“It’s a pleasure,” he tipped his hat to Delilah just before another round arrived. With a charming smile he must have spent years honing, urging the girls to clink their glasses. Delilah brought her second beer against theirs while nervously staring at her third.

Cira’s pace had begun to slow, but she was far from done. Her tummy felt tingly and warm—it was a novel sensation that she found no reason not to indulge in. The sensation spread to her arms and legs which moved just a little bit later than she asked them too. This was not a good state to be in for a sorcerer with serious business or potential combatants before them, but Cira was sure she could respond to a threat quick enough.

Wait, using magic right now might be dangerous. I have to test it, right? But how?

Peering around the room at all the drunks, nobody looked like they’d notice anything, but they were all grouped up. There was but one man eating soup by himself and watching the musicians. A candle flickered in the center of his table, one of the few sources of light. I’ll blow the candle out, simple as that.

She slyly put a hand in her coat to hide the light from the spell and conjured a faint puff of air from afar.

The candle blew out effortlessly as a cloth napkin flew off the table. A rippling tidal wave of soup spilled onto the man’s chest and into his lap as his pained yelps drew the attention of every patron and Peaches.

“Gahh! Hot hot hot! What the hell is going on?!” He kicked his chair back and hopped around trying to shake the boiling soup off.

The muscles in Cira’s face clenched and she turned back to her meal, picking up a single worm fry and eating it. That was a fluke, these things happen. Just needs a little calibration, is all.

“Whoa, what happened to that guy?” James laughed.

After one look at Cira, Delilah was mirroring her expression. It wasn’t hard to put two and two together with what she knew about her.

Cira crumbled under the pressure with a nervous laugh. “I heard they have lots of ghost not far from here… hundreds… thousands even…” She had their attention, “Do you think they get out sometimes?”

“Oh yeah, they definitely do,” the striped shirt man called himself Tom, “I’ve seen it.”

“A ghost didn’t take your gold!” The third shouted loud enough for the room to hear, “How many time we been over this?”

James just rolled his eyes. Behind them all a disgruntled young waitress cleaned up the mess and couldn’t keep from suspiciously glancing at Cira. She just kept her eyes forward and finished her meal. Sorry…

“So, you from Leviathin Isle too, Lorelai Jones?” It turned out this one was named Shirtless Joe. He had a bald head and a single gold earring.

She winced, but Joe’s face showed a disarming lack of wherewithal—he was just enjoying the night and some ale. She drank some more in kind, I’ll trust Cira! “Oh no, not me. I’m just a poor village girl from… Skippers Point!” She realized a bit late that she knew very few islands by name.

Delilah looked across the table to see the sorcerer wearing a playful expression. All four seemed to expect her to continue. She gave Cira a smirk, “The day I met Cirina Dreadheart, she nearly killed my Pa!”

Their new friends all looked at Cira aghast, “No!”

“So cold.”

Cira waved her arms around, “Hey, it wasn’t on purpose. And I helped him out afterwards!”

“Next thing I know,” Delilah feigned pouting, “She snatched me away.”

“Damn, Cirina.” James looked at her, “You’re pretty ruthless.”

The others shook their heads and looked at Delilah with sad eyes.

“Oh please,” Cira brushed it off with a belligerent gesture, “she’s exaggerating. And what about you three? Are you three ‘sposed to be pirates or are you in Uru lookin’ for lost pets?”

“Pfffffffft.” James really drew it out, and Cirina Dreadheart lacked the defenses the sorcerer Cira had against spittle and other such conversational byproduct. “You know we’re here for the same thing everyone else is. But no one’s got the balls to go for the royal prima. If you were so close, why didn’t you take it?”

“Fool. I guess pirates out here have no decency.” She shook her head, befuddling the man, “Do you think I lack in wealth such that I would need to plunder the last home these little ones have?” She turned her head and gave Nina a little boop.

Their mugs tipped continuously as they talked about all kinds of things Cira would surely forget by morning. But she was having a great time. Delilah had seemed to loosen up as well. The men here mainly smuggled plain old salt, but every now and again would make a run for the prima.

“You wouldn’t believe all the tunnels out of here. Any number of ways to go straight to the nymph’s lair, and you’d be surprised at what you can find up there.” James jerked his head toward the miles of salt above them.

“I’m sure I would…” Or would I?

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“Heh heh,” Tom slapped his captain on the arm, “Why don’t you tell ‘em about the dragon you found.”

“A dragon?!” Cira’s attention was drawn. “No way! The one I saw was way too big to fit in some tunnel!”

James seethed while his two men held their sides from splitting with laughter, slapping their knees and howling. “Must’ve been a baby, right? Go on, Cap’n, tell ‘em about the dragon!”

He couldn’t take Cira’s exuberant gaze any longer, “Turns out it wasn’t a dragon…” Her spirits fell instantly. “It was… um—”

“It was friggin’ mushroom!” Shirtless Joe’s face was red, and he could hardly breathe.

Cira was almost too disappointed to laugh, but she couldn’t stop herself either. He ran back to town and through the whole of Uru into a panic only for the search party to find a weirdly shaped mushroom. James sulked as everybody had their fun with this story. His stony face gave the impression he’d heard it a thousand times.

They continued drunkenly bantering until Cira polished off her fourth glass. The fiddler’s new tune was upbeat and fast, and a newcomer had arrived—he had a large string instrument propped against him that made deep tones as he strummed. She found herself tapping her foot and moving her shoulders with the beat.

“Hey Lori,” Cira’s words dragged, “you wanna dance?”

A smile crept onto the girl’s face, “I’d love to!”

