06 The Huntmaster

by Rick Dean

Rated: 13+ · Chapter · History · #2361208

A legendary pirate captain cursed to sail the sea beyond death seeking revenge - and ale!

The Huntmaster

“And that, friends, was the last anyone ever heard of poor Will Dover.”

Some of the men groaned, some laughed. A couple younger lads peeked over their shoulders into the jungle beyond the beach. Konrad stood and threw some more driftwood onto the fire. It kept away the incessant swarms of midges, mosquitoes, gnats and other assaulting insects. Alas, it did little to combat the sand fleas.

Captain Scarlett walked towards the fire, lowered a square of cloth, and sat down. He raised his flask and the men toasted him. He searched the clear night sky, seeking out the five planets. Mercury had already set, but he spotted Saturn, Venus, Jupiter, and Mars. Like any good seafaring man, he paid silent tribute to the ancient gods before he began.

“Lads,” he began, “have ye heard of the Huntmaster?”

Most looked, wide eyed, that the captain would share their fire. One grizzled man nodded, the scar on his cheek rippling in the firelight.

“Konrad,” Scarlett turned, “I promised ye last time I would have a drink with you lads. You may have forgotten, but I hadn’t.”

He turned back to the crew, “you men may not know it but Konrad here has lived through much. He may not have any hair on his balls yet but he’s a survivor. He was a boy on a merchant ship when it capsized and he lived by clinging to a barrel of sea biscuits. He’s a tough son of a bitch, that one, and here’s to him!”

Konrad's face flushed, and no longer from the brandy, as the men toasted him.

Scarlett raised his flask again. “Now a toast to all my crew. Without you men I’m sailing nowhere and not even fast.”

The men toasted again, their quiet rumbling showing genuine appreciation that The Captain would make time for them.

“Now then. Since we’re telling tales… The Huntmaster. That’s not his real name of course. His tale goes way back to when I was a mere lad, little more than a cabin boy…

Back then, men knew the real meaning of fear. The Huntmaster had no pretenses. He never pretended to be a privateer. He flew the black flag, and embraced the horrible word pirate. Nary a flag on earth flew whose ships were safe from him. Nor did he bother with any phony papers to feign legitimacy. Back then, Europe may have had temporary peace but true tyrants of hell ruled the high seas. I know. For I sailed with him.

It feels like a lifetime ago. We plundered anything that dared leave port. From Newport to Barbados and all the way around the horn to St. Mary's ▶︎ ; we spared no ship. The Huntmaster knew every trick in the book. Most of the time, when he hoisted the black flag, the merchant would heave-to. They knew when The Huntmaster raised the red he would give no quarter, but instead slaughter every last man. The merchant would lose their cargo regardless, but if they fought back things went hard. The harder the merchant resisted, the more ruthless The Huntmaster would retaliate. Many a good man felt his life’s blood leak down The Huntmaster’s cutlass.

Well, the one night we pulled up on this little sloop out of Virginia somewhere. Maybe Williamsburg? Doesn't matter. The sloop tried to run but we were faster, and after a couple shots from our four pounders, she heaved-to and lowered her sails. I still remember, she had a cargo of seasoned timber, a couple hogsheads of tobacco, and a butt ▶︎ of pork. The pork was fit only for slaves, but we’d been at sea so long that it felt like eating high on the hog.

Anyway, you could tell from the scowls on the crews faces that the sloops captain was a right bastard. Two of the men volunteered to join us rather than put up with him anymore. The rest seemed to fear their captain even more than The Huntmaster. For all those reasons, I expected The Huntmaster to keep the sloop as well as her cargo, and send the captain down to visit Davey Jones. They wouldn’t be the first crew to feel the wrath of The Huntmaster. Yet for some reason, he didn’t. He spared that captain. They had a quiet conversation that none overheard and whatever secret that captain shared, it spared him his life. Only The Huntmaster knew that secret, and he'd have taken it to his grave if only he had one..

None of us thought much of the sloop; just another target. We ate its pork and sailed into Charles Town where The Huntmaster knew a warehouse with a crew of dockers and longshoremen who would unload the remaining cargo and sell it without any questions. He’d worked with them several times before; yet this time felt different.

