King of My Nightmare (King of My Nightmare, Book 1): Endless Horizon Pirate Stories

by Cristi Taijeron

While chewing on a colorful fruit, he began telling his over glorified tale. “When the ship tipped over onto the reef, I was thrown overboard like the lot of you. But unlike you helpless fools, I can swim. Not wanting to be battered against the reef, like that ship, I flapped my fins and swam around the waves and rode the current to the other side of the island.” He stretched out his long, snake tattooed arms and yawned dramatically. “After drinking some coconut water and catching a fish, which I slathered in lime juice and cooked over a hearty flame, I laid down and took a nice long nap.”

  They stared at him in awe. “You caught a fish?”

  “And took a nap?”

  “And found lime trees?”

  Boa proudly nodded. “Aye, this is like a holiday. We have food and water and look at this view.” He waved his hand around to showcase the swaying palms and calm waters that were now reflecting a hint of sunlight.

  “It is nice here,” Walsh said.

  “Our own piece of paradise,” Rupert agreed.

  I had fallen asleep thinking about how nicely the evening ended, but hearing these men talking about how great this was, reminded me of how terrible it was.

  As their conversation turned from the enjoyments of our awful predicament, to sharing tales of how brave they all had been—none of which impressed the Almighty Boa—I figured I’d better get to work. First, I looked over at the captain to see how he was doing. Finding him sound asleep, and still breathing, I then went to check the pot of beans I’d left on the coals all night.

  While stirring and finding the beans fluffy and soft, I saw Boa reach for a handful of meat, the meat I had set aside for the captain. Holding my hand up, signaling that he stop, I said, “Wait. You can’t have that much.”

  Cocking a brow, and then darting his gaze between my upheld hand and the pot of beans I’d been working on, Boa sneered, “So, you’ve graduated to galley bitch, eh?”

  Of course, the arse warts chimed in by laughing and rambling on with stupid jokes about how I was their servant now.

  As I set the pot aside to cool down, I reminded them, “Would one of you prefer to do the cooking?”

  They all huffed and mumbled about not knowing how to cook.

  “All right, then. Watch who you’re calling a bitch,” I said, then returned my attention to Boa. “Look, we already rationed everything, so we’ll need to recalculate for your share.”

  Everyone agreed to grant the bosun with a share of their portions, so we piled up what we had and divided the strips of dried meat accordingly. As I set aside a pile for Captain Burton, Boa questioned, “Why do you get more than the rest of us?”

  “This bit is for the captain.” I nodded toward where he laid under the shade of our tent.

  Eyeing him over, Boa winced. “Poor ol’ soul lost a limb, huh?”

  Hubert started rambling about how heroic he was to have saved a life that day, but Boa interrupted him, “Ah, well, he looks about dead.” He then eyed the meat in question. “He don’t need as much as the rest of us.”

  Angered by the way Boa took it upon himself to take reign of what we had established, I snarled, “He isn’t dead, and as long as he is breathing he will get treated the same as the rest of us.”

  Boa puffed up his chest. “No he won’t. He isn’t walking, or working. In fact, we’ll need to work harder to care for him, so he gets less.”

  I opened my mouth to dispute him, but Smedley spoke first, “He’ll live just fine on less.”

  “We’ll find more by the time he’s ready,” Walsh agreed.

  Rupert, who was already chomping on his share, spoke with his mouth full, “More for us working men.”

  No. This wasn’t right and I had no intentions of handing anything over to Boa without a fight.

  My tense and rigid posture loosened when Barlow laid a hand on my shoulder. “It’s all right, Bentley. You and I will share our portions with Burton if he ends up needing more.”

  Surprised to hear Barlow siding with Boa and his idiot clan, I looked at Barlow as if I was going to fight him instead.

  He chuckled at my expression, then pulled me away from the group. As he began separating our shares, he said, “Some wars just aren’t worth waging. And this is one of them. We need all the energy we have to get through the day and what meat we have here should be plenty enough for Burton whenever he feels up to taking a bite.”

