The Swashbuckling Yarn of Milady Vixen by Christopher Newman

the filthy hay like deranged monkeys. Hooting and hollering, they altered their voices to sound like girlish men pleading for sweets.
    “Shut up, the lot of you!” the sergeant shouted. “Or by thunder, I will have you all flogged!”
    Sliding out of her clothes, Vixen didn’t blush from the whistles and catcalls of her shipmates. Tom, however, seemed to mind a great deal. Stark naked with her brown skin glowing, she crossed her arms while the soldiers unlocked her cage. They leveled sharp bayonets at her waist, and teasingly she stroked one just for a laugh.
    “Ooh, what big lances you have,” she cooed. “I pray my dinner companion wields something of similar length—yet I doubt it. Perhaps you boys could finish what your liege will obviously fail to provide me. What say you?”
    The Jack Tars around her shrieked with mirth while the guards turned bright red and shuffled their feet in embarrassment.
    “I thought not. There be not a man-jack amongst you, is there?” Vixen provoked them.
    “Come along quietly, you brazen wench,” the sergeant muttered.
    “Give ‘em hell, Cap’n!” the pirates yelled.
    “Don’t do anything rash,” Tom said after their cries died down.
    “You know me, don’t you, Tom?” she smirked.
    “Aye! That’s why I said it.”
    With a swaying of her hips and jiggle of her bosom, Vixen emerged from her imprisonment to find herself quickly surrounded by red-faced, yet aroused men. They ascended the stairs amid the lusty laughs and dirty jokes of her staunch crew.
    Entering the duke’s private quarters, she frowned at the changes to the décor, furnishings and rugs. Her father was a man of simple pleasures and tastes. However, the dandy now holding his title was a creature deplorably indulgent in soft comforts and decadent treasures. Silk throw pillows, a canopied bed and a dresser better suited for a lady’s chamber stood proudly arranged within.
    “Here’s the prisoner, Your Grace,” the gruff man in charge of her escort said.
    “Thank you, Sergeant Willis; that will be all,” Duke Popinjay tittered.
    “Surely you would prefer her hands and feet bound?”
    “I have my pistol, and I fear nothing from this female.”
    “But Your Grace—this is Milady Vixen, not some common wench!”
    “I gave you orders, man. Don’t seek to rise above yourself and chide your betters.”
    “As you wish, Duke Popinjay.”
    The door closed, and Vixen folded her arms under her ample breasts. The tiny flintlock in His Grace’s hands was enough to keep her at bay, so she didn’t rush him.
    “I wonder,” he began with a sneer, “if you realize the position you are in. At my slightest whim I could summon those men back with a simple tug on yonder bell rope.”
    “I only fear boredom while you nervously try to mount me,” she flung back. “That is why you’ve sent for me? To salve the injury I inflicted with my words this morning?”
    “I will take you in every fashion I desire. Yes, you have the right of it. However, you will find my tastes are a bit more exotic than your average pirate’s.”
    Reaching a nearby cabinet, he pulled it open and smiled at the contents, unseen by Vixen.
    “I am betting you do not know how you came to be captured. No? Well, let me enlighten you. I have struck up a deal to end the Gastonians’ use of privateers such as yourself. I recently met with a Marquis de Poste who gave us all the ports and ocean paths you might use.”
    “You lie!” she spat.
    “Oh, it is quite true. With the blessings of my king, I have been engaging in direct negotiations with this man. I am upset, however, since my liege demanded I not punish you myself and wishes to keep that pleasure to himself. But never mind, never mind; I shall enjoy your screams if only for a single night.”
    With a flourish, the duke withdrew a long cat o’ nine tails and, cracking it with an expert’s twist of his wrist, he smiled evilly at her.
    “Oh-ho! You are a beater of women, are you?!” she