The morning meal is meagre, just hard tack and filtered rainwater; the castaway's supplies have run through. It is a fortuitous thing then that Sasha's fishing gear is ready: lining the beach is an assortment of cobbled-together nets, spears and rods. Today, the bulk of the castaways will work at refining their shelters, but Vorya and Ishirou stand sweating in the morning heat, watching as Sasha goes through the ins and outs of the equipment. Ishirou shifts on his feet, his face clouded. It occurs to Vorya that he may know as much as Sasha, and that this training is really for the Rahadoumi. Or perhaps Ishirou's mind is preoccupied; Aerys has still not returned, and Vorya recalls that the Tien man showed a sweet side around her on their trip to the now-underwater Jeniviere.
While there was work to be done, the days had more or less settled into a rhythm. The early morning would see a flurry of activity from the forest in what Vorya had begun to think of as behind them; bird trills and squawks, buzzing insects, and the occasional roar or chitter or crash. By mid-morning, the heat would be oppressive, and the jungle would quiet to the merely pulsating sounds of insect life. Most of the castaways would retreat to shelter during this time and wait out the heat amid the throngs of insect life, slapping and scratching. With late afternoon or early evening, the rainstorms would roll in and bring with them a welcome respite. After an hour or so, the heat would return with a vengeance, only to calm slightly with the setting of the sun. At night, during his watch, the sea would alight with the tumbling spirits of the island's victims. And then, with morning, everything would happen again.
Vorya could not guess at whether the weather patterns would hold year-round, and the swashbuckler had little desire to run that experiment. Hopefully it was a matter of mere hours before they were discovered.
Regardless, fishing. And despite the heat and Vorya's inexperience, the fishers do well. Perhaps it is her time spent continuing instruction once the fishers wade out towards the breakline, but Sasha pulls in little; merely a couple of small tinfish, little more than a large meal. Ishirou does better, spearing a heavy ray, and in the ensuring bloody struggle, a small, toothy shark. Vorya, however, pulls in a haul, enough for many people to eat for the day. His nets seem to find schools of silver-white cloakers, and towards the end of the day he lands a large mackerel. The Rahadoumi man struggles with the makeshift rod and rope line, and for a few frantic moments it looks as if the mackerel may pull free, until Sasha grabbed the wriggling longfish and hauled it ashore - wooden hook still trailing blood from the fish's mouth.
Vorya followed the fish in and watched, mesmerized, as the fish flopped and gasped on the beach, its gils and mouth undulating in synchronous movement, as if a performance. A twinge of--
From the beach, motion and a shout. Looking up, Vorya blinks and blinks again: four strangers - three men and a woman, rangy and tanned, with deep black hair, the men with braided beards, stand just out of the treeline. The one farthest out of the treeline, maybe ten feet from the undergrowth, a long, curved sword, pitted with rust, hangs from his belt, and slowly lets his foot fall to the sandy beach as if he were surprised mid-step. The man opens and closes his mouth as his eyes dart across the strand of sandy beach, taking in the cook area and Pilts, who's begun descaling the cloakers, his back turned. The man's eyes drift towards the gathering late-afternoon stormclouds, Jask's leanto, and the fishers, sweeping over Vorya. Most of the castaways, are in the treeline for their afternoon respite, and judging from the first man's expression not yet discovered. A small silver lining, Vorya thinks, even as the man's mouth opens and closes again, not unlike the now-forgotten mackerel flopping at Vorya's feet.
The woman behind the lead-man barks something, her words thick with an accent, and vaguely Taldane as they drift across the sand, Vorya picking out a few bastardized words. Shipstruk. YaGo! And Klorak the Red? The last man, still partially obscured from view and shorter than the rest, ducks into the treeline while the first man scrambles into action, his hand grasping at something on his back.
Ishirou shrugs, seemingly not concerned with Vorya's gentle rebuke, as he rolls the map and places it inside the others, and then back into the protective embrace of his scabbard-end. "I agree that a field of corn or a harbor is of more immediate use. But still... I own five treasure maps. This is the first one that I've come even close to figuring out. Desna provides a spark of luck when needed. Or perhaps, Besmara? I give my respect to both."
"There will be a ship, eventually, and while food is more pressing, if we make our way south at some point... perhaps in order to look for food? We should seize the opportunity that has been placed in front of us."
=============
Day Three
=============
Dawn creeps with the rising sun over the waves, and still no Aerys. She spoke none of her intentions to none of the castaways before she left, and no one saw her leave to boot.
Other than the woman's absence, which lingers around the castaway camp, dark and ominous at the edge of thought, the day passes productively and uneventfully. Jask's condition remains more or less the same; the man sweats and murmurs and passes in and out of delirious wakeful periods, followed by longer sleeps, filled with shallow breathing and more sweating.
By the end of the day, the castaways' shelters have largely been constructed and are sound; and Sasha's fishing gear is finished; a line of spears and salvaged netting line the beach, as well as some poorly built reed and stick baskets, to hold anything caught. A few rods, strung with unraveled ship's rope, sit next to the spears, and bait - a small sack filled with bugs collected and killed by Vorya during a day spent working in the treeline on shelter sits inside one of the wicker baskets.
The fishing equipment is a good thing, Pilts notes, as the survivors will likely run through their food tomorrow.
That night, the ghosts do not appear; no bodies tumble in the surf. But, other ominous things occur. During his watch, Vorya feels as if eyes are studying him from deeper in the jungle and for a moment the swashbuckler swears he can hear the flapping of leathery wings high above him the darkness of the night sky.
That evening, in the dim light of the cookfire's glowing orange embers, Ishirou and Vorya sit at watch. The lights in the surf have returned, and Vorya scans the wave line, catching an occasional glimpse of a body - sometimes rotting and dead, sometimes seemingly fighting against the surf - tumbles within the sickly sea light. Still, the evening lingers on and nothing emerges from the surf, and eventually Ishirou's attention wanders.
The Tien man once again pulls his katana forth and removing the blade, tips the scabbard and spills forth his stash of maps. Flipping through the maps and tossing one and then another and another to his side, Ishirou smiles and spreads the map out on the sand in front of him. Scrawled in shaky ink sketching is what has become a familiar outline. A scythe-like spit of land bends downward, heading almost due south before again curving inward. Just above that southerly curve, atop a drawing of a hill and surrounded by simply drawn jungle trees, an X. The coastline is easy enough to reconcile now that the castaways have seen the Captain's maps - the northern end of land is the "scythe-blade" of the Smuggler's Shiv where Castaway Beach is located. One could, in theory, follow the coastline south and come very close to the hill and X, marking whatever was there. Scrawled in jagged Taldane, on the other side of the parchment is the following:
1. Summit the hill
2. Wait for sunrise
3. Find the sun between the two spindle-rocks looking east
4. Dig
5. (a symbol that looks like a backwards "J")
"This is the treasure map of Free Captain Lortch Quellig," Ishirou smiles, jabbing one sandy finger down onto the drawn hill. "X marks the spot. I won this map in a game of Conqueror, but I never could figure where this land was supposed to be. The whole island isn't drawn, and I didn't even think it was an island to be honest, but rather a bit of the mainland. But when I saw the map of the Shiv I just knew. I knew. We can get rich, you and me. We just have to get there, and dig. There's even a couple of shovels have been salvaged from the Jenivere. What do you say? Want to get rich? Dig up Quellig's treasure and we get off this island, you can buy a ship of your own with your share. Go wherever you want to go in this world." Ishirou's dark eyes sparkle in the fire light, greed and possibility dancing in the embers reflected there.
Sasha's gaze again wanders down the beachline, her emerald eyes focused on the darker green scrabble of jungle stretching out of view. "I think it is a mistake," she says, blinking and looking back to the castaways. "Not to range I mean. Best know what is here and plan accordingly, than to be surprised."
A gust of wind blows the cookfire smoke into a stretching cloud, and it whips about the castaways. Sasha blinks again, and annoyance flashing across her face, steps to the side. "But, I'm not doing it alone. As to your bait question, Vorya: look for insects. Beatles, fat grubs, worms. If you can find them -- Rovabugs. If you are not familiar, they fly in looping circles, with a loud buzz. Poor fliers and easy to catch. Quite harmless."
"If you can't find any Rovabugs or grubs, any insect will do. Barring insects, vines. We can cut them into slender lines that will cast about in the water as if they are small fish."
"I'll start with building some netting, lines, and spears. Hopefully we can be fishing tomorrow."
The moot concluded, the castaways break away to their afternoons, most to continue working on shelter, Lytte to sit vigil with Jask, and Sasha to her fishing-related tasks.
As Vorya heads into the treeline, he finds Ishirou at his side. The Tien grunts as he pushes a spiderweb aside, peering into the dim light filtering from the jungle canopy. "Aerys been gone all day? Think she's alright? Also, I've got something to show you. Let's take watch together tonight."
The captain's log is filled with precise writing and barebones facts. Early entries are -- again, precise -- in recording progress and events along the way, and barebones in structure, with little emotion or florid writing. Commonly, Kovak would record the weather, progress, supply issues or needs, staffing changes, and ship's repairs needed or completed, and little else, barring any unusual events, of which there were few: Kovak, by the interpretation of his logbook, was a fine captain, and the Jenivere a swift boat, able to evade trouble even through difficult waters.
Yet, as Vorya reads further, the less regular the entries become, and several days are missing entries all together. Kovak's handwriting also loses its precise edge, wandering along the page in uneven lines, and unclear, hastily written penmanship. What entries do appear are strangely short on details important to the passage, and increasingly, as they voyage drew closure to the fateful day of the shipwreck, focused more and more solely on one passenger: the Varisian scholar Ileana. Several entries are nothing more than poorly written love poems to Ileana, while others bemoan Kovak's inability to please her or catch her attention.
Near the end, the entries grow more ominous: Kovak complains that other members of the crew are eyeing "his Leana." In particular, Kovaks suspects the first mate is in love with her, and Kovak notes in one looping scrawl punctuated with slashed underlines that he wishes Devers would just "have an accident."
The last entry of the log before the crash reads:
Changed course for the Shiv. I hope, no, I know we can make a home there. A family. No one will look for us. The passengers are oblvious, but the sailors... they're asking questions. Especially Devers, that bilge-sucker. Yes. Something may need to be done about the crew.
"B-but, but" Gelik stammers, his voice growing high, agitated. "Ileana? She's so plain!"
At the mention of contagion, Vorya does a quick physical assessment. He'd been through two fights and came out alive, but injured. And of course, poisoned or drugged - intentionally or not - and washed up on a beach. Bitten by insects, underfed, and spent most of yesterday in the sun. But diseased or sick? Well, bugs carried disease, and perhaps Euryptids and eel-women did as well. Was that a tickle, just the faintest hint of a sore throat?
"Oh, tha's not good," Pilts mumbles, jabbing a finger at the outline of the island on the map. "The Shiv is a right ship's graveyard. It's not named for tha sickle-shape of the coast, though tha's an assumption yer could make. It's called tha Shiv 'cause it makes a habit of wrecking ships that draw too near. Only smugglers, slavers, and pirates are fool enough to try and land here."
"Or Chels," Bellet whispers, her voice soft as a lace curtain. "I remember the lessons well. They weren't fools of course. Just righteous colonizers. When Sargava was first settled, our engineers built a lighthouse here. It was to be the first building in the colony, and a place to jump waypoint for westward expansion. The first resupply ship arrived to find it abandoned, our people gone."
"And that wasn't the last time my people were here. Some seventy years ago, a Chelish ship wrecked here, part of an attempted re-invasion of our restive and sometimes breakaway colony to the east. The explorer Maximilus Verade - a close personal family friend, I should add - noted the remains of the Ninth Rule on a visit to this island some thirty years back. His expedition account is... fantastical at times. He notes rumors of cannibals, the remnants of that shipwreck. Haunts and curses too. But unverified by Verade himself."
Bellet pauses, her voice more forceful, her arms wrapped around herself as she was steeling against a wind. "This spit of land has been a disaster for my people. Amibition's graveyard. Like an infected thorn attached to a lion's paw."
"There's tales others have tried settlements here too," Sasha says, waving a hand towards the surf. "Mwangi nations, Bloodcove, even Bonefist tried in his younger days. So its said. Its also said that the Shiv is haunted by the ghosts and ghouls of those who have died on those jagged reefs and rocks..."
