Adrian was resting in the sick bay of The Good Ship Galaya after being brought on board by Captain Roth the day before.
It was a simple space near the bow of the ship, only separated from the rest of the berth deck where the small crew slept by a sheet hung from the ceiling to provide a small level of privacy. They left him a thin mattress pad to lay on so he wasn’t totally uncomfortable, even if he was starting to grow bored.
Thanks to the dutiful work of the quiet Surgeon, Sunny, his body was almost feeling entirely back to normal. The soreness had totally faded from his muscles, his headache and sore throat were long gone, and even the shrapnel wounds in his shoulder and thigh were patched up.
That last part had required an emergency procedure that was unnervingly similar to the Captain’s resurrection of the Maiden’s Fangs. Enough flesh had been blown away that it had to be filled in to move normally again, and apparently on The Galaya, that meant a chunk of wood from the ship was directly fused into his body to patch up the holes. Thankfully, the magic numbed the site so he couldn’t feel anything, but the sight of roots digging under his skin was something Adrian struggled to push out of his mind easily.
Reaching up to rub the polished surface that now made up a good chunk of his left shoulder, Adrian was still amazed at the fact that he could still feel through it as naturally as his own skin.
From what he knew of the Surgeons he had met and stories he had heard in Heartspear Cove, things like easing pain, stopping the flow of blood, or preventing infection were routine. Anything else would have to be done using non-magical tools and techniques, like simple prosthetics and surgery. It took a lot of magic to heal a living body, and most Captains weren’t willing to spare their Surgeons more than enough to keep their men alive.
He couldn’t be sure if Sunny was talented enough to use his magic extremely efficiently, or if Captain Roth just placed a heavy emphasis on keeping her crew well and provided an excess portion to the man. Either way, he knew he was overwhelmingly lucky to have chanced upon such a crew. It was not likely that any other ship that found him, pirate or Navy, would have been so hospitable.
That went double for the fact that he’d managed to keep his coat—and also the gem inside—in the room and in his sight at all times. Even after they had stripped him and the stone fell to the ground and lit up the room in colorful reflections, neither Roth nor Sunny had even mentioned the thing.
Sure, they’d introduced themselves as adventurers, not hunters or raiders, but this was still among the strangest group of pirates he’d ever met. What Captain wouldn’t just grab a treasure out of their crew member’s hand if they wanted it? Much less some little kid they just found.
Just then, the curtain separating the room was pulled open to reveal the tall half-orc Captain Roth along with Sunny and another man he hadn’t seen before, wearing a long, heavy leather coat that covered most of his body. He even went the extra length to pull the collar up around his face until only his eyes and bald head were visible. At first glance, he appeared completely human, but something about the unnatural sway of his movements and a glint in his pale violet eyes made Adrian think he could be another half-race of some kind.
“Adrian, I’m glad to see you awake,” Captain Roth said upon entering the space. “I take it your injuries are healing well?”
Turning away from the curious stranger, Adrian respectfully addressed the Captain while Sunny moved silently as ever to once again poke around his body, focusing mainly on the wooden implants.
“Aye, Captain, I’m feeling much better now. I really don’t know how to thank you for everything.”
Roth’s mouth curved into a gentle smile that Adrian couldn’t help but feel contrasted strangely with her intimidating lower tusks. It reminded him more of Dorsey’s wife Despa than the face a pirate Captain would make.
“Do not worry about simple matters like that, boy. If the day should come when I require repayment from a child, then where would my respect as a Captain be? No, we are here for another reason. I have someone I’d like you to meet.”
The Captain hit the other man on the back, pushing him closer to Adrian’s side. He caught a nervous glance pass from the man to the half-orc but she kept her smile up and nodded to him reassuringly. He turned back to look at Adrian and took a deep, calming breath.
“N-nice to make your a-acquaintance, Adrian. My name is S-Sloane, and I have the honor of being the Qu-Quartermaster of The Good Ship Galaya.”
