Destination Paraguay
Emily Asad
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2004, 2012 Emily Asad
All Rights Reserved
3rd Edition
Cover Art © Emily Asad 2012
Cover model - Luis Tilano-Fernandez, Jr.
Discover other titles by this author at Smashwords.com:
Code Name: Whatever
Survival in Style
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Dedicated to my husband Babur,
whose passion for his small country made it live in my own dreams
Special thanks to my favorite Paraguayans:
Nadia and Zubia Asad; Nathalie and Juan José Miniello; Sven and Sabine Pfannl Petrovic and Liliana and Ivana Alvarez Lopez Moreira; Manuel Bogado and Alessandra Carcheri; Hugo Javier Torres Trigo, Ruben Alcaraz Brizuela, and Christian Magrini. Also to Romina Badgen and Luis Anibal Ferreira - maybe you’ll read this to Mia and Lia someday.
To the entire Fernandez family, though I’ll only list a few of you: Adriana Formby-Fernandez, Crisskay Suarez, “Junior” Luis Tilano, Joenna Fernandez, “Téréré Joe” and the two who started it all: Leni and Luciano. Thanks for treating me like family!
To my 6th students from Asunción Christian Academy, who read the first draft all those years ago: Bailey Carrick, Da Sol Yang Park, Esther Shi Eun Lee, Faith Eisenberg, Laura Green, Laura Steel, Christian Ko, Fermin Liu, Hector Chu Wu, Nathan Donaldson and Pedro Nasi.
Finally, this book wouldn’t exist without the Wiley-Segovias, including Kika and Juanita, but especially Jerome Wiley Segovia for all his support through the years.
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Author’s Note:
I am a storyteller, a person who takes a single fact and explodes it into colorful detail. My husband, however, is a fervent historian who believes that facts should be represented in their most accurate form, especially where history is concerned. It is with humility, therefore, that I ask my readers to realize that although this story is based on historical facts during the years 1537 to 1542, this is a work of fiction. While the characters of Cabeza de Vaca and Domingo Irala were real people, I created fictional personalities to suit my story. Also, I squeezed the timeline; events that covered several years in history only take a few months in this book. It is my desire that the reader be left with a pleasant essence rather than a dry lecture. I hope you enjoy my story!
* * * * *
Table of Contents
Chapter 5: Between Here and There
Sebastian Segovia didn’t even flinch as a large green wave whacked into the side of the tiny caravel. After several weeks on board, he knew enough to flex his knees so he wouldn’t lose his balance and cause the captain’s dinner tray to spill. It had become an automatic reflex, like ducking under ropes that swayed in the breeze or hustling out of the way when the sailors turned grumpy. Still, with the weather growing worse each minute, Sebastian wished that the captain would hurry and call for his dinner.
When he first set out from Spain in August, Sebastian’s hair had been dark brown with copper highlights. Now it was sun-bleached and totally auburn. At fifteen years old, he was a big boy. He was tall, true, but also rather chubby. When she was still alive, his mother had called it baby fat and reassured him that he would grow into his height. Everyone else back home just called him fat. And spoiled. And lazy. Nobody ever said he was brave or adventurous or clever, like his father.
Behind the closed wooden door, voices were muffled. Whatever could the officers be talking about for so long? Life on the ocean was so boring. What could possibly be more important than a hot meal?
Sebastian glanced down at the food on the tray and gulped. Meals grew more disgusting each week. When they first left Spain, bread was fresh and soft. Now, weeks later, not were the hard biscuits stale and covered with moldy blue spots, but nasty white maggots had developed, too. It had grown so bad that Sebastian preferred to eat in the dark, where he couldn’t see his food squirm.
He shuddered. I hate ships, he thought. I can’t wait until we reach Asunción.
Asunción! Just the name sent shivers down his spine. Its full name was Nuestra Señora Santa Maria de la Asunción, but Sebastian’s father never called it by its full name. Especially not while writing a letter, since paper and ink were still scarce in the New World. Sebastian grinned to think that he would not have to read any more letters from his father. To be sure, he loved to receive letters, but it was such a struggle to read those messy squiggles that were supposed to represent words. Soon he would finally join Don Segovia in the New World, and then they could talk face-to-face.
Sebastian’s father was an experienced treasure-hunter. He set out on an expedition in the winter of 1535 with the great explorer Juan de Salazar in hopes of finding a mysterious and elusive treasure. So far, nobody knew where it was, but there were so many stories that it had to be true - and Don Segovia was dedicated to sharing in the glory.
It all started with Alejo Garcia’s expedition of 1524. His army of Spanish soldiers and two thousand friendly Guarani warriors overcame floods, draught, and vicious cannibals before penetrating the Chaco, a hot, humid green hell which killed half the party. But they found what they were looking for – massive amounts of silver. Two years later, Sebastian Cabot and his team explored a dangerous estuary on the River Parana. They discovered enough gold and silver to astound the royal courts of Europe. Soon, everyone caught treasure fever, including Don Segovia.
So far, Sebastian’s father had not yet found any treasure, although he helped establish the fort of Sancti Spiritu in 1527 and most recently Asunción in 1537. Since that time, Don Segovia had sent plenty of letters describing strange animals that could talk like humans, strange warriors who used bows and arrows instead of rifles, and strange flowers that were twice the size of the ones that grew in Spain. Always he mentioned how close he was to discovering gold and silver, and in each letter he told Sebastian how much he missed him. Of course, Sebastian only received the letters when a ship arrived from the New World, which did not happen very often, so sometimes there were eight or nine letters at a time.