Silence falls over the beach, and Vorya finds himself gazing out to the sea, watching the waves come in and out. Ishirou flips the captain's log open, the books cover hitting the sandy beach with a emphatic smack, breaking the silence.
"Well, let's see if the Captain knew anything about it." Ishirou shrugs, his face turning a slight shade of red. "I uh. It will take me a while. Not the best with words."
Pilts nods, a slow, measured bob of his head, his eyes on Vorya, directly not looking in Bellet's direction. "Aye, I'll keep watch over 'em. Though if he's sick, and I catch it... yerselves'll may need a new cook."
Tension diverted (for now), Ishirou drops to his knees and pulls the maps from his false-bottomed scabbard, laying a curled stack of them to the side. "These ones are mine. But these charts and maps, they're from the captain's cabin. Oh, and I'll fish as well."
The first map Ishirou lays on the beack lies flat easily -- apparently it saw regular use and was never stored in a tube or folded. It is in fine condition, if a little soiled; relatively new, lacking in creases tears. The map shows the coast of Garund, and plots the Jenivere's path along a series of stops. There is little shown on this map - its focus being the coastline of Garund after all - of outlying islands. It occurs to Vorya that perhaps they are not on an island after all, but rather some remote stretch of the southern continent, some forsaken and hostile expanse of Mwangi jungle. Which, in a way could be a blessing and curse.
Other maps and charts are unfurled one by one. Some show Avistan, others the whole of the Inner Sea, with blank spaces drifting off towards the end of the great plains that connect the kingdom of the east with Avistan. One chart maps the celestial bodies, and another, strangely, is a small atlas of the cities of the River Kingdoms. Nothing provides much context for where the castaways may be stranded.
Last, Ishirou uncoils an older map, one of the Fever Sea and its numerous, often unnamed and uncharted small islands. There, Vorya spies an island that could be where the castaways are marooned, judging from the swashbuckler's foray to the ridgeline yesterday. The land's peculiar curvature -- like the blade of a scythe, and the bay to the south of it match. The island lies roughly 35 knots to the southwest of the last known spot they were on the plotted course, and judging from the map's scale, is a descent size, perhaps sixteen miles from north to south (with about half of that being taken up by the bay), and another twleve or so miles east to west. Many of the islands in the Fever Sea have no official names. Pirates may know them by any number of names informally, or even more likely, most of the islands are mere spits of land, not worth anyone's attention. This island, however, with its sweeping scythblade coming to almost a pincher with its western side, with two smaller islands floating just offshore, and its dense, mountain and forested southern half, has an official name. Printed in small lettering just off the eastern coast: Smuggler's Shiv
Bellet seemingly stands even straighter, her deep violet eyes twinkling, her expression lifting a little around them, a shifting of her crow's feet. She's pleased perhaps, at the deference that Vorya has given? "I will volunteer half of Lytte's time to tending after the convict, as displeasing as it may be. My slip is a fine caretaker, and will no doubt have mister... Jask, it is? Mr. Jask on his feet in no time. We shall of course not share our shelter with a convict, and Lytte, you are not to talk with the convict; there is no doubt he was squirreled away on that ship for good reason." Those violet eyes land on each of the castaways, a few moments spent in silent appraisal, before the noble waves her hand in the direction of Pilts. "The cook can care for the convict the rest of the time. If nothing else, he will be nourished."
The slight - the dismissive wave, the way the lady doesn't refer to Pilts by name - is not lost on the sailor. He stands, fists clenched, rosy-hued face growing even redder by the moment, until, with a flourish, Sasha kips up from her languid pose, a graceful fluid motion that Vorya, who has practiced such things, would find hard to replicate. "Glad that's settled. Regarding the watch, we should have two to a watch, for a couple of hours for each shift, with those of us with some skill at arms staggered across watches. So that's..." It is Sasha's turn to look around the beach, "Myself, Vorya, Ishirou, and Aerys."
"Ahem." Gelik mutters, his fake cough carrying a tinge of annoyance. Ishirou shrugs, and turns towards his shelter, small puffs of sand rising behind him as he sprints towards it, one word drifting over his shoulder. "Maps!"
"And Gelik of course," Sasha smiles, her warmth not quite reaching her eyes. "How could I forget your tales of bravado? We'll be able to have a sword-arm on each shift at the least."
"I'm a decent fisher," Sasha continues. "Who else?" Blank stares all around. "Well, we'll need to learn. Anyone interested, we'll spend the day working at making spears and salvaging any netting we can find."
Ishirou scampers back to the fire wearing a large crooked grin, holding his sword aloft in one hand, a few books tucked under his other arm. "Maps! I have maps. And the captain's logbooks."
Silence settles over the beach, drawn out, like a midsummer's sunset. A steady wind blows off the sea, and as if giving credence to Vorya's words, the campfire flickers, and flickers again, before again gaining strength. Smoke wafts over Vorya, stinging his eyes and bringing a strange scent to his nostrils, the scent of foriegn wood burning perhaps.
Pilts harrumphs, his voice smashing through Vorya's musings about wood like a hammer on glass. "That's all well an' good, but where am I going to sleep? I spent tha last day--"
"I'm no priest or king myself." Bellet interjects, her voice as rigid as her posture. The other castaways had chosen to sit, some on empty crates, or logs, or even just the beach, but the lady had remained standing for the moot, her posture commanding, even in her soiled longdress. "Merely a noblewoman. But I know something about societies. Assessing priorities is well and good, and I agree that shelter and a fire are important. But, we should not tumble about, like drunks leaving a tavern, lacking direction. We should work as the bees do, with clearly defined roles. Some of us can build shelter. You--" the Lady waves one hand in Pilts' direction "--can tend a fire, and I don't know, bunk with our loquacious swordsman here, his sledhome is rather spacious all things considered. But we should not limit ourselves to just these two things. Food should be gathered, or hunted, or fished..."
Gelik Aberwhinge stands, and sensing a pause in Bellet's speaking, jumps into the vacuum, the pitch of his voice high, rising as he talks like the fire's smoke curling into the air. "How do we know we're alone? That there's no competition? That we're safe? What do we do if we're injured? The half-dead one, he's a priest, right? Getting him on his feet again could be good for all of us. And anyways, again, how do we know we're alone here? Should we have guards at night?"
Sasha Nevah, the ginger-haired, pinky-missing, tattooed woman, has been uncharacteristically quiet - compared to her demeanor on the ship, at least, which Vorya found to be borderline manic most all the time. Often never still, Nevah had spent the meeting up until now lounging with her feet pointed to the fire, propped up on her elbows. She draws up slightly, looking into the treeline rising up the ridgeline. "Some of us should range," she mutters, her gaze drawing down the beach and lingering. "See if we really are alone. We can hunt while we explore."
"No. No way." Aberwhinge pounds one small fist into another, a puff of sand spilling from the back of one hand. "We should stay together. Safety in numbers."
Silence again draws over the beach. Gently, Ishirou clears his throat. "We need to figure out where we are. We have maps. And the captain's logbooks. I'm. I'm not much of a reader..."
Jask's eyes flutter open, and the priest's gaze focus on Vorya for a moment, watery pools, almost entirely pupils, dilated black. Vorya notes the sweat slicking the man's stubbled cheeks, his forehead, even his sand-coated arms. Jask reaches out, the motion a seeming eternity, and pulls the food towards him, though he does not eat. His breathing is shallow, his eyes once again lose what little sharpness they had.
After lunch Vorya calls the meeting. In short order, the castaways gather on the beach - excepting Aerys, who seems to be gone. Sitting around the cookfire, the castaways look to each other. The air is still, the fire's smoke rises into the air, little curl to its path. Even the ocean's surf seems tame, quiet, as if waiting in anticipation.
"Well, I'll start!" Pilts ventures, his voice edged, like an echo off a stone wall. "I've gathered our food, put it off the ground in some shelving in the treeline. But we need a better system, unless the birds - an' worse - come for it. And I cook for you alls, and build our larder, but I've got no time for my own shelter. I spent last night on the forest floor..."
The big man tails off, his fists rubbing unconsciously across his belly, before he turns to Vorya. "Anyways, you called this moot. Speak!"
The rest of the night passes uneventfully, though Vorya has trouble sleeping, and it occurs more than once to the swashbuckler they castaways would be wise to institute some sort of guard watch during the night. One fitful eye cast towards the sea, Vorya sees the greenish glow fade to darkness about an hour before sunrise, and then, soon enough the sun breaks over the horizon and with it, the temperature steadily climbs, and the nits, gnats, and biting sandflies return, the insects much more well-rested than Vorya.
The camp stirs with the morning light, and eventually the castaways make their ways from their shelters, eyes bleary, faces pinched and drawn. Pilts manages a sputtering fire, and soon, a warm breakfast is ready, simple but nourishing: plantains, smashed and fried in tallow, and then fried again, and served over cornmeal grits blended with a shaved hard cheese popular among the Chels.
Talk turns to the glowing surf from last night; it seems Vorya was not the only castaway that saw it. Lytte awoke to relieve himself and searched along the glowing surf for a few minutes, though he saw no spectral limbs or anything untoward. Gelik, however, swears he saw a maiden with dark hair and luminescent skin rise briefly from the surf, one strained, grasping hand reaching towards the gnome's ramshackle lean-to, before being pulled - as if a top on a string, the dandy notes with a spinning gesture of his hand - back into the ocean. Gelik's face turns taut and drained, and the dandy picks at his cornmeal, his flourish of a story trailing off into a frown.
After breakfast, most of the castaways work at their shelter, with Pilts gone into the treeline in search of drier wood, and Aerys wandered up the beach, bottle of grog in hand. Vorya begins as well on his shelter, pulling the overturned sled away from the shivering Jask, the man's eyes still closed, teeth still chattering, breakfast sitting untouched atop a large leaf next to the former prisoner. Grunting, Vorya leaves the man to his god's care, and lifts the sled into a bush just inside the treeline. The swashbuckler uses his sunsilver rapier as a poor axe, eventually forgoing it completely to pull at the brush under the sled with his hands. The Rahadoumi finds the work difficult; the brush - largely consisting of one bush with flexible, tough woody stems and three-leaf clusters drooping with red berries - proves to be stronger than Vorya had first assumed. The morning passes and by then Vorya - no survivalist by training - has cleared his bush house from under the sled. The Rahadoumi's hands are lashed with small scrapes and welts, and Vorya can once again smell himself in the damp, still jungle air, but with a little patching on the roof and the addition of a couple of sides, the swashbuckler will have himself a right hovel.
Lunch comes - more cornmeal, this time sans plantain - and most of the castaways retreat to the shade of the treeline or their shelters for the afternoon. The air is still and hot, and in the distance, a booming noise echoes across the beach, once, and then again. The Jenivere crumples, like a house in a mudslide, and sinks beneath the surf, guaranteed to never sail again.
Continuing to build your shelter into the afternoon?
Vorya recalled his boyhood in Azir, many late nights spent atop the walls of the old city, beyond which on one side laid a short beach and then the crash of the estatuary waves where the Jodin river met the Azure sea. Occasionally, mostly on warm nights during the dry season, the estatuary would alight with flickering blue-green light, as if sheet lightening tossed about in the surf.
The walls were always a place for refuge from the city: thirty feet wide in parts, with stone worn smooth from thousands of years of passage across them, they were a gathering place for Azirees wanting to get away from the noise and smell of the city: young lovers hoping to escape their guardians for a few intimate moments; flayleaf pushers with their dangerous goods hiding in the shadows; and those, like Vorya, that enjoyed the moments of peace and contemplation that came from listening to the waves fall upon the shore in the darkness.
In those moments where the sea-lightening came, however, the walls became a gathering place for what seemed the whole of Azir. Families, touts, wedding parties, streetcart kabob vendors, and seemingly the rest of the city would gather in a carnival-like atmosphere to take in the light under the waves.
Here, wherever it was that Vorya was now, there is something just the slightest bit off about the glowing surf. Rather than the crackling blue-green lightning under the waves, this glowing was paler, greener, and more constant. Interest piqued, Vorya wandered toward the surf, the steady roar of the ocean drowning out the sounds of the jungle behind him. And that was not the only thing drowned. There, in the surf, for a moment -- a limb. An arm or leg, it spasmed! The limb was indistinct, its form wavered, and one moment seemed to be clothed in rags, the next mere bone tumbling in the sickly glowing green water. Then it was gone, pulled back under the surf. Vorya could swear he heard, just under the sound of the crashing waves, a moan, long and low and discomfited, not so different from that of his grandfather's last moments before he succumbed to the wasting disease some thirty years before...
