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“ S hip off the larboard beam!”

The day was eye-piercingly bright. The sun had washed the sky to a pale blue and the sea to a gleaming mass of silvery waves.

The Black Wind was a long pistol shot ahead of the Cygnet , too far for a hail to carry back across the open water but Fonteyne ran a warning flag up the mast. Rose, who had spent the last three days on board the Wind , joined him on deck.

They had been enjoying their last few hours together before the ships parted company and Rose set a course for New Orleans.

Within the hour, they easily identified the silhouette of the Pride . But she was coming toward them, not sailing away in the direction of Barataria Bay.

“What on earth do you suppose that means?” Rose asked.

Sebastien shook his head. “I don’t know. Either way, I expect I will be having my cabin to myself again.”

Rose arched an eyebrow and smiled. “You could have had it back any time you wanted.”

“Which should tell you something,” he murmured, lowering the spyglass to look at her.

Rose felt her belly shiver and do a little flip as it did every damned time he looked at her that way. They had spent most of the last three days in his cabin and her belly had been doing a great deal of shivering and flipping.

One of the lookouts came swinging down from the shrouds and reported to Sebastien. “It’s Reed, Captain. He’s signalling to come aboard.”

“Has he run up the proper flags?” Fonteyne asked.

“Aye, Captain. He’s showed the right response to the code.”

“Very well. Slow us down and hail the Cygnet to come alongside.”

Two hours later, Billy Burr, Stubb, and Duardo had joined them on the deck of the Black Wind and waited at the open gangway as Reed came on board.

“We’ve been tacking back and forth for the past few hours hoping to cross your path.”

“We thought you would have been in Barataria Bay by now,” Fonteyne said. “Was your arrival not a welcomed one?”

“We never made it that far. We were stopped by another ship before we came close.”

“You were attacked?”

“No, Captain. We were stopped by Captain Sheridan on board the Kingfisher .”

“Why the devil did he stop you?”

Reed blew out a breath. “He stopped us from going forward to Barataria Bay, because Barataria Bay is not there anymore. It was attacked and destroyed. Many ships were lost and many were captured. The Kingfisher was damaged in the fighting, but she managed to get away. Captain Sheridan also said that many ships had already left the Bay on Lafitte’s orders, as though he was expecting troubles. ”

“Where is he now? Where is Lafitte?”

Reed shook his head. “Sheridan said he fled into the swamp.”

“But the British fleet is days behind us,” Rose said, frowning. “And they were headed for Pensacola.”

Reed snatched the cap off his head and twisted the wool in his hands. “It wasn’t the British who attacked Barataria. It was the Americans.”

Long before Grande Isle came into view, they could see the smudge of gray smoke hanging over the island like a low-lying cloud.

There was wreckage floating in the water as far as a mile out and, when they entered the channel leading into the bay, the water was full of sharks circling, searching for their next feast.

The Black Wind led the way through the channel, followed by the Pride , the Cygnet , and the Kingfisher .

The crews of all four ships were so horrified at the sight of all the sharks that they sought and won permission to fire down at them.

With fresh blood in the water, the feeding frenzy remained outside the bay, although there was a greater horror waiting for them when the former thriving stronghold came into view.

Chimneys of black smoke rose from the charred ruins of the scores of buildings and warehouses Lafitte had painstaking built over the past two decades.

The skeletal remains of wooden structures had collapsed into smoldering heaps.

The wharfs were destroyed. The enormous tent city was gone.

Wreckage from several ships had washed ashore and a pair of burned-out hulls lay beached, canted onto their sides.

A dozen other sets of masts and yards jutted above the surface of the inky water, the sails hanging in scorched shreds above the sunken hulls.

At first, there had been no sign of life amongst the ruins.

But slowly, as the Black Wind was recognized and identified, figures began to emerge from the treeline.

A half hearted cheer even echoed across the bay when all four ships had sailed into view.

Men ran down to the edge of the water, waving their hats in greeting.

Many of them wore filthy, blood-stained bandages.

“Good God,” Penman said.

Fonteyne shook his head with quiet anger. “I suspect God was not good on this occasion.”

“I will gather up what medicaments and supplies I have on hand.”

“Whatever you need. What we don’t have, we’ll find.” He turned to Reed, who had reclaimed his post at the helm of the Black Wind . “Drop the anchor, lower away the longboats. Ferry over what food and supplies we have.”

