The Pirate Queen

While sailing on the Niamb, a 37-year-old Grace goes into labor as Algerian corsairs give chase. She gives birth alone in her cabin to a son, Tibbot, while her crew fights a losing battle on deck. Hearing their struggle, Grace emerges moments after delivery, shoots the corsair captain with a blunderbuss, and turns the tide of the fight. Her men capture the enemy vessel, and Grace collapses from exhaustion. 

After Grace is brought home to Rockfleet, Finola visits. She reveals that her brother, Donal O’Flaherty, carried out the killing of Walter Bourke. Because O’Flaherty was reluctant to do so, marrying Grace was the price he demanded for doing so, clearing the way for Richard to become The MacWilliam. Finola declares that Grace now belongs to the Bourkes and must serve their agenda. When Richard returns, he finds the castle locked. While standing on the ramparts, Grace invokes the clause in their trial marriage contract and, on the 366th day, divorces him.

At 63, Grace sees a fleet of English warships under Sir Richard Bingham enter Clew Bay. Bingham’s men burn two of her ships, effectively trapping her. As part of his final conquest of the region, Bingham confronts Grace at Rockfleet, seizing her castle and lands. He arrests her son Tibbot on a false charge of treason, backed by a confession extracted under torture. He then reveals that he had already arrested Grace’s brother that same morning after framing him for the murder of one of Bingham’s own men. Donal and Tibbot will be imprisoned together at Athlone before he hangs them both, vowing to make her watch. Having already killed her son Young Eóin without trial, Bingham’s threat is credible. 

Dispossessed of her home and with her family facing execution, Grace realizes that she has only one option left. After escaping the blockade on her hidden flagship, the Niamb, she decides to sail to England and deliver a personal appeal to Queen Elizabeth I.

At 15, Grace despises her formal lessons with the strict Father MacKenna, who teaches Latin and other languages but forbids English due to political tensions with King Henry VIII. Grace, who is secretly left-handed, is forced to write with her right hand. During one lesson, Richard Bourke defies the priest and is beaten with a stick. When Grace stands up for him, Richard steps between her and MacKenna and recites his family motto in Latin to defuse the situation.

For two years, Grace and Richard have been training together in secret with knives. Richard is the only one who knows that she’s left-handed and carries a hidden dagger. After their lesson, they spar in a byre, an encounter filled with flirtatious banter that ends with Richard pinning her to the ground. He confesses his admiration for her, and after she consents, they share a passionate kiss. Their moment is interrupted by Brian, the castle steward, who discovers them and warns them with lethal seriousness never to do this again.

At 47, Grace is denied entry and hospitality at Howth Castle. Angered by the slight, she finds Lord Howth’s young grandson, Christopher St. Lawrence, playing near the pier and invites him aboard the Niamb, leaving a note for the lord to retrieve the boy from her home at Rockfleet Castle. Grace then sails to Galway to meet her husband, Richard, and the Lord Deputy of Ireland, Sir Henry Sidney. She proposes an alliance, offering her fleet and 200 fighting men for the Queen’s service in exchange for a guarantee that the Crown will not interfere with Richard’s claim as the future MacWilliam. After a demonstration of the power of Grace’s fleet, Sidney agrees to recommend the arrangement.

When Lord Howth arrives at Rockfleet, Grace doesn’t demand a monetary ransom. Instead, she extracts a promise that the gates of Howth Castle will forever remain open to travelers needing hospitality, an oath he seals by giving her a valuable family ring. As they arrive, Grace’s son Tibbot demonstrates that he has inherited her supernatural “Sense” by predicting an approaching storm, prompting Grace to advise Lord Howth to stay and accept her hospitality.

In London, a 63-year-old Grace is frustrated by her host, Thomas Butler, who has been avoiding her while she seeks an audience with Queen Elizabeth. After finding that Butler has hanged three of her men as a warning against her, Grace and her loyal companion Ultan ambush him in his private rooms. She demands her audience, arguing that Richard Bingham’s actions will incite a costly rebellion in Ireland.

Butler reluctantly arranges a meeting with the Queen’s chief advisor, William Cecil. Meanwhile, the serving girl whom Ultan had bribed to watch for Bingham confirms that Bingham has also arrived in the city. Grace meets Cecil, who, after testing her resolve, sends her a formal list of 18 questions, also known as the “Eighteen Interrogatories,” which she must answer in writing before an audience with the Queen will be considered. Recognizing that the questions are a political minefield designed to trap her, Grace retreats to her ship and carefully crafts her answers in Latin, writing with her left hand for clarity, using the opportunity to detail Bingham’s treachery and make her case.