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NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.
Fall Ceramic DM - Final Round Judgment Posted!
- Thread starter mythago
- Start date
orchid blossom
Explorer
Macbeth said:
Nervous, are you?
If I recall correctly, Berandor said he'd get his sent in on Saturday. The state of the other judges is unknown.
Berandor
lunatic
Whoa, I better not post these things. I hadn't thought about shedding my part of the guilt for a potentially late judgement, sorry.orchid blossom said:Nervous, are you?
If I recall correctly, Berandor said he'd get his sent in on Saturday. The state of the other judges is unknown.
If it takes a while longer to post the judgement, it's probably me. So there.
MarauderX
Explorer
Round 2.4, MarauderX vs. Piratecat
A Walk in the Park
This was the first time Marak had been out of the religious district. He had familiarized himself with the layout of the city of Kargam by talking to the porters and servants at the temples. With the long avenues and the ring-like cross streets it wasn’t a difficult plan to commit to learn. The causeway to the merchant district turned out to be a sight worth seeing in itself.
At one point he passed through a market where many of the stalls were still open and found himself pausing in front of a cloth vendor. The lengths of silk and cotton and brocade sparkling with gold thread were displayed to advantage in the light from dozens of brass lamps. Next to the reams of expensive cloth was a frazzled woman selling simple wood and stone carvings, and Marak was fascinated with the plain toys. He found himself wanting to buy them for his master, though for a foreign servant to give a gift to his new lord was unthinkable. But then, he wasn’t servant anymore. You don’t have the money, anyway, he reminded himself, and kept moving.
Walking down the broad paved length in the cool damp night air, Marak passed between rows of stone giants, each more than fifteen feet tall. In the light of the torches mounted between them, he could see some were meant to look benevolent while others were grotesque two-headed monsters. In another place he would have thought they were meant to represent gods, but here, there was no telling. If he remembered, he would ask Shamuss when he returned.
Marak received the package with a nod from a well dressed servant at the noble’s stoop. It was large, flat and heavy even in his brawny arms, and Marak had to shift it around often before getting a cramp. The walk back to the temple was much faster, as he headed straight there with his load.
* * * * *
Marak handed Shamuss a cup of tea and sat down as the young sage paced. Shamuss sipped carefully at his tea and felt the liquid scorch his tongue. The shades had been drawn at the sage’s request, as he said it helped when he was scrying the ether between worlds. Marak knew of the yearly Conhenci rite performed by a cult of Lorleena, an ancient demigoddess of beauty and riches. They sought to bring her back to the material world, and if she were to return, according to Shamuss and the others, it would be a perversion so terrible it would destroy the whole city.
Shamuss opened the oval package and strained to angle the mirror towards him. Marak lifted it into his lap and the sage stared at himself for a moment. With a few arcane words his image disappeared and the grey fog beyond rolled and slid until a view of the ethereal landscape could be discerned. Marak still didn’t know what he was looking at.
Shamuss sighed impatiently. “If the heathens get far enough along in their ritual, we will see the first signs of Lorleena in the ethereal plane. That’s where I come in, to sever the demigoddess’s link and close her gate into the ethereal.” he said.
Marak was puzzled. “If it’s in the ethereal, why should it matter? It can’t hurt us from there can it?” he asked.
Shamuss sighed and sat next to him. “It’s like crossing a river. The first step to bring Lorleena to our world is to pull her into the ethereal plane, a riverboat of sorts, and then use that boat to ferry her across to our world.”
“Ah, and when that happens we’re all dead. Why do they want to do it?” Marak said.
Shamuss paused and replied, “This cult thinks that if they perform certain rituals at precise times they can remake the demigoddess into her former self and live fat and blissful the rest of their days. And some of them probably think they can use her to smite their foes or outwit rivals or bolster their political standing, or use her in other selfish ways.” He sat back further and closed his eyes, his fingers wrapped around the warm cup.
“So the others are probably there already, disrupting the ceremony, and with Jessa leading them they won’t have any trouble. You said there were only a dozen of these cultists, right?”
“Yes.” said Shamuss as he relaxed.
“Ah,” Marak said, “and should the others fail to stop the ritual you are waiting to stop them with magic. And they have no idea that you’ll be there to stop them, magically that is, and send Lorleena back to her dimension. And we all know you’re the best at this plane stuff, right?”
“Yes.” said Shamuss as he sank into the comfortable chair.
“Ah.” Marak said one last time then waited for the sage to drift into sleep before slipping the nearly full mug from his hands. He shook his head, as he had forgotten to ask about the stone statues.
* * * * *
Shamuss woke in the late morning. The drawn shades diffused the light, and the dim room was empty. Marak must have hung the mirror on the opposite wall and it still showed the dull ethereal scenery in the frame. Shamuss cursed himself for falling asleep on one of the more important nights of the year and ardently hoped that Jessa had succeeded in stopping the Conhenci ritual.
The young sage crossed the floor and used the magic oval portal to glide through the ethereal, looking for stretches and tears in the seamless grey fabric, signs that the ritual had begun. So far nothing, at least not near the city. He would take a moment later and scan as much as he could, but he was weak with hunger and scrounged food from the kitchen onto a clay plate.
An hour later Shamuss perused the ethereal plane via the mirror. His mind idly wondered where Marak had gone. Perhaps Jessa had succeeded already and they were off celebrating at Hook’s Tavern, he thought. It figures they would leave me behind.
Thoughts of Jessa and Marak together bounced in his head as he gazed into the magic mirror. That was when Shamuss noticed that the mirror never showed any stretches or tears into or out of the ethereal, not even to the prime material plane. Surely there had to have been someone or something that had pierced through to the ethereal recently, and there had to be signs of it somewhere. The sage zoomed to view near a spot favored by the Magisters’ Guild and saw that there were no traces where there was normally heavy traffic. He had just assumed the mirror had worked properly, especially for the price he paid, and he hadn’t bothered to look closely until now. Alarmed, Shamuss tossed it aside and paused to grab his small bag before darting out the door into the bright noon sun.
* * * * *
Shamuss needed to find Marak to see if Jessa had succeeded. They had been tricked, and the large foreigner was likely at the temple waiting patiently like a lap dog for Jessa to return. Shamuss had known the man for over a decade, half of his young life. As a servant, Marak rarely left the house, and when he did most of the time he could be found praying to Pelor at the temple. Shamuss ran there, hoping to find him as well as use the holy water as a weak scrying device.
The sage burst into the temple, franticly looking about for Marak, but gave up quickly. He took a golden bowl and filled it with holy water before retreating to a private antechamber. Once he had the bowl in his lap it took him longer than he liked to clear his thoughts and peer down calmly into the water. In the subtle ripples of the holy water he saw the steps to the cult of Lorleena, and traced his way through the front doors. Beyond was a sight that pushed the air from his lungs and he nearly lost the vision. Inside was a bloodbath.
The bodies of the thirty or so men that went with Jessa were strewn about, slaughtered in a one-sided battle. Shamuss bent closer to the surface of the water and examined their wounds. They had been trapped inside the large foyer and cut to ribbons with wicked long spears from moveable side panels, something he hadn’t seen in his magical spying. His incompetence had gotten them killed. He looked around for Jessa’s body, but found only a score of the others. Tears from his cheeks fell into the water, and Shamuss watched the image begin to fade. He shouted and threw the bowl across the small antechamber where it broke into pieces. The water soaked the wall and he saw the last of the bloody picture fade from it.
* * * * *
Shamuss knew he didn’t have time to venture to the Magisters’ Guild to gain access to a crystal ball. He would have to make the jump into the ethereal and investigate himself. The young sage ran to Hook’s Tavern and rented a private room, paying for two nights in advance and demanded privacy. He would have it, as Shamuss was a generous customer, and they were surprised that not even Marak was to disrupt him.
He sat on his folded legs and gathered his strength for the upcoming journey, as it was always rough on his health. Shamuss concentrated and pierced through the barrier of the material plane and found the ethereal on the other side. He felt the usual sensation of his skin being stripped from his flesh as he pushed his consciousness into the adjacent plane. Despite all of his planar travels, Shamuss never grew comfortable with the many feelings of jumping from one to the next.
The ethereal plane had never been a safe place to Shamuss, as his first ghostly encounter had nearly killed him. It never seemed a place that anything beyond monsters and ghosts could call home, and there was precious little on the plane for anyone to be territorial. He likened the plane to an ocean, with the shore being closest to the material plane. He had only wandered in the shallow ethereal and had never attempted delving into darker depths. Jaunting there had always been unnecessary after he had learned how to use magical devices effectively, and now he wished he had spent more time becoming comfortable with ‘walking the fog.’
Shamuss moved slowly through the ether. First he climbed upward to gain his bearings then walked in the direction of the cult of Lorleena, keeping his eyes open through the blur for any signs of the Conhenci rite.
