Another beginning (Nel Sayo)

[Dusk]

73rd Day of Fall, 511AV Paski Fishing Grounds, Northern Suvan Sea, six days from Syliras The Raging Tide was not the most accommodating of ships, but it was better than most could ask of a pirating vessel. Meaning no one had tried to rape or kill her since she'd joined up with them. Small victories. Long months had been spent with them, traveling throughout the Suvan Sea and taking advantage of what trade ships they could catch unawares. They weren't the best at their profession, and some of their assaults had been close calls with a few unlucky (or unskilled) men dying each time. But there were always more to be found or recruited from the ships they raided, and the Captain, Alain Coolwater, was always willing to throw the fresh meat to the front of the line. Vanthan, he was, and like all his people it was easy to tell his moods by the shifting colors of his eyes. Most of his crew were Vanthan as well, though a few humans were naturally in the mix. It made for a useful crew in Fall and Winter when the winds blew chill and the ice rimed the edge of the sea, but it meant they didn't often go south. But then there were plenty of merchant ships going to and from Syliras, enough that they could ignore the heavily protected ones and choose ones that looked like easy pickings. Even the butter yellow sails looked friendly and inviting, and - to a pirate - like a little slice of heaven. "Well, this shouldn't take long," Alain chuckled to himself as he peered out at the horizons to be sure there weren't any other ships lurking about hoping to set a trap for them. But none were forthcoming, and he grinned as they bore down on the merchant ship and the men on deck began to panic and run around as they tried to cut the sails enough to catch the wind and escape. "Wanna take a bet on how quickly we can get the cargo and be on our merry way?" he said with a grin to the pale Konti. Which was what they were up to now. The ship they were tracking had the look of a young vessel, newly converted to a cargo ship from an old Svefra ship that had scraped the rocks one too many times. Patches were visible above the waterline, and one could only imagine that there were more below that were likely being prayed for even now.

[Nel Sayo]

The lady pirate's eyes were watching the friendly snap and bulge of those jolly yellow sails. “If it takes more than an hour,” she said, after a minute. “I get your dinner rations.” Bright blue eyes slid sidelong to him in a half-glance, the hint of a smile touching one corner of her mouth. That was all anyone had gotten from her in the months she'd been working for Alain Coolwater. A spare glance and the ghost of a smile. These pirates did not know the laughing, crowing girl that Nel Sayo should have been, had once been. She ate with them and fought with them, but did not sing with them or dance with them or smile much at all. There had been so many beautiful, sunny days aboard the Raging Tide, but they had not been enough this time. A full plate of food had not been enough. A song for sea-sailing, a mist-ridden moon, the feel of warm, white sand between her bare toes. None of it had been enough, perhaps because she wouldn't let it. But she wasn't cold, or cruel, and that was something. Amiable and helpful and hard-working, if nothing else. She liked Alain Coolwater, and the rest of them, at least well enough to sail with. Or maybe she just needed to be a-sea, and any ship would have done. She wasn't sure; she didn't let herself think on it much. She shifted a little, folding her arms, and sank into a lean against the railing. The quiet clank of the rapier on her hip settling. She wore a white chemise, open at the collar, the sleeves shoved up to her elbows. Where once she'd been so careful about concealing the silvery scales that wound up her arms, now they shimmered here and there, caught by a glance of sunlight. Most of the beads and shells and braids that she'd liked to wind into the pale, twisting lengths of her hair were gone. Only one remained – a single, pearly shell on a single braid, lost somewhere in the up-swept tumble of curls, but still there. She thought maybe she ought to be more excited, as the Raging Tide bore down upon the young vessel and her scrambling crew. But it just wasn't as fun as it had once been. “What do you think she's carrying?” she wondered aloud to the Captain.

[Dusk]

The captain grinned at her bet, and nodded his agreement before bellowing a few orders that might shave a minute or two off their approach. "Likely something good," he said, eyes narrowing as he stared at the other ship. For all that the rest of the crew were panicking, there was one boy standing at the railing and watching their ship's approach without any trace of fear. A dirty urchin of a sailor, he looked, and the captain was hoping he was pissing his pants instead of thinking. "Ship like that, patched together so quickly? Likely it's a group of folks who got their hands on something valuable and needed to get it to the buyers as quick as possible. Could be artifacts, or slaves maybe but it's hard to get slaves out of Syliras. If we're real lucky, it'll be a couple Kelvic bitch pups. The blue boys pay mountains of gold for a female Kelvic." Some of the pirates had hauled themselves up to the railings, roaring challenges to their intended victim and being just about as intimidating as a bunch of pirates were capable of being from fifty yards away. The men of the yellow-sailed ship looked terrified, gripping their swords in sweaty palms and looking for all the world like they might throw up on their attackers instead of defending themselves. All except the boy standing just aft of the center mast, leaning a hip against the rickety railing of the ship and - was he grinning? "What is that kid doing?" Alain muttered under his breath, holding a hand up to cover his eyes and try to get a better look. Nel, with her younger eyes, would be able to see perfectly well what the young man did. Not so much a boy as Alain though, just shorter than most men. Though he likely wasn't much older than twenty. Dirty, though, her captain had been right about that. He looked like the worst sort of dock trash, the kind of kid you'd never let on your ship for fear he'd slit your throat in your sleep. Thirty yards away now and barreling down on them. A shout was given, and the wheel cut hard to the left and the Raging Tide twisted in the water so that she'd pull up alongside the ship instead of ramming straight into her. And even as she focused, he pulled a pipe out of his beltpouch, struck a match off the railing, and lit it. A few puffs of smoke drifted up as the ships slid ever closer, and then the young man grinned and gave Alain and Nel a lazy salute. Blue eyes - shockingly blue - identified him as one of the Svefra, though the rest of the cowering crew looking human enough. He pulled the pipe away, and opened his arms wide as the two ships drifted closer - too fast now to stop it. "Welcome to the party, boys!" the man yelled across the water, still grinning absurdly. "It's so good of you not to be late. Ya'll can surrender now if you like. I really would, if I were you." Fifteen yards, and closing.

