Death Whispers 11: An Unwelcome Committee

July 26, 1722. On board the schooner, the Silk Duchess, in the waters offshore the newly rebuilt town of Port Royal.

Author’s Note: Death Whispers of the Etherwave is a serialized fiction story that is a part of Legends of the Privateers. Each chapter will appear weekly.

Missed a chapter? (or ‘Episode’ if you like!) Well, never you worry, as we’re only just getting started! The full list of chapters will appears here!

Transformed by the cataclysm of 1712, Doctor Pedro Sangre and his four courageous privateer companions confront mysterious and evil forces that plague innocent people. Together, they grapple with uncanny forces and myths come to life, risking everything to preserve peace and set right what has gone wrong.

Previously: A clandestine meeting with Pedro’s old friend and mentor, Lucien Massena shed some light on the dire Codex. More importantly, it pointed Dr. Sangre and his allies toward an even better, yet far more deadly person to speak with. That is, provided they live to tell the tale…

July 26, 1722. On board the schooner, the Silk Duchess, in the waters offshore the newly rebuilt town of Port Royal.

“All hands! Port Royal off starboard!”

The muffled call from the spotter on deck snapped my attention back to the moment. At the foot of my bunk, Sebastian snored gently in his sleep. I watched him for a moment, then picked up my pen, opened my notebook, and recorded my thoughts.

Taking another dose of my ‘medicine’. Hopefully, by letting it settle, that means it won’t taste like toad sweat.

I set the pen down, then stared at the vial on the other side of the table. The small glass bottle was filled with an elixir based on Lyra Valtor’s ingredient list. I brewed up a batch last night before we set sail.

It was a thick, lime-green liquid that slowly churned on its own in the bottle. I watched it sway slightly while the Silk Duchess moved over the waves. My right hand felt warm, and the tattoo-like scars there shifted irritably.

I knew I needed to take a dose of my ‘medicine’, but I just couldn’t will myself to drink it.

A few minutes later, that’s how Elara found me when she walked into the narrow cabin. Sitting still, partly slouched, and glaring at the bottle with its dubious contents. I spared a glance at her while she walked over to sit on the side of the bunk.

With the ship underway, Elara didn’t dress in what most believed a ship captain should wear. That was for stories and formal occasions. She was more practical than that and preferred function over fancy.

Today, she wore a plain white captain’s shirt, blue vest, trousers, and boots. The shirt and vest had needed some alteration to accommodate her thayan dragonfly wings on her back. But like she told me once, that’s the challenge of having thayan ancestry in a human world. Most clothes fit fine, provided there were some adjustments made for wings.

I pressed my lips in a tight line, then looked at the ‘medicine’ I’d brewed with a sigh.

“You know,” Elara said softly, interlacing her hands in her lap. “I’m just a ship’s captain, and certainly no surgeon or alchemist. But I don’t think you can drink that medicine by scowling at it, Pedro.”

“It’s vile, querida,” I admitted. “When I drink it, I feel something inside me, tense and twist, almost into a knot.” I took a frustrated breath. “Then there’s the taste. I know I have to drink this to keep my ‘affliction’ under control, but still…”

“Asa mvur, you know it’s necessary,” she replied with a sympathetic look.

I rubbed my eyes while I clenched my jaw. There wasn’t any good answer. She was right.

She clasped her hands, then shrugged.

“So, Durner and Skaldi finished building the part from the Codex page?” Elara asked. It was an obvious attempt to get my mind off the elixir, but I appreciated the effort.

“Yes.” I pursed my lips, while I turned to face her, and not the bottle. “It’s turnscrews, and part of a gearbox for a pump system. Not nearly large enough for a bilge pump, and a little too large to use in brewing. But, I could make it work if I had to. They’re convinced the pump is used to drain something, and I agree with them.”

“Drain what?”

I shook my head.

“No idea, querida. But considering what has come from that Codex so far? I feel it’s nothing good.”

Silence filled the cabin, broken only by the distant sounds of waves lapping against the hull, and the crew on deck. I returned to my vigil, staring at the bottle. My own war of wills.

