Her Every Pleasure (39 page)

It was happening. It had begun.

She opened her eyes and lifted her head from her pillow. How many hours had passed? she wondered, but she did not wait to find out. The new day was only at first light as she jumped out of bed, rushed across the room to the balcony, grabbing her trusty knapsack along the way.

With shaking hands, she took out her folding telescope and tried to locate Agnos from her balcony. She struggled to hold the spyglass steady despite her frightened trembling and searched the predawn sky until she saw black smoke rising in the distance. She gasped when an orange explosion flared out, so small with the miles between.

Oh, Gabriel.

Her heart thumping, she scanned the horizon for further clues about what was happening around Agnos. Blast, it was too far to make out much. Slowly sweeping the whole area with her telescope, she stopped in astonishment, suddenly spotting the first-rates.

Good God, they must’ve gotten the message faster than Commander Blake had realized. They were already sailing toward the strait in a massive line like lumbering Leviathans. Before long, they would enter the narrow channel and pass by Ali Pasha’s coast, reminding him, as ordered, of their protection of Kavros.

At first, Sophia was heartened to see them. With Gabriel’s attack already under way, this was most felicitous timing. Their arrival was not too soon to tip off the enemy that something was afoot, and indeed, at this point, Gabriel’s lesser forces, for all their courage, surely needed whatever fresh help they could get.

But then—studying the scene before her, a bit of movement on one of the rocky outcroppings caught her eye.

Puzzled, she focused the telescope on the tall, jagged clump of rock and suddenly gasped to spot a dark-skinned man in position there—with a carronade!

Bewildered, she trained her spyglass on another of the seemingly uninhabited rocks. And again, she saw another turbaned foreigner lying in wait with a fatbarreled, short-range artillery piece.

And another, stationed on yet another cluster of rocks. As the sun made its first foray over the horizon, it glimmered over the mighty masts of the approaching British first-rates, and illumined several more of the enemy’s unobtrusive positions.

Chills ran down Sophia’s spine, and as she lowered her spyglass from her, it all came clear.

It’s a trap.

This is exactly what they want us to do. They’re going to destroy the ships.

The fiends were lying in wait with their portable cannons, positioned to blast the mighty first-rates in the one spot where every ship was most vulnerable: its unprotected stern.

Any attack from the side was useless and would be met with a devastating broadside from the vessel’s full arsenal of guns; the bow, too, was well protected. But the stern was every ship’s Achilles’ heel.

All they had to do was time it right, let the ships pass to the fore and then hit them from behind.

With the first-rates crippled, foundered in the strait, Kavros’s defenses would be severely compromised.

Then the Order of the Scorpion could take the island.

Gabriel’s dire warning of the greater threat echoed in her ears. Not just Kavros was in danger. Those first-rates kept the peace throughout the Mediterranean.

Oh, God.
Her heart in her throat, she realized she had to keep those warships out of the strait! They had to be warned to stay back immediately. But how?

On the beach below the palace, the fishermen were already out and stirring, readying their boats for the morning’s catch. Her eyes narrowed as her gaze homed in on them. Why, if that was the only navy that Kavros could boast of its own, then it was hers to lead.

The next thing she knew, she was running out of her room.

“Timo, wake up! Come with me!” Her trusty guard was seated on a chair outside her chamber door. She shook him back to wakefulness but did not wait for him, dashing off and rushing through the palace with a few sleepy attendants scrambling after her.

He leapt up, still groggy, and came bounding after her. “What’s going on?”

“The first-rates have come! We’ve got to keep those ships out of the narrows! Hurry up!” Tearing out of the palace, she went barreling down to the water.

The atmosphere was tense down on the slowly lightening beach. The fishermen could hear the distant cannon-fire coming from the direction of Agnos and did not know what to make of it.

When Sophia came tearing down into their midst, calling to them, they turned and looked at her suspiciously, unaware of who she was.

“Fishermen of Kavros! To your boats! Your country needs you!”

They turned and looked at her in question, not quite sure who this young woman yelling at them was.

Timo came rushing after her.