Shivering and teeth chattering, Jask goes under the makeshift shelter for the evening, his eyes focusing on Vorya for a few intense moments until he mouths the words thank you, weak, dank breath barely reaching Vorya's nose. Later, Vorya hears some stronger words coming from the former prisoner... a prayer, repeated again and again judging by the cadence, though the words are difficult to make out. Eyes closed, Jask sweats and prays, and eventually falls asleep.
The castaways for the most part are quiet, or at least around Vorya, who they give a wide birth. When Pilts leaves Vorya his dinner, the large cook scratches his stubble and looks to the treeline. "Likely will need to forage some wood tomorrow. And build a shelter in the treeline, keep it dry from the rains." Dropping a small dinner - cold, previously smoked cod and shaped parsnips, with an unpeeled orange, all wrapped with leaf, Pilts ducks out of the shelter, on to deliver the next person's meal. Perhaps it is the days' exertion, the danger, the lack of a future, but Vorya swears the meagre meal is one of the best he's ever had.
The sunset is quick, a few minutes at most, and the castaways watch in silence as yellow turns to a fiery orange and then is snuffed out like the end of a dragon's breath, darkness dropping over beach, only kept at bay with the few everburning torches salvaged from the Jenivere, which cast their glow against the night all around, a futile fight edged in shadow and the sounds of night bugs.
Of which there are plenty. They loop and buzz Vorya and Jask's shelter, bite at the Rahadoumi's ankles, back, neck. Vorya turns in the sand, half-in and out of a fitful sleep, and wakes sometime in the dark night to find a new, strange light almost to the beach: the waves crashing against the shore are infused with their own radiance, a pale green, which ebbs in and out with the surf, the effect almost as if it were faintly glowing.
nature DC 15:
Phosphorescent algae and plankton can create a glow like this. However...
If Vorya looks closely, Perception DC 16:
There in the waves, an arm or leg, it thrashes! The limb is indistinct, its form wavers, and one moment seems to be clothed in rags, the next mere bone tumbling in the green water.
The rain falls, a veritable miles-wide waterfall. Ducking back into and under the cover of the jungle canopy, darkness clouds Vorya's vision, though the rain is at least manageable under the trees towering over Vorya's head, their tops now lost in the shadows. Other than the constant rush of water all around, the forest is silent as a tomb; no birdlife, no croaks, no strange crashing sounds in the distance.
The walk back goes quicker than the assent up the ridge line, if much messier. More than once, Vorya slips in the mud and ends up on his rump; a few times the swashbuckler nearly slips and falls from a precarious spot, only to catch himself on a nearby vine or branch. And still the rain comes down only starting to lessen when Vorya sets foot back on the beach.
The castaways have retreated to their lean-tos, the cookfire is out, the half-smoked remains of the eryptid cold and slick. Vorya can just make out the forms of the Lady Bellet and her servant, hovering under a soaked blanket, their lean-to collapsed in the storm, watching the swashbuckler as he approaches what he's begun to think of as Castaway Beach. Close to the now extinguished fire, Jask Derindi lays, covered in wet sand, eyes closed, but with hands freed from his manacles. The only sign the man still lives is the chattering of his teeth.
Like a candle flickering in the wind, the rain lessens, and then stops, and a few moments later the sounds of birdlife and buzzing insects resumes, as if the storm had never come. The beach smells earthy, pungent. Like a fresh-dug grave.
It is late afternoon/early evening. What now? As a reminder, you have some food, no shelter (but maybe someone will let you bunk with them in their poorly constructed hovel?), some maps (both the ones that Ishirou keeps in his scabbard and the ones from the captain's quarters), logbooks, a half-drunk Aerys, one partially smoked eryptid, a few everburning torches, and that world-famous Rahadoumi pluck and persistence.
Putting aside his thirst, Vorya began climbing again, the ascent growing more vertical. The stream - a trickle really - meandered away to the west.
Vorya plunged back into the jungle, huffing in the humid darkness, his hands slipping on rocks as he pulled himself up the ever more steep hillside. The undercanopy grew dark, darker than before, and time fell into an almost medative rythm marked by a hand on this rock here, a foot stepping over this branch there, and then eventually, ahead, another clearing.
Vorya was vaguely aware he was headed down as he stepped into it, and the mountainside gave away to an impressive vista. Vorya found himself in a barren stretch of mountain, the foliage around him blacked and burned away. Trees, burned off to the base stretched down the mountainside for a hundred or more feet, and for a moment Vorya was reminded of the great dockside fire of Azir a decade past, where a merchant ship caught fire while docked and the pier around it burned. Five ships were lost, burned to the waterline and sunk. But the dock was burned as well, and when low tide came, the remainders of the pier stretched like blackened fingers from the sea. The industrious Rahadoumi rebuilt the dock within a month, and the city absorbed the tragedy as his people did, like a new scar layered atop many others. Here, the forest was in the process of doing something similar. Shoots of green - small trees, vines, and shrubs bent under Vorya's foot as he jockeyed closer to the downslope to get a better view.
Vorya had come over a comparatively low ridge, a spine of mountain that stretched to the south and east rising as it went, obscuring what Vorya could see from his vantage. A sweep of coast mirrored the mountain ridge, curving south and east and eventually all the way around, nearly a circle, like the blade of a sickle. In between the coastline, a bay, its water the color of coal, reflecting the gathering stormclouds overhead.
Vorya estimated the bay to be a few miles across, and he could see no evidence of friendly fishermen along the coast, nor could he see any evidence of river deltas meeting the bay. Perhaps his fishermen sat on a different coastline. To Vorya's west, the mountain spine dropped further until it met the sea in a rounded peninsula, with a few small islands gathered just offshore. Across the mouth of the bay, two larger islands sat, rocky protrusions jutting from the dark, frothing sea around. The southernmost of the two islands looked not so different from the land Vorya currently stood upon: jungle-covered rock leading to water, either in plunging cliffsides or less often, coves and beaches. The northernmost island, however, was different. Where the rest of the nearby land was verdant and green, even under the darkness of the stormclouds, the northernmost island was grey, as if the island's spindly trees had been sapped of their vitality; the island sat reminiscent of a tumor sprouting from an alley dog's head.
Overhead, the stormclouds were fat and grey, and one fat drop of water, and then another, fell upon Vorya's sunbaked head.
Decision made, Vorya climbed the game trail. It meandered a bit but headed mostly upwards, at times almost straight up, as if the creature(s) that made it were able climbers. Vorya cursed quietly, sweat ran into his eyes, mosquitos bit into the back of his neck. And still he went, up the trail. He was close to turning around, when he heard it, hidden behind the pulsating sounds of the jungle's insects: the bubbly sound of running water!
Picking up pace, Vorya climbed further and picked himself up and over a rock and there it was, as fine a site as anything on this near murderous day; a small fall, slicking over a hillside and collecting among the rock outcropping Vorya now stood upon before running off the other side of the rocks and back into the jungle.
Vorya's mouth watered, his self-awareness - the smell, oh his smell - assaulted his senses alongside his thirst. A bath and drink then? Or a drink and then a bath?
With a bit of a vantage from the rock outcropping, Vorya found himself looking out over an expanse of sea, darkened by the gathering stormclouds. Below him, a few hundred feet at least, was a spit of sand that wandered to the west. Likely the east end of the castaways' beach, which meant the Jenivere was more or less below him, though unseen. He had wound his way around to almost the top of the ridge by which he'd been earlier in the day, just much, much higher this time.
A nearby bird shrieked, perhaps angry at the intrusion of a larger creature at its watering spot, and Vorya looked up to the trees. The hillside climbed up, nearly vertical, but there may be a way around, further to the east. And though judging distances could be difficult when traversing topography with the features of a crumpled sheet of vellum, there was likely the ridgeline not too far away. Perhaps there was a vantage of what lay on the other side?
Fuming, Vorya charges towards the jungle. He moves at a hurried clip straight towards the closest treeline directly to the south. Sand kicks up behind him, coating the back of Vorya's legs, drifting into his shoes. The swashbuckler stumbles through a patch of small green cedums with bright pink flowers, rage clouding his thoughts, and storms into the expanse of greenery beyond, barely noticing the buzzing insects alighting on his sweat-soaked skin. Still enraptured in rage, Vorya draws his rapier and stabs impotently at a nearby tree, and then calming a bit, uses his blade to push aside vines and shrubs and move - slowly - further inland. Vegetation, mostly in shades of green, is thick here, and Vorya squints in the darkness given by the canopy of trees above him, and marvels at how quickly the environment has changed.
Gone is the punishing sun, the bright blue sky, the sandflies. In their place, a damp and dreary dimness surrounds Vorya. His feet kick through piles of dead leaves fed upon by fungi. From the leaves sprout small plants - wiry, spiky bushes; delicate, frondlike ferns, creeping vines, and dotting one nearby fallen tree, strange cuplike fungi, orange and bristly, stretched in a meandering line across the log's bark. The occasional orchid and spiderplant attach themselves to winding tall trees which stretch skyward towards the jungle canopy. Under the trees, the air is fetid and wet. Sweat slicks Vorya and beads of moisture line plants. Vorya suspects if he were to devote enough time to it, he could lick enough water from the nearby plants to satiate his thirst.
But, in the presence of the bugs, this seemed at best an even trade. The forest practically murmured, a pulsating, insectoid communication all around. Mosquitoes bit at Vorya's arms and ankles, gnats flew at his sweat-soaked brow, and a large, lumbering bug the likes of which Vorya had never seen before buzzed angrily around the castaway's head.
Pushing more of the underbrush aside, Vorya pressed deeper, noting that the elevation was steadily rising. Besides the humming of the bugs, Vorya heard other sounds - birds mostly, bright chirps associated with flashes of color - emerald greens, crimson, azure - as the birds took flight. Occasionally, a growl or yip would find its way to Vorya's ear, the only sign of a nearby animal unseen in the underbrush or low branches of the emergent tree canopy above him.
Rubbing some sweat - and gnats - from his brow, Vorya pauses, uttering a small curse of frustration. He'd been pushing through the jungle for tens of minutes now with no sign of water - other than the slick jungle all around him. No signs of fresh, flowing water at least.
Sighing, Vorya turned back to the beach, spying a press of trampled greenery climbing around a large boulder and out of site towards the ridgeline. A game trail, which meant perhaps water, perhaps food. Perhaps something that would find Vorya himself a snack. Did the swashbuckler dare follow it?
Water? Vorya's question ripples across the beach, returning only silence. Moments roll by, like the dry desert scrub that would blow across Azir's streets. The comparison brings a memory to Vorya's mind - or more a montage of memories - the herders' market, every Starday. The herders would make the trek to the eponymous Herder's Square, traveling miles from the city the day before with select animals - mostly cattle and camel raised on the grasslands of the fertile Ute, but also occasionally goats and sheep from the sierras farther away. The goats were always particularly fascinating to Vorya. The young goats -- kids, Vorya recalls -- would be tender and were a delicacy in Azir, and nobles and chefs alike would pay a pretty silver for them. The herders separated the kids from their mothers, with the mothers staying behind with the herd, and the kids were pitiful by the time they had arrived at market. They bleated incessantly, and in absence of their parents, the little goats stayed close to the herders that would ultimately be their demise...
Gelik's eyes widen, and the dandy gnome nods towards the expanse of green beyond the beach, now nearly silent in the mid-afternoon swelter. "D-do you think it is safe? Safe to go in there?" Pilts casts another eye towards the supply raft, his face pinched. "Probably not enough there to do more'n wet our whistles, but at least we won't die o' thirst tonight. If ye' brought anything like that o' course."
Before Vorya can answer, the Jenivere's cook, Pilts, points to the sand-covered supplies Vorya, Ishirou, and Aerys have drug on their rope and wood sled up the beach. "D'ya have pots, glasses, other things that can catch rainwater in there? We can do like we'd do on the Jenny, 'n catch the near daily storms blowing off'n the Eye. O' course, if we're still close to the Eye, that is."
Sure enough, to the northwest, dark clouds begin to cover the place in the horizon where sky meets sea. As Vorya knows, storms can gather quickly in this part of the world. There will likely be rain soon.
