🏝️ Chapter 6: The Grey Sea
The first few days aboard the Serpent's Kiss were a lesson in pure, unadulterated misery. My world shrank to the relentless, nauseating pitch and roll of the deck, the constant, damp chill that seeped into my bones, and the brutal economy of shipboard life.
I was Gully's slave, spending my waking hours in the sweltering galley, peeling, scrubbing, and hauling. My hands, already raw from the tavern, became a map of blisters and cuts. The crew, for the most part, ignored me. I was a ghost, a skivvy, beneath their notice. But I was watching. I learned their names, assigned to them by Tim in his gruff, offhand way.
There was "Silent Tom," a hulking brute who never spoke, his communication limited to grunts and gestures. "Red," a wiry man with a temper as fiery as his hair. "Old Man Finnigan," whose age was a mystery but whose knowledge of the sea was absolute. And then there was "The Professor," a lean, sharp-eyed man who was the ship's navigator and the only one besides Avery who could read. He watched me with a quiet, unnerving curiosity that made my skin crawl.
Harker kept his distance, but his presence was a constant, oppressive weight. He held no official rank, but he commanded a fearful respect. He would pace the deck, his eyes scanning the horizon not for other ships or weather, but for a specific, dreaded sail—that of Billy Bones.
It was on the fourth day, as we plunged into a vast expanse of featureless grey sea, that the mood on the ship began to curdle. The initial momentum of departure had faded, replaced by the monotonous grind of the voyage. The men grew restless, their suspicions festering in the close quarters.
The change began with Red. I was carrying a bucket of potato peelings to toss over the leeward side when he stepped into my path, his arms crossed.
"You," he sneered. "The landlord's boy. What's your real business aboard, eh? Harker's little pet."
I tried to sidestep him, my heart thudding. "I'm the cabin boy. I work."
"Aye, you work. But why are you here?" His voice rose, drawing the attention of others. "We all signed articles for a merchant run to the Carolinas. But we ain't on no course for the Carolinas, are we, Professor?"
The Professor, who was checking a line nearby, didn't look up. "The course is the captain's concern, Red."
"But it ain't, though, is it?" Red pressed, turning his anger on the navigator. "It's his concern." He jabbed a finger towards Harker, who had stopped his pacing and was watching us from near the mainmast, his expression dangerous. "He's the one with the secret chart. He's the one we're all dancing for. So I'll ask again, boy. What is this voyage really about?"
The crew had stopped their work now, forming a loose, menacing circle. I was trapped, the bucket heavy in my hands. I looked from Red's furious face to Harker's stony one. My orders were to be silent, to observe. But silence now felt like a death sentence.
"It's about a island," a voice rasped. It was Old Man Finnigan, emerging from the crowd. His milky eyes were fixed on me, but he spoke to the crew. "I've heard the whispers in the wind. I've seen the look in Harker's eye. It's the same look I saw on Flint's men, fifty years ago. He's hunting for the Ivory Isle."
A collective intake of breath went through the men. The name held power, a mythical, cursed weight.
"The Ivory Isle?" Red whispered, his anger replaced by a superstitious dread. "That's a ghost story. A death sentence."
"It's real," Harker's voice cut through the murmurs, calm and absolute. He walked forward, the crew parting for him like sea foam before a ship's prow. "And the boy is the key. He brought the chart from the last man who tried to keep it from Billy Bones. A man who got the black spot for his trouble." He stopped in front of Red, looming over him. "You signed articles for a share of the profits. The profit on this voyage will be greater than any cotton or tobacco run. It will make every man here a king. But the price is silence, and loyalty. Question my orders again," he said, his voice dropping to a lethal whisper, "and you'll learn what happens to mutineers."
Red paled, his bravado evaporating. He muttered an apology and shuffled back into the crowd. The confrontation was over, snuffed out by Harker's will.
But the damage was done. The secret was out, and the crew now looked at me not as a ghost, but as a thing of dark portent. As they dispersed, I felt their eyes on me—no longer indifferent, but filled with a new, complex mixture of fear, greed, and hostility.
That night, as I tried to sleep in my swaying hammock, the words of the men echoed in my mind. Ghost story. Death sentence. The gentle creaking of the ship no longer sounded like a lullaby, but like the groans of a wooden coffin. We were sailing into a legend, and I had just been named the prize. The grey sea outside was nothing compared to the chill that had settled in the heart of the ship, and in my own.