LOST SOUL

I nuzzled my face into the darkness of her bosom. Her tender skin, felt like warmth of the sun on a beautiful summers day. There was a light fragrance to it as well, that of the morning sea air. She abruptly pushed her self away from me. With ease she escaped from my embrace even tho I struggled to keep her near to me.

As she ran away down a white sandy beach, her voice came to me in a whisper. It was like I could feel the breath of her words on my skin, as tho she was standing beside me. “Take care my love for soon we shall be together forever.”

I began to ran after the figure of her escaping down the beach. I wanted to catch her and never let her go. The more I ran towards her tho, the more the distance seemed to grow between us. I tired calling to her but she took no notice to me. Then came the sound of knocking as if far away. Stopping,I looked to my left and saw a very large crab standing in the distance. It was knocking a massively deformed claw against a door. A door that seemed to be standing on it's own in the sand. As the sound of the knocking came again, this time much closer, it awoke me out of the dream I was having. I sat up in bed and shook my head. the last of the dream slipped away. The woman in those fleeting images, made my hart sink. Every time I dreamed of her she always ended up out of my reach.

Then the sound of knocking came again. This time I realized it was some one knocking on my bedroom door. I got up and went to see who it was. On my way, I coughed up a huge wade of blood specked phlegm and spat it into a rag I always carried around with me.

“What the fuck a duck do you want.”, I said roughly.

Standing in the doorway was the captain's effeminate cabin boy. The wear and tare of life on the sea and the constant physical and sexual abuse from the other men had left him pale and pasty. It had striped away any of his boy hood charm leaving him much older looking then his seventeen years of age. A timid creature with soulless eyes.

“Capin told me to come get you, we got to ship out today.”, he said meekly.

I stood there staring at him with the evilest look I could muster. My voice filled with hatred. “What the fuck do I care what mister fancy pants wants. For all I fucking care, he can go buy himself another man to do the job. I'm tired of his ways. Fuck a fucking rock I'm to old and sick for this shit.”

The little maggot shifted his wight from foot to foot, like he had to take a piss. “Capin said if you didn't want to come that I was to say, he still had the bill of sale and you were his till you payed off you debt to your kingdom.”

My anger raised at the thought of that fat pig of a man, gloating over this little maggot of a boy. I could almost see the evil glint in his eye and that self riotous smug smile of his, as he told him what to say to me. It made me want to scream, Instead I broke out into a fit of coughing. I hacked up another bloody wad of phlegm,this I spat at the boys feet. “Get out! Tell your fat fuck stool of a captain that I will be there sooner or later.”

With a little whimper the boy scrambled out of my door and down the hall. I slowly got dressed and took my time packing my meager belongs into my one and only sac. Flinging the sac over my shoulder, I coughed out another chunk of phlegm. The crimson red flecks were unmistakable. I sighed and shrugged it off. Taking one last look around the tiny room, I walked out and shut the door behind me. When I went downstairs to return my key, the pretty daughter of the hotel keep was sitting behind the counter

“Mista Shanks, what ya be doing up so early? Ma tolled me not ta wake ya till evening.” She said as she batted her eyes and smiled at me.

“Sorry May. But looks like I wont be needing the room any more. My fart sucking, ass munch of a boss wants to go on another one of his silly quests.” ,I said trying to act causal.

“ Aww that's to bad mista Shanks. I kind liked having you around the place.” She batted her eyes at me again and I smiled back at her with the nicest smile I could muster.

I didn't have the hart to tell her this felt like last time I would ever see her again, so I simply waved goodbye and walked out the door. As I walked down to the pier of the port town, the ship I had been basically imprisoned on came into view. She was a squalid looking thing. With some effort tho, she did clean up nice. She could end up looking as pretty as a thistle. Her name was The Rose Of The Sea and she had been my home for years now. Since becoming part of her crew, I had grown to lover her and hate her at the same time. Most of our time we were out on the seas. Traveling form one creepy local to another. We were sent places, by collectors, to find hidden secrets and magical items. Any other items we found along the way we would keep for our selves and would sell to the highest bidder back on land. The captain loved to make as much profit as we could off a voyage. We had only been at port a few days before the captains butt buddy Percy came to get me. I had spent the days sleeping off the drink, the nights I had spent tomcating around the towns bawdy house's. When I dragged my rum soaked head in to sleep, it was nice to be able to share banter with the pretty lass May.

