Boards creaked underfoot as they entered Hangman’s Cove and Cira didn’t have the agency to tiptoe nervously. Skipper practically dragged her along at Jimbo’s pace, whose nimbleness continued to surprise Cira. Maybe my outlook’s not so bad. I’m glad I ran into him.
It was difficult to tell where the sun was, but the whole island was illuminated by the fairly consistent veil of thin clouds that encompassed it. The shroud seemed to cover Hangman’s Cove in a bright shade of moonlight, making for a strange day.
“So, what did it?” First Fleet Captain Sticks asked, “Did the witch take your leg? I wish I could have seen the main event, but we were too deep.”
“No, the witch was laughably easy to deal with, though I was cheating. It’s hard to say how an even fight would turn out, but she couldn’t touch me.” Cira got a disgusted look on her face, “I’d hardly call it the main event. I only had to stop her when she tried to turn the infirmary and all of Uren’s plague victims to dust.”
“Geez,” he shook his head, “I never liked witches… No offense, I think. Witch pirates are probably a whole different thing, huh?”
“None taken. I’m no witch… My friend is though.” This put a little smile on her face for a moment. I totally have a friend now. All I had to do was lie and steal from her. Am I a pirate after all? “I cut my own leg off. Took a nap after beating the witch up and woke up with my leg crushed.”
“That’s no fun…” He grabbed a bottle out of a man’s hand as they passed him.
“Cap’n.” The man nodded.
After holding it up to Cira she shook her head and he continued, “Anyway,” and took a long drink before throwing it off into the clouds to disappear in the mist, “I heard if you punch a nimbus shark in the nose they’ll fly away. Well, I tripped.”
“Hah!” Cira laughed in the exaggeratedly hurt Jimbo’s face, “I knew it was a shark!”
“Tch. An’ I knew you lost yours in the most boring way possible.”
“No, you didn’t…” Cira mumbled. It’s not much worse than tripping into a shark. Boring’s not the word, but that sure is a hell of a stumble. She was quiet for a minute as they climbed a set of stairs, biting her lip and trying not to let the pain leak out optically in front of these manly men.
“Don’t worry, we’re almost there.” Jimbo reassured her at the top of the steps, which lead them to a slightly wider level with a lot more people walking around. Everyone up here looked the part of either a pirate or simple smugger, and there were even kids running around in similar rags. Evidently, they didn’t care much for tailors around these parts, but she did appreciate the atmosphere. The entire city was like a foggy morning at the docks.
“You said the five minutes ago.” The withered sorcerer groaned.
“That’s not a very long time, Dreadheart.” They passed suspicious looking hawkers and open-air taverns on the way and people gave her weird looks as they passed, but it might have been because Jimbo led them through town like he was chatting with an old friend.
“People keep looking at you here, are you supposed to be famous or something?” Cira thought it was strange that everyone seemed to recognize Jimbo.
“Seriously?” He was dumbstruck, “It couldn’t possibly be the recent rumor of a pirate-punchin’, witch-smiting saint handin’ over the Black Scourge to me on a silver platter. Only for me to appear carrying a wounded young girl who matches the description exactly. You didn’t even bother to change. Some of these guys were in your glowy red chamber, ya know.”
“Damn. I guess I could have seen that coming. Word sure travels fast with pirates.” Cira shook her head. At least it’s only the pirates who know all my identities are one in the same. I hope Lomp did his part and everything’s working out alright in Uru.
“Well…” Skipper sounded nervous when he spoke, apparently from Jimbo’s presence, or possibly Cira’s. “It didn’t help when you single handedly took down Ripley and his crew.” Jimbo rolled his eyes, but Cira was curious to hear the rest and urged the young man to continue. “Had to be forty men. They were real close to Uncle Don—”
“Pfft!” Cira spit on his shoes. Accidentally. “What did you just say?! Is he talking about the same Don?”
Cira stared at Jimbo in disbelief. He nodded with a hard to read expression, “Aye, that’s his uncle. He’s not a bad kid though.” Patting Skipper on the arm with a toothy grin, he chuckled, “The guy you shot was his son.”
“No!” Cira’s jaw fell open and she clung to the flimsy railing, holding a finger up to stop her crutch, “You’re shitting me, Jimbo.”
“The apple don’t fall far from the tree. Boy was on his last legs anyway.” He pounded a fist into his palm, “Tried to stand up to me when we got back with the news and begged on his knees the moment the peg came off. He even had the nerve to use my name around town to get his willie’s worth the same night. Good riddance if you ask me.”
