Sacrifices for the Deep

Brandy bottle in hand, Captain Visser swayed with the roll of the ship, eyes locked with the cherubic face on the canvas. From beneath golden curls the boy looked back, also moving with the toss of the waves, expression frozen in a serenely benevolent look. Given the circumstance the good captain considered the look condescending at best, malevolent at worst. Was that crest of red and gold above the hat brim meant to be a halo or the fires of Hell?

Little Hoitink, promoted from cabin boy to first mate on account of attrition, poked his head in after the briefest of knocks, “Jan is dead, sir.”

“Which one?” The captain asked the question without taking his eyes off the painting, not genuinely curious, or perhaps just beyond feeling.

“All three of them at this point, sir.”

A heavy sigh, “Who be left then, first mate?”

“Yourself, sir, myself, Bakker, Abspoel, Oomen, and the stowaway.”

A heavy draught from the bottle, “And their condition, good lad?”

“Puking, passed out, calling for his mother, and still refusing to talk.”

“Pheh!” Visser tried for a drink but finding the bottle empty chucked across the room. The ship took a heavy lurch that caused even the seasoned captain to stagger two steps to his right. The lad knocked his head on the door frame but valiantly made as if it were no pain.

“Can I get you anything, sir?” Hoitink managed to say through a grimace.

“Do we have anything, lad?”

“Don’t suppose so, sir, not what isn’t underwater in the hold.”

“Right, right,” he waved the young man away, “go tend to the men.”

A crack of lightning heralded the boy’s departure, resounding along with the cabin door being tugged shut. The captain hardly flinched as he side stepped back into position in front of the painting. The face on the canvas looked back at him with the same calm and untroubled look, bedecked in lace collar and roughly detailed tunic. The height of the waves nor the water in the hold gave him no trouble, tacked onto the wall with a dagger, a nail, and a small file jammed through the bottom corner to keep it unfurled. None of the events of the voyage could alter the child’s beatific countenance, not the forced departure on a Friday, not the rabbit found on day two, nor the fool greenhorn whistling on day three. Certainly, the carefully rendered bonnie lad could hold no ill will towards the stowaway, the unkempt and seemingly mad woman who was found cowering deep in the hold, clutching the painting.

The lamp mounted to his left sputtered and died, casting the room in half shadow, weakly illuminated by three remaining lamps, none of which shone as brightly as they ought. This was no surprise, as the whole journey had felt as though undertaken in half light. Hazy skies robbed the sun of its brilliance. Foggy nights snuffed out the stars and left the moon a smudge of pale silver. Perpetual mists had lingered about the ships and even seemingly in the men’s eyes, causing many of them to speak fearfully of the wittewijven and confess their sins to the sea.

Captain Visser regarded the painting closely, inching closer across the unsteady deck. The eyes, large and dark, gazed back upon him. The slight smile seemed at once to mock and beg forgiveness. The gentle cheeks and rounded chin bespoke a high birth and a well fed existence. Surely, the child had a name, perhaps something simple, something with a Van in it. Rogeveen. The captain decided the boy’s family name was Rogeveen, his mind half addled by the bottle of brandy and addled the rest of the way by the fate of his crew. A dozen dead by the end of the first week, accidents and old illnesses flared up. Another dozen by week two, stranger and stranger events, inscrutable diseases. By week three, they were dropping like flies, many simply jumping overboard to get it over with before they could succumb. 

Amidst the other creaking of the ship, the door to his cabin sang of its own opening then clattered against the wall, prompting the captain to ask without removing his gaze from the painting, “Yes, Hoitink, who is dead now?”

“All dead,” rasped an unfamiliar voice from the doorway. Eyes gone wide, Visser turned to see the stowaway lurking just outside the door, her ash white skin brilliant despite the heavy shadow of the corridor. Her face must have been turned towards the floor, as all he could see was a mass of dark, unruly hair. Her knees angled inward, and her shoulders sloped left to right with one arm dangling low at her side, the other contracted and twisted around her back.

“Madame,” barked the captain, “what is the meaning of this?”

Teetering and jerky, she crept into the room, “Nehalennia will have the boy. She swallows your ship to take him.”

“You, you stop right there! What madness is this?” As she continued to approach, the captain’s hand went to his waist, where his cutlass should have been but was not, cast aside to the shadows of the cabin in his stupor and melancholy.

“Sacrifices for the deep,” she croaked, inching closer, finally fully in what light there was in the cabin. In her hand dangled a thin dagger, dark liquid dripping from its tip.

“Stop your rambling and your step, foul wench. I’ve no desire to strike a woman but no compulsion against it either.”

As if launched by a spring the woman hurtled forward, the blade flailing upward. Though he braced for the attack, Captain Visser was underwhelmed. Her slight frame carried little force, and he caught her attack easily. Her face struck his chest, and she was still for a moment, practically hanging from his hand about her wrist. An acrid smell arose from her, body odor and something sickly and putrid. 

“What have you done?” Teeth gritted, he redoubled the strength of his grip on her forearm. She writhed, slowly at first, then flicked her head back violently to look up at him with sunken eyes before shrieking like a wild animal. Between the shock and a heavy roll of the ship, Visser stumbled back, at which point the woman went into a wild series of convulsions, disorganized by unnerving in the frenetic nature of it. A sudden upward heave of the deck sent them both toppling over to roll in a tangled, squirming mass.

Rolling to a stop against the wall, Captain Visser found himself atop the unruly woman. His efforts to disarm her or at least keep the dagger out of his own breast had resulted in plunging the blade into her stomach, just below the rib cage. Her eyes rolled back as a gurgling sigh escaped her lips. Those lips curled into a smile all the same, and the eyes came back down to look upon her killer. Her grin broadened showing blackened and chipped teeth barely hiding an undulating tongue.

“You gave me no choice,” a gallant statement, the best he could manage.

Through her sickly smile she rasped, “Sacrifices.”

Captain Visser’s eyes flared, “Sacrifices? What did you do? What have you wrought?!” In his anger he leaned on the knife, which in turn pierced something deep inside, something vital, the loss of which sent the mad woman quickly to the final slumber. The good captain scrambled to his feet and made an unsteady path to the corridor. Dark as it was, he knew his ship and moved quickly, frantically. Hope as dim as the confines of his vessel he burst into the mess where his final crew had been left to convalesce. Aside from the moaning of the ship’s timbers and lapping of unseen waves, the room gave him a silent greeting.

He tried to call out but only managed a hoarse whisper, “Hoitink? Bakker?” He fell silent himself. As his eyes adjusted he could see the forms where they lay, all still, all dark. Stumbling forward he crossed between the tables and benches to the back corner, to the pitiable small form there in the deepest shadow. Falling to his knees he realized there was now an inch of water in the room, not that he cared. He pulled his first mate to him, cradling the once cabin boy as the child that he in truth was.

The ship lurched once more and kept turning, sending the contents of the room, furniture and men, sliding first to one wall, then tumbling onto the ceiling. Captain Visser reeled in the darkness, water sloshing from all directions. A bench struck him in the hip on the initial slide. A table crushed him at the shoulder as they went upside down. Something wooden struck his head a glancing blow a moment later, but he couldn’t guess what it was. Through it all he kept his grip, kept close, clutching a lifeless body as the cold ocean filled the room, covered his body, and invaded his lungs.