Salveran Tides

Chapter Three: The Seas of Salveras

It's almost too beautiful, the Main is. That's what worries me the most. Waters this gorgeous are often the ones that hide the most secrets. (Taken from the journal of a nameless pirate, found in a shipwreck on an island with no name.)

Leona stared up at the light filtering through the deck hatch. It gave her some perspective to the rocking of the boat, though she had no idea how fast they were going. The glimpses of clouds she caught looking up could have been moving in synch with the boat, or the other way around. The only thing she knew for sure was that only one night had passed, and that Scarlet and her companion had spent a large amount of it making noise. She had a firm idea about what had been going on, and it had been hard to sleep.

She took a breath, smelling salt and moisture on the air. It was thick and heavy - a storm was likely on the way. She'd never experienced any kind of surface weather before, her only experience with rain being to watch the droplets plink on the underside of the surface. But she knew what water smelled like.

The hatch clanked, then lifted away. Scarlet's boot thunked down on the wooden steps, followed by the rest of the woman. She'd put her clothes back on, at least, though Leona wondered what state of dress her companion would be in. "Good morning, Princess," the pirate said. She hitched her hip and put a hand on it. Even in the low light of the hold, Leona could see a tinge of flush to the human's skin. "Sleep well?"

Leona gave her a flat look. "Like the dead," she deadpanned. "Couldn't hear a thing. No enthusiastic moaning, no limbs thudding on the floor..."

Scarlet snickered. "Yesseil's a tad loud at times, don't worry."

"What are you doing here?"

"Can't have you sitting down here festering and getting in a bad mood now can I?" Scarlet reached into her pocket and pulled out a length of rope. "'Tis a lovely day outside."

"Not for much longer," Leona said. "It's going to rain soon."

"Aye, I feel it too." Scarlet winked. "If I've sailed through one storm I've sailed through them all. Come on, up and at 'em."

Leona stared at the rope, then at the human's face. "Is this...is this your attempt at being nice?"

"Perhaps." Wary of the ulterior motive that Scarlet no doubt had, Leona raised her arms in front of her. Scarlet smirked. "Nice try."

Before Leona could blink, Scarlet pounced and hogtied her. Leona wriggled and flailed. "You're incorrigible!" Leona spat.

"It's a point of pride," Scarlet said. She grabbed the top length of the rope and hauled Leona up out of the hold onto the deck. The clear blue sea stretched out for miles around them. For the most part the skies were clear, save for large white clouds in the distance behind them.

Scarlet hauled her over to the mast and tied her to a steel eyelet driven into the wood with another length of rope. Leona snapped at her captor, her teeth chomping down an inch from Scarlet's arm. "Oy, when I want you to bite me I'll bloody well ask you to," Scarlet said.

"If you think someone like you would

ever

get a piece of this, you truly are mad," Leona said.

Scarlet's smirk only deepened. "I don't have enough fingers to count how many times I've heard some variation of that statement in my life, Princess." She tied the knot, then leaned over Leona. Her hair fell down around her face in a crimson veil, accentuating her heterochromic eyes. "It always ends the same way. Yesseil can attest to that."

The arrogance,

Leona thought.

The sheer arrogance. I've never met anyone who carries themselves the way she does. Just because she's deadly and gorgeous doesn't mean she has the right to do whatever she wants.

She paused.

Objectively. She's

objectively

gorgeous.

Footsteps sounded near the cabin as Yesseil emerged. She brushed a lock of hair away from her face with a single finger, the motion smooth and elegant. Leona knew what an elf was, of course, but she'd never had the chance to meet one. Such a meeting was a little tricky given her aquatic home.

Her mother had never bothered to mention how pretty they were.

The elf was holding a mechanical device of some kind in one hand and a small sack in the other. "Are we on course?" she asked Scarlet as she moved to what little shade their was in the lee of the cabin.

"I just lashed the tiller right," Scarlet said, moving away from Leona to sit with Yesseil. "If this wind holds and we keep ahead of the front behind us we should be in Port Corrin by morning."

Yesseil opened up the sack and passed Scarlet a small sliver of stone. "And then we hope Lexaeus hasn't met his fate."

Scarlet pulled out her knife and the cutlass she'd stolen from one of the men who had tried to steal the ship the day before. She ran the stone along the edge of the latter, angling it to grind the blade back to sharpness. "And if he has, we pay the governess a little visit."

