Through the broken fence there was a back alley which skirted the upper levels of Hangman’s Cove. Skipper split off immediately and made his way further down, but Cira and her two pirate pals made their way to Larry’s down a path between the buildings and the forested hilltops. Heavy leaves from the hanging foliage brushed against them as they walked down the springy boardwalk. They could hear the tension in the ropes holding it together creak with each step.
“Do you think Skipper will be alright by himself?” Cira couldn’t help but wonder.
“Bah, he’ll be fine.” Jimbo waved her off, “Not like we’re gonna go join him. Just have some faith.”
“I take it he’s been a reliable errand boy while I slept?” Some of the flowers growing to their side were beginning to look familiar. Six broad petals as blue as the sky which none could see from the Lost Cloud. Cira spent a good while the day prior staring at them through a window from her bed of convalescence.
“A tad more than errands. He’s a good well-rounder. I swear my belly’s gotten bigger since he joined too—the boy sure can cook.” Jimbo nodded thoughtfully, “Great job pickin’ him up.”
“He didn’t leave me much choice,” she admitted, “It was between accepting his help or watching him be ground to a pulp by my barrier.”
“I’d say you made the right choice.” Joe added from the front. “The kid patched up the holes in my socks the other day.”
“Well, that was nice of him.” His tactic may not be too far off from the goons, but much more proactive. Through a series of favors, he’s gained the crew’s trust pretty quickly. I guess it isn’t too hard when you prove yourself reliable. Cira was the least reliable person she knew at the moment, and it was an uncomfortable, foreign feeling that weighed on her nerves. “We’re almost there, right?”
“Just a few houses down.” Jimbo replied with a snide laugh, “You ain’t getting scared now that you’re back on the ground, are ya?”
Cira caught herself stealing nervous glances toward the main boardwalk in the spaces between each house they passed, “Tch. Scared of what?” One should always stay vigilant… That’s just common sense.
“You can hang onto my sword if you want.” He wore a shit-eating grin as he held his cutlass out to Cira.
“Oh, piss off.” She smacked it away as they arrived at a vaguely familiar run-down shack. Cira never went out back, but she could tell it was Larry’s and slowed down.
“Well don’t just stand around.” Jimbo briskly walked past and threw open the door, “We’re back!”
Cira could hear a surprised man gasp right inside the door and the extensive clattering of bottles from the front room. As she entered, she saw someone that took a few moments to recognize, and when she did, tried her best to offer a smile, “Heyyyyy, Pops. How are the fingers?”
He pushed himself into the corner against the headboard and started screaming with the fear of god in his eyes, “You stay away from me with your mind tricks, witch!”
Slap!
“The Captain don’t like repeatin’ herself.” Jimbo scolded him while his face was still reeled back from the unexpected open-palm smack, “She’s not a witch and you cut your own fingers off, dumbass. Now, calm down. We ain’t here for you.”
I can’t say he’s wrong, but… No, I guess you just have to be harsh around here. What if he went around town saying I control people’s minds? I don’t even control the nymphs. Cira had been looking around but hadn’t seen Nina since their trip to the Flying Dutchess.
“Ain’t no way I’d cut my own fingers off unless she made me do it!” Pops looked at her like some kind of swamp creature.
“I’m surprised you hadn’t done it before with the way you drink,” Jimbo shrugged, “Now accept it or I’ll have to beat you up. You already got ‘em back anyway, so what’s it matter?”
“Damn you, Sticks…” There was an intense stare down for a moment until the ceaseless clattering of glass reached a crescendo and the door to the front room swung open.
“None o’ that in my house, got dammit!” Larry had dark bags under his eyes and matted chest hair that looked sticky from dried liquor, “What the hell is that on your face, boy?”
“They’re training goggles,” Jimbo retorted, taking great offense, “What’s you’re damn problem?”
“I’ll tell you just what my problem is!” Larry’s unfocused eyes suddenly trained on Cira and started twitching, “YOU!”
When Larry roared, she shrunk back instinctively. Oh, now I’ve done it. “I… lost track of time?”
“Not only did you bail on the treatment I so kindly offered,” He held up a first finger and his tone was cold, but his face contorted in rage when the second went up, “but then you went and cut Pops’ fingers off?!”
