Sillistra

 It was four days from Corimar to Sillistra, the first in the Island chain and the only place to provision for a long Voyage. We came to harbor about mid day, bearing waves, shields rigged for our defense, archers in the rigging in case the Empire had sent runners ahead to warn us off. Two ships approached, tacking to block the harbor from us. I saw one of the men manning the rails lean forward to see us, and I could see boarding planks loaded and ready, with many an archer in the rigging. They were a smaller ship, but they had advantage of knowing the water of the cove. "Come to," Our ship swung around and I waited until we were broadside, something no attacking ship would do. I was giving them an open shot, hoping to prove to them I came so rigged to protect myself. "She's showing broadside." I could almost hear the report from the Dragon's nest above the other ship. I knew what the next order would be. "Close distance." "Hold position!" I told my men. I wanted to wait until they were in hailing distance. I had only shown broadside to be sure they gave me a chance to speak before trying to board me. "Go'ner ashore?" I asked as the ship moved close enough for me to see the crew. "What business freehold you come so set for war demanding the Governor's pardon?" "Freehold captain, sworn to seas, and seeking provision to make the reef, but I race dragons from Corimar." I stated my business succinctly, I only wanted food and water for a voyage. But I had Empire ships behind me and could not lower my guard. "Do you have a name man-of-waves?" "Leshawn." "And what boards?" I knew now they were checking my credentials. "Dragon Wynd, captained by the same." "We heard report that you stood to swing." "The reports of my execution are much exaggerated, you can see that now. They advance dragon against my house because I would not allow them to buy these boards. I and my Patron ask leave to dock that we may provision for the Deeps." 'Buy the boards' was euphemism for scuttling the ship. They paid the crews that scuttled them the approximate worth in salvage to leave them be. Thus 'buying the boards' after they were wet. "Sunset Wind will lead you, we shall follow." So boxed in, I would be escorted ashore just in case I meant any harm I was outnumbered by at least a hundred seasoned men between the both of them. We came to safe berthing and they threw us a line. I saw a crowd gathered and by the uniforms they had to be the Governor's men. "Go'ner ashore?" I made my request known to the governor himself. "Aye ashore, and welcome." The voice that spoke was familiar but any hope of recognition was gone when I saw the shattered visage that approached. Though he must have been handsome at one point, he was now no more than a ravaged wreck. One eye was missing, covered by a patch of dragon scale that bore the crest of a well-known house, his left hand, which clutched a crutch, was badly mangled, the Doctors had done what they could just to save the hand. One foot was missing entirely, and he did not even use a peg foot to his aid but hobbled with the help of the crutch. But his shoulders were broad and his legs were well-muscled, he must have been a sight when he was hale and hearty. "Any who come bearing freehold or bones are welcome here. But especially you Captain Leshawn." He waved the other ships to stand easy and addressed me directly. "Do I know you?" I was surprised that any would know me so quickly especially when I had not introduced myself to him. "Aye, I served with your father, when you were still a boy in the rigging. I used to come to you with chips of scale or shell carved into the most fanciful of shapes, and tell you of the days before the ill wind." Even with a clue such as that it took a moment before my brain knew him. "Doma?" "Aye." He laughed, it was still the same musical sound I had always known. "Hail and welcome Leshawn. Come down that we may speak in more proper fashion." I stepped to the boarding rail, Delphe behind me. There was a long pause as if the world itself had stopped when Doma caught sight of Delphe. For a moment neither moved nor made a sound, then, Doma made to kneel and bowed in excuse. "Your Pardon Lord," At this I knew he addressed my patron. "My condition prevents me." "I count it the same that you tried." Delphe put his hand to Doma's shoulder, a sign I recognized as absolution. "Do not kneel before me, I do not own your service or your blood. I go to take my liberty the Wynd is the captain's I am but surety-fare." A look passed between the two, and Doma dropped his gaze. "Aye Lord." I paused a moment to turn back to my crew. "Take on as much victual and water as may be had, Archers repair strings and bows, find fletchers, wrights and smiths, any work need be done I will pay, tell them I'll lay no credit against these boards." "Hoist pennant, captain ashore." "Come captain, Dine with me, there is much to talk of." He smiled and offered me his good hand as a way of helping me ashore. "So tell me what brings you here in a manner of war under the freehold banner?" Doma helped me onto the floating dock, and I stood, a moment, marveling at the changes that had been made since last I had been to these shores. Unlike most Islands Sillistra was built mainly of wooden docks and the businesses that had grown up on them. I stood a moment getting used to the unique rhythm of the free-floating deck beneath my feet as Doma hobbled on like an old Deck hand in a storm. I on the other hand looked like a Landlubber, but I had been remiss in visiting my Father's old friends. I carefully made my way across the colorful landscape, reminding myself of the different meanings of the colors that draped the boards and pillars of the floating world. The outermost crescent, with the green boards were the docks, where men of honor pulled their ships in, the water deep enough to allow even the largest of the three-masted ships to dock here. My two-masted dragon Wynd seemed tiny compared to some of the monsters tied up at the docks. Men and women bowed to me as I passed, ever mindful of the fact that I was armed, and that my ship was notorious as that of a pirate. The bones were always welcome here, but not always well