The Devil

‘How could it be worse?’

‘There could be two ships filled with those Fay bastards determined to send us to the bottom.’

Carpenter cursed loudly. ‘You find this sport? You are as mad as Bloody Jack. There are times I think you are seeking out ways to die.’

The Corneille Noire swept across the waves, a single-minded predator with the Tempest caught in its cold glare. Courtenay waited with one foot on the rail, one hand gripping a line, his grim gaze fixed on the other galleon’s progress. As it swept alongside, he raised one arm.

Will stared at the Enemy ship, frowning. In the light of its swinging lanterns, the grey-skinned, unblinking crew seemed like statues, oblivious of every sensation. Even from that distance, Will could tell they had the taint of rot about them. But if the captain Jean le Gris was troubled by what had happened to his men, he showed no sign of it, levelling his sword at Courtenay and shouting abuse into the roaring gale. Behind him, the pale sentinels of the Fay waited for the bloodletting. Will sensed their terrible gaze upon him.

‘Let us not wait for them!’ Courtenay bellowed. ‘Send them a greeting from Hell!’ He slashed down his arm.

The message darted from man to man until it reached the master gunner on the gun deck. A rolling wall of fire erupted into the watery world. From bow chasers to broadside cannon to stern chasers, the booming of the guns thundered out, louder even than the storm. Plumes of white smoke whipped away in the wind. Most of the shot plunged harmlessly into the towering walls of black water as the squall flung the two vessels around the high ridges and deep valleys of the swell. But one smashed a hole through the pirate ship’s castle to where the captain’s cabin would have been and another tore rigging from the mizzen top. Bloody Jack shook his fist and roared his jubilation, leaning so far over the rail that Will thought the waves would pluck him away.

‘No cannon will drive them off,’ Carpenter shouted, his brow furrowed. ‘They will not rest until we go down.’

‘If our only choice is to take them with us, that is what we shall do,’ Will yelled back. ‘Though in these turbulent waters, it will take an age to whittle each other to pieces.’

The Tempest rolled at an alarming angle as another wave crashed across the deck. Will swallowed a mouthful of brine. Only his grip on the rigging saved him as his legs flew out beneath him. When the galleon righted, he saw the Corneille Noire broadside on, its gun ports open. The captain was waiting for the swell to draw the two vessels in line before giving the order to fire.

‘Heads down,’ Will called. The fire spewed out of the pirate ship, and the cannon cracked. He flung himself on to the deck as red-hot shot screamed by. To his right, the rail disintegrated. A sailor slow in dropping low disappeared in a red mist. Another screamed, his leg gone. Deadly shards of timber flew around, and the cacophony of cries of men in agony echoed along the length of the galleon.

Courtenay hung over the rail to survey the damage inflicted on his vessel’s hull. ‘All above the waterline,’ he concluded with a pleased nod. ‘Then let us not stop there.’ As the swell lifted the Tempest high, he bellowed the order to fire again. Thunder rolled all around. The acrid stink of burnt powder whisked in the wind.

Sizzling shot tore through the Enemy vessel, more by good fortune than judgement. Seasoned oak as hard as iron burst into shards. Rigging tore free, lashing across the deck. The mainmast cracked and skewed at an angle. Bloody Jack made his own luck by throwing caution to the wind, Will knew: any other captain would have taken the decision to flee rather than fight in those seas.

At the pirate captain’s orders, his grey, dead men clambered up what remained of the rigging to cut loose the mainsail before it dragged the mast over the side and the ship to the bottom. Jubilation flooded Will. The gamble had worked and the pirate ship had been crippled. But the triumph was short-lived. Even without its mainmast and sails, the Enemy ship swept closer.

‘They are going to ram us,’ Carpenter yelled.

‘Board us, more like,’ Will corrected as he watched the frantic activity along the other ship’s deck. The rotting crew lined the rail with grapnels and rapiers in hand. Behind them, the Unseelie Court waited to seize their moment.

‘Prepare to repel boarders,’ Bloody Jack roared, striding along the deck. His men wrenched out their own rapiers and daggers and scrambled to the rail. Will hauled himself up, drawing his blade.

