A Pirates Life

Chapter 2.

I woke with a start to the sound of heavy boots crossing overhead. I tensed, breath catching in my throat as two voices drifted down.

One I recognised. The pirate from earlier.

"...swear he's down here, Cap'n. Skinny lad, but say he knows his letters. Could be useful."

"I'll decide who's useful Blackburn," a gruff voice replied. "This better not be a waste of my time."

"Aye, sir. But he says he worked on the docks too."

The door creaked open and light filtered into the cramped store as they descended the steps.

I scrambled upright, wiping my hands on my shirt, trying to make myself look like anything other than a stowaway that was recently fucked against a crate.

Blackburn came first, ducking under a beam with that gap-toothed smirk plastered on his thick face.

Behind him was a man who could only be the Captain.

Tall and broad-shouldered. Mid-forties maybe, he was calm and commanding. His coat hung open over a clean linen shirt, dark hair tucked behind his ears, his dark eyes moved over me appraisingly.

"Name?"

"Thomas," I said, voice higher than I would have liked.

"You're the one crawled aboard while we were docked?"

"Aye, sir."

"Why?"

I stuttered. "I... I was running. King's men."

A pause. He stepped forward. "That's not a reason. That's an excuse. Why should I keep you on my ship, Thomas?"

"I can work," I said quickly. "I've worked the docks since I was a kid. I know lines, knots, sails. I can climb. I can patch."

"And?"

"I can read and write. A bit. Numbers too."

He folded his arms, still unreadable. "You any good in a fight?"

I hesitated. "Not really."

That earned me a slight twitch of his brow.

"But I'm fast," I added. "And I learn quick."

He stepped even closer, and I fought the urge to back up.

"Do you know what this ship is, boy?"

"A pirate ship."

The captain stepped closer, his hand suddenly gripped my chin, turning my face to inspect me. "And do you know what happens to stowaways on pirate ships? Some captains hang them. Others toss them overboard.

He let go of my jaw, and grabbed my crotch, firm and possessive, as if weighing my cock and balls in his hand like they were just more cargo. My breath hitched, but I didn't flinch. "But I'll decide your worth."

I swallowed.

He gave my balls a firm squeeze before letting go, then turned and began walking away. "You get one chance, Thomas. One." His voice was quiet now. "You disobey an order, you steal, you mouth off... I'll have you flogged and thrown to the sea."

I nodded. "Yes, Captain."

He turned and walked away, as he left he said, "Blackburn. Take him to Old Titch. Let's see if he's got use beyond a pretty face."

Blackburn jerked his head. "Come on, lad. Time to meet ye' fate."

I followed. "What's... Old Titch?"

Blackburn looked over his shoulder, grin spreading, highlighting his missing teeth "Wouldn't ye' like to know."

"I would, yeah."

He kept walking, not answering.

"Is it a punishment?"

"Oh, could be," He laughed. "You're twitchy. I like that."

He led me down a narrow run filled with barrels and crates, we climbed a few steps and ducked my head as I stepped into a galley.

The room was far longer than it was wide. With dark wooden tables jammed together mismatched benches and chairs shoved around them, it would be a tight squeeze to get than fifteen men in the space. The room was lit from port holes down the one side and a single gas lamps down the far end, where a older, wiry man worked surrounded by pots and pans swinging gently from the swell of the waves.

He glanced over, "Oi! What's this? You ain't getting anything from me Blackburn."

"Calm ya tits Titch. I gots' you a stowaway," Blackburn said, shoving his thumb at my chest. "Cap'n wants him worked. Says he reads letters an' all."

He wiped his hands on a rag and began crossing he room, "Oh does he now?" The cook's eyes slid to me and back to Blackburn. "And why are you still in my galley. You breathe on my broth and it'll curdle."

Blackburn snorted. "He's yours then."

He gave me a look that promised later, then reached to clap my shoulder. Titch cracked the ladle into Blackburn's wrist with a clang.

"Hands off the stock." he growled.

Blackburn scowled, rubbing his wrist. "Touchy old bastard."

"Touchier than your ma on market day. Go on, fuck off. Go hump the mast."

Blackburn left with a low laugh, boots fading back down the steps. Titch waited till the door thudded shut, then sidled up, and got closer than was decent as he looked me up and down. He sniffed, like he could smell what Blackburn had done to me. "Pretty face, ginger, bit posh too. But the calluses of a dock rat. What's your name?"

