The Red King by Rosemary O'Malley Page B

he
shouted orders down to Fleming. “We have the wind, leave off the
oars! We need the guns, Fleming! Ready the guns!”
    Rory saw Andrew then, standing unsure in the
midst of it all, and leapt down to land gracefully before him.
Andrew was breathless, both with fear of the coming battle and from
his sudden, thudding heart. “I don’t know what to do,” he said.
    “You will stay below, out of the line of
fire. We can out maneuver her, but there will still be rifle fire
as we pass. I want no chance of you being hit by a stray bullet.”
He took Andrew’s face in his hands and kissed him with great
feeling before moving on to the foremast.
    Malik passed him then, carrying a large
basket atop his shoulder. “Follow me, Coinin. I have work for
you.”
    Andrew was set to striking the shot for the
small cannons being readied on deck. “See how they’re smooth,
perfectly rounded?” Malik said, holding one up so that the sun lit
the surface. “We need them dented, dimpled, to make them fly
straight. Take the hammer and set to, and hurry.”
    Andrew did hurry, ignoring the pain in his
fingers when he missed. He was too focused to be worried, a fact
that he took for granted until the heard the first of the warning
fire. It seemed so close. Too close. When Malik returned for the
basket, Andrew asked, “How much danger are we in Malik? Please,
tell me.”
    Malik said, “You need to stay below. You need
to do as you were told.”
    “I don’t think I can stand not knowing…not
helping. I have to do something!”
    Malik left him without answering.
    Undeterred, Andrew climbed the steps to the
top of the hold. He peered out but kept low, barely raising his
head above the rim. The men were quiet; those not working the jib
or rudder were stationed at intervals with weapons ready. He could
not see Rory or Fleming at all. He saw Yousef kneeling nearby with
a belaying pin in one hand and a boarding axe in the other.
“Yousef,” he said, wanting to call out loudly but not wanting draw
attention to himself. “What is it? What’s happening?”
    “The captain means to board her. We have to
circle the ship until we can come about the side. It will take more
precision than might, so we have to listen careful for the
commands. So far they haven’t even had a chance to try and
broadside us, but their rifles are ready. Keep low.” It was the
third admonishment he’d received and it touched a nerve.
    “I can do something! I’m not helpless!” he
said, his newly discovered temper flaring.
    Yousef quirked an eyebrow at him and said,
“Get to the kitchen and help prepare for wounded, we’re likely to
have many today.”
    Andrew punched the wooden frame at his side.
They were all correct, of course, Andrew was useless here. He
abandoned his spot and followed the instruction, finding a handful
of men already at the tables. He was given a long bit of raw muslin
and set to tearing long strips for use as bandages. He had just
begun when there was a barrage of gunfire from above. It was not
their own.
    “That would be the schooner. They know we’re
too fast for them big guns so they’ll to try to pick us off with
little ones,” one of the other men told him when he jumped.
    “How successful should we expect them to be?”
Andrew asked, his voice quavering a little. The sounds of the small
cannons echoed through the room.
    “Not as much as they’d like, to be sure.
We’ll do more damage with our nine-pounders than them with those
big guns. She’ll be boarded and that’s when the real fighting
begins.”
    There were more sounds of battle; guns,
shouts, even a few screams. Andrew could make no sense of any of
it. He sat as still as a statue, his entire body tensed and aching,
listening to the fury up above them. At one point he caught himself
whispering a prayer, his lips and heart leading while his mind was
spun up in anxiety. There was a wrenching noise and the ship
shuddered all around them, knocking them all sideways as the