This last letter, dated January 16, 1542, was brief. Much of the ink had been smudged to the point of being unreadable, but two sentences were clear: “I’ve built a home for us. Come join me.” It was now nearing the end of September, and Sebastian carried it with him everywhere.
Home. It was something he craved, since his no longer existed. His uncle had never made him feel very welcome, and yet Spain was the only home he knew. Would he like Asunción? Would he recognize anything over there or would the very trees and animals be different?
These were the thoughts that gnawed at him as he stood there on a small caravel entering the giant mouth of the Río de la Plata. While he waited, he glanced down at the enormous dinner tray with its neat, cloth-covered basket of hardtack, the dry biscuit that the officers would dip into their stew. They had no choice; if they did not soak the biscuit, it was so hard it could break teeth. A small round of waxed cheese rested near the edge of the tray, keeping a bottle of wine from rolling around. The food wasn’t as heavy as the plates, utensils, and pewter mugs, all engraved with the captain’s elaborate seal. Sebastian counted them again, just to make sure he had enough for all the officers, just in case the cook down in the galley had missed something.
When that no longer amused him, he watched the other sailors performing their duties, from mopping the deck to tightening and loosening ropes to checking the wooden boards to make sure they were still sound. Although he had been aboard for several weeks, he still did not understand all the business to running a ship. Neither did it interest him. He was not fond of ships.
A man in a high, ruffled collar and puffed sleeves strode over to Sebastian and folded his hands behind his back. “The meeting is going a little long today?”
It was Alvaro Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, the most annoying man on earth. At least, he annoyed Sebastian. The man was always asking obvious questions, interrogating someone or another, and usually making people feel guilty for something. He was one of the King’s favorites, a very wealthy and powerful man, who fretted and complained and griped about the “tiny little ship” that had “all the luxuries of a stable” and “smelled like a pig sty.” Not a day passed that he did not insult the Santa Clara and her crew. Sebastian tried to avoid him whenever possible.
“Sebastian, you’re an intelligent lad who reads lots of books. What have you read lately?”
“Amadis de Gaula, sir,” he replied through clenched teeth.
“Oh. An adventure story. You would do better to read saints’ legends, boy, or at least the Sublimis Deus. Holy books for holy thoughts, to build character. None of that adventure trash you young people are so fond of nowadays. Or perhaps you’d like to read my own book, the one I wrote about the Indians in North America? I have a copy in my quarters.” At Sebastian’s lack of reply, he held out his copy of the Sublimis Deus. “Would you like to borrow this one for the remainder of the voyage? You do read Latin, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir.”
Cabeza de Vaca fairly forced the book into the boy’s outer vest pocket. “Good boy. I’m sure you’ll agree with the Pope when he says that the natives of the New World are rational beings with souls who must not be enslaved or robbed. You do believe that, don’t you, son?” Without waiting for an answer, he continued. “There are many good Spanish men who have fallen for the trap of free labor here in the New World. They think the natives are here to serve them, instead of it being the other way around. You see, it is our duty as good Christian men to teach the pagans about God. We can only do that by meeting their needs…”
Here we go again, thought Sebastian, but kept his thought to himself.
“…but there are some men who abuse their trust and use them as free labor. Especially that preposterous governor Irala. Did you know that he actually encourages his men to take pagan wives? Shameful! A proper marriage in the eyes of God is between Spaniard and Spaniard, not Spaniard and Indian. Don’t you agree, boy?”
A small spark of defiance burned in Sebastian’s eyes but he was careful to keep his jaw closed. His own father had recently taken an Indian wife. Although she spoke a pagan language, she was learning Spanish like a proper woman. Could his father be wrong to have married a native? He had converted her to Christianity before marrying her.
“…don’t know why those men love Irala the way they do. He must be weak, to give his men what they want all the time. When I’m governor of Asunción, I’ll set down some rules and then there will be order instead of chaos. Why, I remember one time when I was living among the Indians in North America…”
Sebastian suppressed a groan of agony. Cabeza de Vaca had spent ten years living with natives in North America, and it was all he talked about. Originally, he was supposed to be part of an expedition to explore Florida to chart potential treasures there, but his party had been split up and then disaster upon disaster befell them. Only four of the original two hundred men survived, Cabeza de Vaca being one of them, and when he finally returned to Spain, it was in disgrace. To save himself from losing all his titles, lands, and positions of respect, he wrote about his ten-year ordeal as if it were a spiritual blessing to have been gone for so long. He told about how he had a chance to preach the gospel to the Indians, and how he had become a faith healer. By turning his monetary failure into a spiritual success, he managed to regain respect from the royal court – so much so, in fact, that he had been granted a new position as governor of Asunción, to take the place of the present and very popular governor, Domingo Martínez de Irala.
Sebastian wondered how his father would handle the news; it seemed that all the men who followed Irala adored him and would gladly follow him to certain death if he asked them to do so. Sebastian doubted that any of the soldiers would ever love Cabeza de Vaca.
“…so that’s why they avoid eating fish. Are you listening to me, boy? Did you even hear a word I said?” Cabeza de Vaca heaved a heavy, patient sigh. “Sebastian, you’ve been a perfectly bland and polite person this entire voyage. You never rebel, you always follow regulations. You’re almost boring. What exactly is it that you wanted to do with your life?”
Sebastian swallowed the growing lump of anger in his throat but kept his face neutral. Ignoring Cabeza de Vaca would only make him stand here longer, so Sebastian answered him. “I want to live a nice, quiet life, get married, have children, and see my grandchildren.”
“So you’re not an adventurer like your father? You don’t take risks? You don’t gamble?”
Sebastian kept his answer as short as possible. “No, sir.”