"Thomas."

He leaned in, "Well Thomas," he whispered, I prepared myself to be pushed me to my knees...

"You can peel." He tossed me a blade and gestured to a sack of root veg. "You cut yourself, I boil ya balls."

I stared at the knife, then at him. "That's it?"

He snorted. "What, you want me to bend you over the table first?"

I shook my head.

"Right then, Ginger. Welcome to the beating heart of the ship. You don't piss in my pots, you don't nick so much as a pea, and if anyone comes in here givin' you grief, you point him out and I'll trim his bollocks. Clear?"

"Aye, Cook."

"Titch," he corrected and pointed at the veg. "Peel 'em. Fast as a whore drops her knickers when I show me prick."

I laughed, and hauled the bulging sack onto the table. The galley rocked with the ship's sway, heat from the stove heating the room. Titch moved quickly, hands with missing fingers flashing as he hacked salt beef into cubes.

I peeled in silence for a long while before he finally said, "So what's your story, then?"

I glanced over. "You want the short version?"

"Short, long, or bent over. I'm not fussy."

I cracked a smile despite myself. "S'pose I got caught with my cock in the wrong place."

"Yeah? Who was it in?"

"The Earl's son."

Titch stopped stirring. Looked at me.

"No shit?"

I shook my head with a small smirk and continued, "Got caught mid-thrust. Guards chased me through the docks with my breeches round my ankles. Climbed onto this ship without really thinking."

He let out a belly laugh and slapped the side of the pot. "I like you already, Ginger. Got the sense of humour of a dock rat and the balls of a shark."

"Suppose I'll take that as a compliment."

"You should. Not every slick-arsed land rat can make it past breakfast in my galley."

Just then the door opened.

A tanned lad with windswept hair ducked in, rope slung over one shoulder, shirt half open and a grin like it belonged on a stage.

He walked closer, eyeing me curiously. "You the stowaway?"

"I guess so," I said, unsure how to respond.

He stuck out a hand. "Flinn."

I took it. "Thomas."

"Well, Thomas," Flinn said, giving me another once-over, "you look better than the last stray we pulled outta the hold."

"Thanks... I think."

"I'm here to show your around. Before everyone comes looking for fresh meat in the galley."

Titch waved us off. "Don't let him near the twins unsupervised. They get twitchy when they smell virgin."

"I'm not" I started, but Flinn was already heading up the ladder.

"Come back before supper or the next time I see you you'll be soup." Titch shouted as I followed Flinn up the ladder and down a narrow passage.

The ship was a maze of cargo, tiny bunks, and men in various states of dress. Some eyed us, some didn't care, but I felt every gaze. Flinn moved fast, always knowing when to duck, which hatch to kick or ladder to climb.

Eventually, he stopped in front of a door "Ready?" he asked, then swung it open. I blinked, blinded by the sunlight.

The main deck was chaos. Around fifteen men, some hauling lines, others brawling or singing, one pissing over the rail.

The sails were enormous, striped and patched, and the rigging looked like a tangle of spiderwebs.

Flinn clapped my shoulder. "Welcome to the Devil's Fancy Thomas. Better than a noose?"

"Here's hoping," I said, but my chest felt lighter than it had in months.

"Come on," he said. "You'll want to know who not to piss off."

Flinn jerked his chin toward the quarterdeck. "Up there's the Captain's quarters. Don't set a toe unless you're called. That there's Rook. The quartermaster, he'll count the hairs on your balls if he thought it'd help with shares.

He spun me by the waist. "Sail Sal, needle's quicker than a snake." He continue pointing out and naming men, almost none of which I remembered.

He pointed out an Angry looking man with yellowed fingers and teeth, "Cutler. Don't let the limp fool ya," Flinn whispered, "Mean bastard, don't get caught alone with him."

"Right," I muttered. "Noted."

Flinn yanked a hatch up with his boot and slid down, I followed and landed in the gun deck, air close with tar and iron. He led me forward, ducking a hanging lantern. "You'll bunk in either of the common quarters." He explained as we descended more steps, "Cutler's in that far one, so I recommend this one." He said pointing into a long thin room filled with hammocks.

Two men arm-wrestled on an upturned chest. One looked up. "New fish," he said, bored. The other glanced back without interest.

