Treasure Lost

by R. G. Cordiner

  Farren stuck out his chin, “I can hold my own. I’ve even got my own crossbow.”

  Aeolus paused for a second and then laughed in a high pitched cackle that whipped out across the air, caught the bosun’s attention and reeled him over to them. He waddled closer, leaned forward so that the fat below his face flapped in the breeze and bellowed, “C’mon lads, get to it or you’ll feel a taste o’ the cat!!” Both boys hastily resumed their duties under the beady gaze of the large man.

  ...

  On the other side of the creaking vessel, the captain was at the helm and near him Malhair was carefully watching the falling sand in the hourglass, poised to strike the bell. Below on the deck, Reeve and Peter were on their hands and knees scrubbing the slimy boards as the majority of sailors slumbered beneath.

  Peter lowered his voice, “Reeve, so is the bosun as bad as he sounds?”

  “Well he will use the whip, if that’s what you mean. I have had worse, and had better,” the blond haired youth said.

  “So do you enjoy doing this?”

  “Enjoy? Who enjoys?? I’m from a small village. I never really had the skills for a trade … if I keep my head down and work hard, maybe I could run my own ship one day.” Reeve’s eyes looked distant.

  “Well, I suppose there are worse ships to be on.”

  “What?” Reeve shook his head, as if waking up. “Yeah, of course there are worse – there are some awful captains in these waters, not to mention pirates.”

  “Pirates? In these waters?”

  “Uh huh. Whenever we go west we run the risk. The ones around here would rip the flesh from your bones as soon as speak to you. And I heard that some of the pirate captains are actually demons!”

  Peter scrubbed silently. He doubted the rumours that Reeve had heard, but nevertheless, they often were based on fact … weren’t they?

  ...

  The fire crackled on the deck and licked at the sides of the two huge iron cauldrons that squatted over it. The smell of soup wafted through the air and, despite it not being the most pleasant of odours, it still tugged at the hungry crew. Several sailors lounged close to the heat and were playing a game of cards that was becoming rowdier as their wine rations quickly disappeared. Others sprawled over rigging, in hammocks or wherever they could find room on the creaking deck. Peter and Farren sat near Aeolus and Malhair with their bowls, some biscuits and dried sardines. Reeve sat on the prow lost in his own world.

  Peter looked into his bowl at the oily soup and, as he stirred it, bits of gristly bacon, garlic and chick peas oozed to the surface. He sighed. Farren brought his biscuit to his mouth and … “Wait!” Malhair grabbed it off him and tapped the biscuit on the side of the ship. Six maggots flopped overboard.

  He turned to Farren, “Now you can eat it.”

  “Oh Malhair,” Aeolus whined, “you ruined the fun. That was good fresh meat that was!”

  It was later and the food and wine had long since been consumed, the fires had been extinguished and sleep had taken hold of most of the crew. The brothers lay on some sacks on the decks. The deck and the sacks were damp and they found it hard to sleep with the constant rocking. Their quest for slumber was further hindered by the noise of a sailor near the stern who was humming to himself, the loud snoring of a reed thin man near them which was swinging his hammock in time, and the noise of the rats as they scurried across the deck and gnawed at the scraps.

  As the clouds above them parted like curtains to reveal the night’s beauty, Farren turned to Peter and whispered, “So how do you think we catch this ship then?”

  “I’m not sure. When I talked with Reeve he mentioned it was heading west. From what I can gather, it seems like we are heading south west.”

  “How do you figure that?”

  “Well, I took a glance at the compass rose before, and that was our heading. But it means that unless we change direction soon, there will be no way to catch them.”

  Farren frowned, “So why don’t we just tell the captain in the morning what happened. You know, ask him to change the course?”

  “It won’t work. To start with, this is a merchant ship taking a cargo of fish to another port with, I assume, a tight deadline. So he is unlikely to have time to make a detour. Especially if that detour involves heading towards the one set of people the captain really doesn’t want to see.”