Finally, Elara walked over behind me to put her hands on my shoulders. When I didn’t move, she reached over to collect the potion, then put it in my hands.

“Asa mvur,” she said softly. ”Once upon a time, you helped me survive a bloody, mud-soaked massacre. You had every reason not to, but you did it anyway.”

Elara tapped the cork on the bottle.

“So, take the medicine, even if it tastes bad.” She patted my shoulder. “We all need you alive.”

She paused for two heartbeats, then took a slow breath.

“I need you alive.”

Then she gave my shoulder a gentle squeeze.

“The longboat drops in a few minutes, so we can put ashore in Port Royal to visit that horrible hag of yours.”

I sat still, long after Elara had left. Her words stirred old, painful memories that I tried to blink away. I could almost feel the blood-soaked mud on my hands, and smell the powder shot from that day.

A spark of green flame on the back of my hand caught my attention. I scowled at it.

“Enough. I get the point.”

The tiny flame vanished in a puff of smoke the moment I pulled the cork, and downed the syrupy liquid in one swallow. I coughed and clenched my right hand tight. After a second, I reached for the pen and my notebook.

Letting it set didn’t help. Now it tastes like toad sweat and despair. Remember to ask Lyra Valtor if I can add some mint…

I stuffed the notebook into my shoulder bag, then headed out the door with it, and my gray long coat. A sleepy Sebastian followed right behind me. With any luck, the visit to Morowen Waxbend would be uneventful.

Nothing could have been further from the truth.

The short trip to put ashore at Port Royal was calm and forgettable. Visiting Morowen Waxbend was anything but that.

“Elara! Behind you!” I snapped.

Three Death Whispers rushed in behind us through Morowen’s front door. One of the ghoul-like fiends grabbed me by the shirt, then hurled me across a nearby table. I slammed into a window frame, then collapsed to the floor. Pain throbbed along my back while carved wooden figures rained on me from the shelf overhead. Sebastian barked, then spit tar at the fiend.

Elara stepped back, snatching her ghost blade free of its scabbard. A blue-white aura and hum chased the sword as she parried a slice from a Death Whisper.

“Where did they come from?” she yelled over the shrieking fiends. “I don’t see any books flying around.”

“No idea,” I replied while I scrambled to my feet, despite bruises. “The woods? Nearby warehouses?”

The fiend that threw me rushed forward, ready to cut me apart. I snatched up a thick wooden chair and shoved it in front of me like a shield. The creature’s cutlass slammed down, splintering the chair instead of my shoulder. Wood shards flew everywhere.

I shoved, knocking the cutlass to one side, then pummeled the Death Whisper with the chair. The wood splintered into kindling, but the creature barely noticed. Sebastian splattered tar spit across its face.

The Death Whisper backed away a few steps, then let out an ear-splitting shriek of rage. Eyes burning, its mouth stretched into a warped mockery of a human mouth complete with sharp, jagged teeth.

I hurled the ruined chair at it, but the creature batted it away like it was nothing. Wooden pieces tumbled in all directions across the floor.

Suddenly, lightning ripped the air with a peal of thunder, like a cannon. Bright bolts leaped from the far side of the room and speared the Death Whispers with a sharp sizzle. The three fiends convulsed, impaled on the lightning, while bits of their rotten clothing and withered bodies burned away.

Elara and I retreated while the lightning did its dire work. A short woman, barely five foot two, stalked across the living room toward the creatures. It was Morowen Waxbend. Her nailed boots added a percussion to the thunder, while more lighting jolted from her outstretched sea-blue hands.

“They’re Death Whispers,” she snarled. Solid black shark eyes scowled at the fiends. “They could’ve been made anywhere. Get ready.”

The sea hag sneered at the Death Whispers, almost bearing rows of sharp teeth at them.

“This won’t wreck ‘em, but it’ll burn some of the fight out of ‘em.” She tossed another blast of lighting as she gave a tiny shrug. “Also, they’ll be mad enough to chew nails.”

