“Don't hold your breath.”
Purdue was glad to have Sam's support. He may have had to twist his arm a little, and even now he was only going along with him out of annoyance, but at least he was going to be part of it. Purdue wouldn't just have to rely on strangers and pirates this time. There was someone he really trusted by his side. That could make all the difference.
“We might have to go down there.”
It had been a long time since the Wharf Man felt like he had been ripped off. Most people didn't dare try to scam him, and anyone who tried to outright steal from him would end up dead. He lived his whole life, and conducted all of his business, knowing that his possessions and his deals were secure. He had more than enough muscle to make sure of that.
Yet somehow, some rundown former billionaire had defeated his top enforcers and gotten away with an entire stockpile of old pirate gold. That damn David Purdue had made a deal with him, and then dared to take more than what was decided. Sure, the Wharf Man planned to do the same to him, but he had the right to do so. He had resources and power and was the one that should be dictating the terms. David Purdue was nothing compared to him—but he still decided to run off with the gold that was rightfully the Wharf Man's.
Not only that, David Purdue had gotten help from people who were supposed to be working for the Wharf Man. A whole crew of workers turned on him and helped Purdue make off with all of that money. All of them needed to suffer for that. Every single one of those traitors and that thief who lured them to his side.
The Wharf Man stood on the deck of one of his best ships. A yacht that he had taken from a wealthy man who was cruising the coast of Jamaica on vacation. It was a waste of a good vessel so the Wharf Man sent out some of his men to take it off that man's hands, and now the former owner of the yacht was rotting in the ocean somewhere, and his boat was in better hands.
It was rare for the Wharf Man to leave his home in Jamaica. He preferred letting his subordinates go out and do jobs themselves when it came to crossing the sea. Most of them were loyal and came back with all kinds of interesting things, so he didn't usually have to lift a finger to get what he wanted. Now things were different ... all thanks to David Purdue.
“Where is he?” He boomed, speaking to a man with a bloody face on the deck. “Where is David Purdue, hmm? Where is he?!”
The bludgeoned and battered man on the deck was Akoni, one of the people who chose Purdue over the Wharf Man, part of the crew Purdue had used to find that pirate's gold. He had stolen the Wharf Man's workers but they were just as responsible for leaving. He had given them homes and food and work, yet they still turned against him.
“I don't know!” Akoni cried. “I have not seen him since we got the gold!”
“My gold!” The Wharf Man growled. “You mean my gold.”
“Y-y-yes! Your gold! I do not know where he is! I d-d-don—”
The Wharf Man put his big hand on Akoni's cheek, caressing his face like he was just a little pet in comparison to him. He stared down at him, remembering that there was a time when he thought he was one of his loyal workers. Instead, he had bit the hand that fed him, and needed to be put down. If he really didn't know anything about Purdue, then there wasn't much point in keeping him alive.
“This is your last chance,” the Wharf Man said. “Where did he go with the rest of the crew? With the rest of the gold? Tell me now and I may let you live.”
“I do not know where he went! I just know that we all got a message from Aya! I got one yesterday! She said she had something to tell all of us!”
The Wharf Man grimaced at the thought of Aya ... beautiful Aya ... the leader of the crew that joined Purdue. She was just as much to blame. He trusted her more than the others. She was supposed to steer them in the right direction, and instead she joined forces with a thief who dared to take from the Wharf Man.
“Where did she say you would be meeting, Akoni?”
“I-I-I do not remember. It is on my phone! It is on my phone!”
The Wharf Man glanced over to his right hand man, Oniel, who raised the phone in his hand dutifully. “Good. Very good.” He patted Akoni's face. “You have done a good job, Akoni. You know you made a bad choice leaving us, hmm?”
Akoni nodded, with tears rolling down his face. He leaned his head against the Wharf Man's hand like a small toddler asking for forgiveness. Instead of comforting though, the hand seemed ready to come down on his skull.
“My business with David Purdue is not over,” the Wharf Man said. “Do you understand? I am going to find him. And I am going to punish him for what he has done. Just like I have to punish all of you for your own betrayal.”
“I am so sorry!” Akoni sobbed beneath him. “P-p-pl-please. I should not have listened to that man but he told us we would all get gold—”
“Shh,” the Wharf Man cooed. “No need to say any more. You know why I have to do this.”
The Wharf Man suddenly took hold of Akoni's face with his wide hands and started squeezing his skull in his grip. His former employee was shrieking underneath his fingers, crying for dear mercy, but the Wharf Man had none to give. He didn't usually enjoy getting his hands dirty when he didn't have to, but he was more than willing to do that to settle this matter.
There were terrible crunching sounds until Akoni fell silent and the Wharf Man tossed him off the deck, letting his limp body sink down into the sea.
It was like that old saying about having to do things yourself sometimes. This was something he needed to make sure was done right, and carried out properly. He also wanted to make sure that he got to personally break Purdue's neck for stealing from him. He had sent out many other ships looking for Purdue, but he made sure to tell them not to kill him if they found him. That right was reserved for him and him alone.