“I’m not familiar with your local pirate lingo, but all this talking is making my head hurts.” Cira didn’t remember the backlash from losing her aura to be this bad the first time, but she had significantly less mana then. Walking from Breeze Haven to here took a little less than an hour, but it had really taken it all out of her. Holding her eyes open was arduous as climbing the stairs. “You’ll need to tell me about your battle later…”
Her knife had been put away before entering the city, and she held her head in her free hand. Jimbo looked a little worried and peered into her face, “You’re lookin’ pretty pale too. Hey Skips, carry the girl, would ya?”
“Put me down,” Cira’s voice was a little weaker, and her arms had no strength behind them as he scooped her up effortlessly, “It’s not that bad… wait, it might be.”
Suddenly Cira looked around and it almost seemed like she was in a dream. Details had become hazier, and everything seemed quite vibrant in the mist’s light.
“What do you mean?” Jimbo asked, “If you know something it might help to say it before you pass out. You ain’t lookin’ so hot.”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“I’m tougher than I look. Give me some credit,” She pursed her lips, then explained quietly, “This was the other thing I was worried about… Inside my ship’s barrier, I was being slowly healed. Though it was weak, it kept me alive while my leg rotted. I’m likely very low on blood, for one. I’m sure all the pressure on my leg for so long wasn’t good either. My fingers are cold, but my remaining ankle feels stiff.”
“Sounds pretty bad, Cap’n.” Jimbo looked up ahead, “It’s that shack on the far end right before the stairs.”
Thank goodness he said before. They had wrapped around the cove and almost reached the other point by now. There were a few levels of walkways and shanties above them, but some had stairs wrapped around them with different paths offset. It was hard to say how many levels the city had, but it was nerve-wracking to be carried through in the arms of the nephew to the man she destroyed in every way but fatally. Without a shred of malice, he could slip and they’d both fall to their deaths.
It made all that meat churn as her stomach fervently tried to digest it. “Hey, walk gentler or I’ll throw up on your shoes.” How did this get so bad so quick?
“Easy now, we’re actually there this time.” Jimbo pounded on the thin plank walls before swinging the unhinged door open, “Larry, wake the hell up! Got a priority patient for ya.”
She was shuffled through the doorway and saw a corpulent man with no shirt and gray bushels growing from his chest. “Hehh?!” He rolled out of bed and deflated with a groan as he hit the ground. “Jimbo, got dammit! I told you not to wake me up so early! What do you need now?!” His voice had that rich tone to it that old men sometimes got, and bottles scattered across the ground as he got up.
“This is the doctor?” Cira looked at him with apparent disappointment.
“The hell does that make you?” He turned his grump to Cira, “A girl with one leg and a shit attitude?”
“Point taken…” Cira quickly quieted. He got me there. I shouldn’t judge the man by his looks. I just hope he doesn’t drink on the job… Who was Cira kidding? Of course, he does.
“The old drunkard’s better’n he looks,” Jimbo said, offering him a hand to stand up, “We had a big party after Ripley went down. Nobody liked Don’s racket, and the stories from below had everybody goin’ wild before I even showed up. It only died down last night.”
“Well?” Larry got up and found a pair of glasses on the table. His stench was overbearing, but Cira gave him the benefit of the doubt. He squinted his eyes and inspected her closely, paying extra attention to her stump, then moving onto the remaining limbs. “Yep, you should be dead. Jimbo, who in the nine skies is the lady?”
“Tell anyone and I’ll stick ya,” He waved his peg around, “It’s the one I was tellin’ you about. Kicked the Astral Witch’s ass then crashed into Lost Cloud. A right swashbuckler, she is.”
His eyes widened and he stared at her in shock, “Bullshit! You? All that crazy stuff I been hearin’?” He was doing double takes between Cira and Jimbo, who only shrugged, “Did she do that to your leg? Looks like it was done with light magic.”
Okay, he might be better than he looks. “No, I did it to myself, but you’re right…” Cira blinked a few times trying to stay present. She found that she was still winded after being carried the rest of the way. Words were difficult to push out and she felt they were beginning to slur, “I was pinned under an orichalcum rod for a week and kept alive within an aethereal based healing domain. Does that mean anything to you?”
“I see…” He focused on her left wrist, “That explains the swelling and impaired circulation. Looks like you cut an ulcer in half, but you damn near lost the whole leg. I would have cut it off above the knee personally.”
