The Devil's Tide

by Tomerlin, Matt

  As he did my mother.

  A flash of steel shot between Calloway and Blackbeard. Blades clashed, and his killing blow was brought to a premature halt. And then she saw anger sweltering in his evil eyes, which were now fixated on Nathan Adams. Nathan's cutlass trembled in his lone hand under the force of Blackbeard's heavy blade.

  Blackbeard's guttural voice boomed like thunder across the beach. "You dare come between me and my prey, boy?!"

  "You'll claim no one else tonight," Nathan said through gnashed teeth, his entire body straining under Blackbeard's weight against the blade.

  "The boy tried to kill me!" Blackbeard protested.

  "She is a member of my crew."

  Blackbeard withdrew his blade, relieving Nathan's strain. "She? A girl made attempt on my life, and you would deny me vengeance?"

  Most of the crew had gathered around to watch, waiting with baited breath for Nathan's answer.

  "I'm giving you Hornigold," Nathan said. "How many vengeances do you require?"

  "I will drink my fill until I my lust be slaked."

  Nathan sighed, sheathing his sword. "Then I fear the ocean will be drained."

  Blackbeard pointed to his distant ship. "When her hull scrapes the bottom, I'll know my duty is done."

  "Your ship will find the bottom," Calloway hissed. "One way or another."

  Blackbeard frowned down at her. "I do not know what I've done to wrong you, girl, and neither will I linger to unravel the mystery. Do not think yourself special, for I have touched many, and will touch many more. Should we meet again, I will not recall your face."

  He turned and joined his men, who were maneuvering Hornigold into the boat. Hornigold stared at her hopelessly. She looked away.

  Nathan seized her hand and lifted her up. "What madness took you?!" he demanded, shaking her. "That man is not to be trifled with, and you attempt murder? You nearly undid everything!"

  "You undid everything yourself," she snarled in his face. "All for your whore! You can't go back to Nassau after trading Hornigold. None of us can!"

  "You knew the risks when you stole aboard Dillahunt's ship."

  "Dillahunt's ship!" she yelled. "Not yours!"

  "The reward is worth the risk," Nathan stubbornly replied, looking to the ships on the horizon. "For all of us."

  "Mostly for you," she said, struggling to free herself from his solid grip.

  He dragged her toward the big tent. "You'll remain with Dillahunt, under close watch. I don't know what business you have with Edward Teach, and frankly I don't care. I thought Kate Lindsay would make trouble. I didn't expect any from you."

  "You're hurting my wrist."

  "Good." They reached the tent, he shoved her through the flaps, and she fell to her knees inside. She heard him yell for both Maynards to stand watch outside. She remained on the ground, palms flat, staring at the back of her hands.

  I'm sorry, Mother. I tried. You can't say I didn't try.

  Her peripheral vision caught movement in the corner opposite Dillahunt. The woman from Blackbeard's ship was seated before the desk, a bare leg sticking through the slit in her white robe, crossed over the other. She regarded Calloway with a raised eyebrow. "Are you that Lindsay woman everyone is always talking about?"

  "No," Calloway murmured softly. "I'm nobody."

  HORNIGOLD

  "I've concocted something special for you," Edward Teach said.

  Hornigold had no idea where they were now, but Griffith's Isle had long since faded from view. The ship was surrounded by vibrant turquoise water. In the distance, off the starboard bow, there was a patch of little white sandy islands that barely broke surface level. The sun was in the middle of a cloudless sky.

  He stood upon the cutdown forecastle. The crew had gathered round to watch, crowding the decks, perched on the rails, and dangling from the ratlines. This was the highlight of their day.

  "Just get on with it," Hornigold pleaded. He was so tired. Since Dillahunt's men had apprehended him, all daily necessities had seemingly abandoned him. He hadn't been able to sleep for more than an hour without being stirred into consciousness by horrific dreams that explicitly detailed his own death. He'd hardly kept any food down, and the few times he did, he woke to find he had shit himself in his sleep, and not the solid kind.

  "I won't be hurried," Teach said. "You've made me wait this long, Benjamin. It only be fair that you indulge my theatrical side. I have an audience to please."

