Alek sat on the deck, dangling his legs over the side of the ship, watching and waiting for the moment that chapel would raise itself from the sea. Ivan sat on the deck as he and Jean scrubbed the blood from the deck. They’d removed the body, dragged it over to the edge of the ship, and let it sink beneath the calm, dark sea.
“I saw something down there.” Jean whispered to Ivan, his hand stained with the blood of a man they’d once dined and shared tales with. Ivan glanced at him but didn’t respond. He dipped his rag into the bucket between them, the blood-tinged water lapping at his fingers as he wringed the rag and went back to scrubbing at the deck.
Jean reached out and grabbed his arm with freshly bandaged hands, stopping him. His single eye stared intently into Ivan’s. “I saw something.” He said again. “Something moved in the water, just beneath us. You must convince him to leave this place.”
“He won’t listen to me.” Ivan said, jerking his arm away. He scrubbed at the deck more vigorously than he probably needed to, skirting the edge of the mast that still laid in the middle of the deck, an annoying hazard they now had to traverse. “I’ve tried. He won’t…” He huffed an annoyed breath.
“He must.” Jean insisted. “You knew him before he was our captain. You must know how to get through to him.”
Ivan recalled the way Alek had been all those years ago, bright-eyed and eager for adventure. His claims to one day become an infamous pirate just as the famed Blackheart had been had once been laughable. Now, he feared it would doom them all. Still, it’d been enough to convince Ivan to leave behind his noble roots, to stow away on a merchant’s ship and set out on what could very well be an ill-fated adventure.
“It’s something with that skull.” Ivan found himself saying. “I don’t know. Maybe it really is cursed, but Alek isn’t acting like himself.”
“You must make him see reason. For all our sakes.”
Ivan sighed. “I can try.”
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By the time he’d worked out what to say, dusk was only an hour away. Ivan carried a bowl of lamb stew as he walked up the steps to their captain who had still not moved from the helm, his legs still dangling over the edge. “I thought you might want something to eat.” Ivan began, sitting down beside him. He thought of dangling his legs over as well, but Jean’s insistence of something being in the water kept his legs safely stretched against the wood of the deck.
“How can I eat” Alek asked, still staring at that cross, “when it is right there?”
Ivan stared at the cross, noting how the water had not moved an inch. Nothing indicated the chapel would rise at dusk. Perhaps it wouldn’t, and they could all go home. “This place makes me think of the first town we arrived in.” Ivan said conversationally. “Do you remember? My father somehow figured out where we were and sent men after us. We had to hide out in a small chapel just like this one.” Alek didn’t reply, but he slid his eyes away from the chapel. “There was only room enough for one of us in that back closet, and you kept your back against that door, willing to risk your life to keep him from me. We’d barely known each other six months at that point.”
“Your father was an asshole.” Alek finally said, picking up the stew. “You’d be better off dead than back with him.”
“Doesn’t mean I want to die out here.” Ivan dared to say. “Something feels off about this place. Jean says he saw something swimming beneath the ship.”
“He’s paranoid and superstitious.” Alek said, chewing on a piece of lamb. His eyes glittered in the fading sunlight. “I won’t let you die out here. You trust me, right?”
Ivan grimaced. “To the grave.” Famous last words, he thought to himself.
They said nothing else as they both watched that chapel. Dusk fell, and for a moment, a single, hopeful moment, nothing of interest happened. Their ship began to rock as the sea roiled beneath them, the inky black waters frothing around the chapel as it began to inexplicably rise out of the depths. Ivan and Alek both had to grasp the edge of the railing to keep from tumbling overboard as that chapel dumped buckets upon buckets of water back into the sea. Blackheart cackled beside them as the skull rolled away from them. Alek hastened to his feet to retrieve it, abandoning his half-eaten stew beside Ivan who could only stare in wonder at that great stone chapel covered in thick green moss. A remaining piece of a shattered stained-glass window sparkled with sea water. The whispers of a prayer rose on the air as if the sea had been filled with the ghosts of the past. Ivan hastened a glance down towards the rest of the deck and found Jean with the rest of their crew on their knees before the sight, Jean with his hands folded together, his voice rising with his prayers.
