Chapter 5: Becoming Seamen

Chapter 5 - Becoming Seamen

“Who the hell is that?” Viktor snarled. He had been staring at the princess, where she sweated under the pile of blankets. He wasn’t entirely convinced that smothering someone with a fever was a good idea, but Ornik seemed to know what he was doing. When the door had opened, he’d expected to see Ornik delivering him beer, not whatever this woman was.

“This is—” the toad man began, but he was rudely shoved aside by the woman.

“It truly is her. Highness! I’d thought you lost!” The woman fell to her knees and pulled one of the princess's hands free from the covers. The newcomer’s other hand slid towards her belt.

“Get back!” Viktor shoved her away.

“This is Rosa, Viktor.” Ornik blinked slowly, then his tongue flicked out and licked his left eyeball. That always gave Viktor the ick.

“I have herbs,” Rosa objected, reaching for a pouch at her waist and holding it up. “And who the fuck are you, ser? I’m a secret knight! I’m commander of the Twin Moons, the most feared Royal super double secret mercenary—”

Viktor lunged forward, snatching the pouch away and shoving Rosa back from his charge. He’d failed before, but he would save the daughter whose father he had been unable to protect.

“You fell for this shite, Ornik? The Twin Moons were bloody bandits!” Viktor drew his sword, noting the slight drain on his mana, and put the point against Rosa’s throat. The urge to lean forward ran through his muscles, and a quiet voice at the back of his head whispered about the joy of slicing flesh and letting the red that hid within run all across the world. Ornik’s cudgel of smiting appeared in his clammy mitt, and he brandished it as well.

“I… I am not from around here. You dry skins and your cults and clubs and secret teams. It’s all very bizarre. What shall we do with her?”

“We can’t just let her go. Now, thanks to you, she knows Lataya is here. Blood and fire, Ornik. Give me your belt.”

“But what about my trousers?”

Viktor glared at Ornik, then shrugged. “I assume the ale you drank, and didn’t bring any up to share, is going to give you a fat belly. You’ll grow into your trews. Belt, please.”

Viktor had Ornik secure Rosa’s arms behind her back, then tied the free end of the belt to the bars on the window. Why would a pub have bars on the inside of the windows? A conundrum for another time. He sheathed his murderous blade, and the intrusive thoughts about mass slaughter vanished.

He frisked her, blushing as he did so.

“You sure that buttcheek is safe?” Rosa snapped. “Maybe another fondle will convince you it isn’t hiding a dagger.”

“Shut up.” He had been professional, not pervy. “This is a weird collection of stuff for a knight to be carrying. What’s with this?”

He had piled up her belongings at the foot of the bed. Half a dozen daggers of various shapes and sizes, one of which had been strapped to her inner thigh, three pouches, one containing enough Sable to replenish their coffers, another filled with dry powdery leaves, and the last containing a dehydrated finger. At the base of the finger was a ring marked with a crossed pair of crescent moons. He waved the severed digit under her nose, which crinkled as she turned her head away.

“Give me that back.”

“Maybe what wasn’t the right question. Whose bloody finger is this, and why are you running around with it tied to your belt?”

Ornik’s tongue flicked out and slammed against the bars next to Rosa’s head, causing her to flinch again. She didn’t know he’d just been snatching up a bug crawling on it, but the inadvertent intimidation did the job.

“What baffles me is that my otherwise intelligent friend didn’t realise that it was odd that a knight didn’t have a bloody sword.” Viktor glared at Ornink, who blushed a dark shade of green.

“Viktor…”

“Give me back my finger! I need that,” snarled Rosa.

“Nope. Whose was it?”

“Just some noble we caught out in the woods.”

“Liar… although…”

Viktor looked closely at the finger, and there was definitely something more unusual about it than the simple fact that it was a dead man's finger some chick had been carrying around for weeks. It resonated with him on some level.

His mind dissolved into sparkling lines and sigils, and his own right index finger began to burn. The bones in his index finger ached as the Access Runes on the dead digit were transferred to his own living one.

