The mystmaze’s end was in sight. Twila could see the Endeavor’s wreckage in the cavern beyond–its cracked hull and broken mast silhouetted against the smoldering campfires. The coat was tucked under an arm, a pistol in the other hand, and a weight filled her stomach. “Do you think he’s down there?” She asked.

“No.” Charlie holstered her own pistol. “The ship’s boat is gone. It’s safe.”

Twila started to put her pistol away, but something felt wrong. Instead, she slung the coat over her shoulder, scratched her cloth-wrapped wound lightly, and drew the second of [Anton’s Paired Pistols]. Armed and ready, she crept through the cavern toward the ship.

Sure enough, the ship’s boat had disappeared. A smog stain covered the cavern floor where its vents had pushed it into the sky. Twila stared into the dark tunnel. Her eyes strained to see anything–a spark of mystfire or smoke–that would show where the [Sky Captain] had gone. But there was nothing.

“See, he’s gone. You have business on board the Endeavor, skipper,” Auntie Charlie said.

Carter looked up at the hull, then at the campfires. “I’ll wait out here,” he said. He wandered off toward the pirates’ cave-floor camp, looking over his shoulder several times.

Twila shrugged and climbed up into the Endeavor’s belly. Auntie Charlie followed her through the hammocks and the supplies, up to the upper hold, and into the room with the brig. Coatless lay on the floor, unmoving. Twila’s stomach plummeted. The selkie had looked back when she’d left her here; had she died in the brig? Or would they have to try to nurse her to health somehow before they could return the coat?

“Coatless? You still there?” She said softly.

The seal woman’s big, black eyes opened slowly. She blinked, and the eyes widened. Then she was on her feet, hands reaching through the bars toward her coat. Her lips moved, but words didn’t come out.

Twila held out the coat. “We got this back for you. We’ll try to get you out of there soon.”

Coatless’s hand grasped the coat, rubbing weakly against it. She pressed her face against the bars and nuzzled the thick fur. Her eyes sparkled, even though the garment wouldn’t fit through the bars. Her mouth moved again, but still, no words came out.

“How do we spring her out of there? No keys,” Twila said.

“Let’s go check the skipper’s cabin. There could be something in there. If not, we’ll need to bust the brig open. The hinges are a usual weak point.”

Charlie turned and left the room, but Twila stayed for a bit. As she walked closer to the bars, Coatless’s eyes widened again, she started chewing on her lip, and then she tried tugging the coat through the bars. Her sounds were definitely not human–they sounded more like a dog. A very stressed, upset dog. Twila raised her hands and backed away. “Sorry, Coatless. Stay there and, uh, don’t go anywhere, okay?”

“Twila, are you coming? Carter, get up here too!” Charlie yelled.

“I’ll be back soon,” Twila said. She hurried back to the main hold, then up onto the deck.

Her quartermaster stood near a double door set into the quarterdeck’s wall, fiddling with the handle. She pulled her hand back suddenly. “He trapped it! Don’t worry. It’s not poison, just a little burn. I’ll be fine.” Then, before Twila could even ask if her hand was okay, Charlie drew her pistol, aimed it at the handle, and pulled the trigger.

The glass windows into the cabin shattered, and the door handle twisted, but the door itself stayed shut. “Twila, if you don’t mind, shoot the rest,” Charlie said.

Twila pulled her pistols and fired. One purple mystshot slammed into the lock, then another. What was left of the windows exploded inward, and the door bowed and shook. When she’d finished and had started reloading, Charlie kicked the door. It shook again as something fell to the ground inside. Then she yanked it open.

Carter ran up behind them. “Whoa,” he said.

Twila had to agree. Whatever Skipper Anton had been, his room back on the Hourglass had been downright sparse. He’d had a small bed, a few bottles, and the sky chest–but not much else in the way of comforts. Most of his room had been taken up by the time engine, and even the sky chest’s contents hadn’t screamed ‘valuable’ to any of the ship rats until they’d read the dead skipper’s journal.

[Sky Captain] Vayne, however, was doing well for himself as a pirate. A brass–or maybe gold–chandelier hung from the ceiling. Candlesticks made from shining metal lined a fancy wooden desk in the corner. Its surface had a fine dust coat; its occupant hadn’t been much of a writer. Twila stepped inside with Carter on her heels. Shattered glass crunched under their feet. “I’ll be out here,” Charlie said.

“We should bring the Hourglass here,” Carter said. “With all this, we could pay for months’ worth of veggies, and I could buy passage back to Iswixel. I wanna go home, Twila.”

“Why home? We’re close to the big treasure. We just have to solve the mystwall puzzle and walk out of there with enough crowns to buy Iswixel, not only passage there. Think, Carter.” Twila stepped over to the candlesticks and poked the wax. “One of these was lit recently. Vayne was here.”

“No, Twila,” Carter said. “You set course for your old home just as soon as things went south at the Gibson Foundry, but you won’t let me go home? That’s not fair.”

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

“Don’t forget, a key ring,” Auntie Charlie called from outside.

“We’ll talk about this later,” Twila said. She strode over to the sky chest near the foot of the bed. “He didn’t lock this. Must’ve been in a rush.”

As she kicked the chest open, her eyes widened. Carter’s did too. Some of the coins inside had been stacked nicely, judging from how they’d fallen into the gap in the chest’s center. To the side, a smaller, locked chest sat. Twila tried to lift it out, but its handles were flush with the chest’s sides, and she couldn’t get a grip. After a few tries, she stepped away from it. “It’s only half-full. He took the other half. And there’s no key here.”

