Scarlet With Drops Of Crimson

Chapter One

January 1717

"HOLD FAST!" A beckoning voice shouted amongst the chaos between two ships in conflict.

Loud, thunderous explosions went off all around, mixing with the harsh crashing of waves against the hull of ships and the blood-lust screaming of crewmembers wielding cutlasses and flintlocks. Two ships were at war, called to arms by the affiliation brandished by the flags at the very top of the mast. It wasn't until one ship was left incapacitated that the opposing crew boarded the stationary vessel and laid siege to the surviving crew who hadn't succumbed to cannon fire.

Steel clashed with steel, grinding together with such intensity that sparks were beckoned to style the combat. Blades cut deeply into flesh, causing blood to give a new shade of paint on the deck. The brutality from it all was an art to those who so proudly brandished their weapons and their snarling, yellow teeth. They were pirates, after all.

The captain of the pirate crew let his voice crack out throughout the chaos to summon one particular member of his crew whom he desired to end the conquest if they were to make it out alive and with a substantial number to keep his ship sailing. "SAM! By God, lad! Find that bloody captain and put an end to this madness!"

The person whom the captain entrusted with such a task was a woman in disguise under her real alias, Samantha.

"Aye, captain!" Samantha barked as deeply as she could muster, for if the crew were to discover her true nature as a woman, they would throw her overboard as they were naive to the belief that having women aboard as crew brought about a curse.

Her opponent was a sailor in yellow clothing, distinguishing his nationality with the Spanish. Although he did not pride his appearance as formally as the British – or more preferably labelled, the Redcoats – by styling his hair into buns curled up on the sides of his head, he did have his hair loose with the back tied up to create a rat tail.

Samantha grunted, exerting herself from the prolonged fight that should have ended sooner had she not miscalculated her footing which cost her the killing blow against her current opponent. Their blades scraped together, hers horizontally with his vertical, gradually growing bigger in size as it got closer to her ocean-blue eyes.

With a swing of her leg, Samantha kicked the man between his legs and slammed the bottom of her hilt on his upper back, causing him to collapse to the ground. She then used her blade to puncture his back, instantly putting him to rest.

"Now... to find that captain." Samantha breathed deeply, muttering to herself so as to remind herself of her task.

Replacing her cutlass with her flintlock, Samantha charged towards the port side of the ship which was parallel with the Spanish ship and grabbed a dangling piece of rope and swung herself across. Her gun found its victim and a round bullet shot out, rendering the weapon useless as there was too much activity around her to reload. The bullet met its victim's skull, effectively killing another Spanish soldier.

Tossing the gun aside, Samantha drew her dagger when she spotted a fellow pirate at blade point of a Spanish soldier gaining the upper hand in their brawl. She lifted the dagger above her head and embedded the blade into his skull. The pirate nodded at her to express his appreciation before running off to hack at a Spaniard's back.

"Shit! Too much momentum." Samantha cursed herself when she found herself struggling to remove the blade deeply embedded into her victim's skull.

She grunted, squirming as she desperately tried to remove the blade as she wished not to be impaled from behind or have her throat slit unexpectedly from behind.