Lawrence University Creative Writing Club Spring Serial Story
After all my travels, here I was at last: Davy Jones’ castle itself, the reason all these creatures kept tugging me to and fro, farther and farther down into the deep. My toils were nearly at an end, and yet I could hardly bring myself to be relieved. Grateful though I might have been for my rescue, the sight of my dead crewmates bit into my mind like the anchor pendant still gripped too tight in my fist. Everything that had happened to me since that storm…it all seemed to be because of Davy Jones and those vampires, whatever games they were playing against one another.
One way or another, I would bring that game to its end.
My shark escort ushered me into the castle, and were I still on land, the sight would have taken my breath away. The castle was a single great spire, reaching from the ocean floor up and out of view. Great branches of coral criss-crossed up and down the structure, though I had thought none would grow so deep, and so huge were they that for a moment I could only imagine the Viking legends of a tree that buttressed the whole world.
The room I’d been brought into ringed the center of the structure, with schools of fish and stranger things yet flitting between doorways lining the walls all the way up and down the spire. Rather than hallways sprawling across the land, here in the depths every room opened into a single three-dimensional space. At the center of it all, a plume of what looked like jet-black smoke billowed up from the ocean floor below us, all kinds of tiny creatures clinging near it. Mesmerized, I floated towards the plume—only for the policeshark who had arrested me to put himself in my way.
“Look, don’t touch,” he said. “The vent’s far too hot for most of us subjects.” Belatedly, I realized what he meant. Although it had taken me a minute to notice, with the magic I’d been given protecting me from the cold and pressure of the deep, in here I actually felt warm – as though I were back at the surface again, the sun beating down on my face. How hot must that vent be, I wondered, for this castle to feel like the world above?
To my surprise, my escort didn’t guide me down towards the base of the vent. Instead, we ascended, weaving amidst coral branches, to an ornate porthole at the midpoint of the spire. A pair of swordfish guarded it, their noses crossed. The one on the right turned to face us as we approached. In an official tone, she said, “Captain Selachi. Are you here to make your report?”
“That is right,” barked the shark leader. “We routed the coven and found this human fraternizing with them. He says he has news for King Jones; I say the King’ll want to see him whether he’s lying or not.”
I glared at the Captain. “The vampires ate my crewmates, and tried to eat me.”
“That’s what they–”
A deep voice echoed out from Davy Jones’ throne room, interrupting him—
“ENTER.”
The throne room was cold, colder than the seafloor vent nearby should have allowed. Polyps and tube worms lined every surface up to a bony throne cast in deep shadow. I was briefly very glad that, underwater, I didn’t touch the floor. A low chant reverberated from one side of the room to the next, never ceasing for breath. Although it was too quiet to make out the words, something about it set my hair on end.
Captain Selachi swam to the throne and whispered to the figure within, no doubt reporting his version of the raid.
“Davy Jones!” I did not bow as I shouted out, interrupting the shark. Jones may have been king here, but he was not my king. If he held a tighter grip on the vampires, we would all still be up above the waves, blissfully unaware of what lurked below. I would never have been kidnapped by the vampires; never have seen this place, met Lumen and Granny…I refused to let my falter show, shouting over the unsettling chant, over Selachi’s whispers, over my own thoughts. “Rein in your subjects, Davy Jones!”
“The insolence,” gasped the Captain. “How dare you speak this way in front of King Jones?”
“SILENCE,” came the voice from the throne. Selachi stilled.
“SPEAK.”
“A kraken sank my ship, leaving only me alive,” I spat. “A kraken set loose by your city’s vampires!”
A moment—then the shadow laughed, a booming cackle that shook the room. Minutes passed as Davy Jones laughed at me—until, just as abruptly as he began, he stopped, and he spoke.
“THIS IS WHAT ALL THIS WAS ABOUT? MY FORCES PETITIONED INTO THE LARGEST RAID IN YEARS, ALL SO SOME HUMAN CAN SPIN A TALE BLAMING HIS ILL FORTUNE ON MY REALM?”
My heart plunged into a bucket of ice. “You’re denying it. After everything your realm put me through, after seeing my crewmates dead with these eyes, you dare say I’m lying?”
“YES. I KNOW YOUR KIND, AIR-CREATURE.”
Davy Jones railed against me, working into a frenzy. With every word, my world narrowed, as though the only thing that mattered was the speech of Davy Jones and the chanting, growing ever louder around us.
“YOU COME TO THE SEA FROM YOUR ACCURSED WORLD WITH YOUR NETS AND YOUR SPEARS, STEALING MY SUBJECTS’ ICHOR FOR YOUR FUEL. YOU RAID MY WATERS, THEN WHEN THE WIND AND SEA CLAIM YOU, YOU DARE BLAME MY KINGDOM? I, WHO WAS DRAGGED UP TO BLACKBEARD’S RIGGING, AND RETURNED SCARRED YET UNBROKEN?”
And suddenly, he came forward into the light. Davy Jones was a fish, yet one unlike any I had seen in my life. His body was pink and puffed out, like a blob of old fat, and he had a face like a parody of a clown—with two beady black eyes, a round, sagging nose and puffed-up lips caught in an eternal frown. The chanting reached a fever pitch, and now I could understand it, understand the words that haunted the king of the sea every day of his life:
“Up to the surface. Up to the surface. Up to the surface.”
“THIS IS WHAT THE SHALLOWS DID TO ME. I HAD NO MAGIC FISH TO PROTECT ME…AND YET SOMEHOW, I SURVIVED, TWISTED, TRAPPED BETWEEN WORLDS. NO, SURFACE-DWELLER. NO BEAUTY, NO TRUTH CAN COME FROM THE CROSSING OF YOUR WORLD AND MINE. RETURN WHENCE YOU CAME, AND NEVER DARKEN MY KINGDOM AGAIN. TAKE HIM AWAY.”
WIth a dismissive flick of Davy Jones’ fin, fish of all kinds and colors swarmed into the room around me. Even as I tried to swim towards him, they gathered into a tempest that pushed me out to the center of the castle. The heat built and built as I swam desperately in place—caught a glimpse of unsurety in Selachi’s eyes—and then a bubble of frigid water formed around me, yanking me into the vent, and all that remained was up, up, up, until I breached the surface.