'What the Hell are they playing at?' the Captain watched the crew of the Spanish brig as they bustled about on the isthmus between the northern and southern islands.

They were busy setting a table with silver cutlery, drinking goblets, cloths, plates, napkins, candles, and two red velvet chairs on opposing sides.

'What are they doing? Why haven't they attacked us yet?'

'Don't wish that away!' the Quartermaster whimpered. 'Be glad they're not blowing us to pieces right now.'

'But haven't you stopped to think why they aren't blowing us to bits?' the Captain pondered, lowering the spyglass. 'They have the upper hand. We're trapped in the bay. They have every gun trained on us and ready to fire. So, why aren't they?'

'Captain,' Martin tapped Black Hal's elbow. 'There's someone coming off their ship.'

The Captain nodded and put the glass back to his eye. He lowered it again pretty soon after, his face screwed into an expression of disgust and loathing.

'Hamish, care to confirm lest my eyes deceive?' He offered the spyglass to Martin, who took it and slowly put the rim to his eye, the brass still warm from sitting against the Captain's cheek.

He watched as a man with a wide-brimmed hat, a curled black moustache, and a jerkin with golden streaks, climbed down the ladder and into a skiff bobbing beside the ship. A couple of deckhands in white linen shirts rowed him over to shore, whilst he spoke emphatically with the man in an apron, who sat beside him with a pot on his lap.

When the skiff ran aground, their captain stepped out and put his hand on his cabin boy's shoulder. He leant into his ear, then sent him scurrying across the isthmus to the Scourge's camp.

'It's Van den Berg alright,' Martin grumbled, handing the spyglass back to the Captain. 'He's sending someone over.'

The cabin boy, as red as rust, no older than twelve, panted up to the crew. He timidly stepped forward, the men eying him with their hands over their pistols and swords.

'Speak to captain?' he drawled, his accent thick and throaty for such a young boy. 'Where the captain?'

'I'm the captain.' the Quartermaster stepped in front of Black Hal. 'What business do you have?'

'You're not captain.' the boy chuckled softly, then suddenly remembered the lion's den he'd just wandered into. 'Captain... he tall with big beard. He carry silver sword. Where is he?'

Captain Percival sighed and pushed the Quartermaster aside with a gentle nudge.

'Thank you, Ratchett, for taking the flack, but I can handle this. What do you want, boy?'

'Ah, you are him!' the boy beamed. 'Maestro, he want you to eat with him. He say he want to discuss terms.'

To this, Captain Percival's eyes blazed.

'Then you go back there and tell your maestro that if he wants to discuss terms of any kind, he can come here himself and face me like a man, not send a child to do his bidding.'

The boy strained to listen to the Captain's frothing rave. When he had finished, he muttered to himself and cleared his throat with a soft tweet.

'Mi Capitan told you would say this. If so, he told me to say that "Our guns are aimed at your camp. If do not cooperate,' he struggled to pronounce the longer word. 'We will blow you to sky high". Please, come with me, señor.' The boy beamed with infuriating innocence. 'If it help, he say you can bring one of your man with you.'

The Captain sighed and passed his hand over his mouth, pacing from side to side.

'Well... at least it might buy us some time,' he turned to Quartermaster. 'Pack up what you can quietly. Don't make it look like we're rushing to get away. If anything goes wrong, you're in charge. Get the men out as best you can.'

'Wait,' the Quartermaster put his hand on the Captain's shoulder. 'If I'm staying here, who's going to go with you?'

The Captain whirled round, and Martin blushed as he suddenly felt eyes upon him.

'Hamish is a trustworthy lad. He'll come with me, right Hamish?'

Martin nodded.

'Aye, Captain,' he tried to sound spritely, if only to hide the fear in his voice.

'Good. Stay here and guard the camp. You. Boy. Lead on.'

'Uh, before, please.' the boy put his hands out to bar the Captain or Martin for going further. 'To remove weapons? No sword or... or weapons at table.'

'Sod that,' the Captain spat, gripping his silver sabre. 'I'll be keeping as many weapons on me as I like, thank you. Lead on.'