A quick glance over the maps before they go into the bag bolster Vorya's hopes. There are a multitude of navigational aids in the stack, with one worn and yellowed map showing the plotting of the Jenivere's course, a plan repeated over numerous trips over numerous years. Aerys traces her finger along the route, a small frown crossing her face. "How long were we... asleep? Surely not too long. We would have been in or nearing Desperation Bay the night we all blacked out. Can't have been too far, right?"
Oh well, that was a question for another time, a problem for the future. For now, it was time to construct the raft and send the less important items - weapons, armor, money, perhaps some tools - toward the shore and hope it caught a current.
Back home in Rahadoum, days were hot, but even so, Vorya finds this island's muggy heat and the overhead sun punishing. Azir, being located on the west coast of an arid nation enjoyed a dry heat and gentle breezes off the sea. Here, on this unknown island, humidity sat in the air almost like moist blanket. Vorya's armpits, back, scalp and crotch were all soon fecund swamps; sweat dripped off of the swashbuckler like rain from one of Azir's colorfully painted rooftops. The castaways soon began to work inside the confines of the ship, stripping the Jenivere of rope of lumber and then hauling it up into the sunlight for assemblage.
A few hours later, the raft is finished. Pulling it to the side of the Jenivere, the castaways find that the tide has gone out, and a string of slippery rocks lead from the ship to the shoreline. With care, they could be traversed to the sandy shore of the beach. Cursing silently under his breath, Ishirou shrugs and then grins. "Well, maybe we could make the raft a sled? Pull it down the beach?"
And so, Vorya, Aerys, and Ishirou eventually find themselves on the beach with their supplies intact, and begin the arduous process of pulling the raft/sled back to the others. Staying close to the waterline where the sand is wet and firmer proves advantageous; the castaways' feet sink less into the ground and the sled is easier to pull. Still, it is painful work. Rope burns the castaways' hands and wrists, sweat pours from their bodies, sand flies flit about their necks, rapacious.
Give me a fortitude save, please.
Eventually, the afternoon sun high in the sky, the threesome arrive at the castaways' beach. Smoke from a cooking fire curls into the sky. Set high above the fire, the meat from the dead eurypterid sits impaled on a stick, curing in the campfire smoke and sun. The beginnings of shelters have cropped up on the beach. Lytte struggles with a makeshift lean-to erupting from a nearby dune while Bellet watches from the shade of her broken parasol. A driftwood "tent" is under construction near the cookfire.
Sasha and Gelik, meanwhile, huddle together near the treeline, analyzing a covering built from sticks and leaves.
The sun beats down, the humid air offers no respite. If this day is any indication, afternoons on this island will be brutal.
Ishirou's hand goes reflexively to his sword; he doesn't grip the hilt as if to draw it, but rather places his hand over the place where the scabbard meets the katana's pommel hilt, a small disk, wrought of blackened iron in the shape of two grasping dragons. "You first, Vorya." Ishirou's brow is creased, face clouded. "But then, I'd hate to deprive you of your murder weapon." Ah, a little sunshine then.
Vorya, Aerys, and Ishirou make their way up to the Captain's cabin, finding themselves once more standing topside. Using their swords, Vorya and Ishirou pop the door from its tilted frame, and pulling it open, find the captain's cabin -- or most of it. The back left corner of the cabin is gone, smashed again and again against a rock outcropping, which now juts into the room and holds the shuddering Jenivere barely afloat. Captain Kovak's cabin was once well-appointed, though much of finery now lays tattered; the four-posted bed is splintered, sheets soiled. A cabinet, bolted to the far wall, sits with its doors splayed, the clothes that once lied within scattered about the floor. Dried blood spots the floor, with one dark splash indicating a great deal of it exited someone near the door.
The top drawer of an overturned desk holds a ring of keys, while another holds a grouping of star charts and maps and a large, leatherbound tome embossed with the word Log.
A lower desk drawer is locked. Kneeling, Ishirou draws his sword once again, and instead of using it as a pry, tips his scabbard; a scroll tube, roughly one foot long, tumbles out the end, and Vorya realizes something that had been tugging at his mind since he first saw the sword (failed perception check earlier); the scabbard was long, much longer than the blade of Ishirou's sword.
Opening the scroll tube, Ishirou gently unfurls a few small maps and lays them to the side; in the middle of Ishirou's maps - mostly hand-drawn in ink, from a glimpse Vorya is able to gather - lies a small pouch, which is itself unfurled, revealing a few gleaming tools; picks, spatulas, and a small set of pliers. Thieves' tools.
A couple of minutes more and the desk drawer lock clicks open, Ishirou letting loose a satisfied sigh. The inside of the drawer is padded, preserving the contents within: a bottle of fine brandy 50 gp, claimed instantly by Aerys, a darkwood model of the Jenivere in a glass bottle 100 gp, and a small pewter coffer containing a mish-mash of currency from different countries 350 gp in total. Also in this lower drawer is a long black leather satchel that contains a dozen potions for emergency use, each neatly labeled in precise Taldane: four potions of "lesser healing" cure light wounds, one potion labeled "healing" cure moderate wounds, four potions of "lesser restoration," a potion labeled "for disease" remove disease, a potion labeled "breathe water," and a last potion labeled "walk on water." water breathing and water walking
Finally, a footlocker leaning against the desk contains a box labeled "Jask Derindi," inside of which are a masterwork dagger, suit of leather armor, two vials containing liquid unlabeled potions, a spell component pouch, and a holy symbol - or so Vorya assumes - a carved deep mahogany amulet depicting a winged serpent twisted into a circle, eating its own tail.
The storeroom, predictably, turns out to be locked, but after a few kicks from Aerys, the frame of the door splinters and it swings inward, creaking on rusted hinges. Originally, the castaways' weapons and gear were stored here for the length of the voyage (excepting Ishirou's sword). Though the castaways' gear had been removed and stored in the pile on the beach, the storeroom still contained supplies that could be useful in building a secure campsite: a block and tackle, three large canvas sheets, two fishing nets, a grappling hook, two bullseye lanterns, twelve flasks of lantern oil, 150 feet of hempen rope, and five shovels.
Aerys stretches and casts a glance around the room. "Lots here. How we getting it all back?"
"Sailors also go down with their ships," Aerys barks, tucking a bottle of grog unti a sack. "Let's not join them. Anyways, liquor's mine. Consider it payment for saving your arses."
While Vorya and Aerys pull food (and alcohol) from the larder's shelves, Ishirou drags the bodies into the great cabin. Next to the bodies go the salvaged food in neat groupings of like-minded objects: salted meats; fruits, vegetables, and perishables; legumes, flour, liquor. Laid out on the floor, it will be more than the three of you can carry in one trip. Aerys huffs, frustrated, while Ishirou kneels at the bodies.
"Look at this," the swordsman says, pointing to two small pinpricks on the neck of the cook's assistant, the skin around which is rotting, blackened, inflamed. "This is what killed him. Now, look this." Ishirou holds out his own bruised wrist. Wiped somewhat clean on a kitchen rag, the bites-marks there have stopped bleeding and are numerous, almost human-like punctures, shallower and numerous. "That thing in the larder did not kill the boy. And here," Ishirou turns on his heels, pointing to punctures in Devers' armor. "I know the blade of a sword when I see one. He was stabbed before the eel-woman got him. Likely a rapier, or an epee, or perhaps the end of a longblade." Ishirou's eyes meet Vorya's as he says the word rapier, and he quickly looks back to the corpse.
Aerys nods, a look Vorya hasn't seen yet settling across her features - respect. "Oi, not so bad yourself. Saw the fancy sword and yer clothes and figured you fer a bit of a dandy, but... you did well. You as well, Ishirou."
The swordsman cracks a wide grin - Vorya swears he's seen Ishirou smile more since they marooned than when they were safely aboard the Jenivere - and then runs his hand along the scratches crossing his neck and face, which comes away slick and red. "Here still. Unpleasant for sure. But, we're alive. And-- food!"
The larder was used by Pilts and Piper to store some of the more often accessible foodstuffs, as well as some of the ship's finer foods - foods that would be eaten by paying passengers and the ship's officer class. So, even though the bulk of the food would have been kept belowdecks and the Jenivere was only a few days from its final destination in Sargava, there's still a sizable store of food in the larder.
Some of that food is no good; sprayed with blood and ichor, smeared across the floor, or gone bad in the time since the ship crashed. But even so, two large boxes of oranges and mangoes, likely picked up at port in Senghor, sit enticing on a shelf. Salted cod and pork hang in baskets in the back of the larder, and a variety of grains; beans of course, but also millet and split peas, sit in small sacks. The larder once held a sizeable amount of liquor, but only three bottles remain unbroken; a fine rum from the Magic Valley distillery in the city of Quent, in the Shackles, and two clay jugs of grog. Rounding out the haul, a variety of allums and root vegetables: onions, potatoes, yams, and groundnuts. A sack of flour sits on a low shelf, a streak of blood across its burlap surface. Vorya estimates that there's enough food to feed one person for probably a month. Of course, there's nine mouths to feed on the beach...
The corpse of the cook's assistant, Piper, contains nothing of value. Devers' armor and short sword, however, are finely made.
So, let's call it 36 days of food for one person, or 4 days for the castaways. Devers' studded leather and short sword are both masterwork. Checking anything out on the ship?
The melee in front of Vorya is just that: a brutal, no holds-barred, close-quarter tumbling of fist, claw, and blade. The beast, so close to freedom, rends and snaps at Ishirou, her claws raking across the swordsman's neck and face, her fangs biting into Ishirou's wrist, an attempt to end his life just as she had Devers'. Ishirou's blade cuts deep this time, a black-bloody slice across the eel-woman's back. Rum and Punch dig into the creature's side, and audible crack of one of her rib's resounding in the tight space.
Wounded and bloody, the creature still stands, as does Ishirou. Their momentum flags, the wounds taking their toll. There is an opening, if Vorya can take it...
Vorya slides into the larder, sunsteel rapier thrust in one smooth motion towards their foe -- and unfortunately thrown off target by a shudder convulsing the Jenivere. While his strike is wide, the swashbuckler's sea legs don't let him down. Slipping around the eel-woman, Vorya kicks an errant pot of out his way and spins in the tight confines of the larder, ending behind their enemy in a few fluid steps.
The eel-woman for her part pays Vorya no mind, intent as she is on freedom. Her tail slides across the floor, snake-like, and propels her into Ishirou. The castaway has just the time to brace himself, and the collision ends in a wet thump, one of the woman's claws raking harmlessly across Ishirou's chain shirt. The man's katana flashes in the torchlight, but this is more a brawl then a swordfight. Ishirou struggles to stab at the creature, his blade merely deflecting off the creature's scaly hide.
Aerys fares better. The woman wades into the melee across from Vorya, using the swashbuckler's position to split the eel-woman's attention. Punch extends in a testing jab before Aerys follows up with Rum, a rocking crack across the creature's jawline.
Aerys drains the rest of her bottle of rum and lets it drop to the floor with a soft clink. "Yes. I'll open the door. Rush whatever is beyond, and I'll follow with Rum Punch." Leaning to the side of the door, Aerys grasps the handle and mouths one word. Ready.
Whatever Ishirou's feelings on the matter, he's been outvoted. Sliding his katana loose, Ishirou takes his place to the side of Vorya and places one hand atop the soaking tub, and with a silent nod, begins pulling.
Devers was a barrelchested sailor in life, and the soaking tub, made of beaten copper, is likely half as heavy as the dead weight within it. With one heave, Ishirou and Vorya manage to drag the tub a mere foot, the copper basin dragging across the floor with a resounding, deep scrape. Looming over the mate, Vorya notes, eyes growing wide, Devers' left hand. The First Mate's hand has been heavily damaged by whatever fight (fights?) Devers was in before his death. Small jagged punctures and slashes cross the man's knuckles and fingers, and a deep set of punctures, perhaps from teeth, spaced roughly like that of a man's though obviously sharper, run across Devers' wrist. Dried blood coats the mate's wrist, shirt, and the sides of the wash basin; the severed artery in Devers' wrist is likely what killed him, despite the numerous other wounds the man sustained since Vorya last saw him.
But, it is what Devers grasps in his hand that turns Vorya's stomach: a severed purple-black tongue, studded with ridges and measuring easily seven inches. Even now, so long after Devers' death, the tongue still twitches, a spasm of life running through it.
