Karadra's Shipwreck

The Ship - Chapter 11

He heard a voice in his head, masculine and gravelly. Opening his eyes, he saw only black. Not the abyss of absolute darkness – a different kind, teeming with little silver sparks; a place he had never seen before.

“You are weak too,” the voice accused and, in his slumber, Arsik felt inexplicable shame. “You failed to survive despite the help I gave you.”

“What help? Who are you?” His own voice was merely a whisper, raw and faint, his head light and quiet. He hadn’t felt this way in years; he rather enjoyed it.

“I am the sting that guides your hand. I live inside you.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“It doesn’t matter,” the voice replied serenely. “It is all over now, anyway, Host…” Something interrupted him before he could finish whatever he was planning to say next.

A melody echoed from the faraway depths of Arsik’s sleep, its soft siren song caressing his ears. Doubtless, it was a violin. Arsik lacked musical education but could recognize a violin when he heard one, and this was the most beautiful thing he had ever heard.

He surrendered himself to the melody. Peaceful, serene, he basked in this solitary moment of happiness that had embraced him.

The voice startled him again.

“Perhaps fortune smiled upon us after all, Host,” his strange companion said and disappeared.

Arsik lingered in the void. The melody faded, leaving behind an unquenchable wistfulness…

When the song ended, he felt a breath against his neck, sudden warmth on his legs and arms. A moment later, pain followed. His head was slowly regaining its usual, familiar weight; the cuts on his hands reminded him where he’d been the last time he was conscious. He experienced the sensation of falling from a great height, like a dream abruptly ending once you meet the ground.

Opening his eyes, he saw the fall was real: he dropped from the cross into a pair of slender arms, wrapped in black fabric.

“You are so light,” he heard a female voice saying close to his ear, warm like the breath against his neck.

The shadow was carrying him, his weight that of a small child. His body floated over the stones and sand as the moon cast silver light upon their path. Crows accompanied their nightly escape with black feathers from their bodies and pensive songs from their beaks; crows in a dry night, on a part of the island that was isolated and full of secrets.

His eyelids fluttered open and he saw her hair. She was supporting him with an arm around his waist or his shoulders now, however she could. Snow-white hair with red streaks cascaded over ebony skin that smelled of salt and flowers. A hood concealed the largest portion of her face. Her build was as slender as his, but she appeared much more robust – her thin arms held him up easily when his strength abandoned him again, and ultimately lifted him up from the ground once more. Much stronger than she appeared, for sure; she held him in her arms like a baby.

Her eyes met his – coal-black eyes, rough diamonds on a beautiful face made from dark angles. The woman grinned in excitement. Dimples formed at the corners of her mouth. “Berserker!” she said, and the familiar word rang in Arsik’s mind like a bell toll.

“Who…” he croaked through dry lips, covered in blood, salt and sand. His head hung backwards; he watched the starry sky unfolding like an upside-down painting above.

They were almost at the edge of the beach. Moonlight split the sea in two. Arsik could hear the waves licking the sand nearby in a melody as happy as the violin’s had been – and at the end of the road, there was a boat.

A ship, hidden in the shadows.

With its ladder in the water, it was waiting for them a few feet off the shore. Arsik couldn’t examine it adequately from his current, curious angle, but it looked like a sturdy, beautiful vessel. Its main mast shot up into the night that blew on its sails – a night that sang the sailors’ songs, the music of the ropes and the captains’ prayers. Arsik had listened to it all in the past; he heard it now once more, in his mind, and felt it again as the woman’s steps through the water and then up the wooden ladder brought them to the deck.

“You will be safe here,” she said and laid him down gently.

***

He woke up on a soft bed. Once again, he had received medical treatment. His hand was better, despite the nail having damaged his nerves. He’d never be able to fully use it again, but that ship had sailed the moment he lost two fingers by Maaro’s jaws. His face exhibited a deep injury, that nevertheless appeared to be healing fast.

The ship in whose cabin he now found himself had already laid its course. Arsik could feel its movement on the waves, could see the black waters through the solitary porthole. A sense of peace came over him. He was lying on clean sheets and that felt amazing.

Perhaps we will make a stop at Ayaton after all, he thought, and why not? The island of rain wasn’t far. It didn’t have one of the busiest ports, but often enough, captains had reasons to visit it.

Arsik tried to recall what he’d seen while boarding the ship. He remembered the sails, spotlessly white, no coat of arms – a rare sight. Didn’t this ship belong to the kingdom of the Judge Trentor Rye? If it didn’t have the Burning Ship as its coat of arms, where did it belong? And if the captain owed allegiance to one of the other three kingdoms of the Empire, why didn’t Arsik see one of their coats of arms? They could be pirates, but this didn’t look like a pirate vessel. It also didn’t carry any sign of the weaponry or maneuverability of a warship, and Arsik’s instincts nudged him towards a different direction.

At that moment, he thought of her – the black woman that had saved him just in time, the figure that had materialized out of the darkness and pulled him out of hell. His clothes still carried her scent. Intoxicated by it, he felt his heart pounding loudly in his chest. Adrenaline rushed through his body and forced him to stand up.

He opened the cabin’s door and went outside.

The summer wind blew on the deck with a sweet chilliness that filled his lungs. The ship glided on the smooth waves, leaving Saraport’s dark landmass behind. The moon and stars shed their glow upon the deck’s wooden bones, casting playful shadows that danced with the sails and ropes.

From the soft murmuring at the far end of the deck, Arsik deduced a conversation was in progress. As he headed there, walking slowly on the floorboards, the ship seemed much longer than before.

