“Kill them!” Nezir shouted. The pirates leapt at the monster and the maiden, emboldened by the presence of their leader and the weight of numbers. The bravado evaporated as the pair attacked right on back, a dozen pirates dying in the span of a few seconds, either ripped apart, speared, in one unlucky case, bitten clean in half. Shouts from behind Windy and Leanne announced the arrival of more friendly fighters as marines and Skjar poured into the melee, Asim and Wogenreiter at the forefront.
Asim, spotting Ferez and Leo, shouted something unintelligible at the old Skjar. The raider nodded and charged with a roar on his lips and his hauskarls in tow. Spotting the party breaking toward the mages, a pirate planted himself in front of them, an improvised billhook braced before him. Wogenreiter didn’t even acknowledge the man’s presence as he barged through, the force of his reckless charge splintering the polearm against his cuirass as he knocked the pirate arse over head. He didn’t stumble as his boot came down, crunching through the man’s skull.
Two axe swings and two flying heads later, the pirates’ resolve crumbled. They scattered, what little cohesion they had kept in the initial onslaught collapsing as they climbed over each other, rushing to get back inside the fortress. It was the worst thing they could have done. The allied fighters showed no mercy as they surged on, Windshear in the lead, slaughtering men in droves whether they stood and fought or tried to flee.
Nezir screamed and cracks spider-webbed through the column behind him before the structure fractured into a mess of floating debris. He launched the earth into the crowd, aiming for the griffon running rampant through his forces. Moments before impact, they veered wildly off course missing the griffon, scattering into the milling pirates with lethal force. The pirate king’s head snapped up as Ingrid screamed out of the sky, swinging a foot at his head. Saving the griffon and Leanne had cost her the element of surprise, however, Nezir ducked the blow and swung a bone crushing fist into her gut. The strike launched Leanne through the air, the pirate sprinting after her as she tumbled along the docks. As she slid to a halt, stunned, the Crimson Blade crashing towards her, Ferez clambered to his feet with a cry, stumbling towards her. But he wasn’t her guardian angel this time.
Nezir was a handful of paces away when Wogenreiter crashed into him, slamming the mage to the ground. The old Skjar raised his axe to bury it in Nezir’s head, but the pirate was faster. A shaft of earth broke through the dock beside his head, wrapping around the Skjar’s arm and hauling him upright. A second shaft broke through a moment later, latching onto the other arm. Nezir rose to his feet, his whole being heavy with menace as the earthen tendrils pulled tight, dragging the grizzled raider to his knees. Wogenreiter could do nothing except spit curses at the pirate as the imposing stone figure loomed over him.
“I’ll be seeing you real soon, pirate,” Wogenreiter said, then hawked a glob of phlegm at Nezir’s feet. Nezir scoffed, stretched out his hand, and with a flick of his wrist, pointed his fingers to the sky. The docks rumbled as, below them, beneath the wood and the water, the earth shifted. The rumble grew to a roar as a spine of stone burst through the decking between Wogenreiter’s knees, the sharpened edge shearing through steel and meat and bone, splitting him in half from groin to the top of his head.
Time slowed. Somewhere in the crowd, Reichblut screamed, as Nezir turned to face Ferez. He saw the pirate’s eyes, framed by dull, slate grey rock. They were crinkled up in mirth. He was laughing. The Crimson Blade extended a hand towards Ferez, the movement agonisingly slow to Ferez’s heightened senses. He tried to correct his path, to dive aside, but his overtaxed legs didn’t have the fight left in them. They buckled and he fell as an earthen snake burst through the planking at his feet, snagging his ruined arm. His voice failed him as pain ripped at his consciousness, a gargle all he could muster as he clawed at the restraint with his free hand. It was a futile gesture as another rope seized that hand too, snapping taut and dragging him to his knees.
The ground rumbled. Ferez tried to rise, but his arms were held tight, his legs insensate when he commanded them to move.
The water sloshed, and Ferez snarled. He could feel the stone surging towards him through the black sea below.
The pirate laughed.
Ferez shrieked his defiance.
Ingrid’s foot crashed into the side of Nezir’s helmet.