'Martin?'

Something tugged at his wrist.

Emily's eye, glistening with something like sadness, or fear, met his.

'Please... be careful, will you?'

Martin smiled his warmest smile and nodded.

'I will.'

***

'Buenos días, comrades!' the man in the golden jerkin, who had been known as Van Den Berg, called out. He leant back against his chair and dabbed the corners of his lips with a napkin. 'Greetings! I'm delighted you accepted my invitation.

'Didn't give us much of a choice,' the Captain grumbled under his breathe.

'Oh, you still have your weapons?' Van den Berg asked. That's disappointing. I thought I had made my message quite clear.' He glared at the cabin boy, who shrank into the sand quivering.

'Oh, your message was clear enough,' Captain Percival folded his arms across his chest, 'and we chose to ignore it. Forgive me if I'm not entirely comfortable with the idea of approaching my enemy unarmed while he has guns trained on my camp.'

A roar of laughter tore through Van den Berg's throat, and he wiped away a tear with his napkin.

'I suppose I can forgive you of that, but if you please, leave them where you stand. I consider it rude to bring a weapon to a peace talk. And as I can see us becoming fast friends, consider this gesture of a banquet my gift to you. You showing up to my table unarmed can be your gift to me. Does that seem fair?'

The Captain stole a glance at Martin, then up at the cannon barrels that glistened from the portholes. He sighed and reached for the buckle of his sword belt.

'Lay down your sword, Hamish. And your pistol. Might as well start as we mean to go on.'

'Hamish?' Van den Berg gasped. 'That's young Hamish? Well, well. I almost didn't recognise you. You know?' He tapped his cheek and winked.

A burning hatred ignited inside Martin's heart as he felt his scar boil with anger. His hand was on his sword; it could have been so easy, but he looked up to the Captain as he lay down his own arms and felt duty-bound to do the same.

'I hope you don't mind, I started breakfast early. I was famished, so I can't imagine how you must feel.'

'Sure it isn't poisoned, snake?' the Captain spat.

The Spaniard chuckled again.

'Of course, it isn't. I'm eating it the same as you. If I had wanted you dead, not only would I have done so already, but poison would not have been my weapon of choice. You have my word, Captain Percival.'

'And whose word is that, exactly?' the Captain approached the table and put his hand on the head of the empty chair. 'For all the wagging that forked tongue of yours is doing, you've haven't told me your real name, "Van Den Berg".'

'Oh, of course, of course,' the Spaniard exclaimed after dousing a mouthful of eggs in a generous gulp of wine. 'I am so rude, forgive me. My name is Manuel Christian Toros de Seville, but you may call me Captain Toros, if you don't mind. This is my ship, El Terror del Mar. She is my pride and joy. Now, I don't believe I need ask you for an introduction. Everyone sailing under the Spanish cross knows of the fearsome Black Hal, or rather they did. It's unfortunate that you have fallen on such hard times.'

'A temporary setback,' the Captain grumbled. 'Not all of us have sunk so low that we need to sneak into ports to drink with our enemies and suck on the dregs of intel that fall from their mouths.'

Toros dabbed the mango juice from his chin and cleared his throat.

'I will ignore that slight in favour of our new friendship. Just a joke between... What is that word? Mates?'

'Indeed,' Captain Percival sat down and stared at his empty plate. Martin thought he heard Black Hal's stomach rumbling, though that may have been his own. 'But before I even consider consolidating our friendship, mind answering a question or two?'

'Not at all, but it depends on what they are,' Toros mumbled through a mouthful of ripe pineapple. 'There is no harm in asking.'

'How did you find us? There's no chance in Hell that you could have followed us through that storm.'

Toros gave a laugh that cracked the sky like thunder.

'That was the easy part. You think you're the only one who knows these waters? This sea and every island inside are etched onto my memory with exquisite detail. If you had sunk, my problems would be over, but if by some miracle you survived that storm, I understood that you would be in need of repair and resupply. I was planning on sailing to every careening bay in the area until I found you, but it just so happened that you picked the most obvious one. You should have seen how hard my crew and I laughed when we saw your little ship sitting in the lagoon over there,' he ripped another peel of laughter and wiped away another tear.

