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earshot. Robert walked over to him, his eyes darting to the four points of the
Retribution
as he did, then beyond to the Portuguese coast on the eastern horizon. He recognized the long sweep of the shoreline. Lisbon was but a day away.
    ‘Captain Morgan!’ a voice called from the
Cygnet
. All on deck sought out the figure of the
Cygnet
’s captain on the quarterdeck opposite.
    ‘Captain Bell,’ Morgan replied, raising his hand.
    The
Cygnet
closed to within fifty yards.
    ‘Steady the helm,’ Robert shouted instinctively, the close quarter sailing increasing his vigilance.
    ‘New orders from the
Elizabeth Bonaventure
,’ Bell called, his hand cupped over his mouth against the wind. ‘The
Golden Lion
has captured a small craft and seized papers that speak of a large supply fleet in the Bay of Cadiz.’
    Many of the words were whipped away by the wind but the implication of what remained was clear. Morgan’s brow creased. Surely Drake was not going to change the priority of the mission.
    ‘You are to come about south-west and bear away from the coast,’ Bell continued, ‘and strip your masts of any flags that identify you as English.’
    ‘But what of Lisbon? What of our original orders?’ Morgan protested, angry that as a leading officer he had not been consulted.
    ‘They are for naught,’ Bell shouted, ‘Drake commands and we sail for Cadiz!’

CHAPTER 3
     
    29th April 1587. Cadiz, Spain.
     
    D on Pedro de Acuña paced the aft deck of the
Asuncion
, the command galley of a flotilla of nine anchored in the lee of Cadiz. He walked with his arms folded behind his back and his foot traced a line in the timbers of the deck. He was a short man, with a solid frame and his shoulders swayed in time with the gentle roll of the deck beneath him. De Acuña glanced up at the city as he made his turn at the portside bulwark, his mind drifting back to the meal in the governor’s house the evening before and the company thereafter. A smile crept onto his face as he pictured the youthful beauty who had shared his bed.
    The wind ebbed for a moment and de Acuña’s nose wrinkled at the stench from the galley slaves. There were 144 of them chained to their oars on the open main deck. De Acuña looked upon them with disgust. They sat languidly at their oars, their heads bowed in silence with only the occasional rasping cough emanating from their ranks. They were condemned men, sentenced to serve at the oars of the
Asuncion
at the King’s pleasure and de Acuña thought again of how welcome the governor’s house would be after the confines of the galley.
    The day on board his command ship had been like any other over the previous month; long and tedious, but thankfully it was coming to an end. The sun was already dropping at pace towards the western horizon behind El Puerto de Santa Maria on the far side of the harbour mouth. He looked to the supply fleet anchored a mile further up the harbour, their individual hulls and masts indistinguishable save for the 1,000 ton Genoese merchantman and one of a pair of galleons he knew to be amongst them, its high castles silhouetted against the evening sky.
    De Acuña’s gaze remained fixed on the distant galleon, a magnificent evolving breed of ship so different to the aged galleys of his command. At Lepanto the galley had reigned supreme but now they were rapidly becoming obsolete in an age where warships were not only measured by the number of men and cannon they could carry, but also how far they could project that power. The sturdy ocean-going galleons had pushed the borders of the Spanish Empire to the four corners of the globe but its success had left ships such as the
Asuncion
languishing in home waters, relegated to guarding merchants and victuallers, a loathsome task for the once noble galley and its
comandante
.
    ‘Ships approaching bearing north-west,’ a lookout called and de Acuña spun around to look beyond the harbour mouth and the tip of the headland of Cadiz. A