He crossed through the ether, staying in the shallowness of the plane near the material world to keep his bearings. Shamuss stopped in front of the familiar doors, behind which he knew of the death. He hoped none of the deceased had crossed to into the undead world as ghosts to have their revenge on him now. He glided through the doors and into the dark foyer. Seeing nothing he continued onward to the main ritual chamber. The ethereal winds whipped around him; the sage knew the Conhenci rite would have started by now, and he walked swiftly down the narrow corridors. He paused at one of the columns, fuzzy in the ethereal realm, and peered beyond it to the main chamber.
Shamuss saw a circle of cultists surrounded by candles, not in the material world, but like him, in the ethereal. He blinked to make sure that it wasn’t a trick, that the fog of ether hadn’t clouded his spectacles or his mind. Sure enough it was real, and the ritual was happening. He watched the rite for a while as each of the twelve members added a piece to the spell and stepped back to rejoin the circle. As his mind weighed the options before him, Marak rested a heavy hand on the sage’s shoulder. Shamuss turned with a start.
“Marak!” he whispered, “what are you doing here?” Shamuss could hardly believe his servant was also in the ethereal, though he seemed just as uncomfortable. The sage was reminded that he needed to keep his guard up as he wouldn’t hear the footsteps of anyone approaching.
Marak’s face was stoic. “I’ve just come to make sure you do what you’re supposed to.”
Shamuss nodded and adjusted his glasses. “Good. Well, give me a minute to come up something.” Both of them watched and waited. Soon they saw the fabric of the plane stretch, and on the brink of tearing.
Shamuss said, “Let’s try a distraction. If you can disrupt them by dragging one of the heathens from the circle I’ll stop the rest of the rite with magic. It won’t take me long, so we have a pretty good chance.”
“No, we don’t.” Marak replied.
Shamuss squinted, “Sure we do, don’t be so…” He stopped in mid sentence when he looked at Marak. The large man’s face spoke volumes, but Shamuss stammered, not understanding. “We have to stop those heathens!” Shamass said.
“I am a foreigner, a servant to you for a long time, and I have listened. I have understood what you mean by heathen. Am I not a heathen too?” Marak replied.
Shamuss looked up at the large man. In his mind he knew that Marak was right, that by his own definition Marak was a heathen, and would always draw suspicion from him. He focused on the larger picture once again. He had to convince the jaded man that this was no time to argue. “I… We… But the rite… we have to stop it!”
Marak was stern. “No. I am no longer a servant to you. I have a new master now, and she knows I am not a heathen. I don’t want to see you hurt. Please be still and don’t fight.”
Shamuss sprinted toward the ceremony, moving through the ether. He could sense Marak chasing him, moving just as slowly, but he had to try. His enchantment began but was never completed as Marak tackled him from behind, and they both spun through the fog. With his legs wrapped around Shamuss, Marak landed three blows to knock the sage unconscious.
* * * * *
Shamuss woke on his side, his hands bound in the straps from Marak’s sandals. The taste of blood was fresh in his mouth. In front of him Jessa was also bound with leather straps and had had most of her belongings removed. Her auburn hair was stained with blood and her eyes were closed peacefully. She was still so beautiful to him. He heard the voices of the Conhenci rite continuing behind him, and he struggled to move in the ether to see how far along they had come. He was horrified.
The great head of the demigoddess had pushed through the tear in the ethereal from another plane. It looked strangely like a rabbit, ghostly, and with gnashing jaws and terrible spines along its back. Shamuss knew that the form it took in the ethereal plane would be pleasant compared with how it might appear in the material world, and he wrestled his imagination to stay calm. The Conhenci rite was gathering speed, the chants had become feverish, and time was running out.
Shamuss saw his bag in Marak’s large hands. “Did you look through all of my things just like you did hers? There’s something inside that you and your new mistress might want to see.”
“Ah.” Marak responded, but didn’t move.
“You see, like Jessa, I always have a back-up plan. It will destroy the beast of Lorleena in the ethereal before she can get to our world. The only problem with the plan is that it will obliterate anything in the ethereal, including us.” Shamuss was bluffing, but he did know there was one last back-up plan.
Marak swiveled to look at the sage. “So you would kill us all instead of letting the rite be completed?”
“If it’s completed we’ll all be doomed anyway, so we may as well die protecting the city.” Shamuss said.
Marak eased his hand into the bag. He pulled out several scrolls and Shamuss’s journal, and then gazed down at what he found in his hand. He slowly let the bag slip from his hands and Shamuss could see that he was holding the three figurines Marak had seen last night. Marak and Shamuss looked each other in the eye.
Shamuss spoke each word slowly, deliberately. “I couldn’t help but spy on you last night Marak. I know how limited your experience is with the city, and I wanted to make sure that you would arrive back safely. I saw you looking at them, and decided to get them for you. I didn’t mean that you are a heathen, Marak, I know that I am confusing sometimes. I called them heathens because of their cruelty and selfishness. You are different than that, you care about us, about the welfare of others. I know how much I take you for granted sometimes. I wanted to thank you for all of the things you do for me. I wanted to give them to you after we had stopped the rite.”
A rush of emotion overcame the big man, tears streaming down his cheeks. He clenched the figures and pressed them to his chest and wept. He glanced between the unmoving Jessa, Shamuss, and the ongoing rite. He was ashamed of his choice now, having been coerced into undermining Shamuss. He didn’t want Jessa to know, and he wanted to run far away to another land to escape his errors once more. Not this time, thought the strong man. This time I will pay for my mistakes, with my blood if need be.
Marak loosened his shoe straps and refused to look Shamuss in the eye.
Shamuss said “Look, don’t worry about Jessa or me or anything else right now. We have got to stop them.”
Marak snuffled several more times before he looked up. “Ah,” he said.
“Remember the time when Jessa kissed you long enough for me to sneak by the high priest at the temple? Let’s try that again.”
“You want me to kiss her? Now? She’s not even awake, and somehow I think that’s wrong.” Marak replied, blinking.
“Yes, of course it’s wrong. But what I want you to do is kiss the head priestess there.” Shamuss said.
Marak gazed at his new master. “Ah, alright. Will that break up the ritual?”
“No, but it’s a start. I will do the rest.”
Marak jumped into motion. His legs moving as fast as they could, he was upon her in the same stealthy fashion he had used to surprise Shamuss. He gripped the priestess by the waist and planted his lips solidly on hers. She screamed and the other priests lowered their chanting to glance at her while maintaining their concentration. Still Marak clasped her to him, forcing their faces together.
Jessa stirred and felt her head pound with pain. Her eyes focused first on Marak and the cultist, then on the huge rabbit head with white spines. She thought she must be dreaming and let the pain overtake her once more.
The priestess clawed at Marak’s eyes and spun away from him. He still clung to her silken robes and tried to reel her back to him. With enough space between them she cast a spell, and he was slammed in the face with a heavy force that sent him sailing in the direction of Lorleena’s head. The priestess was in tow, as Marak had refused to let go, and they tumbled recklessly toward the demigoddess’s open maw.
She struck the nose of the titanic creature, her body being the size of one of its nostrils. Marak let go of her and glanced along one of the creatures lips, struggled for a hand hold. His hand found one of the whiskers and he clasped it with both hands. Marak watched horrified as she, only the second woman he had ever kissed, screamed desperately. He saw a tongue wrap over her head and pull her down into its mouth, and now only the chanting of the other cultists could be heard.
Shamuss hovered above the gigantic head of the demigoddess and focused on magic to seal the tear in the ethereal plane. Marak’s distraction had given him a foothold against the cultists, but he would have a tough fight as they redoubled their efforts. He worked at pushing the humongous head back through the void and was met with some success. Several of the other priests broke their concentration to target him with hexes. Shamuss grinned when their spells failed to do what the casters hoped, as he knew the rules for magic were different in the ethereal. With their hold weakened, the sage pulled the tear closed.
Marak had closed his eyes and waited for the end to come and held onto the large whisker with all his might. He felt something pulling at him, trying to yank him loose, but he held fast. Eventually something gave, and he was thrown wildly backward. He opened his eyes and saw the horrid whisker lying next to him on the ethereal ground. Marak looked up and saw Shamuss giggling with glee as the other cultists fled back into the material world.
* * * * *
Jessa awoke to an empty room. A fire was burning in the fireplace and she recognized the hooked pokers. She was in a private room of Hook’s Tavern. She recounted the ambush and her strange, but realistic, dreams. It all seemed a fog to her now, and she pivoted to put her feet on the floor.
“Glad to see you’re finally awake,” said Shamuss, “and I’ll bet you’re hungry too.”
“Yes,” she said, “I had the strangest dreams.”
“I’m sure you did. We had a pretty tough time without you, didn’t we?” Shamuss asked as Marak entered.
“You bet.” Marak answered.
Jessa saw the scabs around his eyes from where the priestess had scratched him and gasped. “But… it was a dream…I was so sure…”
Marak smiled. “Nah, it was real. Hey boss, you want some tea?”