I boarded the ship and went to stow my sac under my bunk. I found the ship mostly empty, tho I did see Percy slip off into a corner. I then went to find Captain Smilt. I did not like him at all, even his name to me stank of filth. He was ; miserable, opinionated, smelly, fat and just a all around bastard. He may once have been a fairly wealthy man. He claimed to be a bastard son of a king in some backwoods kingdom. What ever his past may have been, he was not as wealthy as he once was. All he seemed to own now was The Rose Of The Sea and was such a cheep bastard that he bought his ship's crew out of the debtors slave market.

It was in those slave markets that Smilt had found me. I was expected to sail with him for another two years before my debt would finally be payed off and I would be a free man again. Tho I knew I would never make it through those next two years alive. Something was eating away at my insides it was making me very sick. As my illness had grown I had made my peace with death and I now gladly waited for my judgment day. For I knew on that day at the end of the path I would be in the loving embrace of the woman in my dreams.

I found Smilt sitting in his cabin, going over the details of the voyage, with a strangely dressed fellow. I began yelling the moment I opened the door. “Smilt you fat fuck stick! What the fuck, do you think you were doing sending Percy for me? You knew I still had thee days leave left.”

“Calm down shank. You know the rules. Your a prison sailor. What ever I say goes until your done paying back your debt. Now shut the fuck up and sit down. You worthless pile of debt dodging dung. Let this fine gentleman here finish telling me the details of our next voyage.” He nodded to the man to continue.

I took a seat in a chair. The man cleared his throat and gave me a quick snide grin and continued his conversation with Smilt. “As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted my employer has requested that you bring the book back here in one mouths time or the contract is void. If the book is damage the contract is void....”

While the two men finished talking, I sat daydreaming trying to recapture images of the woman from my dreams . Her beauty was so exotic to me. At the same time she seemed so very familiar. Lost in my own thoughts I barely noticed when the man left.

Trying to sound interested but not really caring, I asked Smilt about the book and a smile broke out onto his face. “Well it's called The Book of the Gray old ones. It is a magical book that grants wonderful powers to any one who will learn its secrets.”

Trying to sound impressed I asked, “ And where do we find this Book of the Gray old ones?”

His voice went quieter and he leaned forward like he was telling a secret, “Well heres the thing Shanks, it's on the Island of the dead.”

I almost fell out of my chair when he said that. That was the last place I wanted to go. “The Island of the dead? you got be kidding me? You do know, that no one who ever has come back from that place, has come back sane?”

Leaning back in his chair, resting one leg over its arm he said, “That's why I have you Shanks. With your keen sense for danger, we are sure to pull it off.”

All I could do was stare for a moment in disbelief. Then I said “For the fuck of a flying dog. I don't want to go Smilt! I'm tired! and you know as well as I do that I'm dying. You wont tell me you haven't noticed. I rather die peacefully, in a warm bed. I don't want to die on some god forsaken dead island. No one even knows how to get there for sure anyway. Any one who has come back, hasn't been sane enough to give directions.”

He smiled once again “But what you and every one else don't know is that I know the directions to the island of the dead. I have known them for a very long time. What I didn't have up till now was the map. Soon as we get to the island, it is as simple as following the dotted line through the graves. It will lead us strait to the right one. I'm even told this map is very special. That it is made from the skin of one of the Gray old ones”

For a long time I kept trying to argue with him, to find my self some sort of way out, but it was hard to find one. Smilt had a excess for every thing and when he didn't he would play the debtors card. Finally I broke him down and we came to a understanding. I would agree to give formal protest to our voyage, but to sail along anyway with out any hassle and Smilt agreed that once the job was done, to finally set me free from my bond and be rid of me. happy with our agreement we gathered the rest of the crew. That afternoon we began our voyage for the Island of the dead. There was a fine wind in our sails and not a cloud in the sky. Some where on that god forsaken island was a magick book we were being sent to find. But at that moment I didn't give fuck about the book or the man who was supposed to be buried with it. Or his skin that had become the map to his final resting place. All I cared about at that moment was the warm sun and the cool breeze.

The voyage to the island wasn't supposed to be very long. From the sounds of it, this trip was something Smilt had been planning for a long time. We had sailed on many longer voyages then we planed on sailing in this one. On one such voyage, we lost half the crew and the ship was almost destroyed. When us that remained alive got back to land, we drank to honer our dead shipmates and to to every sailor lost at sea.