“Hmm. What a remarkable young person. I, on the other hand, always strive to improve myself. I gained my estate by being shrewd with money, and I only invest in worthwhile ventures. Do you know why I came on this little ship? Aside from saving the Indians from Irala’s selfish desires?” He did not wait for a response. “There’s gold in the New World, boy. I can feel it. I’ve been lucky that it has eluded all the others, but it will not elude me. I’ve talked with the foremost explorers about the best ways to reach the land far to the west.” He winked at Sebastian. “When I get to Asunción, my men and I will take some volunteers through the Chaco to the land of wealth. I plan to triple my estate!”
Sebastian kept his gaze fixed solidly on the cabin door, waiting for the captain’s order. Cabeza de Vaca did not seem to notice; he had entered his favorite subject of conversation: himself. He could talk about himself until he starved to death.
“… and that’s the kind of life you need to aspire to, Sebastian. I say this for your own good. You need to have ambition in your life.” He patted Sebastian on the shoulder and gave him a fatherly smile.
Sebastian gave him his best fake smile. “Thank you, sir. I’ll keep that in mind.”
Cabeza de Vaca smiled as if he had bestowed a kingship upon Sebastian. “That’s right. You’ll make a fine naval officer someday, boy. Just got to get some personality. And don’t forget to return my copy of the Sublimis Deus before we dock.” He wandered off to encourage some of the other sailors, leaving Sebastian to brew in quiet anger. His arms ached even worse now, but he would never show his fatigue to that annoying man.
Several more minutes passed. Finally, Sebastian heard Captain Ramirez call him in.
“Sorry to keep you waiting ,” he said, beckoning Sebastian toward him.
All the officers looked tense. It was not his place as cabin boy to ask for details, so he set down the heavy dinner tray in front of the officers. Rolling his shoulders in small circles so nobody would see his relief, he arranged the plates and food on the table. Then he carefully poured some wine into each of the officers’ glasses. He returned the bottle to the tray and stepped back behind the captain’s seat, ready to serve again if he was needed.
“That’s all,” said Captain Ramirez. “Go eat your dinner and come back when you’re done. We’re going to be here a while longer.”
Sebastian gave a little half-bow and silently left the room, glad to be out so soon. At the same time, he was worried. Private business among the officers could mean trouble aboard ship. He decided to ask Father Gustavo, who often knew things before the captain did. But since his stomach was growling from hunger, he decided to ask after dinner.
The cook often made fun of Sebastian for being a chubby boy, but Sebastian was careful to eat no more than any of the other sailors. He never asked for more than his share of rations. It was true that his stomach rolled over the belt of his pants, but he was by no means as fat as the monks and bishops who prayed in the monasteries.
“Don’t just stand there gawking, boy,” said the cook as he slopped watery stew into Sebastian’s plate. “Take your biscuit and get out. You’re the last one to eat; I’m waiting for you so I can clean up. And only take one biscuit, now. We don’t want you sinking the ship because you’re too heavy for it.” He laughed at his own mean joke.
Sebastian frowned at cook’s cruelties. He took a biscuit from the wooden barrel and went to a corner to eat in peace. The stew tasted strongly of salt port and lime, and the biscuit was dry and crunchy and extremely hard. He longed for the day when they would reach Asunción and he could be on dry land again. Not that he was prone to seasickness, but sharing a caravel with forty men and twice as many animals made him feel claustrophobic.
After taking one bite of the heavily salted stew, he gagged and made a face. It tasted awful, even more rotten than usual. Sebastian’s homesick mood grew and couldn’t help but thinking about his mother’s beef and vegetable stew back home. The more he thought about it, the more the idea of eating cook’s stew made him sick, so he decided he could skip a meal.
“I’m going up deck,” he said.
Cook shrugged. It made no difference to him what the boy did or did not do. He was too busy eating the rest of his stew to care about one overweight boy.
Knowing that Cook would explode in anger if he threw food away, Sebastian took his plate and biscuit with him. Sailors who wanted to eat their dinner in the fading sunshine beckoned Sebastian to join them, but he did not feel like talking tonight. He made his way to the captain’s cabin and sat down outside the door. Nobody would bother him if they thought he was still on duty.
Thoughts of his mother’s stew brought on a sudden bout of homesickness. Sebastian hated being pudgy, but since he was not an active boy, he accepted his soft arms and a flabby stomach. Yet his figure was by no means unattractive. If he ever did lose his chubbiness, he had broad shoulders that could support strong arms and a muscular back. He was tall for his age, almost as tall as his father, and he shared his father’s sharp nose and clefted chin. However, he got his auburn hair and hazel eyes from his mother, and her soft pouty lips too.
He also inherited his mother’s favorite pastimes: reading, studying, drawing, playing music, and writing poetry – perfect activities for the cramped lifestyle aboard the ship. His gentle nature and intelligent answers made his a favorite of the officers although it drew criticism from the other shipmates when he was alone. They called him “my daughter” and “sweetheart” and often made him cry.
Doña Segovia had spoiled him, he knew, but he loved her for it. She had good reason: all her other sons were dead, and Sebastian was the baby of the family by ten years. The Segovias were hidalgos, descended from an ancient royal bloodline, but so poor that they had to put aside their nobility and work for their food just like commoners. All the Segovia boys except Sebastian had chosen a naval career and became captains of their own ships. But war is cruel, and all three of them were killed protecting their country. Doña Segovia had grown overly protective of her youngest son and never would have let him set foot on the Santa Clara if she had been alive, not even as a cabin boy. But she had died two years ago, just after Don Segovia left for his second trip to the New World. Since then, Sebastian lived with an uncle who mostly ignored him.
