Dell sat down in his cushy armchair and steepled his fingers. “First, I wanna know what history’s got to say bout me, so why don’tcha give me the quick and dirty so I can see how close they got it.”

Rowan opened his mouth to say something when he was immediately interrupted by Pat yelling at them as he bustled on back with a fresh notebook and quill.

“Don’t you say a word until I have this notebook open and I can hear you clearly, I don’t want to miss a thing,” even yelling, his voice still managed to sound completely monotone, “even if it’s just Dell’s story about killing the squid again, I would like to know how it’s told merely hundreds of years later.”

“Kraken,” Dell frowned at Pat, giving what would’ve been a pointed stare had he had eyes, “they’re much bigger than even giant squids. People truly don’t appreciate the difference until a single tentacle kills half a fleet.”

“A giant squid would only be able to take out a single ship at a time,” Rowan nodded in agreement, “fishermen can kill a giant squid, fishermen fear krakens almost as much as the gods, if not more.”

“Interesting that no matter the time, the fishermen fear the gods,” Pat mused, “even when there isn’t a god of storms or waves for them to fear.”

“A god of waves?” Rowan asked, “that’s a thing? I thought there was just the god of the deep?”

Pat jotted something down quickly as he sat down, “And what exactly is the domain of the god of the deep?”

“He’s the god of all bodies of water, responsible for the tides, waves, typhoons, and all aquatic creatures,” Rowan answered, “Although I wasn’t a follower so I couldn’t tell you the specifics. I follow the god of light.”

“God?” Tiffany asked with what was surely meant to be a piercing stare, “Not the goddess of light?”

“No,” Rowan shook his head, “the god of light, as he has been since before our recorded history.”

She swung her skull to face Dell, and even without facial features, Rowan could tell she was scowling at him.

“Why did you not tell me this Dell?” she asked in a sweet voice that dripped with poison, “Why did you not see fit to mention that my goddess had fallen and been replaced?”

Dell shifted uncomfortably in his seat, “Well, y’see, er…”

“I see what, Dell?”

“Ya know, I’m not a very religious man,” he glanced away, doing his best to avoid Tiffany’s eye sockets, “it’s just not somethin’ that’s really come up, plus I dint want to upset ya.”

“Ah, I see. You didn’t want to upset me.” She let her words hang in the air for a moment, “because lying by omission definitely wouldn’t upset one of the holy crusaders of light and truth, right?”

“Pat knew too,” Dell said guiltily, “why aren’t you givin’ him the guilt trip too?”

“Because I didn’t ask Pat,” she said sternly, “I specifically asked you how the pantheon of light was doing, if people were still embracing the goddess’ love.”

“An I said yes,” Dell’s voice shifted to a more indignant tone, “The teachins are basically the same an the pantheon of light was doing great when they sent me an my crew to deal with the lich an it’s cursed island.”

“You damn well know what I meant, Dell.” Tiffany’s glare seemed to get even more intense.

“Regardless,” Pat interjected, “I’d like to hear Dell’s history from someone other than Dell, so can we please table this for later?”

Tiffany glared at Dell for a few moments longer before sighing deeply, “I guess so. I’m also curious as to what history has to say about the slayer of the spires.”

Dell opened his mouth, looked back at Tiffany and snapped his jaw shut, gulping audibly before leaning forward to face Rowan, “Yes, enlighten us please, before I become even more dead than I already am.”

“I don’t know the history books word for word,” Rowan said, looking at them uncertainly, “I just remember the story of Captain Dell because we liked playing heroes so much as kids, and even then I don’t remember that the best.”

“That’s fine,” Pat nodded, “history is just a collection of different accounts anyway, it’s only through assembling as many of those accounts as we can that we can determine the most likely series of events.”

“Most likely?” Rowan asked, “Not the true factual events?”

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“The only way to have all the facts is to be omniscient, and even the goddess of knowledge can’t claim that,” Pat shrugged, “so we line up as many stories as we can, add all the common denominators, and that tends to become the history of events. It often misses a lot of the specifics because they don’t seem important, but all of it is part of a larger puzzle. Every single little detail.”

Rowan considered this for a few moments, and then nodded, “Alright, so, uh….”

The three stared at Rowan expectantly, making him suddenly very nervous, as if he was back in his history classes on test day. His mind was blank, just like on test day. “it was uhhhhh…”

“Pause,” Tiffany loudly stopped his stalling, “we introduced ourselves, before you start telling us Dell’s story, why don’t you tell us your name?”

“Oh, yeah, where are my manners,” Rowan gave his head a shake, “I’m Rowan Jesker, crusader of the church of light, on a mission to avenge my family.”

“Well, nice to meet you Rowan,” Pat said with a hint of impatience in his monotone voice, “now, I would very much like to hear what you have to say about Dell’s history.”