  “Well we’ll just have to sabotage the ship or something,” Farren suggested.

  “Not that we know how to do that. Besides which, assuming we can somehow get them to head towards the pirate ship, we don’t know for sure that Nanna’s on it, let alone whether she is still alive. Have you thought about what we will do if we somehow manage to catch up?”

  “What do you mean?” asked Farren.

  “Well there’s only two of us and probably more than twenty of them. How do we get on board? How do we find her? And what use are we to her if we do? We’re not experienced at fighting.”

  “Peter, we can deal with that when we get there. This crew would fight.”

  “But should they? This is not their fight. And what if she’s dead?” Peter looked worried.

  “She’s tough … besides the pirates already want to find us.”

  “Yeah I know Farren, that scrap of paper. But having pirates who want to find you is not a good thing. I’m just not sure whether we should call it off.”

  “What and leave Nanna to die?” Farren looked shocked.

  “She could be dead already.”

  “That doesn’t mean she IS dead. It’s worth it to find out. Look at what she’s done for us.”

  “Yeh, I know. But I just don’t know how much we can do for her right now,” said Peter.

  Silence ensued and, as Farren drifted off to sleep, he was thinking of the exciting battle that may lie ahead. Peter was trying to think of how to change the course of a merchant ship without a crew of twenty finding out, and Aeolus took the longest to find sleep as he digested what he had just heard.

  ...

  “Get up, you lazy slobs!!!”

  Farren awoke with a jolt and was hit with the stench of rotten fish. He opened his eyes and found himself staring into the large cavernous maw of the bosun.

  “C’mon you!”

  There was a sharp pain in his shins as he was kicked violently. He quickly got to his feet.

  “You should have used the lodestone ten minutes ago – move it!”

  Farren paused for a second and then remembered that the compass had to be remagnetised regularly. He rushed to the front of the helm where he found the binnacle, which was a small cupboard that was attached to the deck. It had an open box sitting on top of it, containing the compass. He opened the cupboard doors and found the lodestone within. Farren rubbed the compass with the lodestone to remagnetise it.

  Whilst this was happening, Aeolus and Peter were manning the log and line to work out the ship’s speed. Aeolus glanced around, “Look, I heard you and your brother last night.”

  Peter stiffened but remained silent.

  “I have a way for you to change the ship’s course.”

  There was a pause, “Why would you help us?”

  “Well, I got press ganged on this ship just like you.” Peter frowned but didn’t correct him. “Only I have been here for two years now. It’s not bad, but I want adventure. You know, the chance to make some money and have a bit of fun. Let’s face it; I’m hardly going to get rich as a deckhand on a ship full of fish, now am I?”

  Peter surveyed Aeolus carefully. He was suspicious about how quickly Aeolus was prepared to betray his crewmates. How did he plan to make money through sabotaging a ship to lead it to a bunch of pirates? But, despite a restless night, he had no ideas himself and no choice but to go along … for now.

  “So what’s the plan?” he asked.

  “Well it’s actually quite simple really. I’m on the traverse board today and …”

  “Hang on,” interrupted Peter, “the traverse board…?”

  �
��Sorry, I forgot you’re only new. The traverse board is a round piece of wood with all the compass points on it, with eight holes going out in each direction. Every half an hour one of the crew, I think it’s Malhair today, tells me our current course and I put a small peg in whichever direction we are going. Then, by looking at the board later, the bosun can work out our course and adjust if he needs to.”

  “I see, so you’re thinking of plotting a fake course … If you make the bosun think we were going south, when he wants to go south west, he would then steer the ship west.”

  “Exactly! And that course should lead us directly to adventure!”

  Peter looked out to sea. Adventure was the last thing he was looking for. Just getting out of this alive would do.

  “Ok,” he said, “let’s do it.”

  ...

  Aeolus was true to his word and every half an hour after Malhair came over to announce their south westerly heading, he grabbed a peg and put it in the traverse board to indicate that the ship was in fact heading south. To further enhance their chances of success, Aeolus took Reeve aside.