Death Touch of the Dimac Master unlocked!

Once per week, you can kill anyone or anything with a touch. It’s a bit like what you did with your ex, except you only killed her ability to love again, not her body. Have fun with it.

Viktor staggered backwards as the finger dissolved into ash and the ring clunked ot the floorboards. Rosa shrieked in anger and glared daggers at him.

“Who the hell did that finger belong to?” he demanded. That was dangerous magic.

“Those bones were… You bastard!” She thrashed, trying to break free.

“Ornik, watch her. Don’t take your froggy eyes off her for a second. These aren’t mana herbs.” Viktor waved the pouch at his gullible friend. “I don’t know what they are, but there’s no magic in them. No good magic anyway.”

“Just watch her?” His big eyes blinked slowly. Viktor regretted his harshness for a moment. You can’t put the bitching back in the bag, though.

“We can’t let her go.”

Ornik waved his rod of smiting, and Rosa pushed herself away from the toadman, as far as her restraints would allow. That chair leg didn’t look like much, but it had a malevolent aura that promised doom to anyone whose head it bonked.

“No, don’t kill her. Yet.” Viktor glared at Rosa, who stared back defiantly. “We might need her. Hiring a ship is expensive, and she might have a bounty on her. I’m going for a beer. Just keep an eye on her.”

The taproom still smelled like stale ale and smoke as Viktor emerged from the stairway. The crowd had grown while he’d been upstairs, various rough-looking peasants, with a handful of merchants or lower nobles mixed in, judging from their fancier clothes.

“A pint of ale, please, Bar Lord,” Viktor said wearily as he planted his backside on a stool.

“How’s your lady friend?” the barkeep asked as he worked the pump.

“Not well. Where’s the nearest apothecary?” Viktor lifted the pot and its foam-headed contents to his lips as he slid a Sable across the counter.

“Four doors down to the left, ser. Going to be here long?” An empty glass appeared in one of his hands, a rag in the other. Polishing commenced despite the vessel in question being pristinely clean.

“I’ve paid you for ten days. What happens if I need to leave early?” Viktor took another swig. It was surprisingly decent stuff. Nutty and fruity at the same time. He wiped his sleeve across his face to remove the foam stuck to the end of his nose.

“Old Bart the Bartender don’t offer no refunds. You’ve got your ten days. Leaving early is on you, but you’ll get an evening meal each day you’re here.”

Viktor nodded reluctantly. He had been panicked. Only an idiot throws a pouch of money at an innkeeper in Lisarel without checking the bloody price first. He needed to be more careful in future. He weighed the pouch of money taken from the rogue upstairs. It would cover some mana herbs for sure, but he needed more to hire a ship. He was certain he needed to escape, to get Lataya away from the kingdom. They needed time. Time to figure out how to grow strong enough to deal with the Outworlders once and for all.

The background grumbling and banter of the drinkers faded into the background as he got lost in his thoughts. A ship was the answer. They needed to get away from the Kingdom. It would only be a matter of time before more of them arrived in this world, and this city would fall once they had “levelled” enough to storm it.

He looked at the barman. The old fellow was grizzled. Grey of mutton chop and balding on top. It appeared his eyebrows were attempting to compensate for this receding hairline, but were instead simply giving his eyes moustaches.

“Any ships sailing soon?” Viktor tried to sound casual, but the rag paused in its infinite glass polishing for a moment, then sped up again. “You’re going to wear that glass away if you aren’t careful.”

“There’s one due to leave on the ebb in two days' time, ser. Heading East to Ribbislurp.”

“Vadelock isn’t such a bad place.”

“Begging your pardon, ser, and I saw you was travelling with one of them frogs, but it’s no place to take a sick woman.”

Viktor would have time to get the herbs and turn in Rosa for the bounty before the ship sailed. “What’s it called?”

“Foamswallower. Her Captain is in the booth yonder. I’d advise against it, friend.”

“Needs must when the devil vomits in your kettle, Bart. Needs must. I’ll have two more ales, please.”