Cira’s gaze was unsteady as she swayed, “I didn’t know… if I could get through the femur…”
He watched her nodding out and glared at Skipper, “Boy, take that girl into the back. Let’s get her on a bed.”
Cira wanted to protest but found herself being carried away and set upon a cloud. It only felt that way, but it was just as good as Nymphus to her in this moment. It became even harder to fight off the fatigue.
“Your stump looks infected despite the burns. Another few days and you’d have been past saving. Where’d you even get a barrier like that? If it was holy it would have healed that too.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know.” Cira weakly waved him off, “There are advantages, but I can’t remember them.”
When her head fell back into the pillow, she knew it was over. With the last dregs of energy, she took a pouch from her belt and handed it to Jimbo, “Keep this safe for me, alright? It ain’t much, but you can use it if you need to.”
“I can do that, but I don’t think I’ll need to—” He unstrung the lace and froze upon seeing the mithril inside, “use it for anything…”
“And you trust this guy?” Cira couldn’t help her suspicious stare at the surprisingly knowledgeable old man nursing a bottle that appeared while she wasn’t looking.
“This man performed my birth, and he patched my leg up. You can have your beauty rest, princess. I’ll be checkin’ up on ya too.” He kicked Skipper on his ass, “Come on now. You earned a drink.”
As Cira welcomed slumber, Larry held out his palms and a golden healing light flowed into her. “Now, maybe if you weren’t so irresponsible you could do this yourself.”
I don’t want to hear that from him. “How dare you be so astute…” She mumbled as she drifted off.
___
Cira opened her eyes slowly and found herself in a remarkably clean room that was nothing like what she remembered from being carried in the door. The surfaces were dusted and she saw a cabinet full of medicines. The same pale daylight came through the window and illuminated a pile of open books on the table. I guess I didn’t get a good look at the back. This guy might be a real doctor.
“Holy shit, she’s up!” Jimbo’s voice came from one corner and Cira turned, blinking the sleep away.
“Hey, it’s you guys.” Along with him was James. “I remember you.”
“I’m more surprised than offended.” He retorted, “Glad to see you’re up. I thought you’d disappear into the sky after what you pulled, but I guess even the best of us hit a debris stone now and again.”
“Hey, Lost Cloud’s a little better than that.” Jimbo defended his home island. “Not a bad place to land for someone in her position.”
“Better than Fount Salt, but true enough…” Cira agreed, taking in a breath of fresh, humid air. “I feel much better now.”
“Glad to hear it. While you were sleepin’, I got ya a little gift.” He picked up a hand-carved wooden peg leg with void gazelle straps, “Ol’ Larry measured your stump and it should fit just right. I’ve been through quite a few of my own. Don’t know what the hell that tourniquet was, but I couldn’t find a better leather.”
She couldn’t help a smile from growing as she took it in her hands. It was smooth to the touch and carved from a vibrant red wood, which looked nice with the now clean black leather. So, this is what it’s like to have friends. I’m on a roll. “How long was I out, though?”
His face fell into an uneasy frown, “A little over three weeks…”
“Damn.” She scanned the room and fell on Larry’s flushed face. He now wore a white cotton shirt, but it had various wet spots across his belly, “Why, though?”
“You were in a coma. I thought you were a goner.” He looked at her leg, “I was able to keep your knee, but I had to trim ya’ up a little bit. There was a nasty blood clot down there, and from what you said it was stewing for a while. I think you had a stroke around the time you walked through my door.”
“That’s not good.” She stared at her palms, flexing them and then stretching out her legs, pausing for only a moment on her even shorter leg. “I feel fine, but everything still looks kind of funny. Really bright.”
“That’s your other problem…” Now Larry looked like he was about break news to a terminal patient.
“Girl.” Cira shook as a deep woman’s voice came from her other side. Her eyes were sharp like a hawk’s, beset in a face tanned by decades in the sun, and her hair was tied straight up. Wearing colorful garb made up of many strips of fabric sewn together, she didn’t fit the pirate image in any way, “You are in a worse state than you think.”
“Huh…?” She couldn’t figure out who this woman was supposed to be. “What are you talking about?”
“You have a deep fracture within your soul.” Her serious tone gave Cira the impression she was knowledgeable on the subject, “Your aura will never return. Any mana it draws in to reform instead seeps directly into your soul. You have a year at best until you burn away.”