He fingered his father’s letter, tucked inside his shirt. I’ve built a home for us. Come join me.
“I can’t wait until we land,” he muttered to himself. He leaned up against the cabin door. Closing his eyes, he tried to picture what his new home would be like and what new animals and plants he would have to learn. He wanted to draw everything he could, perhaps even someday be a famous scientist like Copernicus or Andreas Vesalius. He kept his eyes shut, trying to forget that he was in the middle of an empty ocean. Slowly, the noises of the caravel faded. Men ceased talking, the cook below stopped clanging his pots, and even the captain and his men inside the cabin made no sounds. Sebastian smiled to himself behind closed lids. “Powers of imagination, never be conquered,” he whispered aloud.
His own whisper startled him. Often, to escape the lonely days, he would imagine himself elsewhere. But the reality of this imagination caused him to open his eyes. He looked around and saw that the sailors had indeed ceased talking. In fact, they were sleeping – and some of them began to snore.
Frowning, Sebastian sat up a little bit straighter. The creak of a ladder caused him to turn his head, and he saw the ugly, weather-beaten face of Rodrigo Lopes peeping up at the sleeping crew. Sebastian closed his eyes again, sensing that he was in danger.
“Hello?” called Rodrigo, timidly at first and then much louder. “Hello?”
There was no answer. Rodrigo climbed up the ladder onto the main deck. “They’re all sleeping,” he announced. “It worked!”
“Don’t just stand there talking!” hissed another sailor named Santino Ayala. “Check to see that the captain and the officers are out.”
“I put the powder in their wine myself,” said Rodrigo. “A dose in their stew, and one in their wine? Of course they’re sleeping.”
“I said go check.”
Rodrigo sniffed but did as he was told. Sebastian kept his eyes closed and pretended to be asleep while Rodrigo carefully opened the cabin door. “Yep, they’re sleeping.”
“Where’s Gato?” asked Santino, stepping over sailors as he walked the deck. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted, “Gato!”
“On my way, sir,” replied Gato, a short, scrawny man whose cat-like footsteps made no sound as he approached from behind. “Everyone below is asleep.”
Santino rubbed his hands together. “Perfect. I can’t believe how easy this was! We’re right on schedule, and about to become rich. Congratulations, gentlemen!”
“And to you, Captain,” replied Rodrigo, stressing the title. “What do you plan to do with your own ship?”
“Paint her black and pillage my heart out,” laughed Santino, pinching the end of his beard.
“Just how long is the potion supposed to last?” asked Gato.
Santino kicked the sleeping body of the sailor closest to him. “As long as we need. Maybe four or five hours. Of course, Cook will probably sleep an entire day, with the way he eats.”
Gato scanned the empty ocean uneasily, looking for a pirate ship named the Blue Sparrow. “I don’t see her anywhere.”
Santino shrugged. “She’s coming. Give it time. She’ll be here.”
“But what if she doesn’t come? What if everyone wakes up before she gets here?”
“Then we follow our emergency plan, remember? We pretend to be asleep, just like everyone else, and we blame it on rotten food.” Santino grabbed Gato by the collar and pulled him so close. “You did remember to hide the bag of sleeping powder, didn’t you?”
Gato nodded, eyes wide in fear. “I have it right here in my pocket, sir. Captain.”
Santino released his hold. “Good. Then we have nothing to worry about. Let’s go get some early rewards, shall we?” He laughed again and climbed down the ladder that led to the crew’s sleeping quarters.
Gato furrowed his eyebrows. “Early rewards?”
Rodrigo sighed and spoke as he would to a child. “We’re supposed to pay fifty percent to the Blue Sparrow, right?”
“Right…”
“So what they don’t know we have, they won’t miss, right?”
Understanding dawned in Gato’s eyes. “Oh, right!”
“Just make sure it fits in your pockets so they don’t search you. I’m gonna see what Cook’s been hiding all this time. You go check the sailors on this deck. But leave the cabin for Santino.”
Gato waited for Rodrigo to climb below before he muttered, “Why does Santino get all the good stuff?” Then he walked to the front of the Santa Clara and methodically began to check the sleeping sailors for gold pieces, necklaces, medallions, rings, and any other trinkets that could be safely hidden within his pockets.
Sebastian let out a breath he had been holding. His neck ached from being held in a bad position for so long, but he did not dare move for fear that Gato would suspect something. Then again, Gato seemed like a real idiot, so Sebastian thought he could risk moving his head just a little bit, and very slowly.
Mutiny! It was a mutiny! No, Sebastian corrected himself, it was worse. It was piracy. His own crewmates had turned pirate. And apparently they had been planning this for quite some time, probably before they set sail from Spain. Sebastian’s blood ran cold to think how helpless they were. He had heard tales of the Blue Sparrow, and none of them were comforting. Probably they would be sold into slavery – or simply murdered. He began to panic. He imagined himself being thrown overboard and forced to tread water until he died of exhaustion. Or got eaten by sharks. Or maybe they’d tie an anchor to his legs and he wouldn’t even get the chance to tread water or be eaten by sharks.
He had to force himself to calm down and think. What could he, youngest pampered son of the Segovia family, do? Should he try to rescue the crew somehow? Should he escape? Could he take the captain’s dinghy and sail away in it? Night was falling and it would be dark soon. What if someone noticed he was missing? Would they pursue him? Would they torture him to death instead of just letting him walk the plank?
Gato had forgotten to close the cabin door, and now Sebastian peered inside. The officers were indeed sleeping, their wine glasses completely emptied. Sebastian himself felt slightly drowsy, and he had only taken one bite of stew.
