“You seem to have lost your appetite for fighting, Captain van der Rhys. I, too, have had enough of this bloodshed. I was homeward bound. I wouldn’t have attacked your ship. You’re wounded as am I. Your ship is in no better shape than mine. Both will sink within hours if they’re not shored up. What’s it to be? I can sail on with my men or I can fight till one of us dies. The decision is yours.”

  “There’s nothing to fight for, Sea Siren, I went in search of the man with the hook. I found him on one of the inner islands. He’s aboard my brig. I’m taking him to Batavia to be judged and sentenced.”

  “You have the man?” Sirena asked, shock making her green eyes murky as the water beneath her, all thoughts of Regan and love erased by her desire for revenge.

  “He’s my prisoner.”

  “He belongs to me, hand him over! This time I won’t play the weak-kneed woman.”

  “Neither of us is fit to judge this man. Let others do it.”

  “I’m his judge and I’ll sentence him! Don’t let all this have been for nothing. I can’t give up now. Hand him over to me. I promise you if you do that, this is the last you’ll see of me.”

  Regan frowned. “Tell me why you want this man and then I’ll decide.”

  “I’ll tell you nothing. We hold the advantage,” she said brazenly, knowing she lied. “It’s a personal matter of mine and mine alone. Turn him over to me and I’ll allow you and your crew to go unharmed. If you don’t,” she shouted clearly, “I’ll run you through. Make fast work of your answer, for I have no patience this day.”

  Regan stood on his collapsing stern mere feet from Sirena on her bow. Perhaps if he gave her what she wanted he could get her to let her guard down and then attack her and bring both the Sea Siren and The Hook to Batavia.

  “Well!” Sirena shouted.

  Regan nodded. He called an order and the man with the hook-was standing next to him.

  “Give him a cutlass and swing him aboard,” Sirena shouted, her eyes glittering in anticipation of securing her quarry.

  “No, Captain; no, Captain. Quarter! Quarter!” The Hook shouted.

  Sirena laughed. “Why is the coward yelling for mercy? I have not made my objective known.” She laughed, the tinkling musical sound carrying over the water and bouncing back with an eerie shriek. She leaned nonchalantly into the rigging, her cutlass held loosely in her hand. Fearfully, the man with the hook tried to edge away from Regan, only to find himself with a hold on the rigging and swinging toward the bow of the Sea Siren.

  “Don’t move!” Sirena ordered sharply, her cutlass pointed at his midriff. “Captain van der Rhys, I think it would be best if you lowered your jolly and had your men descend the ladder before I forget my generous offer. You’re to follow them directly. If you don’t,” she shouted, “I’ll keep my promise and run you through. You could salvage your ship if she was shored within the hour; if not, she sinks. I prefer that she sinks. Look lively now. Till we meet again!” Sirena raised her cutlass in a salute and gave him a mocking bow. Regan stood as if carved from stone. She was as tricky as a fox and wily as a minx. Briskly, he gave the order to leave the ship.

  Sirena turned and jumped from the tackle box with the stealth and speed of a panther. Her eyes glittered as she swung the cutlass in wide swaths in the air. The breeze ruffled the greasy lanks of hair on the man’s head. His eyes held fear as he brought his own cutlass up to ward off a blow.

  Sirena lashed to the right and to the left, giving no quarter. The man fought valiantly but he was no match for the hate-filled woman who swung her blade with an expertise Regan had yet to see matched anywhere. Sirena darted to the left and slashed downwards with the cutlass, ripping the man’s boot to the toe. She brought up her hand and the cutlass sliced at the man’s ear. When it dropped to the deck, Sirena lowered her cutlass and pierced the flesh and taunted the man.

  “You bleed like a pig!” she shouted. “Already your head is covered with blood. The sight sickens me. Let us get this over with. I’m tired of this play!” With a lightning movement she jabbed to the right and the sound of steel against steel rang in the bright sun. Quickly, she withdrew and brought her arm up with all the might she could muster, knocking the cutlass from the man’s hand. Sirena drove the point of the cutlass through the man’s shirt sleeve and pinned him to the wall.

  The man’s eyes were filled with fear as he gazed into the glittering eyes of the woman before him. He looked from one man to the next. He would get no help from them.

