1492 - Conquered by Paradise: The Great Fog

The sea was a great, heaving monster, endlessly swallowing and spitting the galleon forward. Fog blanketed the horizon, thick as wool, drowning out the sun and casting the ship into a limbo of gray. Water dripped from the rigging like cold sweat, and the sails hung limp, bloated with dampness but empty of wind. The crew of the Santa Madre shuffled across the slick deck, their hollow faces gaunt from weeks of spoiled rations and brackish water. The air stank of mildew, rotting wood, and the unwashed bodies of men on the edge of despair.

"By God, I’ll cut his throat myself if he makes us sail one more league into nothingness!" snarled Juan Ortega, the ship’s first mate. He was a wiry man, his face scarred from a life of skirmishes with pirates and Moorish corsairs. His narrow eyes, sunken deep beneath his brow, flicked toward the sterncastle where Captain Don Alejandro de Rivera stood, a solitary figure against the mist.

The captain gripped the railing, his knuckles pale against the sodden wood. Alejandro’s once-pristine doublet hung loose on his broad shoulders, streaked with salt and grime. His beard, once neatly trimmed, had grown wild, streaked with premature gray that mirrored the fog. He had been raised among the Castilian nobility, taught to command men and win battles, but now his crew’s mutinous whispers clawed at his resolve.

"Speak low, Ortega," growled Pedro Alvarado, the bosun, who leaned heavily on the haft of his gnarled belaying pin. "The men need no spark to burn this ship to cinders."

Ortega spat over the side, his lips curling into a sneer. "You think he knows where he’s leading us? Forty days since the storm drove us off course, and we’re sailing circles in the devil’s fog! We’ll die out here—or worse, we’ll live long enough to go mad."

Pedro’s thick arms, tattooed with faded serpents and crosses, flexed as he adjusted his grip on the pin. "He’s still the captain. You’ll follow him or face me."

Above them, Hernán the Crow, the ship’s lookout, perched in the crow’s nest, wrapped in a threadbare cloak that clung to his bony frame. He peered into the endless gray, his eyes red-rimmed from salt and sleepless nights. Hernán was a wraith of a man, rumored to have been a pickpocket in Seville before finding God—or at least the sea—and joining the expedition. His hollow voice drifted down through the murk. "Nothing ahead but more of this cursed soup."

The men grumbled below. Miguel Velasco, the ship’s carpenter, sat sharpening his blade against the edge of a barrel. He had the look of a man who’d seen more **** than life, his fingers missing two joints from an old mishap with a saw. "Maybe Hernán’s eyes aren’t worth a damn anymore. Maybe we’re already dead, drifting in purgatory." His words were met with uneasy silence.

A sudden, sharp cry broke through the gloom as Father Gaspar, the ship’s chaplain, stumbled out from below deck clutching a wooden cross. His eyes, wild and bloodshot, glistened with fervor. "Repent, sinners! The Lord tests us with trials of fog and hunger! Have faith, or we are doomed!"

Ortega’s laugh was bitter. "Faith won’t fill the belly or guide us to land. Perhaps your God enjoys the sight of starving men." He glared at the priest, who shrank back toward the stairs.

Captain Alejandro’s voice cut through the murmurs, steady and cold. "Enough!"

The deck fell silent as all eyes turned to him. The captain descended the stairs from the sterncastle, his boots thudding against the wood. "Ortega, you forget your place," he said, his voice low but sharp as a blade. "Mutiny—even whispered—earns a man the rope."

Ortega’s jaw tightened, but he lowered his gaze. "Aye, captain."

Alejandro’s dark eyes swept over the crew. "We are not lost. We are delayed. This fog will break, and land will rise before us. Until then, you will follow orders. Is that clear?"

The men muttered their assent, but the tension hung heavy in the air. The captain’s words were a brittle shield against their rising fear.

For days now, Alejandro had carried a secret certainty that he could not share. He felt it in his gut—or, more precisely, in his cojones. Every night, his dreams were vivid with strange visions: a blazing sun over emerald shores, and always the unmistakable pull of his arousal, like the needle of a compass. He would wake with his cock rigid and aching, as if drawn by some unseen ****. He could never speak of this to the crew—what man of honor could explain such a ridiculous premonition? But deep down, he trusted it. Whenever he felt himself harden without reason, he knew they were close to land.

Hours passed in the eerie stillness, broken only by the creak of wood and the slap of water against the hull. The fog seemed alive, pressing against their skin, dampening their spirits.

Then, just as the crew’s despair threatened to boil over, Hernán’s hoarse cry rang out from the crow’s nest. "Land! Land ho!"

Every man froze, their eyes snapping toward the misty horizon. Slowly, like a veil lifting, the fog began to thin, revealing a dark shape rising from the sea—a jagged coastline fringed with dense, emerald jungle.

The crew erupted into cheers, their voices raw with relief. Don Alejandro allowed himself a rare smile. "Prepare to anchor!" he barked. "Today, we step into the pages of history."

But as the ship drew closer, the jungle seemed to watch them, silent and waiting. None aboard the Santa Madre could guess what awaited them on this strange and forbidden shore.