“Aye Captain!”

Sebastien’s steely blue gaze settled on yet another horror. What had looked like a heap of logs stacked on shore was, in fact, bodies. The crew had seen them too and the silence that had fallen over the ship was so complete they could hear the rustle of the flags and pennons overhead.

While the crews were loading supplies into the longboats, Fonteyne rowed himself and Rose ashore in a jolly boat.

He did not wait for the bow to push up onto the sand, he jumped out in knee deep water and splashed onto the shale.

A small grouping of men had gathered to meet him; most of the faces were familiar, all wore grim expressions.

“Not a very fine welcome back for you, Captain,” one of them said. “But for our part, we’re glad to see you, sir. Ye’re a bloody welcome sight.”

“My men are bringing over fresh food and the doctor should be on board the first longboat.”

Hungry eyes looked out into the bay where the ships were lowering nets and baskets of food into the boats. “Don’t suppose ye have a barrel o’ rum to spare? Bloody bastards carried off every cask they could find.”

“Pretty damned certain that would be one of the first things the men loaded.” Sebastien looked around. “How long ago was the attack?”

“Six days, mebbe seven, hard to tell. Didn’t get no warning.

Ships opened fire before they was even through the channel.

Come at us from both sides to cut off escape like they know’d how best to trap us.

Blasted an’ just kept blastin’. Ten or more gunboats.

Dunno. Didn’t wait around to count proper. ”

As they crunched their way across the shale, Rose was thankful for the gloom, for she could feel the blood drain from her face.

In her mind’s eye she could see the note she had shared with her father.

The note Ramsey had penned detailing exactly how to make a two-pronged attack on Barataria Bay to catch them unawares.

But that note had been found in a courier pouch intended for the British, not the Americans.

It was a piece that did not fit the puzzle.

Behind them came the shoosh and bump as several more longboats reached the shore and bit into the sand.

“Lafitte?” Fonteyne asked the sailor, drawing his startled gaze back. “Where is Lafitte? Is he alive?”

“Lafitte is here!” a voice boomed out from behind the ruins of a shed.

Jean Lafitte, as covered in filth as the rest of the men on the beach, limped forward, his right ankle heavily bandaged, a forked stick making do as a crutch.

“I am alive, my fine friend, and confess to having sprung a tear in my eye when I saw your ship.”

“What the devil happened here?”

“What happened here was treachery! Pure treachery!”

Fonteyne’s jaw hardened into a ridge. “Your men said they were American gunboats. Why the devil would the Americans attack Barataria?”

“The same question I asked myself, and the reason, when we saw the ships approaching, we let them into the bay unchallenged. Once inside—” he threw a hand up in frustration and anger— “there was little we could do. It was Claiborne, of course.

“The arrogant fat bastard sent them in the hope, I’m sure, of destroying our base before Jackson arrived to take all the glory.

I suspect his spies told him the British had approached me with an offer to join them and the swine convinced the council that I would accept it.

” Lafitte took the weight off his ankle and lowered himself gingerly onto an outcrop of rock.

His dark eyes flicked to Rose. “What is she doing here? And why is she not in irons!”

“Captain St. Clare is here under my bond. Well-earned, I might add. And hardly what should be concerning you right now.”

“This,” Lafitte scowled, waving an arm wide. “This all concerns me, ‘Bastien. Perhaps if you had been here instead of chasing this little thief around the Gulf?—”

“My ship might well have ended up at the bottom of the bay along with the others,” Fonteyne cut him off sharply. “You said Claiborne wanted to attack before General Jackson arrived in New Orleans. Does that mean he is here? Has he brought an army?”

Lafitte leaned over and spat into the sand.

“Aye, the great general is here. Though I would not call a thousand Kentucky woodsmen and squirrel-hunters an army. He has put out a call for farmers and townspeople to join his militia. Faugh! Most of the bankers and shopkeepers have never even held a musket, let alone shot one.” He paused and squinted up at Fonteyne.

“We hear rumours of an English fleet arriving any day.

If they were here now, they could sail straight up the Mississippi and capture New Orleans without firing a shot!

“It is not a rumor,” Sebastien said. “We have seen it. Ten ships … nine now, hopefully … filled with seasoned troops from the Continent.”