  “Reeve mate, the captain has asked me to get a couple of extra bottles of rum to have for lunch. I’m still on the traverse board – any chance you can go below and get them?”

  Reeve dutifully obliged and returned with the alcohol which, as the large fires were being lit, Aeolus surreptitiously placed within sight of the bosun. With a gap-toothed grin, the large man waddled over and began to swig it down in great gulps. Aeolus smiled. Sure enough, later that day when Aeolus showed the bosun the traverse board, the man’s mind, befuddled by spirits, did not think to check the readings and he adjusted the course.

  Peter however was becoming increasingly concerned and had managed to corner his brother in the jardines, near the ship’s bow. Luckily there was no one nearby to listen, as he squatted next to his brother over the round holes cut into the deck that led straight to the sea. Farren had finished going to the toilet and was about to pull up his breeches when he was stopped by Peter.

  “Just pretend you’re still going. We need to talk. Aeolus has changed the traverse board and the bosun seems to have taken the bait. So we are now heading west at a fair clip. Hopefully that means we will catch up to the pirates at some stage, assuming they were in fact going south west and didn’t change direction themselves.”

  “That’s great, so what’s the problem?”

  Peter frowned, “I’m still not sure what we can do, even if somehow we manage to catch up.”

  Farren snorted, “Look, why do you think we came on this ship? We are here to look for Nanna. What did you think we would do – find her, wave and then go? We owe it to her to try and at least attempt a rescue.”

  “What can the two of us do?”

  “I don’t know. Swim over, sneak aboard in the confusion. We might get lucky. We can’t just sit idly by as the one person who's done most for us in this world slowly dies,” said Farren.

  “I’m not saying we should do nothing. I’m just not sure it is right to risk this crew’s lives – all for one person – and we don’t know if she is alive. Maybe we should give up whilst we have the chance.”

  Farren frowned. “Give up? We’ve come this far, we can’t stop now. How will we sleep at night if we later find out that there was something we could have done? We have to at least try – it’s what she would do for us.”

  “Ok, we’ll try,” conceded his brother

  As he walked off, Peter shuddered as a chill ran up his spine.

  ...

  The man scratched at his scraggly, unkempt beard, pulled out a large flea, crushed it between his fingers and then shoved it into his mouth. He reached down and pulled a small knife from his boot and proceeded to slowly pick at what remained of his teeth. With a grunt, he looked down through the rigging at the deck far below and watched the rest of the crew scurrying around like rodents. Bored, he glanced out towards the sea. He looked again. No. It couldn’t be.

  “Ship, captain, I see a ship ahead!”

  The cloaked figure on the deck looked up at the crow’s nest and then turned to the bosun.

  “Chad, the eyepiece.”

  The large bulk of a man grabbed the instrument, which looked like a twig in his oversized hand and handed it to the captain. A rattling sound came from within the cowl.

  “He’s right. Renard!”

  The Frenchman sidled up beside the captain.

  “We can’t afford for our position to be given away, Renard. Prepare for battle.”

  Chad grunted. With one hand, he reached over to pick up the flail with its heavy chain ending in a large spiked metal ball, and hoisted it over his shoulder. As he did so, the muscles in his back and arms rippled like waves.

  “Get cannons ready!” he bellowed.

  Renard smiled.

  It had begun.

  Chapter 4

  The Pirate Meeting

  The Nemesis ploughed a path through the water in its relentless pursuit of its victim. The crew of the other ship, realising their fate, frantically rushed around the deck in a futile attempt to prepare for the inevitable. As the Nemesis began to catch up to the merchant vessel, the pirates could see them beginning to load their cannons.

  “Renard, raise the colours!” yelled the pirate captain.

  The Frenchman hoisted up the pole a red tattered flag that was adorned with a simple black picture of a skeleton. As the ship drew closer, the pirates below deck prepared to light the fuses of the cannons. Above them, the crew stood armed with their favourite choice of weapon, calmly waiting. They watched as the gap between the two ships shrank and saw the portly bosun on the other ship screaming orders at the crew.

