), Tavern (Expanded), Brothel, Sawpit, Cookhouse (Expanded), Stoneworks, Distillery, Residential Quarter, Farmland, Fisherman’s Dock, Hunting Camp, the Code
Faction Status : Unofficial Governor
🏴 [QUEST PROGRESS — FROM DRIFTWOOD TO REPUBLIC]
Milestone Reached : Growth Tier III — Settlement
Reward : 75 Fate
🏴 [JAMES CALLOWAY — STATUS]
Rank : Captain, Flying Gang
Reputation : The Next Great Scourge
Influence : A Fleet of His Own
Fate Balance : 200
Population growth of this scale normally reflects present governance, patient planning, and years of labor. This is, instead, the result of a rumor you paid for and then promptly forgot you’d ever set in motion. I have chosen to record it as a success regardless, since the alternative would require admitting you did something correctly on purpose.
James let the figures sit for a moment before dismissing them.
He lingered at the wheel, taking in the smoke, the timber, the fields, and the whole busy place together.
Then Grey called the next sounding, and every eye on deck returned to the business of guiding four ships through one narrow passage in the reef.