  "Fair?" Hornigold said, aghast. Speech sheared at his parched throat, but he supposed he could endure a little pain in his final moments, if it meant speaking his mind. "You would not exist if not for me."

  Teach nearly bristled, but he calmed himself with a few deep breaths. "The only reason I won't deny that is because you so clearly regret it."

  "With all my heart."

  "From your woeful look, I'd wager you've very little heart left. I pray my concoction wakes you from lethargy." He took Hornigold by the shoulders and pointed him toward the hatch leading to his main hold, just as the two hulking men hefted a long black crate from the dark. They set it upon the deck at the feet of Hornigold and Teach, taking care not to damage it. It didn't take long for Hornigold's weary mind to register what he was looking at.

  "I went through many of these," Teach said, scratching his beard, "making sure it be just airtight enough, but not entirely airtight, if you get my meaning. There be a science behind it. Took months to get the first one right."

  "The first one?" Hornigold said.

  Teach grinned and squeezed his shoulder, as though they were the best of friends. "You'll see for yourself soon enough."

  It was a coffin, shiny and black, with four brass handles knotted with thick rope. On the lid, level with the intended victim's head, was a brass-lined porthole, inlaid with the clearest pane of glass Hornigold had ever seen.

  "The porthole is new," Teach said, looking rather proud of himself. "Cost a fortune to get it right. The glass was always too murky, or it cracked after ten feet."

  Hornigold crumpled to his knees and retched. Only milky fluids emerged from his mouth. The entire crew boomed laughter. Teach chuckled softly. "Better here than in there," he said, gesturing at the coffin.

  Hornigold gazed up at him. Teach's dark face was indistinguishable with the sun peeking over his hat. "I beg you, Edward. Don't put me in that thing."

  Teach pondered that for a moment and then shook his head. "If you'd let me catch you sooner, I might be persuaded to offer favor. Mayhap I'd set you on one of those little sandbars with a pistol and one shot. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

  "Very much," Hornigold gasped.

  "However, you eluded me so long that my mind be set upon task."

  "Gold! I can offer you gold!"

  Teach cocked his head. "Where be this phantom gold you speak of? Your pockets look scant. Should we check your arse?"

  "Adams has it!" Hornigold cried, the words slicing at the inside of his dry throat. "He probably aims to split it with Kate Fucking Lindsay."

  "I already know what Adams has. The boy thinks me unmindful of his sudden wealth, but he will pay for his treachery in time. One revenge at a time."

  "How?" Hornigold demanded. "You're wasting time with me and your silly revenge while Adams slips away!" He needed to keep Teach talking. He had prepared himself for a quick, merciful death, but this was ridiculous.

  "My grasp extends very far, Benjamin. You of all people should know that. Griffith's fortune will be laid at my feet in but a few days."

  Hornigold seized Teach by the legs, shaking him. "You can't put me in that thing, Teach! You can't! Take off my head. Shoot me. Strand me on one of those islands without even a pistol, but don't put me in that coffin! For the love of God, man!"

  "God," Teach said, eyes sweeping over his crew. They all laughed knowingly. They had heard every plea, and they knew every retort. There was no way to win this. No one ever had. "God does not want your love. He wants your fear, and when he's had hi
s fill of that, he'll take your soul. I will deliver him both in one stroke."

  Rage clouded like a thunderstorm in Hornigold's breast. He struggled to lift from his crouch, but his weak legs refused to cooperate. "You don't know what God wants," he sneered derisively.

  Teach spread his arms wide. "I have eyes, Benjamin. I see a world of fear and death. If that world be designed, it be exactly as its creator wills it. If he be a kind god, he would strike me down before you, would he not? Yet he has delivered you into my hands."

  "I think your hands are moved by another," Hornigold said.

  Teach directed a guttural laugh at his crew, and they laughed with him. "We've heard that one before, haven't we, men?"

  "Aye!" they shouted in unison.

  Teach turned to Hornigold. "The other you speak of . . . tell me his name."

  "I will not."

  "Say it."

  Hornigold looked up at the indistinct shadow that towered over him, the sun struggling for purchase beyond that black hat. "Lucifer," he said.

  "Aye, Lucifer." Teach bent down to whisper in his ear. "Mayhap he stands before you."