Captain Percival chewed the inside of his cheek, his face darkening.

'Fine. Second question. What do you want with us?'

'Ah, now we get to the real meat of the situation,' Captain Toros said, biting into a thick slice of bacon that fell apart by the tender strand. 'The answer comes with a question of its own: Is she still with you?'

Martin let out a short gasp, which drew the attention of the two captains.

Toros grinned a wide, ugly grin.

'So, that would be a "yes"? Thank you, Mister Hamish.'

'And what if she is?' Captain Percival slammed his first on the table like a gavel. 'What business is she of yours?'

'She is both our business, my dear Captain. She holds the key to all our futures, and with it our fortunes.' Toros threw his napkin aside and sat forward, his hands clasped in each other. 'I am not speaking to you as a Spaniard to an Englishman. I am speaking to you as a fellow man of the sea, a Gentleman of Fortune, a brother of the coast. We are not so different, you and I, and in the end, we both want the same thing. We are not enemies. We should be working together,' he sat back and propped his boots on the table, crushing a crisp apple to pulp under his heel. 'Here is my offer: You hand the girl, and the cylinder, over to me. In exchange, I shall give you ten percent of the loot I currently hold, which amounts to around five thousand pieces of eight. That's five hundred pieces for you and your men to divide however you see fit. I will let you go free, and if we ever see each other on these waters again, I promise I shall leave you be. Does this sound admirable to you, Captain?'

Captain Percival stared around the table of food. He picked up a hunk of bread and turned it in his hand, admiring its golden-brown crust. Then, he leaned forward until shadow cast by the brim of his hat darkened his eyes.

'Firstly, I do not respond well to threats, even unspoken ones.' His fingers pierced the hard crust of the bread like talons. 'Secondly, we are not alike. Just because we earn our keep in the same way does not make us brothers. You were my enemy yesterday and you will be my enemy tomorrow just as you are my enemy today. Most other men who've had the balls to face me have earned themselves a knife in the throat for a lot less than what you've said.' His claws crushed the soft flesh of the roll down into a doughy ball in his grip. 'Thirdly, why would I settle for a measly five hundred pieces of eight when I could have sixteen and a half thousand pounds and have the satisfaction of seeing you and your ship blown out of the water by my Scourge. Answer me that, mate.'

There was a moment of silence punctuated by the mangled hunk of bread thudding onto the table.

Toros was unmoved by the Captain's tone. He instead wrapped himself in an expression of deep thought and vexation.

'Sixteen and a half... but... that means he wants to sell...' Then, his expression lightened. He sat back with that familiar, ugly grin plastered across his thin lips. 'Ah. She hasn't told you yet, has she?'

'Told us? Told us what?'

Toros sniggered to himself.

'She hasn't told you what's inside that cylinder. She hasn't told you what you're transporting, and why. If you did, I guarantee you would see things my way. My goal was never to sell that thing; it was to destroy it.'

'De... Destroy it?' Captain Percival drawled.

Martin's eye was drawn almost involuntarily by the Captain's hand as it felt the pocket of his overcoat, hidden from Toros' sight by the table. 'But... why? Why would you destroy it when it's worth so much? A fortune?'

'There are some fortunes not work pursuing, and some that should never surface,' Toros chuckled. 'And if you really knew what she was carrying, you might find my offer a little more alluring. It is, after all, the right thing to do trust me.'

'What's inside that thing?' Captain Percival demanded. 'What is she carrying?'

Toros flashed his ugly grin.

'I could tell you, but I'm not going to,' Toros dabbed his cheek once more, then threw the dirty napkin onto Percival's empty plate and stood up. 'I think it would be more fun to see what happens if you asked her about it. I am generous; I will give you time to discuss it. You have until sunrise tomorrow to rethink your position on my deal. If I do not have a response, I shall blow you and your little ship out of the water before you can even think about raising anchor. But I know you will make the right choice, for all our sakes. I look forward to our fruitful friendship, Captain.'