Being in control of the boat made the seasickness significantly less, though calling what Casper was doing “control” was a stretch.

Cold, salty air buffets the faces of the panicking crew who manage to come to consciousness enough to see their ship crashing through waves on a collision course with another vessel.

The ground falls out from under Casper as the ship rocks back down to meet the sea as they crest the top of another wave.

One hand grips tightly around Laihal’s wrist, as she slides toward the railings edge as the ship once again rises sharply upwards.

“I'd kindly request that you don’t let me fall!” Laihal shouts over the roaring wind. “I do not know how to swim!”

“I wont!” Casper confirms, half laughing, half reassuring.

His other hand grips the captain's wheel, as he tries to steady their position to no avail.

Casper had seen ships at port with their sails up, and stopped. He had seen ships out at sea, with the sails down in order to go.

Logically then, Casper let every last sail down, and haphazardly tied them to keep them open.

It worked well at first, as the spinning of the wheel correlated well enough to the direction of the ship.

That was until the wind picked up rather substantially, sending the boat carving a path through the open ocean, aimed directly at the slavers ship, going a rather incredible speed.

It would have hit the vessel that had previously been between Casper's and the slavers, but they luckily had enough crew on deck to get out of the way.

“Sailing is rather difficult, isn't it!” Laihal shouts as the hull cries in protest with yet another rise and fall against the waves.

“Very!” Casper confirms, spitting saltwater from his mouth, as what feels like half the ocean crashes against the deck.

Casper laughs, as the men aboard his stolen ship cry out and begin to try and brace and drag their companions to the lower decks as the slavers ship gets closer and closer.

Casper throws Laihal towards the wheel, and wraps her hands around the peg like holds.

“Hang on!”

Laihal holds tight, and Casper sprints across the deck, swiping at the ropes holding the sails open.

One by one the ropes are cut, and one by one they begin to flutter dead in the air.

Sprinting past more crew members, Casper approaches the anchor, and waits as the ship slows slightly before releasing the hold on it too.

The wood screeches and whines as the anchor is dropped into the ocean. Casper continues to use the mark to check small glimpses into the future, running through the outcomes of certain actions until ones he deems favorable appear, and then follows them.

Casper turns and sprints back towards the wheel, ignoring the ice cold water splashing over on him once more.

As he reaches the wheel, the anchor hits the bottom and forces the boat to lurch violently forward, nearly Sending Laihal into him.

Casper catches her, and then spins himself around to pin her between the wheel and himself.

He would have enjoyed the closeness of their bodies, but right now he was too focused on not crashing.

Casper spins the wheel violently to the left, forcing the boat to arc at a dramatic angle and sending it almost sideways as it continues to get closer and closer to the savers

“Let's go!” Casper shouts, and releases the wheel as the ship continues its path towards the slave ship.

Laihal obeys, and joins Casper at his heels as the two take to running across the deck, where Casper plants his hands firmly on the railing, and lowers himself into a squat.

“Three, two, one!” Casper shouts, and just as their own ship begins to arc in the wrong direction, Casper leaps.

It was a functionally impossible jump for a human, so he would have to hope that Laihal either didn’t notice, or didn’t care enough to give the leap scrutiny.

Casper exchanges the deck of the boat for the open air as he leaps over the gap between the two vessels.

Spraying salt water at his face, roaring wind at his back, the gut wrenching feeling of a sudden drop, all meld into one insane sensation of adventure for what feels like an eternity.

At the peak of his arc, halfway between the two boats, is the moment in time Casper realizes he had failed to notice something.

The crew of the other ship were preparing for them.

Of course it made sense in hindsight, but Casper had been so caught up in the fever pitch of the moment he had failed to keep his senses on the slaver ship.

Three cloaked figures stand on the deck, each one's attention turned to his and Laihal’s airborne bodies.

Casper watches a faint magical glow builds under a cloak, aimed directly at him.

Casper throws his arms forward, tucks his head and drives his knees hard into his own chest enough to make him tumble head over heels twice, just in time to see the arcing magical bolt cut the air over where his head used to be.

The deck of the enemy boat rises to meet him, forcing him to brace and then throw himself forward to use the momentum to gain extra ground.

Twisting around, Casper watches as Laihal lands in the same moment, crashing into one of the robed figures and sending them both rolling around on the ground.

The deck rocks under Casper's body as the waves take it upwards. Using the movement, Casper jumps moments before a sword swipes where his feet were.

