Dead Men Tell No Tales Read Online Free

when the knocking interrupted their congress. She had lured him every night, never answering to his pleading requests to abandon her course of action, but keeping his mind occupied with pleasures he had never known.
    “ What’s happening?” Drake peeked out of the cabin.
    “ Geist just spotted land, Sir,” said Mac.
    “ And do you believe …” Drake never finished his question as a chilling scream shattered the vessel’s quiet.
    There was an improvise commotion on the bridge, and Drake’s eyes could not distinguish what was about at first.
    Then he saw it.
    Luther, the giant, was staggering on the quarterdeck as a disgusting creature was chewing at his neck like a hungry dog. The thing was what persisted of a sailor’s upper body, except that only his decaying head and its coiling spine, encased in a coating of algae, remained. The gunner was using his strength to get free of the undead’s vise, but to no avail.
    To the port, similar creatures and more intact shambling fiends, were slowly climbing the railings, while a swollen terror of that cursed sea had already reached the Banshee’s deck and was approaching the screaming German.
    “ Avast! At arms!” cried Mac, while Drake, half-naked, pointed his pistol to the bloated figure and fired. The monster’s head exploded like a ripe melon; brainy fluids and splintered bones flew in every direction before he fell overboard.
    The crew crawled out of the ship’s portholes, yelling battle cries, armed with cutlasses and rifles.
    Kaya stuck her head out of the cabin, shocked by the sight of those things attacking despite her Loa’s pact, but then she understood.
    “ Stay inside!” shouted Red Leg, slamming the door shut with a kick and blocking her inside with a heavy barrel.
    Everywhere there were shouts and the sound of bursting putrid flesh, as projectiles and blades found their way in the waterlogged raiders.
    Geist was grabbed by a crab-infested and flayed horror, which proceeded in biting his face off, causing blood to flow copiously from the top half of his pale body.
    MacTavish was opened from crotch to sternum by a horde of crawling monsters, which slithered on their bellies or walked on their hands to reach their prey.
    Seeing everything lost, Drake rushed to the cabin, removed the barrel and allowed Kaya to get out.
    “ Let’s go! The ship’s doomed. Your Loa hasn’t kept his word,” he cried amid the screams of the dying.
    She nodded, but whispered “It’s not him who hasn’t kept the promise.”
    They ran to the lifeboat, while Red Leg continued his stand, disabling as many Risen as he could, whilst new horrors continued to climb from the Banshee’s portside.
    Once the barge was in the water they jumped into it, soon reached by Red Leg and two of his goons.
    With a sundered heart Drake uttered a prayer for his lost friends, as he rowed toward the island of the dead.
    ‘ See you soon, my friends.’ He concluded his thoughts.
    ****
    They reached the swampy beach and quickly disembarked, making for a thicket of mangroves to find shelter. In the distance, the cries of dying mariners played a bloody symphony.
    “ We’re doomed Red Leg! I told you it was a foolish deed you were asking from me,” said Drake clenching his teeth, whilst grabbing the older man’s ragged shirt.
    Immediately, the Admiral’s goons were on him, but Morgan stopped them on their tracks.
    “ We’re not doomed, Drake. We’re here. Do you see any Risen around, huh? You do not have faith, scurvy dog. That’s your fault. But mine’s strong and I will not linger here while the end of the Curse is at arm’s reach!”
    He was as fanatic as the man who had started it all.
    Yet he was right, there were no living dead shuffling around on the beach. For unknown motives they did not set foot on the island.
    “ Well, but I’m not going to allow this woman’s blood sacrifice. Take mine’s,” he proposed, ignoring the disapproving look into Kaya’s eyes.
    “ There’s no