"Who is Lexaeus?" Leona asked. "And what fate awaits him?"

"My first mate," Scarlet said, continuing with her sharpening as Yesseil withdrew small metal objects out of the sack and began to affix them to the device in her other hand. "A more stalwart man you'll find nowhere else. The fate that awaits him - the one we're trying to prevent, mind you - is death, Princess."

"Seems like the fate all of you are trying to avoid," Leona said.

"True," Scarlet admitted, switching from the cutlass to work on her knife. "But Lady Zella has a particular hatred for Lexaeus. Last I checked her governorship's reward for him was twice mine."

"What did he do, kill her children?"

"Child, singular." Scarlet's next whetstone stroke was particularly strong. "And even if he was technically an adult by age, his demeanor was that of a petulant little shit. Though all this happened before I met him. We've had a few run-ins with her soldiers over the years. Sank about a dozen ships flying her banner. We'll keep doing it after this, too."

Leona glowered at her. "Your cavalier attitude about murder is doing little to endear me to you."

"Their life or mine," Scarlet said, as if that made anything clear.

Leona shifted her gaze to Yesseil. The elf lifted the device in her hand up to her face, closing one eye and looking down the length of it. As Leona examined it, she realized it was a weapon of some kind. The main body looked like a larger version of the pistols that she'd seen used many times already, with some modifications. At the end of the barrel were two fins, one atop the weapon and one on the underside. A length of wire linked the two fins, disappearing into the weapon's barrel. On the side was a lever on a track with a handle that could be drawn back by hand. "What are you making?" she asked the elf.

Yesseil's head jerked up from her tinkering, as if she was surprised she'd been addressed. "Oh! Erm, I, right. I'm making a crossbow. But better!"

Leona's new mental encyclopedia of human terms, now firmly entrenched in her subconscious, conjured up an image of a blocky wooden weapon. It

did

resemble the weapon that the elf was making, albeit turned ninety degrees in its orientation. "I...see," she said. "Is this what you normally do?"

"Yesseil's the best gunsmith in Siraglia," Scarlet said, and for once Leona didn't pick up a hint of sarcasm or irony in the pirate's tone. "Her equipment always set us a cut above every other ship on the Main."

The elf blushed to the tips of her ears. "It's not like my ideas are visionary or anything! A lot of them are just common sense improvements to existing designs."

"Far too many human designers stick to what's worked and never bother to think of ways to make it better," Scarlet said, spinning her knife around her finger. THe blade winked in the sunlight. "By nature, your ideas blow theirs out of the water."

Yesseil's blush deepened. "Oh, stop."

Scarlet leaned into the elf's side, making the elf giggle. The interaction was in stark contrast to almost everything she'd seen from Scarlet so far, and it made Leona uneasy. How could a woman so bloodthirsty switch it off like it didn't exist and be so affectionate? There was no way it could be authentic. She had to be manipulating the elf.

Maybe that was her way out.

"Have you known Scarlet long?" Leona asked Yesseil.

"A few years," the elf said, slotting a small rod into the weapon she was building. "I took a break to pursue my own ventures but it...didn't quite work."

"I said I was sorry," Scarlet said.

"You owe me big time."

"I'll make it up to you." Scarlet nosed along the elf's ear. "Promise."

Evidently, Leona had missed something stuck in the hold the day before. "And have you two always been this...affectionate?"

Yesseil bit her lip. "It took a little while," she admitted.

Scarlet looked at Leona with intent, her eyes narrowed slightly. She had to know that Leona was fishing for information. But she didn't tell Yesseil to not answer any questions. The pirate simply rose, sheathing her weapons in her belt. "I'm going to check the tiller," she said, before walking away.

Both Leona and Yesseil watched her go, then the elf turned back to her work. Leona leaned forward as much as she could, speaking in a low voice. "Listen, please. I don't know what history you have with Scarlet, but I feel like it should be enough for you to avoid the consequences of betrayal. Cut me loose, I beg of you."

The elf narrowed her eyes at her. "And why would I do that?"

Leona felt her heart sink. "Because..."

