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With their swords flashing against the stormy sky, Captain Cervantes de León and his crew swarmed the deck of the stricken English ship. The Albatross had been blown far off-course and too near New Spain to expect aid. Her passengers scrambled out of the cabins as she slowly listed starboard. Before they even spotted the skull-and-crossbones flag of the Adrian, cries of “Pirates!” had already sent them into sheer terror. A wave jolted the ship, but the attackers did not lose their footing. Cervantes was no privateer beholden to Spain, or indeed any kingdom, for in his heart he belonged to no land—the sea was his domain.
“No quarter!” Cervantes bellowed over the clamor. “Bring Soul Edge to me!”
His men wasted little time in picking off the exhausted few that were armed. Even the sailors preparing the skiffs were soon harried. Most of Cervantes’ crew were Valencians like himself, and the rest from the Catalonian or Basque shores, all brought together by the promise of plunder. Cervantes strode amid the carnage with a longsword in his right hand, and in his left hand was a shorter blade with a pistol built into the hilt. He wielded both with terrifying ease. For most, the heavy longsword would be a hindrance, and even fewer men could boast of shooting with either hand.
The Albatross’ captain broke through the ring of steel, knocking one of the pirates to the deck. His grizzled jaw was set as he drew his cutlass and lunged. Cervantes side-stepped him, slashing his side with his longsword. The captain doubled over in agony with his cutlass clattering beside him. He found himself staring up into the barrel of the pistol-sword.
“Tell me, where’s Adams?” Cervantes growled, kicking the cutlass out of reach.
The captain shuddered, vainly struggling to rise to his feet. He found himself facing the barrel of the pistol-sword. “Devil take you,” he spat.
Cervantes stomped on his shaking hand and ground it under his boot. “Out with it! Or I’ll send you to him first.”
The captain’s breathing became labored. “Gone…” he gasped.
With a single shot, Cervantes finished him off.
As his underlings opened the cargo hatch, Cervantes surveyed the chaos. He could hardly distinguish any of the passengers in the darkness. A child’s scream pierced through the din. A woman carried a small boy in her arms as she ran toward the gunwale. He quickly lost sight of them in the throng. Adams brought his whelp, did he? More’s the pity.
Soul Edge was near, he was sure of it. Why the merchant Adams would bring such a priceless sword to the New World was beyond his understanding. By all accounts, Adams was something of an antiquarian; it stood to reason that an ancient weapon was in his realm of interests. All that mattered was getting the sword to Vercci, the Merchant of Death himself. A year ago at the Black Tail Inn, Cervantes had choked back laughter at the prospect, but now it was as good as his. The favor, in exchange for the latest cannons and the pistol-sword, was finally about to pay off.
Before long, a burly pirate hauled a long wooden box up from below. “This must be it, Captain,” he grunted. “I’d wager Adams already turned tail.”
The others whooped in raucous triumph, bringing the rest of the raiding party running. Cervantes sheathed his swords, lifted the box, then raised his hand. The others soon fell silent.
“Burn her down,” he ordered.
Eager as ever to take down an upstart English vessel, the pirates splattered the deck with oil from the cabins’ lanterns and set it ablaze. As they returned to the Adrian, the burning Albatross groaned as she slowly sank into the dark sea.
The flames and smoke slowly vanished from the horizon and the moon was shrouded in clouds. On the deck, the crew gathered around their prize. The box itself was plain, but the sword within was bound to bring a handsome reward from Vercci. Cervantes guarded it with more than his usual jealousy. His expression was so stern that even the brasher young lads gave him a wide berth.
“Don’t celebrate yet, boys,” Cervantes announced. “First I need to be sure that we have the real Soul Edge.”
“Let’s all see it!” shouted a lanky young man as he leaned against the foremast. “It’s all we got from that lousy ship!”
Cervantes glared and the young man instantly shrank back. “In due time, Rodrigo.”
The navigator cautiously spoke up. “Captain, it’ll be a long while before the next port of call, and even longer before we reach Spain. What will we do if it’s a fake?”
Cervantes crossed his arms and his brows knit as he thought about it, but his patience was wearing thin. “Not a word about Soul Edge until I prove it. Until then, none of you are to disturb me, got that?”
The crew were quick to answer a resounding “Yes!”