  “Why do you want to kill me?” he whined. “What did I do? I do my job and take my pay.”

  “And a few other things along the way,” Sirena said softly. “I want to hear you say the name of the man who employed you when you sailed with that pig Blackheart and attacked the Spanish frigate Rana, killing her crew and raping the women. Finally you murdered one of the women with your hook. You slit her from her throat to her gullet. Remember? Now! The name of the man!”

  “Chaezar, Señor Chaezar Alvarez!”

  “I already knew. I wanted to hear it from you!”

  “What do you want from me?” The Hook whined.

  “I want you to pray.”

  “Wha—what?”

  “Pray! I want to see you pray!”

  “I—don’t—know how—”

  “Then you had better learn quickly. I won’t tell you again. Now pray!” Sirena flicked the cutlass, making small knicks on the man’s arm as he attempted to do her bidding.

  “Holy God—”

  “Go on!”

  “Holy God—”

  “You said that before, now pray!” She jabbed the cutlass, drawing blood from the man’s arm.

  “Holy God, help me—”

  “Your God doesn’t seem to hear you. Louder, much louder.”

  “Merciful God, help me—”

  “Louder! He still doesn’t hear you! You appear to have a problem. Where is this God you pray to? One would think he would answer so heartfelt a plea. Try again, this time on your knees! Loudly and clearly. I want every man aboard this ship to hear your prayers!” Again she knicked the man’s arm and, to his horror, more blood spurted. “I want them to hear your prayers just as they heard my sister’s when you raped and killed her!” Fear at her words was like a live thing in the man’s eyes.

  “You’re not praying. Loud and clear!”

  “Merciful God,” the man whined, “help me, don’t let this crazy woman kill me! Help me!”

  “For some strange reason this God of yours isn’t paying any attention,” Sirena said softly. “Why is that, do you think?”

  “Don’t kill me!” the man whined.

  “I’ll be your God!” Sirena shouted. “Pray to me!” She reached into the pocket of her blouse and withdrew the pearl rosary. With one movement she had it looped around the man’s neck.

  “I’m waiting!”

  “God help me,” the man pleaded.

  “Yes,” Sirena said conversationally, “I’ll help you, just the way you helped my sister. I’m going to listen the way you listened to her.”

  Sirena gave the cutlass a vicious swing and brought the end of it down on the man’s shoulder. The loud crack of the splintered bone was fierce on the quiet deck. “Pray!” she demanded coldly.

  “Mother of God …” Crack! and the cutlass sliced the air.

  The man’s face convulsed in pain as Sirena brought up the cutlass a third time. “Kill me!” the man groaned. “I can’t stand the pain.” Sirena stood and looked at the man.

  “Throw him overboard. Let his compatriots see to him.”

  The man’s screams would ring in Sirena’s ears for a long time as her men grasped him under the armpits to heave him over the side. Suddenly there was bedlam and—Regan and his men on the deck of her ship.

  “You made one mistake too many, my lovely Sea Siren,” Regan said mockingly. “You were so set on your vengeance you thought we would do your bidding, and accept your generous offer of our freedom after you sacked our ship. The tables are turned now!”

  Coldly, in a ringing voice, he issued orders and the frigate’s men were secured in the hold. She was defenseless.

  “Swing aboard ship, shore her, and secure her tight as a drum. You have less than an hour—heave to, lads. Now,” Regan said briskly, “we’ll go to your quarters and see what this is all about.”

  “Take your hands off me or I’ll kill you!” Sirena spat, her green eyes shooting sparks of flame.

  “With what? I have your cutlass,” he laughed, swinging it in the air.

  Sirena followed Regan to her quarters. She defiantly stared into his eyes. “Are we to play your game of lust again? Will you make love to me here in this room or will you do it on the decks, like the animal you are, for all to see? You’ll have to rape me, for you’ll never take me of my own free will. I’m finished. There’s no feeling left in me. I found that which I sought. I completed my mission and the end is here. Monies will be paid to your bank account for all the damages you suffered at my hands. Get on with whatever it is you have to do.”