Another pull, another scrape across the floor, and Ishirou looks to the castaways, tapping one hand to his ear. Silence. Indeed, the thumping and scraping beyond the door has stopped, replaced by a foreboding silence. And then, a new sound from beyond: a rasping wet gurgle, that drones on and then repeats, a cadence that could be... a song? It has the repetition and structure of one, if not discernable words.
One more pull, one last scrape across the floor, and there is enough space to swing the door open. The song continues, that clogged gurgle, almost feral, almost music. One last hurried look among the castaways, one last nod of affirmation, and Aerys flings the door wide.
Torchlight filters into the larder. At first, Vorya's eyes are drawn to another corpse, this one of the cook's assistant, the skinny and timid teenager Piper, sprawled along the floor, resting against the left wall. Piper was the only other member of the crew that would have been mid-ships when the crash happened. Blood crusts a gaping slash across the boy’s throat, as if he’d been surprised from behind from a sharp blade. Poor Piper’s leg has been knawed off from below his left knee as well. A clean bone descends from a ragged stump of muscle and flesh, though little blood is on the floor under the boy. He was killed elsewhere, and the leg of the cook’s assistant was eaten after his death.
Movement draws Vorya’s eye, a slithering form shifts from the dark recesses of the larder into the torchlight: clawed hands pull a creature forward across the floor. Vorya thinks at first that she is a woman crawling across the floor, but it is quickly apparent that she is nothing of the sort. Stringy, ragged hair hangs from her scalp, draping over her bare back, which is the grey color of dirty ice. The woman’s back is criss-crossed with scars, and patches of fish-like scales grow sparingly at first, and then more frequently as Vorya’s eyes travel down the woman’s back, until her human side gives way to something more piscine; a flopping, slithering tail like that of an eel, striped gray and black. The woman raises her face to the castaway and her gurgling tune drifts with her, almost pulling Vorya toward her in the rancid air of the larder. She opens her mouth into a wide, fearsome smile; the bloody stump of a tongue rubs along sharp fangs and split, chapped lips. Blood runs from the eel-woman’s mouth, down her chin and bare chest, slicking the floor, and the abomination surges forward towards its freedom, her song turning to a gurgling, high-pitched malevolent scream.
Pungent death, sickly sweet, hangs in the air, mixed with the stench of the creature, the smell of methane bogs and body odor. To his left, Vorya can hear Aerys wretching. The swashbuckler just has time to react before she will be upon them.
the situation:
Vorya is up, then the monster, then the NPCs. The whole area is difficult terrain.
The galley is predictably, and not to put too fine a point on it, a mess. A field of pewter and tin utensils lies scattered across the floor; well-used, dented, and scorched pots and pans, and a variety of tools used for food preparation: knives and cleavers, a zester, mixing bowls, wooden spoons, spatulas, a fine rolling pin with mahogany handles, and even more tools, some of which Vorya can't identify the use of. Dessert from the Jenivere's final cabin meal - a pound cake with red velvet icing, judging by its remains - lies streaked, crumbled, and splattered across a work table, the nearby backsplash, and the floor.
The galley's heavy equipment sits mostly in their place, being built into the ship to be immovable. Along the outer wall sit the two large brick ovens, each topped with a burnished bronze boiler, glinting the torchlight of two more everburning torches, still in their braziers. The wood work tables used for dicing, julienning, peeling, rolling, and other food preparations also sit unmoved, like patient beasts of burden standing resolute, awaiting their next purpose.
Only the large soaking tub - essentially a large beaten copper bathtub used to wash dishes and pots - is out of place. Pulled from its mooring - a cracked wooden frame - the tub has been propped against the larder door. Inside the tub, his legs dangling outside, just touching the floor, glassy eyes open in a final, fixed stare toward the galley's ceiling, lies the corpse of the Jenivere's First Mate, Anton Devers.
Dried blood lies pooled across the bottom of the tub and spackled across the floor. Still more has run from under the door itself, a mix of blood, some of it very dark, almost black in color. Wounds criss-cross Anton's body; deep, jagged cuts. Other wounds - punctures - pierce the mate's finely made studded leather. Anton's high-quality shortsword lies across his chest, as if the first mate was intent to keep it nearby even as he expired.
Something scrabbles along the other side of the door, somewhat regular scratches, like a hand or perhaps insect legs running across a surface. Then a thump, and another, as whatever lies beyond throws itself at the makeshift barricade. The larder's door rattles in place but holds; the tub Anton died in barely moves.
Whatever lies beyond has been kept safe by the passing of Anton Devers. Unfortunately, without opening the door, the remains of the larder will go to the bottom of the Fever Sea once the Jenivere finishes breaking apart.
Aerys runs a hand under her nose and takes another sip of rum, two long, low words escaping her. "Chiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnny us."
Ishirou shrugs, the usually dour man still grinning. "Well, call it whatever you want. But that worked out as well as could be expected, yeah? And yeah, I'm gonna grab my sword. You're headed to the great cabin, I'll go with you."
Aerys meanwhile, leans over the side of the ship, her attention intent on the waves below. A half-minute passes and she looks up to Vorya and Ishirou, sweat beading on her brow. "The bottom of the Jenivere, it's gone. Nothing left. Like it was sheared right off. Anyone below us wouldn't have survived."
Heading towards the stairs, Aerys barks, "Anyways, I didn't come here to lollygag topdeck. What're y'all waiting on?"
---
Fears of darkness below prove overblown, as does the side of the trebuchet room. One of the trebuchets lies tipped against the back wall of the room, while the other hangs out of the blown-open hull of the ship, broken up likely from repeated pounding as the wheeled siege weapon rolled into it. Stepping over a tangle of rope, arrows, and baskets, the door to the great cabin swings open easily to find the room predictably in disarray: tipped furniture lies askance across the room, food is streaked along the floor, pungent and buzing with flies, a painted white and chipped wooden pawn from the scattered conqueror board rolls in front of Vorya along with the rocking of the ship.
Both of Vorya's companions make beelines for their cabins; Aerys emerging moments later with a bottle of rum, from which she takes a long pull and then sighs. Ishirou almost bounces from his, scabbard in hand. He draws his blade forth: a finely wrought katana, well constructed and kept by the Tian man in obviously loving care. "She's a beauty, eh? Family heirloom."
For a moment, the blade glints in the room's torchlight, and then Ishirou slides it back into its scabbard.
perception DC 15:
The scabbard is noticeably long, probably almost a foot longer than the blade of Ishirou's katana.
Ah yes, the torchlight. A total of four everburning torches once aligned the great cabin. One rocks gently against the far wall, one is still in its brazier, and two are nowhere to be found.
The moment draws out like wisp of smoke unfurling from a doused candle, and Vorya's instincts prove quicker than time itself. Before a thought has even crossed his mind, Vorys finds Aerys' outstretched hand, clasping it tight. Aerys' eyes widen even more, impossibly deep pools of deep brown... and then her weight pulls both of the castaways from the cliff.
Time speeds up, and both Aerys and Vorya hurtle towards the deck of the ship, the fast-approaching wood a brown blur. Still, the castaways' reactions are quicker. Twisting in the air, Vorya lands in a crouch and then lets the rocking motion of the ship guide him onto his hands, using the ship's motion in concert with his fall to distribute the force of the landing. His hands slide across the wood decking and Vorys feels a deep splinter dig into one; a feeling not unlike rope burn prickles one of the aethist's knees, hot and bright. Still, an unexpectedly good outcome for any fall. 4 damage from the fall.
Beside Vorya, Aerys fares even better. Aerys also lands feet first, waves her arms windmill style, and the falls backwards onto her rump. The woman looks up at the cliff and lets loose a long, howling whoop turned laugh.
Seconds pass and Ishirou lands atop the deck, catlike, dropping into a fluid crouch, a smile crossing his face. "You two are blessed. Tian acrobats in another life, no doubt."
The Jenievere levels for a moment, almost motion at all, and then shudders as the next wave hits. Vorya's gives himself a figurative pat on the back; it seems his instincts were correct and the Jenivere would be not much longer for this world.
Or what was left of it at any rate. The castaways were indeed quite lucky to be where they were when the ship... crashed? Vorya curses again the blank spot in the castaway's collective memory. Regardless, most of the bow of the ship is simply gone, and what is left is underwater. All that survives - if Vorya's mental map is correct and things are intact - are some of the upper decks: the captain's cabin and poop deck above it, the great cabin and its associated rooms, the trebuchet room, the galley, larder, and passenger's supply room.
Perception DC 15:
The churning surf obscures it, but a moment of calm gives you a glance at what lies below the surfling. Or rather, what doesn't. The entirety of the Jenivere below the mid-decks is gone, sheered away like the coat of a Brevic sheep in the spring. Anyone below-decks - most of the crew, according to your memory - must be dead.
In front of the castaways, the door to the captain's cabin rattles in its frame. The entire cabin, including the door, tilts to the left reminding Vorys of the impossible leaning towers of Jalmeray. Nearby, the stairs leading belowdecks, to the trebuchet room sit, darkness beyond it. The room certainly sat in darkness, but beyond it would be the great cabin and its braziers containing continual light torches.
From somewhere belowdecks, a racquet: long, scrabbling sounds followed by irregular thumps, repeated, and then again. And again.
the situation:
In its current state, the entirity of the remains of the Jenivere is difficult terrain.
The route to the top of the bluff is circuitous and would likely take a couple of hours to wend into the treeline from the beach, then east up the craggy bluffline. Thankfully, Aerys had spotted a simpler path, one that made use of a cleave in the bluff to climb up about twenty feet and then move across at a small incline to where the ship rocks into the cliffside with each battering wave. If they don't fall, the only dangerous moment would be when the castaways were directly over the ship and would need to descend roughly thirty feet to the deck of the Jenivere.
And so, the castaways set off, wending their way up the cliffside fissure. The sun beats off the rock; exposed on the cliffside, scalding hot rock to the castaways' backs, it seems hellishly hot, hotter than even on the beach. Foot after foot, hand after hand, the castaways make their way and the sun ticks higher in the sky, and sounds from the jungle are obscured by the waves crashing into the bluffside, a continuous loud roar. Down the beach, the other castaways toil, mere dots moving along the yellow expanse of sand, like beetles scurrying across a dungheap.
Finally, the Jenivere - or what is left of it - looms below them. From this vantage, Vorya can make out the remains of one of the ship's two lifeboats. The bow of the smaller craft still lolls about in the surf, attached to a protruding timber by a thick rope, as if someone had moored the boat to the wreck, and it was subsequently crushed by the action of the waves smashing the Jenivere against it and the cliffside. Of the Jenivere's second lifeboat, there is no sign.
A debris field spreads from both the lifeboat and the Jenivere: wood, canvas, and metal intertwined upon itself, reminiscent to Vorya of tales he's heard of the River Kingdoms, where floods fell the forest trees and create sweeping wood dams that block the rivers, birthing small lakes and new tributaries every spring.
Vorya blinks, coming back to the present. The only thing left to do is to climb down a bit to then drop onto the deck of the Jenivere, and so the castaways begin their descent. The cliffside is sheer and handholds hard to come by. Ishirou, proving the most adept climber, begins the descent, with Aerys following next. They move a few feet down, followed by Vorya, when the cliffside gives way, and Aerys slips, her feet coming untethered from terrestrial rock, the woman twisting, contorting her body in an attempt to grab the cliffside. Her eyes meet Vorya's for a second, deep brown irises wide with shock, and time slows to that immediate moment when a choice must be made. Will Vorya reach for Aerys, and risk her potentially dragging him into the air with her, or will the swashbuckler let the woman fall to the deck of the Jenivere, thirty feet below?
The walk to the Jenivere is as Vorya suspected, not too far. Still, the walk along the beach proves difficult; Vorya's feet sink deeply into the dry sand at first, eventually forcing the small group to the surfline. "Slowly then," Aerys barks, casting a dark look towards the sea. "Eurypterids are not solitary animals. Quite social, actually."
And so, wary of the ocean and unwilling to move into the jungle behind them, the castaways move diligently up the beach, and the sun climbs higher in the sky. Sweat darkens Vorya's shirt. Ishirou ties his hair in a tight bun atop his head. Aerys pulls her hat low onto her brow, occasional curses drifting on the wind back to Vorya's ears. The woman had a gift for them, Vorya is forced to admit to himself.