To kill time, I spent as much of it as I could on deck being master of the watch. As the captain would steer from the helm, I kept the rest of the ship working like clock work. During the day I would do any mind numbing chore I could find. Anything at all to take my mind off the endless pain in my gut. What ever was eating away at me, wanted to be done with me soon. In the evenings, when I would finally relax some. I would pass the time, playing cards with a couple other sailors. We would gamble and drink till We stumbled to out bunks and pass out. You wanted to be stinking drunk when you went to pass out on your bunch. Sleeping next to all those other unwashed and smelly men was a horrid experience. All the sounds of snoring and farting was enough to drive a man mad. on the night before we reached the island, I had spent my evening sitting up in the crows nest watching the night sky. In the moment a shooting star shot across the night sky I came to a realization. Our time on this earthly realm was no more longer then that shooting star was. also that I lacked any hope of expecting to live though this adventure.

The next day we anchored in a sheltered cove on the edge of the Island of The Dead. Even before we left the ship Smilt began pulling his tricks . He started to complain of pain from some old war wound and he was unable to join us on the map quest. Not very surprised with this, I quickly agreed when he suggested I take three men and follow the map to find the book. once ashore we found that the route marked out on the map began at the same cove we had anchored in. The first thing marked on the map was the old wooden dock we found when we rowed to shore. Following the map was to be pretty simple. It began by following a overgrown foot path through some dense jungle. This was not that hard to travel along, due to being able to make out the path fairly easily.

It took a while but we coasted though it until we reached a very high wooden log and iron fence. Stretching out of sight to the left and right through the jungle. It was over grown with crawling vines and exotic looking flowers. We stopped for a moments rest so I took a close look at the fence and found strange markings engraved on the logs. were the path met the fence their was a gate broken off it hinges and thrown off to the side twisted and broken. It looked like something had wanted in or out real bad. Once in side the fenced in area we found that most of the jungle had been cleared away and in its place were thousand and thousands of tombs crypts and head stones. Many were damaged,most looked very very old. What few trees were left standing were dead or very sickly looking. It was as if all the death was slowly being sucked up by the trees.

As we began to make our way through the many graves we had to stop more and more to check the map. We twisted and turned deeper and deeper into the grave yard. The atmosphere around us became creepier and creepier until it felt like the spirits of the dead were at any moment going to spring out and use some sort of hoodoo on you. It was so strong that before long I begin fearing for my life but I tired to stay brave for the men with me. A long time passed and nothing happened until as we rounded a corner entering a small wooden lot. The tress were old looking and covered with vines. As we entered, it quickly became to dark to see. We were forced to stop to light torches. As the light flared from our torches into life, the man standing next to me was snatched up screaming into the branches of the trees. Only his torched remand. After a panicked moment of not knowing who or what had attacked us ,the mans screams died away.That's when his body crashed down through the tree branches to land beside us half eaten.

Scared wit less, we ran away from there regretting leaving our shipmate but fearing for our own lives much more. We ran on until we were out of breath and it felt safe enough to stop. Even tho the atmosphere around us was as dark and gloomy as ever we took a few moments to rest and try catch our wits. With no help of that happening, we consulted the map and continued on. We followed the directions and the path till we came to a spot were we had to go under ground into a dark tomb on the edge of a small lake. The lake was to large to walk round so the only option was to continue following the map. Neither of the other two men would go first so I took the lead. As we entered we began to find arrows painted on the wall corresponding to the path on the map, appearing to mark the way through the passages. We passed a room full of open coffin with their contents grimly spilling out on to the floor. A shadow sprang out of one of the open coffins and became a solid black mass. This shadow monster latched onto one of the men with me and dragged him kicking and screaming off into the dark of another room.

In the glare of our torches we could see nothing. A second later he fell silent. With no hope of saving him, me and the other surviving man ran through the dark corridors. Following the arrows until we escaped back into the night air and even then we moved away from there quickly. When I next checked the map I noticed that where the other two men had died a strange symbol had appeared. Marking the spot like each man's life had become a sacrifice to some unknown god .