The sloop we’d captured never arrived in Charles Town, but the men we’d spared did. They did, but not their captain. I reckon they’d had their fill of him and fed him to the sharks. For that other captain's death, The Huntmaster found himself accused – wrongly – of murder. The governors’ men dug a pit for a cell and stuck him in there to rot. The Huntmaster would stay in that pit until he died or until he swung from the gallows. The same gallows would later claim Stede Bonnet ▶︎ , the bloody fool. Despite all the things he did, The Huntmaster stood before justice for someone else’s murder.

The days passed and The Huntmaster grew weaker. I don’t need to say how miserable Charles Town is during the summer months. The sun beat down, burning and blistering his skin. The mosquitoes feasted upon his flesh. The pit held brackish water at the bottom – too salty to drink but not too much for all the insects of the mangrove swamp. His tongue swelled to the point where he could no longer speak.

As for his crew, most of them died fast in Charles Town’s gallows. The hangman set the knot to the side and gave them a long drop, snapping their necks and killing them fast. On the other hand, they left the Huntmaster to die slow. Me? They spared me, because of my youth. I couldn’t have been more than twelve, and looked even younger yet. The town spared a couple others as well, but most met their end in the Carolina swamp. They tried to house me with a couple who lived in town and hoped to change my evil ways. They’d lost their child to the bite of a copperhead, and I gave them a second chance. They meant well but I already knew I would spend my life at sea, so I didn’t stay long.

One man – I never learned who – remained loyal to The Huntmaster. The man couldn’t free him but he brought him ale in the night. The ale kept him alive. Whenever his tongue loosened from the drink enough that he could speak, The Huntmaster cursed all who crossed him. We could hear the curses from the pit. Vile, unspeakable promises. My spine shivers even now just thinking of them. Every last man who ever crossed him would die unspeakable deaths. The Huntmaster promised that even death would not save the ones who betrayed him.

Well, the summer dragged on, and the days turned into weeks and still The Huntmaster wasted away in that pit. His clothes rotted. We could see his ribs and even his hipbones pointing out if we looked down into the pit. Then at last, one day he died. The governors’ men dragged his corpse out of the pit. Flies had already gone to work on him – probably before he even died. Such a sad sight, a giant of a man, fearsome, yet reduced to this bag of wasted filth.

They prepped his body for an unmarked chunk of clay out in the pauper’s field. Yet somehow before anyone could bury him, the body disappeared. No one saw or heard anything. No one knew what happened. Word got around that he’d come back from the dead to dispatch the revenge he’d promised. Within days, the remaining men from the sloop all died. None could figure out how. One at a time, their bodies were found lying in the street, unmarked, yet with the chill of death seeped into their bones.

The men of his own sloop came next. He spared me, and he spared the man who gave him ale as well. The rest, he figured, must have conspired in his betrayal. All of them, from the quartermaster on down, they all met the same end. People noticed one common theme to all the deaths. They found each body with an empty ale-mug upside down upon its chest. The same ale that had kept him alive for so long now marked his victims from beyond the grave.

The night after the last man died, The Huntmaster's sloop disappeared. No men from Charles Town went missing with the ship. It had no crew that anyone could identify; just a dead man on a ghost ship. He’d emerged from the bowels of hell and now sailed the high seas. For years, sailors would report seeing this ghost ship, sailed only by a captain with a mug of ale in his hand. Any in his path who crossed him, he slew. Those who did not hinder him found casks of ale in their holds.

This was his quest now. Ale had restored him and he would bring ale to the free people. He now protects those who fight against King and Crown – no matter whose crown that may be. The Legends speak of his name with honour and fame.

Captain Scarlett then looked around the fire and finished, “so to you, my friends, I raise one last toast. To The Huntmaster!”

The men cheered the tale and drank their fill. Then Scarlett added in a ghastly snarl, “and should any of you dare cross me, I swear upon all that his holy and unholy alike, you’ll face a far worse fate than any ever dealt by The Huntmaster.”

WORD COUNT ▶︎

VIDEO ▶︎

LYRICS ▶︎

Writing.Com, its affiliates and syndicates have been granted non-exclusive rights to display this work.