Gracchus startled at the noise of thumping on his cabin door. He realised he must have dozed off. As he startled, he spilled the quarter of the cup of wine he was drinking onto his tunic. He muttered to himself some choice swear words, as he tried to brush the wine off before it soaked in. After this futile attempt, he stopped bothering, as he decided a darker red stain on a red tunic wouldn’t be all that noticeable.

“Captain? Permission to enter?” Vannur’s voice carried the query through the door.

“Come!” said Gracchus. “What is it?”

“It’s time. The men gather in front of the hold hatch. Twenty-five men, with twenty for the mission, plus the five additional men you asked for.”

“Good, good. Now, when we brief the men, I need you to stand at the rear. If any protest, I will give you the signal to take care of them. I can brook no doubt or dissent. The risk is too great to tolerate nonsense.”

“Aye, sir. I’ll get her done.”

“Right, move them into the cargo hold so I can give them their orders. I’ll be along shortly.”

“Aye.”

With that, Vannur moved to the table and grabbed the plate of ash to remove it and have it cleaned in the scullery. He turned to leave but paused a moment and said, “I figured you didn’t want to be disturbed until now, so I kept your supper aside. I’ll bring it here after you brief the men.”

“Very good. Let’s get this over with.”

While Gracchus made his way forward towards the hold hatchway, he pondered about how he would split the gold with his men. Regardless of who was on the raid, he needed to pay all of them. He knew this mission was an extreme risk. By the Gods, however, the payday will be incredible once it’s done. He would make out like a Lord regardless of capturing slaves. He only had to leave a uniformed body behind and return to Disipica.

Gracchus entered the hatchway down into the ship’s hold. The cargo hold was quite a spacious area, as it was a ship for carting human cargo, so space for the captives and the supplies needed to ensure minimal losses from a long sea voyage took priority. Towards the aft of the hold were two sets of wire bars making two cages, separating male from female captives. Gathered in front of the slave cages were twenty-five of the crew, with Vannur standing behind them in the shadows cast by the lanterns lighting the space.

Gracchus made his way down the stairs, and scanned the men, a wicked grin splitting his face. And then he began. “Men, tonight we hunt! Our prey will be worth much more than usual. Oh, so much more than usual, I am sure.” As he spoke, there were murmurs of anticipation from the group. “The men we hunt, we will sell to the pit trainers for the arena, and you know they pay good gold for fighters, and mark my words, the men we hunt are fighters worth gold!”

Some of the men began looking a little confused. He went on, “And the women, by the Gods, oh, the women! Gorgeous, tall, toned, blonde. Women such that you would think they had fallen from the heavens!”

Gracchus had tried to plant the seeds of greed and the seeds of lust as he had countless times before, but never so emphatically, as he knew what he would say next would cause the toughest among them to have doubts.

“For those of you aware of the winds and the sun’s path, you know the direction we are heading. For those of you who don’t know your arse from your elbow, let alone up from down…” This elicited a few nervous chuckles. “…we go north to Sofjorland!”

At this point, a stocky crewman interjected, “But Captain, that’s Haldermen land, that is! You’ve lost your mind if you’re planning on raiding there!”

Gracchus looked at Vannur and gave a sharp nod. Vannur sprang like a pouncing cat, and before anyone could even flinch, he was behind the commenter, his left arm around his neck, and with a sick crunching sound, his right hand had buried the full length of his marlin spike into the commenter’s ear.

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The commenter’s eyes rolled back in his skull and he made a choked gurgling sound as Vannur slowly lowered his body to the deck and then pulled the spike out of his ear with a squelching sound. The hold was dead silent except for the fading sound of the victim’s death rattle and the receding, slow tap, tap, tap of his right heel on the deck as his nerves twitched out his last staccato.

Gracchus allowed a couple more seconds as he glared at his men, a wicked grin streaked across his weathered face, secretly relishing the looks of terror on their faces, and the shift up and down of some of their Adam’s apples as they gulped nervously. He then blasted out into the silence, “WHO ARE WE?”

The men mumbled, “Nevan.”

“What?”

“Nevan!”

“Where are your balls, men? WHO. ARE. WE?”

“NEVAN!!!”