“You know I don’t, and stop calling me boss. You are a free man and have earned my respect as an equal, so do us both a favor.” Shamuss said.
“Ah, what’s the matter, are you afraid I’m going to try to drug you again?” Marak chided.
Jessa asked, “What’s he talking about?”
“Nothing,” replied both simultaneously.
After finishing his stew Marak pointed out the window, beyond the figures on the windowsill. “So I never got to ask you, what are those stone statues down the street for? I noticed them on my way to the nobles’ district.”
Shamuss looked to Jessa for the answer. “That’s the final back-up plan.” Jessa answered. “I’m glad it didn’t come to that.”
A Walk in the Park
This was the first time Marak had been out of the religious district. He had familiarized himself with the layout of the city of Kargam by talking to the porters and servants at the temples. With the long avenues and the ring-like cross streets it wasn’t a difficult plan to commit to learn. The causeway to the merchant district turned out to be a sight worth seeing in itself.
At one point he passed through a market where many of the stalls were still open and found himself pausing in front of a cloth vendor. The lengths of silk and cotton and brocade sparkling with gold thread were displayed to advantage in the light from dozens of brass lamps. Next to the reams of expensive cloth was a frazzled woman selling simple wood and stone carvings, and Marak was fascinated with the plain toys. He found himself wanting to buy them for his master, though for a foreign servant to give a gift to his new lord was unthinkable. But then, he wasn’t servant anymore. You don’t have the money, anyway, he reminded himself, and kept moving.
Walking down the broad paved length in the cool damp night air, Marak passed between rows of stone giants, each more than fifteen feet tall. In the light of the torches mounted between them, he could see some were meant to look benevolent while others were grotesque two-headed monsters. In another place he would have thought they were meant to represent gods, but here, there was no telling. If he remembered, he would ask Shamuss when he returned.
Marak received the package with a nod from a well dressed servant at the noble’s stoop. It was large, flat and heavy even in his brawny arms, and Marak had to shift it around often before getting a cramp. The walk back to the temple was much faster, as he headed straight there with his load.
* * * * *
Marak handed Shamuss a cup of tea and sat down as the young sage paced. Shamuss sipped carefully at his tea and felt the liquid scorch his tongue. The shades had been drawn at the sage’s request, as he said it helped when he was scrying the ether between worlds. Marak knew of the yearly Conhenci rite performed by a cult of Lorleena, an ancient demigoddess of beauty and riches. They sought to bring her back to the material world, and if she were to return, according to Shamuss and the others, it would be a perversion so terrible it would destroy the whole city.
Shamuss opened the oval package and strained to angle the mirror towards him. Marak lifted it into his lap and the sage stared at himself for a moment. With a few arcane words his image disappeared and the grey fog beyond rolled and slid until a view of the ethereal landscape could be discerned. Marak still didn’t know what he was looking at.
Shamuss sighed impatiently. “If the heathens get far enough along in their ritual, we will see the first signs of Lorleena in the ethereal plane. That’s where I come in, to sever the demigoddess’s link and close her gate into the ethereal.” he said.
Marak was puzzled. “If it’s in the ethereal, why should it matter? It can’t hurt us from there can it?” he asked.
Shamuss sighed and sat next to him. “It’s like crossing a river. The first step to bring Lorleena to our world is to pull her into the ethereal plane, a riverboat of sorts, and then use that boat to ferry her across to our world.”
“Ah, and when that happens we’re all dead. Why do they want to do it?” Marak said.
Shamuss paused and replied, “This cult thinks that if they perform certain rituals at precise times they can remake the demigoddess into her former self and live fat and blissful the rest of their days. And some of them probably think they can use her to smite their foes or outwit rivals or bolster their political standing, or use her in other selfish ways.” He sat back further and closed his eyes, his fingers wrapped around the warm cup.
“So the others are probably there already, disrupting the ceremony, and with Jessa leading them they won’t have any trouble. You said there were only a dozen of these cultists, right?”
“Yes.” said Shamuss as he relaxed.
“Ah,” Marak said, “and should the others fail to stop the ritual you are waiting to stop them with magic. And they have no idea that you’ll be there to stop them, magically that is, and send Lorleena back to her dimension. And we all know you’re the best at this plane stuff, right?”
“Yes.” said Shamuss as he sank into the comfortable chair.
“Ah.” Marak said one last time then waited for the sage to drift into sleep before slipping the nearly full mug from his hands. He shook his head, as he had forgotten to ask about the stone statues.
* * * * *
Shamuss woke in the late morning. The drawn shades diffused the light, and the dim room was empty. Marak must have hung the mirror on the opposite wall and it still showed the dull ethereal scenery in the frame. Shamuss cursed himself for falling asleep on one of the more important nights of the year and ardently hoped that Jessa had succeeded in stopping the Conhenci ritual.
The young sage crossed the floor and used the magic oval portal to glide through the ethereal, looking for stretches and tears in the seamless grey fabric, signs that the ritual had begun. So far nothing, at least not near the city. He would take a moment later and scan as much as he could, but he was weak with hunger and scrounged food from the kitchen onto a clay plate.
An hour later Shamuss perused the ethereal plane via the mirror. His mind idly wondered where Marak had gone. Perhaps Jessa had succeeded already and they were off celebrating at Hook’s Tavern, he thought. It figures they would leave me behind.
Thoughts of Jessa and Marak together bounced in his head as he gazed into the magic mirror. That was when Shamuss noticed that the mirror never showed any stretches or tears into or out of the ethereal, not even to the prime material plane. Surely there had to have been someone or something that had pierced through to the ethereal recently, and there had to be signs of it somewhere. The sage zoomed to view near a spot favored by the Magisters’ Guild and saw that there were no traces where there was normally heavy traffic. He had just assumed the mirror had worked properly, especially for the price he paid, and he hadn’t bothered to look closely until now. Alarmed, Shamuss tossed it aside and paused to grab his small bag before darting out the door into the bright noon sun.
* * * * *
Shamuss needed to find Marak to see if Jessa had succeeded. They had been tricked, and the large foreigner was likely at the temple waiting patiently like a lap dog for Jessa to return. Shamuss had known the man for over a decade, half of his young life. As a servant, Marak rarely left the house, and when he did most of the time he could be found praying to Pelor at the temple. Shamuss ran there, hoping to find him as well as use the holy water as a weak scrying device.
The sage burst into the temple, franticly looking about for Marak, but gave up quickly. He took a golden bowl and filled it with holy water before retreating to a private antechamber. Once he had the bowl in his lap it took him longer than he liked to clear his thoughts and peer down calmly into the water. In the subtle ripples of the holy water he saw the steps to the cult of Lorleena, and traced his way through the front doors. Beyond was a sight that pushed the air from his lungs and he nearly lost the vision. Inside was a bloodbath.
The bodies of the thirty or so men that went with Jessa were strewn about, slaughtered in a one-sided battle. Shamuss bent closer to the surface of the water and examined their wounds. They had been trapped inside the large foyer and cut to ribbons with wicked long spears from moveable side panels, something he hadn’t seen in his magical spying. His incompetence had gotten them killed. He looked around for Jessa’s body, but found only a score of the others. Tears from his cheeks fell into the water, and Shamuss watched the image begin to fade. He shouted and threw the bowl across the small antechamber where it broke into pieces. The water soaked the wall and he saw the last of the bloody picture fade from it.
* * * * *
Shamuss knew he didn’t have time to venture to the Magisters’ Guild to gain access to a crystal ball. He would have to make the jump into the ethereal and investigate himself. The young sage ran to Hook’s Tavern and rented a private room, paying for two nights in advance and demanded privacy. He would have it, as Shamuss was a generous customer, and they were surprised that not even Marak was to disrupt him.
He sat on his folded legs and gathered his strength for the upcoming journey, as it was always rough on his health. Shamuss concentrated and pierced through the barrier of the material plane and found the ethereal on the other side. He felt the usual sensation of his skin being stripped from his flesh as he pushed his consciousness into the adjacent plane. Despite all of his planar travels, Shamuss never grew comfortable with the many feelings of jumping from one to the next.
The ethereal plane had never been a safe place to Shamuss, as his first ghostly encounter had nearly killed him. It never seemed a place that anything beyond monsters and ghosts could call home, and there was precious little on the plane for anyone to be territorial. He likened the plane to an ocean, with the shore being closest to the material plane. He had only wandered in the shallow ethereal and had never attempted delving into darker depths. Jaunting there had always been unnecessary after he had learned how to use magical devices effectively, and now he wished he had spent more time becoming comfortable with ‘walking the fog.’
Shamuss moved slowly through the ether. First he climbed upward to gain his bearings then walked in the direction of the cult of Lorleena, keeping his eyes open through the blur for any signs of the Conhenci rite.