  Still angry, but knowing how senseless it was to feel this way, I took a few deep breaths to calm down. Realizing just how hungry I was, I figured I’d feel better after I got some beans in my belly and headed for the pot. Hoping the beans had cooled enough to eat, I stirred the steamy mush and wondered how I was going to serve everyone. We had one spoon and one pot for all eleven of us…

  Noticing the way the men were looking at me, like wolves ready to eat me instead if I didn’t serve them soon, I knew I had to figure it out fast. Quickly, I tested the heat on the beans and then told them to hold out their hands. “There’s only enough for each of us to have a handful for now, but I’ll make more for dinner tonight. Line up.”

  They lined up like we used to do in the mess hall back when Clarence was alive and telling us superstitious tales. I had no stories to tell, and all I could think about was getting my own share as I filled the spoon for the first serving.

  Of course, Boa shoved his way to the front of the line and took his portion without saying thank you. Quickly licking his scoop out of his hand, he wandered away from the group as I served the others. Smedley didn’t thank me, either, but everyone else was polite enough to at least nod their heads as they accepted their servings. As Humphry held his hand out for his, thanking me before I even served him, Boa’s loud, obnoxious voice sliced through our polite exchange of words. “Look at this!” He ripped a rat out of the snare I had made last night. “It seems we’ll be eating like kings today. Who made this snare, anyhow?”

  “I did,” I grumbled as I filled Tennison’s hand with beans.

  “Good job,” Boa surprised me by saying, then continued in his annoyingly jolly tone, “Let’s get the skin off this beast and roast her up.”

  After roughly passing the rat to Dennel, who swiftly took to skinning it as if Boa would whip him if he did not, Boa reached into his pockets and pulled out a bunch of little green fruits. “Add a little lime juice and you’ll think it is beef instead of rat.”

  “I didn’t know rats lived in the tropics,” Rupert said as he slurped up his pile of beans in order to make room for the fruit Boa handed him.

  “They scamper ashore from passing ships,” Boa looked down at Rupert like he was foolish for not knowing that. “Which means people must stop here from time to time.”

  Walsh yelped, “Oh, good. Then someone will eventually come by to help us.”

  “Unless that someone is Spanish,” Barlow grumbled with a mouth full of beans.

  The men booed at his comment.

  “They’ll kill us if they’re Spanish,” Peck whined while picking at his teeth.

  “My pa was killed by a Spaniard,” Dennel lowered his head in sadness, then started skewering the sliced pieces of the rat meat.

  Boa patted Dennel’s back, hard. “Ah, don’t you worry about no Spaniards. If they show up, we’ll steal their ship and sail home just like that.”

  Just like that? As he carried on about ravenous hunters who attacked Spanish galleons from mere canoes, I lowered my face into my hand. There was no way a beat and battered bunch like us could take on a feat like that, and we didn’t have as much as a mere canoe, anyhow. No matter what I thought, the men were now hooting in excitement and growling like warriors. Eh, who was I to stomp out the hopeful fire Boa lit under their arses? Though I was unsure if the tales Boa was telling so confidently were true or not, I was certainly getting a headache from the loud and annoying tone of his voice as he told them.

  Doing my best to ignore them, I scooped the final pile onto my own hand and then sat down in the sand. Staring at my handful, I once again debated between
plowing through it like a starved dog, or savoring each warm and mushy bite like it was the last bit of food in the world. I chose to be a man and eat slowly. Bite by bite, I let the flavor hit my tongue and I felt each morsel slide down my throat and land in my empty, aching belly.

  Like an angry beast, my stomach grabbed and devoured each swallow before I had a chance to enjoy it. Once my hand was empty, I was just as hungry and angry as before. Maybe more so after having the taste and not receiving enough of it to become satisfied.

  While I tried to get a grip on my cravings, I watched Boa poke Dennel. “Hurry up with that rat, mate.”

  Boa’s posse quickly turned their rude comments toward Dennel, who was skewering strips of rat meat on small sticks. As they laughed and joked and poked fun at Dennel for being so dumb and working so slowly, I filled the empty pot with more beans. I could have defended Dennel. I certainly considered it, but for now it was more important that I get dinner going than it was to pick another fight with the bosun.