"Right," Flinn said, already turning to go. "Before Titch decides you're better as stock, you'd best show your face."

I took the hint and slipped back the way we'd come, ducking into the heat and clatter of the galley. Old Titch didn't look up; he just thrust a wooden spoon at me like a weapon.

"Stir. Slow as a funeral, not fast as you fucked that lordling. Scrape the bottom or she'll catch and I'll tan ya hide."

"Aye," I said, grabbing the spoon.

"Good. Now pass me them herbs. No, the other bastards. You know your green stuff from your grass?"

"I can read the labels," I said.

He snorted. "Oooh. Listen to 'im. Read the labels, all civilized. Maybe you're the lordling." He slapped a stained scrap on the table with his missing fingers. "Tell me what I've got left of salt pork and ship's biscuit."

I leaned over the mess of letters, scrawled in a hand that looked like a drunken spider had fallen in ink. But I'd seen worse from the harbourmaster's ledgers.

"Twelve pounds salt pork, eight crates of biscuit," I said after a moment. "And... something about weevils?"

Titch's eyebrows shot up. "Well, fuck me sideways. You can read." He snatched the paper back, squinting at it.

The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur of chopping, stirring, and dodging Titch's occasional swats when I moved too slow.

"Time to feed the animals," Titch announced, handing me a stack of wooden bowls. "You'll serve. Don't skimp, don't favour. They'll try their luck"

The mess deck was chaos, almost twenty men crowded around benches and tables, laughing, cursing, shoving. Titch prodded me forward with a ladle. "Move, boy, they get mad if they get too hungry."

I started serving, trying to keep my hands steady as I ladled stew into outstretched bowls. Some men barely noticed me. Others stared too long, eyes tracking my movements like predators.

I finished serving without incident, though I felt eyes on me the whole time: some curious, some hungry. When everyone had been fed, Titch handed me my own bowl and jerked his head toward an empty spot on the bench. "Sit. Eat. Before you fall over."

"It's good," I managed between bites.

"Course it is. I made it." He leaned back, surveying the room with proprietary satisfaction. "Food keeps men loyal. Captains think it's the gold or the glory, but it's what fills their bellies that matters." He tapped the side of his nose. "Remember that."

I nodded, scraping the last of my stew from the bowl. Around us, the noise had grown. Men were gambling, telling stories, arguing over past exploits.

When the meal was done, I helped clear the bowls and scrub the pots. Titch watched me finish the last pot, then nodded approvingly. "Not bad for your first day, ginger. You might just survive."

"Thanks," I said, wiping sweat from my brow.

"Off to bed with ye'. Dawn comes early at sea."

I made my way back through the ship's warren of passages, remembering the route as best I could. The lower decks were quieter now, most of the crew either on watch or settled in for the night.

I finally found the sleeping quarters, the space was dim, lit by a single swinging lantern. Men sprawled in hammocks or on narrow bunks built into the hull, some already snoring, others murmuring quiet conversations. I expected to have to find some corner to curl up in, but then Flinn waved from the far end of the room.

I squeezed through the tight spaces to find him lounging in his hammock in nothing but his undershorts, my stomach flipped. He nodded to the wall beside him where, to my surprise, a second hammock hung in a sliver of space I wouldn't have thought could fit one.

"Got you sorted," he said with a casual shrug. "Figured you'd need somewhere to sleep."

"I... thanks," I managed, surprised by the unexpected kindness.

"Don't mention it." He gestured to the floor near our feet where a broad-shouldered man I recognized from the meal line was already snoring softly. "That's Benno. Sleeps like the dead, snores like thunder."

I looked around, noticing how the crew had transformed the cramped space. Old sails hung as makeshift curtains between bunks. Crates stacked to create walls. Bits of fabric draped strategically. Every man had carved out what little privacy he could from the shared quarters.

"It's not much," Flinn said, watching my face, "but it's home."

I climbed awkwardly into the hammock, nearly tipping myself onto the floor before finding my balance. I adjusted trying to get comfortable, but everything ached, shoulders, back, thighs and arse. Mostly my arse. I shifted again, trying to find a position that didn't remind me of Blackburn, and groaned under my breath.

Flinn chuckled softly beside me. "That bad, is it?"

I glanced at him. His arms were tucked behind his head, his chest bare, the lantern light catching the dusting of hair between his pecs.

"You try taking Blackburn almost dry and see how you sleep."

