by B. H. Young
The captain sat behind a carved wooden desk, billowing globs of smoke from his large pipe that hung just off the side of his mouth. A weathered beard draped in braids and decorated with beads, his face bared inked skin and rows of boils and scars. Behind him fastened to the wall, the large jaws of a trophy hung slightly crooked. Two armed men in ragged garb stood at the sides of the captain with arms crossed and intimidating glares sitting on their faces. One a dark elf and the other a pot bellied Dwarve; both were covered in tattoos.
"I am Captain Nimbus of the Siren's fleet... and you are?" the captain asked. His voice was obstructed by the stem of his pipe and sounded gagged.
"Godzton."
"So, Godzton, what special deeds have I done to receive payment from an Iron seeking audience with me?" The captain gazed with probing eyes at him.
"I seek information of one you gave passage to recently. A large man with phantom eyes and possibly two companions."
"Aye, scary looking fella that one, those eyes, unnatural," he shrugged, "yeah he had two others with him, didn't catch their names. A slick looking fella and one of the meanest looking fucking snow Elves I've ever seen. What of it," he said.
"Where did you take them?"
"Ah, now you didn't pay that much Iron," the captain replied with a grin of greed pushing up his cheeks.
Godzton laid more coin onto the desk to the much-pleased eyes of acceptance of the Captain. "Where?"
"That's more like it." The Captain smiled with approval. "I took them down river to Vette. Normally I'm not in the business of carrying touring passengers to random ports, but the amount of coin he offered was too good to pass up," he said.
"I need you to take me and my men there at once," Godzton said and placed more coin in front of the captain.
"Oh that request is going to take more than coin if I'm to tarnish my standing as a pirate by giving passage to some Irons," he said with a heavy brow.
"What then?"
Pirates would sell their mothers up the river for the right amount coin so the captain rejecting the total placed in front of him as complete payment took Godzton back a bit.
"A few days back while we was docked at the port of Dawnrell, Namith Jerron, a cunt of a man that's been trying to take over my territory sent a fucking nightsolt-induced troll down on us like a fucking hammer!" The Captain puffed angrily at his pipe. "We know the big smelly bastard was pickled up because it was foaming at the mouth by the gallons. We also know it was Jerron that sent him because he branded the damn things ass with his fucking fleet's sigil," he said.
Godzton stood idle in thought of amazement to the likes at which river pirates would go to rid themselves of the competition. Trolls were known to be very temperamental and territorial and had been hunted to the brink of extinction in the kingdom during the rule of King Narcel Gardenor seven hundred years ago. Few remained and survived from those times and were a rare sight of wildlife today. Often it was said the ones that had survived were the meanest and strongest of the various breeds.
"So never minding the questions running through my head on how an imbecile son of a flea-bitten tusser like Jerron could find and catch a troll and then inject it with enough nightsolt to lay waste to Morthet, I need to deal with him quick like. That damned troll destroyed my ship and killed a dozen of my men," he said and his face grew red as pipe smoke steamed from his flared nostrils.
Godzton looked around the cabin absent to the captain's rambling words of his feud. His thoughts were elsewhere on matters that were more important. "We're on your ship," he said blinking narrowly below a sunken brow.
The captain jerked the pipe from his mouth and pointed to the Dwarve standing at his right. "This is Larry's ship. My ship is at the bottom of Dawnrell's harbor because a troll hopped up on nightsolt decided to wipe its nasty fucking ass with it!"
Godzton realized his lack of attention to the captain's story had insulted the man. That was not his intent. He reached up and pinched the bridge of his nose. "So what is it you want then, Captain Nimbus?"
"The bastard has been in hiding since. I need to know where he is and folks are not too keen on answering questions from someone like me. But they'll talk to an Iron sure as they'd confess to the Gods."
It was dumb fortune that Vette was the home of a flesh peddler whose ear was to the ground on all matters of the unlawful. A reliable source of Godztons and if anyone had what the captain sought it would be him.
