Thirty-nine men and four women sat bound in ropes on the remaining docks of Dreadheart Cove. Blood and burns marred their bodies as Jimbo looked over them with a deep frown. From the armory to where Wick’s crew landed was half-burned down and they dragged everyone back toward the barricade before it started to collapse.

Cira’s newest battleship was docked next to them and took up most of the view while Jimbo deliberated with his immediate crew. “Gah, I wish James was here. He’s much better at this stuff.”

“If there’s any way I can help, Captains, just let me know.” A young man just a few years older than Cira by her estimate stood with them. He had descended from the flagship alone as when they finally got close enough to help again, the battle was over. The young Captain of the Far Shore pirates had light blue hair the color of the morning sky or breaking waves, while his face was soft with delicate features—nothing like the rugged pirates Cira had come to know.

“Reverend Shores, was it?” Cira inspected him with scrutiny. There must have been a reason Jimbo said he didn’t like them, and I think I might understand.

“Please, just Shores to you, Lady Saint.” His smile froze as he saw a less than welcoming expression on Cira’s face.

“I’m no saint and you will not refer to me as such.” As her gaze bore into him, he started to wither.

“M-my apologies, er, Captain!” Now he too had fallen to his knees, “I only wish to swear my eternal allegiance to the blessed one, foretold of in the scripture!”

She let out a long sigh, “Great… I don’t have time to ask what that’s about.” With her arms crossed, Cira paced around and grumbled for a few seconds, “I’ve got it. You and all your men start clearing out this base. Put anything you can call treasure on Jimbo’s ship and everything else on yours. Prepare to weigh anchor on my word.”

“Yes, Captain!” He saluted and ran off toward his ship again. Meanwhile the thirty or forty pirates that went on a treasure hunt with them filed off and started to help with disaster relief—mainly moving bodies and tending to the wounded.

The atmosphere across the hideout was heavy. It was a victory in that they weren’t annihilated, but about a third of the Stick Brigade was confirmed dead, while a few handfuls more would live with their injuries for the rest of their life. Some were in such a state where they may never walk or wield a blade again.

Any of Wick’s men confirmed dead were stripped and tossed into the clouds. Cira watched the Far Shore in their tan-schemed and surprisingly well-kempt pirate rags hoofing any salvageable pieces of their black and gold painted armor while tossing the rest off the edge.

“We need to get out of here.” Cira interrupted Jimbo’s conversation with Tom and the rest, “With this much smoke, I bet the whole island’s coming.”

The fires had died out, but a thick pillar of black smoke still loomed overhead. It stained the veil of mist above them and slowly spread out on the breeze.

“What do you plan on doing with them?” She pressed.

“P-please don’t kill us!” They were all stricken with fear, but one man’s cry broke the floodgates and they all started to plead for their lives. “We never wanted to work for Wick!”

“You don’t know him like we know him!” Another tried to convince them, “He’s crazy! If we didn’t come, we’d be dead!”

“He ain’t even back yet!” Jimbo rebutted.

“He got back yesterday.” The pirate broke down, sobbing as he begged. “Y-you know me, Jimbo! We went to school together! I don’t wanna die for a bastard like that!”

I always thought of pirates as nomadic, but when they gather on an island like this, I guess it makes sense that childhood friends could end up on enemy crews. I’m glad I didn’t grow up on the Noose.

“The fact remains,” Jimbo’s expression was difficult to read, but it was clear he was troubled. “You killed a lot of my friends. Some assholes too, but they were all my men.”

Easily a hundred of Wick’s crew had perished during this raid, many of them likely this man’s friend, but the aggressor didn’t have the luxury to complain about that. The sniveling man had no recourse.

“You know, I used to work for Captain Wick,” Joe had lost Larry’s shirt at some point during the last minutes of battle and looked at Cira, who was trying her best to stay out of the deliberations. “Until Jimbo kicked my ass. You may be new here, but not many choose to work for Wick. He stashed me mom ‘n’ little sister away somewhere and made me to go out on hits like this.”

Good to know. The guy is worse than Don. Still, how do you deal with that? When a captain sends an order, it’s still the ones in front of us who pull the trigger. The ones with our crew’s blood quite literally on their hands.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

When Cira didn’t reply, Joe continued his tale, “He spotted me the coin to send ‘em up to Porta Bora and helped me get ‘em back.”

“Are you saying he should give everyone a chance?” Cira didn’t expect this angle from the crew. She herself was pissed, but she also didn’t expect the opposition to be the product of such tyranny.

“Hell no.” Joe laughed, “Some of these guys are real pieces o’ shit.”

“How do you tell them apart?” Either way, we can’t possibly break out fifty wives and children from wherever some skeevy pirate king keeps them. How would that even work?

“That’s the hard part.” Jimbo shook his head and groaned. “I can’t just dump everyone off the side. That’s what Wick’d do.”

“Yeah, I don’t know how I feel about mass sky burials.” Cira shuddered to think how impossibly far one would have to fall before dying that way.