Four shapes sat in a small, private circle, talking amongst themselves. One of them was gigantic. Arsik eyed the creature’s size warily but froze once he realized it had a tail as well.

The man sitting farther from Arsik spoke louder. “Is that him?”

Three heads whirled to look at him in the dark. Arsik started smiling awkwardly but then remembered his teeth and kept his lips shut as he approached the group.

“Yes,” answered a familiar voice. “The pirates had nailed him on a cross. That’s where I found him. The poor soul was suffering.”

She had a subtle accent; Arsik couldn’t quite place it. Her hood had now fallen back on her shoulders, exposing pointy ears under hair fiery and white. An old man with thick, snowy hair and pockmarked skin stood next to her with his back straight. His piercing green eyes regarded Arsik suspiciously. “Are you certain about him, lass?”

Arsik retained his calm; gulping, he said nothing. He tried to catch the woman’s eye again but was distracted by the monstrous creature next to him.

This close, he could examine it more thoroughly. It was at least six feet, muscular, with huge arms that ended in claws larger than a bear’s. As it slowly turned towards Arsik, the moonlight shone upon its red, scaly skin and made Arsik shiver. The scales covered the entirety of its scarlet flesh, climbing up to its bald skull and the otherworldly, serpent’s face with the slanting, lidless eyes and yellow irises. Sheathed on its back, was an enormous two-handed sword, its curved blade reaching past the creature’s tail, almost touching the floor.

Arsik stared at it, speechless. He knew what the creature was, but he’d never seen a member of the dragon race of the Sarkanta up close before. Very rarely did these creatures travel south, away from Miasel, the ancient island of the Dragons that lay a world away from their current location.

The Sarkanta snorted a warm breath onto Arsik’s face; he felt his lungs momentarily polluted and choked back a cough. The old man approached him and scrutinized him carefully. Arsik noticed his clothes and realized he was the captain. It was obvious by his shirt ‒taut over wide shoulders‒, his breeches and the way his belt was tied, his poise, the look in his eyes. Everything fit – except one small detail.

He wasn’t at the steering wheel.

Arsik saw it a few feet away, moving to and fro as if surrendered to the invisible hands of the wind. He frowned and met the old man’s eyes. The captain offered him his hand.

“I am Sentrik, lad. Sentrik Elya. What is your name?”

Arsik winced at the name. Elya was one of the most powerful names in the Trident Empire. The Queen of Ayaton herself was named Siriafil Elya. There was no doubt: this captain –or old man, anyway– descended from a royal family.

Arsik shook his hand. “Arsik,” he said curtly and glanced at the woman first chance he got. She returned the smile and came closer.

“I am Maestra. It is a pleasure to meet you, Arsik,” she said, taking his hand in both of hers, blanketing a part of his soul as well. For a moment, he felt her caress between his fingers. Embarrassed, he retrieved his hand.

“This is Arthax, the Sword of Smoke and protector of our ship,” the old man said, indicating the Sarkanta. “And this…” He gestured towards the second woman, a demure figure waiting patiently in the shadows. “This is Karadra. My wife.”

The dark-haired woman was near or in her forties, with fair skin and a blue shawl wrapped around her beautiful body. Her smile was as warm and welcoming as her eyes, but her voice was broken and weak.

“Hello, Arsik,” she said, and he nodded. When he met her eyes, he felt a dizziness, as sudden as a thought, and his skull started itching. He raised his hand to scratch his greasy hair, but his fingernails couldn’t reach the spot that was bothering him. The woman smiled again as she studied him, her eyes filled with tenderness.

“Arsik,” said Maestra, commanding his attention. “I believe you are tired, exhausted I daresay, as today you balanced on the edge of a very dangerous cliff. The wise course of action would be for you to lie down in your room and recuperate, and afterwards we will devote the appropriate time to fill in the blanks of this unusual night.”

Her words fluttered out of her mouth like music notes. As she spoke, Arsik was losing himself inside her dark eyes. When she smiled at him, she exposed a series of perfect teeth. For that smile, fights would break out among the pirates of the 21 Seagulls.

Then, he saw something on her back: a sheath, for something larger than a knife but smaller than a sword. Arsik moved to examine it closer, and Maestra turned her back to facilitate his curiosity.

“It is a violin,” she said, and Arsik flinched in surprise.

“A- a violin? How? When? Do you play? I mean…”

He couldn’t form the words the way he wished, having a thousand questions and not knowing where to start. The violin’s melody in his oblivion still echoed in his mind.

Maestra smiled again. “Every evil in this world starts with a beautiful melody.” The ease with which she spoke suggested she used this quote often. “Yes, Arsik, I play the violin. You could say that I used to be a fairly good violinist once upon a time,” she said and smiled, as did Karadra, who patted Maestra’s arm in commendation. “I would show it to you, but it is best it stays inside its case for now. The sea salt loosens its strings and the humidity warps the wood. We wouldn’t want that now, would we?”

Arsik nodded his agreement, clearly enchanted by everything.

Karadra’s face darkened a moment later. She leaned on the captain and almost bumped her head on his shoulder.

“Already?” he asked in puzzlement as he supported her weight.

Arthax spoke, his voice like thunder in the night. “It is late, Sentrik. Go downstairs.”

The captain nodded. With Maestra’s assistance, they led the almost faint Karadra towards the stairs that would take them to her cabin.

“Arsik,” Maestra whispered to him as she passed. “Go to your room and I will come find you.” At her smile, Arsik simply bobbed his head in agreement again.

He waited a few moments and then followed after them.