The Wharf Man looked out at the waves slapping against each other and the horizon ahead. He would find Purdue wherever he was, and he would make him suffer for the blows he had dealt him. None of that should have happened. Purdue should have accepted whatever scraps the Wharf Man gave him and just moved on with his life. Instead he had decided to rob him, and the Wharf Man didn't tolerate people stealing from him. No one took from him. Anyone who did always ended up dead, and soon Purdue would be a decaying carcass in the sea, just like all the other thieves who crossed the Wharf Man.
INTERLUDE: THE WHARF 1
There was a time when no one called Delroy Campbell the Wharf Man. Instead, he was more widely known as Fat Boy, Wide Load, Piggy, Plumpy, and all manner of other “clever” aliases children gave to overweight children. He was far larger than other boys his age. He always had been, and they all made sure he remembered that. When they would kick around a football in the streets, they often didn't let him join in, and in the rare times they did, they relegated him to guarding the goal, to do nothing more than stand there and use his big body as a wall.
He didn't like to talk about it, but back then his obesity was a real struggle that took a toll on his confidence and his courage. It effected how he interacted with everyone around him, and made him feel like such a failure throughout his youth. Every single person looked at him a little longer than they looked at anyone else, maybe because there was more of him to see than anyone else. His girth plagued him wherever he went.
For a long time, it had felt like a curse. It was only as he grew a little older, approaching adolescence, that he realized that his size could be a gift. It was only when kids started figuring out that it could be a good thing to have a big, strong friend to help them out when they were in a bind. Suddenly, he was very popular. Everyone else had grown bigger and older, but no matter how much they grew, he was larger still. He was so colossal in comparison to the other kids that no one dared to try and mess with him anymore. People wanted to befriend him, since Delroy was like a living human shield that they could hide behind if a fight broke out—and plenty of fights did.
In one particularly memorable scrap, a lanky boy named Marcus was hara
ssing one of Delroy's friends. Marcus was a snotty, arrogant little shit and everyone knew it, but no one dared tell it to his face. He came from a successful family by the standards of their community, and thought he was better than everyone else. Despite his skinny body and crooked face, he acted like a prince. He looked shocked when Delroy stood up to him and warned him to stay away from his friend. That confusion quickly turned to petty anger, and he once again thought that his social status would help him push someone around, even when that someone was so much larger than him.
Unfortunately for Marcus, Delroy couldn't be pushed around like all of the other kids he liked to step on. He wouldn't be able to push Delroy no matter how hard he tried. To pick a fight with Delroy was akin to trying to get into a fist fight with a tank. It was a fight he could never have won but that arrogance clouded him to the facts. He still saw Delroy as beneath him, but Delroy refused to back down to someone so much smaller than him.
The fight was brief and ended in mere seconds.
Marcus thought he could throw some punches at Delroy's face but Delroy used his size to envelop his opponent. He wrapped his burly arms around the boy, lifted him off of his feet, and smashed Marcus onto the ground. All of the spectators, their schoolmates and neighbors, stood in shock as the smug boy they all feared was downed in a single blow. Marcus limped away and he never thought so highly of himself after that.
The amount of joy Delroy felt was indescribable in that moment, but there was something else mixed in with all of his pride in himself. There was a strange feeling—that this was the first time he had really hurt someone before.
Delroy became a legend on the streets after that. Everyone recounted the giant young man tossing the rich boy onto the ground like a rag doll. For weeks, he got pats on the back and praise from his peers. His strength and size was rewarded, not slandered.
His parents weren't nearly as proud of him as the rest of the town seemed to be. They didn't congratulate him, or thank him, or even tell him that he did the right thing to bring down a bully. They were angry with him for even getting into a fight. They didn't care what the reasons were. All they cared about was that he had dirtied his hands with violence and shamed their family. They wanted him to be respectful, kind, and gentle like he had been for years, but completely ignore the pent up rage he felt from all of those years of being a joke. That chubby boy with his big round cheeks wasn't Delroy anymore.
What was the point of having so much strength if he couldn't use it?
Secretly—out of the earshot of Delroy's mother—his father seemed to agree.
2
CHAPTER TWO – THE VOYAGE OF FAMILIAR FACES
Most of the crew that helped him find Admiral Ogden's treasure horde were more than willing to respond to Purdue's request for a meeting. After all, they worked well together during that voyage, and proved Purdue wrong when he thought all of them were just sadistic criminals. They didn't mind him either, since he followed through on giving them their fair share of the spoils. That had earned him their respect, and thanks to him, they were finally able to escape from being under the Wharf Man's thumb.
There were only two who didn't show up to the reunion. They must have been satisfied enough with their previous reward. Either that, or the Wharf Man tracked them down for deserting his crime ring. Purdue really hoped it wasn't the latter, but given how angry the Wharf Man was the last time they spoke, he didn't entirely doubt the possibility. Then again, they may have gone back to the Wharf Man willingly. Some people just couldn't break away from their old lifestyles.
Aya smiled when she saw Purdue again. She had been their navigator and the impromptu first mate on the last voyage, and was the one who Purdue worked best with. He was glad that she seemed so pleased to be back on another expedition.
“You just cannot take a break, can you?”
