Hmm.

I turn to Roland. He clearly hasn’t noticed it yet. Busy scanning around for enemies as far as I can tell.

I wave my hand at him to get his attention.

He raises a questioning eyebrow.

I quietly point to the water. “Know of any invisible ships?”

I watch his eyes briefly widen as he puts one and two together.

Nodding. “Alright, do you have any idea on how to get aboard?”

Oh right. That… That is a problem isn’t it.

…

Could we try poking it with a shaft of wood or something to figure out where it exactly is?

I look around for something long enough, then zero in on Rolands blade staff almost immediately.

“Try and poke the boat with your staff maybe?”

He nods. “I can try that, it’s called a sword-staff by the way.” and twirls it around so he’s not poking it with the sharp end.

‘Course it is.

“You should keep watch though,” he comments.

Walking around towards the pier he begins slowly fanning around to find the edge of the boat. There’s a solid thunk as the end of his staff bumps into it after a moment's effort.

He keeps going like that for a bit.

Glancing back towards the still smoking city, I can see there are still a lot of fires… I’m also increasingly disturbed by the lack of people around.

I would not be surprised if many were simply hiding… But that doesn’t explain why so many fires go untended.

I glance towards the Castle, resting high on its hill above the city, I can even make out the tower I was in… The Castle has a few sections that have collapsed from the bombardment but incredibly, much of it remains intact. It’s hard to tell much more detail than that though in just the moonlight.

It’s started to lightly rain, and the wind has died down to almost nothing.

I have another wave of dizziness that passes fairly quickly too.

Leaning up against the low wooden wall on the edge of the pier I balance myself against it, again thankful for not having to haul that backpack around. The rough wood seems to have been freshly replaced, given its lighter tone compared to the rest that I can make out.

I stand here like this for a short few minutes while Roland meticulously pokes at the ship.

The rain has picked up a bit by this point.

Pulling the cloak tighter, I thank Marry for her thoughtfulness. Hope she’s alright.

At last, Roland calls out. “I think there’s a ramp here.”

Hearing his heavy greeves on wood makes it obvious what he’s doing.

I walk over to examine the extremely strange appearance of a knight crossing what appears to be an also invisible boarding plank. He keeps using his staff similarly to how a blind person might do so. He slowly taps the sides and in front of him while carefully taking short steps.

He keeps like this for about 2.5m and then abruptly vanishes.

Opting not to stay silent on this one… “You still there?” I call.

No response.

Seconds tick by without any indication that he was there at all. The rain picks up a bit further.

Walking over to where the plank should be… I make sure to haul the backpack up along with me. Roland placed it well away from the edge of the pier, towards the middle.

Opting for the less exact approach, I shuffle my feet across its surface in an effort to find the edges. It’s slippery from the rain. I force myself to move even slower. I am not keen on relearning how to swim.

It takes me an incredibly agonizing amount of time to eventually cross the plank, and when I finally do it becomes abundantly clear why Roland didn’t return my call.

As soon as I cross the threshold… The entire ship suddenly springs into view. I’ll come back to that in a moment though.

Roland is having a ‘casual’ yet tense staredown with about a dozen people on the deck, dressed in various relatively colorful outfits. Lots of personal additions to what appears to be a common uniform underneath. Some of them look to be in varying states of disheveled as well.

Some of them appear to be discussing things under the sound of the rain, making it impossible to make out what is being said. Judging by some of the gestures and expressions they aren’t terribly happy to see us. There’s a fair bit of pointing in my general direction. I look around to make sure that they are in fact pointing at me.

None of them have that look of “in charge” though.

I resume looking around the boat.

It has three masts that are tall enough that I can’t make out their tops in the dark.

I’d say that’s impressive, but I don’t really know anything about sailing ships.

The deck is made from a dazzling deep red wood polished to such a shine that I can see my reflection in it. Can only tell it’s red due to the covered lanterns mounted around the ships sides. I glance away from the rain distorted image.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

Not sure if or when I will get used to that.

The stern of the boat appears to be a low slightly raised section with a few small swivel mounted cannons pointed to the rear.

The wheel also has a small windowed cabin surrounding it. I can’t make out much detail about the cabin itself in the dark like this though.

Towards the front- Er, Prow? I can see another small group of cannons on a slightly raised section of the ship. Also has what looks like a figurehead or perhaps a ram that I can’t make out in the dark.

I glance back to Roland and the small group.

They’re still talking, so I step a bit closer to overhear the discussion.

A barrel chested man is addressing Roland at the moment. He wasn’t there a moment ago.

His expression is a grimace, marring an otherwise clean shaven face with steely blue eyes.

He carries what I would assume to be several objects suggesting authority. He’s wearing a rather nice blue and black striped coat with shiny chainmail underneath it. His huge tricorn hat looks several sizes too large, and has an oddly sparkling azure blue feather clasped onto its top. On one hip is a huge double barreled flintlock, and the other a cutlass.

Hmm. Think my pirate senses are tingling. Pretty well dressed for a pirate though… Privateer?

“-ordered m’crew to ready the ship right in the damned dead of night. Ran off in an ‘uff to who knows where…”

They both glance at me briefly. I’m also immediately aware of being stared at by several of his crew.

The Captain does a bit of a head scratch. “Why don’t ye two come below, lest ye catch yer death in this rain.” He shakes his head. “Damn weather’s unnatural y’know. I can smell it.”