Sense Motive DC 15:
Ishirou stays close to Aerys throughout the walk, within an arm's distance, always putting himself between her and the sun. If Aerys notices, she says nothing about it.
The punishing heat of the early afternoon even effects the jungle that climbs the ridgeline to the group's left. Earlier, it had been rife with sounds, especially birdlife. Now, the jungle grows silent, as if its denizens are settling in for sun's ascent into the sky. Or, perhaps, they were merely curious about the newcomers, and watching intently?
At last, the Jenivere is close. The beach lining the cove comes to an end, and instead waves crash into a bluff that stretches past the wreck, until it curves out of sight. The tide is high; waves batter the ship's stern, which is wedged between the cliffside and the chain of rocks that stretch into the sea.
Ishirou slaps at his neck, an unconscious grimace of annoyance at some biting insect, a flea or a sand fly. "We could swim?" he offers, voice wavering.
"Or we could climb along the bluff," Aerys says, tracing a pointed finger along the bluffline. "Then down there, and eventually drop onto the deck."
Of course, it is high tide. You could always wait the tide out as well, and see if a better course of action presents itself in a few hours. The sun beats down upon you, bright and merciless, like the glare of vengeful god.
Jask grunts, his eyes trained on the distant ship, and then ducks his head, rubbing a bead of sweat from his cheek as best he can with his shoulder.
"No, never been. Probably never will, to be honest, even if we get off this... island? Or whatever this is we're marooned on. My gear -- Captain taunted me about having it. May be on his body, or in his cabin. Key to the manacles or some tools are most important of course, but my gear, need it to help. You'll know it when you see it, man of the Kingdom of Man."
Will move us onto the ship tomorrow night. Sorry for the delay. Travel and work stuff rearing its head, took a good chunk of my night tonight.
Aerys holds her hands up in front of her. They are the hands of someone that has lived a hard life; scars criss-cross her knuckles and the backs of her hands, Vorya notices her left pinky is bent, as if it broke and fused back together without the aid of a splint. "Bow's for hunting. In a tight spot, I prefer these." The woman balls her hands into fists and then shakes the left fist, and then her right. "Meet Rum. And this is Punch."
"Oh, I can stay!" Sasha volunteers, her face shading a tinge of red. "When I said 'we should go to the ship,' I meant it in a kind of 'some of us here on the beach should go' kind of way, not a 'you and me' kind of war."
And so it is settled; Ishirou, Aerys, and Vorya will go to the ship. As for Jask, he merely shrugs, shoulders rolling up at an awkward angle, with his hands tied behind him. "Perhaps. Both the mate and captain had keys." Still looking out to sea, Jask prods Vorya another time, his voice flat, devoid of any emotion. [b]"You never answered my question though. Where are you from?"
Activity is indeed the key, and the castaways spring to it-- for the most part. Pilts offers to gather some driftwood for a fire, and Gelik, standing, brushes his ruined clothes, tufts of sand drifting away on the breeze, before casting looks about for suitable shelter. Ishirou moves about the beach, hefting pieces of driftwood and swinging them, testing their suitability as a weapon, and Sasha checks her weapons, ensuring they are firmly attached and ready for the journey to the ship.
Bellet however, chuckles, her voice lilting, the kind of amused laugh that one finds at a dinner party or a friendly game of cards; it hangs in the air of the castaway's beach, as out of place as a polar bear or carnival troupe. "I am afraid, Vorya, that I will not be building shelter. Lytte however will be happy to help. As he is not his own person, consider his assistance my contribution. I am old, and tired, and shall need to conserve my strength." The broken parasol twirls above the noblewoman's head, purples and blues blending into a pinwheel.
Jask sits in the sand, staring out to sea, his voice flat. "Get me free and I'll help. Of little use until then."
And Aerys rises with a sigh, and looking to Vorya, offers one simple word. "No."
Stepping towards the swashbuckler, she removes her hat, and shakes it, before sticking it back on her head; Vorya notices her hair is already matted, sweat trickles down her brow. "I'm going to the ship."
Jask stares up at Vorya, a cavalacade of emotions passing quickly across his countenance. For a moment, Vorya realizes the look of someone making a connection, and then Jask's face grows placid, and he turns back to looking towards the ship. "Now that you know me, may I ask your name, stranger? And if I may ask, where are you from? We don't look so different, you and I. Closer cousins than the others. But your accent... I can't place it."
Vorya's request for a lockpicker is met with silence, though Ishirou wanders over, and judging Jask's bindings for a few seconds, shrugs. "I could help if I had my sword."
Confusion plays across the man's face, and it occurs to Vorya that it must be a ridiculous sight, him dressed in grime-ridden, shambolic finery, blocking out the sun, smiling wildly.
The man squints, as if trying to make out Vorya's shaded features, and shrugs. "Cabin 3? Is that where I was kept? I was brought onto the ship hooded in the middle of the night, from Pezzack. Took the hood off but kept me muzzled in my cabin. Name's Jask. I'm no soldier. Have no rank."
Jask turns his head from Vorya and stares out toward the Jenivere, letting a long moment pass. "Seems we're rightly berked, yeah? See the captain about? Or the first mate? They delivered my food to me. Unshackled me so I could eat, shackled one hand to the frame of my cot. So I couldn't run." Jask laughs, a mirthless chuckle, exasperated. "Where would I run to? Anyways, they've got the keys." The man - prisoner? convict? - shakes his hands behind his back, his manacles clinking dully together. "Get me free, I can be of use."
Nearby, Sasha rises from her whispered conversation with Gelik and slowly walks the beach, staring at the sand, intent on something. Raising her head, Vorya catches a wide smile and she waves. "Oi! Vorya, yeah? You were here, right? Look, footprints. What's left of 'em anyways. And Gelik was here. A furrow in the sand. More footprints, probably footprints. And here, and here."
Animated now, the woman with the strange tattoo walks quickly across the sand, pointing as she goes. "Someone drug us from the surf. Who woke up first? Was it you, Ishirou? Did you drag us?"
Turning to the sea, she scans it, hand covering her eyes, one foot propped atop a round, polished rock. "There might be survivors on the ship. We need to get there."
"We need food, my dear!" Gelik shouts, his voice carrying on the wind.
"Shelter." Pilts grunts. "I'm going to build me a shelter. Morning's ending, the day's gonna be hot." The cook casts a wary eye towards the greenery rising up the mountain to the south. "And I don't trust that jungle's a good place to find shade."
Not as notable, perhaps, but interesting none-the-less: there was one other crew member besides Pilts and the officers that were on occasion in the Great Cabin - the cook's assistant, Piper. Piper, a young boy of early teenage years, skinny and timid, with a shock of red hair like a plume of lava erupting from his head, is not on the beach. Although he tended to be overshadowed by the ship's cook and stayed to the corners of the Great Cabin, Vorya can't say he saw Piper the night of the wreck. Piper was likely in the galley, which was off the Great Cabin.
Eventually, the rest of the castaways stir. Everyone on the beach is alive, thankfully. All wake with some manner of sickness, similar to Vorya; nausea, confusion, no recollection of the Jenivere's crash. Word spreads of the pile of gear, and each castaway in turn goes through it, pulling items that Vorya assumes belong to them.
The castaways are, in order of their wakening:
Ishirou, of course, the dour Tien man who stands nearby, scratching his perpetually scruffy beard. His hair is drawn back into a braided - and now quite tangled - ponytail, crow's feet spread from the corners of the man's dark brown eyes. Ishirou wears loose cotton pants and a bosun's shirt, stained and grey from the events of the last few hours. A chain shirt glints in the sun from underneath his dirty shirt.
Aerys Mavato, a trim, athletic half-elven woman with short dark hair, tanned skin, and fierce blue eyes. She is dressed in tightly fitted leather armor under now quite dirty dark blue pants and silken shirt. Her tricorn hat, black and simple, sits perched upon her head, shielding the woman from the already punishing sun. Laid in the sand next to Aerys are a longbow, leather quiver with arrows, a pouch, ink and quills, and a waterlogged book, which Aerys hovers over, turning the pages every few minutes to dry them in the sun.
Lytte, the plump manservant of Lady Amara Bellet, a man with kind eyes, sandy brown hair, closely trimmed, and freckles that play across his pale face. He contains little possessions of his own, merely his servant's clothes and a knife tucked into his belt; however, he has already pulled the Lady into the shade and retrieved her gear by the time she wakes.
Lady Amara Bellet, tall, prim, and even in her current state of discomfort, imperious. Bellet is paler than Lytte, with wispy grey hair she has tied into a bun atop her head. Perhaps her most striking features are her eyes, their color a deep, verdant purple that seem to shift hue in the sunlight, as if they are fine amethysts. Lytte has found among the gear pile her parasol, bent but still functional, jewelry, three stained and waterlogged dresses, a carved, wooden walking cane of exceptional beauty, the cane itself tipped with bronze and carved to look as if imps rise from clouds towards a golden handle.
A man who Vorya does not know, middle-aged, plain-looking, likely a Garundi, with a dark complexion and dreadlocks that are slanted to grey. He has watery brown eyes and is dressed in rags. His hands are bound behind his back by well-made manacles.
Gelik Aberwhinge, the spry, energetic gnome Vorys had last seen knocked or passed out on the floor of the Jenivere. Gelik looks much worse for the wear, with bruises along his neck and a black eye. His dandy noble's clothes are in tatters. Like Aerys, he has a book with him, and ink and a quill, and a pouch. The dandy also has a new-looking steel buckler, a gnome-sized longsword, and a fine bow and arrows, all of which look as unused as the buckler.
Sasha Nevah, she of touseled red hair and mischievous green eyes, and she of the missing pinky finger on her left hand. Sasha removes her shirt to don her chain shirt, and Vorya catches sight of a tattoo between her shoulder blades - two barbed, insectoid limbs entwined with each other. Sasha is slender and athletic, and besides her worn sailor's outfit and chain shirt, has a fine rapier and kukri strapped to her belt.
Lastly, there is Pilts, the overweight middle-aged ship's cook and surgeon, who wears his hair closely-cropped, as he does his beard. He, for one, doesn't look worse for the wear, but mostly because Vorya had only every seen him looking disheveled, wearing stained cook's clothing and with a tinge of grog hovering on his breath. Pilts has nothing with him.
Notably missing from the beach is one passenger; the Varisian scholar Ileana D. Argacy, a bookish woman with curly black hair that belied her Varisian heritage. Vorya recalls she had a tattoo of a multi-hued butterfly that graced her right wrist, but Ileana was otherwise not terribly notable; she was not particularly attractive or conversational, at least.
Also notably missing; the half-orc Captain Alizandru Kovak and his first mate, Anton Devers, both of whom were last seen by Vorya in the captain's cabin. They were the two last people that Vorya had seen alive before he awoke on the beach, which of course was in and of itself, quite notable.
The castaways seem for the most part stunned into silence and despair. They sit about the beach largely unmoving and not speaking. Lytte is an exception; even now he flits about his mistress ensuring her comfort; he tunnels at a small, jungle-facing dune as if to build a place for the lady to sit, protected from the sun and wind with her parasol. Sasha and Gelik sit huddled together, staring out to see, engaged in quiet, intent conversation.
As near as Vorya can tell, it is mid-morning. The sun climbs higher in the sky, the wind - even this close to the shoreline, seems to be dying down. No doubt, the midday will be oppressively hot, perhaps even dangerous. The wall of greenery Vorya has begun to think of as "behind" him - south, Vorya decides based upon the placement of the sun in the sky - rises in the form of dense jungle. The calls of birds, the buzzing of insects, and occasionally other sounds - the call of an animal, even once a loud crash, can be heard within the greenery. Food lied there certainly, but also likely danger. To the east and west, ragged arms of jagged rocks reach out to embrace the wave-tossed cove that Vorya finds himself castaway upon, and to the north, the waters of the sea surge and churn between the beach and a line of razor-sharp rocks.
The Jenivere lies to the east then, damaged beyond repair. Only the fortuitous presence of a sharp ridge of rock near the side of the sheer cliff wall has prevented the wreck from sinking entirely into the sea, for only the ship's stern seems to have survived the wreck. So, the captain's cabin, the galley, the larder, the Great Cabin and its staterooms and storeroom - all are likely more or less or intact. The crew's quarters and storage areas of the ship look to be submerged.
