Nathan's levity faded. "There's no shame in it, darling. We all bear our marks. Take pride. You can spit in the world's face, because you've lived to tell of them."

"You think I'm lying, don't you?"

How could he not? How could anyone believe such a tale: a single woman riding foolishly into battle to save her husband? To her own mind, the entire ordeal possessed a dream-like quality, as if she had watched someone else.

The corner of his mouth quirked. "And what of it, if you were? The effect is the same: the marks would still be there. You suffered no less, regardless the cause. Any fool can see there's more to it and only a fool would inquire. Hell, no one tells everything," he said with a mirthless laugh. "Couldn't get a bloody word in edgewise, what with everyone jabbering."

Nathan wasn't being cavalier, nor taking her story lightly. With a body more battered by far, he spoke with the eloquence and weight of experience. He spoke not down to her, but as equals, joining her into a brotherhood of those christened by battle, either on the decks of a ship or fields of war.

Cate rested her chin on her arms and turned her attention to the night once more. Clouds swathed the moon's hips, its three-quarter brilliance illuminating the night in silver and the purplish-black hunched shapes of islands, which dotted the horizon. The stern lamps gilded the Morganse's wake. Beyond the glow of the lamps, the ship's path streamed away in a phosphorescent V-shape.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" she sighed.

"Aye, 'tis beautiful."

She turned to find Nathan's gaze fixed on her, his profile frosted by the moon.

The space between them was filled with the sounds of the ship and low-voiced hands. Sails reefed, her wings clipped for the night, the Morganse's voice was but a whisper of her daytime chorus, the water barely rustling as she slipped past.

Stillness, however, was not Nathan's natural state. He soon began to shift, the creak of his belts and tinkle of bells seeming to shatter the silence. He hazarded further movement only enough to resituate, and then settled. Soon, however, came the drumming his fingers on his belt. He was clearly troubled by something.

Little wonder what, she thought ruefully. He would be glad to be shut of her. Then he could have back his cabin, his bed and what answered for a peaceful world in a pirate's way of life.

After clearing his throat several times, Nathan said, "You jumped on a horse?"

It took Cate a moment to smoke his meaning. Her shoulders moved in a half-shrug.

"I grew up on a farm with five brothers."

"Five brothers." He gave a low whistle. "Your father must have been proud."

"Would have been prouder with six, but settled for five." She was disinclined to elaborate; it hardly seemed worth the effort, at that point.

"So, Witch o' the Moors, is it?" he asked.

Cate twitched at the raw nerve touched.

"Scary, isn't it?" She heaved a sigh and ruffled her hair in frustration. "How can they make up such outlandish drabble from something so horrible? Do they think it was some kind of a game?"

Nathan nodded knowingly. "Happens all the time, darling; a fascination with the macabre and the grisly."

"You never inquired much regarding my past." Nathan had been keenly interested in her identity when she first arrived, and then seemed to have lost interest, never pressing for further details.

He shrugged. "We all have a past. Backgrounds-where we came from, who we are 'tis many times best left unsaid. If a man desires you to know, he'll tell you. You might find yourself learning far more than intended, and then you're obliged to carry that secret, share his burden. Not many shoulders are wide enough to carry all that."

"How much are you carrying?"

His gaze dropped quickly to the sill between them. "Enough."

Nathan paused considering, the space between his brows furrowing. "All I care is that the men know a sheet from a shroud and live the by ship's articles. From there..." A shifting of his shoulders finished the thought.

A wide smile flashed in the moonlight, as he said, "Most believe their former lives were drowned when they crossed the Tropic of Cancer."

"Drowned?" It was an intriguing thought. If only His Majesty's Courts would see it the same way.

"'Tis the superstition at any rate," Nathan said, the grin widening.

Cate made a low growling sound as she rubbed her forehead on her arm. "I never wanted to be famous."

Nathan pursed his lips, his sprouting beard making a soft rasping sound as he rubbed his jaw. "Fame's not so bad. It can bring you free rum and your choice of the best whores."

"Can't say as I ever pined for either one."

"People recognize you. They know your name."

"I've rather been striving to avoid that," Cate said tartly.

He ran a thoughtful hand along the curve of his mustache. "You can control it...mostly. Sometimes it takes on a life of its own, begins to grow with or without you."

Suddenly Cate felt so very tired. "All I wanted was Brian alive. The rest was only what was necessary to that end."

"People who do what they must to get what they want are to be admired."

"Including killing?" She shot Nathan a doubtful look. "Do you find that an admirable trait?"

"Admiration comes in many forms, luv, under many masks," he said evenly.

Nathan's eyes found hers and held them. Glittering in the moonlight, the umber depths were laden with wisdom far too advanced for his years, the fruits of hard-earned lessons.