  The captain of the Nemesis gave the order. Chad turned the wheel and the ship responded. It lined up at an angle with the stern of the merchant vessel. With a pull on the ropes the crew raised the wooden panels that obscured the cannons. They then slowly pushed the heavy weapons forward until they were in position.

  The calm of the pirate ship was in contrast to the reaction of their opponents. Yelling.

  Screaming.

  Running.

  Panic rippled across the deck and engulfed the vessel.

  The pirate captain smiled. “Fire the cannons!”

  BOOM!

  BOOM!!

  BOOM!!!

  The sound resonated through the pirate ship and it rocked to a series of explosions as all of the cannons vomited out their deadly cargo.

  There was a small fraction of a second between the firing and the realisation hitting the large bosun’s face. Then he was struck through the eye by a large splinter of the deck that had just shattered around him.

  The initial salvo crippled the merchant ship. The Nemesis drew alongside and the pirates began to board their victim. Some swung across on ropes, whilst others simply leapt across the diminishing gap between the two crafts. The sailors attempted to put up a fight with the limited weapons they had, but a couple of quick swings from Chad’s flail put paid to any ideas of continued resistance. Those who met with the bosun’s weapon did not live long to discuss the experience, as three men went flying through the air in one direction, and various grisly body parts that previously belonged to them, flew in another.

  At the other end of the deck, Renard calmly set about despatching resisting crew members with a sword in each hand. He used the minimum of effort, a simple thrust here, a slash there and the bodies fell like puppets whose owners had left them. He continued at pace across the deck until he met Chad in the middle.

  “Twelve to me. You?”

  “I kill ten,” the large man rumbled.

  “Well I am still winning, n’est pas?”

  “Yeh, I think.”

  Renard muttered, “You … thinking? That’ll be the day.”

  The few crew remaining huddled together on the deck, shivering with fear. A shadow was cast over them and they looked up to see the cloaked pirate captain.

  “Renard, check the hold.
”

  “Oui, cap’n.” The Frenchman inclined his head and then retreated below. There were a series of bumps and sighs and then he returned, wiping his blades.

  “There were four below, but now - none.”

  “Right, you know what to do.” And with the cloak billowing behind, the captain jumped across to the pirate vessel. Five of the pirates remained on the deck watching the crew, whilst Chad and Renard went below. There, they rolled the ship’s cannons back and turned them around so they faced inwards, with the fuse poking out over the side. They then retreated upstairs. The five pirates and Chad jumped back onto their ship whilst Renard lit a torch. He climbed up onto the stern and then swung alongside it, lighting the fuses. As the rope reached the bow, he leapt in to the air and landed back with a somersault next to the captain. Chad began to raise the mainsail as they started to move further from the merchants.

  “Wait. In the water. There are some youths.” One of the pirates pointed towards two figures desperately swimming. Renard leaned down and pulled two daggers out of his boots and then sent them spinning through the air until they landed with a soft thud in the backs of the two crew members. Their carcasses floated lifelessly in the water.

  The captain chuckled mercilessly.

  KABOOM!! The merchant vessel exploded into fragments. For this ship the adventure was over.

  ...

  Farren awoke and immediately winced in pain. He struggled to open his eyes at the brightness of the light. He blinked, disorientated. Where was he? He looked at the water around him and then it dawned on him. The merchant vessel! Farren felt his leg, where the bruise from the bosun’s morning wake up calls was an ugly black in colour.

  “Debris!”

  Farren looked up, but couldn’t see the crow’s nest in the bright sunshine.

  “Debris, cap’n.”

  He leaned further over the edge and could just make out what looked like chunks of wood in the distance. Clearly another merchant vessel had just met the Nemesis and come out the worse for wear. Farren saw the bodies of two youths with daggers in their backs and shivered. That could have been them.