Black Gate

The woman was stunning. Long blonde hair that fell in ringlet curls framed a round face with high cheekbones and porcelain skin. The men in the room no doubt also noticed that her dress clung tightly to her generously proportioned curves. Dina, however, set her tray aside and grabbed the broom from the corner.

“Out!” she said, jabbing it at the woman.

The woman jumped sideways with a squeal of rage.

“I mean it,” said Dina. “That’s a glamour you’re wearing, and I don’t allow magic in my tavern.”

The woman pouted, her rosy red lips puckering just so. Behind her, Dina could hear the scrape of chairs against the stone floor as several of her patrons got to their feet.

“I mean it!” Dina shouted. “I run an honest business.”

The Witch’s shot smashed its prow with a sudden chaos of flame and smoke, blood and cinders. Lengths of oar blew into the air and fell slowly like matchwood to the sea. Sailors and pieces of sailors littered the waves with a red stain. Kate’s ruffians howled, and the crews of the Raven and the Falcon roared with approval.

The Arab ship quickly sank under, the men in her waist and stern jumping overboard. The uglies aboard Kate’s vessel rushed to the gunwales with musket and pistol and fired upon the men in the water.

The Lark then let loose with a thunderous broadside.

The Witch‘s side guns answered, as did the Raven’s. The Falcon’s cannon blasted a second galleass under the waves, her shot striking below the water line and sending the Arabs aboard her to desperate measures, attempting to caulk and repair the wound and return the Falcon’s fire.

Gallant’s crew sent their foes down to a deep grave with a blistering salvo of cannon shot once again aimed at the water line.

Zeus van Rijn’s curses could be heard rising above the din of battle as the Lark swept the waves and bore down upon Buchanan’s ship.

John had never tamped anyone into the black before. He had seen Ronnie do it, twice. The first had been a young guy on a motorcycle, maybe nineteen or twenty. Veronica had tucked her long black hair behind her ears, then focused on the target. The kid had looked right at them, a puzzled look on his face, sweat suddenly pooling on his forehead, and then something had come out of the bed of a pickup heading the other way, something small and sharp that struck the kid squarely in his left eye.

For a second it seemed he would keep the bike from toppling, even as his hand flew to his face. Then he lost it, not even laying the bike down, a skid morphing into a tumble, and John thought or imagined he could hear his neck snap when he hit the pavement. Veronica, utterly calm, had looked at John, who was open mouthed and shaking.

“So now you’ve seen,” she’d said, and they had never spoken of it again.