He crossed through the ether, staying in the shallowness of the plane near the material world to keep his bearings. Shamuss stopped in front of the familiar doors, behind which he knew of the death. He hoped none of the deceased had crossed to into the undead world as ghosts to have their revenge on him now. He glided through the doors and into the dark foyer. Seeing nothing he continued onward to the main ritual chamber. The ethereal winds whipped around him; the sage knew the Conhenci rite would have started by now, and he walked swiftly down the narrow corridors. He paused at one of the columns, fuzzy in the ethereal realm, and peered beyond it to the main chamber.
Shamuss saw a circle of cultists surrounded by candles, not in the material world, but like him, in the ethereal. He blinked to make sure that it wasn’t a trick, that the fog of ether hadn’t clouded his spectacles or his mind. Sure enough it was real, and the ritual was happening. He watched the rite for a while as each of the twelve members added a piece to the spell and stepped back to rejoin the circle. As his mind weighed the options before him, Marak rested a heavy hand on the sage’s shoulder. Shamuss turned with a start.
“Marak!” he whispered, “what are you doing here?” Shamuss could hardly believe his servant was also in the ethereal, though he seemed just as uncomfortable. The sage was reminded that he needed to keep his guard up as he wouldn’t hear the footsteps of anyone approaching.
Marak’s face was stoic. “I’ve just come to make sure you do what you’re supposed to.”
Shamuss nodded and adjusted his glasses. “Good. Well, give me a minute to come up something.” Both of them watched and waited. Soon they saw the fabric of the plane stretch, and on the brink of tearing.
Shamuss said, “Let’s try a distraction. If you can disrupt them by dragging one of the heathens from the circle I’ll stop the rest of the rite with magic. It won’t take me long, so we have a pretty good chance.”
“No, we don’t.” Marak replied.
Shamuss squinted, “Sure we do, don’t be so…” He stopped in mid sentence when he looked at Marak. The large man’s face spoke volumes, but Shamuss stammered, not understanding. “We have to stop those heathens!” Shamass said.
“I am a foreigner, a servant to you for a long time, and I have listened. I have understood what you mean by heathen. Am I not a heathen too?” Marak replied.
Shamuss looked up at the large man. In his mind he knew that Marak was right, that by his own definition Marak was a heathen, and would always draw suspicion from him. He focused on the larger picture once again. He had to convince the jaded man that this was no time to argue. “I… We… But the rite… we have to stop it!”
Marak was stern. “No. I am no longer a servant to you. I have a new master now, and she knows I am not a heathen. I don’t want to see you hurt. Please be still and don’t fight.”
Shamuss sprinted toward the ceremony, moving through the ether. He could sense Marak chasing him, moving just as slowly, but he had to try. His enchantment began but was never completed as Marak tackled him from behind, and they both spun through the fog. With his legs wrapped around Shamuss, Marak landed three blows to knock the sage unconscious.
* * * * *
Shamuss woke on his side, his hands bound in the straps from Marak’s sandals. The taste of blood was fresh in his mouth. In front of him Jessa was also bound with leather straps and had had most of her belongings removed. Her auburn hair was stained with blood and her eyes were closed peacefully. She was still so beautiful to him. He heard the voices of the Conhenci rite continuing behind him, and he struggled to move in the ether to see how far along they had come. He was horrified.
The great head of the demigoddess had pushed through the tear in the ethereal from another plane. It looked strangely like a rabbit, ghostly, and with gnashing jaws and terrible spines along its back. Shamuss knew that the form it took in the ethereal plane would be pleasant compared with how it might appear in the material world, and he wrestled his imagination to stay calm. The Conhenci rite was gathering speed, the chants had become feverish, and time was running out.
Shamuss saw his bag in Marak’s large hands. “Did you look through all of my things just like you did hers? There’s something inside that you and your new mistress might want to see.”
“Ah.” Marak responded, but didn’t move.
“You see, like Jessa, I always have a back-up plan. It will destroy the beast of Lorleena in the ethereal before she can get to our world. The only problem with the plan is that it will obliterate anything in the ethereal, including us.” Shamuss was bluffing, but he did know there was one last back-up plan.
Marak swiveled to look at the sage. “So you would kill us all instead of letting the rite be completed?”
“If it’s completed we’ll all be doomed anyway, so we may as well die protecting the city.” Shamuss said.
Marak eased his hand into the bag. He pulled out several scrolls and Shamuss’s journal, and then gazed down at what he found in his hand. He slowly let the bag slip from his hands and Shamuss could see that he was holding the three figurines Marak had seen last night. Marak and Shamuss looked each other in the eye.
Shamuss spoke each word slowly, deliberately. “I couldn’t help but spy on you last night Marak. I know how limited your experience is with the city, and I wanted to make sure that you would arrive back safely. I saw you looking at them, and decided to get them for you. I didn’t mean that you are a heathen, Marak, I know that I am confusing sometimes. I called them heathens because of their cruelty and selfishness. You are different than that, you care about us, about the welfare of others. I know how much I take you for granted sometimes. I wanted to thank you for all of the things you do for me. I wanted to give them to you after we had stopped the rite.”
A rush of emotion overcame the big man, tears streaming down his cheeks. He clenched the figures and pressed them to his chest and wept. He glanced between the unmoving Jessa, Shamuss, and the ongoing rite. He was ashamed of his choice now, having been coerced into undermining Shamuss. He didn’t want Jessa to know, and he wanted to run far away to another land to escape his errors once more. Not this time, thought the strong man. This time I will pay for my mistakes, with my blood if need be.
Marak loosened his shoe straps and refused to look Shamuss in the eye.
Shamuss said “Look, don’t worry about Jessa or me or anything else right now. We have got to stop them.”
Marak snuffled several more times before he looked up. “Ah,” he said.
“Remember the time when Jessa kissed you long enough for me to sneak by the high priest at the temple? Let’s try that again.”
“You want me to kiss her? Now? She’s not even awake, and somehow I think that’s wrong.” Marak replied, blinking.
“Yes, of course it’s wrong. But what I want you to do is kiss the head priestess there.” Shamuss said.
Marak gazed at his new master. “Ah, alright. Will that break up the ritual?”
“No, but it’s a start. I will do the rest.”
Marak jumped into motion. His legs moving as fast as they could, he was upon her in the same stealthy fashion he had used to surprise Shamuss. He gripped the priestess by the waist and planted his lips solidly on hers. She screamed and the other priests lowered their chanting to glance at her while maintaining their concentration. Still Marak clasped her to him, forcing their faces together.
Jessa stirred and felt her head pound with pain. Her eyes focused first on Marak and the cultist, then on the huge rabbit head with white spines. She thought she must be dreaming and let the pain overtake her once more.
The priestess clawed at Marak’s eyes and spun away from him. He still clung to her silken robes and tried to reel her back to him. With enough space between them she cast a spell, and he was slammed in the face with a heavy force that sent him sailing in the direction of Lorleena’s head. The priestess was in tow, as Marak had refused to let go, and they tumbled recklessly toward the demigoddess’s open maw.
She struck the nose of the titanic creature, her body being the size of one of its nostrils. Marak let go of her and glanced along one of the creatures lips, struggled for a hand hold. His hand found one of the whiskers and he clasped it with both hands. Marak watched horrified as she, only the second woman he had ever kissed, screamed desperately. He saw a tongue wrap over her head and pull her down into its mouth, and now only the chanting of the other cultists could be heard.
Shamuss hovered above the gigantic head of the demigoddess and focused on magic to seal the tear in the ethereal plane. Marak’s distraction had given him a foothold against the cultists, but he would have a tough fight as they redoubled their efforts. He worked at pushing the humongous head back through the void and was met with some success. Several of the other priests broke their concentration to target him with hexes. Shamuss grinned when their spells failed to do what the casters hoped, as he knew the rules for magic were different in the ethereal. With their hold weakened, the sage pulled the tear closed.
Marak had closed his eyes and waited for the end to come and held onto the large whisker with all his might. He felt something pulling at him, trying to yank him loose, but he held fast. Eventually something gave, and he was thrown wildly backward. He opened his eyes and saw the horrid whisker lying next to him on the ethereal ground. Marak looked up and saw Shamuss giggling with glee as the other cultists fled back into the material world.
* * * * *
Jessa awoke to an empty room. A fire was burning in the fireplace and she recognized the hooked pokers. She was in a private room of Hook’s Tavern. She recounted the ambush and her strange, but realistic, dreams. It all seemed a fog to her now, and she pivoted to put her feet on the floor.
“Glad to see you’re finally awake,” said Shamuss, “and I’ll bet you’re hungry too.”
“Yes,” she said, “I had the strangest dreams.”
“I’m sure you did. We had a pretty tough time without you, didn’t we?” Shamuss asked as Marak entered.
“You bet.” Marak answered.
Jessa saw the scabs around his eyes from where the priestess had scratched him and gasped. “But… it was a dream…I was so sure…”
Marak smiled. “Nah, it was real. Hey boss, you want some tea?”
“You know I don’t, and stop calling me boss. You are a free man and have earned my respect as an equal, so do us both a favor.” Shamuss said.