“Will you take me aboard?” she cried, racing over to the shaggy captain of the largest boat. She stared eagerly at him, out of breath.

“Your Highness!” Timo exclaimed, but he could not stop her as she zipped up the ladder and jumped onto the boat.

“Highness?” the men murmured. “It’s the princess?”

“Indeed, it is!” she cried, grabbing hold of a line and jumping up onto the rails. She addressed them at the top of her lungs. “And I implore your service now! We must into the straits at once!”

“Princess—what is going on?” the captain exclaimed.

“The British ships are coming into the narrows, and if they advance much farther, they’ll be destroyed! We can’t let that happen! They are our allies, and if they’re destroyed, they can’t protect our country. It’s a trap! Don’t you see? Oh, there’s no time to explain! Are you with me or not?”

They hesitated, probably unsure if she was a madwoman.

“Don’t you hear the guns?” she cried with an angry, sweeping gesture toward the sea.

“Is it really the princess?” someone yelled.

“Can’t you tell?” Timo retorted loudly.

“Hurry, for the sake of your country!” Sophia shouted. “Get this boat moving! Please!”

“Your Highness, what do you want us to do?” asked the captain of the boat that she had commandeered.

“Follow me!” she shouted, pointing passionately toward the straits.

And to her sublime amazement…they did.

The men flooded into their boats with a hearty cheer.

Moments later, they were yanking up anchors, letting out sails, speeding their vessels into the current.

Sophia’s fishing-boat captain led the way. The longfamiliar crews were shouting back and forth to each other as they fanned out across the strait, a ragtag flotilla forming a little line across the narrows, and advancing bravely toward the mighty first-rates.

Hurry,
she thought, desperate to ward the ships off. She only prayed the first-rates would not interpret their approach as threatening and blow them all out of the water.

Meanwhile, in the distance, the guns still roared.

Her heart pounded as they neared the hidden enemy positions. The fishermen realized that something was afoot, of course, but had not noticed the concealed men on the rocks.

Sophia knew that the warships were the enemy’s prime targets, not them. Still, she hoped these Scorpion blackguards did not change their minds about that. She knew she was playing roulette with the fishermen’s lives, but Leon had taught her to know that, sometimes, that’s what a leader had to do. Decisions made for the fate of many were not easy.

She prayed that the Janissaries waiting with their artillery would think nothing of the approaching fishing boats. Every day, after all, the Greek sailors went out to make their living from the sea, just as they had done for thousands of years.

It was a tense sail out into the wind, but tension turned to heart-thumping dread as they neared the massive gunships, closer and closer, neither side backing down.

Stopping those big ships would be a test of nerves, but she had to do it to save them. As they neared, British voices shouted to them to move out of the way, but she yelled back, “Come no farther!”

“Stand!” she yelled at the fishermen when some of them started to shout that they were going to have a collision.

More cries from the towering deck of the first gunship in the row of three echoed through the dawn. Her heart pounded, but not until the gunships loomed over them did she quite believe they had managed to slow their pace to a crawl.

Furious heads peered over the side of the rails at them. “What is the meaning of this? We’ll give you fifteen minutes to get out of the way, and if you don’t move—”

“Wait! You don’t understand! We are trying to help you!” Holding her ground on the fishing-boat’s prow, she threw her head back and answered them. “You must not come into the straits! A trap has been laid for you there! Commander Blake did not know it! Come no farther or your ships will be destroyed!”

“Who are you?” the officer demanded.

“I am Princess Sophia of Kavros!”

A pause followed. She winced, fearing they’d think she was mad to claim such a thing. But the answer surprised her.

“Well, dash my wig, yes, you are.”

She furrowed her brow, staring up at the silhouetted officer. All she could see was the outline of a head. “Do I know you, sir?” she yelled up, noting the sudden alteration in his tone of voice.

“No, but I saw you once, Highness, at a ball in London. Wanted to ask you to dance, but I didn’t dare.” He laughed modestly. “At your service, Madam. I am the first mate of this vessel.”

“Well, first mate of this vessel, I will certainly owe you a dance if you aim your guns at those rocks there, where our enemies have set up an ambush for you.”