Ferez’s tethers collapsed, and the rumbling ceased, as the pirate flipped through the air. It was only thanks to his armour that his head remained on his body. The vengeful Skjar blasted him again as he flew, hurling the bastard through the ranks of his own fleeing fighters, bodies crushed by the heavy stone as their master crashed through their ranks. The mongrel hit the ground, bounced, rolled, and swiftly regained his feet, sprinting back towards the fortress, heedless of the minions he had just crushed.
To Ferez’s great surprise, Ingrid didn’t give chase.
“Run coward!” she yelled, “Cower behind your walls. They will not save you!”
She snarled and lashed out at a nearby group of slavers, an invisible blade of wind neatly bisecting them at the waist, then turned and ran to Ferez. She fell to her knees and skidded to a halt beside him, frantically running her eyes and hands up his body, searching for wounds.
“I knew I shouldn’t have left you alone. Every time I let you talk me into it. Every time! And every time you nearly die!”
“Ingrid, my love, I am alright, I-”
He let out a strangled scream as she grabbed his shattered arm, and she fixed him with a furious glare.
“Alright, maybe I am not completely alright,” he conceded.
Ingrid opened her mouth to unleash a stream of obscenities and graphic depictions of violence, but Leo interrupted her.
“Don’t worry, Ingrid. I’m alright too,” he called out with a cheery wave from where he reclined on the planks.
“I couldn’t care less about you, you fool. If you had the decency to die quickly, this idiot wouldn’t have gone charging off after you in the first place. What happened?”
“Eh,” Ferez said, letting himself sag against the angry woman, nuzzling into the curve of her neck. “Th’s few mur prrts in th wy thn ‘s tht,” he mumbled.
She grabbed his hair and yanked his face away from her.
“I didn’t catch a word of that.”
“There were a few more pirates in the way than I thought.” He gave her the sweetest smile he could manage, impeded by the wincing from almost having his hair ripped out. She glowered at him for a few seconds, then released her grip and pulled him into a tight hug. Ferez went right back to nuzzling as his eyes closed. It probably wasn’t the time for a nap, but he was very tired and she was so warm and soft and…
“Alright! Up and at them, old boy!” Leo shouted. Ferez groaned and turned his head to find Leo lurching unsteadily to his feet and stumbling towards the fortress.
“The Pit are you on about?”
“Battle’s not done yet. We have ourselves captives who need saving!”
“Leo, Ferez is in no state to fight,” Ingrid said, clutching him protectively against her chest, a gesture Ferez didn’t mind at all, though he would rather she wasn’t wearing the armour. “And to be honest, neither do you.”
“Pish posh, I had a sit down. I’m ready to go! Ferez is too, I’m sure.”
“I don’t think I am,” Ferez mumbled weakly.
“Fine! Fine. I’ll go by myself then,” Leo said, resuming his determined stumble.
Ferez closed his eyes, enjoying being cuddled up with Ingrid for a few more seconds before he climbed to his feet.
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“Wait up, you idiot,” he called after the water mage, stumbling after him at a slightly faster pace than a slow walk. Actually, that might have been generous. A better comparison would be crawling along the ground. A crawl in which you didn’t actually use your arms or legs, just sort of spasmed along like a dying worm. It was fine, though, as Leo was moving even slower.
“Ferez Abdul Ahud!” Ingrid called after him. “You are not setting foot in that fortress!”
“If I don’t go with him, he’ll get himself killed.”
“Better him than you.”
“If he’s going, I’m going.”
A screech interrupted the conversation as Windshear and Leanne bounded out of the crowd, skidding to a halt in front of Leo.
“It’s a good thing he’s not going either, then,” the bodyguard said.
“Windy! You’re meant to be resting on the ship!” Leo said, shuffling over and patting the monster on the flank. Now the beast was standing still instead of tearing through a horde of human bodies, Ferez noticed the swathe of bandages wrapped around one of his wings. It let out an annoyed trill and headbutted Leo, knocking the water mage on his arse.
“Ow! What was that for?”
“Being a pig-headed fool,” Leanne translated, Windshear snorting in agreement.
“Look, I know I’m not in top shape at the moment, but the lads can’t go in there without me. There’s still half a team of battlemages at large. They’ll be massacred without us there.”
“They’ll be massacred with you there,” she replied, her expression stern and unyielding. Ingrid planted herself beside the bird, then planted her hands on her hips.