Elara squared off against the fiend near the door, then nodded. I jerked my sword loose from its scabbard as green flames exploded to life around my right hand. Morowen arched an eyebrow at the flames before her eyes flicked to mine.

“Oh, well, don’t we have a lot to talk about?” the sea hag rasped. “Wreck these, and we’ll have tea.”

Morowen slapped her hands together in front of her. A thunderclap to shake a ship threw the Death Whispers against the walls. Elara didn’t waste time tearing into the nearest fiend with a vengeance. Her ghost blade a glowing hum of death.

The second Death Whisper moved to join its partner, but Morowen blocked its path. She was a grinning bundle of merry murder, wrapped in a cheerful, sky blue calico dress. A charcoal vest was riddled with gardening tools she brandished like an assassin.

Morowen tackled the fiend, knocking it, and her, outside the house. Ominous snipping and stabbing sounds followed. I didn’t dare look.

Besides, I was already busy.

Once the lightning vanished, the last Death Whisper spun to face me and shrieked again. Its eye sockets blazed with burning blue flames of hate. The ghoul-like fiend closed the gap between us in a blur. Sebastian spit tar at it, but missed.

It attacked with a hot vengeance, cutting and slashing, but wary of my burning right hand. The fiend was relentless, its attacks getting faster than my eyes could follow. After each thrust or cut, the thing madly grasped at my shoulder bag. Each time, I danced out of reach, but I was getting tired.

“You will not get my notes,” I growled.

I quickly put a small breakfast table between myself and the Death Whisper. When it lunged at me, I shoved the table forward and pinned the fiend hard against the wall. It shoved back, but I had already moved. The table flew end over end across the room until a bookshelf gave its life to stop it.

After a step to the side, I dove right for the Death Whisper. I slammed my burning fist, sword and all, into the fiend’s ribs. It hammered a bony fist across my face. Stars exploded in my vision, but I kept punching. So did the Death Whisper.

Time was a bloody blur, mixed with shrieks and the feeling of hitting a bloated fish. Then I heard something snap in the creature. An odd wet sensation slid along my right hand, followed by a brief dizzy spell.

Suddenly, the Death Whisper exploded in a cloud of burned paper and cobalt blue lightning. A mist of black blood ink decorated the floor, my once white shirt, and gray coat. The green fire sizzled happily as I rubbed the side of my head.

A shriek from behind, and a bark from Sebastian, yanked at my attention.

“Elara!” I exclaimed, and turned for a fight. But she had it all well in hand.

Near the front door, Elara had taken flight to better avoid the Death Whisper’s attack. I watched while she flew to the left, then slammed her ghost blade into the fiend twice. On the second stab, the creature exploded like the one from the bookshop.

The room went as silent as a tomb. Elara and I swapped a nervous glance, then looked to the front door at the sound of boots on the footpath outside.

Morowen Waxbend stalked inside carrying a Death Whisper’s cutlass that trailed smoke. Black blood ink was smeared in a desperate streak across her calico dress. She hung the cutlass by the front door next to two parasols, then turned to face us, arms crossed.

“Now then,” she said, jaw tight. “Someone grab those burnt papers fluttering around so I can ruin them. A ghost blade wrecks a Whisper, but the damn things sometimes reform. Then, we’ll have tea, and discuss a few things.”

The sea hag fixed me with a hard glare that made me fidget.

“Such as, why those things were in my own home after all these decades? Or how,” she jabbed a sea-blue finger toward the green flames on my hand, “you wound up with that, Pedro? Let me guess, it has to do with a certain damn book called the Codex Luminari, doesn’t it?”

I swapped a glance with Elara, then winced at Morowen.

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Hoist the Colors is a work of pure, unabashed fiction. Actually, when it's not swinging off the rigging, or shivering some timbers, it's rather shy and retiring. Did I mention it enjoys baking? Names of characters, places, events, organizations and locations are all creations of the author’s imagination for this fictitious setting. So he really is all to blame here.

Any resemblance to persons living, dead, shoved overboard, or reanimated is coincidental. The opinions expressed are those of the characters and should not be confused with the author's, since the characters and the author tend to disagree a lot.