“I-I did not—”
“Then you give me this bullshit?!” He counted a third finger and leaned in as his face turned red and Cira lacked the defensive artifacts to protect against his spittle, “Only thing you lost track of is your got damn manners! Or is that broken soul turnin’ your head into mush?”
Shirtless joe stayed out of the way, but Jimbo still had his newest signature grin on as Larry laid into his captain. He didn’t exactly tell me when I needed to be back. Is it really that big of a deal? Cira was going to swallow her pride and apologize when Larry cut her off, “I ain’t done! Now you’ve gone and made an enemy of Captain Wick!”
“Hold on a minute,” Jimbo stopped him by stealing the bottle from his hands, “We don’t know anything about that last bit. Care to fill us in?”
Larry looked at the trio like the clueless idiots they were when Cira noticed Pops trying to remove himself from the situation. After a few seconds, the doctor shook his head with a long sigh, “I figured it was bullshit, but that don’t matter much, does it? Talk around town is you told Gerald you was tryin’ to kill Wick soon as he makes it back to the Cove. The damn kid’s a hero. Even took an arrow to the knee tryin’ to stop you.”
“Pfft.” Jimbo’s face scrunched up, “I always knew he was rat. Didn’t expect it to bite my ass so soon, though.”
“And he ain’t the only one in town!” Larry swiped his bottle back and took a messy drink, “That means I don’t wanna see your faces ‘til you get that figured, now get your shit and get the hell out before those black and gold chumps come back.”
I guess I should have expected as much. It wouldn’t be good to cause him undue trouble. Larry has helped me out a great deal, after all. Cira was momentarily taken aback at the harsh words. Even though they made perfect sense, she still didn’t feel good getting yelled at and kicked out.
“Fine then.” Jimbo turned up his nose at the doctor and threw a couple coins at him, “I guess I’ll pay you in gold then.”
“That ain’t even your mithril, boy, and it ain’t worth the trouble! I brought you into this world and I can take you right out—” Larry flipped his bottle up and was about to smash it on a desk when Cira ran between the two. Jimbo’s face was twisted in a snarl with one hand on his peg leg but became frozen in time when Cira rushed in.
“Both of you, relax! We’re leaving right now.” She couldn’t do much on her crutch, but it stopped Larry from making a shank, “If you have to stab each other, wait until I can heal you.”
Larry mainly took a little more talking down, but Cira got her crossbows back and already felt more comfortable having them holstered. The peg leg fit nicely through a superfluous loop on her belt for now, and then they were ready to go.
“Word of advice,” Larry spoke as they were halfway out the door, “You should steer clear o’ the hideout. Gerald obviously sold you out.”
“Shit!” Jimbo’s eyes went wide and turned to Joe. “We gotta help the guys!”
“Too bad ya got that damsel with ya.” Larry chided, “May as well just hand her over on a platter if you head down there now.”
Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
Jimbo looked at Cira and there was pain in his eyes. He clenched his fist, and the turmoil was evident as Cira looked at him in confusion, “What the hell is that face for? Let’s go already.”
“Are you sure? It’ll be a fight. I don’t know if I can keep ya safe in all that.”
“I’m starting to doubt you took down forty men all by yourself.” Cira feigned a strike with her crutch to his open chest and it hit its mark, “I’m not as helpless as I look. Aren’t they supposed to be my crew, anyway?”
“Well, if you’re that sure, I guess I shouldn’t doubt you.” Jimbo came to an understanding, but Cira felt like she was bluffing. I don’t doubt I can hold my own… but how many guys are we talking about here? I forgot, if I get my hands on a sword, I won’t have any tricks to rely on. Will I be able to stay alive without killing anyone? While my crew kills people all around me?
Nobody died during the deritium raid, unless they got dragged off by their friends before Cira could notice and heal them, but tangling with these pirates was walking a fine line. She always knew pirates were a mixed bag, but the constant among them all was an inclination for violence. That was simply a consequence of their way of life. Pirates never die of old age, they say.
Cira’s ruination today was of her own making this time around. Normally there was someone else to blame for good reason, but this was another one of her delicately placed pitfalls. Once upon a barrel of ale, she had gotten a little carried away and declared herself captain of a whole fleet. Why she didn’t turn over the whole gig when she put the hat on Jimbo’s head was a mystery to even her. She was having fun and making great progress in her work. That’s just how it turned out.