I bet that’s how they got the rest of the crew, he thought. I’m glad I didn’t eat the stew.
It was eerie to be on such a silent ship. Gato muttered to himself from time to time as he played pickpocket. Finally he joined the other mutineers below deck.
Sebastian saw his chance to slip into the cabin and try to rouse the captain, but he was afraid. He had never been a brave boy. Once, when the family was all together for a holiday, his oldest brother had captured some mice and set them in Sebastian’s bed. Sebastian fell asleep and woke up screaming as furry little bodies with sharp toenails scampered over his body and ran away. His parents had come to see what was wrong, of course. Doña Segovia cradled ten-year-old Sebastian to sleep as if he were a baby, all the while scolding his older brothers. Don Segovia, however, stared at Sebastian with such disproving eyes that Sebastian felt so ashamed of himself that he wet the bed, which made his father even more upset. “That boy will never amount to anything great,” he had said. “He’s as much a mouse as the ones that made him scream.”
It was the memory of his father’s keen disappointment that drove Sebastian to enter the cabin. Since that day, he had tried to earn his father’s approval, but somehow he always failed. Sebastian did not want to die tonight with his father still thinking him a coward. He must survive! And he must save his crew!
He crawled over to the captain’s chair. “Captain,” he whispered. “Captain.”
Nothing happened. Nobody moved, nobody stirred. It felt like being a room with dead men, except for the occasional snores. He dared not raise his voice above a whisper, and he dared not stay in the cabin too long lest Gato return and find him missing. He hesitated, and then did something dreadful – he pinched the captain as hard as he could.
The captain moved, but just a little bit. Sebastian pinched him again.
This time, he woke up. He swatted at his leg lazily, like a man swatting at a mosquito during naptime. “What’s that? Who’s there?”
Sebastian chose his words carefully, knowing that he must have the captain’s full attention if possible. “It’s me, sir. We’re under attack. The Blue Sparrow is about to kill us all!”
“Blue sparrow? Attack?” Captain Rodriguez turned his head so it rested more comfortably on his arm. “No birds here, boy…” He dozed back to sleep. Another pinch woke him up, this time with more alertness. He glared at his cabin boy. “Sebastian! What are you doing here?”
“Sorry, sir. You’ve been drugged. You all have. I’m the only one awake, and a pirate ship is coming to take all our cargo. What do I do?”
Captain Ramirez struggled to sit up. “Do?” He looked dazed. “Pirates?”
Sebastian shook him, hoping to clear his head of the potion. “There are three mutineers on board, sir. What do I do?”
It was no use. The captain fell back on the table, his cheek cushioned on a hard biscuit.
Sebastian crawled back to his original “sleeping” position, his heart pounding in his throat. He was scared, he was outnumbered, and he felt like crying. Stop it, he told himself. Stop acting like a little child.
A tear slid down his cheek and he quickly wiped it away. As he stared at the sleeping sailors, he saw that Father Gustavo’s body was among them. He had no time to go to his friend, because Gato was returning. He closed his eyes and feigned sleep again while Gato rechecked pockets to see if he had missed anything.
Every morning Father José greeted Sebastian with a smile and the words, “Be the man you want to be.” He repeated those words again before Sebastian fell asleep. Now, as Sebastian gazed at his friend through slitted eyes, the words began to pound in his brain. Be the man you want to be. Be the man you want to be.
The words suddenly made sense to Sebastian. Well, he thought, I can either sit here feeling sorry for myself, feeling scared, and wanting to cry… or I can do something brave to save us all. But what?
No ideas sprang to mind. All he could do was wait.
Chapter 2: The Escape
“There she is!” Gato called, his high-pitched voice shattering the unnatural quiet on board. “The Blue Sparrow!”
Rodrigo and Santino quickly joined him on the main deck. The ship was still a long distance away, but her triangular flags were distinctive.
Santino turned to his mutineers. “Remember, we load people first, then livestock and goods. Let’s be neat and quick about this, men. We want everything off so we can take the ship and leave.”
“What happens to them when they wake up?” asked Gato.
“Who cares? They’ll be in the Sparrow’s brig and we’ll be sailing toward Mexico. Nobody will know it was us. Come on, help me start bringing the animals up.”
Sebastian’s jaw dropped as he it occurred to him that they would be stealing his father’s livestock - his inheritance! When he had gone to live with his aunt and uncle, they had claimed everything, including his mother’s furniture. Sebastian had fought long to convince his uncle to let him bring the animals to the New World, and even then, Sebastian was only allowed to keep one prize bull, three of his horses, and some small livestock. His uncle kept the rest and justified it as “safekeeping” for the time when Sebastian and his father would ever return home to Spain. The thought of those mutineers stealing his inheritance made Sebastian grit his teeth in fury.
When they were gone again, Sebastian tried to wake the captain once more. He failed, except that there seemed a time when the captain was almost conscious. He grabbed Sebastian’s arm and said quite distinctly, “Take the documents to Asunción with you. They must not be lost, upon pain of your life... or the cockroaches, either…” Then he fell asleep again immediately, and would not be roused further. Sebastian could not tell if the man had been dreaming or giving an order, but the words were clear.
Sebastian knew which documents the Captain was talking about, but he did not know what they said. He had been told on his very first day as cabin boy that these documents, plus a package for Father José, were vitally needed in Asunción. They were so important that they had been assigned to a guard whose only job was to see that they remained safe. The only person allowed to touch them was the captain; not even his officers knew what the documents contained.
