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Chapter 45: Burning
🕑 Added 2025-07-22 19:37:28 +0000 UTCMarco nodded. “She took a risk on us. Feels right to pay that forward. I just hope she can use it.”
He moved to the rail, watching his prize bob slightly in the waves. “We tow it, unload what we can, and let her decide. Maybe she rebuilds it. Maybe it becomes a tavern. Maybe it burns. Not our call.”
They worked in what was starting to be a well-practiced way, lashing ropes on the new ship until it would follow theirs. Riv actually stayed behind on the other craft, working the rudder so it would follow with as little drag as possible. They had a plan if things went wrong, cutting the ropes on their side while Riv dove into the water and swam for them. With any luck, they'd still be able to escape from a threat if they needed to.
It took the better part of a day to reach the floating bar again. Marco kept the sails tight, the wheel steady, and the course angled to account for the pull of the captured ship. Even with the wind at their backs, the strain of dragging a second vessel slowed their journey to what felt like a crawl.
As the sun began to dip behind the curve of the world, Elisa was the first to spot the problem.
“Is that... normal?” she asked, rising to her feet and squinting into the distance. “It feels like more smoke than last time.”
Marco didn’t answer at first. He followed her gaze, then pulled out the spyglass and checked for himself.
Black smoke, more than a chimney would put out. Not white, like a fire someone had already put out would have been. Whatever was burning was still burning.
Aethe joined him, voice tight. "That’s too much for cooking fires or garbage. That smoke is coming from burning buildings. Maybe ships."
“Cut the rope,” Marco said. He felt sick. "Signal to Riv to get over here."
"But..."
“We can come back for it,” Marco explained. "Cut the rope. That's an order."
They sped through the water after that. Marco kept back a small reserve of the power he used to boost the ship, but otherwise went forward as fast as he possibly could. He hated every second of delay that reserve cost them. He hated it with everything in him.
The place was a wreck.
One of the outer pontoons was gone entirely, reduced to shattered stubs that floated at strange angles in the water. Debris drifted all around, and the main deck was painted with blood.
Elisa covered her mouth.
“They were attacked,” Riv said grimly.
"Recently," Aethe added. "The blood hasn’t dried. This wasn’t days ago. This was hours ago, at most."
Marco swallowed. His throat didn't cooperate. It was dry with rage as he stood just steps away from the wreckage.
"Who could even kill that woman?” he croaked. “Who would be strong enough?"
"Nobody,” a weak voice said, just behind one of the burned-out merchant stands. "I could use some help though."
The woman was in rough condition, in what Elisa called an in-between state of healing. She had a lot of vitality, so she wasn't getting worse very fast as her body replenished most of what it needed to keep things at an equilibrium. Bleeding like she was, though, there was enough new damage happening at any given minute such that her body couldn't really get on top of things.
"Hold still." Marco, Elisa, and Aethe all got started patching up her wounds. It needed the three of them just based on the sheer amount of cuts they had to wrap up, but after a few minutes of work they had the worst of the bleeding cut off. “How long now?”
“A couple of minutes until I can stand.” The woman shook her head. "Bastards came in calm, like nothing was wrong. I killed a lot of them, but I can only move so fast. I think some of the workers might have gotten to the basement, though. Check on them for me?”
Marco nodded and left her to the care of Elisa as he moved towards the bar. Inside, it was a lot like the outside. Filled with things he didn't want to see, smells he didn't want to smell, and an experience he should have been used to by now. Somehow it was different here in a place that had once been happy than it had been out in the ocean, taking down pirates who would have otherwise attacked normal people. It was worse.
There were more dead bodies near and over the cellar door than anywhere else in the bar. Marco tried to ignore what he was doing as he cleared them to the side, shot the lock out of the wood, and opened the door.
There were three workers down there, huddled behind some barrels. It took him time to find them, then longer to convince them the coast was clear. They walked back to where the woman was now standing. She nodded and held out her hand as Marco approached.
“Heldol,” She said. "Formerly Captain Heldol, of the Raven."
“Ooooh." Elisa's eyes widened. "Makes more sense now.”
"To you, maybe." Heldol half smiled. "Most people your age wouldn't know."
"She was an explorer,” Elisa explained. “The premier adventurer of her generation.”
“That they wrote books about. There's a big difference between the adventures that travel where authors will go and the ones that go where they won't." Heldol looked around her, and Marco watched the fire in her eyes burn brighter. "Goddamn it. Goddamn Steed."
"So it was Steed. I thought pirates didn't attack bars. I guess that was just a story?"
“They don't attack bars generally. That much is real. The difference here is that Steed is in some kind of dead serious hurry to find something and doesn't plan on sticking around this part of the world afterwards. Still didn't think he'd burn down my bar just to find you though.”
"I don't understand why, either."
"I think one of those pirates I let go probably fudged the story a bit to get out of trouble,” Heldol guessed. “Turned a maybe into a certainty, and that way he didn't have to take responsibility for letting his captain mess up like he did. I've seen it a thousand times.They were looking for you already, but now they’re focused in.”
“Was Steed here?”
“Not sure.” The whole bar lurched then, dangerously teetering on the edge of disconnecting from the remains of the pontoons. “Whew. We better get out of here.”