Sloane spoke quickly, with a quiet, wispy voice that, along with his stutter, gave off the sense that he was a shy man that would rather be anywhere than where he is now. He then turned back to Captain Roth, earning him one more encouraging nod from the woman. “Go ahead, Sloane; show him. We can’t move on until this is over with.”
Sloane paused for a few seconds and Adrian even spotted a tremor in the man’s gloved hand. It made him wonder what could make the second-highest ranked pirate on the ship act so afraid, but those thoughts didn’t last long. Sloane moved to undo the top button of his long jacket, letting the collar drop down from around his face. Adrian was right about the man’s half-race origins, but he wasn’t prepared for the sight of Sloane’s appearance.
Each of the five half-races on the Oversea had some distinguishing feature that marked them as distinctly non-human. Half-elves had long, pointed ears and gleaming blonde hair; half-dwarves had their short and stocky bodies; half-drakes had nearly impenetrable scales on their torso and neck, as well as heavy, powerful tails; and half-orcs tended to have larger, more muscular bodies overall with colorfully tinted skin and sometimes tusks like Roth.
Finally, there was the last group; half-abyssals. While the members of the other races had some individual features—things like different colored scales, or distinctly shaped tusks—half-abyssals could have any number of traits from the countless species of true Abyssals they descend from. Fins, scales, rubbery skin, dozens of eyes, poisonous spikes, tentacles in place of limbs. One half-abyssal could be more visibly distinct from their own sibling than either of them were from the average human.
Sloane himself had thin, silver-blue scales that covered his jaw and upper lip. Small holes between them leading down his neck gave off a hint of blue light that cast an ethereal glow on his reflective scales. Most noticeably, rather than a human mouth, his thin smile stretched all the way from ear to ear, allowing him to open his lower jaw far enough to swallow Adrian whole. It was full to the brim with long, clear, needle-like teeth that stuck out from between his silvery lips menacingly.
Altogether, his appearance brought to Adrian’s mind images of the horrible creatures of the Depths that the pirates of Heartspear Cove told drunken horror stories about late at night. The true Abyssals that attacked lone ships and powerful fleets alike without care, using anything at their disposal to drag their victims below the waves.
Adrian knew that most people of the Oversea held an extreme distrust, if not outright hatred, toward half-abyssals. In his entire life on the cove he had never once seen one in person—at least, not one that wasn’t hiding themselves from the crowds of pirates.
Most of them spent their lives in small communes without ever stepping aboard a ship, and the ones who did find a crew willing to take them on were left to menial labor if they were lucky enough to not be reduced to cannon fodder. Even for the extremely lucky few that were born as Captains, getting ahold of a ship to actually utilize their abilities was not a simple task. And if they did manage it, they would likely be blown out of the water by the first larger ship they passed. There wasn’t a single crew on the Oversea who hadn’t lost a mate to the Abyssals, after all.
But that didn’t include Adrian, who had never seen the creatures of the Depths, and whose jaw hung low while he was curiously scrutinizing every inch of Sloane’s face. Seeing the supposedly terrifying creature for the first time. The man, clearly unused to such attention, squirmed in place under the close examination until Captain Roth spoke up.
“Alright, that’s enough. Go ahead and button up, Sloane. I think we’ve seen what we needed to.”
With his Captain’s permission, Sloane didn’t hesitate to pull his collar back up, covering the sharp nest of teeth to Adrian’s disappointment. Though, seeing how much more comfortable the half-abyssal man looked afterward, he did feel a bit bad for staring so much.
If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.
“Y-yes, I believe so as w-well, Captain Roth. Thank you for your k-kindness, Adrian.” Sloane bowed his head to Adrian once before continuing. “Should you w-wish to join the crew, I have n-no objections to your recruitment.”
Adrian bolted upright in his bed, almost throwing Sunny to the ground in his excitement.
