Stowaway

1675.

Midnight had barely settled over the manor when the watchman’s call faded into silence. For a brief moment, the night was calm. Still. Untouched.

Then, the world erupted.

Cannonballs punched through stone walls as though they were paper; gunshots ricocheted through vaulted corridors; steel clashed so violently the very air trembled. The admiral’s household—positioned at the fort’s center—had no real chance of withstanding such an assault.

By the time the first pale streak of dawn bled across the horizon, illuminating the sea that had carried the invaders to their shores, the pirates had already broken past most of the fortress defenses. They came ravenous—for plunder, and for the Spanish Crown’s price upon the family’s heads. Treason. Conspiracy. Gold enough to make monsters of ordinary men.

The admiral’s progeny, in particular, were promised high ransoms...and darker fates. The pirates did not hesitate to aid the Crown—a rare alignment of resolves, but who could say no to such a sweet reward?

But the admiral’s only surviving child, Julien, had something the pirates did not expect.

A servant who’d worked in his household for years.

Helena.

She was a low-born servant taken into the household when she was just a girl. A servant who, despite her origins, had found a home—warmth, kindness, and a place in a family that treated her as more than what she was born to be. She owed them everything. And Helena had already chosen her path.

Loyal, stubborn, terrified Helena—who had grown up beside Julien like a sister beside a brother—would protect him and the family line of the people who had given her everything.

Another cannon blast shook the lower levels, dust drifting from the rafters above. The lower floors had been safer—until the screams bleeding down from above proved safety an illusion.

Helena spun toward the west corridor—looking, searching for his quarters—and nearly collided with him.

Julien.

Sixteen. Pale. Terrified and confused. His embroidered doublet half-fastened, his hands trembling as he fumbled with a ceremonial sword far too heavy for him.

“Helena—” he breathed, relief cracking into fear.

She didn’t waste time.

“Move,” Helena ordered, grabbing him by the arm with both hands. “Move. We don’t have time.”

“My father—he said he’d—” he insisted, clinging to the belief like a lifeline.

Helena’s eyes hardened.

“Your father is not here,” she snapped, hand tightening on his arm. “And they need someone from your family alive. That means they’ll take you.”

Julien froze.

His throat bobbed. His eyes widened in that helpless, boyish way that made something in Helena’s chest lurch painfully.

The metal doors above rattled again, something massive slamming against them.

Helena dragged him into the servant quarters, kicked the door shut, and dropped the bolt. She shoved him toward a trunk, hands shaking as she tore it open.

Without warning, she seized the front of his embroidered coat and tore it off his shoulders.

“H-Helena!” Julien gasped, stumbling.

“Quiet.” Her voice was steel. “Take it off.”

She stripped him down to his undershirt with frantic, practiced hands. He tried to speak, to understand, but she didn’t let him.

Buttons popped. Fabric tore.

Her fingers trembled, but her resolve didn't.

“What are you—”

“Put these on.” She thrust a coarse servant’s shirt and trousers into his arms. “Now.”

He stared at her—at the tremor in her jaw, the panic in her eyes—and knew better than to argue.

“Helena,” he whispered, voice cracking, “I don’t understand. My father—”

“You don’t know that!” Helena cut in as he tried to repeat his earlier statement, exasperation spilling through her fear. “We have to do something.”

“And what would that be?” he bit back, finding his voice. “It’s not like we can just walk out the front door.” His tone was sharp—not cruel, but frightened—and it reminded Helena, painfully, of how they’d always spoken to each other. Like siblings arguing in the dark.

Helena placed her hands on his shoulders, grounding them both.

“I can’t,” Helena said quietly. “But you can.”

Julien’s breath hitched. She pressed on.

“Dress up as a servant. I’ll wear your clothes. I’ll… I’ll let them take me. I’ll deceive them long enough for you to get away.”Her voice steadied against its own tremor. “They won’t know I’m a woman. Not immediately.”

Julien blinked, horrified.

Realizing.

“You can’t… Helena, you can’t do that.”

She didn’t answer.

“This is your only chance, Julien. If things turn out well—if you survive—you can come back. They’ll recognize you. But for now, you’re safer pretending to be a servant.”

Something in Julien finally cracked. The false certainty. The bravado.

His shoulders shook, and his eyes glossed with tears he tried desperately to blink away.

“But you…” The rest of the sentence lodged in his throat, heavy and unsaid.

Helena’s expression faltered, her own determination cracking at the edges.

She didn’t answer. She kicked aside the trunk lid, grabbed the clothing he’d worn—the dark breeches, the loose shirt, the embroidered coat—and began pulling them onto her own body.

She hauled on his coat, the sleeves too long, the shoulders too broad. She tied her hair back, smearing soot over her cheeks. Then she grabbed a wool cap from the floor and jammed it over her head.