“Got to keep moving,” Purdue replied. “It's the only way to live long ... or die young, I suppose. If you move in the wrong direction or to the wrong place.”
Aya looked at Sam and then back at Purdue. “A new face.”
“This is Sam Cleave. He and I have worked together...” Purdue tried to tally all of the journeys he and Purdue had been on together, but the number was a lot harder to calculate than he thought. He looked to Sam for assistance. “…How many times now?”
“Too many,” Sam said and extended his hand to Aya. “Joining Purdue on these becomes something of a bad habit. Try not to fall into that trap. Once you're in, there is really no getting out of it. I'm living proof of that.”
Aya shook her head. “Thank you for the warning.”
Once Sam was finished meeting the rest of the crew, Purdue addressed them all as a group. There were about a dozen of them, twenty-four eyes staring at him, looking anxious for whatever he had planned for them. He couldn't blame them. Their last voyage hadn't exactly gone smoothly, but as their captain, it was his job to make sure they all came back from this voyage fruitful and alive.
When he first discovered the logbook, Purdue had spoken to the crew about the possibility of searching for this final lost treasure, but that was some time ago. He needed to remind them all about what they were looking for, and to get them ready for the quest.
“It's good to see you all again. As you may recall ... just maybe ... we found Admiral Walton Ogden's treasure together, didn't we?” Cheers rang out and some even starting clapping. Purdue smiled and gave them a moment of celebration before he raised his hands to quiet them down. “As you might also recall, I told you that we didn't find the last of it. Admiral Ogden put something aside—threw it away actually—because it was too valuable, or too dangerous. He let the ocean have it instead. That doesn't seem fair, does it?”
There were shouts of no and even boos from some of the more enthusiastic sailors.
“Aye,” Purdue said, glad he was riling them up. He needed to turn their trepidation into excitement if they were going to follow him all over the world. “No we've earned a right to all of the treasures he collected. We've proven that we are the true inheritors of his riches, haven't we? That pirate didn't leave his riches behind for just anyone. No, he left those treasures behind for people who could actually find them. He left those treasures for us!”
More cheers erupted, mixed with laughter. Sam stood to the side, looking baffled by Purdue's relationship with the crew of scoundrels and criminals. It wasn't the usual company he kept, but Sam hadn't seen Purdue at his lowest point. He hadn't seen the desperation that led to working in circumstances that were far from usual.
“You told us before that this was worth more than any amount of money ... and that it can control the sea ... so what exactly is this treasure?” Aya asked.
“He didn't specify exactly what it was in the logbook ... but something that powerful, I'm sure we'll know it when we see it.”
Sam chuckled beside him. “So it could be anything ... anything at all.”
Purdue ignored Sam and tried to not let doubt seep into the crew. “We just know that's in the deepest part of the ocean ... he used the power of this treasure to drop it in the deepest part of the sea. A place, that back then, could otherwise never be explored. Things are different now. We can get down there if we really want.”
“How?” Aya asked, tapping her foot down on the deck. “I don't think this boat is built for underwater.”
“True enough,” Purdue said. “We'll have to get creative. Our destination is the deepest known part of the ocean, the Marianas Trench ... and there's only one vessel on Earth that has ever descended down there and explored it ... the Deepsea Challenger.”
They set sail on course for the United States, where the submersible Purdue had in mind would be waiting for them. Acquiring it would be difficult but he'd faced just about every difficulty on the planet. There was nothing he couldn't do with enough willpower and enough money. He walked through the narrow hall of the ship to his cabin and when he opened the door, he found Aya sitting on his bed, looking through the book
of shadows.
She'd done this same thing once before. The book of shadows was his last remaining artifact that survived the Order of the Black Sun stealing his things and burning down his home. It was also his most recent addition, thanks to the help of an occult expert named Jean-Luc Gerard, who was one of his friends taken during the Black Sun's attack. It was an incredibly dangerous old book. He'd seen its contents be put to use and it could unleash power and horrors that weren't fit for mortal eyes. Its author was a particularly sadistic witch, so there weren’t many nice spells inside.
“I thought I told you to leave that book alone,” Purdue said.
“Sorry,” Aya said, slamming it shut. “I just haven't been able to stop thinking about it since the last time we were on this boat. Some of the things inside are...”
“Horrible,” Purdue finished for her, and snatched the old diary out of her hand. “You know some people went crazy when they read the things inside.”
“You are afraid I am going to lose my mind from reading?”
“In this case...yes. That's exactly what I'm afraid of. You are a big part of this crew, Aya. We can't have you going insane in the middle of a search.”
“Fine,” she relented. “Bring me another book then. These sea voyages can be so boring until we get to where we're going. I need a book to pass the time.”
“Aye, I'll find you another book,” Purdue grumbled. “And it will be one that won't fill your head with spells that murder people or turn them inside out.”
Purdue put the book of shadows back in his bag.
“Why do you even still hold onto it then? If it's so bad?”
Purdue turned back to her. “Because I don't exactly have much else. I hate that damn book but it's the last part of my old collection I still have left. Julian Corvus and the Order of the Black Sun got their dirty hands on everything else.”
Order of the Black Sun Box Set 10 Page 2