Casper twists in the air to try and land on the cloaked figure now underneath him, but instead finds the air ripped from his lungs as another cloaked figure tackles him in the middle of his jump.

Casper crashes hard into the mast of the ship, and then slides off of it with the massive figure who had taken him. Casper struggles to make sense of the strike, as the black cloak makes perceiving the massive man's movements nearly impossible.

Nearly

Casper channels the mark for divination. Not very far into the future, but just enough to get the edge over his attacker.

A massive fist shatters the wood next to Casper's ear, but Casper lifts up his head and drives it under the man's armpit. Sprawling out his legs, Casper anchors one to the ground under him and uses the other to kick backward, flipping the larger man over and reversing their positions.

Casper, now mounting the man, moves to crush his throat with a single jab but feels his arm grow numb.

Hot blood splatters against his shoulder, though his mark activates itself to increase the durability of his muscle before the suddenly appearing singing blade totally cuts the arm off.

The force is incredible, more even than his fight with the man in black.

His arm doesn't get cut off, but with nowhere else for the force of the sword blow to go, it instead sends him flying through the air.

Casper rockets almost entirely off the ship, only to angle himself so that he collides with the deck instead in the last moments, sending him through the lower levels until his body crashes against the bottom most deck, stopped from moving any further from the pressure of the water against the bottom of the ship.

The air crackles around Casper as the weight of someone appears on top of him.

“Fuck you’re fast.” Casper winces as he pulls his head to the side moments before a blade carves down the spot it used to be.

The cloaked figure takes care not to hit the bottom of the ship, which makes the strike not carry nearly as much force.

Casper grabs at the man's extended arm and pulls in time with his own body moving up.

In one quick, brutal motion, Casper knees the man in the stomach with the power of the mark behind it, but refuses to let him fly away as he continues to hold onto the man's wrist.

He instead carries the momentum, spinning the man in the air and then slamming him down back into the bottom of the deck, but finds he's suddenly weightless before any follow up strike can be given.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

The decks blur past Casper as he is suddenly wrapped in the black cloak, and thrown back upwards towards the higher decks.

This was a pretty difficult fight, he had already needed to use the mark to stop the damage and increase durability, and now he was being thrown back into the air by this assailant.

He would have to use it a bit more then if he wanted to make sure all of this damn effort ended up worth it.

Tangled in the mess of robes, Casper channels even more of the mark just as they breach the hole in the upper deck and arrive back at the top of the ship.

Timing the strike, he grabs at both of the man's arms which are wrapped firmly around him, and spreads them apart, then pulls down, driving his knee once more into the man's chest.

Angling himself, Casper repositions so the knee drives the man back into the deck of the ship.

Their bodies separate, and Casper crests over the deck, to land in a tumble nearby Laihal, who brings her incredibly sharp nails to bear against the scaled throat underneath one of the cloaks.

“Don’t!” A familiar voice cries out.

Casper raises a hand for Laihal to stop, though she still holds the struggling, hissing mass in her powerful arms.

“Do I know that voice?” Casper asks in the night, watching as the cloaked figure who had attacked him the most stands and brings up both hands, empty.

“You may…. Do I know yours?” the voice responds, approaching slowly.

“I'm sure you do.” Casper frowns slightly, as the man pulls his hood back to reveal the dramatically perfect golden hair belonging to Rathiel.

This was worse than he could have possibly imagined. Rathiel was under the impression that Casper was a normal human. No normal human could have ever survived his attacks, let alone fought back.

“Good to see you again, friend.” Rathiel offers a nervous chuckle and motions to the others to remove their coverings as well.

Thodhan, the big man, removes his first. Laihal then releases her hold on the last, who reveals herself to be Szostes.

The air between them all felt heavy with the implications, everyone assuming something entirely different more than likely as eyes trace the familiar faces.

Casper truly would hate to have to kill these people. They were good, honest folk, but what other option was there if they knew?

“What are you two doing here?” Rathiel starts, his voice measured, calm, but not without caution.

“Good question, I suppose I could ask you all the same, but I’ll play fair and answer. Szostes knows that I had intent to free the slaves aboard this ship. I explained as such to her in the thieves guild…” He leaves the accusation of their cooperation with the guild hanging.

Rathiel flinches slightly. “I understand you perhaps think less of us, for our rather tight involvement with the guild, I assure you it disgusts me as much as it does you, yet it is necessary to save lives…” Rathiel begins to explain.

