7 CHAPTER 7: THE RETURN OF CAPTAIN ANNA

"Captain Anna… You are back…" Charlotte said trying to sound happy.

"As alive as always, matey," Anna answered while getting closer to Charlotte. "And I see you have been good as well," the captain said once she was standing right in front of her shipmaster and offered a hand to help her to stand up.

Charlotte took Anna's hand and stood up, and once she was on her feet she hugged her captain. Anna started to feel uneasy with this sign of affection and exclaimed: "Shipmaster Charlotte, calm down!"

"I beg your pardon, captain," Charlotte said releasing Anna. "I have forgotten you do not like hugs."

"That is not important now," Anna replied. "The important thing now is that you come back with me to my ship and we continue with our hunt for a siren."

By listening to this, Charlotte felt a mix of relief and worriedness, as those words meant Anna would leave soon but her ambition to capture a siren was strong as before. Charlotte was about to reply to her but Anna gave her an order. "Before we leave, we are going to check the shack we found on the beach. Maybe we will find something useful for our trip."

After getting the order, the two men who had fought with Charlotte started to walk in direction of the beach followed by Captain Anna. Charlotte followed them closely to not raise any suspicion, all while inside of her head she was making a plan to make the pirates leave and prevent they plundered Ismael´s shack.

Trying to stop the loot would be impossible, but Charlotte could plot something to make the pirates go: once on the shack, she would tell them she found it and turned it into her property with all of the stuff inside of it. Then, she would help them to carry whatever they wanted back to their ship and once they were done she would invent an excuse so she could stay behind. The chances for this plan to work were low, but Charlotte knew she had to try or Marina and Ismael would be in danger.

Meanwhile, in another place far from Charlotte's location, Marina and Ismael were still trying to go to the town through the forest. After walking for a few minutes, they could get out of the forest and arrived at the town outskirts.

"We finally made it," Ismael said relieved for the sight of some facades of buildings.

"What will happen to Charlotte?" Marina asked while catching her breath.

"If she had any luck, she probably defeated the pirates. If not, she may be dead by now," Ismael answered, making Marina shudder in fear with the possibility of her friend's death. Ismael kept walking, but then he felt as if he was going on his own. He turned around and he saw Marina standing still on her same spot, not following him. Ismael dropped the wooden crates he was carrying and returned to the point Marina was standing. He asked her "What are you thinking?"

"We have to get back," Marina said looking at Ismael right into his eyes.

"No," he replied firmly and turned around to keep on his way towards the town.

"Why not?" Marina asked angrily.

"Because Charlotte was very clear with her instructions. We must go to the town and stay there until the pirates are gone," Ismael explained keeping the firmness on his voice.

"But what if something happened to her?" Marina asked worriedly.

Ismael just looked at the siren intensely, waiting that his firm sight was enough to make her understand they would not go back. But this did not work, as it only made Marina look at him with sad, begging eyes.

"Please, Ismael. Charlotte is my friend. I cannot leave her behind just like that," Marina said keeping the sadness in her eyes. Ismael tried to resist her pleas, but her sad eyes were too much for him and in the end, he agreed to her petition.

"All right, then. We will go back to the forest, but at the first signal of danger we will come back to the town," Ismael said with a severe voice tone to show he was reluctant to disobey Charlotte's orders. Marina just nodded her head and turned around to go back to the road she and Ismael had gone through.

After a few minutes of walking, Marina and Ismael arrived at the spot they had separated from Charlotte. The place looked different from the first time they stayed there as there were broken branches all over the place, some trees and bushes with scratches and skid marks on the floor.

"Do you think Charlotte is okay?" Marina asked while looking at the scratches on a tree.

"I am not sure," Ismael said while checking the skid marks. He kept looking at them until he found some footprints that were almost erased. Noticing they all were going in the same direction, he said: "Marina, I think I found something." He pointed to the footprints with one hand and with the other he pointed to the direction they were going. "It seems these footprints go all to the beach. And it seems they belong to four people," he explained.

"Does that mean Charlotte is still alive?" Marina asked hopefully.

"It is possible," Ismael answered.

"Then we better hurry," the siren said and started to run towards the beach. Ismael ran as well, following her closely.

At the beach, Captain Anna's crew was taking the last water, food and other useful stuff from the shack for their ship. The place was almost empty when Anna and Charlotte arrived as some men were raiding it while Anna and her other two men followed the trio of friends through the forest. Due to this, Charlotte did not try to stop them. It was too late to do that.

Captain Anna was at the front of the shack supervising the crew's job accompanied by Charlotte. After a few minutes, the captain decided to ask a question to her companion. "Tell me, Charlotte, how did you make it to this place?"

Charlotte´s mind went blank with that question. Although she had created a story on her mind to justify her knowledge about the shack, she was not sure if her captain would believe it. Still, she tried to convince her.

"I am not sure, captain. I can only remember being hit on the head when our ship was attacked, and then I woke up in this shack. The owners treated my wounds and allowed me to stay with them as long as I helped them with some chores."

Anna stayed silent after listening to the story, analysing it to find something fishy on it. Charlotte looked at her intently, hoping she had believed it.