“I’m with the bodyguard on this one. Neither of you are going anywhere.”
Leo shot to his feet.
“I’m not arguing with you, Leanne,” he snarled. The anger in his voice shocked the bodyguard, her dour expression cracking at the outburst. “There are children in there. Children. The Blade’s forces have lost the docks and the roof. Their backs are to a wall. How long before someone has the bright idea of using the slaves as hostages? We need to strike while they are reeling. Take the bottom floor and start busting people out.”
“I know you want to save them, Patriarch, but you can’t fight like this.”
“Don’t tell me what I can and can’t do!”
“You saved Mia, isn’t that enough?”
“No!” Leo shouted. Leanne reeled like she had been struck and Leo stopped, taking a step back.
“Lea, I’m sorry, I…” His shoulders slumped, head lolling forward as he swayed. Leanne launched off Windshear’s back, catching the water mage as he crumpled and gently lowering him to the ground. He looked up at her, his eyes welling up with tears.
“How many kids just like her are down there? I think about them, and I think about Mia, and I think, what if she was down there? And I couldn’t do anything about it? Wouldn’t I hope and pray that someone would save her? Wouldn’t I need someone to save her? But there isn’t anyone else here, is there? If we don’t do it, no one will.”
He trailed off and silence descended over the docks. Even some of the fighters pursuing the pirates had frozen in their tracks.
“Wait, Mia is a child?” Ferez asked.
“Mia is his child,” Leanne replied quietly.
By the gods…
“You have a kid?” Ferez squeaked.
“Adopted,” Leo replied. “It’s… it’s how I lost my arm, actually.”
The attention of the crowd took on a new feeling. One of morbid curiosity. Even Leanne seemed a little intrigued as she propped him up to talk.
“We had just wrapped up a job escorting some merchant prince or another back to Ris,” Leo began. “The job had gone sideways. We ran afoul of some Blade ships, took heavy casualties. Then, to make matters worse, we hit a terrible squall. Hadn’t seen the likes of it before. Drove us to Aqua Vitalle, decimated, with our few remaining ships all but falling apart. I knew about the place by reputation, it was why I’d never stopped there before. But any port in a storm, right? Still, the Famiglia running the joint was bad. And I mean, bad. They were the smallest independent family in the archipelago for a reason. After the first few strong-arm teams came back sans skin, the bigger families stopped trying to take over and let sleeping mad dogs lie. Enter Leo Two-Fingers and his merry band of marauders. We laid up to recover and repair the ships.”
He paused, shaking his head as he collected his thoughts.
“I gave shore leave to everyone not involved in repairs,” he said, finally. “We soaked into the island’s streets, finding bottles and breasts to bury ourselves in after a hard slog. I found myself in The Pirate’s Parlour with my personal guard, halfway through a nasty bottle of rum, and feeling very sorry for myself.”
“And then this grimy little girl bursts through the door. She couldn’t have been any older than eight or nine, a knapsack clutched to her little chest. She was in hysterics, shouting, begging someone to help her. The locals looked away. They already knew what was going on, even if I didn’t. I told her to calm down, and tell me what was wrong, but before she could, a posse of the local Famiglia enforcers burst in. Said she had stolen from them and needed to return the goods, plus interest.”
“I didn’t like the way their spokesman said ‘interest’, so I told him I’d happily pay them back, plus whatever monetary fine they thought appropriate, but that they could leave the girl well enough alone. Things got tense. Harsh words were exchanged, and it almost came to blows before the girl, my Mia, bless her pure soul, declared she would hand herself over. Before I could stop her, she had crossed the room to stand with the bastards. She said the crime had been hers, and she wouldn’t see well-meaning bystanders caught up in it. I kept arguing, of course, told the enforcer I’d kill him if he touched her. And you know what he did? He smiled. Bastard actually smiled at me and said, ‘you must be new around here. Let me show you how our town works’.”
Leo clenched his fist, his tears drying up and expression hardening.
“He threw her to the ground and raised his sword, about to execute her in front of me, just to put me in my place. Now, maybe it was instinct, maybe it was the rum, but I jumped at him. He saw it coming a mile away and swung his sword at my neck. Like the fool I am, I blocked it with my arm. Cleaved almost the whole way through. He kicked me in the chest, and I went down. The other enforcers charged my guard, keeping them at bay as he stood over me, ready to deliver the killing blow.”