“Really?! You’ll really let me join?” He turned between the three pirates rapidly, checking for any sign of deception or ridicule. Many crews in Heartspear Cove said the same thing at one point or another, but it was always just a drunken joke or scam to get a half-elf slave. He’d given up on actually joining a pirate crew until he was allowed to join Garza’s raiders when he turned fifteen, not that that was an option anymore.
Sunny’s face was blank as usual—with a slight hint of reasonable irritation—so there was nothing to learn there. Sloane had jumped back a bit at Adrian’s sudden movement, but after gathering himself he managed to give a weak nod. Finally, Captain Roth wore an expression intimately familiar to Adrian; the same grin Dorsey gave him whenever he got permission to stay out later at the bar or take a sip from the old half-dwarf’s ale.
Thankfully, Roth seemed to take the tears welling up in his eyes as a sign of happiness. She lay her hand on his head comfortingly and messed with his matted blonde hair.
“We are lucky to have you, Adrian,” she said, then turned back to Sloane. “I leave command of the ship to you, Quartermaster. Please first make sure our Navigator hasn’t set fire to the galley. Sunny, go with him in case she’s burnt herself again. I will get our new Boatswain up and running.”
“Boatswain?! I’ve never even sailed before!” Adrian shouted while Sloane and Sunny left through the curtain. “How am I supposed to run the entire ship?!”
“Calm yourself, Adrian. I do not expect you to fit the role immediately,” the Captain assured him with an amused grin. “But as of now, it is the only available role to take. Unless you’d rather start out as a deckhand?” Captain Roth chuckled to herself before pulling over a table with a parchment and quill.
Rather than use ink, she simply held the tip of the quill against the wall beside him and green light flowed through the wood into the colorful feather pen.
Adrian’s mind was blank while he watched the Captain write up his crew member contract. It was all happening so suddenly. After this, he’d be a real pirate. He’d be able to use the power of the Constellations. It was everything he’d ever wanted. But his heart still hurt.
“What do you know of the Captain System, boy?” Roth called Adrian out of his own head.
“U-umm… what? Do you mean the different ranks? Like how Archcaptains are above Admirals and normal Captains?”
She shook her head, reaching up to gather more green light. “The rankings are but a mere facet of the System overall. The Captain System is a gift from the Gods.”
“The Gods?” Adrian jumped in. He had heard of them of course, but was surprised to hear the word come up here. “I thought they were just legends? Nobody has prayed to the Gods in a thousand years.”
Captain Roth looked at Adrian like a child, which irked him.
“Even if that were true, there is no doubt to their existence. The Constellations themselves speak of their vile, dastardly ways. There are many reasons our people have stopped praying to the Gods; but it is also true that some of them loved us in their own way,” she explained while getting back to writing.
“The Gods left our world one thousand years ago for reasons unknown, taking the five non-human true races with them. Unfortunately, something went wrong, and the Abyssals were not completely banished from the Oversea, allowing them to return here from their place in the Depths and take control of the waters, stranding the remaining Humans and half-races on the sparse plots of land.”
Adrian moved to the edge of the bed, taking in the information eagerly. He’d always loved listening to the tales and legends told by tourists in Dorsey’s bar.
“As a parting gift to fix their mistake, the Gods left behind the Captain System to manifest in a lucky few at birth. It is the System that allows us to communicate and bond with the Constellations above, and to use their own power as our own,” she explained, finishing up the contract and turning to face him.
“And it is through this contract that I can share that power with you, Adrian. I’m sure that’s what you’ve been waiting for, no?” Captain Roth smirked knowingly at him.
Adrian couldn’t hold back a wide grin in return. “Aye, Captain.”
Captain Roth burst into hearty laughter, slapping him on the back. Adrian was happy to find that it didn’t hurt at all thanks to the Surgeon’s good work.
“Good lad, Adrian. As expected of the future Boatswain of The Good Ship Galaya,” she finished through her amusement.
Adrian reached down to the table and slid the parchment in front of himself. “So I just sign it? And then I get magic?” He asked excitedly.