Two more tankards were passed across the bar, and Viktor paid the man. That rogue had been carrying a lot more money than was normal, so he didn’t begrudge the expense of an introduction.

“Excuse me…ser? I hear you’re leaving for the east sometime soon?”

“What’s it to you, ye jizzum guzzling poop poker?”

The captain wore a tricorn slanted to one side atop a fringe of wild silver hair that framed his weathered face. His jacket was soiled and stained, but it had once been extremely fine indeed.

“You served in the navy?” Viktor took a seat opposite the surly old bastard and pushed the second beer over to him.

“Rum, sodomy and the lash. That’s what they taught me. It’s how I run me ship.”

“Are they all mandatory?”

“Oh, you’re a clever one. Well, unlike a squirt that should have landed on ye whore of a mother's back like you, I’ve been around the world. I’ve seen things you wouldn’t believe.”

Viktor was taken aback by the graphic and completely unnecessary abuse. “Yeah, the entrance to the World Core, ships on fire at the Tannhauser Gates, M beams glittering in the dark.” Viktor was starting to regret approaching this insane old pirate.

“Think you’re a wit. What do you want, boy? Captain Johnson Longfellow of the Foamswallower ain’t got time for boys who don’t show no respect.”

“Passage East when you next sail.”

“Piss off. I’m full up. Every bugger and his favourite cow wants away from the Kingdom. Bloody Outworlders. Killed the fucking King. Bastards.”

Viktor glanced around nervously and rested a hand on the hilt of his sword. Slice his throat, let the red river flow. He snatched his hand away and put it on the table instead. “You were a royalist?”

“Stupid. Doesn’t matter to the common folk whose fancy arse is oiled and rests on that overgrown barstool. But he was fair, and now everything fucked. Inconsiderate shit getting murdered.”

Viktor waved a hand at the barmaid after spotting his new friend's glass was empty. “I’ve got to get a very special someone to Vadelock, and I hear you’re going in that direction.” He clinked his stolen coin pouch on the table once, then tucked it away on his belt.

“Did someone shit in your ears, boy? I said I’m full up. Might have some room for a couple of deckhands, though. Reckon ye can work a rope and shove a broom?”

From Royal Guard to deckswabber on a broken-down sloop captained by a man whose parents must have taken an instant dislike to him. The humiliations kept piling up. But he would get past it. Resolution blossomed in his chest. However degrading and unpleasant the company might be, he needed to get the princess away from the Outworlders. Far away. What Lataya would think of scrubbing sheets and greasing poles to pay for her passage, he refused to imagine.

“I figure that should bring the price down a bit? If we all work?”

Longfellow sniffed and shifted, hoisting a peg leg up over his other knee. “If ye work like my cocks up your back, it’ll be free. If ye don’t work, I’ll use ye for chum.”

“I don’t know about… that. But my companions and I can work.” Chore, the most useless spell in the history of the world for a swordsman, might just come in useful for once.

“She’s in bay twelve. The figurehead is a three-titted mermaid. Dawn two days from now. We won’t wait if you aren’t there on time.”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.” Viktor passed the barmaid a coin to pay for the Captain’s second ale. “I’ll be seeing you, Johnson.”

“I’m Captain Longfellow to the likes of ye, ye dribble of queef juice. You’re my seaman now, and I’m more than happy to shoot ye over the side of me ship if I have to. I’ve done it many times before.”

“No doubt.” Viktor bade him farewell and made his escape from the obscene old man.

With unsatisfactory transport arranged, his next job was acquiring mana herbs. Then he would have to go and see the Bounty Hunters' Guild and find out what Rosa was worth.

The street was quiet, the sun having set since they’d arrived at the Knight’s Secret. Flickering mage lights hung from poles that turned patches of fog into little bright islands in the misty night. The apothecary had the classic red-and-white striped pole outside, but it was run-down and grimy. Paint was peeling, and half the varnish had chipped away on the heavy oak door. He pushed it open to see what awaited him within.