Smelling the air… I can’t detect much more than smoke and sea salt.

He leads the way towards a large hatch in the center of the ship, evidently closed in the rain.

Nudging a mechanism along the lip of the hatch, it pops itself open.

There’s a small stairwell leading downwards into the ship, and it appears to be very well lit. The stairs are made out of crisscrossing metal plates with rough surfaces on them too. Presumably a slippery spot when it gets wet.

Reaching the bottom, he leads us down a short and somewhat cramped hall that’s not quite tight enough to be called claustrophobic. None of the crew members follow us down here along with him.

Short winding halls further… We reach a rather interesting room.

The room is, at first glance, lavishly simplistic. I say that because of the display of utilitarian simplicity, and obvious sheer apparent rarity of some of the things in this room.

The table itself is a massive metal affair with a rather curious map embedded directly into it. The entire thing is animated to such a degree as to be almost exactly like a bird’s eye view… Cartographical magic maybe? They certainly don’t have planes, let alone satellites. This probably makes avoiding storms a lot easier… I watch as dark clouds flit across the image ever so slowly.

I can still hear the rhythmic drumming of rain on the ceiling above too.

The chairs are comfy looking to say the least, and the rest of the room is decorated with various trophies, evidently seized from enemy crews, swords bolted to the wall, and even stranger things evidently gathered from various creatures all over.

It is, as far as I can tell, a meeting room of some sort.

I take the offered chair from the Captain.

He takes a seat opposite, and his stern expression from above deck changes to one of sadness.

Bowing his head. “I’m sorry about your father. He was a very good friend of mine,” he says softly.

I’m left briefly open-mouthed with the sudden change of speaking patterns. My best grimace comes fairly easily though, considering the circumstances.

Regaining his composure, he goes straight to business.

“I am called Captain Rafael Ortonza and it is a pleasure to meet you, despite the… circumstances.”

I have a sense of Roland standing quietly behind me.

“I have a room ready for you… Though I was anticipating the Magister to join us. There is another room beside it that I suppose you can have Roland.”

He looks at each of us.

“I can personally show you to it, but I suspect you have some questions on your mind first.”

“I do.” I mutter.

I guess I should keep it short. If we’re safe then I can ask him more later… Especially considering the 3 months we’re going to be traveling.

He nods.

“So… Do you know anything about the attackers?”

“I wish I did,” he sighs. “Then at least we might try to avenge what happened here.”

“Are we to leave immediately or… Are we staying till morning?”

“That’s your call to be honest. I personally want to give others a chance to ah… Turn up. We only have about half our crew on the ship right now.”

Roland interjects. “I think we should also give the Magister and anyone left in the Castle a chance to join us as well.”

“Alright.” I nod.

I can’t help asking about all this… “Did you collect all this stuff over travels? And this incredible map…”

“Ah… There’s that insatiable curiosity,” he laughs lightly. “Some. A great deal of it is from my predecessors though. Lots of interesting things to be found diving, or… Sinking enemy ships.”

“Ask me about it later and I’ll show you some of the really interesting stuff that’s in the ship's strongroom.”

He nods. “How’s the state of the Castle? When it was still light enough to see, it looked pretty bad.”

Roland interjects again. “Not great. We had to leave in a hurry.”

“Ok.” I pause. “I think that’s all I have for now. I think… I could certainly do with some sleep.”

He stands up. “Well in that case then follow me. Guest rooms are near mine, towards the back of the ship.”

He leads the way through his ship a little further, continuing deeper, towards the back like he said. Small oil lamps hang from the walls with decent regularity.

“I’ll introduce you to the various ship officers once we’re properly at sea. For now, stick around your room, I’ll have someone visit in the morning.”

Turning to look at Roland he continues, “Your room is that one.” He points to the door immediately across the hall. “It’s probably not as nice as you are used to… But I hope it’s adequate.”

Coming up to a door, he offers me the small key after opening the door for me.

The door itself is pretty nondescript. What’s on the other side however… Is not what I was expecting on a ship.

The first thing that I notice is that the room is quite large, a double bed dominates the middle of the room, sweeping pale blue curtains obstruct the full view of it though. A dresser… Carpet strategically placed around the room, and herringbone patterned hardwood covering the rest of the room. There’s also a small desk and a chair on some sort of metal rail attached to the floor.

From behind me I hear a laugh from Rafael. “Not quite what you were expecting huh? I’ll leave you to it. There’s a washroom behind that door over there… And before you ask, yes it’s plumbed. We don’t have unlimited water though, so go easy please.”

“Thanks, I’ll endeavor to be considerate of that.” I say.

I give him a nod, step inside and promptly close the door behind me.

Sheesh, still better accommodations than I’d expect in a 4 star hotel. Sans TV, Radio, Coffee, and Internet… Hmm. I may need to re-evaluate this one.

Not sure I miss the constant nag of the day to day news though.

While thinking through all this I dump all the heavy things I've been hauling around in a heap beside the bed… I take care not to let the sharp things go on the bottom though, instead laying them flat.

Taking the cloak off I give it a light shake and toss it onto the hangar beside the door to dry.

Finally a chance to relax a bit.

Still lots of unknowns… But for the first time in a while I feel a lot safer.

Especially after I lock the door.

Turning to the bed, I dive onto it fully clothed and pass out in moments.