They say Clissolt has four quays and three keys. I’ve only seen two of the former and have no idea what the latter part of the saying is supposed to mean. But I was told this by a drunk old man in a dingy alleyway and everyone knows those are the blokes who offer the greatest wisdom.
-Quoted from Karis Zellart, wandering merchant of ill repute
Trent winced. Rose felt a little bad for ambushing him with such a personal question—two, at that—but she needed to know the answers.
Sailing with someone who was still a stranger to her in many ways was a little uncomfortable. She’d come to know Trent, but there was much of his history and goals that he still hid from her.
After a deep sigh, he pulled his gaze from the setting sun and turned to her. “I suppose it’s fair that you learn more about us. After all, I can’t ask you to join me on this final voyage without telling you why it is a final voyage,” he said with a forlorn smile.
“That would be a little imposing,” she replied with a wry smile. “Not that I’d say no. Where else am I going to find such a charming bastard to leech from?”
“Nowhere in this backwater sea, that’s for sure,” he quipped. His smirk fell, replaced with a faraway gaze. “We don’t need to go all the way to the beginning. I’ll start somewhere in the middle.”
“I captained a notorious crew of pirates in the Sunblessed Sea, my home. Nasar was part of it of course, as well as Yasmin, who we’re on our way to pick up in Zoria,” he said, beginning the tale of his past.
“In total there were thirty-two of us, most friends of a decade or more who’d joined under one banner to find our fortunes on the open ocean. And for a while, that was exactly what we did. Plunder merchants, raid coastal towns and small cities, and adventure through any convergences we were lucky enough to encounter.”
A deep sigh escaped his lips and his eyes dulled a little. He was remembering something tragic, that much was obvious to her.
“I’m not quite sure when it started to go wrong. We got too big for our little corner of the world, I suppose. A few of us were infamous, with some countries offering bounties for our capture. It was a point of pride at first, comparing which of us was worth more—dead or alive.”
“Everything went to shit when we won a battle against two ships from the Minenblum Royal Navy. Usually it was nothing special—blast each other to bits and the next week they’d send another crew after us. This time, we managed to kill a prince. Not just any spoiled scion, but Queen Lorelai’s favourite son, the Second Prince Kaldex. Faramir be damned, why was the bastard so weak?” he chuckled, not a hint of joy on his face.
“I can answer your second question here too. Branmore Saff was just a Lieutenant Commander back then, serving under Kaldex. His vendetta could be one of pure vengeance, or perhaps his career suffered when the prince died. He still rose to become a commodore, yet he’s wasting all his time chasing me down when I’ve barely got a few years to live.”
Rose gasped. “What’s that supposed to mean? You’ve roped me into your crew and you’re going to go and die on me?”
Trent smirked. Shaking his head, his eyes regained their usual confident lustre. “You want to know why they call me Blackheart?” he asked.
If she said yes, there was no turning back. But refusing at this point wasn’t an option, she was already tied to his ship—quite literally. “I do.”
“We aren’t getting married, dear Rose. You’re far too young for me,” he joked, reaching down to lift up his shirt. “Isn’t she a beauty?”
Whatever words came to mind when she saw the gruesome sight of her captain’s chest, they were far from enough to do the disfigurement justice. All she managed to stutter was, “How? How are you still alive?”
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Half of Trent’s stomach was missing, the other side cauterised by blackened, rotting flesh. His ribs poked through the severed muscles and his organs seemed to be held in the air on invisible strings.
Every few seconds, a pulse of blue light sparked through his blood vessels, lighting up the macabre display. Yet that paled in comparison to the source of his woes; the reason he’d earned his name.
His heart was black as charcoal, cracked and dry. It hadn’t beaten once the entire time Rose had watched. Every time the blue light pulsed outwards, the rot spread a tiny bit more. Looking closer, she saw the source.
A tiny little metal contraption was attached to the back of his heart. Embedded inside was a little fragment of a tidestone that pulsed at regular intervals.
“I guess you really did need that convergence core,” she muttered. “Fuck.”
“Come on now, there’s no need to stoop to such vulgar language. It’s not like you, Rose,” he said, lowering his shirt to hide the source of his shame. “That was courtesy of Second Prince Kaldex. He had a strange artifact, likely a gift from his mother. It activated upon his death. I’ve yet to find a cure. This final voyage is just me chasing a myth. A supposed cure to my ails. Either we find it or I die trying.”
There wasn’t much she could say. She could barely think. Instead, she just leaned over and gave him a hug. He seemed surprised, but wrapped an arm around her shoulder and ruffled her hair.
***
Rose sighed, snapping her sketchbook shut and pocketing her pencil. Since the last bout of inspiration, she’d found herself unable to recreate the images in her mind the way she wanted.
Her drawing skill had stagnated at 17, with nothing giving her the spark she needed to get past this bottleneck. There would be time later, perhaps. A city loomed in the distance, a monument of beige and orange.
They would arrive in Clissolt before the day’s end and they had plenty to get done while they were there. To start, money was to be made. They had plenty of treasure to sell and perhaps even a tidestone, if Rose decided to part ways with the keepsake of her hard won victory over the serpent.
Apparently Zoria was a little less hostile towards pirates than Minenblum. Certain villainous buccaneers who went around killing without a second thought gave the others a bad name.
Pirates tended to bring big windfalls to the local economy when they docked. Flooding the market with foreign products and buying up local produce in bulk—especially alcohol.
That was just one of many myths that Trent and Nasar had busted through their little chats while sailing. She learned that discovering two convergences in such a short time was unusual.
Enough that it made them suspicious of Rose and her supposed ‘fate’. The encounter with the gem-eyed blacksmith only served to fuel the fire.
Regardless, he wasn’t going to cast her out over a little bit of manifest destiny. If anything, the more danger they experienced, the more wealth they amassed.
Trent hadn’t discussed their goals in detail, but whatever they were sailing in search of would require plenty of money to keep them afloat as they went. Especially with Felix eating half the pantry every mealtime. The boy was a glutton.
This time around their crew had a lot of treasure as well as mundane goods to offer. Rose wanted to follow Trent to the market and see how he went about the mercantile side of their business.
Being a successful pirate wasn’t just about getting good at waving her cutlasses around. She also needed knowledge of all the supporting aspects.
There was a silver lining to the daunting prospect of learning how to haggle and calculate with money—there might be a skill in it related to her occupation.
Two monolithic structures, built from sand coloured stone—mined from the colossal mountain near Clissolt—jutted out into the ocean from the shore. The city had no beaches, only rocky cliffs and reefs that were deadly to ships that ventured too close.
These were the famed Clissolt Quays. Trent said there were three, but I only see two. Docking the ship had been a simple affair. All they had to do was sail close enough and drop anchor once they could be seen from the quays.
A little rowing boat made its way out to greet them, a dock official wearing round glasses and bearing a tattoo of a viper on his neck informing us where to dock Liberty. After he collected the fee, of course.
Rose grimaced at the leery eyes he flashed when Trent brought the coins out. Like any other pirate, she dreamed of hoards of treasure, but it was more of an aesthetic.
Her true reasons for venturing out to sea lay in freedom and adventure. Those, along with the thrill of developing her skills, had been where she discovered the joy of piracy.
“I heard you wanted to come with me to sell our wares, dear Rose?” Trent asked as they tied off the ship. “I might need to teach you some mathematics first.”
She didn’t like the devilish grin on his face as he said that. Writing was bad enough. Only the prospect of completing her occupation faster stopped her from changing plans and dragging Felix to another tavern.