Free The Tears of Dark Water by Corban Addison

ruin.
    For a brief moment, Ismail considered letting the boat go. Better to suffer the agonies of death, Adan had said, than to become a companion of the eternal fire. But his father was gone, cut down by the men whose teachings he had decried. His mother was gone, too, and probably dead. Of their family only Yasmin remained, and she had been taken by the Devil himself. In the nightmare of the present, the rules of conscience no longer apply. There was only one way forward—the way of the gun.
    “ Astagfirullah ,” he said quietly, begging Allah’s forgiveness. Then he shook Liban’s shoulder. “Get up! I see a ship.”
    Liban grunted and squinted at him through sleep-laden eyes. “What? Where?”
    “There!” Ismail replied, pointing west.
    Liban took the binoculars and stared into the distance. “It’s a sailboat,” he said, tensing visibly.
    “Help me wake the others,” Ismail said, prodding Osman and Dhuuban.
    The men struggled into the sitting position, shaking their heads as if casting off the cords of sleep. They passed the binoculars around, and their eyes grew wide when they sighted the boat. They began to whisper excitedly among themselves.
    “A ship!” they exulted. “We’re saved!”
    “Quiet!” Ismail hissed. “Get your weapons ready. But do not shoot unless I give the order. No one is going to die tonight—neither you nor the sailors on that boat. Is that clear?”
    He saw nods all around. They were with him, even Mas. He was their leader, the sailboat his prize. He spoke unequivocally: “This is our chance. There won’t be another.”
    Then he turned and started the motor.
     

Daniel
     
    The Indian Ocean
    07°50´49˝S, 56°13´41˝E
    November 9, 2011
     
    A strange vibrato sound interrupted Daniel’s dream. He was climbing a cliff surrounded by snow-capped mountains. He didn’t know why he was there, but he didn’t question it. Vanessa was calling to him from above, her face obscured by clouds. Quentin was below him, playing out the rope. A breeze was blowing, but it was muted somehow, a murmur in the preternatural scene. The buzzing noise stood out, then faded as quickly as it came. Daniel’s unconscious mind tried gamely to find a place for it, but the disturbance was enough to disrupt the flow of the dream.
    He rolled onto his side and opened his eyes halfway. The cabin was dark as pitch. He touched the bulkhead beside him and remembered where he was—the aft berth of the Renaissance . He heard the rumble of the engine through the soundproofing he had installed in the retrofit. The glowing hands of his dive watch told him that he had twenty minutes to sleep before he had to spell Quentin. He listened for a few seconds and heard nothing amiss. Then he closed his eyes again and dozed off quickly.
    The next sound, when it came, tore apart the night.
    He sat up straight, his nerves ablaze, as the clamor of automatic gunfire pierced his ears. There were multiple guns, and they were close.
    He heard the shouts next, in high-pitched English: “Captain, don’t be afraid! We don’t want to hurt you! We just want the ship!”
    He moved without thought, his reflexes driving him out of the cabin and into the nav station. He switched on AIS, sending out a signal with their course and speed. Then he pressed the unmarked red button. It was a safeguard of last resort, something he never imagined he would have to use. It felt inconsequential beneath his fingertips, but it was the only thing that could save them now.
    His next instinct was Quentin. He launched himself up the companionway and found his son standing in the cockpit with his hands in the air. Daniel saw the skiff closing in from astern, dark faces and gun barrels glinting in the moonlight. He spoke to Quentin with a firmness that belied his terror.
    “Don’t move. Do whatever they say.”
     
    The hijacking was a disorderly affair. The pirates swarmed over the gunwales of the sailboat as if they were scaling the ramparts of a