“Ah, what’s the matter, are you afraid I’m going to try to drug you again?” Marak chided.
Jessa asked, “What’s he talking about?”
“Nothing,” replied both simultaneously.
After finishing his stew Marak pointed out the window, beyond the figures on the windowsill. “So I never got to ask you, what are those stone statues down the street for? I noticed them on my way to the nobles’ district.”
Shamuss looked to Jessa for the answer. “That’s the final back-up plan.” Jessa answered. “I’m glad it didn’t come to that.”
Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
Three Kings
Autumn 2004 Round 2-4: MarauderX vs. Piratecat
The Three Kings was five days out of Brighton before Jasper Stanhope was invited to the Captain’s mess. The young auditor had been virtually ignored since he had first stepped onto the deck, and he still didn’t have his sea legs yet. He had spent most of the time lying in his canvas hammock within a sweltering storeroom. Every pitch and yaw of the vessel was reflected within his aching stomach, and the notion of dining with the captain was less than enticing. He couldn’t afford to be rude, however. Too much was at stake.
“Mister Stanhope. I’m Captain Wallace.” The captain didn’t rise as Stanhope ducked through the low door and entered the cabin. Wallace was dressed in a pristine white uniform. Seated next to him at the small table was an attractive young woman in a surprisingly formal silk dress. No other crew was present, but the table was laden with dishes of food. Captain Wallace already clenched a spoon in one calloused hand, a bowl of stew in front of him.
Stanhope gave a small bow. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Captain.” He gave another bow to the girl. “I hope I’m not late.”
Wallace’s voice had a burr of the north country to it, and hostility was evident. “You are. We’ve been waiting three minutes. We started without you.” He squinted at Stanhope. “Did ye get lost?”
Stanhope gave a polite chuckle as he sat down at the end of the table across from the Captain. No one else echoed it. Stanhope cleared his throat.
“May I ask, sir, who is the lovely young lady dining with us?” The girl was fifteen or so, fine-boned with wide blue eyes behind small spectacles. She turned her head towards Stanhope and smiled, and he was appalled to see that she had accidentally dribbled stew down her chin and the front of her silk dress. She didn’t seem to have noticed, or if she did she didn’t care. Stanhope wondered if the girl was somewhat touched in the head.
Captain Wallace cleared his throat. “This is my daughter, Abigail.” He nodded at her. “Say hello to the auditor, Abigail.” He made it sound like an insult. He probably means it as one, Stanhope thought.
Abigail looked over into Stanhope’s face and smiled. “Hello,” she said shyly. Stanhope smiled back at her, silently cringing at her slovenly table manners, and when he turned back was shocked to see the fury dancing behind the Captain’s eyes.
“Abigail comes on all of my voyages with me,” said the Captain. “I bring her to keep her safe. She’s a very special girl, and not one to mix with the sailors. Talking to her without my express permission will get a man lashed, and if anyone ever had the stupidity to touch her I’d murder the bastard. Do you ken what I’m saying?” His index finger tapped against the table, keeping time with every syllable. His face was red, and he looked as scared as he did angry.
“Of course,” Stanhope said smoothly. He tried not to glance over at Abigail, who was still dripping sauce down her front as she looked at him. “A commendable attitude, I’m sure.” Stanhope felt nervous bile rising in his throat. He’d do it, too, Stanhope realized, and the Good Lord pity anyone who would be so stupid as to steal away Wallace’s poor excuse of a daughter. He groped for a change of subject.
“It looks like you run a fine ship, Captain. I haven’t had a chance yet to talk to any of your crew or officers, but they seem to be the model of efficiency.”
Wallace eyed him. “Why’d you want to talk to them, then? You’ve no reason to.”
Stanhope raised his eyebrows. “Captain, you know my duty. . .”
The man across from him clenched one fist. “Indeed I do, sir. And I know my officers. Unlike my crew, they’ve been with me for many a run. They’re fine men, each of them. Busy men. They know how to run a ship.” The captain smirked. “Do you know how to run a ship, Mister Stanhope?”
“Well, no, Captain,” said Stanhope carefully. “That’s not my job.”
The captain’s voice was steady. “Then ye’ll stay the hell out of their way or by the powers I’ll throw ye overboard.”
“Captain, I. . .”
“Make no mistake about it, Mister Stanhope.” The captain leaned forward over the wooden table, one square fist planted solidly in his daughter’s plate of food. Beans slid like oozing blood around his clenched knuckles, but neither of them seemed to notice. His voice was low and hard to hear at first over the constant creaking of the ship. “My officers know that I don’t care for extraneous passengers on my voyages. I especially don’t care for company auditors who wish to count pennies and grade how I conduct my business. The Three Kings is an old ship but a sound one, and it’s hauling the cargo it was made for. It’s not designed for lubbers who think they’ve a right to tell me how to handle my affairs!” His rising voice was close to bellowing by the time he finished.
He’s covering something. “That’s not my job, Captain.” Stanhope managed a quick and sincere smile as he lied. “You haven’t been doing anything wrong. Quite the reverse, actually. Your voyages are substantially more profitable than the average for our vessels. The owners have asked me to study your methods and determine what things you are doing which bring you such great success. My presence here isn’t a punishment or a threat, and I’m sorry if you somehow thought it was.”
Wallace grunted and jabbed a piece of chewy beef into his mouth. “Is that so?” He sounded suspicious.
“Yes indeed.” Stanhope broke open a ship’s biscuit and was surprised to see weevils dropping onto his bread plate. They squirmed there, legs waving in the humid air. Weevils in the bread already? wondered the auditor. We just set out from port! No one else seemed to notice. Across from him, the Captain stuffed a biscuit into his mouth whole, chewing loudly before washing it down with a swig of wine. Stanhope surreptitiously pushed the bread plate away from him. The next time his gaze fell on it, the weevils were gone.
“You’ll probably notice the crew slaving away up on deck,” said the Captain with an odd smile.
“Indeed.” Stanhope looked up expectantly.
“That’s not true slaving, Mister Stanhope. We both know that you’re here to find out why I have to hire on an entirely new crew every time I reach port.”
Cutting right to the chase, thought Stanhope. He nodded.
“I thought as much. The Three Kings is haunted. That’s the reason. If ye had asked before we left port, ye could still be on dry land.”
Stanhope blinked. To his right, Abigail dabbed at her lips with a napkin, completely missing the trail of gristle and sauce that descended from her chin. “Haunted?”
“Aye.” The older man leaned back in his chair. “It’s got a foul spirit on board, and a terrible curse. She used to be a slave ship running black ivory through the middle passage. She sailed under a captain named Gibbs. Y’heard of him? He was infamous. Over twenty runs, six to eight weeks at sea each way, over four hundred Africans chained in the hold every time. He packed them in, did Gibbs, right tightly. Legend has it that he dumped more than five loads.”
Stanhope felt sick. “Dumped. . .?”
Wallace was enjoying himself at Stanhope’s discomfort. “Supposedly he was chased by military vessels, but by the time they overhauled him there wasn’t a negro on board. Probably hooked their coffles to lead weights and. . .” He made a little swooping motion with his hand to indicate sinking. Stanhope’s stomach lurched. “Nine years ago, in ‘51, they found the ship floating completely empty off the coast of Cuba. No slaves, no crew, no Captain. No one knows why. They converted her to a merchantman, took out the shelves and the chains, sold her to the current owners and hired me to sail her.” He took a sip of wine. “Now the ship is haunted, though. You can hear them down in the hold, if you listen at the right time. you can smell them. And that’s why I keep hiring new crews, and that’s why the owners sent you to investigate.”
The door opened and the first mate stuck his head in. “Needed on deck, Cap’n,” the big man mumbled. “Sails.”
Wallace shook his head. “Pray continue eating. I’ll be right back.” As he stood, Stanhope noticed what looked like a small wine stain on the Captain’s sleeve. He pointed it out as the Captain left the room.
Wallace’s smile was thin. “That’s not wine, Mister Stanhope.” He rubbed a blunt finger across the stain and brought it to his lips, tasting it. Then he was gone and striding up to the deck.
Cradling the tea cup in her hands, Abigail clumsily sipped tea before turning to Stanhope. “It’s from the beatings,” she said helpfully. “Daddy has a knout.”
Stanhope was startled. “What?”
Abigail pointed over to the far wall, where an odd knobbed bone leaned against a corner. “It’s a knout, like a whip. He found it washed up on a beach. Daddy uses it to beat people to death when they’ve been bad. And when they’ve touched me. People don’t touch me much any more.” She sounded sad.
“He. . . he does?” The slender end of the flogging stick was tinted red, and the knobbed end was worn from long use. Stanhope turned his gaze back to the girl. “What is it, anyways?”
“It’s a bone from a whale’s pizzle,” said Abigail. She took another drooling sip of tea that extended the food stains on her dress front, but took no notice. “That’s what Daddy said. If people want to put their pizzle in me, they’ll get beaten to death with one. He uses it for other punishments, too. It makes people scream very loudly. The three kings tell us not to ruin the merchandise, though. That’s important. ” Her eyes lit up, and she put one hand on Stanhope’s leg as she leaned forward with curiosity. “Say, do you have a pizzle?”