"When you came in, I was thinking about the night before Brian was supposed to be captured," she said, looking to the night once more.

He looked up, scowling. "Supposed to be captured?"

Cate nodded, ruefully smiling. "Arrangements had been made for one of the tenants to turn him in the next day. We were all starving. It was a way for his family to receive the reward, rather than risk a stranger reporting him."

"What about you?"

"I left that morning, before he was to be taken. The authorities were too interested in him to notice me."

"Lord deliver us from noble men," he grumbled with a barely tolerant roll of the eyes. "You got nothing?"

She smiled weakly. There had been a reward for both she and Brian. Dreading a life without him, she had been willing to sacrifice herself as well. The arguments had been passionate, Brian intransigent, claiming to see her safe away would allow him peace of mind to face what was to come. Her name was stricken from the family Bible; she no longer existed. And then she was spirited away to a series of clansmen and sympathizers, escorting her under the cover of darkness, night after night, until she was far enough south and no longer readily recognized.

"His family sent me a little when they dared through connections. The mail or couriers were too risky," she said.

Cate looked up at the moon once more, lopsided and waxen. "Our last night was a night like this, except cold. It was Brian's last opportunity to see stars and breathe fresh air, so we slept outside. We took quilts and found a quiet spot."

There were no tors or lochs, and the stars didn't sparkle with the same brilliance as in the crisp mountain air, but she saw that night just the same. She couldn't tell Nathan everything of that night. There had been no tears; those had been used up. They barely spoke, for there was little more to be said. His was going to be the easiest: imprisonment, trial, and then death, probably all within a moon's cycle. Hers was the worst: to keep living, alone, half of a whole. She watched the dawn rise from over his bare shoulder as they made love for the last time.

Nathan looked off to the phosphorescent glow of the ship's wake.

"Your husband was a wise man." His graveled voice was a tight rasp. "I know what it 'tis to lie in some stinking cell waiting for me final dawn, whilst trying to decide which I fancied more: to see the sky or draw a clean breath. The sword or a noose is preferable to entombment."

She had managed to delay matters for a bit, but there was no way around it, the inevitable always being exactly that. "So," Cate said softly. "How's it to be: the nearest garrison or all the way to Port Royal?"

"For what?"

"Turn me in." She leaned back against the window frame, drinking in the heady mix of freshness and salt. "I want to enjoy every last moment of freedom I can. In a way, I'm ready to be done with it. It will be a relief to not live in constant fear."

"'Tis painful to deflate your hopes," Nathan began carefully, "but you shan't be turned in anytime soon, not if this lot of oysterheads have anything to do with it."

Cate swiveled around, curious to see what he was playing at. "How can that be?"

"They voted." He jerked a thumb toward the cabin door, and then held up his hands in defense. "Upon me word, I had nothing to do with it."

"But there's a reward." Pulse racing, she curbed her soaring hopes, afraid to believe.

"There's barely a man on this ship what doesn't carry some kind of a price on his head," he said, rising to his feet. "Turn in one, and I would be obliged to do them all. Bloody inconvenient, that. I'd have to press a whole new crew."

Nathan paused at her elbow and bent to peer at her. "You'll be well tonight, then?"

"I think so," Cate said unsteadily, bracing her head in her hands. Protection. Safety. Caring. Haven. Home. She now had it all.

Nathan hesitated near the mizzenmast, inclined toward leaving, and yet reticent to do so.

"So, let's see..." he said, coming back. Rolling his eyes in affected consideration, he sat amid the creak of leather, his knee brushing hers. "We've treason-that's to be admired; I've never managed that one-Murder. Conspiracy..." he said, ticking off the charges on his fingers.

"Defamation against the Crown," she put in. "Mayhem-there was a war, after all. Espionage-an assumption on their part, but it's impressive on the broadsheets. Lewd conduct-a woman traveling with an army of men couldn't possibly do otherwise, could she? Sorcery and witchcraft-I suppose my eyes had something to do with that."

They laughed quietly. He had alluded to the evil-natured color of her eyes many a time.

"You've a charge sheet to be proud of," Nathan declared, with a flash of ivory and gold between his lips.

"And now, I can add piracy, I suppose."

Her intent had been light, but his expression darkened. "Not if I have aught to do with it. We'll claim you were a hostage, and if necessary, were used most egregiously."

"That won't help the reputation, but then I suppose I have none to defend."

"It will keep you from the noose," Nathan said with conviction.

To what end, if you're gone? The bitter thought swept in without warning. She quickly batted it down. Besides a home, Nathan was offering a future. He and his ship were a godsend and she would take it, be damned the cost.

He leaned to touch her arm and she was suffused with a flush of warmth. She looked up into a walnut-colored gaze, intent with concern.

"You'll be well tonight?" he asked again.