  The last ounce of hope trickled down Hornigold's inner thigh. A stream of fleeting warmth collected in a little yellow puddle about his heel. His shoulders quaked as his head fell between them. He would have collapsed had Teach not placed a hand under the pit of his arm.

  "I have a parting question for you, Benjamin Hornigold," Teach said. "I will not ask twice."

  "Ask," Hornigold muttered.

  "Do you not wish to live?"

  Hornigold looked up suddenly. Some stupid part of him was still desperate for life. Why he would wish to endure more of this ridiculous world he couldn't say. Instinct trumped dignity. "Yes," he blurted at once. "Oh God, yes!"

  The crew laughed again.

  Teach's face was so close that bristles of his beard scratched against Hornigold's cheek. "Very well." He rose to his full height and gestured to his two hulking assistants. "Put him in the coffin."

  Hornigold shrieked as they lifted him off his feet. He thrashed his legs and pounded his fists on their heads, but they might as well have been statues. Two men, who Hornigold recognized as Narrow Ned and Hemett, raised the coffin's lid, which tilted on very thin silver hinges. The interior was plain and without cushions, painted in black. There was a goopy tar-like substance lining the seams. Silver shackles were chained into the base.

  The hulks dropped Hornigold inside. He continued thrashing, sticking his limbs out of the coffin so they wouldn't be able to close the lid. One hulk held him by the shoulders while the other seized both of his feet, securing the shackles around his ankles. Narrow Ned placed two chained cannonballs at his feet, fastening them to the shackles. Ned disappeared and reappeared with two more cannonballs, adding to the others. "What in God's name are you doing?!" Hornigold demanded.

  Ned's lips peeled away from rows of rotten, yellow teeth. "It's a courtesy, Benji. Makes it so you go down rightways up."

  Hemett seized his arms, forcing them into the coffin. Hornigold shrieked at him, and Hemett blinked as spittle pattered his face. Hemett released Hornigold's wrists at the last minute, and the lid snapped shut, leaving him nearly in darkness, save for tiny slits of light in the seams of the lid and the little porthole that lined up perfectly with his face. His shrieking instantly fogged up the glass. He managed to slip his right hand over his chest, raking his knuckles against the lid. He frantically beat at the glass.

  Teach's face appeared in the hole. His voice was muffled through the glass, but his words were clear enough. "The last thing you want to do, mate, is break that glass."

  Hornigold pounded at Teach's face, but the only thing he managed to break was his own skin, smearing the glass with blood.

  "Goodbye, Benjamin," mumbled Teach. He offered a final smile, indistinct through the crimson sheen. "I will miss the chase."

  And then he was gone.

  Hornigold caught glimpses of the hulking men. They had something in their hands, but he couldn't see. And then rapid thuds racketed the lid, and the thin slits of light in the seams gradually started to vanish.

  They're nailing me in. Oh God, this is actually happening. How can this be happening?

  It can't be happening. It's not happening. I'm dreaming. That's it. I'm dreaming.

  No you're not, Benjamin.

  The coffin jerked suddenly upward, and the main sail started to shift. Hornigold glimpsed men on either side, carrying him. Something thumped beneath him. He saw the sails rotating as the coffin was turned clockwise. And then he heard and felt wood grinding over wood beneath him. Suddenly his face mashed the glass and knees hit the lid as he lifted into the air. And then the coffin came to a jarring halt, sending a numbing vibration down Hornigold's spine as he was crushed against the backboard. He wiped blood from the glass with his sleeve, and he saw that the coffin was suspended by the four lines of rope, and four of Teach's men were slowly lowering him over the side of the ship.

  This is a dream. It's too ridiculous to be anything else. Wake up, wake up, wake up.

  Teach was between them, dark and blurry, but his eyes gleamed, wide and curious. He was leaning forward like a kid struggling to see a dolphin.

  You're going to drown, Benjamin.

  I'M DREAMING! IT CAN'T END LIKE THIS!

  The rest of the crew were lined up all along the starboard side of the ship, smiling and laughing and elbowing each other. He knew half of them. He had captained many of them, before Edward Teach. Some had been trusted friends. He had shared food and drinks with them, played games with them, laughed with them.