  Casually, Regan tossed her a rapier. Instinctively, she reached up to grasp the hilt. She eyed the long, slender weapon and laid it down next to her. “I told you I was finished. I’ll fight no more.”

  “The tables are turned now. I have the upper hand and now you have lost the desire to duel.” Regan laughed, the sound harsh and guttural in the still cabin.

  “Think what you will, I’m finished. At this moment I don’t care if you rape me or kill me.”

  Regan frowned. She meant it. The mocking green eyes he remembered were now dull and flat and … lifeless.

  “What if I take you back to Batavia?”

  “Then do it, don’t just stand there making idle threats. I told you that I was finished, how many times do I have to repeat myself? You Dutch are a stupid lot!” Sirena leaned back on the hard bunk, her long tawny legs extending in front of her. Nonchalantly, she toyed with the handle of the rapier at her side. Regan stood mesmerized at the sight of her long, creamy legs. His eyes traveled to her thighs and stopped, the rapier almost dangling from his hand. When he raised his eyes to look into hers, her hand grasped the hilt of the rapier and, with one fluid motion, she knocked his weapon from his hand. The tip of the silver blade rested directly below his navel. “It would be advisable if you didn’t so much as breathe, Captain van der Rhys, for if you do this weapon will travel downward at an alarming rate of speed. I’ll castrate you without a second thought. Now back off slowly if you desire to have your manhood remain intact. Breathe softly, Dutchman, for I have no patience left. To the ladder now and shout your orders to board your ship. If you hurry you may save her.”

  “All hands board the brig,” he shouted loudly. Silence greeted his order and a burly head appeared at the top of the ladder.

  “Aye, Captain,” he said as he jumped with the aid of the rigging to board the brig. The other seamen followed him and then Regan departed.

  Sirena stood on the bow, her green eyes laughing merrily. “Good-bye Dutchman! Remember what I said about the monies finding their way to your bank account. A notice will be posted at Batavia announcing my retirement! My apologies,” she said, bowing low.

  “Tell me something before you leave. Would you have … ?”

  “Castrated you? You’ll never know, will you?” she replied, laughter bubbling over in the sea-green eyes. “You’re free, Dutchman, as free as I am. Perhaps now we can pick up and try to live what passes for a normal life.” Each gave the other a mocking salute with the tip of their rapiers as the two ships sailed away. Tears formed in the emerald eyes for the things that might have been.

  The Sea Siren was dead.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Regan sat in his office, his face a veritable thunder cloud as he looked at the empty space where the model of the Tita had rested. Would he ever be the same again? The Sea Siren had found that which she sought and she had conquered it. Was it a mistake to hand over The Hook to the woman? He thought not. If nothing else, he gave her peace. He would never forget that glorious, long-legged creature. Never as long as he lived.

  He had other matters to occupy his mind now. His son. He now knew that his son lived somewhere. His journey to the inner islands had been fruitful. If he had to, he would move heaven and earth to find him. When he had been bearing down on The Hook, the scurve had babbled like an old woman, and revealed the fate of his son on that horrible day aboard the Tita so many years before. He should have known, if not at least suspected the wily Gretchen and that bastard Chaezar. He would kill them both with his bare hands!

  He knew he had to think carefully before he made a move. He would attack the Spaniard on his home ground and kill him! And Gretchen, that bitch! He’d draw and quarter her and hang her on the wharf to rot in the sun! His thoughts were interrupted by a sharp rap on the door and the entrance of a tall, blond man.

  “Captain Dykstra, how go the repairs on the Whispering Wind?”

  “The galleon will be ready next week. What’s this scuttlebutt I hear?” the man asked.

  “What was it you heard?” Regan asked.

  “Scuttlebutt has, it you found The Hook and turned him over to the Sea Siren.”

  “What you heard is true. She gave her word she retires from the sea.”

  “And you believed her?” Dykstra asked, amazement lifting his voice.

  “Yes, I believe her.”

  “They say her treatment of The Hook was brutal!”

