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The dying beast twitched, thrashed, and collapsed onto the bloodied sands. Its monstrous primeval body had been ruined as easily as a defenseless cargo ship, another victim of the pirates.

As the tropical dusk darkened into night, Nemo stroked through the calm lagoon, crossing the distance without a splash. He approached opposite from the gathered pirates and clung to the Coralie’s barnacled hull at the water line.

Using the stealth and meticulous care he had developed as a hunter on the island, Nemo climbed the side of the ship, finding footholds on the rough hull planks, pulling himself up by portholes and the hinged starboard gunports.

He hauled himself over the deck railing and crouched behind a tall coil of rope. Tense and completely alert, he knelt on a bloodied grating, over which the pirate captain must have flogged his poorly disciplined crew. A gunshot rang out, and Nemo ducked, sure that he’d been caught, ready to fight and make a full accounting of himself. But then he heard the hooting laughter of the pirates celebrating their victory.

Most of them must be up on deck, celebrating, now that the cannons had ceased firing. Without being seen, he scampered to a hatch and climbed down into the rank-smelling shadows. A satisfied and confident smile stole across Nemo’s face as he calculated what he could do, how much damage he could cause. The pirates would rue this day.

Experiencing an eerie déjà vu, he hurried down the ladder into the main hold. He knew this ship, had lived aboard her for two years. The Coralie had been his home as much as Ile Feydeau or his Granite House cave. He remembered where his bunk had been, as well as those of the first mate, the carpenters, and sailmakers. Most importantly, Nemo remembered where the gunpowder was stored, where kegs of explosive black powder were stacked in the heart of the ship, shielded from outside attack.

But the protected stores were not proof against an infiltrator like himself.

Saddened by what he found himself forced to do with Captain Grant’s fine ship, he cracked open one of the casks and spilled the sharp-smelling black grains over the decking and then ran a trail around the other barrels, so that all the kegs would ignite simultaneously.

Noseless kept a full storeroom of explosives. With a bitter grimace, Nemo realized that a pirate ship needed to use its cannons far more often than a research vessel like Captain Grant’s. The scarred captain’s additional stockpile would bring about the pirates’ doom.

He took a smaller cask of gunpowder and walked backward, leaving a long dark line all the way to the ladder. He could still hear the pirates reveling up on deck; apparently none of them felt any grief for the loss of their devoured comrades, nor did they leave the ship to investigate the dinosaur’s carcass.

Kneeling, Nemo removed his flint and steel. When he struck them against each other, the clinking sound rang out -- but the squeezeboxes and singing and laughter from three decks above were far too loud for any of the pirates to hear him. Finally, a spark flew from the dagger blade and landed in the black powder. Igniting with a fountain of gold flecks, the flame ate along the fuse line faster than a rapid walk.

Foregoing all pretense of caution or silence, Nemo scrambled up the ladder, past the second deck, then through the hatch into the open air. He burst out between two drunken pirates, who reeled backward with a cry of astonishment. Nemo took advantage of their disorientation and ducked past them, shoving with the flat of his hand. One of the pirates grabbed his arm, but he whirled like a cobra and sank his teeth into the man’s knuckles like a vicious animal. The pirate yelped and released him.

Standing at the quarterdeck, Noseless saw the young man. “Get him!” Only then did the brigand captain look over at the deck hatch, as if wondering what Nemo had been doing below, where a wisp of smoke curled up. His cadaverous face changed, and his scarred visage held a look of horror. “Down below! Get to the powder storeroom.”