The Seventy-Six

The Heroes are aboard the De Ruyter with Anne Crieux in command, but they are desperately short-handed -- they have only a skeleton crew and have lost more in the battle for the bastion. There are 76 surviving slaves, but none of them are seamen, and only a tiny handful of them speak any Thean languages at all.

The Black Spot Gives Chase

As the action rises, the Heroes are fleeing the Castillian Black Spot. Jenny Blackstockings knows of a haven nearby -- an island called Shatruck's Rest in the center of a mess of reefs known as Shatruck's Tangle. The De Ruyter sets sail hard for the Tangle, reaching there and beginning to navigate the reefs as the Black Spot comes up close behind.

As they reach the reefs, the lobolly boy comes to give Doctor Orlando bad news: Big Reilly, shot in the head by one of the De Ruyters, is in a bad way. He will need surgery now, amidst a pitching ship.

Shatruck's Tangle

As the ship begins to sail through Shatruck's Tangle the Heroes go to work. Doctor Orlando is in the hold, trying to operate on Big Reilly, while Axel is aloft, working the lines high above. Jenny has gone to her gun crew -- as the ship makes a turn, she lines up carefully a shot on the Black Spot and fires hard, hitting the rudder to cause it break off and allow the De Ruyter to make it through the reefs as Orlando finishes his surgery.

Meanwhile, Alondra and Charles Adeyemi, the leader of the seventy-six freed slaves, have been talking. Adeyemi fears that the pirates mean to re-enslave the Seventy-Six, but Alondra is able to talk Charles down and begin to earn his trust.

Shatruck's Rest

After making it through the reef, the De Ruyter anchors in a cove at Shatruck's Rest, the small island in the center of the reef -- reputedly, a hidey-hole for a pirate captain of years gone by named Captain Thomas Shatruck. The De Ruyter is in desperate need of repairs, and so Orlando and Jenny set to repairs while Alondra and Axel explore the interior of this small volcanic island.

Diving down using her strange mask, Jenny learns that a bad infestation of shipworm has eaten through the keel -- the De Ruyter is on her last legs, and a single bad hit on a reef could crack her literally in two. She may not even be able to make it out of the Tangle, but Orlando devises a scheme to use the iron lining of the magazine to build makeshift braces. Working with Jenny, they are able to jury-rig a temporary solution -- hopefully enough for the ship to make it to their rendezvous at Boneyard Key. While down in the water, Jenny also notices a mysterious underwater cave that leads somewhere inland, and sees air bubbles escaping, suggesting that there is oxygen on the other side.

In the interior, Axel breaks away from the hunting party. He is nearly caught by quicksand, but escapes to find the treehouse built by Captain Shatruck and locate the captain's remains; it seems he died five years or so earlier, but had made his home on this island after retiring from piracy. Elsewhere, Alondra and the hunters find an animal whose back was broken by some great beast, and then when they explore a set of banana trees one of the Seventy-Six who climbed the trees in search of bananas is brutally killed by the creature. The hunting party rushes back to the De Ruyter, with the crew and the remaining ex-slaves both spooked by what they think is a haunted island.

The Caves of Shatruck Island

The crew is afraid as they settle down for the night, but despite their pleas, the Heroes decide to swim down and explore the underwater cave at night. They emerge in pitch black, and it takes them some time to find light, but ultimately they discover an underground cave system that seems to have been dug out by Captain Shatruck. They are not the first to find the caves, though -- someone has sealed the hidden cove entrance to the system, and then in a cavern full of crystal pillars they find a spike pit trap with a slain pirate in it. The pit itself almost claims Orlando and Axel as they are exploring.

Disabling the trap, the Heroes find a trap in a hallway that has already been disabled and then come upon Shatruck's treasure room: a small stone room covered in blood, drawn onto the walls in strange angular designs. The treasure chests have been looted, and there is another dead pirate -- sacrificed -- as well as a crystal skull whose dome has broken open like something has hatched from an egg. Jenny recognizes the knife that sacrificed the pirate as belonging to her former captain, Captain Travers of the White Rose, who used it to murder his entire crew in some black ritual. The knife itself is distinctive, a sickle-shaped blade like an agricultural instrument, forged from good quality steel with the mark of the blacksmith who made it.

The Heroes make their way out of the cave complex back to the treehouse, and then from there back to the ship, where they learn that the Creature attacked in the night, breaking Jack's back. He is in a bad shape as the De Ruyter sails for Boneyard Key.

Boneyard Key

Rendezvousing with the Banshee, the Heroes learn that the crew is divided. Led by Long Ned, many of the crew wish to re-enslave the Seventy Six and sell them for prize money, as the Banshees have made little in piracy in recent times. Captain Malcolm is absolutely opposed and is is willing to break the charter if the vote goes against him, while Charles Adeyemi and the slaves are willing to pre-emptively strike at the crew to stop them from voting.

The Heroes navigate these fraught politics carefully: Alondra convinces Adeyemi that the Captain is on their side while Jenny humiliates Long Ned, goading him into beating her up. Orlando leans on wounded crew to give him their proxy, and Axel sways the topsmen to his side.

In the end, it is a close vote -- too close -- but Long Ned loses. Anne Crieux stays Quartermaster, the Seventy-Six stay free, and the Banshee sets sail for Aragosta.

Persons of Note

Charles Adeyemi

The de facto leader of the Seventy-Six rescued slaves, Adeyemi is a Thean-educated Ifrian slave. He seems to have been a revolutionary at some time in his past, and he is quite willing to turn to violence to keep his freedom.

Captain John Malcolm

The Captain was willing to break the Charter to keep the slaves free, a dangerous secret that could spark mutiny if the crew learns it.

Long Ned

The boatswain is growing increasingly dissatisfied, and now he has a new target in the Heroes, who humiliated him.