“Why not?”
“Because up until about five minutes ago I didn’t even know there were elves on this island,” I replied before looking around cautiously, “and I doubt these gals are cannibals.”
Jesse appeared confused about that for a few seconds before a look of realization and mild fear washed over his face, “Oh, the meat…”
“Yeah, the meat.” I said with a nod as I slowly turned around and started heading back in the direction of the house, “And as much as I want to say it came from a docile cow or something, I’m thinkin’ it’s more likely that it was a boar or something.”
“Or worse, a dire boar.”
“What’s a dire boar?” I asked, making no effort to hide the concern I felt.
“Like a regular boar but, you know, dire.”
“Thanks for that total lack of explan-” I started then stopped as something rustled in the bushes to our immediate right, pushing me to run like all Hell.
Boars are scary.
Dire boars are scarier.
I mean, I assume.
CHAPTER 7
“You two alright?” Fern asked as Jesse and I finally made it back to the house after more than a few wrong turns in the jungle.
“Us? Oh yeah, we-we’re good.” I stammered, “How are you? Garden looks good. What boar?”
“Dax, calm down,” Jesse muttered between labored breaths, “there weren’t any boars out there.”
“Oh, yeah, I’m sure that’s why you decided to run too,” I snapped back, my fear having made me somewhat antsy, before looking over to the slightly concerned Fern, “anyway, the main thing is that Fern has done an awesome job with the garden.”
“Well, I tried my best,” Fern replied abashedly from next to the well-groomed and fruitful garden she was standing beside, “I wish I had a few more bits and pieces so I could really make something beautiful, but for now we should start getting some really interesting fruit.”
“I’ll say,” Jesse let out with an impressed huff as he walked away from me and started inspecting the garden, “they have a sort of aura around them, is that your doing?”
Fern nodded proudly, “I went ahead and gave them a sort of preservative enchantment so they don't rot. How’d things go with the dark wood elves? Badly I’m guessing?”
“What makes you thi-oh,” I said as I realized why she thought that, “the whole running out of the jungle looking scared shitless thing, right. Yeah, no, things with them went pretty well. I don’t think they’ll be joining us yet.”
“Why not?” Fern asked, clearly bewildered.
“I guess they just want us to prove that I have what they need.” I replied, deciding it would be best if she wasn’t told about how they’d left me a little psychic message, “Doesn’t matter for now though, how’s Cassie? Has she come back yet?”
“I think she’s still working on the harbor,” Fern replied before leaning in slightly as if she was about to tell me a secret, “might be an idea to go offer her some food. Don’t tell her I said this, but I’m a bit concerned that she’s overworking herself.”
“That’s just dwarves,” Jesse chuckled, “not tryin’ to be racist or nothin’, but they’re like horses in that they’ll run themselves to death if they’re driven to do so.”
I think that’s right about the time when I started to panic about race relations and the history of the world I was in.
Was there a Martin Luther King dwarf?
Was there a Hitler elf?
Was it the other way around?
Were there words I could and couldn’t say as a human? Or a male? Or a Creator?
I had to align myself as a centrist, quickly.
“Da-”
“I’m not a racist!”
Okay, so I realize that I didn’t handle that all too well, but even though I’d cut Jesse off mid-word he still seemed somewhat amused.
“Alright then, it’s weird that you have to say that though,” he chuckled while Fern simply looked at me with confusion, “it’s almost like you’re trying to hide something…”
He was being a dick, but I took that as a sign that I was more or less in the clear, for the time being at least.
“Hey, guys!” Cassie called from the jungle, freeing me of the obligation to explain myself, “Ship’s pulling into the harbor!”
None of us said anything, instead opting to head in the direction of her voice with a slightly excited skip in our step.
“This is goin’ to be so cool,” I said as we walked, “you think it might be pirates?”
“I really hope not,” Fern replied, “the last thing we need is pirates, especially if we’re looking for a way off the island that doesn’t involve rape and imprisonment.”
I was kind of thrown by that to say the least.
It honestly hadn’t occurred to me that what I saw as an opportunity to expand, the girls might see as an opportunity to escape.
Not that I wanted to be holding them against their will or anything, I just hadn’t considered the possibility that they weren’t totally stoked to be on the island.
Anyway, with that fresh, slightly depressing truth nugget dumped on my head we reached the edge of the jungle where Cassie stood atop a rock, looking proudly at the mouth of the waterway with her arms crossed against her chest.
“Here it comes…” the happy part-dwarf practically giggled with an excitement I hadn’t yet heard in her voice.
It was a schooner with pristine white sails and what looked like oil-treated mahogany for a hull, but it wasn’t flying any sort of flag.
“Merchants?” I suggested.
“Who knows?” Cassie chuckled, “I’m just hopin’ they don’t run aground. The last thing we need is for us to have made a channel of death.”
“‘The Death Channel’,” Jesse muttered amusedly, “that’s some late-night TV material right there.”
At first I was worried the girls had heard, but they were clearly far too distracted with the ship that was steadily moving into our little harbor.
“Alright,” I said with a clap once it was clear the ship was at least going to make it most of the way through the water, “let’s head over and get ready to greet our visitors.”
