Prologue
The storm raged around them, screaming fury and wrath into the helpless ears of the unseasoned sailors. The waters pulsed and thrashed, twisting and clawing at the sides of the boat, spilling onto the deck as the great depths attempted to pull them down into its cold clutches. The tiny figures desperately clutched at ropes and sails, buckets passed from hand to hand. A single thought was silently shared between them.
This is the end.
No one could tell if the water running trails down their cheeks was the ocean or their tears. No conscious thought was thrown into their actions any longer. As adrenaline rushed, keeping the men on their feet despite their many restless nights, they slipped across the deck with a single minded intensity.
Survive.
The word rang in their minds, along with the voices of mothers and of fathers. The laughter and loving murmurs of wives, husbands and children.
Survive.
They senselessly screamed at each other, their voices lost to the winds. Orders went unheard as each tried to keep themselves and each other alive.
It was too late, and they knew it, yet they continued to fight. The winds could blow them clear off the deck of the boat, and the thrashing seas could drag them down to the ocean floor, but they would never stop clawing and screaming. To give up was not in their nature.
Suddenly, a voice broke through the howling of the wind and rain. It was a lilting, soft voice, singing a light harmony out of place with the harsh music of the storm.
‘Fifteen men, in a boat,’
A rope snapped free, throwing the two sets of hands that had moments ago been clasped around its threads in a vice like grip into the hungry clutches of the sea.
‘Fifteen men, none will float,’
The main sail came crashing down onto the deck, sending splinters of wood flying, ripping into flesh.
‘For you, who will cry?’
The sailors began to fall to their knees, clutching at bleeding wounds, as the water ripped through the railings.
‘Your souls, will not fly,’
A young boy, no older than twelve, raised his stricken face to the sky. His tear stained expression was lit by a crimson red.
‘I come to judge your sin,’
The hull split in two with a sound like thunder, and the greedy hands of the ocean rose up into the air with excitement, falling onto the deck with glee as they clutched at the ocean’s prey. It wanted revenge, and so revenge it would have.
‘Your torment now begin.’
The top of the last standing sail fell beneath the surface of the crashing waves, sucked down into the pit of swirling black and blue.
As the boat sunk, the red tinted storm clouds dispersed, and the ocean calmed, sated, and relaxed with a sigh. All that remained were the few bubbles streaming up to the surface of the now still waters, not a piece of debris or smoky stream of blood to be seen in the aftermath.