liked. For we were the best friend of those who could not seek parts from the Empire. The red boards to the left marked the water that was tainted, left over from the battle that had freed the island from the Empire nearly a hundred talon agone. The yellow boards to my right were where they brought in supplies from the smaller, uninhabited islands nearby, and before me loomed the Governor's mansion. It ajoined the decks at a right angle, and had been officially annexed by the floating island a few score of talon agone, under a little-known loophole of the law, because the empire maintained no force on the Islands and the 'boards' had been freed, so too was the island that was connected to it. We stepped into a room that appeared to be my cabin aboard the Wynd, and for the first time, I was slightly frightened of my friend, for he had recreated my office down to where I kept my personal stash of good rum. I had always preferred rum to the ale that the commoners drank. And now, he poured us both a healthy helping of the amber liquid before dismissing the two men who had been lounging in the shadows with the curt command to lock the door. "So, Jalen." He took a long pull on the rum. "What brings you here under the freehold flag. Have you decided to give it up?" "Convenience." I smiled. "I am still my father's son." That was the only admission I would make that I was not freehold. "More to the point you are your grandfather's. And that, methinks is why they seek your life." "What do you know of my Grandfather's crime?" "Nothing that I can speak unfortunately." Doma smiled and poured another healthy helping of rum. "But you bear his name, his very image and his title, and some say that is why they seek to make your end." "King of Pirates?" "Aye." I laughed, they had called me that since I first took the Wynd, but I rarely used it except when I needed the prestige it could give. "I am the master of perhaps a hundred rag-tag ships that will not cease their fighting long enough to be of service to any." "Save you, Jalen. I've seen you. You can command men. Even those who hate you cannot disobey you if you truly wish to command. And now I think it is time I gave you what I have held for you." "Something of mine?" "Aye, something your father earned and gave to me to keep safe. In return I ask only one thing." "Anything Doma, even were you to ask half the seas, I would do what is within my power to get it." I didn't hear myself, at that moment, and I didn't understand that I had just taken the first step to accepting a fate I had been hiding from for most of my life. Doma smiled and laughed. "Nothing half so bad as all of that. But, that when I am brought low, you remember me to the deeps as a Man of Seas and Bones. For I fear many of us will be brought to blades 'ere the end." "Aye, that, I will do, and with a good will." All this talk of death was beginning to make me maudlin. He placed on the table two small pieces of Dragon scale, which had been carved into the likeness of a seated dragon, wings spread back. These small markers, no bigger than chessmen, had been drilled to receive a cord so that they could be strung. These were caller tokens, and nothing on land or sea was worth as much as even a single one, I saw two before me. Caller tokens allowed whoever bore them to go to the Helatin, the great Dragons, and demand their service. Doma met my eyes, a mischievous sparkle in his own. "Your father did some service for them, and he gave me these to keep until the day that you should come here as the man you proclaimed yourself to be to the Magistrate." Doma smiled and drained his glass. "But I fear that by the time you become what you are to be, you will be too far away to ask for help. So I give them now." "Leshawn?" Now I wondered what had been said of me for so long. It seemed that everyone knew my fate but me. "I am not really the King of the Pirates." "Aye." I sighed. It seemed they held that up at every turn. "Do they not tire of the stories of the King of Pirates?" "Never. They hunger for one more. For the one of how he beat back the Empire and reclaimed both land and sea." He poured us both a generous helping of rum and pledged my life before drinking. I laughed and returned the honor. "More like died valiantly in the attempt." I smiled. This was the man who had protected me when I was young, who had told me of their plans to force me to serve forever, the one who helped me plan my escape from the Empire ship where I had been press-ganged into service as a youth. I had never been told how he had gotten the scars that he now bore, he simply told me that he had gotten them in my service. And I again wondered about this man and just what he knew of the house of Shades and my mysterious benefactor, Delphe. "Perhaps, but what a death it would be. Fly black, die black?" He quoted the oft-encountered rule of the sea. That once you openly flew bones, you were a Pirate forever. I shook my head, this was ridiculous, I was neither king nor prince. "Doma they advance against my house and Kin, against my half-house as well. Rejik is kindled on, and the rest of my brothers are laid low save the one no one speaks of." Doma put down his glass with a sad nod. "Aye. This I have also heard." I could see the twinkle in his eye before he asked the question though, "Will you take their challenge and raise bones in defiance one last time?" "They damn me to the noose for hanging bones, and then drive me the deeps, telling all that I have gone against my word. They take even honest treason from me and damn me for crimes no man-of-waters would do." I wasn't as angry about being called a Pirate; that I could live with. It was the fact that they told others that I had gone against Jangir's law. That I had cast utterly forbidden magika, and that I had hidden behind my men to do it. They called me not only a Pirate and a murderer, but also a coward. That angered me, as did them finding a way to force my men to go against their blood-sworn word and betray, not only me, but the Lord of the seas as well. "Aye. As they did your father." Doma met my eyes. "But he chose not to raise banner, some say he lost the code." Doma shook his head. "They say that he could