Is this why people say you have to be careful with alcohol? While most drunkards wouldn’t accidentally become a pirate captain, Pops’ lost fingers were a great example of how drinking could get out of hand. Whether or not she’s met any of them, or if they’ve even seen her face, she made herself responsible for at least a hundred lives that night, only for it to continue to snowball in her absence.
“Skipper might be in trouble if it’s this big of a deal.” Cira thought out loud, “We should send Joe to fill him in.”
“Now you want to go fight with one less man?” Even Jimbo was alarmed at this point. “Besides, everyone knows Shirtless Joe.”
“Then have him put a shirt on and go fetch our cook.” She ran over the plan in her head then turned to Joe, “And when you find him, bring him to the hideout. Here, have him put the food in this.” Cira dumped a bunch of jewelry out of one pouch into a coat pocket before handing it to Joe, “This should hold everything, and don’t let it get stolen.”
He took the bag in both hands like it was a bar of gold before stuffing it into a pocket, “I got it. We’ll come help as fast as we can, but I don’t have a shirt.”
“Make sure you don’t stuff the bag in your pocket after its full…” Cira now turned back to Larry, “Hey do you have a shirt we can borrow?”
“If I do, will you get the hell out?!”
Larry produced a striped shirt three sized too large for the already heavyset Joe. Somehow with a shirt on his stubble looked more refined, his brown eyes held a sharper gaze, and he looked stout rather than borderline overweight. He was like a totally different person.
They were quickly swept out the back door by an angry doctor and the group split again. “How far is the hideout?”
“Not far, but at least ten minutes.” Jimbo led her further down the back alley they entered from, “Up here there’s a cave that’ll take us right to it.”
They were passing a peak on the hills to the left after which the cove sharply curved back around to its other point and Jimbo stopped, turning to an inconspicuous wooden wall against the hillside that stretched on until the next staircase. He tugged on a rope that looked like it was holding two sections of wall together and one side slid back to reveal a dim passageway.
“Wow, nice hidden door. I didn’t even see it.” The world was full of wonder without Spatial Sight. Cira looked around to see if there were any passersby then took a last glance over her shoulder before proceeding. When she turned to follow Jimbo, he was entering the cavern with a lit torch in one hand. Cira rolled her eyes and quickly caught up.
When she made it through, Jimbo closed the wall back up behind them. “Shouldn’t be any monsters down here, but it does happen. Keep quiet and follow close.”
She nodded and they continued into the dark tunnel. Cira took this opportunity to pull a few rings out of her pocket and put them on. One just cast light and was fueled by the dark mana it enveloped—so it was weaker with Jimbo’s torch out, but it was nice to have. She wore six passive shield rings, though a pirate with a big hammer could probably shatter them all at once. It was better to have something rather than nothing when it came to barriers though. If she got close enough for a punch, another ring would sap her opponent’s mana and use it to repel them, giving her fist a heavier impact.
“You goin’ to a ball?” Jimbo chuckled, “Couldn’t hurt to have brought one o’ your fancy swords. I’d say keeping a low profile is out the window.”
“Excuse me for not expecting to fend off a royal subjugation at the hands of a traitor on my first trip to the hideout. The plan here was specifically not to fight.” Cira sighed, but there was nothing to be done about it at this point. “I’m also not having any fun.”
“Yeah, the plan’s shot.” He agreed.
The dark cavern was otherwise quiet, and they were going up instead of down most of the way. Cira was grateful that this wasn’t the beginning of another underground adventure and was about to ask how much further before Jimbo held a finger to his lips, “Shhhh. This bend lets out right above our spot.”
After putting his torch out, Cira hid her own light. Jimbo walked slower to make less noise and Cira tried her best to follow suit, pulling the small crossbow off her belt and struggling to get a bolt knocked. I really didn’t think this through. There’s no way I can reload this if I’m surrounded with blades.
Daylight faded in ahead as they passed the bend and the two crouched down. Approaching the mouth of the cave, there were lush ferns and other dense bushes hiding the opening from the outside. They crept through it with Jimbo taking the lead and Cira got a first look at her hideout.
