Page 20 of The Pirate Queen

She is escorted through the murmuring throng, pushing the onlookers aside. Cursing as they step on feet and elbow stragglers out of the way. Grace is shoved into the open area before the gallows where Bingham waits, holding court. He surveys her clean dress, her wild hair. Does not reach for his perfumed kerchief.

“Welcome,” Bingham tells her, swinging an arm wide, as though this were the theater and she an honored guest. He motions toward the gallows. “I believe you know these men?”

She looks up. Draws in a quick breath. Know them? She practically raised them, calls them nephews to this day, though they belonged to her late husband. They are family to her, the same as Donal’s children.

If she intends to cry, it must be now. She’ll not let them see her weep when they set that rope against her throat. She shakes her head, then growls the despair away.

“Ah, good. You recognize them,” Bingham says, then raises a hand and the crowd stills, grows silent. He turns in a circle so everyone can see him. “These are the worst men living!” he shouts.

His voice echoes off the stone walls of the courtyard. And no, these are not bad men, they are some of the best men she knows. Her husband’s nephews. Barely out of their twenties. And there is another behind the scaffolding, waiting. They all wear grim looks of acceptance as they wait their turn.

She did this to them. And she hates herself for it.

“They have done nothing wrong,” Grace tells Bingham. There is a waver to her voice. “Don’t do this.”

“Oh.” He grins. “It is already done. I just wanted you to have a better view. Now mind your manners, lest I have to gag you as well.”

Bingham takes another step toward the gallows. “These men,” he shouts, “have all supported the Gaelic uprising!”

The courtyard fills with boos. Someone throws a bit of rotten cabbage and it hits one of them in the face. She watches as he rubs the juice off his cheek and onto the dirty shoulder of his tunic.

“Two of them are known thieves!” Bingham shouts, clearly enjoying himself. His voice grows louder with every word, his smile wider.

“Lies!” Grace hisses between her teeth, but the sound is lost amid the crowd.

“They have plotted—along with this woman—to involve the Scots and rebel against the Queen. Each of them has confessed to these crimes while imprisoned here. I have read their letters. Thus they shall be sentenced to death by hanging, as is fitting for all traitors to Her Majesty’s service.”

Of the four, three are illiterate. The other has held a sword more often than a quill. None of them could have written confessions of any kind.

For the hundredth time since getting captured in the woods, Grace wonders about her men. Where are they? Why have they not attempted to rescue her? Perhaps they know when they are beat. Or maybe Manannán has finally turned from her. It has taken her only fifty-six years to run out of luck.

There is no point arguing that these men do not follow the English queen; they serve only Grace. And it is to her that they look, chins lifted, as Bingham raises a hand.

“Their punishment is death,” he declares, then brings his arm down in an arc.

The trapdoor drops beneath her nephews and the ropes snap tight.

“No!” Grace gasps, and stumbles forward a step.

But she is yanked backward by a fist in her hair, and Bingham’s breath is hot against her ear. “I will kill them all,” he hisses. “These men. Then your sons. I will find your daughter and watch while my guards ravish her. You will stand here when she dangles, then I will set the noose around your neck myself. There will be nothing left of you to remember.”

Maiden, 1538

“To Sea”

Grace is eight years old

The girl is tenacious. Half wild. And prettier than she ought to be. The other girls her age are still freckled, all elbows and knees and teeth. Growing into themselves. But Gráinne has a finality about her, like this is the face she is destined to wear, it only has to catch up with who she will be in the end. High cheekbones. A fine straight nose, though Eóin O’Malley sees more Scottish in its bridge than he would like. She must get it from her mother’s side. Somewhere back a Gallowglass got into the line, no doubt. But he can admit that it is fetching on his daughter. As is her full mouth—prone to impudence when she stubs a toe or runs into the brambles. Her eyes, however, still alarm him. He has never seen such eyes. Gray at rest, like the clouds before a storm. But tinged with green when she turns to fury, as she has done frequently these last three years.

Nary once did the girl consider her severed braid a lost battle but, as far as Eóin can tell, a challenge accepted. Though she has not touched her hair again, she also hasn’t allowed it to be braided. Gráinne leaves it wild, curling around her shoulders, tangled by the wind. If he didn’t know better, he would think she did it to remind him of their conflict. It suits her, though. Even if Maeve does have to untangle it with tallow and comb thrice a week.

He watches his daughter chase the waves and knows that, somehow, he has been bested by this miniature girl child. Sailing to the moon would be easier than denying her any longer. And he would, just to get away from her incessant pleas.

“Take me with you, Da!” has been her daily refrain.

She wants the water the way he wants whiskey after a day of gutting fish. As a need. And so, after three years, he and Maeve have finally reached an accord.

He will take Gráinne to Galway. Fecking Galway. Just this once. The city he hates most, on a day when the sea will no doubt bring up her breakfast. He will chart the hardest route. He has already ordered the crew to show her no mercy. They’d scowled at him. Gráinne is their favorite. She is everyone’s favorite. Her greatest gift is making people like her. Eóin is certain the damn wee banshee is gathering an army loyal only to herself.