Just then the door opened behind them, and Stanhope almost knocked over the table leaping to his feet. “Did I miss anything?” asked the Captain as he reentered the room.
“Daddy, I was just asking Mr. Stanhope about his -- ”
“It’s a boring job, Miss Wallace,” interrupted the auditor. “Truly it is.” As soon as protocol allowed, Stanhope claimed seasickness and bid his good evening to the Captain and the girl. He was conscious of both parties watching him as he left the cabin, one with adoration and one with unalloyed suspicion. For some reason he thought again of the weevils in the bread, and he managed to make it to the rail before getting sick.
Within a week, the auditor had begun to think that Captain Wallace may not have been lying. He was certainly a brutal sadist with a beautiful half-wit for a daughter, but he must have been convincing; the auditor’s dreams had been haunted for several nights with dreams of being chained in a stinking, claustrophobic hell of bodies and disease. Twice he’d woken up screaming, sure that he was chained to someone only inches away. The entire crew seemed subdued. Perhaps that was because Wallace was giving an average of one beating a day with the whalebone knout. No one had been killed yet, but with the Captain willing to flog more the mildest of offenses it was only a matter of time. No wonder he loses every crew, thought Stanhope. I’d desert the bastard myself.
Stanhope wanted to see the old logs, though, and Wallace wouldn’t show them to him. Three requests had produced angrier and angrier responses, and Stanhope was now convinced that Wallace was hiding something. The question was, what to do about it?
He glanced out the porthole. Dusk was falling and a storm was blowing in; he knew that Captain Wallace would be on deck for at least the next hour. He took his oil lantern and slipped out of his tiny cabin.
Up on deck, the rigging was groaning horribly every time the Three Kings wallowed and pitched in the trough of a wave. Talk about suggestible, he thought. That really does sound like people screaming. And what’s that smell? Sewage? As he made his way across the swaying deck towards the Captain’s quarters, he felt something nagging at him. Something he should remember but couldn’t, something important that had been chased out by his over-active imagination. Damn it, there are no slaves down there, Stanhope thought. I’ve been in the hold. It’s full of fabric and goods. Not bodies. Quit imagining things. Clinging to the rail as the ship rolled, Stanhope stared at the hatch down to the hold beneath his feet until stinging droplets of rain began to pelt him from above.
He quietly pulled the Captain’s door open when there was no answer to his knock. The cabin was dark. He shut the door behind him and made his way to the large desk in the corner. Turning up the light of his lantern, it didn’t take him long to discover the hidden log books from previous voyages.
Abigail found him there fifteen minutes later when she entered her father’s cabin. Stanhope wasn’t precisely in a romantic mood. Instead he was full of fury, his previous nervous vaporings forgotten. “Girl,” he barked from behind the desk, “why is it that your father hasn’t paid off a single crewman from the last three voyages? That’s why he’s made such a profit. He isn’t paying wages to anyone but the officers. Why not? They can’t all have deserted.”
Abigail stood framed in the doorway, the pale lamplight glinting from her spectacles. Her eyes were wide as she closed the hatch behind her. “Because of the three kings, of course,” she answered. “Daddy and the safe men brought in the boat by themselves. They always do for the last day.”
“What?” Stanhope was perplexed. “What do you mean? Are you talking about the ship itself?”
“No, silly!” Abigail nimbly crossed the cabin. “The treasure. It goes with the ship. Daddy found it hidden in the figurehead when he first claimed it. He won’t let me touch it. It’s very old, older than the ship. The Three Kings.” She pouted and pointed to a sea chest behind Stanhope. He turned and jiggled the lid, expecting it to be locked. It seemed to be at first, but then opened smoothly with an oily click. Not knowing what to expect, Stanhope raised the lid.
They looked almost like chess pieces, and the shadow around them seemed alive. They were the only thing in the chest. Then the reek of the dead air assaulted his nostrils.
yOu ARe eaRlY.
We dID nOt ExPEct thE OfFerINgS so SoON.
wE WiLL ceLeBrATe yoUr GiFts.
He realized with a shock that he hadn’t actually heard a thing. The voices slid into his brain through his nose. The smell coming from the statuettes was the reek of a sulpherous charnal house. He smelled rotting flesh and human waste and the sharp pang of fear, but the odors somehow carried voices.
“As we celebrate yours!” Abigail said gaily from behind him. “I’ve certainly missed you.” Stanhope spun and gaped at her.
WE sMeLl yOur bLoOD uPoN ThE sEa.
tHe olD bOUnTy dIes qUiCKly, aNd SomEOnE mUSt RoW.
ShAlL wE CoMe nOW fOr tHAt WhICh yoU oFfEr?
“Why, yes, please!” said Abigail. “How fun. You’ll love seeing this, Mr. Stanhope. They come and get the merchandise from us. It’s truly a sight to see.”
Merchandise? wondered Stanhope. The fabrics? Then Abigail’s words during dinner struck him, and he remembered what had been nagging at him. “The three kings tell us not to ruin the merchandise, though.” But at the time they had been talking about punishing the crew! Understanding flooded in, and he gazed in horror at the three simple statues.
Suddenly he realized that the ship had stopped pitching. He glanced out the porthole on the wall beside him, and with a thrill of horror saw that the nighttime sea and its accompanying storm had been replaced with. . . emptiness. Empty sky, empty sea, nothing there but shadow and scent. They had left the ocean. It was more terrifying than he could have imagined. He heard the crew screaming from the deck above, but he somehow felt utterly alone.
Then Abigail was beside him, murmuring and groping at his clothing, trying to pull him onto the desk as her spectacles slipped from her nose. He fought back his panic long enough to focus on what she was saying.
“Don’t worry, silly, they’re not actually demons. They have too many legs for that. Or not enough.” She pursed her lips. “It’s a little hard to tell. They’ll come now, and they’ll take away what they need, just like they always have. You called them this time instead of Daddy, so you must claim me. I wonder if they mind that? I’ll stay with you if I can.” She looked up at him, her eyes calm and trusting, but in her excitement she had begun to slobber. “Can we send away my Daddy? That way I can be yours forever and ever and he can be with all the others in the bad place. We’ll get more ships, and more, and the more gifts we give the stronger we’ll be!” Her laugh was like tinkling crystal. As she slipped her hand up his leg he reflexively looked over to the wall where Wallace kept his knout. It was gone.
“We’ve got to stop this.” He pushed her away and turned back to the chest with the hideous figurines in it. There he froze. Somehow, the pieces of roughly carved stone were examining him, and the miasma rose up around him once again.
uNExPecTEd. YoU aRe NOt HE whO HAs cALlEd uS beFoRe.
UNfOrtUnATe.
tEMeRitY.
“Oh God oh God.” From above he heard the furious roar of the captain from somewhere far off, the swish of the whalebone whip, the pounding of feet overhead. He realized that he was probably doomed. He tore himself from Abgail’s greedy hands and ran back to the porthole.
The smell from outside was abhorrent. It was fear and sweat and filth, the scent of disease. He squinted, and where there had been mist was now. . . something. A ship? Yes, rowed by the screams of a thousand human souls, but also a face and a fish. Maybe even something more. Three recognizable things. Three Kings. Of Hell? Maybe, reflected Stanhope, of someplace worse. He felt his mind peeling away a layer at a time, like an onion rotting in the sun, and he wailed as he dashed back to the chest. Abigail waited for him there, but he fell to his knees over the darkness and screamed into the spreading void.
“I supercede the Captain! I represent the owners of this ship, who can fire the Captain whenever they want. Oh please, please, listen to me, I do!” He was grasping at straws, but he babbled it again and again to the tiny figurines.
hE WHo coMmANds CarRIeS tHE buRdEN OF sIn.
Do YOu aCCePT thIs bURdEn?
tHe REwaRdS arE PaLPaBLe.
Stanhope hesitated, weighing costs that he couldn’t even guess at. He could hear the slaves now, screaming and sobbing, just as he could hear the crew of the Three Kings praying or panicking. He could feel Abigail’s hot breath against her neck and her hands in his hair.
He rested his forehead against the edge of the chest, and his tears fell into the darkness around the statuettes. He thought about how many ships the owners controlled, how many he could control himself as he rose in the business. He wondered how many sailors would be missed. He felt himself slipping through icy water, chained to a hundred other souls. He felt hot breath on the back of his neck.
He chose.