"Folks in Pyne aren't quick with talking to the law. I know someone in Vette as luck would have it. I can't guarantee you that he has the information you are looking for. But I can guarantee that if he doesn't no one does. Get us there as fast as this ship can and I'll get you all the information I can. You have you my word," Godzton said. It made no difference to him to help the pirate in his feud. One vagrant pirate dealing with another meant less work for him.
The captain bobbed his head in agreement, he knew as others that an Iron's words were as strong as their namesake was and they never broke them. "Get your men, we leave for Vette," the captain said pointing Godzton to the door.
"How'd it go with the river rat?" Ginrell asked with a slander.
"He gave passage to Sylo and confirmed two others traveling with him, a man and a snow elf, he did not know their names. He took them to into Fleslinburg, to Vette and he will be taking us there as well," Godzton said.
"We are to Travel with these fucking pirates?" Laythan scoffed.
"We do what we must. Send two ravens," he placed his hand atop Laythan's shoulder, "one to Overseer Lisbet to report and the other to Archivist Edverc seeking any information regarding Sylo. Tell him to make haste; we will be in Vette awaiting his response. Go quickly," he said.
"Ginrell, head back to the stables and sell off the horses."
"Aye, riding the Dandelion River with pirates, this will be a drunken tale to sing about for the years to come," Ginrell said and stuttered with laughter.
Chapter 7.
Martha Cagmere had been at her desk for a few hours now stressing over an assignment. Her eyes had begun to cross so many times, while reading about the Deadly Flora of Snail's Back Isles by Meister Grant Bonello of Spire Hall, she feared they would freeze into that position and she'd be seeing double of everything for the rest of her days. So many words, page after page, the book seemed to go on forever. She hated it. The instructors seemed all too quick to burden recruits with ample reading rather than prying off their lazy asses to allow them fieldwork.
Martha was more adventurous and could excel quicker with the hands-on of fieldwork assignments, she thought. But seldom did recruits get to go out into the field in these dire times. Iron Town was as far as they were permitted and only then in the company of a vet or an Overseer. Martha saw no difference between Iron Town and the Iron Compound. Sure, there was a nice little stretch of a road of freedom between the two places, tethering them like a mother and her newborn, but they were both restrictive and daunting places as if fraternal twins.
She growled under breath as she turned the page and saw that once again Meister Grant Bonello had chose to fill another page from top to bottom with no spacing between the cluttering words. Several hundred pages in, he had gotten carried away as such more than she cared to remember. It was almost as if the scholar simply loved to read his own words, and asumed everyone else would to as well. The studies were for her benefit but still, she hated it. Why in the hell did she need to learn about the vegetation of Northanos? She did not plan ever to go there.
There were five weeks left before she would take the oath and be elevated from a recruit to an Iron and she could not wait. She counted the days as they passed, days that seemed to grow slower. Martha closed the book, leaned back into her chair, and stretched her arms out. A glance to her bed and a notion of crawling into and sleeping for hours taunted her.
Then there it was, coming like a tormented ghost to chastise her forgetful stubborn ways. Martha could feel it setting in. A mere trembling of her hand and
bubbling in her stomach that followed an aching throb in her head. The preceding signs of withdrawals from the Vannik Serum leaving her body were an all too familiar feeling. She was not very thorough with remembering her days since last use and always waited until the last moment before taking her next dose. Godzton would always give her grief about it with much concern. It was a habit she aimed to break it would just take time to overcome her forgetful ways.
She pulled her syringe from the drawer with a vial of serum. Preparing it with flinching hands, she laid her left-hand palm up on the desk and delicately pierced her left wrist with the needle. Grunting with displeasure, her face twisted to the stinging prick and she pushed the handle down rushing the serum into her vein. It was not a pleasant experience but one that must always be done in order to avoid a more fatal occurrence. She sighed with relief as the symptoms began to cease and fade away soothing her.