“Give the guy a minute to get his thoughts together,” Tiffany said, shaking her head. “He was ready to fight us or run away the second he woke up less than five minutes ago. You weren’t even giving the poor guy a chance to introduce himself.”

Pat nodded to Tiffany then faced Rowan, “I apologize, I let my excitement get the best of me, there are only so many of us here and only these two are particularly tolerable to me. I am very eager to learn more while I still can.”

“Are you on a time limit of some sort?” Rowan asked, “aren’t you already dead?”

“Yes, and yes, one day I will start turning to dust.” Pat replied, “I’d like to know and record as much as I can before that day comes to pass.”

“Some people may consider that question rude,” Tiffany said, giving Rowan a pointed look.

Rowan blushed a little and quickly apologized. Pat waved him off, then put a quill to the page and looked back at him expectantly.

“Well, once again I don’t remember this the best and I might mix in parts from the kids tales by accident, but I’ll do my best. I cannot remember any of the specific dates, but essentially the church of light was begged by the people to take care of a sea monster that was disturbing trade from and to the continent on the side of the world. They did a minor investigation and gathered that some sort of zombie leviathan, like a squid or sea dragon, and then they gave the job to what was essentially a well geared trading vessel, at the helm of which was Captain Dell. That was the Wave Rider I think it was called.

Captain Dell, his crew, and three crusaders set out towards the spires that the trade routes went through to try to take care of what was assumed to be a zombie sea dragon or mutant giant squid or something of that sort. When they arrived, they found plenty of destroyed ships, but no sea monster. As they started to navigate the spires themselves, the kraken surfaced just outside of them. It started to swim and crawl its way into the spires while Captain Dell quickly and carefully navigated through the spires, getting the krakens overlong arms stuck. Once the kraken was stuck, they raced back towards it and Captain Dell along with the crusaders jumped off of the waverider and onto the one of the beast’s trapped tentacles.

They journeyed up the tentacle while the beast struggled until eventually, they reached one of the eyes, then the kraken broke free, and the crusaders were knocked into the water and lost to the spires. Captain Dell then used his sword to climb into and through the kraken’s eye as it started to dive. He then stabbed it in the brain and when the corpse floated to the top, he climbed out and used it essentially as a boat to make it back into kingdom territory where he was rescued by the navy and granted the ship Leviathan Slayer along with a matching title.”

Pat scribbled furiously, Dell frowned, and Tiffany touched a finger to her chin and tilter her head.

“Well, now I need to know,” Tiffany leaned forward slightly, “How exactly did you and your friends pretend at being Dell when you were a kid?”

“Three or four of us would climb up on a big branch and try to make it to the end while other kids tried to shake us off,” Rowan said sheepishly, looking down at the plain cotton pants that had replaced his armour, “The last person on the branch was the Captain and got to ‘slay the kraken’ which was just hitting a big stump with a rusty sword one of the other kids found. Only the captain could swing the sword, kids that fell were crusaders and had to help the kraken shake of the rest.”

Dell’s frown deepened for a moment, and what was left of his brows furrowed, “That’s what’s in the history books? Also, I dunno if I should be offended or flattered by that game.”

“Flattered, please,” Rowan said, “and as far as I remember it, that’s all the major details.”

“No mention of my prior occupation?” Dell leaned closer.

“No? we all assumed you were a trader turned hero based on the waverider being a trade vessel,” Rowan answered, “why would they have mentioned it?”

“Because I weren’t a trader,” Dell said with a dark tone, “And I am offended they called the Wave Rider a ‘well-geared trading vessel’, or is that you paraphrasing some much nicer words?”

“No,” Rowan immediately shook his head, “that’s what it was referred to as. Almost verbatim, ‘a well-geared trading vessel’. They may have used an adjective or two like sleek or speedy, maybe.”

“Downright offensive, that.” Dell started rubbing his temples, as if massaging away a headache. Bits of skin seemed to fall off with each motion of his hands, Rowan couldn’t tell if it was from his hands or face though.

“Well shit,” Dell sighed, “I’m probably gonna have to give you some backstory so you understand things a bit better.”

“Like what?” Rowan asked.

“To start, I weren’t a trader, as I already said.” Dell shook his head, “I was a pirate. And it weren’t a job given to us by the church, it was supposed to be an execution of me an my crew, an hopefully the kraken but that didn’t actually matter a whole lot to them.”

“Another thing to not upset me, Dell?” Tiffany’s singsong voice was like ice, the almost musical tone cutting instead.

“Don’ give me that Tiffy,” Dell’s voice almost stern, “You heard most the story.”

“Apparently not the important part, like the actual beginning of it.”

“Well,” Dell sighed again, “I suppose now’s a good a time as any ta tell ya how it all started, since I’m sure Rowan here would like to hear it as well.”

“Considering you’ve just told me one of my childhood heroes was a pirate,” Rowan imitates his head exploding, “yes I fucking would.”