  Yet, as I added water to the pot and set it over the fire, thinking of how long it would be until I was able to eat the small and unsatisfying ration of warm food, all I could think about was fighting. The urge to act with violence intensified as I observed the unpleasant surroundings. Boa and his men were still teasing Dennel and their insults had now dug into Peck as well. Peckadennel both let out a few forced chuckles when Boa caught their gazes—as if this attack of character was all in good fun. The doctor looked displeased by the tension but was surely too nervous to do anything about it. And Barlow, who was sitting on a log near the injured and unconscious captain, scowled like an angry ol’ bear as things carried on.

  Thinking back on how well these men behaved and cooperated yesterday, I found myself all the more annoyed by Boa’s reappearance in the group. We had all been getting along and were working well together before he showed up. Now, there was once again division in the air, and that was simply a stupid way to act while we needed to stay focused on survival.

  That thought led me into thinking of how my aggressive attitude was no different from Boa’s. I needed to be better than that. I had to rise above the hatred that was eating at my soul the same way my stomach acid burned up those beans.

  While setting the now boiling pot of beans over a bed of coals, I tried to cool my temper. But I found it quite difficult to get my wits about me with smoke blowing in my face, causing me to choke on the hot air. I was barefooted and my skin was tight and crackly from getting burnt yesterday. The weather was already hot and swampy and bugs were biting at every inch of my exposed skin. And I was so damn hungry. After taking a conservative drink of water, I decided to eat one of my strips of salted pork. Maybe I’d regret it when I ran out later, but there was no way I could get through the day with this starved and crazed frame of mind.

  Digging my teeth into the hard and dry slab of salty pork, my mind vanished into the savory haze that then overtook me. Bite after bite I fell deeper into the heavenly moment until my hand was empty and my belly was full. Yes, that was just what I needed.

  Feeling satisfied, I stood up and breathed in a fresh breath of air. I finally felt ready for the day ahead, but my brief moment of peace was quickly diminished when I took in the sight of Boa chugging down the last servings of our hard attained and well filtered water.

  As if he was not the one who just gulped down enough to satisfy four of us, Boa stood up and pushed the empty barrel toward where Walsh and Rupert sat. Belching, Boa rubbed his muscle ripped abdomen and barked, “We’re out of water. Go fill that thing up.”

  They jumped to his outlandish command. As they wandered off with the barrel he so carelessly emptied, a million curse words flashed through my mind, but I had more important things to do than spew them out. No matter how I felt about Boa, he had seen things I had not and I needed information that only he could offer.

  Looking into my antagonists eyes, I asked, “What did you see on your adventure across the island? How big is it?”

  Appearing surprised by my questioning, Boa said, “Not very big. Maybe twenty times the length of this beach.”

  “How high are the hills? And did you happen to see the source of the stream?”

  He squinted. “The hills aren’t very high and I did not see the source of the stream.”

  “I’m going to follow the creek.” I said, “We need to know how much water we have before we get too comfortable here.”

  “Too comfortable?” Boa laughed like I was a fool. His remaining arse warts chuckled alongside him, but I don’t think they even knew what was so funny to their errant leader. “Where the hell else do you think we are going to go?”

  Looking into my decanter that was just about empty, I said, “Wherever there’s water.”

  While trying to ignore their loud and annoying laughs and jokes about not getting too comfortable here, I heard Captain Burton let out a groan. Bolting into the shelter, I knelt down beside him. “Good morning, sir. How are you feeling?”

  Since I had taken care of him throughout the night, he seemed to have grown comfortable in my presence, and perked up at the sound of my voice. With his remaining hand, he patted my thigh. “Awful. Bloody awful. Never felt worse, in fact.” He coughed, which led to a yelp. “That hurt. It all hurts. Water.”

  I looked at my last sip. Craving it with all of my being, I decided it best to hand it over to him. “Here,” This is the last bit for now, but finding more water is the first thing on today’s list.”

  “List…” He gagged on the final sip of water, spilling some of the precious liquid into his beard. “List…Log…must answer to the log.”