A light tapping at her door by little hands grabbed her attention. Martha had been waiting for that sound since Godzton had left. Flushed with excitement she opened the door to the sight of the small boy no more than twelve. Nevy was his name, the son of the owner of the compounds carrier post, and he was a ball of sweetness filled with manners who delivered messages from afar. The young boy stood in attention with a large bag strapped over his chest hanging at his side. He extended his little arm holding a sealed message.
"This message came for you Miss Martha," Nevy said with a smile.
"Oh, such a proper little gentlemen you are." She plucked the message from his little hand. "And how is my handsome little strongman today?"
"I'm fine ma'am. Father has started teaching me how to attach messages to the birds."
"Well now that is a big responsibility. You will be running the carrier post for your father in no time I'm sure of it." She ran her hand atop his small head and gave him a big smile.
Nevy blushed at her. "Yes ma'am Miss Martha," he said and shuffled off with a gust of shyness.
Martha shut the door, jumped into her bed, and sat against the wall staring at the first letter of her name and his last written on the outside of the message before breaking the wax seal. It was a sly method they used to keep their secret. The cheer on her face hurt as she read Godzton's words of comfort. She envisioned him in a radiant light as her eyes moved from left to right one sentence after the next. He would sometimes sign the letter in the name of the next place he would be in case she felt the need to send him a reply, but he left this letter unsigned. It bothered her not, Martha was just pleased to hear from him and know he was safe. Her mind Strayed off into blissful thoughts of him as she pressed his letter to her chest.
The door to her room swung open then slammed shut right away as Lacy Mills entered. She was pacing back and forth the small room brooding, much to Martha's curious eyes. No doubt, Iron recruit Bradley Kuhn who she was having a fling with had once again set her off. Her and Lacy shared the room and grew like sisters during their stead as recruits. Lacy was a strong woman of the faith who liked to dip her toes into uncharted waters of sin and stew of anger when Bradley would try to pull her all the way in.
"Of all the men here I end up falling for the vilest sickening pervert of them all," Lacy said huffing and puffing.
Martha's face trembled fighting back the smile as she tried to look sincere and concerned to her friend's rant. "What did he do this time?" she asked in a frisky voice.
"Sex, sex, sex! That's all he talks about, is he content with just having a nice girl of faith who cares for him," Lacy's eyes narrowed and she grunted and shook clenched fist into the air, "no not him he wants a nice little proper strumpet of a woman to do filthy things to him, the pervert."
"Well, what happened?" Martha's comical voice stopped Lacy's pacing, if only shortly.
"He wanted to meet out behind the maintenance hall after lunch. He knows full well not to try and drag me off into the Swallowed Dungeon... I know what kind of things go on in that place. Thinks I'd give myself to him in some ancient dirty pit closed off for hundreds of years, the foolish pervert. I should allow him to take me into the Swallowed and then push him into one of those endless holes in there. It'd serve him right--"
"Lacy," Martha screeched to get her back on track. Lacy was quick tempered when it came to Bradley's failed advances and would trail off in her rants for hours before getting to the point if Martha allowed her.
"Sorry, Martha. Well, he said he had a spot for us behind some stacked crates where we could be alone for a bit and he could hold me." Lacy stood with a stiff posture bearing a shroud of disgust. "Oh he'd like to hold something that I'm sure of--"
"Lacy!"
"As usual, we start kissing about and before I know it he's got his," her face squirmed and twisted into a souring mask, "thing out."
"His what?" Martha giggled. She knew her friend would not say the word but she liked to pick at her playfully.
"His... his thing, his ugly little thing, though it was stiff as a damn board, could nearly poke my eye out had I let it. The pervert wanted me to put it in my mouth." If Lacy's eyes had peeled any wider, they'd have fallen out of her head. "I told him I wouldn't even touch the damn thing let alone put it in my mouth. He's lucky I let him put his slimy tongue in my mouth, the pervert. Oh it was just ugly!"
