To say it was a dark and stormy night, simply did not cut it. It was the day after the summer solstice, the darkest and stormiest night of the year. The gods were angry. The gods were vengeful. The gods were at war in the skies. Clouds, black as coal, blocked out the moons and stars. Hail fell upon the crew like shrapnel. Lightning cut the air and electrified the ocean. Mighty gales tore the sails from the masts. They were sailing through Hell.
Waves tossed The Implication around like a toy and Elle Blackwood vomited over the side of a gunwale. If I don’t die, I think I’ll kill myself, she thought, hugging the barrier for support. Her thin tunic was soaked through and holy where hail punctured her skin. She closed her eyes to brace for death. It made no difference; the world was black either way. “STEP TO LADS!”, roared the captain. “Tighten the sails. ‘Else we’re kraken bait!” Black figures charged up and down the deck like bulls. Elle looked up to the helm. There the demon stood. Randal Dundragon. Though at first, she only saw a silhouette. A silhouette wearing horns like a crown. A silhouette with lightning raining down around his head and a black cloak flapping around him like wings. With one hand he spun the wheel. With the other he held a ball of fire that illuminated his red face.
“Batten down the hatches! She’s sending us a big one!” What down the what?! Who’s sending what?! This was the furthest out to sea Elle had been and the only time by herself. She was scared. She was alone. She was drenched. “BRACE!” It was dark but she saw it coming. An enormous black wave. Made of jet and frothing angrily, it loomed like a monolith. Elle found herself in one of those moments. One of those moments that seem to last forever. An instant filled with deep unending fear and hopelessness. A thousand memories flashed like the lightning above her head. She saw Blackwood manor and its roaring fires. She saw a deckhand fall from the crow’s nest. She saw Nick carrying the boar by Crawford river. She saw rain and hail. She saw her first kiss under Trollbridge. She saw an explosion, belched from the front of the ship. A great maelstrom of fire and smoke that shook the boat as the wave was turned to steam. Its ghost floated to the clouds in coils and warmth washed over the deck. She saw Nick’s sapphire-blue eyes closing for the last time, before she fainted.
“‘Ey get up!” She could not tell if her eyes were shut or if it was completely dark again. “Up! Storm’s not passed yet.” She found herself in the shadow of the captain. His figure was black and amorphous; she couldn’t quite tell where his limbs ended, and his clothes began. All she could discern were slitted, yellow eyes staring into hers and hair that blew in the wind as if underwater. “Up.” He kicked her. “The storm is coming. I will not tell you again.” He disappeared in a blur and took her vigour with him.
By the look of the sky, it was dawning, and the storm had passed; so, Elle was, once again, lost and confused. My head! The world was spinning, and her guts were twisted. While she pulled herself to, she noticed the sun was rising. An orange glow spread across the dark sky like a pool of blood leaking from a wound. It was rising fast. “STEADY LADS!” Dundragon bellowed, “Bring her about!” The Implication turned on its axis, the black waters beneath the hulls frothing madly. “Steady”, he mouthed as if speaking to the air or his ship. The sun wasn’t rising it was falling. No, I’m asleep still. No. Elle put her head in her hands and buried her eyeballs in her palms. Or I’m dead and this is hell. There’s certainly enough demons. Does that make Hell real?
From behind her hands, Elle saw the world go dark again. The sun had fallen into the ocean. This is too much. A burly hand grabbed her shoulder and forced her into a rush of crew mates. “Powder monkey get to yer station.” He pushed and pulled her so hard her feet struggled to find the floor. “Your mother’s not here, lad. No use crying to her”. If this is hell, perhaps my mother is here… somewhere. “Maybe we’ll scuttle ‘em before we feed the fish.” Scuttle? Who? Elle looked out starboard. They were in a void. She saw neither sign of enemy ship nor her mother. “Get that lad below deck before the sea has him!” Voices were coming from all directions in a whirlwind of salty, fishy breath. Another arm grabbed Elle from behind, she summoned an ounce of bravery “Get o-“She was silenced by a sharp slap. “Down there. Or you’ll get more.”
It was hazy below deck, lanterns swung from the ceiling like flaming conkers. Why am I thinking about conkers at a time like this? When did I last play conkers? Conkers seemed so far away. In the middle of a cold, dark, wet hell, Elle could hardly imagine collecting chestnuts in the meadows. The end of summer was a long time ago. Conkers were so far away. Home was so far away.