"Let me make something clear," Yesseil said. She slotted the final part into her crossbow, the metal setting into place with a loud click. "Do I always agree with Scarlet's methods? No. As a matter of fact I often wish she'd temper her brutality. But that is simply the way of things out here. I cannot pretend to know what life underwater is like, but here on the Main, between corrupt island governors and the Church forces, things are dangerous." She reached up and touched the tips of her pointed ears. "Things tend to not go well for elves unless I'm part of a group that I can rely on to protect me."

"That is

not

what I would call what Scarlet gets up to."

"You're allowed to think that," Yesseil said. She pulled back on the handle on the side of the crossbow. The motion pulled the string back into a V-shape, the fins of the bow bending backwards. "But you don't seem to fully grasp how things work up here yet."

"It's not as if I'm here of my own free will," Leona hissed, her anger coming to the fore. "I have no idea how I wound up on that accursed beach in Scarlet's captivity."

"But you're here now, aren't you?" Yesseil stood up in a fluid motion, her face impassive. "And I won't betray Scarlet. Not after all she's done for me." The elf walked away, ducking back into the cabin with her weapon underneath her arm.

Leona cursed and leaned back against the mast. Her impulsive plan to escape and figure out a way to get her necklace back later was, for lack of a better turn of phrase, dead in the water. She had underestimated Yesseil's loyalty to Scarlet. They obviously had more history than she'd counted on...or the elf was scared of the pirate.

Said pirate returned a moment later, that infuriating smug grin on her face. "Nice try," she said.

Leona hung her head, unable to even muster up a response. She really had underestimated the human. Scarlet moved inside the cabin to join Yesseil, leaving Leona tied to the mast under the sun.

All alone with her thoughts, Leona stewed. She cursed her predicament. What cruel twist of fate had put her in this mess? Her memories past waking up on the beach had a giant hole in them.

Her journey had begun a few days prior, in her home. Leona's mother Setrion ruled over the Altaean kingdom underneath the waves from their capital in Riesla. Due to their underwater domain, they had no enemies from above. The biggest threat to their domiciles was usually just the wayward kraken that got big ideas in its bulbous head.

Then the Forsaken had shown up and Leona's brother had vanished. Since her mother seemed to have little interest in emerging from her turtled up state, Leona had struck out on her own. The Altaeans had the entire sea to themselves, and the seabed was dotted with ruins and temples. Surely there was something in one of them that could help. It was when she'd been exploring one of those ruins that she'd been incapacitated and wound up on the beach.

She had no idea how long it had been since her being knocked unconscious. It hadn't been a blow that had done anything, just a shadow in the side of her vision and then blackness. For all she knew she could've been knocked out with magic and put in suspended animation for a century, drifting aimlessly on the tide. There was no way to tell.

Leona growled in frustration and opened her eyes. The way she was tied up on the deck meant she was facing the rear - aft - end of the ship. Was it just her, or was the storm front speeding up?

She blinked, then narrowed her eyes, watching the storm. The clouds seemed to have added haste to their movements, coming together in mere minutes to form a massive thunderhead on the horizon behind them. The cloud grew larger and larger in quick time, lightning flashing within its depths. Only it wasn't the blue-white color that lightning should be, but a hellish, angry red.

Leona's eyes widened. Despite not having much of an aptitude for it, she knew magic when she saw it. "Scarlet!" she yelled. "Scarlet, get out here now!"

Nothing happened for a few moments. Then the pirate emerged from the rear cabin, barefoot and topless. Red bite marks colored her neck and breasts. "Considering I've never in all my years had a captive call

for

me rather than the other way around," the pirate said, "this had better be bloody good."

"The storm," Leona said nodding furiously with her head.

Scarlet moved out of the lee of the cabin to look behind the ship. "Aye, what about..." Her voice trailed off as she beheld the massive thunderhead, now even larger, bearing down on them. "Blimey, that fucker's big! Yesseil, shirt on, love! And bring me mine!"

The elf scampered out of the cabin a moment later, her hair mussed up and her own neck dotted with bite marks. She gasped at the sight of the storm. "What the-?" Her head snapped around to Leona. "Is this your doing?"

Leona was about to answer when Scarlet did it for her. "If it was, why would she warn us?" Scarlet said, grabbing her shirt from the elf and buttoning it up with quick motions. "Though honestly, not sure why she warned us in the first place. Thing would have crept up on us before we'd ever realize it, and she'd be home free." She shot Leona a glance. "Though I'd be remiss if I didn't say thank you."