It was very apparent at this point that it was to be every man for him self. Tho I did not wish ill will on the man with me, I knew that when it came down to it, I would leave him to his fate like we both had with the others. He probably thought the same thing of me, tho neither one of us said any of this. Their wasn't much to say at this point we just had to push on. It had gone dark long ago and our torches were almost burnt out. We were passing a fairly large tomb stone when with out any warning a huge leathery beast jumped out from behind it and attacked and mauled the other man to death. In a flash, the beast had the mans throat ripped out with his mouth of razor teeth. All I could do was scream and throw my dyeing torch at and run. I ran and I ran. I ran until my sides hurt and it felt like I was breathing fire.

When I finally got control of my self, I checked the map by what moon light there was and found myself to be just outside the center of the island and the ending of my quest. Soon I would find the horrid book and be off of that forsaken island. Here the trees grew more lively. They grew so closely together that they blocked out all the light. It became so dark that with out my torch, I had to slow my pace to a crawl. With my hands stretched out in front of me to ward of any dangers i stumbled my way through the dark. It was some of the most terrifying moments of my life and nothing happened. Just the anticipation of a attack, drove me mad. Soon I began to see a faint glimmer of light in front of me. I came out of the pitch black of the tree cover, into the lite of the night sky. I found my self in a clearing. It was shrouded on all sides by the thick bit of forest that I had just walked though, toped off wit a amazingly lite star filled sky.

In the center of the clearing, glimmering with almost it's own light, was a large evil looking sarcophagus. It appeared to be made out of a white stone. From this distance it was a massive thing. Close up, it would be over the hight of a man. At the end of it, farthest from me, was a large Colum that ended at a point. At the other end was a stone slab alter, about chest hight with something laying on top of it. When I went to examine the alter, I found the book. On the alter as well as the sarcophagus were engravings of stang symbols. Some were like those on the map. All looked freshly carved, even tho they probably had been there for a very long time.

The cursed book that I had been sent there to find was horrid. It made me sick to even look at it. The cover of the book appeared to be the skin of some ones face. I could only imagine that it was the same man who's skin went into making the map. The rest of the book looked to be covered in the rest of his skin. At that point I did not care what happened to me. I had the book and all I had to then was leave the island and this nightmare would be behind me. Once I picked up the book, every thing changed. I was instantly transported out of my body and into some dark and lonely place. I could feel some one near to me but I could not see who it was. When I called out no voice spoke back. What did happen, was suddenly before my eyes. My life began to be played back to me, as if it was a movie, projected onto some sort of screen. Beginning from the moment I touched the book, right back to the moment I was conceived. When that moment was reached the screen blinked out of existence. I then suddenly felt like I was being transported somewhere very quickly. I could feel air whooshing around me.

When it felt like I had stopped, a voice began to speak. Out of the darkness, it began to explain to me the mysteries of the universe. When it was done this, it began to answer any and all questions I ever had about life until my mind was satisfied. I must have been alone in the dark with that voice for a very long time. When it was all done I was quickly sent back to into my body. I found my self standing with the book cradled in my arms. When my vision focused back into the reality around me, I became aware that Smilt of all people, was standing in front of me pointing a pistol

With tears streaming down my face, I held the book out in front of me. Like it was some glorious object. “Smilt! May the wonder have mercy on your soul! How did you get here?”

He waved the gun at me. “That does not matter, what matters Shanks good buddy, is that book. I want you to hand it over to me.”

I hold up the book as if it was some holy relic. “Oh this thing? You wont believe what this thing has shown me Smilt!”

His voiced raised in anger and he cocked his pistol. “I know exactly what I know and I know you need to be handing me that book. Or I will put a bullet in your scull!”

“Ok, OK, the book is yours.” I drop the book to the ground and stepped back.

All I see next is the flash from Smilt's gun. Then their was a bright flash of pain in my chest and I began to have to struggle to catch my breath. I was quickly over come and I fell to my knees, then on to my back. When Smilt next came into my field of vision, he was framed by a background of billions of stars all slowly dimming out.

He leaned down close to me and said, “What ever the book may have shown you is a tiny faction of what it will teach me. But their could only be one and I am it.

I whispered back with what little breath I could muster. “You promised I was a free man when this job was done. You promised to set me free! You fat fuck!”

He placed his hand on my chest and said, “Oh but I did my friend, I did.”

Finished saying what he had to say, Smilt walked away. I could hear his boots crunch in the gravel until they faded off in into the distance. As the last of the stars also fade out of existence, I am not worried. I am calm and happy. Soon I will be in the arms of the woman from my dreams and then I shall be finely free.