A hush fell as Cervantes retired to his private cabin. A few lingered in anticipation after the door shut, but they soon dispersed, for if the sword proved to be a fake, the captain’s anger would have been fiercer than any storm they had braved. In the meantime, the first mate would make sure there was enough wine left over for him when he returned. They assured themselves that if it was a fake, it would be Vercci who would bear the brunt of Cervantes’ fury.
Under the light of a lantern, Cervantes laid the box on a table. He opened the latches with his hands trembling. He was sure he had something that would make a conquistador regret his dreams of gold, something that only the Merchant of Death could hope to pay him for. The ultimate sword, the sword of heroes—whatever else it was called, it was his for now, all wrapped up in undyed cloth.
He carefully unwrapped it and found two blades. Which one was Soul Edge? The larger one was a straight double-edged sword like his own, and the smaller had a single-edged blade that curved in a way that reminded him of some of the Indian swords in Vercci’s collection. The hilts were such a strange, almost fleshy red that he wondered if they were carved in carnelian or some other precious stone. Stranger still, the hilt of the larger sword featured sculpted grotesque faces gaping in mute agony, as well as four talons jutting from the guard.
His inspection turned incredulous. He had never seen Vercci wield a sword himself, but one of his servants had been quick to show him the sets of Indian daggers held between his knuckles. The Merchant of Death surely had no shortage of enemies, but he was getting on in years.
“Can you even wield a thing like this?” Cervantes said with a derisive snort.
The moment his left hand grasped the hilt, the talons clamped down on his arm. As they dug into his flesh, searing heat coursed through his arm. He tried to wrest it off with all his might, but the sword would not let go. A deep, rumbling voice began to echo in his mind.
Kill!
“Who’s that?” he demanded.
No one answered. No one came to the door. No one would dare.
Cervantes turned back to the box and saw the curved blade floating before him, casting a fiery glow under the lantern’s light. Soon he heard a host of screams seemingly from all around him. He had been on many sinking ships, and in his youth he had seen burnings at the stake in autos de fe, and the hellish cacophony sounded like all of them at once. The deep voice that called to him was joined by a high feminine one that hissed like newly quenched steel. He stood frozen. For a fleeting moment, he thought he had encountered a sort of siren.
Kill! Kill! Kill them all!
“Stop it! Get out of my head!” The screaming only grew louder. He could no longer hear his crew.
Involuntarily, his right arm reached for the curved blade and seized it. Both swords fit perfectly in his hands. Heat shot through him again, and he gave one last shout of mingled fear and rage. Yet, in all his long years at sea, he had never felt more robust.
On the deck, the crew was uneasy. They had been watching the mastheads spark with the pale blue corposants. The still air hissed overhead. Another storm was surely on its way. They hurried to the riggings, but none wanted to be the one to alert the captain of the omen.
“Saint Erasmus, pray for us,” one sailor muttered as he climbed down from the mainmast.
“God keep us from Cervantes’ wrath,” the first mate said sardonically.
When Cervantes stepped out onto the deck, he found many of his crew lowering the sails as the storm brewed in the distance. The first mate reluctantly turned to greet him, but before he could even speak, the longsword cut him down. When he fell bleeding from the throat, the crew futilely shrank from Cervantes as he raised both swords. As he cut a few more down, the rest bolted and he gave chase throughout the ship.
Only in their last moments did the rest of them see Soul Edge.
When Cervantes finally stood alone on the bloodied deck, he once again heard the swords’ voices over the waves. The heavy longsword and the swift short sword, a combination worthy of one who brought death with his own hands. Soul Edge could never be Vercci’s.
More, they whispered as one. Offer more souls to me.
“How many?” he asked.
As many as you can.
The Adrian changed course for Spain and sailed on with her mastheads glowing like grim torches against the dark sky. The only creatures that followed were a school of sharks that, in time, dwindled to a single one. So long as he held the swords, Cervantes de León only wanted to live for raiding. His hands seemed paler now, almost bluish in the moonlight. He had only seen such paleness on drowned men but he was completely unafraid. He had held no finer prize than Soul Edge and he would defend it.
Kill! Kill!
“To Hell with Vercci and his riches!” he roared to a bolt of lightning. “I’ll conquer the seas myself!”