Pirate Souls

II - Chapter 4 - Vindicta

At the end of the afternoon of the following day, we dock at La Balise. The Anarkhia is not in sight. She has moved quickly. She knows that I am on her heels.

A short inquiry of the dockers tells us that they docked for only half a day. They have filled the hold and recruited fifteen or so sailors. Madness! Florence is in danger.

It appears that the fellows she has recruited are mercenaries, the sort which hire their services out to those who pay the highest sums. The eighteen thousand pieces of eight will be largely enough to remunerate them, if they do not decide to help themselves to the booty and wipe out the crew.

After having dined in a miserable inn, I go back to the stinking little room that I have to share with Cook. I am pursued by nightmares all night long.

I hate La Balise. The fort reminds me that the cruelty of sailors goes well beyond all the abuse that a nipper of eleven can imagine. After having embarked for the New World, I was whipped, denied food and forced to work both day and night. Obliged to perform foul tasks for ever fiercer masters.

Deep down, I had convinced myself that I was doing penance. For the deaths of the young baker, my mother and my father. For Brian. That is what kept me going.

My fucking guilty conscience.

And then slowly, things began to change. I survived the violence and brutality with Cook at my side. We became men. Aged fifteen and with our first pay, we followed our friends to a brothel in this supply port. Outside, a hurricane was raging. The fear of dying under the unchained elements made us drink more alcohol than our bodies could contain.

In truth, I was terrified. Not by the storm, but by the disfigured whores and their besmirched makeup. They proudly exhibited their wares and their flesh in this seedy inn frequented by travellers. Each time a prostitute took her client upstairs a kid washed the tables with an old cloth. He tried to make himself as discreet and invisible as possible. Drunk as a lord, I bumped into him. And then I slapped him. He didn't deserve it, but his sad look awoke the memory of my brother in me.

A woman came up to me. Much older than I. I did not dare say no. I followed her to a dingy room filled with suspicious smells. I didn't like her coarse face. I turned her over and mounted her as I had seen other sailors do. Yes, I forced myself to do it. I had to do it. I wanted to know.

She gave little cries, thinking that it would stimulate me. It was not so. I ordered her to be quiet. She would not shut up. She laughed. She was mocking me.

So, I faced her. I grabbed her by the throat and hit her. This excited me. I continued to fuck her, and strike her at the same time. I went berserk. The will to hurt her engulfed me.

My fists struck her face. Several times. Blood flowed from her mouth and nostrils while I forced myself on her. My first sexual relationship is the image of my life.

I climaxed in blood.

And hatred.

It's time. Still night-time. Cook and I go towards the docks, following Carpentier and his cronies. Even before he shows me the ship, I surmise that it is the one that is furthest from the middle.

'First mate Kelly, this is the Vindicta,' declares the customs officer, proudly.

She is magnificent. A small thirty-yard warship, armed with a battery of more than twenty cannons. Her three beautiful masts rise majestically above the deck. Contrary to my brig whose hull is rounder, her flat shape is more reminiscent of a longboat. I love her already. I surmise that she is light, fast and easy to handle, darting through the sea and cutting through the spume.