  “Yes, it was. But she didn’t kill him, she threw him overboard and my crew picked him up. He’ll do no more harm, so battered is he. You must remember something, Dykstra, men have been fighting wars and destroying their enemies since the beginning of time. And men have, through the ages, arrived at a formal code, a set of ethics and honorable conduct. Not so women. War is new to her, power to destroy her enemies untried. When a woman meets her enemy she has no code of ethics. She’s unhampered by a sense of honor. She has a much keener sense of kill-or-be-killed than we men. A woman faces her enemy and destroys him.

  Seeing Regan’s serious, reflective mood, Captain Dykstra changed the subject. “Chaezar Alvarez left the island. There’s a great deal of speculation as to where he’s gone, but nothing definite. The only thing certain is that he’ll be gone at least two months.”

  Regan glared at Captain Dykstra and the man groped for another subject. “Frau Lindenreich,” Dykstra said more confidently, “has accompanied her latest lover on a buying trip to India. The man’s a merchant and has promised to supply her with the richest silks in the East to refurbish that endless wardrobe of hers.”

  Regan’s scowl deepened, his mood became blacker. “Chaezar will be gone for two months, you say? Why, do you think?”

  “Personally, I believe Señor Alvarez is to meet his superiors in Cape Town to give an accounting of his losses. He’ll have a lot of explaining to do.”

  Regan, Dykstra in his wake, strode through beaded curtains and into the anteroom of the most exclusive brothel in Batavia. “Clarice!” he shouted drunkenly, “where the hell are you? As madam of this whorehouse, get your ass in here! I’ve brought you a new customer and don’t send me any of your disease-ridden hags. Nothing but the best for my friend,” he said, reeling into the beads. Frustrated, he grabbed a handful of the colorful beads and ripped them from their hangings. Hundreds of beads scattered and rolled across the floor. He laughed at his destruction and, wobbling on unsteady legs, he muttered to Dykstra, “I always hated those damn things. They remind me of prayer beads.”

  Clarice ran into the room. Regan van der Rhys had taken the place apart more than once. “Stop calling my brothel a whorehouse! What you do here is your own business, but I thought you gentleman enough to keep it to yourself. This is an establishment. Your money alone has made me fat and rich.” She kicked angrily at the beads with her plump, slippered foot. “In the future, treat my furnishings as if they were your own. I’m tired of redecorating after your visits.”

  Regan laughed uproariously at her little joke. “Dykstra, old friend,” he said, clapping the nervous captain on the back in an expansive mood, “I’ve kept this ‘establishment’ operating. I’m their most valued customer. Don’t believe anything Clarice tells you. All she does is bank what I spend here. She’s probably worth more than the two of us together.”

  A smirk on her plump, jaded features, Clarice was busy pouring rum into ruby crystal goblets. Regan could burn the place down, for all she cared. He’d always make good and then some, in retribution. “Luanna isn’t here right now.” Clarice smiled slyly. “I have two new girls, both of them are virgins, perhaps they could profit from your vast experience.” She hoped she had sparked Regan’s interest. It was time Luanna, Regan’s favorite whore, was set back a few steps. She was getting caught up in her own importance lately. Regan’s preferring someone else could shake some sense into her.

  “Two virgins,” Regan hiccuped drunkenly, “I’ll take them both!” Seeing a flame of interest in Dykstra’s eyes, Regan said magnanimously, “On second thought, Clarice, give them to Dykstra. I’ll pay!” he said, downing the glass of rum. “What have you got left?”

  “Nothing,” Clarice answered flatly, “the other girls are otherwise engaged.”

  “Well, disengage them,” Regan boasted, “all of them!”

  Worried for her trade, Clarice soothed the impetuous Regan. “Regan, why destroy your image? In your condition you wouldn’t be much use to one girl, much less seven. Let me get you a room for a few hours. Sleep and then I’ll send in everybody and anybody you want.”

  Regan looked at her with drunken suspicion. “I’ll wait for Luanna.”

  Clarice led the two “virgins” into the room. They were beauties, there was no doubt about it. They were small, and delicately boned, almost childlike. Slim narrow hips extended into lean, lightly muscled thighs. Nubile, budding, coral-tipped breasts peaked out from gauzy shifts. They were a smooth skinned ochre-color. Their eyes had an Oriental slant. Clarice introduced them to Captain Dykstra, ignoring Regan. Eagerly, they began to paw and pet the perspiring Dykstra.