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| Flag of Queen Ruby of the Pirates |
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A Hard Life Come to a Dead End
Ruby was the beloved daughter of a famous Admiral of His Majesty’s Royal Navy. Middle age found her married to a rum ruined former ship’s captain and now tavern owner in the impoverished town of Port St. Phillip. Trapped in circumstance, peril and adventure yet awaited the handsome woman who believed her life was to be spent tending bar, scrubbing run sodden tavern floors and sloping pigs.
Ruby’s husband was a sot, but when the door of his tavern was
breached by the thirsty pirates he rose on his feet to defend his wife, whom he
still loved, the only true treasure he possessed. The Captain's final battle
was brave and short. He ended in a pool of his own blood on the dank, beer
soaked floor. Ruby, unready, was taken prisoner as were the other ladies of the
town. It took five strong men to drag Ruby to their ship.
Ruby knew the uses of rum on sailors and proposed a party, a
welcome surprise to the pirates. The
revels began, but the pirates quickly fell into a drunken sleep while attempting
to prove to the smiling women which of them might hold the most rum.
When they awoke with headaches the following morning, they
were startled to find irons on their feet, shackled to chains run around the
beams of the ship. Above them they could hear the sound of feet on the deck,
hear the rasp of rigging running through the blocks and the high pitched voice
of Ruby, directing the trimming of the main course. What had been their ship was under way. They were now prisoners locked
in irons. Ruby and the women were in command of what was now the ladies’ ship.
Ruby had heard many stories of the sea, none more legendary
and improbable than the tale of the key to the sea. Said to have been forged by Vikings, the large iron key to the sea was alleged to give the Captain who held
it command over wind and wave. It was said the key was the power which allowed
the Vikings to find Greenland and the new world. The key could put the wind
behind your sails and turn it against your opponent. It could calm the storm
for your vessel’s crossing but raise the gale against a ship in pursuit.
In the hands of the righteous, the key was the most powerful
magic on the sea. However, in the possession of a murderous thief and kidnapper
like Anderson it had been of no use, a relic that had cost him much and had yielded
him nothing.
When Ruby and the ladies battered down the door to the captain’s cabin they found the key among his many treasures. Ruby knew what it had to be. She passed over the precious gems, gold and silver in the treasure chest to grasp its handle. She told the other women; “with this we shall be powerful and free.”
A Decision is Made, A Voyage Begins
Ruby reached into the pirate jacket’s oversized pocket and
touched the key to the sea with her fingers, feeling the waves tremble beneath
the ship at her touch. She looked at the women before her rapidly become an
effective crew. Ruby considered what their lives back in the power of others
might be. More hardship, burials sure to be forgotten and the certain return of
other pirates. They could expect forced, unfair dealings with the rapacious
agents of the West India Company or the occasional press gangs of the erstwhile
Royall Navy taking the men. That course did not promise freedom or happiness for them or the
many others who suffered.
Ruby looked at Sapphire (all the ladies had taken to naming
themselves after precious gems) whose hands rested on the huge wooden wheel of
the ship. Assisting her was beautiful, raven haired Crystal, a young girl with her entire life ahead.
Ruby turned her face into the wind, feeling the air. The sea
breeze opening with the morning’s warming heat brought the worn plume of Ruby’s
hat up and into the sun. It was a fair wind for travels North to a convenient
island where Anderson and his pirates could be marooned. Beyond that could be found
the wealthy parts of the Caribbean, a sea of arrogant captains, greedy company
agents, slavers and more pirates than a women should have to contend with.
Not the ordinary workplace of a lady for sure, but work which
needed doing.
Ruby looked at Sapphire and Crystal, and beyond them to the blue sea
and islands out to the horizon.
“I think not,” famously said Queen Ruby, adjusting her hat. “Easy over three points to starboard.” She touched the key in her pocket and the ocean beneath the keel yielded to the ship, the wind backed to her desired direction and the Jeweled Princess began its first voyage.
300 Years Later in Carolina
Pirate Queen Ruby and her Ladies in Raiding have been sailing
for years. Crystal is now a young women and can hold down the poop deck in a
storm with the confidence of any man. However, as Ruby possesses the key, no
storm every overthrows the Jeweled Princess.
On the hot,
still days after a hurricane, when everything is in ruins, it is the Jeweled
Princess that often shows up first with assistance. If the crates of crackers
heaved into the lighters bear the mark of the West India company, no one seems
to mind.
Except of course, for the West India company, who profits for
King and investors by buying everything the islands produce at prices of it’s
choosing and selling everything needed there at a premium, standing on its royal grant of monopoly. The King gets his share of all. The Royal Navy’s first
job it to be sure of that. The sugar cane
grown gets sold to the company for a pittance and the run later purchased costs dear. It does
not profit the West India company to see it’s run and crackers donated to the poor
for free, even after a Hurricane.
During one storm, when Ruby used the key of the sea to end a mighty Hurricane. The massive energy of the storm was concentrated and there was an exposion. She and her ladies find themselves in a strange world, 400 years in their future. A world of wonders, but also troubles. They have kept their distance up to now, attempting to observe this world of marvels from a safe distance, but their casks have run dry.
Ruby and her ladies have been forced to land at the Isle of
Palms after scouting the Lowcountry to obtain that most precious treasure, water, to fill the casks of the Jeweled Princess. They will distribute some largess,
get help hauling the water out to their ship and be quickly off over the waves
leaving the pirates, royal navy and company agents in their wake, who have somehow also reached the future with her.
The casks are full. The Jeweled Princess is ready to make sail, but Crystal, now the flower of young womanhood, cannot be found. Ruby must remain ashore with the other ladies in raiding to search for her sister. As the island fills with summer visitors, the Ladies in Raiding are not unnoticed. Reports have reached the King guards. The West India Company has offered rewards: 20 pounds for a lady in raiding, 100 for Ruby and a thousand for the Key to the sea.
Crystal is rumored to be in Summerville, reveling in the opportunities this new century presents to an experienced 16th Century Pirate Maiden. Our next chapter unfolds in Summerville on May 18. Read Crystal Goes A Roving, Pirate War in Summerville?
Ride the Bus, Join the Story
On May 27, 2023, starting at 10:30 am on the Isle of Palms, take the free CARTA Beach Shuttle from the mainland and join the story.
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