Born a Monster

Chapter 2

Squall

Of course, sailors are wary of pirates and sea monsters, but storms are feared as well.

They have the ability to capsize ships, even big ones. More feared is their ability to leave ships hundreds of miles from where they were, lost on a sea with no landmarks in sight.

“Well, I’m in no hurry. Can we go around it?” I asked.

“Little one like that, we can go right through. We strike sails and keep the nose of the ship pointed into the waves.”

.....

I shrugged. “You are the captain. If we’re going through, we’re going through.”

“Just stay in your hammock, you’ll be safe enough.”

“But... but to see the crew battling an actual storm! Surely we’ll be safe enough there by the aftcastle, we can lash ourselves to the stairways.” Kismet said.

“During storms, even small squalls like these, the deck is no place for unseasoned hands. Every crewman here will have a safety line, and even then we sometimes lose hands.”

She didn’t mean people losing hands, she meant losing deckhands, or whole people.

“I understand the risks, and will keep out of the crew’s way.”

“But... but...”

“Kismet and I look forward to whatever training will help us view crew activities in future squalls.”

“Yeah! Let’s get that training done!”

Captaine Levemont smiled. “After we’re through this current squall.”

“AFTER this current squall.” I agreed.

“Aww. But we can help tie things down in the hold?”

“If Quartermaster Macrotsi permits.”

“Come on.” She grabbed my elbow, and twisted me around.

“Thank you, captaine!” I hollered over my shoulder.

Color drained from her cheeks, but she waved so I waved back.

Macrotsi would have made an able stevedore, or loader and unloader of cargo vessels. His shoulders were broad, and he was muscled like someone who wrestled aurochs. He was on, and worked like, someone on double rations.

He had all the resistance to Kismet’s charms that I did, which was enough to curb her more unreal requests. An offer to help tie down cargo?

I could do a whole chapter on knots. Rather than talk about hitches and half-hitches and bowlines and tautlines, just trust that while I can’t name each and every knot that is, I had learned how to tie them.

Kismet was better at it. I’d usually be the person holding the rope tight while she tied the knots.

It wasn’t an easy task, with the deck rolling the way ships do. But it was something we could do. For hours.

And in the manner of any laborers, we talked. Kismet was interested in the horror stories, sea myths, and other stories of the sailors, and I had learned to keep my big mouth shut at these times.

Being descended from a leviathan-size sea creature, I knew such things lived in the oceans of our world. I had no problems with a turtle large enough to have an island on its back, I just wanted to know why it stayed on the surface most of the time.

#

Our footlockers were part of the walls and floor, and we had learned the first day to keep our possessions inside them. We had also learned that nice strong steel padlocks made for better neighbors.

Like most doors on the ship, ours had simple locks. Kismet had demonstrated that for me by showing me how easy it was to pick them. I hadn’t had a reason to try it for myself.

During the squall, we were to keep our doors shut and locked, to keep them from slamming and banging and such.

It was noisy, and the ship pitched, leaned in ways it wasn’t supposed to. But the captaine was right, in my hammock I avoided the worst of it.

When it was over, I unlocked my door and knocked on Kismet’s.

“I think that’s the worst of it.” I said.

“Rhishi! Rhishi, help!”

“I’ve only got a knife, this may take a while.”

“Hurry! This really hurts!”

She was right; these really were easy locks to pick.

She swore me to speak no details of how she was wound up into her hammock; I can say that I’ve seen flies in spider webs less entrapped.

“What are you lot doing?” one of the sailors asked.

“Nothing.” She said.

“Get back in your bunks. This is just the eye, we’ve got the other side of the storm yet to go.”

She needed no help after the second half of the storm.

We went to deck, where they were swabbing the decks with saltwater.

“The deck looks clean to me, captaine.”

“Clean? My deck is covered with RAINwater, the stuff that warps wood and bends planks. Stuff so foul you have to put grog in to drink it safely.”

“You heard the captain, Rhishi. Bonus deck swabbing. Let’s find some swabs and get to work.”

Well, the sailors were more than happy to hand over their swabs.

I suppose that makes sense; one of my classes was Manservant, whose core ability was Efficient Cleaner. Both Kismet and I had that, and it allowed us to do things like swab in ten percent less of the time. They went to other areas of the deck, wringing out and re-coiling ropes and such.

Only once the deck was back in order did the captaine order the sales lowered. We took tack against the wind, or some such, and resumed navigating toward the southwest.

“With any luck, we’re only a few miles off course.” Gibson told me. He was some sort of expert at jibbing and tacking, which is the art of taking the bow and stern (front and back) of the ship, respectively, through the direction of the wind.

“Which we won’t know until night, when the stars can be seen?”

“Yup. Don’t fret none. We’re far enough away we can still land on any island you want.”

“Captaine’s call. I still don’t know our destination myself.”

“Seems rather lax, for a passenger.”

“I have to visit all the civilizations before I can get home. Doesn’t much seem to matter where we start.”

“Like I said, lax.”

#

Well, Vanity was my second most developed sin, after Gluttony. I’ll properly go over why sins are important, later. But my point here is that it was difficult to admit that Gibson had a point.

Bosun Smythe was a swarthy fellow, white of beard and light brown hair on his head, with almond-shaped eyes that one could associate with the exotic, but which I associated with the people of the Khanate, particularly with the Kathani, the peoples of the southern deserts.

“Bosun...”

“Working.” He said, focusing on one deckhand in particular.

“A single question.”

“A moment. GIBSON! TEACH THE NEW HAND HOW AND WHEN TO TIE A SLIPLINE KNOT! Ask.”

“Which crewmembers have the most experience with the Southern Isles?”

“That is a question that deserves a cup of rum.” He said. “Meet me after dusk handoff in the mess.”

“Done.” I said.

The mess, or mess hall, is where the crew ate meals, socialized when off duty, played sports, and similar events. And before you ask, yes, it was difficult to keep the place clean.

As for the cup of rum, it was an alcoholic poison, spiced with cinnamon, vanilla bean, cloves, and three other spices I don’t recall off the top of my head. I didn’t have to make the stuff, barrels of it were available for the signing.

At the time, I was well under my ration of rum, so it was a more than reasonable price. The problem came when everyone else wanted a cup of rum for their tales. Some could be talked down to a tumbler, others couldn’t.

Let Kismet work on the long-term negotiations, I wasn’t about to get into debt.

Nope, nope, nope. Debts caused nothing but problems.

And I took notes. Some of them went onto the map, such as the location of pygmies, or local monsters, or where fresh water could be found.

Kismet added to the local legends, and some of the history of the area came into shape.

Generally, people were people.

No less than six nations had colonies in the area. Furdia, Manora, Malos, and Neonia had their own colonies. The Norvik had conquered an Itini colony and in turn been absorbed culturally. And Daurea, from nearly a quarter of the world away had an island it dumped prisoners and exiles upon.

.....

Between and among this the native tribes of the island, physically representing the Bashin, but using their own language and culture, existed. Supposedly more tribes than there were islands.

And, other influences, some like human, and others decidedly other.

Dragonwyr actually was the domain of a dragon, though reports from the crew gave different names for him or her.

In the southeast, one of the spawn of the Kraken lived, though she tolerated none of her kindred near her.

And these were just the most credible of stories.

“We should start here.” Kismet said, tapping the map.

#