Viola

The Trial

The next morning the sun did not wake me, for I was too trained against its lazy summer rays for that. The Lady Captain's uneven footsteps slammed into the floor and I awoke with a stiff neck and shoulders. Floors, though excellent in many aspects, were not particularly comfortable.

After making eye contact with me, the Lady Captain informed me I was to be put on trial this bright and cheerful morning for my 'crimes.' She steered me out the door to the deck.

A whole courtroom of people arranged themselves for me. A man, whose name I learned was Kaito, was to be the prosecutor. And I, I learned, was to be providing my own defense. The Lady Captain judged and the rest of the crew jurored. They were my audience and I was an actor without a script.

Kaito began the investigation snappily. "Do you have a skill not present among this crew?"

The question was polite enough, but the way his scarred lips twisted afterward sent a shot of fear through my lungs. The crew took this as an opportunity to introduce themselves. It was a show of audience participation and of how sure they were I would not run away from them.

First came Ali and Beni the Moroccan twins. Then the gunmen: Fahad, George, Dmitri, and the master himself, Kaito. Victor worked on rigging, as apparently other members of the crew helped him out as well as attending to their own tasks. Aaron was the boatswain, and Jack was the 1st mate. Alessandro and Oscar navigated. A man lacking legs in the corner introduced himself as No-Legs Lukas the musician. Henri was a cook, and probably a rigger or something of the sort based on his broad shoulders. A quiet man named Adrien was the cooper. Finally, the Lady Captain introduced herself with a grand sweeping bow, much to the amusement of the crew.

It was a small and motley bunch, the likes of which I would never expect to be the scourge of French merchants everywhere. My plans for turning in the pirates to the authorities seemed to shatter in that moment; I could not think of any skills I had that would assist them.

"Can you rig?" Kaito demanded. "Can you navigate? Shoot? Carry? Carpenter?"

"No," I responded to each demand, growing quieter with each syllable I was forced to pronounce.

Being faced with the prospect of one's death tends to be somewhat sombering.

I remained silent for several minutes, turning my brains inside out for something, anything I could do. The crew seemed to be disappointed with their entertainment. Maybe they had expected more of a fight.

The Lady Captain extracted a pistol from her burgundy cloak.

I was running out of time.

She fixed her gaze on me.

I laughed nervously. "I can sew! Look at you all, ripped shirts and pants. I bet you haven't gotten new clothes in years! I could sew up your clothes, sew up... sew up... your bodies! When you get injured, or if you get injured because you all are all obviously very good at what you do, but if the occasion arises I could be the person for the job. The ladies all say my embroidery is the best and my stitching is just the same!"

I shifted my eyes rapidly from one crew member to another. They murmured to each other. The Lady Captain lowered her pistol.

"Let her go." she sighed. "Any object?"

None did.

"Gentlemen," she continued, "it seems our lovely Mademoiselle Madeleine may have a useful skill after all."

And so I became the seamstress and surgeon of the most notorious pirate crew of the Mediterranean.

They gave me a hammock to sleep in the hull with the rest of the crew. Apparently, pirates were so uncivilized that women slept in the same space as men. Although I would prefer my chances with the crew over the Lady Captain's bedroom, it was the general principle of the matter that bothered me.

In the hull pirates were constantly moving about. I could not sleep for three nights. For the first time in months, I did not see the stars at night.

The pirates around me did not even make an effort to quiet themselves, playing card games and chatting at all hours of the night. When one would leave to fulfill his duties, another pirate would pick up his cards and play on. I could hear them talking to one another. More often than not, it was about me. I should be flattered none of them believed I was planning to turn them in. I began calculating my means of escape and of revenge.