awaiting their doom. Sluggish beasts, flaking dead flesh, slow-witted, easily led. Easily killed.
They swarmed onto the main deck, mindless and vacant-eyed, but they were nowhere near fast enough to repel the powerful, skilled pirates
overtaking their ship. Donté swung his right arm, and jabbed with his left, heads rolling, bodies folding. Onward, moving slowly toward the main
deck, seeking the one man whose death could put an end to the zombie infestation of the vampire seas of the Caribbean. Through the shouts and
screams, blood and eye-burning smoke, vaulting over moldering bodies and rolling heads, he finally scaled to the upper deck.
One human awaited him--throat slit, blood seeping. Blood flowed from between his fingers clutched over the wound, and the other hand reached
toward the sea. With his preternatural sight, far in the distance Donté spotted a thick white mist form into the shape of a raven and then it
disappeared.
Shape-shifting voodoo bastard. The taste was bitter as he watched it disappear into the dark of night. Too fast, too far for Donté to follow.
"Bloody damnation," Donté raged.
Fiery hate and anger filled him as he stared down at the dying man whose life slowly ebbed away. The light in his eyes dimmed, a last whoosh of
breath, and the luster of his humanity was doused forever. Another lost opportunity to gain information on Zoliel's whereabouts. The crazed witch
doctor had slipped through his hands once again.
"Clavius Zoliel, one day you will not elude me!" he yelled into the surging wind.
He heard the splashes of water and grunts of his men as they hoisted the undead bodies into the salty sea. Not enough. Not nearly enough. His
attention moved to one of the undead, still dressed in the ragged uniform of a French soldier. Would that he had been able to save them before
Zoliel turned them to his own dark purpose.
The terrible truth was that even if he had killed Zoliel, there would have been another to take his place. There always was.
"Cap'n," Jupiter joined him on the upper deck of the dying ship.
It was a moment before Donté turned to look at him. Small cuts littered his body, but nothing serious that Donté could see. They would heal
quickly without any scars left behind, thanks to the bit of vampire blood in his system. Only the vampire's marks ever remained.
"They're all disposed of?" Donté asked.
"Yes, Cap'n. Looks to be over a hundred of 'em."
"A hundred less for the bastard's zombie army." He turned to look at his second in command. "And my men?"
He saw the answer in Jupiter's eyes. Dammit. So many times they managed to come away unscathed. Zombies were slow, dim-witted creatures and
it wasn't difficult to beat them. But now and again, they managed to surprise one of his crew.
"Who is it?"
"Gordon, Captain. One of the bastards was hiding in a lower deck passageway. He caught Gordon in the shoulder." The only type of wound even
Donté couldn't heal. A zombie's bite. He paused for a moment, Jupiter's gaze sliding from Donté's.
"He wants you to be the one to do it, Captain. I think you'd best come now."
Gordon was one of the newest members of Donté's crew. He was small and wiry, quick on his feet. And young. Typically he worked as cabin boy
as there were no children in Donté's crew. A small man, yet angelic in looks, he'd worked as a powder monkey on his last ship, part of the gun crew,
and one of the least enviable positions on a ship, used and abused. Rescued from the water, he was the lone survivor of a raging storm that had
torn his ship asunder, easy pickings for Zoliel. Gordon had managed to get off the ship before Zoliel and his smaller zombie crew boarded and took
it over, claiming what remained of the crew for his own. Gordon had been smart enough to realize what Zoliel was.
Gordon's skill was with the dagger, not so good with the sword or strength of the ax. He'd come under Donté's spell almost immediately upon
joining the ship. Too young to die such a terrible death.
Donté was tired, so tired of all the death. He leaned down to pick up an ax and turned back to Jupiter.
"Take me to him. I'll make it as quick as I can." He shouldn't have been part of the boarding party. Shouldn't have been anywhere near the French
vessel. Damn, there were nights when he hated this hellish command. More some nights than others. This being one of the bad ones. He owed
Gordon a good death. A brave lad even if he hadn't followed Donté's orders.
Chapter 4
Donté found the fallen sailor on the lower deck of the ship, several of his crewmates standing protectively around him. A pool of blood oozed from
beneath him, spreading across the deck, mixing with the remains of the zombies. Shiny and black, more the look of fresh tar than tainted blood.