The portion of the ship still above water is wedged at an angle between the cliff and the rocks, and each wave shakes and tosses the wreck alarmingly. It won't be long before the constant pounding of the waves dislodges the wreck and allows the hungry sea to claim the last of this once-fine ship. For now though, it will be difficult to get to the ship. Vorya notes it must be high tide, or close to it. Reaching the wreck would mean a 150-foot swim, or a climb along the cliff side. Either of which could be done by someone with some skill in those pursuits. But it would be dangerous none-the-less.
Perhaps low tide would reveal another course of action? If Vorya is correct, then low-tide would fall right smack-dab in the worst heat of the day, or in the middle of the night. The second high tide would be well into the evening, many hours after dinner.
"It is not just a sword," Ishirou says, his voice soft, as he takes in the wreck of the Jenivere alongside Vorya, though he offers no further elaboration. "I'll go with you to the ship. When it is time."
As, Vorya stumbles towards the Tien man, the wounded lobster-thing moves towards the surf. It struggles, blue/black ichor oozing from its stump where its tail was mere moments before. The beast wobbles on its spindly legs slowly across the sand, pincers drooping, and then dragging along the ground as it pushes itself with dogged determination towards the surfline. Crawling sidewise, crablike, it skitters into the surf, close to freedom, and then Aerys Mavato bashes it, and then again, with a large driftwood log. The lobster-thing's carapace fractures with a sickening crunch that travels across the beach. Aerys hits the crustacean one more time for good measure, and pulls the battered - and thoroughly dead - creature from the water, and with a grunt tosses it away from the now-receding water.
Mavato leans on her driftwood staff and closes her eyes, tricorn hat somehow still staying snug on her head. Then the woman retches, once, and again, the remnants of her last (liquid) supper splattering the wet sand. Opening her eyes, Aerys looks around, sees Vorya, and shrugs. "Common brown Euryptid. Common in the Shackles at least. Poisonous, don't get get stung. At least we have food now. We'll need to brine it in salt water 'fore we cook it, draw the toxins out."
"Not usually that aggressive though. Strange." Pulling her hat almost over her eyes, Aerys wobbles up the beach toward the greenery beyond; tall, willowy palm trees stretch towards the cloudless blue sky. Closer to the ground, the shoreside vegetation, at first clumps of grasses, cedums, and similar plants, grow into a thick tangle. In short order - a hundred yards at most - the greenery crawls up the sides of a low mountain ridge, obscuring what lies beyond.
Still weak, but thankfully not getting actively weaker, Vorya sits next to Ishirou. The pile of equipment is just that - assorted gear, likely taken from the Jenivere's storage room in the Great Cabin; it all likely belonging to those scattered about the beach.
Ishirou runs a sandy hand under his nose, his voice barely a whisper. "I pulled it from the room late at night, took it back to my cabin. Couldn't bare the thought of it being locked up where I couldn't see it."
The man gives one last lingering look around the beach, his eyes settling for moment on the wreck of the Jenivere before he leans back, planting his rear in the sand and propping his wrists upon his knees, dejected. "Probably still there. Balls."
The rest of the bodies on the beach lie motionless. Dead perhaps, or asleep.
survival DC 15:
Each of the bodies on the beach has a corresponding divot in the sand, just like the one Vorya woke up in. Mostly vanished by surf and wind, there's also lingering evidence of footprints: someone had pulled the passengers above the waterline.
The creature's shell deflects much of the force, but rapier blades are flexible, able to find weak points to be exploited, even if sometimes by accident. Vorya's blade skips along the lobster-thing's shell, slipping off of it, but then finding a gap in Vorya's follow-through, in the space between its thorax and tail. The sunsilver blade twists in Vorya's hand, almost as if under its own volition, and the tail of Vorya's opponent comes clean off. Vorya has made his own luck after all.
The lobster-thing's bravado, or rage, or hunger, whatever, fails, and it skitters away from Vorya as fast as its spindly legs can carry it, back towards the surfline.
By the gear pile, Ishirou grabs his head in his hands, voice manic. "IT'S. NOT. HERE!"
Do you take an AoO or let lobster-thing go?
the situation:
Vorya takes 1d2 ⇒ 2 CON damage. Give me another save.
Desna does not smile on the Rahadoumi. It was a saying coined by Rahadoum's ancient enemies, the Thuvians, a taunt that encapsulated the ages-old feud between the nations. In the eyes of the Thuvians, eventually the Rahadoumi lack of faith would be their downfall, for one needed the gods to make their way in the world. A whole nation turning their backs on their favor? Madness. It was merely a matter of time before their luck ran out, individually and collectively.
The Rahadoumi, being a resourceful people, of course had a rejoinder. We make our own luck. Vorya's keen mind put the pieces together in short order; if his strikes were errant, he would have to create more favorable conditions. The lobster-thing was slow, at least on land, slower than Vorya. Vorya would move, carefully but with purpose, and put himself out of harm's way. Make the creature clamber after him.
Slipping away from the creature's pinchers, Vorya moved back, towards the treeline and mountains at his back. The fine sand gave way to small, scrubby plants and spindly grasses, the types of flora that favored salty air.
With the wider vantage point, Vorya spied Ishirou rise to his feet and stumble towards the pile of gear in which Vorya found his rapier. Ishirou dropped to his knees and started to fling gear aside, raising his eyes toward the Rahadoumi. "My sword! Where is it?"
The lobster thing skitters forward, and although it had six legs, their pointy ends are more suited for navigating sand and sea floors. The creature struggles single-mindedly with the scrub Vorya so easily just stepped over, prensenting an advantage for Vorya's next strike.
Vorya had made his luck, now was the time to capitalize. And it needed to be soon; Vorya's leg pulsed with pain, his breath came harder, his knee buckled under his own weight.
the situation:
Vorya is up. Vorya takes 1d2 ⇒ 2 CON damage and must make another fort save. However, smart tactics translate into a +2 circumstance bonus to Vorya's next attack; after that the lobster-thing will adjust.
Vorya quickly finds his "sand-legs" - he is from Rahadoum after all, a land of arid of deserts littered with dunes the size of small castles - and sprints past his crustacean opponent, sensing one of its pincers clack shut just behind him, the lobster-thing pinching nothing but air.
Sword in hand, Vorya turns to face his opponent. It was an unconventional opponent to use a fencing style against, but surely the fundamentals were the same? And perhaps Vorya would be lucky? It could just turn its barbed tail and run back into the surf...
Alas, Desna does not smile upon the Rahadoumi. The creature skitters forward, pinchers clacking. Whether the stinging lobster-thing was brave, or rabid, or hungry was a matter for later debate. What was apparent, however, was that the beast intended to finish its meal, and no blade glinting in the morning sunlight would scare it off. Shifting sideways, the lobster-thing scuttled, crablike, with surprising quickness. It snapped with its pincher, and Vorya waved his rapier at it, realizing all too lately that the creature possessed a savage cunning. The pincer was a mere faint, and the lobster-thing's barbed stinger struck deep into Vorya's thigh, a fiery, pulsating pain spreading from the wound.
mechanics:
stinger:1d20 + 1 ⇒ (15) + 1 = 16 damage:1d3 ⇒ 2
Parry unsuccessful :( Vorya takes two damage and must make a fortitude save Vorya is up!
Vorya clambers backwards, his feet sinking into the sand, his movement rigid, little clouds of sand lifting into the air with each step. Nausea threatens to tumble Vorya back onto the beach, but the Rahadoumi keeps his feet - and his wits - and gathers a quick sense of his surroundings. To his front, the lobster-thing, which seemed to have crawled from the sea up a furrow in the sand the width of Vorya's body, as if the unconscious man been pulled from the surfline. The beach is made of a fine yellow sand that is surprisingly cool to the touch - perhaps it is morning and the sand has yet to heat up under the sun, or perhaps it is the nature of the sand itself. Vorya spins briefly, taking in jungle and mountains rising sharply behind him. The beach stretches in an arc from where Vorya stands, as if it were an arch laid flat, and where Vorya awoke being at the arc's "apex." Eventually, along the left side of the beaches' arc, the sand gives way to a crumbling cliffside, jagged rocks protruding from the churning surf. Leaning against the cliff side, a familiar site; the Jenivere, listing to port, partially submerged, her hull a gaping ruin.
But, more detailed analysis would have to wait, and besides, there are interesting things nearby. Bodies are strewn about the beach; Vorya notes immediately his fellow passengers, or most of them at least: The Lady Bellet and her servant Lytte, Aerys Mavato, tricorn hat gripped in one hand, Gelik Aberwhinge, and Sasha Nevah all lie close by. Ishirou lays further down the beach, and the man slowly rolls onto his stomach, a low groan escaping him as he moves. Next to him, a Mwangi man with coal-dark skin and expansive dreadlocks lies motionless in the sand. Just beyond Mwangi man, mostly obscured by the stranger, Vorya can make the enormous belly of the cook, Pilts, the perpetually stained apron and shirt giving the otherwise hidden man away.
Missing from the scene are the rest of the crew, including Captain Kovak, as well as first mate Devers. Among the passengers, the Varisian scholar, Ileana D'Argacy is also gone.
Of most immediate importance, about ten feet from Vorya lie a small pile of belongings; among them, Vorya spies his pack, bedroll, camping gear, and mess kit haphazardly tossed atop one another. Poking out from the bottom of the pile, the blade of Vorya's rapier lies glinting in the sun. Half-submerged in the sand at Vorya's feet, a heavy, round stone lies upon the beach.
The lobster-thing skitters toward Vorya, its claws snapping, but it is apparent the creature is better suited to the sea; it moves slowly across the beach, buying Vorya a few precious seconds.
the situation:
Vorya is move action from his equipment; it is a standard action to pull anything from the pile. However, that is a straight line that will invite an attack of opportunity. Vorya can instead take a more circuitous route to his belongings, but it will take a full round. Alternatively, Vorya could use the stone at his feet as in improvised weapon. 1d4 bludgeoning damage.
It is pleasant, the feel of sand below you. Above you, warmth, that makes you recall pleasant mornings back in Azir, before the heat pushes people inside by midday. Just like those mornings in Azir, a gentle breeze blows across you, and the sound of the sea ebbs loud and soft and loud again, a constant pleasant background noise. The feeling of something wet lapping at your feet is perhaps a little less pleasant, come to think of it. And the feeling of pressure on your legs is concerning. And of course, there's the searing pain in your right foot, not unlike that time as a child you decided to go wasp hunting without your sandals on...
Snapping awake, Vorya sits up, sand drifting from his hair. He's on a beach, apparently - a band of yellow sand stretches to each side, waves gently crashing against the sand in front of him. Nausea kicks through him, like a viscous hangover, and Vorya spits up bile, clearing yet more sand from his mouth this time. A trickle of fresh blood oozes from Vorya's foot, and the Rahadoumi realizes of immediate importance is the thing that bit - or pinched - or stung - him. The size of a small dog, two large pincers snap in the air before this sleek creature, mottled ochre carapace interspersed with yellow streaks, almost tiger-like in appearance. Otherwise vaguely lobster-looking, its slick tail ends in a long, thin stinger that rises behind it. The pincers clack, the stinger waves, and creature scrabbles forward plunging its stinger towards Vorya's foot. A puff of sand flies into the air where it lands, less than an inch from Vorya's heel.
With a groan, Vorya realizes his rapier is aboard the Jenivere, wherever that may now be, locked in storage as demanded as a condition of travel.
Vorya has taken one hp of damage from the lobster-thing. Vorya is sickened. He does not have any equipment but his courtier outfit and ring of sustenance. Vorya is prone.
sickened wrote:
The character takes a –2 penalty on all attack rolls, weapon damage rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks.
prone wrote:
The character is lying on the ground. A prone attacker has a –4 penalty on melee attack rolls and cannot use a ranged weapon (except for a crossbow). A prone defender gains a +4 bonus to Armor Class against ranged attacks, but takes a –4 penalty to AC against melee attacks.
Standing up is a move-equivalent action that provokes an attack of opportunity.
Stepping over Gelik, who remained prostrate on the Great Cabin floor, his eyes half-open, his breathing shallow, Vorya cast a quick glance around the room to find that Ishirou had lost his battle with the tray of food, most of which now covered the man. The Jenivere pitched again and Bellet and her manservant tumbled to the ground, joining Ishirou and Sasha Nevah in holding tight to the bolted down table. Aerys stumbled towards her cabin, an unspilt jug of wine cradled in her arms, her voice rising over room's sliding furniture, cutlery, cups and plates. "If I'm a dying today, it'll be drunk and in my room, thankyouverymuch!"
