Devil Ship 003: Death Fleet by David Longhorn

Author:David Longhorn [Longhorn, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Horror, upload
ISBN: 9798550450680
Google: 5uYFzgEACAAJ
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: 2020-10-20T06:00:00+00:00

***

Pablo stared up at the dying man, wishing he could change something, everything that had led to this moment. There was something about his eyes as the life faded from them. The savage, a wild beast in human form according to the captain, seemed merely a man now. Pablo had seen the dead on many occasions. He had seen corpses of men and horses thrown overboard when their ships were becalmed and fresh water ran low. Lack of wind, he learned, could be as deadly as any storm. Back home, he had seen bandits hanged in iron cages to die slowly in the sun, their bodies carrion for crows. He had smelled the stench in Valladolid when a heretic was burned in the town square. And once, he had seen a nobleman’s dogs tear a beggar to pieces on the steps of the monastery. The world he knew was a cruel world.

Yet somehow, this was worse.

“Into darkness,” said a voice behind him.

Pablo jumped, turned around to see the sergeant nodding at the staked man.

“That’s Latin, the priest’s lingo—it means ‘into darkness,’” the sergeant continued. “Those who die without the benefit of Christian baptism will go straight to Hell. Nothing is more certain than their eternal punishment. We’ll leave them here, under guard, to rot. If the heathens try to return, they’ll find us waiting.”

Pablo, who could not read, had given no thought to the letters carved into the wood. He did not question the sergeant’s words, knowing that the ways of God were immutable and not for him to question. Instead, he did as he was told, banking up the fires around the stones, then going off with a foraging party to find a stream for water. Along the way, he wished the sergeant had not been looking at him when he spoke of leaving a guard over the rotting corpses.

By the time they got back, the captives were all dead. They threw water onto the fires, which the sergeant said would crack the stones. But though the fires had been burning for more than an hour, the sudden coldness did not shatter the rock. There was some talk between the sergeant and corporal about dragging the stones away, breaking the circle, but their few surviving horses could not be brought miles inland for that. They were too precious to risk in the jungle.

“Very well,” said the sergeant finally. “Get a rope around the middle stone and pull it out.”

Thirty men could be spared. They failed. They tried with the smallest of the circle stones and failed again. The stones were rooted deeper than they seemed. The dawn began to penetrate the darkness of the jungle. They had entered the jungle too late at night. Uprooting stones probably hadn’t been part of the original plan, and they had been at their task for too long. After two more attempts, the sergeant gave up and marched the remains of his unit back to the coast. As they emerged from the jungle

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