Cira could tell they were on the backside of that peak she saw from town, and they were a little higher coming out of the cave. Below the land opened up into a deep chasm straight to the cloudy abyss and wrapped around to form a smaller cove with two points. There were a few different levels built out just like Hangman’s Cove and multiple docks with three clearly royal ships that dwarfed the one she assumed was Jimbo’s.
The sound of gunfire startled Cira and she locked onto its source to see a pirate in black and gold armor wielding a musket. He flipped it up to reload the next round when Cira followed his line of fire and saw another pirate on the ground, crying in pain and desperately clutching a bleeding hole in his chest.
Similar anguished screams filled the cove and echoed back to them on their overlook in the trees. Jimbo’s face was contorted in rage and Cira could feel her heart beating faster. While the black and gold advanced with guns and arrows, bullets bounced off their armor. All of the pained cries came from those wearing the ragged stripes of the Stick Brigade.
No, those are Dreadheart pirates dying down there. I made sure of that. The amount of armored pirates swarming her hideout had to be the same as the kill squad they had just ditched. Well past a hundred of them with presumably more on the ships. Meanwhile the others who she assumed were all her men fought in a disorganized fashion with no real formation and groups running in and out of various openings in the cliffside seemingly at random. After looking for a few moments Cira didn’t see a single wounded ‘Royal Pirate’, yet the others were picked off like helpless children.
While the slaughter raged on, each ship already had a line of men hauling chests and handfuls of treasure back aboard as if the whole operation was a simple, systematic process. She gnashed her teeth together in frustration, “What the hell is this, a culling?” Her fingernails, which hadn’t been trimmed since before her coma, now drew blood from her palms as her fist squeezed shut.
I was so worried about ending someone’s life, but how many—of my crew—will I have watch die today? How many men did my drunken whim already bring to their fate’s end? The number of people saved on Fount Salt beats it by several orders of magnitude, but… That’s not a fair comparison, is it? Even if I hadn’t called myself their captain, I still dragged them into this by taking Don out.
All for what? To save some time searching for the deritium on my own? So that I didn’t have to stay long enough to fight the witch. Who I fought and cursed anyway… Because she would have torn everything down otherwise. There’s just no winning here. I can’t keep acting like a child. I need to take responsibility and clean this up once and for all.
“That’s how Wick does things when it comes to treason. Kill first, take everything, and ask questions later.” He pulled his sword out of the sheath and tried to keep his voice low as he growled, “We have to get down there.”
They were maybe twenty feet above the main stage where the fight was taking place, positioned behind a grouping of buildings made of thick wooden logs. There were palms hanging down and partially obscuring their view, but the battle had taken on sides with the chasm between them. Cira and Jimbo hid in the center where Wick’s men would have to push through, but there were staircases and other paths to get around.
“Hang on.” Cira held him back, “We’ll just get shot if we jump down like this.”
“We didn’t come all this way to do nothing—” Cira smacked him to cut that misunderstanding short.
“Damn right we didn’t. Let’s be smart about this, though. There’s a team of riflemen trying to flank that guy on the ballistae.” Cira pulled a glittering orb of polished stone from her remaining pouch of forged weapons, “We’ll take them down so their guns drop behind that barricade for our guys.”
“I don’t know if six rifles will make much difference, but how do you plan to do that?” Jimbo didn’t see it happening, but he almost knew better than to doubt Cira at this point.
“How’s your throwing arm?” She placed the stone in Jimbo’s hand.
“Not bad, I guess.” Turning it over, he held it carefully like something precious, “What is this? I-I think I can see the mana inside it. That’s death, right?”
“Just light—one day telling the difference will be simple. It’s still a bomb though, more or less.” She shrugged and put away her crossbow to pull the larger one off her back, “Now help me get this thing loaded.”
“Uhh… okay.” With a difficult look on his face, Jimbo very carefully set the white stone down in the grass and helped her pull the wire back and knock a bolt. The larger crossbow had a rifle stock and shot heavy projectiles that were just a size down from harpoons.
“The bomb activates on impact. Throw it at those riflemen’s feet when they reach that broken crate by the barricade and be ready to help me reload.” Cira leaned against a rock and held the crossbow’s stock against her shoulder, putting the crosshair in her sight. There were three men that were clearly the captains of their respective ships wearing black hats with gold feathers pinned to them.
If I don’t take them out, all the lives I've put under my charge will be extinguished. This is no time to hesitate.