“We do not owe them an explanation!” Szostes protests with a hiss, lowering her head as she narrows her eyes at Laihal, who only offers a smile and delicate finger wave in response.

“No, no we do not… But I am sure they would like one,” Rathiel offers kindly. “We may have to work with the guild, but that does not mean we like doing so. Szostes informed me of your intent, but said she had dissuaded you of the attempt. We decided then we would do what we incorrectly thought you could not.” Rathiel explains.

“So you tried to come here in disguise to free the slaves yourselves without risking your reputation with the guild.” Casper finishes for him.

“Correct.” Rathiel smiles and lets out a breath. “Now that we have that cleared up… there is one other thing still lingering between us I believe.” Rathiel's eyes narrow to Casper.

Damnit Casper thought, as he felt the power begin to build within Rathiel. He really would have to kill them then, wouldn’t he? He would likely also need to kill Laihal which would be much much harder to explain to the girls when he returned.

“You’re marked, aren’t you Casper?” Rathiel asks.

Damnit

“Would you believe me if I told you no?” Casper tries, his eyes flicking between everyone aboard.

“No, I believe it is safe to say I wouldn’t.” Rathiel confirms.

Damnit!

If Casper wasn’t mistaken, it sounded as though Rathiel was upset by all of this as well…

“So this is it then?” Casper sighs, lowering himself to strike.

“No. it doesn’t have to be.”

Casper pauses then… listening.

“I have no quarrel with you Casper, in fact, I believe in time I would enjoy being able to call you a friend…”

“But?”

“There is none, that is all. Marked or otherwise I can see in the scales of your heart that you are a good man. You may not believe me, for everything you have heard regarding others' perception of the marked, but I truthfully have no issue.” Rathiel extends his hands wider.

This had to be some sort of trap, a trick. There was no possible way that Rathiel was this moral. Casper had to hide his mark from everyone else in the village because his father didn’t trust the people he built a life for, to be okay with the mark.

Casper's own traveling companions were ready to kill the nameless girl on the spot even after saving their lives. It must be some sort of trick.

“Casper… I do not know what other proof I must give you to show I mean you no ill intent. You may not know me, nor know the weight my word has, but still I will tell you this. Your secret is safe with me, no, more than that, I wish for us to travel together, so that we may be even a small sliver of good in this rotten world.”

It was a lie, Casper knew it had to be.

Raising his sword, Casper narrows his eyes.

He wouldn't give Rathiel the chance to kill the others. All those who come into contact with a marked person must die. It was the law of the land. He couldn’t risk it.

Casper launches himself at enough speed to send a shockwave over the deck as he moves to drive the blade into Rathiel’s chest.

Gritting his teeth, Casper drives the blade forward until the tip pierces the man's skin, and then stops.

Casper’s blade hovers a quarter inch into Rathiel's chest, letting a faint trickle of blood bubble and then trickle out in a thin line into the fabric of his clothes.

“NO!” Thodhan screams, and begins to move towards Rathiel, until much like Casper's own movement, the half celestial extends a hand telling him to stop.

Thodhan obeys, and though his hands remain in fight fists, he remains motionless.

Casper blinks a few times, and removes the tip of the sword from Rathiel's chest, staggering backwards.

“You were going to let me kill you?” Casper asks, as his mind sifts through every possible future, seeing none where Rathiel stopped the blow, or tried to fight back at all.

In every future he could see, Rathiel stuck to his word, and allowed Casper to kill him on his word alone…

“I didn’t believe you would… because I believe you are a good man, mark or no mark it means nothing to me.” Rathiel smiles.

“Rathiel… I am so sorry.” Casper shakes his head, looking down at the spot of blood.

“No, it’s no trouble.” Rathiel heals the wound with a faint incantation and pass of his hand over the spot. The blood stops, as the little cut heals itself in an instant.

“I was ready to kill you.” Casper presses, unsure of how to move forward.

“But you didn’t.” Rathiel takes a cautious step forward, and extends a hand to Casper.

“Casper, when we sat together around the fire and you all spoke, a part of me knew those women were not really your slaves. A part of me knew that it was an act. It was Szostes who told me that “Engee’s” hair had been dyed recently, she recognized the process. Janus recognized “Alexander” and Nephinae from some time he had spent in Ostlen… but we also knew that you all likely had something to do with the auction house.”

Casper struggles to take in the revelation. They had done so well to avoid detection, the best they could he thought, how was it all possible that they knew all this and said nothing?