Devers vanished out the door of the Great Cabin, and Vorya followed, passing by cabin #3 as the ship bobbed in the opposite direction. Lytte the manservant screamed his mistresses' name, voice high-pitched with worry, and Vorya heard something soft thump against cabin #3's door, a sound not unlike a bag of laundry dropped down a chute.
On Vorya pressed, falling into and through the doorway of the Great Cabin and into the room beyond, a small hall that doubled as one of the Jenivere's four ballista stations. Oversized arrows and tipped chests skittered across the floor. Scrambling to his feet, Vorya hopped over an arrow sliding towards him and then slipped by the ballista as it rolled and tipped into the far wall with a crunch and splinter of wood. Beyond the other door lay the stairs to abovedecks and the ship's wheel - presumably where Devers would be headed. Below Vorya, where the crew and cargo lived, Vorya could hear commotion; shouting, voices high with adrenaline and panic, the steady thump of something heavy hitting something immovable.
Perception DC 15:
The ambient sounds of the chaos around Vorya, and the decking between them makes it hard for Vorya to make out everything, but Vorya can make out some words. Asleep. Barricade. Drowned.
Vorya realizes he is sweating profusely; hands clammy, he clambers up the stairs, slipping on a liquid - Water? Grog? Piss? and emerges topside, to find a dark sky over him, a dizzying splash of stars stretching overhead from horizon to horizon - whatever was causing the Jenivere its distress, it was not the weather. The nearly full moon casts a soft, white glow upon the deck. Beside Vorya, a slick of blood trails along the ship's deck. Vorya's keen eyes just catch the bottom half of a sailor as they go over the side of the ship, strangely with no yelp of surprise, pain, or terror. He has little time to contemplate this however; commotion on the periphery of Vorya's vision draws his attention: the snapping of a sail, rope pooling on the deck, and then with a sickening thud not unlike a melon dropped from a window, a sailor hits the deck not five feet from Vorya, dead instantly, his head exploded from the impact of his fall from the crow's nest above.
Up, atop the poop deck lay the ship's wheel. The Jenivere bobs again, this time almost like a dancer shuffling to the side, and Vorya drops to his knees in time to spy the helmsman, a bloke named Carver, collapse and drop from Vorya's view. Blood pulses through Vorya's head, the Aspis agent thinking, almost detachedly, how he can feel each pull and push of his heart, and the ship settles again for a moment even as Vorya slips and falls to his knees. Below him, Vorya can hear the splintering of wood, and a sound almost as if the Jenivere is groaning, as if coming to terms with is impending demise.
Devers stands, not fifteen feet away, his hand on the door to Captain Alizandru Kovak's stateroom. He turns back, catching Vorya's eyes as he runs the back of his hand along his forehead and drops it to his belt, drawing forth a longknife. The first mate's voice carries over to Vorya on the wind, his attention vague. Was he talking to Vorya? Himself? The Captain? "I've been a fool, a damned fool," the wind says, and Anton Devers flings the door open.
Vorya's vision tunnels and he collapses to the deck, rolling to his side. Devers steps into the stateroom, and beyond him, Alizandru Kovak turns, a mixture of suprise and rage playing across his face. Kovak, a wiry half-orc with filed tusks and elaborate, colorful tattoos covering most every inch of his body, raises a cutlass and the door to his stateroom slams shut.
Vorya closes his eyes, breath coming at once easier and more difficult than usual, and notes with interest a sensation of drifting; he must be sliding, sliding across the deck. Perhaps the Jenivere was pitching again, one final strain before the ship came apart and they all drowned. Ah well, Vorya thinks, there will be some comfort in never knowing for sure.
A small smile curls upon Aberwhinge's lips. The gnome silently raises a glass to Vorya and downs it one gulp. Silence settles across the rest of the table as well; the wine glasses stay gripped in hands as the Jenivere rolls gently under them. It was not often that one offered such a backhanded compliment to their hosts. Several seconds pass, and then the barrelchested Mwangi mate rises, his chair scraping across the wooden floor.
Anton Devers is perhaps in his early thirties, if one takes into account the apparent aging a difficult life has had; first, judging from the brand upon his neck marking him as a once-enslaved property of a Sargavan house, and second of course, the life of the sea. Still, Vorya has found him mostly genial and pleasant to be around, though the mate has been quieter in recent days. Devers scratches a few days' old stubble, and then runs a hand through his greying, tightly curled hair. Giving Vorya a snarl, Devers fixes Vorya with an intent stare, his balled fists propping the first mate up. Several seconds pass, and then a small smile cracks the facade, soon followed by a hearty laugh, and Devers sits back down and raises his glass. "Ha! Had you going, didn't I? I agree whole-heartedly with what you say! Once is enough!"
sense motive DC 10:
Devers is an able seaman, but he is not a good liar. It is not the content of his comment, however, that grabs your attention - that seems genuine. It is his behavior as he sits back down; a look cast toward the Captain's quarters above you, a furrowed brow, and quick glance at the floor. Something has Devers worried this evening.
The tense mood at the table lifts, an almost audible group exhalation, and glasses are raised, and a round of toasts start. Aberwhinge toasts the excellent company aboard the ship, each individual one by one, though his ebullience slips a bit when addressing Ishirou. Lady Bellet toasts the cook Pilts, and Aerys raises her glass and says something in elvish, a lilting, poetic-sounding small speech, though its meaning is lost on Vorya. The woman ends her toast, perhaps suprisingly, with a yawn.
Ishirou declines the invitation to toast and so Sasha Nevah stands and raises her glass. "I'd like to ment--"
And the Jenivere pitches fiercely, Sasha's words dying in her throat as her chair slides across the floor and the woman grabs hold of the table with her free hand (a smart thing to do; the table is bolted to the ship's floor.) Gelik goes tumbling as his chair tips, while Lytte stumbles forward and steadies the Lady Bellet. Ishirou has the good sense to save the platter of food from falling to the floor, but tin cups and pewter utensils clatter around the guests, wine splashing blood red across the decking. Across the room, a Conqueror board hits the deck, its round footmen scattering across the floor. The everburning torches of course stay lit with nary a flicker, their magic flames remaining perfectly upright even as their sconces tip, giving the whole scene a surreal juxtaposition.
Acrobatics DC 12:
Failure means you fall.
Of all the dinner guests, Devers of course weathers the ship's sudden pitch the best. He grabs his wine off the table and downs the rest of it in one swift swipe of his hand, setting it back on the table as the Jenivere settles into a more expected rocking.
"Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen. I'll need to check the Captain and see if he needs my help. Please enjoy the rest of your dinner."
Placing his empty wine glass atop the table, Devers turns to leave and the ship pitches violently again. Chairs tip, the Chelish Lady Bellet gasps, Gelik falls again, and Devers makes his way, as steadily as possible, above decks.
This evening is a special occasion; the Jenivere nears port, and the mood is jolly. Gathered around the large pine table in the Great Cabin are most of the paying passengers, even the reclusive Aerys Mavato; the woman, it strikes Vorya, could be considered conventionally attractive if she tried.
sense motive DC 12:
Indeed, the rough haircut and men’s clothes she wears, along with the permanently slouched upon her brow tricorn hat - it is as if she’s trying to hide her beauty. It almost works.
Next to her, the dour Ishirou, wearing his well-cared for, but cheap chain shirt, the man unable to doff his armor even miles from any coastline. Sasha Nevah sits next to him, the woman fidgeting and practically bouncing out of her chair, engaged already in an effusive conversation with Gelik to her other side. Next to Gelik, the Lady Bellet, composed and rigid, and standing behind her, her manservant Lytte, a portly little fellow wearing a prim and pressed servant’s suit of deep purple, the “in” color this season in Cheliax. The head of the table was reserved for the captain, who this evening is absent, an event becoming more and more often as the voyage wore on. In the stead of Captain Kovak, the first mate Anton Devers is in attendance. The normally garrulous sailor is quiet, his face pinched, the only sign of his usual demeanor a smile that breaks through his worry as Pilts arrives with the evening meal, large pewter serving dishes clattering atop the table; whole roasted and herb crusted goat in brown sauce, with roasted potatoes and parsnips, and even a crusty fresh-baked bread.
Not in attendance this evening, in addition to the Captain, are the Varisian scholar Ileana, and of course the mystery guest in cabin three. Vorya is the last to arrive, and Gelik raises a glass of wine to him, the gnome’s eyes twinkling in the everburning candlelight. ”Ah, nice to see you, dear Vorya! I believe that is all of us that indicated they will attend tonight. And what a night for a meal! The sky is as clear as a Quadirian window, the stars as bright as our absent scholar’s mind. Shall anyone offer a toast?”
Feel free to engage with any the NPCs, describe Vorya, or have some of the goat!
Even for the most adept local fisherman or hardened riverman, the shock of life at sea days away from the confines of a friendly port would have been inconceivable. For Vorya, it bordered on blasphemous - especially the crew privvies. There were two in the bow of the ship, of which the crew queued up, weather permitting. The latrines themselves were nothing more than holes in the bowsprit, open to the elements and to anyone waiting in line, and the urine and excrement deposited into them dropped into the waters of the Fever Sea, which jaded by his time aboard the Jenivere Vorya was, even he had to admit were stunning; an evermoving, at times roiling mass of water that stretched out as far as the eye could see, and depending on the time of day glistened with a thousand points of sunlight or loomed unseen in the darkness below, something to be heard but definitely not experienced up close.
But, back to the crew bathrooms, such as they were - the most horrid thing, however, was the ropes that dangled into them; the frayed end of the rope dangled into the sea, and could be hauled up to wipe oneself clean. Most of the seamen did not bother however; the rope, starting from the deck and leading into the privy, and on down their lengths into the water, were streaked with dung. Flies crowded the latrines as if they were refuse pits on land, and Vorya learned quickly the wisdom of standing upwind of the ropes when he went above decks for a constitutional.
Mercifully, the situation in the Great Cabin were better. The Jenivere was one of the few passenger ships plying the route between Sargava and the north, and it was distinguished as being one of the best. The passengers’ Great Cabin was a long room, perhaps 30 feet from end to end, and flanked by five small cabins to each side, each a narrow room with a porthole window, a comfortable cot, and a small chest and bureau for possessions.
And the food! The head cook (also surgeon, if needed), one Pilts, last name unknown, was a veritable marvel, the large man able to work miracles in the galley. Vorya found the passage of time was marked by these meals, served three times a day, except to the passenger in cabin three, who was served - according to Gelik Aberwhinge, a spry gnome with blonde hair and a neat goatee, and who had a facility for gossip that belied his small size - only two meals a day, and the same as what the crew ate at that. The passenger in cabin three had become a sort of game to pass the time, or rather their identity was the game, for the passenger had been brought aboard in the dead of night when the Jenivere docked at Coentyn, and their passenger locked within, stayed quiet (or constrained). Gelik was sure they were a vampire; the noblewoman Bellet merely snorted and said, ”Someone’s enemy.” Ishirou, the rough Tien man from Bloodcove guessed they were a dangerous criminal, and Sasha, she of the perpetually tousled hair and missing finger, theorized there was no sentient being in cabin three at all; the food was an act, and something else, incredibly valuable or dangerous, lay within.
But, back to the meals! The ship’s senior officers often dined with the Jenivere’s passengers, for who could pass up the best part of the voyage; the pewter plates and tin spoons, napkins and tablecloths, and even passable wine, served by the cabin boys. Preserved meats and salted fish were common, usually accompanied by a tasty sauce spiked with liquor, butter, or even one evening, juiced oranges. Occasionally, the passengers and ship’s officers were treated to fresh meat; a small pen topside kept a few live chickens, goats, and guinea pigs, and a companion low-roofed little hutch known as the bovenhut served as a sort of greenhouse where Pilts and his assistants grew a few spindly vegetables.
The crew was not so lucky of course; they subsisted off of cask meat, legumes, and hard tack. Grog was their drink of choice. But, that was their lot in life after all, and Vorya and his companions, along with the goods in the hold, made such a life possible at all. Such was their fortune to be able to serve their betters, Vorya can imagine the Lady Bellet saying, her measured, warm voice rebound through his head as clearly as if she were whispering in his ear.