not fight. That he had forgotten the fire." "What do you say?" "I say he did not lose the code, just the will to fight. The fire died, that I know. He could not give the worst order, not even to save his wife and crew. He had nothing left to risk, and so when they came for him, he gave himself to stone and took his secrets to the shallows with him." Doma took a pensive sip. "What about you? What do you say about all this? Will you run? Will you fight? They dare you to hang bones and damn you before you do. Your very name makes you Traitor to them Jalen." "They send the very fleet itself after me and race me away from Corimar when I would not sell my boards, I fear they leave me no choice but to hang banner." "Is there any other service I may give?" "No Doma, you have earned your honored rest." I smiled as mulled over everything that had been said. "But if you would do me one favor, as an old friend. You were always a man of secrets and languages, and I do not doubt but that my father taught you our codes." He nodded. And I think at that moment he understood my gambit. I needed to let the rest of the pirates know that I was indeed the King of Pirates, and that, for once, I was stepping up to that position. I flipped through my languages again, looking for the one my father had taught me when I was young, the 'old language' they called it, few but Pirates even knew of it anymore. I grabbed a paper nearby and scrawled a few handful of signs on it before rolling it up and handing it to Doma. I grabbed his hand as he tried to take the paper, forcing him to pledge to me he would do as I asked before I surrendered it to him. Now my tone was formal, no more the man of the sea, now it was pure 'deep water' dialect, the speech in which all true binding was done. "Pass it along to all others who are sometime men-of-bones, any who will take up the challenge, if and when I hang bones, those are their orders." I gestured to the paper. "They are to follow them. Unless I, Jalen Shenn should pronounce otherwise within the Captain's own hearing. Any who are not willing to stand with me, strip their colors and stand aside. I allow no quarter for either friend nor foe that crosses me, for the scales must be balanced, and they are either balancing them or adding to the score. If they be fair-weather pirates, I never knew them, nor did Jangir." "And if they do not comply with the order to strip colors?" "They burn." He nodded. That was the Unwritten code, Older even then the law of the sea, Jangir's law of war was that if you pledged aid and then turned away when summoned your boards were forfeit. Their ship and their banner would be burned, any pulled from the waves received what quarter would be given, the edge of a blade. I had no time for 'fair weather pirates,' or the dishonors they tended to bring. Doma nodded and took the parchment from me. He spirited it away into a pocket I did not see. Then he spoke aye, pledged my health and took another drink. "I must say Jalen, it is good to have you back." I saw the twinkle in his eye and knew what he missed. I had missed being back. I was pirate, and I told him candidly what I thought. "The Empire should have left well enough alone." "Where go you?" "I go to the End of the world to seek an end to the war and the answer to my Grandfather's crime and fate. We go to find the ship that carried away my Mirana and set my man on a course against his own blood. And we go to find what the Empire seeks so badly to hide that they would damn me to the shallows for mere mention of my name." "Good winds, calm seas Captain." He clasped my arm and then rose, bowing my direction in lieu of the wings most gestured to me. "I hope you find what you seek." I stopped him before he left. "Any news of Mirana?" "None, save the ill will of her people. They speak that she did not return from whence you sent her with your man, and some speak--" "I will not hear that here, he is already dismissed from my boards, do not bring him to my memory, lest I remember more dishonors to lay against his blood." Doma simply nodded, touched two fingers to his head and bowed in my direction. I knew that sign, it was both a prayer and a curse. The general meaning was 'pardon this idiot for bringing up dishonors not yet paid.' "Your pardon Captain. " He smiled. "Your cabin is through there." I took the rum bottle and my glass into the next room, and was surprised to find myself in my own sleeping chambers. Doma had copied everything, he had even matched the linens on my bed. I smiled, shook my head and poured myself another glass to think over everything I had heard. Most of the next two days, I spent on the beach practicing with the best sword masters Doma had to offer. It had been many years since I had wagered my life on the speed and skill of my blade. And I knew there were new techniques I had felt I had no time to learn before, but now I learned them with a right will. We awoke before dawn the third day, I had timed it well, we would blend into the fog and glide away with the outbound tide. I would keep Archers in the rigging in case any local ship wanted to try me, but I doubted they would. In a matter of twenty minutes we would be out of range and in open waters, if the Empire sought to sneak in they would do so then, before we got out of bowshot, if I had misjudged, then it was good practice to keep us all on our toes. I looked up at the colors, still we flew blue waves, the Freehold nations, if I was to drop these false colors, I would do it with deep water beneath my keel, not until I had crossed the reef. "Steady." My voice was barely a whisper. If they were two days behind us then this was good practice, if they had, as I assumed, slipped in to catch us asleep, they would find us gone when the fog lifted. An empire ship sat at the edge of the fog, but the deepness of the fog shielded us from their sight, and Jangir must have smiled on us for they gave no alarm. We made sail away and as I looked back over the island, I could see that the great fire on the hillside was lit calling all men of seas to send runners. Each island would be notified and one by one, if I still had any power on the seas, they would come to my aid. "So it begins."