Raised By Wolves 2 - Matelots by Raised by Wolves 02 Read Free Book Online

settles the question of how he has gotten on since we left him on Tortuga.” We had left Tom behind after he betrayed Gaston and me to Doucette. “I wonder if he has learned French.”
    Dickey shrugged. “I thought you should know. I know that things will not end well for Tom if ever you should get your hands upon him.”
    He seemed a trifle melancholy.
    “Do you blame me?” I asked.
    “Nay,” he sighed. “When I saw him, I was gripped for a moment by the urge to thrash him myself. But truly, Will, I do not feel he understood the severity of the situation.”
    “He sided with another against his own.” I patted his shoulder. “But nay, you are correct: he was a right idiot before, and probably still does not understand.”
    This elicited a grin. “I wonder if he has taken more to the ways of the Brethren.” Dickey looked away. Even in the dim light of the fire, I could see the red upon his cheeks.
    I raised an eyebrow, and did not strive to keep the humor from my voice. “And what ways would those be?”
    “Oh… you know, about the taking of a matelot and all…” He petered off sheepishly and glanced my way. He snorted disparagingly when he realized I was teasing him.
    I grinned. “Aye, considering his earlier protestations, I think Tom will have learned French first. He would have had to in order to fend them off, since he was not all that proficient with a blade or a piece.”
    We chuckled and I thought of handsome young Tom amongst so many amorous strangers. I would have felt pity, if I did not remember his arrogant dismissal of the need for matelotage. I did not feel that any would take what he did not offer; but they would ask a great deal, and he would not make many friends if he let his former opinions on the matter be known. I was minded of Cudro: if one as determined as the big Dutchman found fancy with Tom, he was surely in trouble. That was disheartening, and I wished to think no more on it.
    “Well, then, you have delivered your news,” I said as my humor faded. “What advice would you have of me?”
    He cleared his throat again. “Well sir, I am recently… enamored of an individual. And I do not know if I should bare my soul on the matter.”
    I was pleased to hear it and decided against the obvious questions, such as who, and what gender.
    “You cannot divine this person’s feelings toward yourself?” I asked.
    “I have no experience with such things,” he said. “The workings of love are a thing I have only read about or observed at a distance.”
    “Are you well acquainted with this… individual?” I asked.
    He rolled his eyes and nodded.
    “So this is not you worshipping from afar?”
    “Nay. I see this person every day,” he sighed.
    “And this person is… available?” I asked. “Your love, if announced and accepted, would not be forced to remain unrequited because this person has other commitments?”
    “Nay, they are as alone as I,” he said wistfully.
    Once again I wondered at his presence here, and his not being in Port Royal with his business partner, Belfry, awaiting their first shipment of haberdashery goods. I now surmised this infatuation to be the cause. This meant it was not a young lady he was enamored of.
    “I must know. Who?” I asked.
    He took a ragged breath and flushed. “The Bard.”
    My mouth fell open as I struggled with this surprising information.
    He sighed heavily and buried his face in his hands.
    “I know, you think me a fool,” he wailed.
    “Nay, nay. He is an attractive and well-respected man, possessed of a fine wit and humor.”
    “I know. Believe me, I know. And…” he stammered. “I cannot see what he would want in me. I once… I once asked him of his former matelot, and he described a big forceful man much like Cudro. I am anything but a man like Cudro, though the Bard said that if he were to do it again, now, that he might not make the same choices. And, and…
    I want… to make him happy, to…” He shuddered and his