[Nel Sayo]

Nel – conundrum that she was herself – knew better than to take anyone for granted. So her eyes stayed glued to the lad on the opposing ship, and when he pulled the pipe from his pouch, a single one of her eyebrows ticked worriedly upwards. He was dirty. He was grinning. And he looked in no way discomfited by the approach of a pirate ship. Nel could not have been called an expert or anything, but that rounded out like a trap no matter which way you squinted at it. She was already moving by the time the Raging Tide slid up alongside the other ship; she didn’t even hear the sailor’s warning. Over the railing in a single, slithering jump. As soon as her bootheels hit the deck, she went sprinting in between scrambling pirates, caught the latch of the door below-decks with one hand, and slung herself down the stairs. She liked Alain Coolwater, she thought to herself, as she stripped the swordbelt off her hips and shoved it into a hidey-hole built into the wall outside the brig. She liked him, and she would be very sad if he died, but she would not be dying with him. The ship and crew she ought to have died with was dredging the bottom of the sea somewhere and though Nel could not have said what precisely she was so determined to live for – she was sure as shit determined. So she hid the belt and rapier, her shoes as well, stripped off her trousers so that all she wore was the over-sized men’s chemise, and then hustled into the brig, and locked herself in a cell. It wasn’t the biggest gamble she’d ever taken. But it was up there. Doc, she thought a bit sadly, would’ve been proud. When it began, she tried to tune out the sound of the crews above smashing into one another, instead rubbing dirt from the cell’s floor into the white chemise, and into her pale hair, and over the shimmering silver scales that wound up her bare legs. The worst part of it all was that Nel could remember, with a sudden, awful clarity, what it felt like to live in a cage and be treated like the Kelvic bitches Alain Coolwater sought. She liked him less, then, and wondered how he might like a set of bars for a horizon. When the commotion on the top deck grew to its pinnacle, she curled up in a corner of the dirty cell and pretended some sort of rescue was underway. Although, really. Nel had never believed much in rescues. They usually came too late, after the worst parts were quite finished, and all the damage distributed. Still, though, a rescue was a nice thought. Like sunshine and slices of watermelon. Her tummy rumbled.

[Dusk]

Nel was, as usual, incredibly good at keeping herself alive. Alain was yelling at her backside as she sprinted across the deck, trying to figure out what exactly was going on. When she made it belowdecks, she'd have her answer - though not quickly enough to save Alain. Through the portholes she would see the bodies swarming up the side of the ship - hard, tanned bodies adorned with tattoos of whales, dolphins, and the mark of Laviku. Up and over, and then the sounds of fighting began as the ambush caught the Raging Tide well and truly in its net. As Nel curled herself into a corner of the cell, the sounds of bodies landing heavily on the deck sounded again and again. Finally, the last few pirates threw down their swords and surrendered, and the sounds of battle faded into silence. It was perhaps half a bell before the door at the top of the stairs was finally pulled open and a few pairs of footsteps squeaked their way below-decks. The dirty, grinning boy came first, still smiling, the pipe still clenched between his teeth. Only now there was blood covering his hands and arms up to the elbow, and it could easily be assumed that despite the cuts on his knuckles, most of the blood did not belong to him. If it weren't for the eyes, one might not even realize he was Svefran; he was too small, too thin, and a touch too pale for it. The two men who escorted him, chattering in Fratava and squeezing blood and saltwater from their hair, looked much more like the status quo of the Svefran race: tall, well-muscled, tanned, bare-chested and covered in tattoos and strings of beads. They looked down at the Konti girl in the brig, and exchanged a few laughing comments back and forth, which didn't get more than a smirk from the boy between them. Cobalt eyes perused her a moment, then the rest of the room, before he chuckled and gave her another lazy salute. "Well done, girl. Play the part of the slave girl, maybe get out of here on my good graces. Problem is, I ain't got none," he said with a shrug. "Good for you on smellin' a trap, and knowing when you're beat. These petchin' amateurs didn't have the presence of mind to tuck their pricks in their pockets before they started swinging. So," he said, leaning a shoulder against the bars of the brig and watching her with curious eyes. "I'm Captain Taylor. These are my first and second mates, Conch and Drift. And you can either stay down here and be a prisoner or you can surrender, put your petching trousers back on, and join us for a drink." He gave her his most charming smile, which wasn't at all charming and had sent many men screaming in the other direction - but he didn't really know how to smile any other way, so that was what Nel got.

[Nel Sayo]

Nel stared at the three pirates over the tops of her knees for another minute, after Captain Taylor said his piece, and grinned that awful grin of his. But she was on her feet a minute later, finding surrender and a drink far preferable to slavery, and making absolutely no bones about it. She even smiled a little – not the full wattage of a Nel Sayo smile, certainly, but a glimmering flicker of it – as she slid a short knife from up her sleeve and reached through the bars of the cell to pick the lock from the outside. “As long as you're not gonna make me drink the blood of your enemies or something,” she muttered, as the lock popped free. “Then I'm all for a beverage.” She tossed the knife at Captain Taylor's feet, slid out of the cell and paced over to the hidey-hole where she'd hidden her trousers and rapier, knocking the panel loose. As she shimmied into her leathers, she asked, a pair of perfectly serious blue eyes meeting the Captain's, “You're not, right? Gonna make me drink the blood of your enemies?”