-- o --
A sip of tea: Abigail’s unfortunate first impression
Bullwhip: the Captain’s knout, a bone whip made from certain portions of a whale
3 Kings: the representations of those who claim the offering
Oval: the porthole looking onto dimness
Nexus: the slave ship of the three kings, crewed by those already given over
Autumn 2004 Round 2-4: MarauderX vs. Piratecat
The Three Kings was five days out of Brighton before Jasper Stanhope was invited to the Captain’s mess. The young auditor had been virtually ignored since he had first stepped onto the deck, and he still didn’t have his sea legs yet. He had spent most of the time lying in his canvas hammock within a sweltering storeroom. Every pitch and yaw of the vessel was reflected within his aching stomach, and the notion of dining with the captain was less than enticing. He couldn’t afford to be rude, however. Too much was at stake.
“Mister Stanhope. I’m Captain Wallace.” The captain didn’t rise as Stanhope ducked through the low door and entered the cabin. Wallace was dressed in a pristine white uniform. Seated next to him at the small table was an attractive young woman in a surprisingly formal silk dress. No other crew was present, but the table was laden with dishes of food. Captain Wallace already clenched a spoon in one calloused hand, a bowl of stew in front of him.
Stanhope gave a small bow. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Captain.” He gave another bow to the girl. “I hope I’m not late.”
Wallace’s voice had a burr of the north country to it, and hostility was evident. “You are. We’ve been waiting three minutes. We started without you.” He squinted at Stanhope. “Did ye get lost?”
Stanhope gave a polite chuckle as he sat down at the end of the table across from the Captain. No one else echoed it. Stanhope cleared his throat.
“May I ask, sir, who is the lovely young lady dining with us?” The girl was fifteen or so, fine-boned with wide blue eyes behind small spectacles. She turned her head towards Stanhope and smiled, and he was appalled to see that she had accidentally dribbled stew down her chin and the front of her silk dress. She didn’t seem to have noticed, or if she did she didn’t care. Stanhope wondered if the girl was somewhat touched in the head.
Captain Wallace cleared his throat. “This is my daughter, Abigail.” He nodded at her. “Say hello to the auditor, Abigail.” He made it sound like an insult. He probably means it as one, Stanhope thought.
Abigail looked over into Stanhope’s face and smiled. “Hello,” she said shyly. Stanhope smiled back at her, silently cringing at her slovenly table manners, and when he turned back was shocked to see the fury dancing behind the Captain’s eyes.
“Abigail comes on all of my voyages with me,” said the Captain. “I bring her to keep her safe. She’s a very special girl, and not one to mix with the sailors. Talking to her without my express permission will get a man lashed, and if anyone ever had the stupidity to touch her I’d murder the bastard. Do you ken what I’m saying?” His index finger tapped against the table, keeping time with every syllable. His face was red, and he looked as scared as he did angry.
“Of course,” Stanhope said smoothly. He tried not to glance over at Abigail, who was still dripping sauce down her front as she looked at him. “A commendable attitude, I’m sure.” Stanhope felt nervous bile rising in his throat. He’d do it, too, Stanhope realized, and the Good Lord pity anyone who would be so stupid as to steal away Wallace’s poor excuse of a daughter. He groped for a change of subject.
“It looks like you run a fine ship, Captain. I haven’t had a chance yet to talk to any of your crew or officers, but they seem to be the model of efficiency.”
Wallace eyed him. “Why’d you want to talk to them, then? You’ve no reason to.”
Stanhope raised his eyebrows. “Captain, you know my duty. . .”
The man across from him clenched one fist. “Indeed I do, sir. And I know my officers. Unlike my crew, they’ve been with me for many a run. They’re fine men, each of them. Busy men. They know how to run a ship.” The captain smirked. “Do you know how to run a ship, Mister Stanhope?”
“Well, no, Captain,” said Stanhope carefully. “That’s not my job.”
The captain’s voice was steady. “Then ye’ll stay the hell out of their way or by the powers I’ll throw ye overboard.”
“Captain, I. . .”
“Make no mistake about it, Mister Stanhope.” The captain leaned forward over the wooden table, one square fist planted solidly in his daughter’s plate of food. Beans slid like oozing blood around his clenched knuckles, but neither of them seemed to notice. His voice was low and hard to hear at first over the constant creaking of the ship. “My officers know that I don’t care for extraneous passengers on my voyages. I especially don’t care for company auditors who wish to count pennies and grade how I conduct my business. The Three Kings is an old ship but a sound one, and it’s hauling the cargo it was made for. It’s not designed for lubbers who think they’ve a right to tell me how to handle my affairs!” His rising voice was close to bellowing by the time he finished.
He’s covering something. “That’s not my job, Captain.” Stanhope managed a quick and sincere smile as he lied. “You haven’t been doing anything wrong. Quite the reverse, actually. Your voyages are substantially more profitable than the average for our vessels. The owners have asked me to study your methods and determine what things you are doing which bring you such great success. My presence here isn’t a punishment or a threat, and I’m sorry if you somehow thought it was.”
Wallace grunted and jabbed a piece of chewy beef into his mouth. “Is that so?” He sounded suspicious.
“Yes indeed.” Stanhope broke open a ship’s biscuit and was surprised to see weevils dropping onto his bread plate. They squirmed there, legs waving in the humid air. Weevils in the bread already? wondered the auditor. We just set out from port! No one else seemed to notice. Across from him, the Captain stuffed a biscuit into his mouth whole, chewing loudly before washing it down with a swig of wine. Stanhope surreptitiously pushed the bread plate away from him. The next time his gaze fell on it, the weevils were gone.
“You’ll probably notice the crew slaving away up on deck,” said the Captain with an odd smile.
“Indeed.” Stanhope looked up expectantly.
“That’s not true slaving, Mister Stanhope. We both know that you’re here to find out why I have to hire on an entirely new crew every time I reach port.”
Cutting right to the chase, thought Stanhope. He nodded.
“I thought as much. The Three Kings is haunted. That’s the reason. If ye had asked before we left port, ye could still be on dry land.”
Stanhope blinked. To his right, Abigail dabbed at her lips with a napkin, completely missing the trail of gristle and sauce that descended from her chin. “Haunted?”
“Aye.” The older man leaned back in his chair. “It’s got a foul spirit on board, and a terrible curse. She used to be a slave ship running black ivory through the middle passage. She sailed under a captain named Gibbs. Y’heard of him? He was infamous. Over twenty runs, six to eight weeks at sea each way, over four hundred Africans chained in the hold every time. He packed them in, did Gibbs, right tightly. Legend has it that he dumped more than five loads.”
Stanhope felt sick. “Dumped. . .?”
Wallace was enjoying himself at Stanhope’s discomfort. “Supposedly he was chased by military vessels, but by the time they overhauled him there wasn’t a negro on board. Probably hooked their coffles to lead weights and. . .” He made a little swooping motion with his hand to indicate sinking. Stanhope’s stomach lurched. “Nine years ago, in ‘51, they found the ship floating completely empty off the coast of Cuba. No slaves, no crew, no Captain. No one knows why. They converted her to a merchantman, took out the shelves and the chains, sold her to the current owners and hired me to sail her.” He took a sip of wine. “Now the ship is haunted, though. You can hear them down in the hold, if you listen at the right time. you can smell them. And that’s why I keep hiring new crews, and that’s why the owners sent you to investigate.”
The door opened and the first mate stuck his head in. “Needed on deck, Cap’n,” the big man mumbled. “Sails.”
Wallace shook his head. “Pray continue eating. I’ll be right back.” As he stood, Stanhope noticed what looked like a small wine stain on the Captain’s sleeve. He pointed it out as the Captain left the room.
Wallace’s smile was thin. “That’s not wine, Mister Stanhope.” He rubbed a blunt finger across the stain and brought it to his lips, tasting it. Then he was gone and striding up to the deck.
Cradling the tea cup in her hands, Abigail clumsily sipped tea before turning to Stanhope. “It’s from the beatings,” she said helpfully. “Daddy has a knout.”
Stanhope was startled. “What?”
Abigail pointed over to the far wall, where an odd knobbed bone leaned against a corner. “It’s a knout, like a whip. He found it washed up on a beach. Daddy uses it to beat people to death when they’ve been bad. And when they’ve touched me. People don’t touch me much any more.” She sounded sad.
“He. . . he does?” The slender end of the flogging stick was tinted red, and the knobbed end was worn from long use. Stanhope turned his gaze back to the girl. “What is it, anyways?”
“It’s a bone from a whale’s pizzle,” said Abigail. She took another drooling sip of tea that extended the food stains on her dress front, but took no notice. “That’s what Daddy said. If people want to put their pizzle in me, they’ll get beaten to death with one. He uses it for other punishments, too. It makes people scream very loudly. The three kings tell us not to ruin the merchandise, though. That’s important. ” Her eyes lit up, and she put one hand on Stanhope’s leg as she leaned forward with curiosity. “Say, do you have a pizzle?”
Just then the door opened behind them, and Stanhope almost knocked over the table leaping to his feet. “Did I miss anything?” asked the Captain as he reentered the room.
“Daddy, I was just asking Mr. Stanhope about his -- ”
“It’s a boring job, Miss Wallace,” interrupted the auditor. “Truly it is.” As soon as protocol allowed, Stanhope claimed seasickness and bid his good evening to the Captain and the girl. He was conscious of both parties watching him as he left the cabin, one with adoration and one with unalloyed suspicion. For some reason he thought again of the weevils in the bread, and he managed to make it to the rail before getting sick.