Sebastian pushed the sleeping guard aside and used a heavy candlestick to break open the lock. Then he removed the documents from the desk and put them in a leather pouch. After tucking the pouch beneath his white tunic, he crawled back to his sleeping position and waited to see what would happen.
It was hard to keep his eyes closed when the Blue Sparrow pulled alongside the Santa Clara. There was a lot of shouting from both parties, and then the captain and some of his crew boarded the Santa Clara. They looked around for several long minutes before their captain gave the order to begin loading.
Through his eyelashes, he could see the captain of the Blue Sparrow shaking hands with Santino. When a pirate walked toward the captain’s cabin, Sebastian closed his eyes all the way and tried to control his breathing, which was difficult because he felt like hyperventilating.
“Captain first, then officers and crew,” called Santino. “We want to make sure the important people are locked behind bars first.”
Several large, muscular pirates boarded the Santa Clara and began picking up bodies as if they were sacks of flour. The Captain and his officers were carried from their cabin and taken to the pirate ship. Gato picked up Sebastian and threw him over his shoulder, carrying a bag of gunpowder in the other hand. Sebastian offered a prayer of thanks that his carrier was Gato, because the bag of sleeping potion was in one of his pockets. If only he could steal it! But which pocket?
Sebastian was taken to the jail cell below deck. Because the captain and officers of the Santa Clara were sleeping so deeply, the jail cell door was left open and bodies were simply tossed on the damp wooden floor. Sebastian tried to not grunt as he was rudely thrown to the floor, but he could not stifle his pain. His captor did not seem to notice, however, and left quickly to go get more sleeping sailors. Sebastian mentally kicked himself for not being able to grab the sleeping powder.
It was very dark inside the Blue Sparrow. A single kerosene lamp burned near the ladder that led to the main deck. Although he was lying right on top of him, Sebastian could not see the captain. He smiled to himself; that meant that nobody else could see, either. He waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, just in case. Soon he realized that they were unguarded; apparently sleeping sailors were no threat. He sneaked out of the cell and hid behind the ladder. When the last of his crew was put into the jail cell and the door was locked, he carefully climbed up the ladder and poked his head out to the deck above.
All the pirates headed away from him toward the Santa Clara. Guessing that they would either load the livestock or trade goods next, Sebastian ran away from those cargo holds and found a safe hiding spot in the shadows. He had no plan except to hope that the pirates or mutineers would not catch him. He realized that saving his livestock was out of the question, at least for now. It made him sick with anger and helplessness. All he knew for sure was that he wanted to get to the captain’s dinghy and row away into the darkness, where he and the precious documents would be safe.
There! Nobody was watching. Most of the pirates were down below in the animal hold, and those who were above deck were making their way back to the Blue Sparrow. Sebastian waited for them to cross the plank, and then he scurried over and hid in the captain’s cabin. It was now empty, except for the bottle of wine with the sleeping potion. He picked up a half-filled glass and the bottle and held them to his nose. He could smell nothing out of the ordinary. Still holding the wine glass and bottle, he studied the room. It might be possible to reach the dinghy by climbing out the small window, clinging to protrusions on the outside of the hull, and swinging himself up into the dinghy which was suspended over the side of the caravel. It sounded like a good idea, in theory; but Sebastian hesitated because it required climbing, an activity he never liked, and he wondered if he would even fit through the window.
Just then, Gato entered. Sebastian froze, hoping that the low light would hide him from Gato’s sharp eyes. But he was seen anyway.
“Hey! What are you doing here? I thought you were asleep!” Gato’s wiry frame filled the small cabin door. There would be no escape.
Sebastian tried to be casual, but he could hear his own heartbeat. “Yeah, well, I was pretending. Santino wanted the Sparrow captain to think I was one of the crew, instead of one of you guys.”
“One of us?” Doubt covered Gato’s face.
“Of course! Who do you think delivered the wine to the captain?” He drew a shaky breath as a sudden idea occurred to him. He held up the bottle and the half-full glass. “In fact, Santino sent me back to get that bottle of wine. It’s the captain’s best, you know. I’m supposed to bring it straight to him, to celebrate his new ship.” He tried to look sheepish. “I had a sip. You won’t tell on me, will you?”
“I thought Rodrigo put sleeping powder in it?”
“Yeah, well, he forgot, so he lied to Santino so he wouldn’t get in trouble. But it’s a good thing. I mean, the stew did its job, right? And why waste a perfectly good bottle of wine?”
Gato looked very confused. “Why wasn’t I told about you being part of this?”
Sebastian shrugged, trying to appear casual. “You know how secretive Santino is.”
Gato knew full well. “Anyone else I should know about?”
“I don’t think so, but why would Santino tell me? Look, don’t tell him about me drinking the wine, okay? He gets so possessive sometimes.”
It was Gato’s turn to shrug. “I don’t know.”
Sebastian gulped but kept his voice steady. Someone else could walk in on them, and he would be in big trouble. “Well, I won’t tell on you if you want to try some. I mean, I know how thirsty you must be, carrying all that gold and gunpowder.” He took a deep breath and then held the glass to his lips. Gato licked his lips – his passion for spirits was legendary – but made no movement to take the glass from the boy.
Please don’t let me fall asleep, prayed Sebastian, and tilted the glass back. He blocked the flow of wine into his mouth by letting the liquid stay underneath his tongue. He made gulping noises with his throat, and then lowered the glass. Fortunately, he had not swallowed more than two drops of the dangerous concoction.
“Are you getting sleepy?” asked Gato after a few minutes, still undecided.
“Are you kidding? This is the best stuff I’ve ever had! I told you I already had a sip before you found me.” Sebastian raised the glass to his lips again despite the buzzing dizzy feeling he was feeling.