“That’s fine,” Charlie said. “We’ll have to get creative about getting into that brig, though. Let’s get back down there.”

“What about what I was saying, Twila?” Carter whined. “I deserve an answer. Why can’t I go home?”

“Not now, Carter,” Charlie said as they returned to the brig.

When they reached Coatless’s cell, Charlie pulled a small flask from her hip and tossed it through the bars. The selkie woman pounced on it, glared, and rushed back to the bars to keep a hand on her coat.

“Drink it. It’s water.” Charlie sighed as the selkie woman scowled and refused to move. “Let’s just pop the cell and step out. If we’re lucky, she’ll drink, feel better, and just leave. Then we can loot the ship properly, with the whole crew. Twila, heat up your sword. We’ll try melting out the lock.”

“Couldn’t you just pop the hinges?” Carter asked. “It’d be faster unless they’re sealed. You’d just need a sword or something to lift the pins. Gimme your sword.”

Twila drew her sword and handed it to Carter, who started working it into the gap between the hinge pin and the hinge itself. “These are pretty badly rusted. Charlie, help me out here,” he grunted as he struggled to pop the first hinge.

With nothing better to do, Twila sat down on the floor, just out of range of the selkie’s coat. Coatless scowled, her eyes shifting between the two people working on the hinge and Twila. She barked a warning and grabbed the skin more tightly. Twila just rolled her eyes. She’d just returned it to the woman–it wasn’t like she’d be taking it back.

“Coatless, what’s your name?” Twila asked.

The selkie stared for a moment, clutching the coat. Then she leaned forward and mumbled something into the bars.

“What?”

“Twila, she’s gotta let go of the coat. The whole door’s going to lever on the last hinge. It’ll hurt her pretty bad if she doesn’t back off,” Carter said. He held the sword up against the top hinge. “It’ll make a passage for her, but she’s gotta back off first.”

“Nola.” The selkie whispered hoarsely. She shot a narrow-eyed look Carter’s way and then at Twila. “You’ll just take it if I let it go.”

“No, I won’t, Nola. I don’t care about your coat. If I did, I’d have kept it. Just two steps back,” Twila pleaded.

The selkie paused. She narrowed her eyes again, then slowly let the coat fall. She took a cautious step back. “Open it.”

Carter and Charlie yanked on the sword’s hilt. A moment later, the top hinge’s pin flew upward, and Carter threw himself away from the suddenly-rotating cell door. It wrenched the other hinge free and crashed to the wooden deck. Nola ran and grabbed the coat. Before anyone could move, she tore a tiny strip off one sleeve and threw it in Twila’s face.

Then she was gone, running through the ship as fast as she could, toward the exit tunnel.

Twila got up to follow her. Her face felt hot, and her chest was tight. She’d helped Coatless–Nola–and gotten a scrap of cloth for her trouble? But Charlie’s hand was on her shoulder. “Let her go. I told you selkies didn’t care much about helping you. Consider that scrap of cloth a great gift. Now, let’s check for the Hourglass and make a plan to loot the Endeavor.”

[Twila Tighe, Ship Rat Mystgineer, Equipment Level 1.33 (Myst 1/15, Hit Points 1/1)]

[Head - Empty]

[Eyes - Myst Lens (lvl. 1) Myst Sight (passive) See own status block and others’ classes]

[Chest - Ship Rat’s Harness (lvl. 0)]

[Waist - Apprentice Mystgineer’s Bandolier (lvl. 1) Deep Pockets (passive) - Equip an additional Gizmo]

[Legs - Canvas Overalls (lvl. 0)]

[Gizmo #1 - Loaded Dice (lv. 2) - Roll the Bones (active, 1 myst/roll) - gain a random myst enhancement; Skill - Trickery]

[Gizmo #2 - Anton’s Pocket Watch (lvl. 4)] Redo (active, 5 myst/5 seconds) - redo the last five seconds of time, with knowledge of what’s happening (1 minute to reset); Skill - Piloting]

[Gizmo #3 - [Pocket Condenser (lvl. 1) - Condense Myst (passive) - Condenses 1 myst/5 ticks; Skill - None]

[Gizmo (Belt) - Mystwork Lantern (lvl. 2): Mystlight (active, 25% failure chance, 1 myst/attempt) - start the light; Adjustable Light Aura (sustained, .5-2 myst/tick) - light a variable area; Skill - Perception]

[Myst Battery - Myst Battery Mk. 2 (lvl. 1) Myst Storage (passive) - 15 myst maximum, requires condenser to refill]

[Weapon/Pair - Anton’s Paired Pistols (lvl. 2) Smoothbore Myst-Shot (active, 1 cartridge/shot) - fire a ray of heated myst; Rapid Shots (active, 2 myst/shot) - fire twice/tick; Skill - Marksman]

[Weapon #2 - Heatblade (lvl. 2) Heat (active, 1 myst/tick) - cause the blade’s edge to superheat; Skill - Acrobatics]

[Weapon/Pair - Empty]

[Skill #1 - Trickery 2]

[Skill #2 - Perception 2]

[Skill #3 - Piloting 4]

[Skill #4 - Marksman 2]

[Skill #5 - Acrobatics 2]