Day 30: Lucre

I have this image of a pirate, one hand half falling off, tugging in vain at a chest full of gold as the tide comes in and fills the cave, drowning him. Because if anything reminds me of pirates, the word 'lucre' does.

The reflected light from the coins tinged his eyes and skin gold as he grinned in the torchlight. Twelve long years, and finally success. His crew had abandoned him, losing hope one by one. But that only meant more gold for him. His left hand ached with gangrene; but a tiny fraction of the loot would buy him the world’s finest hook. Whoever said piracy wasn’t a lucrative career had obviously never discovered a lost treasure of this magnitude.

He could guess why, as he reached down with his one good hand. The chest – one of perhaps twenty – wouldn’t budge.