“I don’t understand…” Casper admits, looking down at Rathiel's extended hand.

“Casper, we have been adventurers for a very long time. Your disguises and efforts would work against nearly everyone else, but not us, not after everything we have seen over the years.” Rathiel chuckles a little, recalling some old memories.

“What do you want then, what is all this, what do we do from here?” Casper asks.

Rathiel extends his hand further. “We do exactly what I said. I like to think I'm a rather good judge of character, and I think I can fairly judge you when I say everything you are doing, you are doing for a reason. You are freeing slaves, giving people chances, doing what’s right, and all of that in spite of the mark you bear, in spite of what people say about it. I want you to join me, join my party as we continue on our way.”

“Where are you going?” Casper lets the words fall from his mouth. It almost felt like they weren’t his own. His entire understanding of everything had been shattered and the world kept moving around him.

It’s like he needed to pause time to process it all, yet he could not. So instead he continued to stumble forwards in hopes that by the end of the fall he would land somewhere soft.

“After we are done here? We are going to Duke Regalt's holdings. The front is getting worse and worse and the men under that man's banner are dying for greed. I intend to help them.”

“You want me to fight in a war for the Duke? Or against him?” Casper lets his eyes look down to Rathiel's extended hand once more.

His entire reason for everything was to kill the Duke and his legion. If Rathiel asked him to fight on behalf of that man he had to decline…

“I want you to join us to end the war. We might not be able to solve the kingdom's problems in a night, but that is why I, we, became adventurers. We want to see this kingdom change, and the only way that change is made is one step at a time. I'm asking you to help me save lives. Not for the duke, nor against him. In our own way. Your other party members are capable, strong, we can help train them, and I swear to you on everything that I am, I will keep the secret of your mark, as well as the rest of my party.”

Casper's heart slows to a crawl, as he steadies himself against the rocking of the boat he suddenly became all too aware of.

Rathiel would have let Casper kill him. Maybe it was because Rathiel truly believe he wouldn’t do it, but Casper had seen the future for a fraction of a second where he did, and Rathiel had died at his hand.

He liked Rathiel, and he wanted to believe him…

And so he did.

Casper takes the man's hand in a shake, looking him in his perfect golden eyes.

“You have yourself a deal.” Casper lets out a tense breath, and watches with relief as the others around the two of them relax slightly as well.

“I am truly glad to hear it.” Rathiel pulls Casper in and slaps him on the back a few times. “I knew I was right about you.”

Casper wasn’t particularly sure if Rathiel was right about him, but still, some part of him felt good about someone finally really knowing he was marked, and being non-hostile about it.

However, there was still one issue…

Pulling away from the hug, Casper turns to look at Laihal, who’s expression of excitement at everything hasn’t yet wavered.

“Oh, me? I’ve known you were marked since the moment I saw you.” Laihal offers with a playful growl.

“You did?” Casper asks.

“Of course, I could see the mark on your arms, all the way to your neck. You are practically soaked with it. All fiends can see it.” She explains.

“That developed?” Rathiel whispers with an impressed tone.

“Oops, sorry.” Laihal smiles. “Maybe you should punish me for telling?”

Casper rolls his eyes.

Evidently she was fine with it, as she hadn’t said anything yet.

“And just to be clear, no one on this boat will tell anyone else that I am marked, correct?” Casper tests, looking around.

Rathiel nods deeply, and Thodhan nods in short, swift bursts, evidently more on the “fear” side, culturally speaking. Szostes looks almost ready to fold in on herself, though from what emotion Casper couldn’t quite tell. Regardless, she seemed revenant and serious in her confirmation of Casper's statement and thus that was enough for him.

“Not even Janus and Dorain.” Casper clarifies.

“By the heavens no, those two talk when they are drunk, I wouldn’t trust them with any secrets.” Rathiel laughs, instantly easing any lingering tension still in the air.

Casper smiles slightly, and looks around at the boat. “So, Perhaps someone else should sail this thing to port so we can free the slaves?”

“An excellent idea.” Rathiel throws the cloak's hood back over his head, and makes his way towards the captain's wheel.

“Starboard!” Rathiel shouts, and watches as Szostes and Thodhan begin to move around the deck of the ship.

“What the fuck is a starboard?” Casper asks, though the only response he gets is a shrug from Laihal, and a rising sensation of nausea as the ship begins to rock once more.