“Have they, indeed?”

“See for yourself!”

In the brightening light of morning, she could see the first mate pull out his folding telescope and train its lens upon the boulders where those blackguards were hiding.

“Well,” he said with a very British determination. “Very decent of you to warn us, Princess.”

“Fire at will, sir, as soon as we’re out of your way.”

“No worries, we’ll fire over your heads.”

“They’ll scare away all the fish,” her boat’s captain grumbled.

Sophia frowned at him, then looked back at the first mate. “Please dispatch whatever men you can spare to reinforce the Marines at Agnos. That is where the fighting is under way even as we speak.”

“With pleasure, Highness. Do you care to come aboard?”

“No, sir. I am headed to Agnos now myself.”

“You are?” the fishing captain exclaimed indignantly.

She turned to him and gently teased him into complying. “Why, yes! You’re not afraid, are you? I’m not, and I’m just a girl.”

“Well, if you put it that way,” the fishing captain muttered while some of his crew laughed. “Make sail for Agnos!”

The first-rates did the same.

Sophia flashed a dangerous smile and moved toward the bow, eager to see how Gabriel’s battle was progressing.

Covered in sweat, flecked with blood, and streaked with the grime of black powder, Gabriel had fought his way into the fortress and now, with the Marines engaging the Janissaries who were left, he was hunting Sheik Suleiman with his trusty carbine.

Panting with exertion, he searched the shattered stone rooms inside the ancient fort, pivoting past one blownout stone doorway after another.
Where the hell had he gone?

Just a moment ago, he had had the tall, lanky Arab in his sights, but had lost him in the fray. The imam had disappeared amid the clouds of drifting smoke. He seemed to have some firm destination in mind.

Gabriel was fairly sure the wily blackguard was trying to make an escape, never mind the fact he’d be leaving his embattled followers in the dust.

If he could not catch him, Gabriel was prepared to kill him. They could not afford to let him get away merely to corrupt more men with his festering hatred, spawn more enemies who cared only for power disguised as jihad.

Maneuvering around another corner, he stepped into what remained of a medieval corridor and spotted the sheik across the open gallery.

“Suleiman!”

The sheik whirled around and brought up his rifle, firing at Gabriel. He threw himself back against the wall, narrowly darting out of the bullet’s path, but a split second later, he returned fire with his carbine, hitting Suleiman in the leg as he tried to run away.

The sheik let out a yell and clutched his bleeding leg. Limping fast, he disappeared out the stone doorway. Gabriel didn’t waste time reloading but whipped out his cavalry saber and raced after him.

When he reached the hollow doorway, he saw that it dropped away into a steep flight of exterior stairs with no rail; they were carved right into the limestone, weathered smooth. The stairs hugged the fortress wall as they descended sharply, but with no hand-rail on the right they fell away in a drop-off into the bright jade water. At the bottom of the stairs, a simple one-man craft was waiting.

“Damn you,” Gabriel growled.
You’re not getting away.

Sheik Suleiman hobbled in rapid motion down the flight of stairs, one hand braced against the fortress wall, the other clutching his hurt leg.

Gabriel started down after him immediately, determined to see the bastard brought to justice. These stairs were treacherous, but in a few seconds, he would have him cornered.

He was closing in on him when the quake struck.

The earth began shaking.

Damn it!
Gabriel fell back against the wall, steadying himself. Lower down the stairs, the sheik did the same.

Then a horrible cracking noise rent the air. He looked up in horror as a chunk of the old fortress wall high above them sagged, teetered, broke off, and came crashing down.

Gabriel flattened himself back against the part of the wall that still held. The broken section fell before his eyes, plunging into the water with a tremendous splash that rose so high, the water sprayed him in the face.

The largest piece was gone, but more of the wall was still crumbling away in the tremors. Smaller pieces. Dust.

This is not good.

Heart pounding, Gabriel held out his hand and lowered his center of gravity, trying to balance himself on that precipice as the shaking continued. It was almost as if the island were trying deliberately to buck him off into the sea.