Along each wall oarsmen groaned, a narrow aisle between was carpeted with vomit and the ceiling quaked under a barrage of heavy footfalls. “Give them Hellfire!” A muffled voice erupted into the air outside. Then the floor shook as hard as the ceiling. Like clockwork, shadows threw down oars, thrust open portholes and stuck out wooden tubes. Silence hung from the rafters. A drumbeat snaked its way into the gun deck, rising, half-muffled, through the silence. Is that a drum or is that my heart?
“You!” Elle jumped and stared at the floor. “Stop just standing there. Look alive cause, like as not, you’re not going to be for much longer.” Elle did not catch the mans face but he was shirtless and just as wide as he was tall. “Take yer fingers out yer arse and get them round this!” He thrust a stick into her arms, around three feet long, hooked with a wick at the end. “Want you with Pissfingers. Down Portside. C’mon snap to.” Pissfingers? Wonder if that’s his nickname or his real name. Guess I’ll never know.
She walked by a few men that could have names like One-eye, Pussface and Brownnose. Imaginative names. All looked as if they had spent an eternity being eaten, shat out, eaten again and shat back out by horrific heathen gods. I suppose the sea and the captain are the heathen gods that treat men like steel hammered into the shape of tools and weapons. She tensed her shoulders and dipped her head as if the ship was ran by corpses.
There could only have been one Pissfingers. Right at the end of the gun deck, orange lantern light fell upon a shirt half full of bones. An old man with hair dyed by soot and burned hands the colour of sulphur that shook like gnarled tree branches in winter. Elle swallowed. The man turned his head, slow and shaking, disoriented. He looked at Elle with glassy eyes that did not see her. His mouth drooped like a bridge, his cheeks were grey and prickly. “Hello?” She bent down to meet his milky eyes. The man mumbled inaudibly. “Excuse me?” She nudged closer. Up close she could see how his blotchy skin drooped over his cheekbones. “Are you her?” Whispered the man. Shit! No! Have I not cut my hair short enough? Are my clothes too tight? How many other people know? Elle tightened her jaw and looked around her shoulders. “Er- No- I-“she deepened her voice.
“You’re here for me aren’t you. You’re the visitor.” That’s not fear. Age makes him shake. “It’s about time.” His tone was that of embrace, like greeting an old friend. A sad smile bloomed on his cracked lips and, softly, he nodded. “I expected you to come for me a long time ago.”
“What do you mean? Who do you think I am?” Somewhere a firework screamed and exploded, crackling. Elle tilted her head and tightened her fingers around the linstock. “I may not have my eyes anymore, but I can still see.” What does he think he can see? Elle had the uncomfortable feeling she aught to be somewhere else. Or someone else. “Here.” The old man fumbled around at his feet, hands shaking. “Hmm…” he padded his baggy shirt. “Where- ah… here.” He presented a pipe; not an impressive or ornate pipe; it was stubby and rough. Elle reached for it with a hesitant hand. It was light, clogged with tobacco and looked as if the old man had whittled it himself.
More firework screeches rent the air, mingling with horn howls and drumbeats, but Elle did not hear. Red light flashed through the porthole; a shadow of a skull lingered on the man’s face.
“Here, please.” He held out a roll of fabric. His hands were gloved in blisters and fresh burns. “Put it on. Put it on.” He smiled, nodding. Elle rolled out the material. It was a pointed hat; the stitching was frayed, and the fabric was worn. She dipped her head and slid it on. The brim was wider than she expected, it shaded her face well. She returned the man an unseen smile. “My name was Amos, these lads call me Pissfingers, I’m past caring, no one else cares; I got no family. I was married to the sun and the moons; the stars and the sky; the earth and the sea. He slouched, head bobbing uncontrollably. “That’s all I got, even the gods don’t listen to me anymore. S’pose they’re as dead as me now.” He’s a wizard! Or was, at least. “If you’re not her, I hope she arrives soon.” His voice cracked. “I do not know how long I can stay.” Elle bit her tongue, her lip trembled like his hands. She was deaf to the footfalls that shook the floor and ceiling. She was deaf to the ring of steel on steel. And she was deaf to the fireworks that screeched their way through the sky.
An explosion of wood and debris threw her backwards. Without knowing it, she screamed. She found her feet and her eyes fell upon the corpse of the wizard on the end of a six-foot iron arrow. All of a sudden, she was blinking liquid grief out of her eyes.
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