“Come to think of it…” Jimbo squinted his eyes and peered at her suspiciously, “You were actin’ pretty weird that whole fight. What was up with that?”

“Yeah, I seen it to.” Skipper thought to add, “Somethin’ in her eyes.”

“Tch. Nobody asked you, Skipper.” Cira tried to look away, but she was flanked by pirates on either side, “I had never taken a life before today.”

“Seriously?!” With shock plain on his face, Jimbo startled her with his questions, “With all that power?!”

“Well… Not since before my father found me—I think…” Wait, what was that? Did that really happen? The dark slate that was usually her memories of that time rippled like the surface of a moonlit sea. At times, she recalled those twisted faces Gazen plucked her from, but rarely in detail.

The sun never rose in those lands until he arrived, and now in the back of her mind, streams of moonlight illuminated the faces of those that never lived to see it. The weak, the failed, the rejected… all met their death eventually, wherever they lay. Often in the street or swept to the gutters if they were in the way. Some made it home, but others couldn’t make it up the steps.

Why… why am I seeing this? This didn’t happen… But this is my home—my homeland. At least it used to be. Could this be… that day? The faces were clear in her mind now. They were men and women from town, children she knew by name. All of them withered or deformed. All of them were still. Unmoving as the cold breeze tickled Cira’s skin. She remembered it was cold out this evening, but she didn’t feel uncomfortable.

There’s no way I… I didn’t do—

“Such small hands could never do this.” It was the first time she ever heard her father’s voice. It was firm but his tone was soft. Cira stared into his bright golden irises, entranced by a gaze that seemed to see right through her. The man seemed so different from everyone else on the island. So different from her—

Cira shook the thoughts out of her head before loudly continuing to her crew, “I’d rather not reminisce.”

The past doesn’t matter. No one’s fate belongs to me.

“Whoa.” Jimbo looked at her and raised an eyebrow, “Touchy subject.”

“Whatever.” Cira quickly steered the conversation in another direction, “I’ve been meaning to ask. What’s this ‘Porta Bora’ place I keep hearing about?”

“Ah, that’s what people down the Boreal call ‘Port Gandeux’.”

“Hmm… I like that better.” Cira sounded it out, “It rolls off the tongue. How do you even pronounce Gandeux anyway?”

“I think it depends on where you’re from. Those nobles up there really make a show of it, though. As you can see, I just call it Gondo. Don’t know what that ‘x’ is supposed to do.”

“Well, I think it’s silent either way…” Cira decided to walk away for a little to clear her head. “Figure out what to do with these guys and get ready to leave.”

With muddled thoughts, she took a stroll along the dock as boards creaked beneath her and stood against the charred edge. She knew there were things she didn’t want to see hidden away somewhere, but why now? Is it because my soul is burning up that these memories resurface? It’s not like it changes anything. I just need to figure out the soul forge and all will be well.

Something nagged her about all this. She had read of those who lost their lives to a broken soul in the past and it wasn’t unheard of for the aethereal damage to cause adverse effects within the mind, but it was not typical of the early stages of soul immolation. This meant one of two things. Either the studies she read weren’t very thorough—which would be difficult to achieve with such a rare ailment—or she was much further along than she thought.

Didn’t that spider say something like that? That I’ll die much sooner than I think. She didn’t want to believe the evil creature in her archive’s words, but every good liar used the truth as a tool. The big question was what the spider wanted—past freedom, that is. It would be counterintuitive to help Cira when she was devoid of mana. Her broken soul was basically a once in a lifetime chance for the imprisoned spider.

What really worried her if its words were true was what came next—that she would need a powerful soul to mend her own. Just as you wouldn’t want someone to spit in your mouth, you wouldn’t want to slop a piece of someone’s soul onto your own. The very thought of it made her skin crawl.

Depending on how powerful a soul she needed, it could become quite difficult to acquire even after she got over the moral quandary of removing a soul from the cycle by her own hand. Doing so was basically super-murder, so she hoped it didn’t end up being some rare, majestic creature, though she certainly would not want to taint her soul with that of a vile beast. There was no winning that one.

“This is all Pappy’s fault.” She grumbled, “And Earth Vein’s.”

Twenty minutes later the hideout was totally cleaned out and Jimbo’s ship ascended from the lower levels. Slowly, she noted, from the deck of her new flagship which as of a few weeks ago bore the name “Wings of the Saint.”

Cira didn’t like the name, but it didn’t matter because it would only host her until they reached Breeze Haven. All of the royal pirates from before were loaded up as prisoners below deck as this was the largest vessel of two.

It was decided nobody had time for prisoners yet, and according to Jimbo, there was a fair chance any hostages could be let go if the one they were meant to be leverage for was thought dead. It was as simple as saving money that would be spent feeding unnecessary mouths.

For now, she watched the smoldering hideout from above. Cira looked down on the destruction and crimson-stained wooden docks. It was the aftermath of a battle that never should have happened and many lives that shouldn’t have been were wrapped up in it.

You will be seeing me, Captain Wick. But it will not be today.