“It’s not quite that simple, but that is the first step.” She reached out, offering him the quill already glowing with green energy. When he took it, the pen felt warm and alive in his hands, like he was holding a bird itself rather than a feather.
The Captain pointed to a blank space near the bottom of the contract. “After you have read it over, sign your name here and the System will connect us, allowing you to use a small portion of my power to form your own bond with a Constellation. The rest will be up to your own ability and willpower.”
Before she finished her sentence, Adrian was already writing his name. He could read the thing later. Magic always comes first.
As the tip of the quill scratched across the parchment, he felt the heat flow out from his hand into the contract, burning his signature into it. When he lifted it off the page for the last time, the last strand of green light remained connected, changing direction to move back up and into his hand. Before long, it had already spread to his head. The last thing he saw was the contract bursting into flames before his vision was overtaken with a bright light.
He felt a twinge of panic in his chest that was soon calmed by Captain Roth’s nearby voice.
“I, Captain Narazenna Roth, do take this boy Adrian into my crew. Under the light of the stars and the glory of the Constellations, let this pact between us be formed.”
A calloused hand came to rest atop Adrian’s head.
“From this day forth, I name you Boatswain of The Good Ship Galaya. As her deck boss and steward, your responsibilities will be many, and they will demand much of you. Do you swear to live your life in service of my ship and her crew, Adrian?”
In the blank white space that filled his vision, Adrian felt the heat of magic coursing through his body. The song of the seas played in his mind, painting a vivid landscape of raging winds blowing against tautly drawn sails, relentless waves threatening to capsize stalwart battleships, and clamorous dragon-birds claiming the skies above for themselves. He saw the world of adventure he’d always longed for laid out in front of him, only asking that he reach out and take it.
The clouds in the illusory sky above swam and twisted, forming smoky words over the vast horizon line for Adrian to read aloud.
“I, Adrian, do agree to take on my role as Boatswain. For so long as I live to see The Galaya sail the endless Oversea, I swear to fulfill my duty such that she and my crew mates are given the opportunity to thrive. From hereafter, mine glories and shames are bound inextricably to hers through the power of the legendary Constellations and the benevolence of the Allied Gods. Should the day come when I must sink to the Undersea in her service, I solemnly pledge my Spirit to the Eternal Fleet in gratitude of this gift, that I may protect the Oversea and its people from all threats within and without until the end of days.”
As his vow came to an end, the visions faded until he was back on his cot in the sick bay of The Galaya, staring into the eyes of Captain Roth—His Captain. She held out a hand that Adrian shook firmly with his own.
“So… that’s it? I’m a pirate now? I can use magic?” He asked, not noticing any real differences in himself.
Roth nodded her head once in affirmation. “Aye, lad. You are now an official crew member of The Good Ship Galaya. Even should you choose to leave our crew one day, your pact to the Captain System will still hold true, so long as you have a ship to sail with and a Captain to serve. There is only one final decision you must make to complete the initiation process.”
The Captain closed her eyes and focused intently on something. A soft breeze blew through the space, fluttering the curtain that split the room from the rest of the lower deck. The already dim candlelight faded into the background, casting the area in darkness. Motes of starlight started blinking into existence behind her, drifting lazily into position.
With each spark that appeared, the room grew brighter and the air seemed to grow heavy. In only a few short moments, the abstract figure of a leafless, barren tree made of small, white specks rose over the woman’s head. A pressure weighed down Adrian’s neck, making him struggle to keep his seated posture or even breathe in the thing’s presence.
She opened her now glowing green eyes slowly and looked through Adrian, making him feel like every secret he’d ever held was laid bare for the universe to see.
“This is my bonded Constellation; Arbor Vitae, The Tree of Life. I offer you a portion of his power such that you may search the skies above for a Constellation that suits you and form a bond of your own,” Captain Roth’s voice was low, each word pushing deeper into his soul.
“Boatswain Adrian; if you are prepared to truly set sail into the world of the Captain System, then let us bring your orientation to its conclusion.”