The Ship of Lost Souls 1 by Rachelle Delaney Page B

do we follow?” one pirate yelled.
    â€œTo the right!” another answered, followed by the now-familiar
shing
of a cutlass being unsheathed.
    â€œBlast.” Jem ducked his head and ran harder, rounding another corner and hurdling a wheelbarrow full of coconuts. He dodged a group of King’s Men squabbling with a merchant, splashed through a gigantic puddle, and kept running, all the while listening to his pursuers stomping behind, cursing as only true pirates could possibly curse. And to think, just yesterday he’d questioned their very existence!
    Jem dove into an alley, hoping to find a place to hide, but instead ran headlong into a skinny woman with a great nest of red hair and a boa constrictor wrapped around her neck.
    â€œCome to see Voodoo Miranda, have you, boy?” Her eyes widened and her scarf writhed and hissed.
    â€œUm, no.” Jem did an about-face and sprinted back out of the alley, just as the pirates entered it. They took one look at Voodoo Miranda, yelped, and stumbled backward over one another to get away from her deadly accessory.
    In the next alley, Jem found an empty barrel and crawled inside, pulling the lid tight overhead. The barrel reeked of old rum but felt safe. Jem let out a sigh and rested his head against the wall. They wouldn’t find him in here. It wasn’t possible. He listened for footsteps but heard none. Safe. He ran his thumb over the pocketknife’s ivory handle, now slippery with sweat. Despite everything, he couldn’t help but feel proud. He’d nabbed a most beautiful knife and evaded a trio of bloodthirsty pirates. Not bad for his first time out. And it hadn’t really been
that
scary. As a matter of fact, it was kind of fun.
    He was just slipping the knife into his trouser pocket when the lid flew off his barrel and Deadeye Johnny reached inside and grabbed him by the collar. The pirate pulled him up, kicked over the barrel, and gave Jem a toothy leer. His functional eye twitched.
    â€œGotcha, boy. Now I’m going to make ye pay.” Jem squirmed and tried to wriggle out of the pirate’s grasp. “Oh no, ye don’t,” Deadeye said, pulling Jem close enough that their noses almost touched. “We’re going to start by cutting off both hands with a dull blade, then move on to yer ears. Or maybe yer nose—”
    Jem gave one last great wriggle and kicked the pirate in the gut as hard as he could. As Deadeye keeled over, Jem tumbled to the ground, then scrambled to his feet and took off running again.
    He took back that last thought. This was not fun. Having his ears cut off by a one-eyed pirate could not, under any circumstance, count as fun. “Whose grand idea was this, anyhow?” he growled. “Scarlet . . .”
    He barely noticed Lucas Lawrence as he sprinted past the boy, focusing instead on a door in a mossy brick wall. He opened it and hurtled through, praying for a safe place to hide. He found a dark corridor. Damp. Empty.
    Trembling, Jem inched back toward the door and squinted through a crack in its wooden slats. Deadeye Johnny and one of the other pirates stood a few yards away on the other side of the door, looking winded as they scanned the street. Deadeye was rubbing his stomach.
    Then, to Jem’s great surprise, Lucas Lawrence sauntered over to the pirates. He began to speak to them as if striking up a friendly conversation with the deadliest pirates around was an everyday occurrence, like cleaning one’s ears. Jem pressed his ear, which hadn’t been cleaned since he left the Old World, against the crack to hear what he was saying.
    â€œLucas!” Deadeye Johnny panted. “Ye seen a scrawny cabin boy run by?”
    Jem wasn’t sure what disturbed him more—being called scrawny or the pirates knowing Lucas by name.
    â€œA scrawny cabin boy?” Lucas repeated, lowering his voice a few notches and rubbing his chin. “There’s a lot of