The others didn’t respond, but once I started walking they were quick to follow. Cassie even managed to overtake me a few times as we struggled to stay ahead of the ship without running, which I refused to do for fear of slipping and impaling myself on any one of the dozen or so jagged rocks that peppered the cliff we were moving along.
We beat it though, mainly because it had to slow down a great deal to prevent both the bow from getting seriously damaged and destroying the dock.
The helmsman was talented for sure, as was everyone else who managed to keep the ship safe as it came about and presented its side to us, its height preventing any chance of seeing who it was that we were about to meet.
“This is going to be fun,” I whispered to myself as a few of the crew members pushed a long plank up and out of the ship before letting it fall a few feet to my right, creating a bridge, “this is going to be fun…”
CHAPTER 8
I’ll never forget the first thing the Captain of the Vengeful Fae said as she stepped onto the bridge, her elegant but practical blue and brown clothing and set of expensive-looking swords that sat on either side of her hips showing that she was both dangerous and at least a little bit wealthy.
Her words were so rich.
So powerful.
So sophisticated.
“Which one of you gawpin’ shit-heaps owns this sorry excuse for an island?”
“I…” I trailed off, making a conscious effort to not gawp, “I’m sorry?”
“Don’t apologize,” Jesse murmured out the corner of his mouth, “makes you look weak.”
“Which one of you is it?” the Captain repeated more forcefully, her flowing chocolate-colored hair waving with the breeze, “Lizard or hobo?”
She was Scottish by the accent, well,
whatever passed for Scottish in the world I was in, but beyond that I had no idea.
I couldn’t tell if she was being playfully disarming or was genuinely getting frustrated with me, and it wasn’t until she pulled one of the three weird-looking flintlocks from the holster across her chest and leveled it with my head that I got my clarification.
“Don’t make me say it again.” she warned as she pulled back the hammer with her thumb, causing a weird sort of red glow to emanate from the barrel along with a theremin-like humming.
“Dax? Buddy?” Jesse whispered concernedly, “Might be time for you to take the reins he-”
“That’s a cool looking gun,” I interjected coolly, “must’ve scared a whole mess o’ people with it.”
The Captain seemed amused, but didn’t lower her weapon, “You’re a brave one, aren’t you?”
“Try my best.” I replied, trying my best to hide the fact that I was freaking right the fuck out, “What’re you looking for here? Because if it’s a place to rest your head… well, we haven’t got much yet, but my harem’s-”
“Harem?” the Captain scoffed before slightly relaxing her arm and grip on her pistol, “You run a harem off this pinprick-sized island? I didn’t even see it on the map ‘til my Quartermaster pointed it out.”
“It’s smallish,” I said with a nod, “but there’s plenty of room for more, if you catch my meaning.”
That earned me a quiet giggle from a few of the dirty but still beautiful all-female crew who had started looking over the ship’s banister at us.
The Captain seemed less impressed though, made clear by the fact that she’d tensed her arm and gotten a severe look about her, “Did you seriously just proposition me, mate? You’re lucky I don’t just lance that empty cavern you call a skull at the sheer mention.”
“Hey, nobody said it was mandatory,” I said as charmingly as I could while forcing myself to remember what Jesse had told me about being more confident and standing up for myself, “but if you’re not going to join why are you here?”
“Because I’m a merchant who was hopin’ to open up some trade,” the Captain replied, “but I sure as Hell ain’t goin’ to trade with some scruffy-lookin’ sexual deviant.”
“Sexual deviant?” I huffed out without bothering to hide how offended I was, “That’s a bit mean, isn’t it?”
“You tell me,” the Captain practically snarled, “are these girls here willingly or did they just have the shit luck of gettin’ trapped?”
“For your information, he saved us, bitch.” Cassie snapped, having apparently decided to step in.
“Yeah, and he’s a Creator, so you better watch how you talk to him.” Fern added.
Not going to lie, I was kind of glad to have them standing up for me. As much as I wanted to pretend, I wasn’t quite at a level where I could keep up that level of cocky, Han Solo-esque charm for more than a few seconds.
And, you know, it was good to know where they sat in relation to wanting to either bail at the first opportunity or stick with me.
Anyway, a few seconds went by, the Captain clearly not appreciating being called a bitch, Cassie ready to throw down as I assumed only a dwarf knew how, and Fern… well, I’m sure Fern would’ve offered as much moral support as she could before we were all brutally murdered.
Then, seemingly out of nowhere, the Captain chuckled, reset the hammer, and holstered her pistol, “You’re a bold bunch, I’ll give you that. Name’s Seastrider, Captain Seastrider.”
“I’m Dax,” I replied before pointing to the others “and this is Cassie, Fern, and Jesse.”
“Well, Dax, you got anything you’d be willin’ to trade for a spot o’ gold?” Seastrider asked without moving.
“You’re willing to give us gold?” Cassie replied before I could say anything, “Isn’t that the opposite of what a merchant’s supposed to be doing?”
“I’m out here looking for stuff to sell to people who’ve got funds which, unless you’re hiding some big pile of treasure under your torn and ratty clothes, ain’t you,” Seastrider said, clearly looking to inflict some insult on the woman who’d called her a bitch, "besides, saves me havin’ to come ashore and hunt down the resources myself.”
