Anne Dray's Arc

Chapter 26 of 28

The prize hull sat moored inside the harbor, but Anne felt no safety in it. The scout had carried her location north. The Crown knew where she lived. Soon their ships would come, and her lookouts could not cover the whole approach. She had too much water to watch and too few eyes to watch it. If a fleet slipped close before her lookouts called it, the chain across the harbor mouth would trap her own ships inside, the same death the old crew had met here. She walked the shore with Emily. The shipwright pointed across the water at a low ridge of pale stone above the far point. Weathered walls stood there, half swallowed by brush. "Old fort," Emily said. "Spanish, by the stonework. Crown never bothered with it out here." She squinted at the high towers. "They'd call it a ruin. I call it a spotting tower with walls already built." Anne studied the point. From that height a single watcher could see the whole seaward approach, farther than any mast in the harbor. One post, instead of six stretched thin along the shore. "Guns still in it?" "Cannons rusted to the carriages. Rifles too." Emily wiped her hands. "Fix the carriages, we hold the mouth from above. Sink a ship before it reaches the chain." Kate came down from the dock, black hair loose, mouth set hard. She had taken her own ship by force and lost no argument since. She looked at the fort, then at Anne. "You want to split the crews. Half here, half up there." "One watch tower does the work of six lookouts," Anne said. "And if the Crown lands men at the point, they hold the high ground and rain fire on us." Kate did not soften it. "You'd be handing them the fort." "Not if we get there first." Anne turned to Emily. "Can you make the guns fire?" "Give me a day and six hands." Kate held Anne's eyes a moment longer. Then she spat to the side. "Fine. I'll take the first watch up there." It was the closest she came to trust. They rowed across at dawn. Emily set her hands to work on the carriages, knocking rust from the iron, greasing the pivots. By dusk two cannons swung clean and true, muzzles trained on the harbor approach. Kate climbed the tallest tower and looked out. She could see three times the water the harbor masts reached. That night a light showed far to the north. Kate marked it early, hours of warning where before there would have been minutes. She sent word down. Anne readied the chain and the crews. The harbor was no longer blind. But the fort's high walls now flew Anne's red banner, plain against the sky. She had traded a hidden base for a fortress the Crown could see for miles. They would come knowing exactly where to aim.