Nest Pitch DM 2: CAPTAIN

Category/Genre: Adult/Historical Fantasy

Word Count: 108,000

Pitch: Escaping a life planned out for him, the man who would be Hook stows away on a pirate ship and finds forbidden love w/a faery queen.

Egg:  If I were an Easter egg, I’d be something exotic, like when Uncle Argo brought home South American chocolate laced with cinnamon. 

Excerpt:

James Lamport was going to sea. 

As he strode toward the London Docks, he couldn’t help but smile.  He was going to see it.  The world.  All of it. 

All he had to do was ask his Uncle Argo.  The sailor’s ship had just come in, and James would make certain he was on it the next time it went out.  

He drew more than a few second glances as he walked onto the docks, his pressed waistcoat a stark contrast to the working men’s attire around him, but he paid them no mind.  The bustling stevedores, the barrels of pickled herring from the North Sea, the merchants selling tobacco and pearls and shrunken heads – this was what excited him.  He inhaled the tangy scent of filth and fish and his heart quickened. 

“Oi lad – catch!”  

James was struck in the face with a burlap sack that smelled like something dragged up from the bottom of the river.  

The booming voice spoke again: “Come to carry me laundry?” 

He looked up and saw his portly uncle standing a few feet off with his pipe in his mouth, a second pack thrown over his shoulder.  

“Uncle Argo!”  They both dropped their bags and embraced one another.  James felt his uncle’s pipe nick his ear, and his thick beard chaff against his cheek.  His uncle smelled of brine and seaweed covered up by exotic perfumes from the Tropics.  “It’s so good to see you!” 

“Aye, and you too, boy!  Been a long time.  How’d yeh know we’d be here?” 

The twenty-year-old grinned.  “Paid a delivery boy to fetch me when the Saint Angela was coming up the Thames.” 

“Clever lad.”

“Well, Father’s money ought to be used for something.”