13. THE QUARTZELIAN PIRATES
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As the day turned to evening, footsteps could be heard along the upper deck. It sounded like the human crew returned and was prepared the start the night’s journey. While the party of five waited patiently and quietly within their cabin, the boat lurched forward, and headed out to sea.
After a few hours of smooth sailing, the goblin crew began to turn in for the night, with a sleepless Kashmir and Stibs keeping first watch in case anyone outside got too close to the cabin.
Colb stared up at the ceiling as he lay in bed, feeling the tide of the ship sway in a rhythmic pattern. He wasn’t feeling seasick, but the constant movement was making it hard to fall asleep. Colb then looked to the side, where 27 had reclaimed and peacefully fallen asleep upon his Yiklar Floating Bed. The floating slab was stable, magically counteracting the back-and-forth movement of the ship. For the first time since 27 had shown it to him, Colb wished he had one of those beds of his own right now.
Tired, the chef goblin looked back up at the ceiling, waiting for his exhaustion to overwhelm the annoying pushes of the waves beneath him. Eventually, he succumbed to sleep.
Sometime later, Colb’s ears perked up to the sounds of clanging metal from the upper deck. Now awake, he sat up in bed, and scanned the interior of the cabin. 27 and Drek both sat up as well, similarly alerted by the noise.
“Hmmm, what are the sounds upstairs, yes?” Colb mumbled. Kashmir rushed into the bedroom area, speaking rapidly in Elvish. She was holding a hand over her head, careful not to bump it on the ceiling as she crouched and ran over. The elf appeared to be very alarmed. Stibs was standing by the cabin door, leaning against the wall and holding his crutch at-the-ready like a defensive weapon.
“MMmMmmmm, I am wondering what those sounds are as well, yes I am,” 27 agreed with a yawn.
“Hmmm,” Colb muttered. The chef goblin hopped out of bed, pulled his Yiklar Amulet of Open Ears out from his pile of leather armor, and donned it. “What’s going on up there, yes?” Colb asked Kashmir.
“Oh, good,” Kashmir replied, seeing Colb had put his necklace back on. “We… we think the ship’s being hijacked, and the crew is being killed.”
“Hmmm! That seems very bad!” Colb replied with surprise. 27 gave him an exasperated look. Colb noticed this, and began translating everything Kashmir was saying.
“We heard another boat start approaching ours around half an hour ago,” she continued. “After a little while, Stibs said he heard some boards clanking above us, and some shouting began. We think that sound was the other ship boarding ours. A minute ago, the shouting turned into sword fighting, which we can still hear happening right now.”
“Rrghegh… should I start cutting people as well?” Drek asked. Colb jumped with surprise, then turned around to see Drek brandishing a knife behind him. “I got out of bed when I heard word of fighting,” the young rogue explained. “Rrghegh, sounds like job for goblin with knife, if you ask me… perhaps it is job for elf with magic as well?”
“MMmMmmmm, there is no reason to start freezing and cutting humans, no there is not,” 27 announced. “There is probably good explanation, yes there is. Perhaps our ship’s crew has… has swordfighting club, yes they do. And other ship came by to have friendly midnight dueling session, yes they did.”
BAM! The door to the lower levels of the ship slammed open, moments after 27 finished his sentence. Everyone rushed to the cabin’s front window to see what was happening.
A group of bearded men in red coats and tight breeches rushed down the stairs. They held rapiers covered in blood. A couple wore eyepatches, and a few others had wooden peg legs. With the door now open, the squawking of a canaryparrot could be heard from the main deck.
“Eyepatches, peg legs, a canaryparrot…” 27 mumbled to himself. “AaAaaaaahhhh, these must be pirates, yes they must be! I remember this from my studies of human culture. They are treasure hunters, yes they are. They must be here to request good deals from the merchants of this ship!”
“Aye, why’s there a tiny house in the cargo hold?” one of the pirates questioned in Hewmish.
“Hurmph, or they’re here to steal the treasure these merchants have below deck,” Stibs grumbled. Drek backed up against the wall next to the cabin door, mirroring Stibs. He held his dagger at-the-ready to stab the next human to enter the cabin.
“AaAaaaaahhhh, well either way, the humans in Cantia were quite keen on my good deals, yes they were,” 27 replied confidently. “If these pirates are lovers of treasure, then offering them some most fantastic of deals will certainly put us in their good graces, yes it will! Here, let me show you.” With that, he stepped forwards, and pushed open the door. Four bewildered pirates double-taked with surprise as a goblin stepped out from the small house.
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“AaAaaaaahhhh, customers!” 27 announced in Hewmish. The other goblins exchanged worried looks. While Stibs and Drek continued to hold their positions around the door, Colb grabbed his shield and defensively stood in front of Kashmir.
“I see you have found our… um, shop, yes you have!” 27 cheered. “Welcome, my pirate pals, to the specific store!”
A pirate suddenly lunged forwards and took a swing at 27. Moments before the blade hit, Drek reached out past the door, grabbed the noble by the legs, and pulled him back into the cabin.
“AaAaaaaahhhh,” 27 announced, immediately stepping out of Drek’s grip and into the open again. “I see you are big fan of sword, yes you are. But… can it cut through metal? AaAaaaaahhhh, because we have special offer on Yiklar Shortsword of Metal Cutting today, yes we do.”