Greed filled Gato’s eyes and he snatched the glass from Sebastian. He downed the rest of the wine in three gulps. Smacking his lips, he said, “You’re right. This is some of the best I’ve ever had.”
Sebastian suppressed a grin. “I’d better get going. Did you need me to help you find anything in here?”
“No, I emptied it pretty well. I think. Why? Is there something else hidden?”
Sebastian tried to think of something to keep Gato from leaving the room. “Ah, well… just the captain’s private gold stash, and I’m pretty sure you already found that.” He watched Gato for signs of sleepiness, but none seemed to be coming. Did he grab the wrong bottle? How long would it be before the potion took effect?
“Private stash? No, I didn’t know about that. Where is it?”
“I’m not sure, but he always talks about it. Maybe we can find it.” He looked under the captain’s mattress, in his pillow, in his drawers… While they searched, Sebastian kept glancing at Gato. All of a sudden, the man’s speech became slurred, as if he were drunk, and he started having trouble keeping his balance. Sebastian was afraid that when he fell, he would fall with a loud thud. There had to be a way to get the man closer to the floor, just in case. “Maybe it’s down here,” he said, getting on his hands and knees.
Gato knelt in front of the lowest drawer. A minute later, he lowered himself to the floor, sound asleep.
Sebastian carefully placed the wine bottle and glass next to Gato. He had to hurry. Surely somebody would come looking for Gato soon, and then Sebastian would be trapped. He remembered the little leather bag of sleeping powder that was supposed to be in Gato’s pocket. Fishing around in the left pocket, he found nothing but rings and jewels. The right pocket held similar items, but just when Sebastian thought that all was lost, his hand touched the leather bag. He withdrew it carefully and placed it in his inner vest beside the document pouch. Then he looked in the direction of the window, his only means of escape.
He was dismayed at how tiny it seemed. He would never fit through it. His shoulders alone were too broad, not to mention his rotund belly. Still, he had to try.
He put his left arm through the window, hoisted himself up a little bit, and tried to fit his right arm through. Useless. There were no other windows, and he did not dare go again onto the deck of the Santa Clara with all the pirates going back and forth from ship to ship. He had avoided being seen so far, but he didn’t want to push his luck. Maybe he could put both arms through at the same time.
He did so, with much pain and pressure, and found that he could just barely squeeze. When his head and shoulders were out in the night air, and the rest of him was in the cabin, he found that he was stuck. He could neither withdraw nor advance; he felt as if a vice were squeezing his lungs and he wanted to pass out from lack of oxygen. He grinned stupidly as an image flashed in his head, an image of a pirate whipping his back with a cat-o’-nine-tails before having to use an axe to cut him free. Panicking, he laughed at the mental picture, and found that when he exhaled, he could move just a little bit.
That discovery was just what he needed. He took as deep a breath as he could manage and then exhaled it all with one sharp blow. It took several times of inhaling and hard exhaling before he was able to wiggle free. He dropped to the narrow ledge below the window and tried to recover his breath. His stomach would be bruised in the morning, and he was almost certain that he felt blood trickling down his back. The dinghy was suspended on the starboard side of the ship; fortunately, the Captain had insisted on board inspection today and several ropes with plank seats still hung over the sides of the ship. If he could just be strong and silent, it would be no trouble at all to swing over to the dinghies. He reached for the first plank seat.
“Santino! I found him. Here he is.”
Sebastian withdrew his hand and held as still as he could. Rodrigo entered the captain’s cabin.
“What’s he doing? Oh… of course. What an idiot.” Santino’s voice floated dangerously close to the window.
“Never could refuse spirits,” said Rodrigo. “What do you want me to do with him? Everything’s loaded and ready to go. The pirates have returned to the Sparrow.”
“Put him in irons with the rest of the crew. I was going to do that anyway, and serves him right.”
“Irons? What about our deal?”
“More for you. In case you haven’t noticed, he’s not exactly the brightest gem in the chest. We can’t risk him spilling our plans to the authorities.”
“But he knows all our plans already.”
“No, he only knows what I told him.” There was a long pause. Santino must have winked at Rodrigo, because all of a sudden, Sebastian heard an exclamation of understanding followed by a hearty laugh.
“Let’s get him over to the Sparrow, then,” Santino said, “and we can start celebrating. My own ship at last! Merchants and officers, beware!”
There were grunts, a dragging sound, and the noise of a wooden door clicking into place, and then silence. Sebastian relaxed a little. If Santino and Rodrigo were boarding the Sparrow, his risk of being caught was diminished. Of course, he could still fall into the water and drown because nobody would pull him out, and the sides of the Santa Clara were too slippery to climb, but he had to take the risk. Besides, the dinghy was on the opposite side of the Sparrow. If he managed to climb into one of them and get it into the water, his chances of escape were fairly good.
It was easier than he expected, although he lost his grip on the ropes twice and almost plunged into the icy ocean below. He climbed – a little noisily –until he reached the captain’s private dinghy, and then he removed the waterproof tarp that covered it. He folded the tarp neatly before looking at the ropes above. Although the captain had explained the process of releasing the dinghy just yesterday, Sebastian had not paid close attention. Now he strained to remember what the captain said.
Pushing at a lever caused the dinghy to dangle at an odd angle as one of the ropes released. He quickly pulled another lever and the boat splashed into the ocean. He held very still, afraid that the noise had been heard aboard the Sparrow, but their loud music and celebrations and drunken shouts were far louder than the splash of a single dinghy.