He smiled, "Been there mate. You into it though?"

"Into what?" I whispered, "Sodomy or Blackburn?"

"Either. Both?"

I hesitated, unsure how to answer. "I... like men, if that's what you're asking," I finally said, keeping my voice low. "Blackburn was just... survival."

Flinn nodded, his eyes glinting in the dim light. "Fair enough. Men here don't care where you stick it, long as you pull your weight."

A hand on my shoulder woke me.

I blinked, groggy, the scent of warm fabric and salt-heavy air thick around me. Flinn was stood beside the hammocks, still shirtless, hair mussed with his eyes gleaming with mischief.

"Come on," he whispered. "Got something to show you."

I blinked harder. "It's barely dawn."

"Exactly." He grinned. "You'll thank me."

Still half-asleep, I swung my legs out and followed him. We padded barefoot down the corridor and out onto the quiet deck, the world still painted in deep navy and grey. The wind was calm, the ship gently rocking.

Flinn led me to the rigging and began to climb, fast, sure-footed. I hesitated, then followed, still in nothing but my thin undershorts. My fingers gripped the ropes as I climbed, high, past the tallest sail.

We reached the crow's nest and scrambled inside, breathless. It was barely more than a wooden ring and a couple of planks. "Ahh," he breathed, "best view on the ship and no one can see us.

"Best view of wha-?"

He raised a finger. "Shh. Patience."

So we waited. The sky softened, turning purple, then gold. Below us, the ship creaked and shifted, the majority of the crew still asleep in their bunks.

Then I heard it.

A door opening, near the rear stairwell. Two figures stepped into view. Both shirtless. One tall and broad, with thick arms and a trail of dark hair down his chest. The other was leaner, wiry, younger.

Flinn nudged me. "That's Harrow and Jace. You me the big one yesterday."

"What are they doing?"

"Keep watching."

They dropped to the deck beside a stack of canvas. The bigger man, Harrow shoved the other to his knees and undid his breeches. Jace went down on him instantly, mouth wide, bobbing his head like he loved it.

Flinn grinned beside me. "Told you it'd be worth getting up."

I said nothing, just stared.

Jace pulled back, spit stretching from his lips to the head of Harrow's cock. Then he shoved his breeches down and turned presenting his arse to the bigger man.

I gasped.

Harrow's hands gripped his arse tight, pulling his cheeks apart. His tongue plunged into Jace's hole, wet and hungry. Jace moaned loud, loud enough that even up here, we heard it.

My cock stirred in my shorts.

Flinn was already hard, clearly.

We both watched in silence as Jace rocked on Harrow's face, gripping the nearby railing, panting and rutting.

"What if they get caught?" I whispered.

"Then they'll even be joined or ignored." Shrugged Flinn, "Told ya already, no one really cares where you stick it."

Then Harrow shifted standing upright he spat in his hand and rubbed it over his thick shaft, and pushed inside Jace in a single smooth, practiced slide.

Jace moaned again, hands braced behind him as he fucked himself on the cock behind him, back arched, eyes fluttering shut.

I bit my lip. My cock was fully hard now, tenting my shorts.

Flinn glanced down at me, grinned, and slid a hand under the waistband of his own. He started stroking, slow, quiet.

So I followed.

And then, Jace looked up.

Right at us and smiled.

His body jerked as Harrow thrust again. He moaned louder, clearly loving the fact we were watching. His hand slid down to his own cock and he stroked in time with Harrow's rhythm.

"Fuck," Flinn breathed, leaning in closer. "I bet that feels great."

"Defienetly," I hissed back, breathless.

He reached over, pushing my hand away and started stroking my cock, slow and tight. I turned to do the same to him, gently rolling the foreskin back and forth over his tip. We were close, bodies pressed together, breathing fast.

Below us, Harrow was thrusting harder.

"Gonna-" Flinn interrupted.

"Me too!"

We came together, cocks twitching in each other's hands, thick ropes striping our hands and across the wooden boards. We groaned, trying not to laugh.

Jace came below us a second later, back arched, cock spurting against the railing he was leant against as Harrow finished inside him.

The sun rose properly then, lighting up the whole deck.

We sat in silence, panting.

"Worth the early start?" Flinn asked.

I nodded, dazed.

He wiped his hand on the wood beside us. "We should do this again."

"Watch people fuck?"

He smirked. "Or more."