This blog series is a fun crossover between How to Break an Evil Curse by Laura Morrison and The Black Pearl by Jennifer Flath. You can read the novels for free at JukePop Serials.
Trying to get information about Fritillary, Alexander has stumbled onto McManlyman's pirate ship and stumbled into the jealous McManlyman.
Read Part 1 here and Part 2 here.
(Pretty much exactly how it happened. Maybe some artistic license.)
Agreeing to a sword fight with a jealous pirate was exactly the opposite of not walking into trouble, which is what not one, but three women had explicitly ordered me not to do. “Take Dmitri,” they had insisted. I had argued, “I’ll be gone for a day. How much trouble could I run into in one day?” I’d have to end this quickly. I took a swing at McManlyman.
The resulting clang put me in better spirits. The footing on the deck was abysmal, and McManlyman had more skill than I was anticipating, but that just increased the challenge. Besides, how complete would a review of Fritillary be without a complete analysis of pirate sword culture?
“Who makes your swords?” I asked, dodging a slice.
“Oh this?” McManlyman asked, waving his sword about. “Pirates don’t buy their swords. They steal them.”
“If you had one made, have them balance it for your tendency to slice left,” I advised. He lunged at me.
I countered a particularly brutal thrust. What McManlyman probably hoped was a fatal blow glanced off my blade, and McManlyman was too surprised to redirect his momentum, which went straight into the deck. He stayed on his feet, which was admirable. I waited as McManlyman dug the point of his sword out of the deck.
“Hey, what’s that behind you?” hollered McManlyman, a panicked look in his eye. Then he tried to kick me, which forced me to jump backward on the slippery deck. My boots were not designed for the traction of gripping a slippery boat deck, and underhanded combat made me cranky.
McManlyman wrenched the sword from the deck with a flourish. “Ha ha!” he cried and lunged at me.
“Go Max!” cheered Lola, clapping with delight. “You’re so manly!”
We fought on for a few minutes more. I was surprised to find myself so evenly matched with such an oaf, but since he hadn’t devoted any brain power toward building sensible relationships, vocabulary, or logic in general, he had plenty of space left for specialized skills. Swordfighting must have been his thing.
The longer the fight went on, the more he resorted to kicking and distracting and generally trying tactics that even in Fritillary had to be considered unethical.
“Ready to give up?” he asked. It did not escape my notice that he was panting and beginning to sweat.
“Sure,” I said, pointing my sword down. As expected, he flew at me in this moment of weakness, ready to tackle me to the ground. I imagine he intended pummelling to follow. I stepped to the side; he went over the railing. The ship was tall, and it was a long time before I heard the splash down below. I did hope pirates could swim.
Lola screamed at me, “You monster! As if I’d want you just because you trick my fiance into falling over the side of a ship!” Then she flew to the railing and looked down. “My darling! My dearest! Where are you? Oh--oh there you are. My love, are you alright?”
“I’ll kill him!” I heard the ex-pirate captain’s voice float up onto the deck.
“Sweetheart, I’ll have a pirate lower a ladder.” She looked over her shoulder at me and then whispered down to McManlyman, “Don’t worry, love. I will take care of him.”
“Thanks, honey!” he called up. “Hey, and tell him I really fight left-handed! Make sure he knows that!”
He wasn’t left-handed.
Lola turned to me and said, “So, mysterious stranger, what do you say you and I have a chat?”
“Actually, now would be an opportune time to leave,” I said. “Perhaps Copper is ready to--”
“Wait--don’t you want--” she said, striking a pose again. “Weren’t you going to try something? You know--with me?” I am nearly certain I saw her pucker her lips.
Great. As a side note, all the sword fights I had won during the last year had ended poorly for me. I should think about redefining success. “All I want from you is information about the royal family,” I replied.
“Hmm. Fine. Let’s reconvene. Somewhere a bit more… private.” She walked in the direction of what must be the Captain’s quarters.
What I really wanted was off this ship, but pirates were starting to peek out from their hiding places to find out what the commotion was about. I decided to chance one conversation before I left. It was hard to tell whether I was learning anything about world culture, pirate ships, or just unhealthy relationships, but these people were unpleasantly interesting.
Pepper kept an eye on McManlyman from the deck. The blustering ex-captain was still in the ocean hollering about keeping my hands off his lady. No worries there.
As soon as Lola had me alone, I wished Pepper was with me, however. Lola was all the uncomfortable advances of Serena with none of the experience. I’m not sure that made her more tolerable, but it did garner her some undeserved pity.
She shut the door and turned around with an exaggerated flourish of her lacy dress. Then, she tossed her hair and said, “At last, we are alone!” She batted her eyelashes. Again.
“Is there something in your eye?” I asked.
She pouted for a moment, then swooped over to me and said, “Perhaps there is. Would you mind looking?” She leaned in uncomfortably close and put a hand on my arm again.
I backed away, but unfortunately there was a wall.
“Speaking of eyes,” she said with a toss of her hair, “Yours are amazing!”
I very nearly felt sorry for the pirate ex-captain. The one who had just tried to kill me. It was well past time to extricate myself from the situation. “Do you have any actual information about anything?”
“Oh, I know a lot of things,” she said with a giggle.