As soon as he had recovered sufficiently from his panic, Sebastian found that he was faced with a new problem. Which direction should he go? Where were they? What if he started rowing, and he headed back toward Spain? The dinghy had a survival pack of dried meats, biscuits, tools, and stale water, but the food supplies would not last more than a week. Wherever he went, he had to reach land within a few days.
He took a deep breath and tried to remember where they were. Captain Ramirez had said that they were three weeks away from Asunción. They had just passed Buen Aire, which was abandoned last year because of the repeated vicious attacks by Indians. Well, it would take much longer than three weeks if he were to row in the dinghy! Besides, he needed to find land, and find it soon.
Wait! They were no longer in the ocean; they had already entered the mouth of a very large river. Cook said so just yesterday. It was like a huge bay, so large that you couldn’t see to the other side, but it was not an ocean. Sebastian felt relieved. As long as he didn’t turn himself completely around back toward Spain, he would hit land within a day or so.
What if the Santino or Rodrigo noticed he wasn’t in the brig with the rest of the crew when they dropped off Gato? What if they noticed the missing dinghy? What if someone noticed a little black ship floating out there under the bright stars, and came after him? The Santa Clara was so much faster than his little dinghy; they would catch up to him for certain. He hoped the pirates on the Blue Sparrow weren’t expecting him, and that once they got what they came for, they would leave.
If only the stars in this hemisphere weren’t so different! Captain Ramirez had told him that once they passed the equatorial line, seasons reversed and the sky changed. It didn’t happen suddenly, of course, but Sebastian had noticed subtle changes as they traveled further south. He had left during summer in Spain, and it would be spring when he reached Asunción. Instead of celebrating Christmas in cold weather, he would celebrate in the heat of summer. As for the stars, there came a point when he noticed new constellations in the night sky, and then the new constellations slowly replaced the familiar ones. Now, as he scanned the sky, the only one he recognized was Orion. He pointed the nose of his little dinghy toward the farthest star in Orion’s belt, took a firm and confident grasp of the smooth wooden oars, and began to row toward land.
Chapter 3: Alone
Sebastian rowed all night. At first, when it was new, it was almost fun to be on an adventure. He could be caught at any moment. Perhaps sharks would try to tip the boat. Perhaps it would spring a leak and he would have to swim ashore. After an hour or so of “perhapsing,” however, he grew tired of imagining various horrors. It was quiet in the water, but by no means silent. He could hear waves rolling and breaking, some of them splashing against his dinghy and spraying him with salt water. For a few hours the waves amused him with their shiny twinkles of moonlight reflected on their surfaces, but when he noticed that his hands were blistered and bleeding, the waves lost all their fun. His back and arms began to ache with the agony of rowing. He took breaks to relieve the pain, first every hour or so, then every forty minutes or so, and then every twenty minutes. Still he could not see land.
He had not realized how weak he was, and suddenly he envied the muscular old sailors who could row for hours and never complained.
Eventually the moon disappeared and the sun began to rise. Its light dispelled some of the night horrors he had been imagining, like the sea monsters and fog spirits and star ogres that could swallow entire ships in one gulp. Of course, his father had made it very clear that such monsters did not exist, but Sebastian had read so many stories about them that his fear was still real. Now the sunlight shone on the water and Sebastian, finally, could see strips of land around him. It was true; he was surrounded on three sides. All he had to do was row to one of the shores.
He was so relieved that he started to cry, and then stopped as he realized that he was wasting his body’s water. With the shore being within sight, he treated himself to a few swallows of the stale water and a bite of dried meat and biscuit. He had been rationing them for a long journey, and now it seemed that the journey would not be so long.
Everything seemed so simple now. All he had to do was land on the northern shore and walk a hundred and sixty kilometers north to Sancti Spiritu, the first fort his father helped establish. From there, the soldiers would take him and his precious documents to Asunción. If he managed to walk twenty kilometers a day, he would be there within a week or so - he heard one of the sailors talking about the route just the other day, wishing for a sight of land.
Hope filled Sebastian, and for the first time that night, he smiled. He put all his energy into reaching the north shore.
It took much longer than he expected. He was not a strong rower and had to take frequent breaks. Not only that, but the sun was growing hotter with each passing hour. He drank one entire flask of emergency water, which left four flasks. When he realized how much he had been drinking, he restrained himself – a difficult task when his mouth was parched dry with all the effort. He didn’t even have the energy to imagine new horrors.
When at last he reached the shore after battling large waves, he was almost too exhausted to haul himself out of the boat, drag her to shore, and tie her where she would not drift away. Once he was sure that both he and the boat were safe, he fell asleep, cheek down on the muddy shores of the Río de la Plata.
* * * * *
A cold wave kissed Sebastian awake from a very deep sleep. He was surprised to find that the sun had almost set. Smells of seaweed and dead fish made him sick to his stomach. He retched. His heaving was in vain, however, because his stomach had not been full for almost an entire day. It began to growl its hunger in protest. More than hunger, though, was the power of thirst. Sebastian was extremely thirsty. There were four water flasks left in the survival pack in the dinghy. He pushed himself up from the wet shore and walked over to the place he had tied his boat.
It was gone! Sebastian looked around, swinging his arms with every wild turn. It was nowhere to be found, not even floating out on the waves. Gone!
Water dripped from his hair into his mouth, making him crazy with its tempting moisture and its promise of salt. The sailors had mentioned how the water should turn sweet when they entered the giant bay, but this was still ocean water. His eyes followed the coastline. At the thinnest edge of horizon, toward the main land, he could see that the water turned brown. That was a good thing - the mud was carried out into the ocean by a river. Find the river, find fresh water. But maybe there was a lake or a pond - or a puddle - somewhere nearer.