Leona hadn't even given a second-thought to shouting a warning. Perhaps she should have - if the storm had caught the pirates off-guard, it might've been the end of the vessel, and she'd be back in the water where she belonged. However, that would mean Scarlet and Yesseil would drown. She just wanted to escape from her captors, not kill them in cold blood. "I don't suppose that means you'll let me loose?" she ventured.

Scarlet smirked. "I still have this." She pulled Leona's necklace out from inside her shirt and waved it back and forth. "Can't be leaving without the bauble, now can you?"

It's becoming more negotiable by the hour,

Leona thought, but didn't say aloud. That wasn't to say she wouldn't come back for it if she escaped without it, however.

Yesseil scrambled up the rigging to double-check all the knots holding the sails in place while Scarlet locked down everything else loose. In the short time it took them to do that, the thunderhead had gained major distance on them, blotting out almost the whole horizon behind the boat. The red lightning looked much more threatening now that it was closer, angry red scars that were there and gone in a flash.

"Well, I've seen many a thing out here on the Main," Scarlet said, tying her hair back with the bandanna, "but red lightning is a new one."

"It looks like it's magical in origin," Yesseil said, hanging onto the rigging above and looking behind her. "Though I can't imagine who could cast such a thing."

Scarlet looked at Leona. "Any ideas, Princess?"

The truth was Leona

did

have an idea, sort of. Magic did run strong in many Altaean bloodlines, the royals being no exception. Both Leona's parents were - or rather, in her father's case, had been - extraordinary magicians, and her younger brother Mikhail was no slouch either. But their magic had always been used for constructive purposes rather than destructive. Could another Altaean mage be doing this? A chilling thought occurred to her.

Or is this some manner of Forsaken magic? Am

I

the target?

A ferocious gust of wind almost blew Scarlet off her feet. The pirate dropped down to her knees, keeping her center of gravity low. "Damnation. Yesseil, get down here and hang on!"

The rain didn't so much as begin to fall as it did hammer them. Droplets thick as mollusk shells spattered the small cutter like miniature explosives, drenching Scarlet and Yesseil to the bone in seconds. The elf scrambled into the lee of the cabin as the thunderhead overtook them, becoming the only thing above them. Lightning flashes lit up the layers of the cloud as if they were firelight, and Leona's hair whipped to the side as a powerful gust battered the side of the cutter.

Over the howl of the storm, Yesseil yelled to Scarlet. "What do we do?"

"Ride it out!" Scarlet yelled back, even though she was hunkered down two feet from the elf. "It's all we can do, unless you've got some elven trick in your back pocket to shout the bloody thing away!"

Yesseil didn't have any howling in her, but the storm damn well did. The wind picked up, threatening to rip the sails from the ropes. Leona felt the ship shift under her, the woode groaning as the wind pushed it in a direction the water didn't want to let it go. Much as her natural habitat was the water, she was bearing the full force of the storm's force out on the deck. Heavy droplet hammered against her skin. She ducked her head against the downpour. The water didn't feel familiar and comforting. It felt hostile, with a small

zap

of magic that sizzled on her skin. Multiplied a thousandfold by the sheer amount of rain, it was like holding onto an electric eel.

The deck bucked as a massive channel in the water opened up underneath them. Leona felt her heart do a flip as they fell through open air for a moment before crashing into the water. The impact sent Scarlet and Yesseil sprawling, and jarred Leona's tailbone hard enough she knew it would be bruised later. "Bloody waves are going to sink us before the storm will," Scarlet said, spitting out a mouthful of water. "Hang on, Yess!"

She scurried out from under cover, hanging onto whatever bit of the ship she could grab hold of as she fought her way back towards the tiller. "What are you doing?" Leona shouted.

"Gotta steer this damn thing!" Scarlet yelled. "Another few drops like that and we're-!" The rest of her words were swallowed by a thunderclap. Scarlet scrambled across the wet deck to the rear, almost pitching over the deck railing into the sea as the stern bucked on a particularly powerful wave. She caught herself, then wrapped both hands around the cutter's tiller. Leona saw a flash of teeth as she bared them against the storm, heaving with all her weight against the wooden rod. She pulled back suddenly, sending the cutter skimming along the swell of a wave that threatened to surge over the side.

"Is she mad?" Leona yelled.