“Yes! We. are. Nevan! We are hard! We are many! We are the greatest of mankind! We take what we want, as it is our Gods given right! We are fay-voured by the Gods. We will raid these barbarians and we will take from them. We will take them!”

He paused a few moments and went on, “Yes, they’re big. Yes, they’re strong and maybe a bit scary…ooh…” He waved his hands as his upper body rocked side to side comically in mock fear. The men had livened somewhat now and chuckled at this, “…. but We. Are. Nevan!”

At this, the men were cheering and stomping their feet in approval. Now Gracchus knew he had them. He let them continue as he slowly counted to five in his head. Then he raised his hands while nodding his head slightly, with his palms pointed to the deck, motioning them to settle down.

“If you would look along the bulkheads, men, there are barrels, and in those barrels are uniforms and armour. We will wear these for the raid. Now, can I trust your discretion, men?” As he said this, he looked meaningfully at their recently deceased former comrade before returning his eyes to their faces.

The crew nodded and murmured their agreement. “Good. This is a raid we’re specifically hired for. So, we are specifically required to conduct the raid dressed as such. Now, because you men will be part of the landing party, you will receive a greater share of the spoils! How does three gold pieces a man sound to you?”

As Gracchus scanned the faces of his crew, he could see the telltale gleam in their eyes as they realised they were about to be paid what would take them half a year to earn if they were lucky. “The raiding party will be Vannur, myself, and nineteen of you dressed in these uniforms.”

One crewman chimed in, “What about the twentieth, sir?”

“I was getting to that, I was getting to that.” He held up his right hand as he said this. “That, my fine, impatient lad, is for our friend, Mr I don’t wanna waid scawy pwaces here.” He mocked and gestured to the dead man.

“He will remain in Sofjorland. I am betting the most useful he has been since his mother shit him out into the bed.” The men laughed raucously at that. Gracchus then asked, “Who among you can shoot a bow? And when I say shoot, I mean someone who can hit the mark.”

A few hands raised. He pointed at the smallest among them and said, “You will do. You don’t need a uniform. Besides, you need to grow some for them to fit you. You’ll be with the scouting party to give the signal to begin the raid. If the circumstances are right, and you loose the fire arrow, I need you to shoot any Halder sentries you encounter.”

Gracchus paced in front of the men momentarily before continuing “Men, we want to capture at least some slaves, and so if there is an opportunity to do so, we will. If we can take some Haldermen, we will make serious gold, men, believe you me.”

He paused momentarily to let that sink in before going on. “These people will be a novelty. Have you ever seen a Halder slave?” He pointed randomly, “You?” he pointed at a different man, “You?” one more “You?”

Each man he pointed to shook their head. “That’s right, because they are rare as rocking horse shit. And the man who has rare, is the man who gets rich, am I right, men?”

The men nodded, their eyes lighting up slightly more. Gracchus then said, “And the more rare we can catch, men, the more money each of you will get!”

At this, the sailors began chatting excitedly amongst themselves at the prospect of even more gold. Gracchus allowed them to continue for a few more seconds before he made a single loud clap with his hands for their attention.

“Moving right along, Vannur will lead the scouting party, which will be you, you, and the um… where’s my bowman... ah there, yes, you. The rest of you will be with me in the main raiding party, except you four. You will guard the landing plank to keep an eye out. We’ll drop dead guy here a ways from the shore to ensure he doesn’t get dragged off by the tide, and then we’ll hide until we see a fire arrow. Clear as mud? Good.”

Gracchus inclined his head as he made eye contact with Vannur, signalling for him to come over, and then to the men said, “All right, those of you who will wear the uniforms, start getting dressed, we move as soon as we make landfall.” At that, he and Vannur headed back on deck to prepare the rest of the crew to beach the ship.

Up on deck near the prow, Gracchus could see the smudge of the Sofjorland coast on the horizon through his spyglass. At which point he whispered to Vannur instructions to furl sail, and stand off until after dark.

Vannur straightened up, took a deep breath, and shouted out his orders. “LAND HO! Furl sail and stand off until otherwise ordered!”

At this, the sailors started hauling on ropes, and the row master yelled at the oarsmen to back oars, and reverse their positions in preparation to back the ship into shore when it was time.