Martha's struggling face could no longer hold back the comedy of it all and she broke into immense laughter. Lacy's face lingered confused for a moment before fading and then growing bright followed by laughter of her own. Martha always enjoyed hearing Lacy's tales of innocent affairs with her beau gone awry. Lacy was of a strong upbringing in the faith and professed to Martha many times in their conversations of life and love that she was saving herself for wedlock. Martha always admired her strong convictions.
Lacy looked at Martha with eyes of fondness. "Why can't I find a proper man like your Godzton," she said and sighed.
"Oh Bradley's not that bad, he's just anxious," Martha said.
"Anxious to stab me anywhere I'd let him I bet."
Martha leaned over, as Lacy sat to her bed, tickling her under her arms. "Can you blame him," she said and laughed.
"Stop it, Martha," Lacy said her words choking on the giggles.
"Oh come on now you are just too pretty for him to control his desires... for all of us to control them. Oh Lacy, Lacy, please touch my thingy and kiss it proper," Martha said falling over with her friend in a fit of chortles as she continued to tickle her.
"You are so bad, Martha," Lacy gasped, smiling as she stood. "Does your gallant man know how filthy you are?"
"Where do you think I learned it from?"
The two girls feathered away the rest of the day in conversation about everything from love, to which courses they hated most, to the latest words of wild tongues of the war.
When night had fallen on the Iron compound there was no one left up at this hour but the guardsmen on the wall and the archers in the towers and Martha, who tossed and turned in her bed under the settling sounds of the old structure. Normally the creaking age of the compound did not bother her, but anxious thoughts of Godzton kept her restless. She rolled over facing Lacy, who was dead to the world in her bed on the other side of the room, envious of her peacefulness. Fluttering her lips, she threw the fur covers back, and jumped to her feet and pulled her pants and coat from the dress cabinet. Bending over to pull her boots on Lacy's quick stirring stopped her. Martha had hoped not to wake her friend.
"Oh Bradley," Lacy moaned in slumber.
Martha threw her hands to her mouth to hold back the bursting of laughter to Lacy's hidden cries of desire. With ease, she pulled the door opened and slipped out.
The short burning wicks of the floor candelabra's lit the hall faintly with sputtering light as Martha made her way to the end with furtive movement. There was no need for much light as she had taken this path many times before in the late hours. So much so that she believed, she could take it blindfolded if necessary. It was during these late strolls Martha was thankful her r
oom in the barracks was on the ground level. It made for easier moving around and was close to where she would go on sleepless nights. With light steps, she made her way out of the barracks hall. Checking the area to make sure it was clear she darted for the door to the old walkway connecting the east and west wings.
The old walkway had been closed off from use because of its failing structure and was considered unsafe. The Iron never bothered to tear it down when they built the new one. Instead, they left it as sort of a monument of the old compound. The cool air made the wooden floor more prone to screaming its age. Screams that would echo in the still night but she was careful and stepped softly.
The center railing near the small opening was her spot. There was enough overhanging of the patched roof to keep her hidden in the shadows even when the moon was full. Many nights she would come here to dream awaken, disregarding the curfew that recruits were expected to follow. Leaning with her arms outstretched onto the railing Martha stared into the plum night sky. The moon was half-full, hiding the other side of its face behind filtered clouds, revealing the courtyard under a faded wash of blue. Four Irons were unloading two prisoners shackled in chains from a wagon and hauling them off to the dungeons she spied. It was a common sight around the compound, day or night. Looking down at them, Martha fantasized when she would be one of those Irons hauling in a late night catch of criminals. Soon she thought.
A sudden creak rose up behind Martha startling her. "Martha, dear?" Overseer Lisbet said, unsure.
Martha turned with worried eyes and trembling lips and uttered no words. After so many nights of sneaking into the old walkway after curfew, her luck had run out and she'd finally been caught. The Gods only know what kind of punishment reigns down on those who refuse to stay in their beds.
"Oh, my dear I'm sorry, I've startled you something fierce." Overseer Lisbet gripped her arm's to calm her.