The Outback

August 2012

"Ahh, there we go," said Thaddeus Post admiringly, the brush in his hand outlining another bone in the reddish dirt. Jenny hiked up her khakis and crouched beside him, examining the long bones of the partially uncovered skeletons.

"Proof of the location of the last Bunyip clan?" She nodded to Daniel, who adjusted the light he was standing near. Her breath fogged slightly in the cool night. "And their caern?"

"Nearby, no doubt," Post said, still working on removing the earth from a shin bone. "See here, the skeleton is smaller than their European cousins. In hominid form they appeared as the aboriginal. Peaceful and quiet - the Bunyip knew little of war before it was forced upon them."

"This is even smaller -" Jenny started, and then sighed. "A child."

He nodded, sitting back on his heels beside her. "The whole species was wiped out in the War of Tears. Though some speculate the Bunyip managed to migrate to the New World, there have been no findings to prove the rumor." He brightened. "Perhaps we will go there next."

Jenny brushed his hair away from his dirty forehead. "Another grand adventure?"

"There is always another one, my dear," Thaddeus said, smiling in the moonlight.

July 1791

"She's a spitfire, that one," sneered the Spaniard, throwing the dark haired French girl into the wooden cell on the ship. Jeanette Vignes gasped, turning around as the solid door was closed tightly behind her. She slumped down into her billowing skirts.

"When my father hears of this -!"

"He will be horrified that his daughter is a witch, no doubt. And pleased to allow the Inquisition to do their good work." The new voice was slick and mellow, belonging to the Inquisitor. Jeanette didn't even know if he had a name.

"I am no witch!" she shouted hoarsely, but some of her previous fire was gone. "I am no sorcerer."

"Yet you read palms at parties, flaunting your powers and drawing the faithful down to Hell with you," said the Inquisitor, his feathers unruffled. "You return with us to Trinidad to stand trial, where you will no doubt confess your plentiful sins."

"I shall confess nothing," she whispered, but her captors heard nothing as they walked away. Jeanette buried her face in her hands, the ship rocking gently beneath her as it put out to sea.

Captain Marco Fernandez studied the sky as his ship, the Esmerelda, left port. He had been sailing between the islands of the Caribbean ocean for years, and was a devout Papist. No doubt the reason the Inquisition had blessed his ship by pressing it into service these past months.

Behind him the sun was setting, but his eyes were on the gathering darkness ahead. There were pirates in these seas, and he prayed to the Mother for protection as they went about the Church's work. Below decks there was a sobbing scream as the heretic was welcomed into the Inquisition's forgiving embrace. Marco crossed himself and tried to listen to the flap of the unfurled sails as the warm tropical winds caught them and propelled his ship toward Trinidad.

Usually he took the ship out himself, a tradition of his that bordered on superstition. If his own hands were upon the wheel then the Esmerelda felt like an extension of his body. The wind in her sails ruffled his hair, and the waters that were split by her prow were the salty spray that misted his face. Nothing could threaten her with him guiding her through the seas. Tonight he stood by as Pedro manned the helm. Inquisitor Castillo had insisted that Marco explain their route in detail while also getting underway, and he could not be in two places at once.

The captain's hands clenched involuntarily on the rail, and then he nodded to Pedro and headed below decks.

Jeanette clutched at the rosary that she'd been allowed in her cell, a small room in a particularly dank part of a ship. The daughter of a merchant, she was not unaccustomed to sailing between the islands, though she had never been confined to the brig before.

A silent nun was posted outside, just visible through the barred window in the door. Her pious head was bowed, but Jeanette was certain the woman was sleeping, not praying. She didn't know what time it was, but it was full dark outside no doubt.

She fingered the beads in her hand, drawing them one by one through her palm. Mother Mary, full of grace... Our Father, who art in heaven...

Her own mother had stood as still as a statue of the Madonna when the Inquisition had come for her, the anguish in her eyes the only thing Jeanette could hold onto after the soldiers had pulled her away. Father was on the ocean, picking up goods to be sold in other ports. Mother had no choice - to protest would have been effectively signing her own death warrant. It still hurt, however, to remember the relative coldness of the woman Jeanette had once depended on for everything.

