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shoulder was bleeding badly from a deep cut, and a shard of wood was embedded in his calf. Dark blood was seeping through his breeches and dripping onto the floor.
    Frantically, Carolina pulled off her cloak and began tearing it into strips to bind Diego’s wounds. She had to get him out of this room.
    What if they were hit again?
    And what had hit them in the first place?
    She whirled around and stared at the smoking cannonball lying on the floor. Its path of destruction led back to a giant hole now gaping in the side of the ship. Diego and Carolina’s little porthole was still intact, but almost the entire wall beside it was missing. And through the giant hole, she could clearly see a long galley ship racing toward them. It was bristling with cannons, all of them pointing at the merchant ship on which Carolina and Diego were hiding.
    Fluttering from the top of the mainmast was a bright green Jolly Roger, emblazoned with four white crescent moons and a double-bladed sword.
    Only one pirate flew a Jolly Roger like that.
    They were under attack…by the Pirate Lord of the Black Sea!

C HAPTER S IX
    C apitaine Chevalle had been Pirate Lord of the Mediterranean for a very long time. Jack could remember the snobbish Frenchman visiting with Captain Teague when Jack was younger. Jack would be sent to bed early while the two of them sipped champagne, laughed over stories of their crews, and inevitably ended the night trying to kill each other in a drunken duel—although neither of them could see straight enough at that point to actually inflict any harm.
    The next morning, Chevalle would be gone, and Teague would spend the day in bed with a splitting headache, grumbling about how much he hated Frenchmen. That was, until Chevalle showed up again…and out came the smiles and champagne once more.
    On one of these visits, when Jack was nine years old, Chevalle’s gold-topped walking stick had mysteriously vanished while the two old pirates were feasting on wine and duck and sweetmeats. Oh, the fury when the theft was discovered! The roaring! The accusations! The swashbuckling battle that ensued! Jack had watched it all from the rafters, grinning and twirling the stick between his hands. At the height of the battle, when the two men had their swords at each other’s throats, Jack leaned out and dropped the stick precisely so it struck both their heads at once, knocking them out instantly.
    Then he’d eaten all the sweetmeats himself and scampered off to bed.
    But if he’d hoped that would be the end of Chevalle’s visits, he was sorely mistaken. Both pirates assumed they had hallucinated the theft under the influence of the wine, which was also no doubt to blame for their headaches the next day.
    Much to Jack’s dismay, Chevalle’s snooty voice and overpowering lavender scent continued to plague him. He could remember sitting up in the crow’s nest on Teague’s ship and spotting the Fancy sailing into the harbor. Which was a ridiculous name for a pirate ship, if you asked Jack. All frippery and ostentation and not at all intimidating, much like Chevalle himself.
    And yet, despite Chevalle’s many visits to Teague, Jack could only remember Teague returning the favor once. Several years ago, Jack and Teague had traveled together to Chevalle’s ancient family mansion just outside Marseille. The journey involved a winding path through a thick forest, to keep the mansion hidden from Chevalle’s enemies, but Jack’s unusual mind still remembered the way.
    He also remembered the dilapidated mansion visible beyond the tall wrought-iron fence. Thick vines of ivy covered the walls, and a good portion of the roof in the east wing had fallen in, leaving rooms open to the sky like the gaping holes in a pirate’s smile.
    Jack pushed his hat back on his head and surveyed the mansion warily. It had fallen into even worse disrepair since he had last been there. Night was spreading across the wide green lawn, but there was still enough