I nodded at that and smiled, “Makes sense to me. You looking for anything in particular?”
“Why don’t you tell me what you’ve got and we’ll go from there?” Seastrider suggested, “I’m lookin’ for a lot of stuff is all, so it’s goin’ to be easier if I know what it is you have.”
“Well, do you need any wood?” I asked, trying to think of the resources I had without consulting the Toolbox.
“We’re good on timber,” Seastrider replied, “as useful as it is, it usually just ends up weighin’ down the ship and leavin’ little room for the stuff we can sell off easy-like.”
“Alright, what about fruit?”
The Captain shook her head at that and started to show signs that she wanted to get off the island, “Most fruit spoils, fast. If we were looking for food, we’d have to be lookin’ at somethin’ that could stand the voyage.”
That’s when my little mind-bulb sparked to life.
“Something like cured meats?” I asked with a smile, feeling awfully proud of myself that I had a memory range that exceeded five minutes.
“Aye,” Seastrider said after a few seconds of thinking it over, “cured meats would work well. How much do you have?”
“How much can you handle?”
There’s a joke in there somewhere about asking her how much meat her and her crew could take, but I hadn’t thought of one with the wood so I wasn’t about to beat myself up over missing that opportunity.
Also, you know, there was a pretty big part of me that didn’t want to get shot in the face.
“I’ve got a few hundred drachmae set aside for resources,” Seastrider replied before giving me an almost involuntary sly smile, “or a few thousand credits.”
As much as it pained me to admit, I was actually having a little bit of trouble wrapping my head around the fact that they had two types of currency.
That seemed like Dungeons & Dragons levels of complicated, which would require me finding whatever passed for a player’s handbook.
“Take the drachma,” Jesse whispered, apparently seeing that I was struggling, “credits are as good as useless unless you’re plannin’ on hitting the big cities or, you know, space, which is probably why she’s tryin’ to unload ‘em on you.”
Glossing over the fact that Jesse had just told me I’d eventually be able to hit the stars, I made my decision, “Gold,” I said, hoping that was what the drachma was and that there wasn’t a third currency, “I like something I can hold in my hands.”
Seastrider seemed kind of disappointed by that, but quickly got over it as she snapped her fingers behind her head, a gesture that her crew immediately understood, “Where’s the food?”
Without saying a word, I pointed my hand at an unoccupied section of the dock and spawned in a single sack of meat.
“Heh,” Seastrider let out amusedly, surprising me with her lack of surprise, “so you really are a Creator then? Good to know. Right, let’s do some business.”
CHAPTER 9
After Seastrider had gone back onto the ship to organize… something, we were left to stand around trying our best to not look bored, occasionally shifting from foot-to-foot for the sole purpose of having something to do.
For obvious reasons, none of us wanted to offend Seastrider by leaving, but it was fast getting to the point where I was weighing up just how bad getting shot in the back would be.
Luckily, it didn’t come to that as a member of Seastrider’s crew came down the bridge right as I was about to decide I was ready to literally die due to boredom.
She was somewhat better dressed than the others, although that may have been an illusion caused by the fact that her clothes were fitted and had various trinkets and shiny charms sewn into both them and her hair, which was long, auburn, mos
tly hidden by a blood-stained bandana, and appeared to be a better kept than even the Captain’s. It was frizzy and mix-matched in its length, sure, but she clearly cared about it somewhat.
As she reached the end of the bridge I managed to take note of the small pouch of what I assumed were drachma loosely lashed to her baldric, but she was coming for me, as proven when she turned to go check on the sack before I could so much as greet her.
“Seems safe enough!” she called over after a quick inspection of the sack’s content, her accent somehow even thicker than the Captain’s, “You want to take a look before we bring it aboard?”
“I’m sure they have no reason to do something as stupid as put us in danger.” Seastrider shouted back, acting as if she hadn’t just had her crew member check on the meat.
“Good enough for me then,” the crew member said before pulling the pouch off her baldric and tossing it over to me, “here’s your gold, and I’ve been authorized to tell you that there’s more if you can get more of this stuff.”
There was a part of me that wanted to live out one of my more childish dreams of letting a bunch of gold coins pour over my hands like some power-mad king, but I decided that that would somewhat hinder business relations.
“I can make as much as you can pay for, Miss..?”
“Paige,” the woman replied before dog-whistling, summoning two crew members who came barreling down the ramp with a surprising eagerness, “and I’m a quartermaster, not some pomped-up lady from the kingdoms or cities.”
“I’m sure they meant no offense, Paige,” Seastrider shouted as she started back down the bridge and set a path for me, to which her two crew members had to practically leap out of the way, “ain’t no way they could’ve known you weren’t a lady.”
I didn’t catch her meaning at first, then my eyes widened slightly, “Oh, I didn’t know you-”
“Let me stop you right there,” Paige chuckled as she came over and joined Seastrider in standing in front of us, “I’m a woman, I ain’t got no problem with bein’ a woman, but I ain’t a lady.”
Build-A-Harem- The Island Collection Page 10