Palm reading - it was ridiculous. Jeanette rubbed the back of her fist over her damp and dirty cheeks, the rosary beads dancing lightly against her skin. It was a jest, a silly game she did for her friends at parties when asked. Promising tall dark strangers and mysterious admirers, the sort of thing girls loved to hear even though they knew it was false. And as luck would have it the tall dark stranger at the last party had been an Inquisitor, and though the Inquisition had been falling further into irrelevance with the Church as a whole it still very much had power to do just about anything it wanted.

Which in this case meant dragging a twenty-four year old maiden from her home just before dinner. Jeanette dragged shaking fingers through her hair, trying to tease out the tangles as the ship bumped and shuddered and the nun raised her head and rubbed her bleary eyes. They were far enough below decks that it was nearly impossible to hear what was going on above their heads in the open air, but Jeanette imagined she could hear shouting. Were they being boarded?

"Sails!" came the call from the bow, where a sharp eyed boy was shielded from the lanterns that lined the sides, and Pedro clutched the wheel a bit tighter than usual. The captain appeared from below decks after a moment, barking orders. The ship on the moonlit horizon carried no lights of it's own. Ships that sailed dark were usually up to no good.

Sailors heaved on lines as Pedro pulled on the wheel, slowly turning the ship broadside to the new arrival as they tried to cut across it's approach and out run it. Captain Fernandez yelled for the lanterns to be doused as the mysteriously dark ship continued to sail right toward them. He grabbed his spyglass to try to get a better look, but even with the magnification he could only make out the broad strokes of the vessel. It flew no flag.

"Pirates, most likely," he said to the Inquisitor who had deigned to grace the deck with his presence. Fernandez's brow was tight with tension, and he looked up at Esmerelda's sails as the wind filled them. Shouts and running footsteps filled the air, and they were making enough headway that his shoulders began to relax.

And then, just like that, the sails billowed one last time and then fell limp. "Mio Dios," he breathed as his beautiful Esmerelda was becalmed and the pirate ship drew inexorably closer.

The nun gripped a small knife in one trembling fist as she backed away from the narrow door that led out of the brig. Jeanette remained pressed to her cell door, her face against the bars in it's window. "Let me out, Sister," she pleaded, and the other woman turned to look at her briefly, shaking her head.

Jeanette tried again. "If it's pirates they will rape us both, let me out so I can help you."

The nun turned an almost venomous glare on her. "Be silent, witch!"

There was a clatter of footsteps on the stairs beyond; the thumps and shouts from above deck were almost quiet by this time. Jeanette backed away, putting her back to the hull just as the brig door exploded inward. Her heart thumped as she heard a gasp from the nun, and then the sound of something heavy hitting flesh. A face appeared at the window to her door, but was gone so quickly she barely had a chance to process it.

She clutched at her skirts as keys jangled and were fitted into the lock, a prayer stuck halfway completed in her head as she tried not to imagine her fate once the pirates got her door open. The cell, once a prison, seemed like her only sanctuary.

Pressing herself as far away from the cell door as possible, Jeanette cast about for anything she could use as a weapon. She grabbed the wooden bucket she had not had occasion to use yet, and edged closer to the door as it opened outward. She had an impression of a dirty male face and a flash of knife, and them she smashed the bucket into it, knocking the man backward and shoving past him into the cabin.

She saw the nun on the floor, bleeding from a cut on her cheek, while the pirate swore mightily behind her. Jeanette gathered up her skirts and pulled on the heavy brig door, slipping through just as she felt the man grabbing for her and missing. She didn't have a plan beyond finding the captain of the ship for protection, or, barring that, throwing herself into the ocean. Drowning was preferable to whatever would happen to her should the pirates catch her.

The sounds of battle still came from above decks, but the shouts were diminished. One side or the other was winning. Jeanette stumbled through the dark and narrow passage, heading for the ladder up, but a sailor's body tumbled down it in front of her, his neck at an unnatural angle. She put her hand to her mouth, and edged around the ladder. She could hide below decks until things calmed down, then run for it.

Someone grabbed her arms roughly, and she was pulled backward through a door, a hand clamping over her mouth and stifling her instinctive scream. "Be silent, witch," Inquisitor Castillo muttered in her ear, kicking the door closed in front of her and dragging her further into the cabin. The only light was from the moon dancing on the waves...they were in the captain's room, the only cabin with windows.