Fitzjames tossed the rock onto his bunk and followed the quartermaster out the door. They stepped down a dark and musty passageway, illuminated by a few small candle lanterns. Passing the main hatchway, the quartermaster disappeared as Fitzjames continued forward. He soon stopped at the base of a tall pile of debris that blocked his path. A mass of barrels, crates, and casks had been strategically wedged into the passageway, piled to the overhead deck and creating a temporary barricade to the forward compartments. Somewhere on the opposite side of the mound, the sound of shifting crates and human grunts resonated through the mass.

“They’re at it again, sir,” spoke a sleepy-eyed marine who stood watch over the pile with a Brown Bess musket. Barely nineteen, the guard had a dirty growth of beard that sprouted off his jaw like a patch of briar.

“We’ll be leaving the ship to them soon enough,” Fitzjames replied in a tired voice.

Behind them a wooden ladder creaked as three men climbed up the main hatchway from the orlop deck below. A cold blast of frigid air surged through the passageway until one of the men tugged a canvas hatch cover in place, sealing it shut. A gaunt man in a heavy wool officer’s jacket emerged from the shadows and addressed Fitzjames.

“Sir, the arms locker is still secure,” Lieutenant Fairholme reported, a frozen cloud of vapor rising from his mouth as he spoke. “Quartermaster McDonald is assembling the men in the officers’ Great Cabin.” Holding up a small percussion-cap pistol, he added, “We retrieved three weapons for ourselves.”

Fitzjames nodded as he surveyed the other two men, haggard-looking Royal Marines who each clutched a musket.

“Thank you, Lieutenant. There shall be no firing except by direct order,” the commander said quietly.

A shrill cry erupted from behind the barrier, followed by a loud clanging of pots and pans. The sounds were becoming more manic, Fitzjames thought. Whatever abominations were taking place on the other side of the barricade, he could only imagine.

“They’re turning increasingly violent,” the lieutenant said in a hushed tone.

Fitzjames nodded grimly. Subduing a crew gone mad was a prospect he could never have imagined when he first signed on for the Arctic Discovery Service. A bright and affable man, he had quickly risen through the ranks of the Royal Navy, attaining command of a sloop of war by age thirty. Now thirty-six and in a fight for survival, the officer once referred to as “the best-looking man in the Navy” faced his toughest ordeal.