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Daring Rescue, Daring Escape
Being a novelized version of Elizabeth's rescue from the sea and that bloody corset

by Honorat Selonnet
First Post: July 17, 2005

Chapter Two: The Gold Calls

The gold is incorruptible. Never will it rust. Never does it decay. Under the ashes and the crumbling stones of long-dead nations it yet glitters. Among the bones of decaying princes it still glows. Down in the crushing depths of the sea, in the rotting bellies of unlucky ships, the gold waits, gleaming patiently. Unlike the furious, corruptible mortals who scurry frantically about the surface of the earth, the gold of earth’s molten heart is patient.

For gold—for the sake of that immortal shine—the rivers of the earth have run red with blood. Kingdoms have fallen. The seas have hissed under rains of fire. Kin have slain kin. Treachery and betrayal, power and cruelty, sacrifice and vengeance march in its train. And still the gold waits—hammered or molded, drawn into fine wires, in heavy ingots or the frailest leaf—all eternal.

To forge a curse eternally binding, the only possible element is gold. Only gold can hold the memory of past atrocities long enough. Only gold can be counted on to deliver retribution down uncounted centuries. The gold remembers. The gold calls.

As the waters of Port Royal’s bay close over the body of the unconscious girl, the gold medallion wakes. For years it has been locked in a dusty drawer, whispering. But now it is free again, and the ocean shudders with the thunder of its call. The great currents of the air shift and fog rises to blot out the sun.

Two puny mortals stare at each other in wild surmise, feeling the change in the wind, seeing the ensign of their ship reverse the course of its flight.

“What was that?” whispers Murtogg, clapping his hand to his hat.

“I don’t know.” Mulroy shrugs nervously. The gold is always a mystery.

Trees lash. The hanging bodies of the unconsecrated dead rattle and sway. The soldiers running towards the dock hasten their steps in unexplained fear.

“Make way!” they cry.

And somewhere, far out in the trackless sea, something dark hears that call and comes about with the new wind and begins its stalk inexorably towards the gold.

Chapter 3

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