Page 10 of Darkest Dredge

Usually, I'd find the melodic crash of the ocean, waves smashing over the breach comforting. But tonight was different. I'd gotten a job on the infamous pirate ship, the Dolorous Eye as a cabin boy. And just as the journey neared its end, with Naussu just a few days away, my secret was discovered.

I wasn't a boy at all. I’d disguised myself to sail with Captain Zann.

It didn’t matter that I was just as good a swordsman, if not better, than all of them. Or that I could do any job on that ship.

Sailors were superstitious bastards. They saw having a woman on board as bad luck.

Now, here I was, marooned on an abandoned island. Could have been worse. The captain could have given me to his crew, and only when I was completely brutalized and broken beneath the hunger of fifty sweaty sailors, tossed me overboard.

Instead, they left me to a kinder monster, tied to a palm tree on the sand.

The creature in these waters was known to crave human flesh.

At least it would eat me, and leave my bones to the crabs to pick clean. A fate that felt like a mercy compared to the alternative.

There was no point in fighting my fate. If I was to be dinner for the god of this sea, then I'd make a fine meal for him.

It appeared shortly after sunset, the horizon still smattered with bright ribbons of pink and red.

This was a monster that made its home in the darkest depths of the ocean. As it rose from the tides, I shivered. Not from the cold, not from fear, but in unholy reverence.

It was Zorcock, God of the Caribbean Sea.

Noah scoffed. "Okay. But that name. The author could have gone with something less silly."

"Keep going," I urged. "It's getting to the good part.”

Zorcock was a large beast, but not as big as the tales made out. Taller than a man, not bigger than a fifty-gun galleon.

From the waist up, he was humanoid. His grayish-green flesh glistened in the faint moonlight. Sleek muscles flexing, making it ripple as he moved toward me. His long, defined adonis belt bled into a meaty cluster of thick tentacles that writhed over the sandy beach, moving faster than two legs ever could. Even if I wasn't tied to a tree, I'd never outrun him.

My pulse thrashed in my ear with its terrifying approach.

The distance between us shrunk, and the final remnants of my nerves tattered like a wind-worn flag when I registered its face.

A tentacle beard!

"Hello, Davy Jones," I muttered amorously, remembering how seeing Pirates of the Caribbean had altered my brain chemistry. "Smash."

Noah sent me a mischievous side-eye before licking his finger and turning the page with a dramatic pause that had me bucking in frustration.

"Great Gulf of Mexico, why are you doing this so slow?"

"Because nothing brings me greater pleasure than watching you throw a horny little fit on my mattress."

He tilted his head and gave my squid dildo a sniff, cackling evilly at the way my cheeks flamed. “Awww, what’s the matter? Don’t you like that I can still smell your pussy on the suckers?”

“Now you’re just ragebaiting me.”

“Well, you shouldn’t make it so fun.”

"I will stab you."

He scoffed. "With what? Your toe nails?"

"You fucking—"

"Calm down, angry little Bea. I'm only joking. Now, do as your captain tells you, and I'll keep going."