  Betrayed them.

  The coffin came to a gentle halt and immediately started to bob up and down, tilting this way and that. Water streamed over the porthole. Queen Anne's Revenge and her jovial crew slowly slid out of his view.

  And then there was nothing but blue sky through a small porthole.

  It wasn't long before the coffin began to tip downward, feet first.

  Oh God, save me. Don't let this happen. Don't let me die like this.

  He heard the cannonballs roll and clink together as they bunched at his feet. Two of the smallest toes on his right foot were crushed.

  Something cold touched his heels, and he tried to recoil, but succeeded only in rattling his shackles. He looked down and gasped hoarsely at what he saw. Water was streaming in from either side of the lid, near his shins, collecting in a pool at the base. The pool spread until it covered his feet and the cannonballs, and the coffin tilted until it was nearly vertical. His knees buckled against the interior. Soon the coffin was so deep that waves lapped at the porthole. The water inside rose to Hornigold's knees, and outside the water lifted above the porthole. The coffin was completely submerged. Hornigold planted his face against the glass and watched in horror as the surface slowly lifted above him. The sun shimmered beyond the glassy canopy. He saw colorful fish swimming in schools, their scales glistening softly in the diminished light. He saw a shark that was either very small or very large and far away.

  The water filled the coffin to his waist and then tickled his stomach. The blue world outside the porthole gradually darkened. His chest heaved rapidly, unable to supply his lungs with enough oxygen.

  Maybe I'll pass out first. Please, God, let me pass out first.

  It's not real. It's a dream.

  It's real. If you're lucky, you'll pass out first.

  It's a dream, it's a dream, it's a dream.

  His teeth were chattering uncontrollably, even though the water wasn't all that chilly. His body shook, arms knocking the slim walls. The coffin started to groan all around him. He pressed his face to the glass, looking downward. The bottom was surprisingly close. Teach had chosen a spot just deep enough, so Hornigold would not be deprived of light. He wants me to see my grave.

  Long strands of gnarled seaweed stretched upward like fingers from the sand. And then he saw strange black columns within the seaweed. He counted twelve of them. Sev
en were standing vertically, and the other five had toppled over. As he descended, details came into focus.

  It was a graveyard.

  He was looking at coffins, much like his.

  One of the coffins had broken open, and a skeleton was suspended above it, chained at the ankles and gently swaying with the seaweed. Bits of cloth and white flesh clung to it, and little fish nipped at what remained of the face.

  It wasn't long before the coffin hit the bottom, settling in the graveyard amidst its companions. Hornigold pressed his face to the porthole. The surface was no more than a hundred feet up, and the weaving orb of the sun taunted him, casting oscillating rays upon his final resting place. He saw the black keel of Queen Anne's Revenge in the distance, slowly moving off.

  Dark shapes darted between the seaweed and black columns. He saw a long thing with tentacles trailing behind a bulbous head. He saw a shark that was half the size of a man, weaving deftly through the graveyard, cold black eyes scanning for its next meal. A huge crab skittered atop of one of the coffins, claws raised as if in reverence to some great crab god above. Something struck the right side of Hornigold's coffin, and then a shadow blotted out the porthole, and he thought he glimpsed white teeth before it passed.

  The water lifted to his chest.

  He beat his fists against the lid in frustration, and he kept on beating until blood oozed from his knuckles. When the porthole cracked, he stopped pounding. A web spread rapidly before his eyes.

  Oh God, this is it.

  His scream was a terrible thing, tearing at the inside of his throat as it warbled out of him. It went on and on, until only a tiny, shrill sound emerged, as if a very small man was trapped somewhere in his stomach. A triangle of glass popped out of the porthole, striking him painfully in the cheek. Hornigold inhaled to summon a final pathetic wail, but saltwater gushed into his mouth and filled his lungs. He gasped for a breath that refused to come, his eyes bulged from their sockets, and he knew at last that he was not dreaming. He beat his hands against the slim walls, and his legs writhed, but he wasn't going anywhere. Agonizing torrents pulsed from his lungs, and his muffled gagging filled his ears as he convulsed violently. He beat his forehead against the glass until it shattered completely. His blood swirled about him in tendrils, drifting through the porthole.