‘This is more like it.’ Carpenter grinned without humour. ‘Now I can put my idle hands to good use. A hogshead of sack to the man who carves the most.’

The Corneille Noire swung close. Will braced himself for the impact. Whatever magics were at play brought the galleon firm alongside, despite the heaving swell. It was as if they were locked in congress, rising and falling with perfect rhythm.

The grapnels flew out across the black gulf, catching in the Tempest’s rigging. The pirates gripped their ropes and kicked away from the rail. Some of Courtenay’s men attempted to cut the lines, pitching a few of the swinging figures into the roiling sea. They went down without a cry, sucked under the black water in an instant.

Will blinked away the driving rain. He glimpsed the bloom of decay on the grey, dispassionate face of the once-man swinging towards him. Yet another of the Unseelie Court’s crimes against the natural order, he thought, glowering. As the pirate’s feet crossed the rail, Will lunged. Cold steel plunged through the thing’s chest, yet still it came. He withdrew his rapier and slashed down. The face peeled open from temple to chin, but still the wide eyes stared. As the pirate dropped to the deck, he swung his knife high. Will threw himself forward so that his shoulder rammed into his dead foe. The dagger whisked a hair’s breadth from his cheek as he drove on and pitched the pirate over the side.

Along the rail blew a smaller storm of steel and curses and spattering blood. Blades clashed as Courtenay’s men wrestled with their dead counterparts. One sailor barely twenty summers old went down in a gout of crimson from a slashed throat. Without pause, his staring attacker plunged his gore-stained dagger into the chest of the seaman fighting beside him.

In the confusion of the battle whirling across the storm-lashed deck, Will lost sight of his colleagues. He thrust himself into the melee. When the fighting was too close to use his rapier, he lashed out with elbows and fists and knees and feet. He glimpsed Courtenay roaring with laughter as he plunged his dagger into a grey face. A moment later the mad captain lifted the corpse over his head and pitched it into the sea.

Beyond the frenzy, Will sensed movement as fluid as the brine washing across the deck. His nerves jangled. Shadows flitted, here, there. When a lightning flash froze white faces, he realized that some of the Unseelie Court had boarded the Tempest. They kept to the gloom on the fringes so that it was impossible to tell how many there were.

Will tore himself away from the fight and made his way, stabbing and hacking as he went, to where Launceston was tipping a pirate over the side. ‘Leave the men to fight these dead things,’ he ordered. ‘The Fay are aboard, and they are our business. We must find John and Tobias now.’

He darted to the other side of the deck. In the half-light, he glimpsed shapes creeping low like wolves at night, lips pulled back from sharp teeth. As a hand flicked towards the hilt of a rapier, Will sucked in a sharp breath and leapt for a rope dangling from a grapnel in the rigging. Bracing himself, he swung both feet into the nearest Fay’s chest, propelling it over the rail.

Another attacked the instant he dropped to the boards, slashing with fast, controlled strokes. When a dying seaman stumbled back into his grim opponent, Will seized his chance, thrusting through the heart with one fluid strike.

Somewhere nearby Strangewayes yelled an anguished warning. Will wrenched around. Tobias was pointing at the door to the captain’s cabin. It swung wildly in the lashing gale. The Fay lord Lansing, whom Will had seen drive a man mad on the Liverpool dockside, now had Grace pinned to his chest with his left arm as he eased her out on deck. The Fay lord turned his cold face towards Will, and called in a clear voice, ‘Lay down your weapons.’ As the other Fay circled, Lansing drew his slender fingers along the curve of Grace’s neck, pushing her head back.

‘Resist him,’ she called in a defiant voice. ‘My life means nothing when all of England is at stake.’

Will knew she was right, and so did Strangewayes.

‘Kill them,’ Lansing said to the other Fay. ‘Kill them all, and let us be done with this rabble and return to the Golden City victorious.’

Before the first of the Unseelie Court could attack, Grace hammered her heel on to Lansing’s foot. In the