Blood of a Captain

The captain stumbled to the side and caught himself on the wooden bulwark as his ship’s deck lurched sharply beneath his feet. Droplets from the wave slamming into the ship splashed into his face.

“Captain, I don’t think we’re gonna make it!” one of his men cried out.

“Captain, the sails won’t hold—”

“—man overboard! Man overboard!”

The sound of his men shouting was drowned out by the crash of the waves and the roar of thunder. Steeling his resolve, the captain pulled his hat tighter against his head and fought his way forward through the howling wind and piercing rain.

Lightning cracked down from the sky and struck the ship’s mast in a blaze.

Smoking chunks of wood hit the deck and men scrambled to avoid the debris.

It was too late to turn back now, weeks into the voyage. Untold treasure was said to be found somewhere beyond the Cursed Sea, and somehow the captain had deluded himself into believing he could be the first to make it through the untamed waters. Because his crew was different—not hunting the treasure out of the misplaced greed of government men or privateers, but rather to prove that they could.

The sirens came for them first, ripping apart his crew like it was nothing. It was a stroke of unfathomable luck that they only came in the night or the ship would have been left riding the waves only manned by ghosts. Half the crew had been asleep below deck, and the captain had noticed the song through the wall of his cabin. It was light, haunting, and the captain immediately knew it was the work of sirens. Only the thickness of the wood kept him from being immediately affected, and he scrambled to stuff wax into his ears and save as many as he could. After that, the sirens didn’t stay long. It was foolish of them to assume that sirens would be the only thing they faced, but after days of silence, they had allowed themselves to relax.

It wasn’t unusual to encounter storms when out at sea for long stretches of time, but there was usually warning of their approach. Instead, the crew woke one morning and within minutes, they were met with the raging waves and crackling lightning of a storm that refused to relent after nothing but clear skies for days. Despite its ferocity, the storm had yet to sink The Summer Gale, and the captain had a sneaking suspicion he knew why.

It’s toying with us.

It was laughable to think a storm could be anything like a living, breathing entity, but certainties were nothing but suggestions made to be defied in this place where dark magic lived.

Bang!

At the sound of a gunshot, the captain whirled around just in time to see one of his men fire a shot into the thrashing sea.

The man who fired the shot held his revolver in shaking hands as he turned to face the captain. “Did you see?” the man shouted, voice barely audible over the storm.

Hair rose on the back of the captain’s neck and he shuddered, turning out to face the sea. It was black as blasting powder, but what caught his eye was the pale glow of something round peeking out from beneath the waves, seemingly undisturbed by the churning of the water. Two white globes of light.

Like eyes.

The captain blinked and they were gone.

It was instinct that drove him to clutch tightly onto the rail and shout: “Brace for impact!”

Mere moments after the words left his lips, the ship jolted beneath his feet, harder than before. As if something hard and unforgiving had slammed into it. Anything not tied down spiralled madly across the deck of the ship, crushing anyone in the way, and any remaining ropes seemed about ready to snap and let loose whatever burden it held in place.

The captain’s gaze returned to the pitch black water just in time to see something large cut through the waves. Scales belonging to a long, serpentine body breached the surface, and the captain desperately strained to see what manner of creature it might belong to.

Legends of sea serpents plagued any port city, but the eyes in the water hadn’t seemed bestial. It was a horrifying trait to ascribe to a monster, but he could not think of a better description than bone-chilling intelligence.

Calculating.

But calculating what? The demise of the crew would be simple. Something so large should easily be able to drag a moderately sized vessel—or even a large one—down into the inky depths.

The captain did not have time to come up with an answer when the eyes surfaced once more, this time rising up, up, up to reveal a large skull with fins in place of ears and two sleek horns arcing backward. Its snout was long and revealed dozens of razor sharp teeth the size of a full-grown man. Steam hissed from its nostrils.

But what chilled the captain to the core was the creature's wings. They were translucent with contained bursts of lightning flickering through them, made for both cutting through the waves efficiently as well as flight. It was then that the captain realized what he was looking at:

Dragon.

Primordial creatures only known from ancient myths before the existence of men. They were said to have been brought to life by the brutality of the unrestrained elements, their power resting in harnessing the chaos wrought by nature. They lived and died as one with the earth.

The captain swallowed tightly, unable to stop his fists from trembling. This was what was responsible for the storm.

“You have something of mine.”

The intangible voice was deep and guttural, echoing through the captain’s head like a clap of thunder. It was nearly enough to bring him to his knees. Others of his crew collapsed around him, screaming and clutching their ears as if that would be enough to drive out the unspoken sound.

“I—I don’t know what you mean!” The captain cried desperately. No one on his crew had ever encountered such a creature before. Of that he was sure.

The dragon pulled a claw from the water, and pointed at the captain’s chest. “There.”

Reflexively, he clutched the necklace where it rested on the wet skin of his tanned chest. “My mother’s necklace?” he whispered, voice trembling and confused.

The storm flickered and, for a moment, everything stood perfectly still.

“Interesting.”

There was a dangerous edge to the creature’s voice that made the captain’s stomach drop.

And just like that, the spell was broken. Thunder boomed, and the ship rocked mercilessly beneath his feet. The captain squeezed his eyes tight, expecting the dragon to tear his chest to ribbons for having something it claimed to own. But nothing happened. Instead, he opened his eyes to see the giant creature sink beneath the surface.

“Maybe the blood of dragons will be enough to save you.”

The storm faded as quickly as it had arrived, leaving the captain and crew stunned at the rapid change. The captain’s knees gave out beneath him and he crumpled to the deck. His entire body trembled with the remnants of primal fear brought about by the dragon and his chest heaved with gasping breaths.

“Captain,” a hoarse voice asked. “What should we do?”

For what felt like an eternity, the captain could not find his voice. Was it too late to turn back? Turning his head back to face the open water behind them revealed the storm had not disappeared, only moved to block their only path back to safety. The only thing visible in the darkness swallowing the sea was two white, glowing eyes, watching them. Watching him.

The blood of dragons.

The captain feared to learn what that meant for the lives of him and his crew. Even the very notion sounded absurd, but he didn’t have time to worry about that right now. He had a crew to lead out of this mess.

There was only one option, then. The captain took a deep breath and rose to his feet. “Fix as much as you can. We keep going.”