"Yes." Cate's throat tightened, touched by his sincerity. Now she would be, better than ever. "I still think I'll stay here for a while; I'm enjoying the night too much."

Nathan laid a hand to her shoulder and frowned. "You're shivering."

"Am I? I hadn't noticed."

In nearly a single motion, he tossed the baldric from his shoulder, slid off his coat and whirled it over her.

"Better?" he asked, tucking it in.

"Mm, thank you." Cate snuggled deeper, the place on her arm where he had touched her still glowing. The burgundy-colored folds might have been worn, but they were strong his warmth and scent. She felt a bit voyeuristic for using him thus, but was eager for anything that brought him a bit closer. "Seems impossible for someone to be cold in the Caribbean."

"I learned long ago, nothing is impossible; improbable, maybe, but never impossible."

The next morning, Nathan stood at the weather mizzen chains. Heeled nearly four strakes, the Morganse raced through the water, the waves curling in a high arc over her nose, soaking the deck in rain-shower thoroughness.

The Morganse was always testy about setting a starboard tack, griping, threatening to fall away. Like any woman, there was more than one way to make her sigh.

Aye, me darling. As you wish.

There was but one soul between them, and she took the share. Justifiably so; she possessed the greater heart, the courage to face the sea every day and the will to make it her own. He was but a means to her ends: to give her enough canvas, a light hand at the wheel, and a fair course.

An imprudent vessel she was, always asking for that bit more canvas than she could carry, not like other ships what cranked and shuddered, with spars that creaked and popped like an old tar's bones at the adding of so much as a staysail. Her spirits ran high, extending past ration as she fought to kick up her heels like a high-blooded horse, willing to run until her heart burst. He found it best to entice her with what she desired most: a full complement of jibs and staysails, shaking out the reefs in the mizzen top to keep her true. Give her her head, and then creep in the braces, when she wasn't looking. Let her royals and courses fly, and she was as happy as a fat whore with a full purse.

The chains buried in the foam, he swayed with her motion as she ate the waves, shaking off one while reaching for the next. He closed his eyes and grasped the shroud. Some claimed the wheel was the way to a ship's heart. Her shrouds were her pulse, a direct line to her lifeblood: the wind. He bent his head to listen to her song, her tempo of water and wind, sough and whistle, thrum, and roil.

No need for log lines. She was making 11 knots if she made a fathom; and the wind a bare four points off her nose.

Damn! How she loved to point!

If it weren't for that skirt of weeds she carried-Gotta careen her soon-it would be 12 for sure. Still, 11 was sufficient to overrun any vessel to suffer the misfortune of putting across her bow.

She continued to gripe-no need for a hand on the wheel to know it-reminding him the stowage required a bit of a shift aft; she preferred not so heavy on the peak. Nothing to be done, until at anchor. With a full day of the hands sweating it out in the hold, a night of revelry ashore would be the only balm.

Once she hummed, the helm steady, he could relax and attend on other matters, ones that had pressed since before the Midwatch.

He checked over his shoulder toward the quarterdeck. Too wet to sit at the bow, where she preferred, Cate perched in the lee of the afterdeck, working. The woman didn't know the meaning of rest. A working fool she was, going until she fell over, if saner heads weren't brought to bear. A few days prior, her scissors had needed sharpening, and a skill for the honing of edges was discovered. When asked how that came to be, she answered: "I had five brothers."

Knives, swords, broad axes, hatchets, and harpoons-the Morganse bristled with a host of sharp-edged objects. Consequently, she spent a portion of most every day sharpening. Hone stone, oil, leather, and rags became her constant companions, all stowed in a small basket. This day was no exception; she busied with several rigging knives the men brought, anxious for a few minutes of conversation while she worked.

Pryce slipped aft to the quarterdeck as he made his way forward. The odd wave caught him now and again, but he knew the feel of his ship well enough to know when to duck. To his mind, a man who couldn't bear being wet had no business at sea, but by the same token, it was a wretched fool who didn't have the sense to avoid a wave square to the face.

Mr. Fox, master of the larbolin f'c'stlemen, hovered at seeing his captain approach. The man tended toward being as fastidious as an old schoolmaster about his realm. He waved Fox off, just to set the poor man's mind to rest. This was not a matter that reflected on his crew, reeving new foretackle blocks, at the moment. Keeping his distance, but with a canny eye, Fox touched his forelock and returned to his duty.

"You, sailor," Nathan called, tapping one on the shoulder. "Name's Cameron, am I right?"

"Aye, Cap'n!" The man knuckled a hasty salute, disconcerted to find his commander so unexpectedly close, and addressing him directly, at that.

"Pray a word with you and your...mate." Nathan urged the man aside, beckoning his comrade to follow. "To your duties, mates," he barked to the remainder who stood gaping.