In the dim light, with ash streaking her face and the boy’s clothes hanging sharply on her frame, she could pass for Julien in terror and chaos.

Not perfectly.

But long enough.

Julien seized her wrist, hard.

“Don’t,” he begged. “Please. Don’t do this for me.”

Helena cupped the side of his face, her thumb brushing a tear he didn’t want her to see.

“I’ll survive as long as I need to. Long enough for them to believe I’m you. Long enough to lead them away.”

“But they’ll—”

Julien couldn’t finish the thought. But the end of his statement hung ominous in the air.

Kill you.

She swallowed, burying every instinct that screamed to flee with him.

“Listen,” Helena said, low and fierce. “They don’t know what you look like. Your family won’t betray us. I would have died on the streets without them. Every day here has been borrowed time. Let me choose how it ends.”

He flinched at that.

“Helena—”

“If I stay by your side, we’ll both die,” she whispered. “Or worse.”

A cannon blast shook the floor. Julien stumbled into her.

Her voice softened.

“Think of it like when we were kids,” she murmured. “Another game of hide-and-seek. Only this time, you’re the one who has to win.”

She blinked fast, keeping her eyes sharp.

“I was born with nothing. If I die giving you something… that’s more than most like me ever get.”

Another crash above them. Boots. Shouts. Metal striking metal.

Julien looked toward the noise, but Helena didn’t move.

“You’re my sister,” His voice cracked. “Not by birth, but—Helena, I can’t leave you.”

“You can,” she whispered. “Because you must.” She kissed his forehead once—soft, trembling. “Besides,” she added with a fragile smile, “if I don’t make it, I’ll just come back and haunt you.”

Another crash. Closer.

Helena turned away, jaw set, eyes burning with fear and fire both.

“Quickly,” she rasped. “We don’t have time.”

“Helena—”

“Shut up,” Helena snapped—too sharp, but necessary. If she let Julien speak another word, she would crumble.

She couldn’t let him pull her into emotional depths of despair. Not now. Not when the success of the plan depended on the ability to outmaneuver the dire situation. The cruelty of the delivery was a mask to keep Helena from breaking, from folding.

She helped him step into the coarse servant’s clothes. They hung differently on his body, ill-fitted, plain, anonymous.

Perfect.

The pounding above them grew louder. Closer. Someone was barking orders in a rough voice that echoed down the stairwell.

“Move.” She grabbed his wrist, squeezing it hard enough to leave a mark.

They ran through corridor after corridor until the shattered doors opened into the courtyard.

Smoke clawed at her eyes. The air reeked of salt, fire, and blood.

The woods were close. Dark. Safe.

They sprinted toward them.

Past the flames. Past the bodies. Past—

Julien slowed.

Terror rooted him in place.

“I don’t want—” He shook his head, planting himself in place.

Then Helena slapped him. Hard.

A pause as the crack of its force hung between them. His eyes widened—not hurt, but awake, finally seeing the urgency Helena needed him to feel.

“You don’t get to want,” Helena said, fierce, unyielding. “Not right now.” Then, darker, a low growl: “Do not let my choice be for nothing.”

He nodded, stunned, conflicted, confused. He was just a boy, standing before the older, wiser sister he’d always admired—always loved a little too much. And now, she stood once again between him and danger and he…

“Go,” she whispered fiercely. “Julien. Run. To the woods.”

Boots thundered.

“Over there!” a pirate bellowed from the ramparts.

Helena’s heart lurched.

Too late.

Julien crashed into her suddenly, hugging her with a desperate, crushing force. Helena froze, letting herself feel the warmth of him—just once. Just long enough to regret it.

“Promise me you’ll try to live,” he whispered.

She forced a breath.

“I’ll try.”

A prayer.

A hope.

A goodbye.

Then she shoved him toward the trees with all the strength left in her.

“Run!”

Julien stumbled forward—

—but the courtyard’s side door behind them exploded.

Wood shattered outward in a violent crack, debris spraying across the stones like shrapnel. The blast threw Helena off balance, and Julien stumbled back toward her on instinct.

Smoke billowed from the ruined doorway.

And pirates poured through.

A brute with a scar down his cheek, pistol raised.

Another, sword drawn.

Then more—soot-streaked shapes flooding into the courtyard like a tide of fire and steel.

Julien choked on a sound.

Helena moved before thought could catch her.

She shoved him behind her just as the scarred brute leveled his pistol.

“There he is!” he roared. “The admiral’s brat!”

Helena stepped into the line of fire, ash-stained cap pulled low, Julien’s too-large coat hanging from her frame.

Her breath hitched.

Her disguise snapped into place.

And in that heartbeat—

between guns and rising smoke—

her plan solidified into fate.