  Overhearing us, Barlow began shuffling through the Captain’s sea chest which he brought ashore last night. “Good idea,” he said as he pulled out the captain’s log and a quill. Handing them to me, he said, “We’ll need to report to the shipping company about the details of the wreckage if we end up getting out of here alive.”

  Accepting the book and the quill, I said, “We will get out of here alive.”

  Boa, who was sitting on the other side of the fire with his bare feet propped up on a log, peered over at us. “What the hell is going on over there?”

  Dipping the quill in the inkwell, I said, “I am going to record the events in the captain’s log.”

  “You can write?” He cocked a brow.

  “That I can.”

  Looking annoyed, he got up and wandered in our direction. “How do I know you’re writing the right thing? What if you’re trying to snake us?” He pointed at the doctor and barked, “You. Come over and take this book. We can’t have our history in the hands of a dumb little inn boy.”

  Barlow chuckled, “Look at the barbaric oaf calling the literate man dumb.”

  Boa puffed up his chest. “I’m just saying, the doctor is higher in rank, let him do the job.”

  As I examined the distrust in Boa’s gaze, I felt a cold hand wrap around my wrist. It was the captain. “You write on my behalf, Bentley.”

  His meek and crackled voice rang powerfully enough to cause everyone to pause for a moment. Though Boa and the doctor both looked uninterested in following the orders of the one-armed, half conscious man, they knew better than to contest his command. As a last minute chance to state his less than favorable stance, Boa huffed, “I suggest the doctor watch him write, to verify that his words are true.”

  Figuring such a balance would help to avoid future problems, I agreed to the terms. With Boa and Barlow standing nearby, and Humphry peering over my shoulder, I read aloud as I wrote these words:

  July 2nd, 1641

  As but a humble sailor assigned to Captain James Burton’s merchant crew, I, Mason Bentley, with Doctor Hubert Humphries as my witness, am writing on the captain’s behalf. After enduring an injury that led to the loss of his left arm, the good captain is currently unable to write, and insisted that I take notes in his log to record the events of our shipping delay. Autumn Moon was wrecked in a storm and those of us who
survived the wreckage washed up on an unidentified island somewhere in what we assume to be the northern Caribbean Sea. I plan to adventure the island today in hopes to gather more information on our whereabouts and to hopefully find some solution to help aid our chances of survival.

  Looking around at my audience, I asked, “Is there anything you’d like to add?”

  The doctor said, “Find the list of men aboard and add their statuses.

  “Good idea, “I said, then flipped the pages until I found the very list I signed the day I came aboard.

  James Burton-Captain: Alive, but lost left arm

  Alfred Dabney-First Mate: Found dead on the shore

  Frank Mills-Bosun: Alive

  Aaron Jenson-Navigator: Assumed dead, lost at sea

  Billy Barlow-Master Carpenter: Alive

  Clarence Henson-Cook: Found Dead on the shore

  Hubert Humphries-Doctor: Alive

  Timothy Peck-Deckhand: Alive

  Johnathan Dennel-Deckhand: Alive

  Jon Jones-Sailor: Found dead on the shore

  Matthew White-Sailor: Assumed dead, lost at sea

  Mark Rupert-Sailor: Alive

  James Walsh-Sailor: Alive

  Daniel Brown-Sailor: Found dead on the ship

  Abel Smith-Sailor: Found dead on the ship

  Markus Smedley-Sailor: Alive

  Joseph Arnott-Sailor: Assumed Dead, lost at sea

  Henry Tennison-Sailor: Alive

  Abraham Sanders-Sailor: Died during the storm

  Mason Bentley-Sailor: Alive

  “Good job, lad.” Hubert patted my back. Why don’t you add ship’s historian by your name.

  Honored by the suggestion, I went back and added the new title by my name.

  Rolling his eyes, Boa sneered, “Isn’t that an exceptional promotion.”

  “From galley bitch to historian, all in one day.” I winked at him, playfully.

  He hissed in disgust, then pulled the doctor aside, asking him to examine one of his wounds.

  With them out of the way, Barlow continued to rustle through the chest. Pulling out a big scroll of parchment, he said, “Looky here, Bentley. We’ve got Jenson’s maps.”