“And then Mia jumped on him. Latched onto his sword arm and started biting. The fight didn’t last long, obviously. Noble intentions don’t trump strength and steel, but it gave me the kick up the arse I needed. I ripped him and his mongrel friends apart, then took Mia and ran, making for the ships. I gave the order to round up the crews and depart immediately, but word got around before we could get everyone back. The Famiglia came for us. Slaughtered most of my men in the taverns, took the rest captive and assaulted the fleet. We might have been able to escape still, with the men who made it aboard, but when they paraded the first captured marine on the docks and peeled the skin off his face in front of us, I knew we couldn’t leave them to their fate. We counter-attacked. Wounded, exhausted, and more than a little drunk, we charged into the streets. It was bloody. We fought with everything we had, but we were outnumbered and already bloodied. We started losing, unable to win against the numbers the enforcers could throw at us. They pushed us back to the ships, leaving our dead and wounded in the streets. I put Mia aboard and gave the order to flee, then stood my ground on the docks, ready to meet my fate.”
“And then don’t you know it? A miracle occurred. An army hit the enforcers from the rear, led, I found out later, by my captured men. The locals had banded together, broke them free, and fought back against the family that had oppressed them for generations. My boys on the ships ignored my order and charged back into the fray, too. Hit from the front and the back, the enforcers crumbled, slaughtered to a man. When the dust settled and the blood stopped flowing, I was left standing there, missing an arm, over half my force dead or so injured as to never fight again, knee deep in bodies on an island that had just claimed it’s freedom after almost a hundred years of terror, wondering what the fuck do I do now?”
“My marauders couldn’t fight in the state we were in, so we stayed to help rebuild. There was a bit of chaos in the following days, as scavengers tried to take advantage and other families tried to move in. My boys kept the peace, patrolling the streets, meting out justice to criminals, and death to invaders. Some of the Vitalleans who had fought got a taste for it and wanted to sign up, so we took them on, gave them training and equipment. Before I knew it, I commanded a city watch, a rebuilt fleet, and an army of hardened soldiers. Two-Finger’s Marauders were gone, and in their place was The Patriarch’s Privateers.”
“By the gods,” Ferez breathed. “I never would have suspected.”
“Noble, right?”
“Not that, I just… I assumed you had lost your arm doing something unbelievably stupid, just like all the fingers. That was actually… heroic.”
“You don’t have to sound quite so surprised,” Leo pouted.
“You established a very clear pattern of behaviour over the years, Leo. I think I’m entitled to a bit of bewilderment at the sudden reversal,” he said. He shook his head as a revelation occurred. “This is the actual reason you agreed to storm the Wail, isn’t it?”
Leo nodded.
“We’re a business first and foremost, of course. But whenever we find slavers, we find slaves. We kill the bad guys, free the innocents, whatever the cost, and bring them back to Aqua Vitalle. Some find work in town, others on the trading ships that pass through. A surprising number become new recruits for the Privateers. That’s how Leanne came to be in my employ, actually.”
He gave his bodyguard a warm smile, while the warrior woman sat beside him, ugly crying into her sleeve.
“And that’s why I’m going in there, now, and busting those people out of their cages. No matter the cost.”
“That’s an inspiring story,” Asim said, standing beside Ferez. The high mage yelped and jumped.
“Gods damnit, Asim! How many times do I have to tell you?”
“I am sorry, High Mage. I was engrossed in the Patriarch’s story. Might I offer an alternate plan to rushing in and dying, though?”
“By all means,” Leo said, his head cocked to the side and eyebrows furrowed. “Who’s that you have there?”
Ferez turned to look fully at his bodyguard. Craning his neck to peer around the towering guardsman, he noticed a diminutive man in brown robes with a shock of blonde hair on his head, the giant’s gauntleted hand wrapped around his neck.
“Go on,” Asim said, releasing his grip and nudging the prisoner forward. The man looked around, wild-eyed, as he licked his lips.
“Uh, n-nice to meet you all. I’m, umm, Gregory. Gregory Dawnslight. I’m the Crimson Blade’s healer.”