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September 27th, 2009 | Related Articles

A short story by Harper Sylvan

The taste of brine, sand, and worse covered his tongue. Sunlight stung his eyes even through his tightly closed lids and Carver finally attempted to raise his head. The pounding surf crashed in time with the throb of his head as he forced his eyes open. Carver peered about blearily.

Where was his ship? Where was HE? He patted himself down with practiced caution. All four limbs and wee little toes were present. Carver gave a sigh of relief and a muttered curse as well, his flintlock and sabre were gone. Digging past the cuff of his boot, he drew out a slender blade and slipped it into his belt… and easy reach. He pulled his large-brimmed hat from the sand, slapping it against his leg a few times before setting it at a slight angle atop his head.

Peering about, Carver saw neither crewman or wreckage strewn across the pale pristine sand and cursed again. He strained to recall the night before, but could not even recall the week before.

Somewhere in the distance a bell chimed. It’s silvery peal struck a strangely familiar note and memory flooded back.

The deck heaved under Carver’s feet as the Murk Thresher broke through a swell, sending white spray over the gunwales. Ahead, the billowy grey and green sails of the fat merchantman promised full purses for his eager crew. The Thresher was leaning hard, her sails full as she steadily overtook the trader. “Shorten sail and ready the port guns and bow-chasers!” Carver shouted, and at his word, dozens of bare-footed crewmen darted about the deck in well-drilled chaos.

Captain Carver climbed the small ladder and stepped onto the deck of the forecastle. Eight sailors were currently loading the two forward mounted cannons. Carver watched the merchantman slightly alter course in an attempt to desperately catch enough wind to keep them ahead of the Thresher. They had to have seen his colors and know they had no chance of outrunning him. Carver’s reputation as a Privateer was also not a bloodthirsty one, he wanted coin and leisure not body-counts. Why doesn’t he heave to? Carver thought. What is he carrying that is worth risking his crew for?

Steadily the Thresher closed the distance and still the trader did not strike it’s colors or cut sail. Numerous figures could be seen on the distant deck mulling about. Tugging on his neatly trimmed beard thoughtfully, Captain Carver nodded to the gunner watching him intently. “Put one close enough to mark that pretty paint, Kip.”

“Aye, sir!” the gunner answered as his team heaved up the bronze barrel to set the range. A moment later Kip pulled a length of burning slow-match from his belt pouch and touched it to the priming pan. The bow-chaser roared like an enraged dragon, launching a nine pound iron ball that splashed into the water only a few yards before the fleeing trader.

Long moments passed but the trader still did not slow or show signs of surrender.

“I don’t think we could have made the point any clearer, men.” Carver said simply. “Gun crews ready the first broadside!”

With a deafening roar, the Murk Thresher unleashed her broadside. Choking powder-smoke filled the air as eight cannon and three swivel-mounted guns known as wolves fired almost simultaneously. The stern of the merchantman exploded in a deadly shower of splinters. Bodies flew about like crude, broken dolls and the whole of the large trader shuddered from the impact.

“Reload!” Carver’s voice echoed like a clarion over the silence that followed their first broadside. While across the short span of water separating the two vessels, the trader’s crew silently and inexplicably regained their feet. The merchantman at last altered course, turning impossibly against the wind, it now bore down upon the Murk Thresher.

“Fire!” Carver shouted, unable to keep the note of dread from his voice as the Thresher sent forth a second deadly volley of round shot and grape into the teeth of the oncoming trader.

Then the two ships collided.

Carver held fast to the fore braces as the bone-jarring impact tossed his crew across the deck.  The prow of the merchantman loomed above him, imbedded into the port side of the doomed Thresher. The trader no longer resembled the fine prize it had seemed from afar. Now, within reach, it appeared a skuttled wreck, as if it had been lying on the ocean bottom for years. “Prepare to repel boarders!” he cried over the rising tide of horror he could see in the men around him.

The crew of the trader swarmed down from their nightmarish ship. Walking corpses from the trackless depths, bloated bodies trailing brine behind them as they overwhelmed the panicked freebooters.

Carver stared with rising dread clutching at his heart and dove over the gunwale and into the deep.

A silvery chime sounded from behind him, and a voice almost like a whisper in his ear spoke, “You and yours are mine. There is no escape.”

Captain Carver swam on into the night, terror lending him strength.

The silvery chime echoed again across the shore and Carver dropped to his knees as the trader drifted into view. His own crew began stumbling out of the surf, their lifeless eyes fixed upon him. They had come to collect him.

“You and yours are mine.” the voice echoed again.