Standing up from her chair was not as easy a feat as she remembered, but Cira had never failed a test of agility in her life. Once risen, she offered a hand to Delilah and they skipped away towards the thumping music.

“Uhh.” James shared a look with his crew. “We should probably go too, right?”

“Man, I hate dancin’.” Joe pounded his ale, and it ran down his beer belly. “But if Jimbo can do it, I can do it!”

Tom followed suit and the three tried to catch up, but the girls were already dancing. Their feet responded to the rhythm as they tapped along. Cira’s goal was to copy those around her and figure it out along the way. They did something of a jig then spun around each other, sometimes holding their arms at their hips and other times swinging them to the sides. There was no apparent order to it, but Cira found it to be the most fun she’d had in ages.

With the party of five, the dance floor had grown sizable. She smiled at their pirate pals as they awkwardly shuffled their feet around by the edge. Only James seemed to have any semblance of moves, but he wasn’t too eager to jump in.

“I didn’t know you could dance!” Delilah’s face was warm as she twirled with her partner. “You’re lighter on your feet than I thought you’d be after drinking so much.”

Cira chuckled, “I can do many things, my dear Lorelai.” She didn’t notice the blush through Delilah’s already flushed cheeks when she grabbed her hand to pull her in and spin her around.

“Never seen you girls in ‘ere before,” the missing benefactor with one leg approached with unrivaled footwork, tapping up with a toothy grin, “Why don’ts we all dance for a little while?”

Finally! Cira’s red cheeks puffed up as her smile grew. This one actually talks like a pirate! I wish they all did. “I thought you’d never ask! Your friends don’t seem to share your agility. The name’s Cirina Dreadheart!”

“’At’s a weird way o’ puttin’ it, but I’ll be hornswaggled if it ain’t the truth. I like you. Friends call me Jimbo sticks.” As an introduction he performed a short tap dance and held his arms out, yar-har-harghing.

Cira clapped, “Why do they call you that?”

“That’s easy,” Without skipping a beat, he pulled his peg leg off and held his stump towards the girls revealing a short knife that glinted to a fine point, “’Cause I’ll stick ya’!” He reeled his head back and laughed boisterously.

With eyes sparkling, Cira gasped, “Amazing!”

Then the door to the outside slammed open. When the fiddler skipped a beat, most heads inside turned to see the man who entered. He fit the bill for generic, dirty pirate captain. Like James if he let himself go and grew a beard. The ill-fitted brown coat and patched pants fit his nasty eyes.

“That seems rude.” Cira said, “why isn’t the doorman doing anything?”

“Captain Don of the Black Scourge pirates…” Jimbo spoke quietly, “He’s always trouble. They can’t risk rilin’ him for just this much.”

“Do they really call themselves that? So uninspired—” her voice trailed off as she noticed something unfortunate. Captain Don was making a beeline right for her with his eyes locked on. She sighed, “Here we go… Stay behind me, Lori.”

He had three men in tow covered in dirt. One was bald and had blood on his shirt. The emboldened captain walked right up to Cira and didn’t even say a word, just looked her up and down, taking his time on her chest and smirking, “Looks like I found me new crewmate. How ‘bout it, little girl? I’ll show ya’ a real pirate.”

She scoffed as aggressively as she could, “I’m no little girl, fool. And there is no pirate realer than I, Cirina Dreadheart!” She imbued her words with high-velocity pirate spittle.

A vein popped on his forehead, “What’d you just call me?!” He went to grab Cira by the scalp, and she deftly dodged, slapping his hand away as the sound rang out across the now silent tavern. Dammit, I’m too drunk but I can’t heal it away or everyone will notice. She had meant to grab his wrist and twist it around his back.

“Damn, wench!” In her impaired state she didn’t realize Delilah was left wide open, “Guess I’ll just take your friend then!”

This time he tried to grab her blouse as if to rip the buttons open. Cira’s unsuspecting sidekick froze up in a panic. Right before his grimy fingers reached her—

Shing!

The pommel of Cira’s saber crushed into the man’s chin. Blood and teeth flew into the air while the surrounding patrons gasped, oohed, and aahed. She could hear their hushed chatters behind her.

“Bitch!” Don spit out more blood, “Okay, that’s it!”

Shing.

Remembering the rule, Cira sheathed her blade again while Don pulled out his own, his followers doing the same. The doorman walked towards them with clenched fists and a hard expression. She prepared for a fight and steadied her stance with fists drawn, facing the incoming blades.

“Alright, enough!” An angry woman’s shrill cry silenced everyone again. Even Don’s crew was shaken. “The hell do you idiots think you’re doing in my home?!”

Cira’s eyes went wide as she slowly turned her head. It was a woman with hair the same color as her and Peaches. She was probably in her thirties, but it was hard to tell from the years of stress wearing on her face. Cira liked the skull and crossbones on her apron.

She stomped up to the raging captain and the girl who bashed his face, “Put your weapons away or I’m fighting! Now.” Her voice was cold.

Cira looked at Don with a smirk.

“Who started it?” The woman’s brow was furrowed in anger, and she looked between the two culprits.

“Look what she did to my face!” Don whined through a busted lip—there was a little piece dangling off where he bit it.

Crossing her arms, Cira gave him a condescending look, “And you tried to kidnap us. You’re lucky you still have hands.”

“God damm—” Don started but the woman of the house wasn’t having it.

“I’m not here to argue, now put it away, Don!” She gave him a practiced glare. “You know as well as anybody else the only fight allowed here is a drinkin’ fight, so take it outside or figure it out!”

He put his sword away and looked at Cira with a compromising thirst for violence in his eyes. He growled, “Which is it then, little girl?”

Cira returned his gaze with contempt, “I hope you’re ready to drown.”