The pirate before him stepped forwards, then carved a slice across 27’s robe in a single swift motion. 27’s eyes widened at how close the blade got to his torso, as his robe drooped from the newly made hole. “Aye, we’re not wastin’ time heya. We’ve got plenty of swards alreadae.”
“AaAaaaaahhhh, you may have high quantity of swords, but quality defeats quantity. That is the Yiklar wa-” the noble started to reply, but he was cut off as the pirate grabbed 27 by the throat, pulling him up off the ground. Colb watched through the open cabin door with horror as 27 dropped his red bag to the ground, and began thrashing his little legs in the air under the pirate’s grip.
“The lot of you,” the pirate said, looking at Colb and Kashmir through the door of the Yiklar Folding Cabin. “Get out of yer’ weird little house right now, or we’ll cut yer’ friend’s ‘art out.” He brought the tip of his rapier menacingly over 27’s heart. The other three pirates stood behind him, watching the interaction with curious interest. 27’s eyes were wide – they looked about ready to pop out of his head – and he let out a loud gulp.
Drek leaned out the cabin door, and chucked his knife into the pirate’s kneecap. “Augh!” the man yelped with surprise, dropping 27. The noble immediately grabbed his red sack off the ground, then scampered back into the Yiklar Folding Cabin. The pirate turned to the others, hands over the hilt of the small knife now stuck in his leg.
“Aye, stop standin’ around and kill every last one of ‘em in that little store!” he shouted, wobbling away from the cabin’s entrance. The three pirates nodded, then carefully advanced on the cabin.
As one of the humans poked his head through the cabin’s door, Stibs smacked him with his crutch. This set the old goblin off-balance, knocking him to the ground as his bad leg failed to keep him upright. Drek dived to Stibs, catching the eyepatched goblin to cushion his fall.
The pirate winced at the attack, but soon continued his advance. He dropped down to a crawl, and inched into the room, sword at-the-ready. The pirate’s two companions smashed a couple of the cabin’s windows, then pushed their arms inside, ready to swipe at anyone that came too close.
“They’re going to get us,” Kashmir whimpered into Colb’s ear. The chef goblin sweat, his wooden shield the only thing he had to stop these three pirates. “I need to make them go away,” Kashmir muttered.
Colb glanced at 27, whose neck was covered in unusually dark green marks from being choked. The noble looked to be frantically scanning the cabin for options, but seemed desperate, as if he was coming up with nothing.
“Hmmm…” Colb muttered. He watched as Drek started dragging Stibs towards the kitchen, away from the crawling pirate and his swinging rapier. “Hurting people is not always the answer, yes?” he whispered to Kashmir. “Hmmm… but to keep our friends safe, you can make these pirates go away.”
Colb stepped around Kashmir, positioning himself behind her. He held his shield up against her back, ready to keep her steady so she wouldn’t accidentally hurt herself.
Kashmir let out a slow breath, which looked like smoke as it froze some particles in the air. She then closed her eyes, looked away, and held out her open hands towards the pirate.
Everyone’s ears popped as air rushed to the elf’s palms, colliding together into a bubbling sphere. After a moment, two thin beams of misty liquid erupted from it, blasting the crawling pirate directly in his eyes.
“AyyeAH!” the human shouted, rolling over and putting his hands over his face. Colb pushed his feet into the ground, holding a strong stance as he pinned his shield against the purple elf’s back. The force of the powerful beam thrust Kashmir into him. Colb’s wooden safeguard made a crackling sound as part of the elf’s bare neck touched it, but the chef goblin held strong, keeping Kashmir stable as she attacked the human.
As the pirate rolled to the side, writhing in pain, Kashmir’s freezing beam continued straight: now shooting out the open door, and freezing the staircase that led up to the main deck.
Meanwhile, Drek took out his Yiklar Bow of Returning Arrow, and took out a pirate in one of the windows. Seeing his two companions go down, the third pirate backed off, and called up the stairs for reinforcements.
“Hmmm, we should get out of here now, yes?” Colb announced to his friends.
“Rrghegh, where would we go? We are on boat,” Drek called out. The sound of a dozen new feet stomping onto the main deck of the merchant ship could be heard from above.
Kashmir’s freezing beam faltered, then ceased. The elf opened her eyes, and looked at the fallen pirate before her. Seizing this momentary lapse in the battle, the third pirate fled up the staircase – struggling as he climbed the icy steps.
“Hurmph, we need to get above-deck,” Stibs announced, standing up with Drek’s assistance. “We’re completely cornered in this cargo hold.”
27 carefully stepped around the blinded pirate, who was still wriggling around on the cabin floor. The noble goblin then stepped into the cabin’s entrance, grabbed the doorknob, and clicked the hidden button on it. With a WHOOSH! the cabin, and all the furniture inside, collapsed in on itself, warping and deforming as it all sucked into the doorknob: leaving behind only the team of five, the two downed pirates, and the equipment they all were holding.
Colb looked around. He was now sitting on the wooden floor of the cargo hold, in an open space with some barrels and crates lining the walls. Above a nearby stack of crates, Colb noticed a circular window. Through it, a second ship – probably a pirate ship – was visible.
“Hmmm, we could escape through that window, yes?” Colb suggested, pointing it out.