"So you don't know how did you make it to this place?" Anna asked after a few minutes.

"No, my captain," the shipmaster replied.

"Well… I DO have an idea of how you made it to this place," the captain said with slight anger in her voice. Charlotte looked at her confused.

"The siren brought you here," Anna said.

"The siren?" Charlotte said trying to sound confused.

"Yes. The siren," Anna replied letting the anger in her voice to be more evident. "When I fell in the water I could get hold of a piece of wood so I could float, and when I grabbed it I could see the siren taking you away from the ship."

Charlotte was speechless. As she heard Anna's words it was harder to hide her surprise. Even if she could not remember the way she made it to the shore, the fact that Anna had just described it to her was shocking, but not for the description, but the fact she had seen it all. Charlotte's fear grew more as Captain Anna was getting closer to her, looking deeply into her eyes. Once they were face to face, Anna said: "Care to explain to me how did you earn the siren's trust and I did not know anything about it?"

Charlotte was paralyzed. Her mind was blank. She felt as if her captain's sight could burn her very soul. She could not think of a credible answer to Anna's question, but her mental torture was abruptly interrupted by the sound of a woman shouting her name.

"Charlotte!"

Both captain and shipmaster looked in the direction of the forest where the voice came up. They could see two human silhouettes moving in between the trees coming to the beach. Charlotte truly hoped they were not her friends coming to try and save her, but when the silhouettes were out of the forest and she could see them in detail, her fears were confirmed.

They were Marina and Ismael.

When she saw them, Anna recognized Marina and shouted "Get those two immediately!" and two of the men started running towards the human and the siren.

When they heard the captain's shout, Marina and Ismael were shocked. The man could not believe his shack was being raided right in front of his eyes, and the siren felt the same horror from the time she met the pirates who kidnapped her. The grunts of the men running towards them were enough to pull both friends out of their trance and make them run to the forest.

Charlotte did not know what to do. Seen her friends had shocked her with fear to the point of not being able to move. She had truly hoped they had escaped, but seeing them on the beach made her mind go blank. The thing that brought her back to reality was a punch in the face that sent her to the ground. Trying to recover from the punch, Charlotte could see Captain Anna standing above her, looking down at her with rage in her eyes.

"You lied to me…" Anna said keeping her eyes on the girl at her feet.

"Captain, let me explain you…" Charlotte stuttered trying to calm Anna, but she ignored her. "You betrayed me…" the captain said continuing with her speech.

The mention of betrayal drained the colour in Charlotte's face. Captain Anna could be lenient with so many things, but betrayal was not one of them. Even with fear, Charlotte was capable to slide between Anna's legs right on time to dodge a descending death blow from the captain. Charlotte could barely stand up when Anna attacked her with violent horizontal swings of her sabre.

"How could you betray me?!" Anna exclaimed without stopping her attacks. "I trusted you with my life! You knew that siren was important for me and still you helped her escape."

Charlotte kept dodging attacks, but it was becoming very difficult as they were so fast. Anna was the only person whose fighting skills that could overcome Charlotte's, and every time they had trained in the past the captain always ended winning their matches. The shipmaster could not help but remember these facts as she was trying to create a strategy, and the idea of a possible defeat worried her and distracted her, and this distraction was used by Anna to kick Charlotte on her legs, making her fall to the ground. With Charlotte down, Anna took advantage and attacked her with a punch to the face, leaving her unconscious.

Once the fight was over, Anna stood up and called her men. "Sailors! Chain up this traitor and take her to the prison." Two of the men took Charlotte and dragged her back to their ship. Anna looked askance to the forest, knowing there were other two prisoners to capture.

Many meters away from the beach, Marina and Ismael were running as fast as possible to get away from the pirates that were chasing them. Ismael was fast and agile, but Marina was not accustomed to running so much. Even with all the time she had gone for a walk to the beach, she did not have the physical condition for running fast and for long periods, and now that she had to do it all of a sudden was very tiring for her.

Worn out, Marina stopped for a moment to catch her breath. "Ismael… wait… I need to… rest…" Marina said panting. Ismael turned around and he saw how one of the men following them was about to jump over Marina. Ismael jumped toward the pirate and punched him in the face, taking him down right before he could catch the siren. Right when the pirate hit the floor, the second one appeared and tried to stab Ismael with a knife, but he leaned back to dodge the attack.

Ismael started fighting with the two pirates, dodging their attacks and trying to get them by connecting punches and kicks, but all of his efforts were in vain as they resisted every attack, and in one of those attacks one of the men took advantage and cut Ismael's right shoulder, and the other man punched Ismael in the stomach, leaving him with no air.

Ismael collapsed and Marina could only watch without doing nothing. She was so shocked by all the actions taking place that she did not notice the men going for her, and when she finally reacted, they were already holding her by the arms tightly. Marina tried to struggle but it was useless. One of her captors got tired of her struggling and hit her hard on the back of her head, leaving her unconscious. This very same man took her on his shoulder and started walking back to their ship, while his partner took care of Ismael by tying his hands before his back so he could be dragged back to the ship.