The hooves of jungle steeds pounded through the dirt paths as Yvonne rode ahead, his elite guards trailing close behind. The thick canopy above cast broken light through the leaves, flickering across his face like firelight. The air reeked of sap and smoke. Somewhere distant, gunpowder still lingered on the breeze.

  He didn’t speak as they rode.

  But his mind wasn’t on the fight ahead.

  It was on a memory.

  Years ago.

  A boy sat in the gutter of a coastal port town, ribs showing, knuckles bloody. Salt crusted his lips. His name had no meaning back then. Just another street rat scamming food and sleeping with a dagger in one boot and rocks in the other.

  Until a man found him.

  Captain Marrow.

  He was a giant of a man with kind eyes and old bones. Wore no crown, but everyone called him “Cap.” His crew didn’t follow orders—they followed trust.

  “Come aboard,” Marrow said that day, tossing the boy a piece of jerky. “You eat. You work. You live.”

  The boy did.

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  And he grew.

  Faster, stronger, meaner than most of the crew. But loyal—at first.

  He’d bleed for Marrow. Take lashes without flinching. Hold the rigging through monsoons. Sail into fire.

  And Marrow?

  He taught him everything.

  How to fight with his fists, not just blades. How to barter without stealing. How to lead without barking.

  “We don’t rule with fear,” Marrow said once, pressing a hand to the boy’s chest. “We rule with this. Even if it’s bruised.”

  That lesson died on a cursed island.

  They landed to scavenge a buried vault, just five men and Marrow himself. It was supposed to be a quick smash-and-grab—rumors of old treasure, maybe cursed, maybe not.

  But the island was a lie.

  Something waited in the ruins. Something coiled in darkness and smoke.

  The crew called it a demon. Yvonne remembered only its breath—hot as magma. Its teeth. Its scream.

  It ripped through two men before they could speak. The third was torn in half mid-run.

  It bit into Yvonne’s arm. The pain was white fire, drowning every thought.

  He screamed.

  Marrow came back for him. Grabbed him under the other arm. Tried to pull him to safety.

  But the bite was deep. Too deep.

  Yvonne looked at his captain—his father figure.

  Then looked at the beast.

  Then he made a choice.

  He shoved Marrow back—hard.

  The captain stumbled, fell.

  And the beast lunged.

  Yvonne ran.

  He didn’t look back until he was on the sand, bleeding, coughing, alone.

  Marrow’s screams had stopped by then.

  When he returned to the ship, he was hunched and bloodied.

  “The Cap’s dead,” he told them. “Held the beast back. Gave me a shot to run.”

  The crew believed him. Most of them.

  Three didn’t.

  They waited until midnight. Confronted him on the bow.

  “You left him,” one hissed.

  “You’re no captain,” another spat.

  That’s when his arm pulsed.

  The bite wound hadn’t healed.

  It had spread.

  Black veins crawled up his skin like ink through parchment. The pain returned—but not as agony. As strength.

  He grabbed the first man by the throat and crushed it before anyone could blink.

  The second drew a blade.

  Yvonne tore it from his hand and stabbed him through the heart.

  The third tried to run.

  He didn’t make it two steps.

  When the others came on deck, they found Yvonne standing over the bodies.

  The wind was cold that night.

  His voice wasn’t.

  “There ain’t no captain left,” he said. “Just me.”

  And they bowed.

  The memory faded as they crested the final hill.

  Smoke curled from the distant base ahead. Pirates were still fighting—rifles cracked, fists swung, curses roared. Tech specialists and coastal raiders brawled in the middle of the training ring.

  Yvonne stopped his steed at the overlook, watching it all.

  Then he stepped down.

  The guards didn’t follow.

  He walked alone.

  Into the war.

  Chapter End.