Within a week, the auditor had begun to think that Captain Wallace may not have been lying. He was certainly a brutal sadist with a beautiful half-wit for a daughter, but he must have been convincing; the auditor’s dreams had been haunted for several nights with dreams of being chained in a stinking, claustrophobic hell of bodies and disease. Twice he’d woken up screaming, sure that he was chained to someone only inches away. The entire crew seemed subdued. Perhaps that was because Wallace was giving an average of one beating a day with the whalebone knout. No one had been killed yet, but with the Captain willing to flog more the mildest of offenses it was only a matter of time. No wonder he loses every crew, thought Stanhope. I’d desert the bastard myself.
Stanhope wanted to see the old logs, though, and Wallace wouldn’t show them to him. Three requests had produced angrier and angrier responses, and Stanhope was now convinced that Wallace was hiding something. The question was, what to do about it?
He glanced out the porthole. Dusk was falling and a storm was blowing in; he knew that Captain Wallace would be on deck for at least the next hour. He took his oil lantern and slipped out of his tiny cabin.
Up on deck, the rigging was groaning horribly every time the Three Kings wallowed and pitched in the trough of a wave. Talk about suggestible, he thought. That really does sound like people screaming. And what’s that smell? Sewage? As he made his way across the swaying deck towards the Captain’s quarters, he felt something nagging at him. Something he should remember but couldn’t, something important that had been chased out by his over-active imagination. Damn it, there are no slaves down there, Stanhope thought. I’ve been in the hold. It’s full of fabric and goods. Not bodies. Quit imagining things. Clinging to the rail as the ship rolled, Stanhope stared at the hatch down to the hold beneath his feet until stinging droplets of rain began to pelt him from above.
He quietly pulled the Captain’s door open when there was no answer to his knock. The cabin was dark. He shut the door behind him and made his way to the large desk in the corner. Turning up the light of his lantern, it didn’t take him long to discover the hidden log books from previous voyages.
Abigail found him there fifteen minutes later when she entered her father’s cabin. Stanhope wasn’t precisely in a romantic mood. Instead he was full of fury, his previous nervous vaporings forgotten. “Girl,” he barked from behind the desk, “why is it that your father hasn’t paid off a single crewman from the last three voyages? That’s why he’s made such a profit. He isn’t paying wages to anyone but the officers. Why not? They can’t all have deserted.”
Abigail stood framed in the doorway, the pale lamplight glinting from her spectacles. Her eyes were wide as she closed the hatch behind her. “Because of the three kings, of course,” she answered. “Daddy and the safe men brought in the boat by themselves. They always do for the last day.”
“What?” Stanhope was perplexed. “What do you mean? Are you talking about the ship itself?”
“No, silly!” Abigail nimbly crossed the cabin. “The treasure. It goes with the ship. Daddy found it hidden in the figurehead when he first claimed it. He won’t let me touch it. It’s very old, older than the ship. The Three Kings.” She pouted and pointed to a sea chest behind Stanhope. He turned and jiggled the lid, expecting it to be locked. It seemed to be at first, but then opened smoothly with an oily click. Not knowing what to expect, Stanhope raised the lid.
They looked almost like chess pieces, and the shadow around them seemed alive. They were the only thing in the chest. Then the reek of the dead air assaulted his nostrils.
yOu ARe eaRlY.
We dID nOt ExPEct thE OfFerINgS so SoON.
wE WiLL ceLeBrATe yoUr GiFts.
He realized with a shock that he hadn’t actually heard a thing. The voices slid into his brain through his nose. The smell coming from the statuettes was the reek of a sulpherous charnal house. He smelled rotting flesh and human waste and the sharp pang of fear, but the odors somehow carried voices.
“As we celebrate yours!” Abigail said gaily from behind him. “I’ve certainly missed you.” Stanhope spun and gaped at her.
WE sMeLl yOur bLoOD uPoN ThE sEa.
tHe olD bOUnTy dIes qUiCKly, aNd SomEOnE mUSt RoW.
ShAlL wE CoMe nOW fOr tHAt WhICh yoU oFfEr?
“Why, yes, please!” said Abigail. “How fun. You’ll love seeing this, Mr. Stanhope. They come and get the merchandise from us. It’s truly a sight to see.”
Merchandise? wondered Stanhope. The fabrics? Then Abigail’s words during dinner struck him, and he remembered what had been nagging at him. “The three kings tell us not to ruin the merchandise, though.” But at the time they had been talking about punishing the crew! Understanding flooded in, and he gazed in horror at the three simple statues.
Suddenly he realized that the ship had stopped pitching. He glanced out the porthole on the wall beside him, and with a thrill of horror saw that the nighttime sea and its accompanying storm had been replaced with. . . emptiness. Empty sky, empty sea, nothing there but shadow and scent. They had left the ocean. It was more terrifying than he could have imagined. He heard the crew screaming from the deck above, but he somehow felt utterly alone.
Then Abigail was beside him, murmuring and groping at his clothing, trying to pull him onto the desk as her spectacles slipped from her nose. He fought back his panic long enough to focus on what she was saying.
“Don’t worry, silly, they’re not actually demons. They have too many legs for that. Or not enough.” She pursed her lips. “It’s a little hard to tell. They’ll come now, and they’ll take away what they need, just like they always have. You called them this time instead of Daddy, so you must claim me. I wonder if they mind that? I’ll stay with you if I can.” She looked up at him, her eyes calm and trusting, but in her excitement she had begun to slobber. “Can we send away my Daddy? That way I can be yours forever and ever and he can be with all the others in the bad place. We’ll get more ships, and more, and the more gifts we give the stronger we’ll be!” Her laugh was like tinkling crystal. As she slipped her hand up his leg he reflexively looked over to the wall where Wallace kept his knout. It was gone.
“We’ve got to stop this.” He pushed her away and turned back to the chest with the hideous figurines in it. There he froze. Somehow, the pieces of roughly carved stone were examining him, and the miasma rose up around him once again.
uNExPecTEd. YoU aRe NOt HE whO HAs cALlEd uS beFoRe.
UNfOrtUnATe.
tEMeRitY.
“Oh God oh God.” From above he heard the furious roar of the captain from somewhere far off, the swish of the whalebone whip, the pounding of feet overhead. He realized that he was probably doomed. He tore himself from Abgail’s greedy hands and ran back to the porthole.
The smell from outside was abhorrent. It was fear and sweat and filth, the scent of disease. He squinted, and where there had been mist was now. . . something. A ship? Yes, rowed by the screams of a thousand human souls, but also a face and a fish. Maybe even something more. Three recognizable things. Three Kings. Of Hell? Maybe, reflected Stanhope, of someplace worse. He felt his mind peeling away a layer at a time, like an onion rotting in the sun, and he wailed as he dashed back to the chest. Abigail waited for him there, but he fell to his knees over the darkness and screamed into the spreading void.
“I supercede the Captain! I represent the owners of this ship, who can fire the Captain whenever they want. Oh please, please, listen to me, I do!” He was grasping at straws, but he babbled it again and again to the tiny figurines.
hE WHo coMmANds CarRIeS tHE buRdEN OF sIn.
Do YOu aCCePT thIs bURdEn?
tHe REwaRdS arE PaLPaBLe.
Stanhope hesitated, weighing costs that he couldn’t even guess at. He could hear the slaves now, screaming and sobbing, just as he could hear the crew of the Three Kings praying or panicking. He could feel Abigail’s hot breath against her neck and her hands in his hair.
He rested his forehead against the edge of the chest, and his tears fell into the darkness around the statuettes. He thought about how many ships the owners controlled, how many he could control himself as he rose in the business. He wondered how many sailors would be missed. He felt himself slipping through icy water, chained to a hundred other souls. He felt hot breath on the back of his neck.
He chose.
-- o --
A sip of tea: Abigail’s unfortunate first impression
Bullwhip: the Captain’s knout, a bone whip made from certain portions of a whale
3 Kings: the representations of those who claim the offering
Oval: the porthole looking onto dimness
Nexus: the slave ship of the three kings, crewed by those already given over
Rodrigo Istalindir
Explorer
Piratecat said:Before I got the photos I had been hoping to write something cheerful and happy, but it just didn't work out that way.
Cheerful and happy are overrated.
I'd been hoping to do another Kylo Krumboldt story, but it hasn't been in the cards. err..pictures.
Rodrigo Istalindir
Explorer
Berandor said:
D'oh.
Cut and paste only works if I remember to paste. Since you're asking, I hope I'm not violating the no-edit rule
"Anders willed himself to relax, extending his paranormal senses outwards. He saw the hallway outside, saw the elevator doors open, saw his former colleagues enter the small enclosure, saw them press the button that would take them to the lobby. (Picture 5)"