“About that,” Marco said. “Do you by chance want a ship? It’s a pretty good one. Not huge, but…”
“Yes.” Heldol cut him off. “Doesn’t matter if it’s a rowboat. I’ll take it. Where’d you get it?”
“Well,” Marco said. “We’ve kind of been hunting pirates. Trying to keep an island’s trade routes clear.”
“Kid, I like you better every minute. Good news for you? You don’t have to do that anymore if you don’t want to. I’m going to be working my way up the food chain for a bit here, which means any little ships in these waters are mine for the time being,” Heldol said.
“Oh. Huh.” Marco looked at Elisa. “Tell her where the island is. I don’t know how to give directions this far out.”
“You sure?” Heldol asked. “I thought it was some big secret.”
“It happens I know the lady who runs the place. She wouldn’t mind this,” Marco said. “Sooner or later, that island is either going to get burned to the ground or thrive. If it survives, it’s going to want a bar.”
Heldol gave a low laugh.
“Then I guess I’ve got a retirement plan. Okay, kids, get to the boat. Get her ready for launch.”
As the workers jogged over to The Foolish Endeavor to prepare to flee the burning hulk of their former home, Elisa sketched out a crude map, talking her way through the landmarks as she did. Heldol nodded along, occasionally pointing out interesting places and things she said didn't show up on most maps. Marco got the sense she might have known which island they were talking about the whole time, or at least had a good guess.
They helped the survivors board the pirate vessel they’d captured. Aethe and Riv transferred all the supplies they could pack Heldol out with. Just now, Marco and his crew wouldn't need them. Returning to the island was a must if only to warn them of the eventual arrival of their new bartender. Marco had a bad feeling on top of that. Seeing this bar burned had him worried.
“You sure you’re good on your own?” Marco asked for the last time.
Heldol cracked her knuckles.
“I'm going to be fine, kid. Trust me. I've been around the ocean, in my own way. Once upon a time, this kind of situation was just my normal Tuesday.”
Heldol's people had the pirate ship in sailing condition at remarkable speed, and she was launched just minutes later. She raised a hand in farewell as they pulled away. Marco watched her go, then spared a few minutes to watch the last of the bar sink under the waves.
“Let’s go home.”
They sailed through the night, skipping sleep to get there faster. Normally they had avoided that, since their trip was just as much about dangerous interludes as it was about long stretches of travel. Without a schedule, it had made sense to dilly-dally. Now, they were all in a hurry.
There was no smoke above the island as they arrived. What there was, however, was a bit more interesting than that.
“Frisk,” Marco said. "He figured it out.”
"Maybe he’s just stopping by,” Riv said. “Or that he’s back to deal with the pirates.”
"Not much chance of either. He has his anchor up, and he’s still coming in. Wouldn’t be like that if he was expecting trouble or loading supplies,” Elisa said as she measured the distance between their ship and the floating fortress. “It’s an angle though, so we still have a straight shot at the island.”
“His ship is a ten, by the way. A big, bold, unbeatable ten,” Marco added.
“The way I see it, we could run away and take our chances or we could run to shore,” Elisa said. “I think it's about an even risk of getting caught either way. We just need to make the decision now.”
“Then shore. Too much can go wrong out at sea, and I’m not ready to give up on the island yet.” Marco saw the sail on the big ship start to rise as he poured everything he had into The Foolish Endeavor. "Ready?"
They were. Everyone got into their positions almost immediately as their ship began flying through the water.
The cannons of Frisk's ship were apparently pretty good, and the water around them was soon churning with near misses. Marco zig-zagged a bit, but only enough to keep the cannons guessing. Mostly, he just tried to go faster. Frisk’s ship moved incredibly quickly for something its size, slicing through the water on an intercept path.
The cannon fire started to get more accurate. Everyone beside Marco took cover behind whatever they could find as cannonballs began to smack to the deck and sides of the ship. At that range, they weren’t doing much damage but it was still adding up. The ship started to groan dangerously as they approached the dock.
“Either he'll respect that this is a settlement and stop,” Elisa said, “Or we’re done for. We'll never get to cover in time.”
They slid into dock, barely ahead of the huge ship’s guns starting to hit them at normal, deadly-accurate range. Impossibly, improbably, Frisk's ship stopped firing.
“I see you’ve brought me a new kind of trouble.” The old woman was there to greet them as they jumped off the boat. “Did you at least get any pirates?”
“Some,” Marco said. “And better. Another pirate hunter. We gave a ship to a very angry woman with a very destroyed bar. Her name is Heldol.”
“They destroyed Heldol’s bar?” the woman whistled. “I never got there myself, but she had a bit of a reputation. They have guts, at least.”
“Guys,” Riv said. “Folks. I’m sorry to interrupt, but shouldn’t we be worried about the huge ship behind us? The floating fortress of disaster?”
“Oh, him?” The woman nodded dismissively. “He’s not going to do anything now. The big test was whether he stopped or not. There’s no reason to stop if he doesn’t respect the law, and every reason if he does. Now that we know which he is, we know what he’ll do. Here he comes now, for better or worse.”
Marco turned, expecting to see another glowing orb of light carrying an illusory captain. What he saw was a rowboat, a very annoyed captain standing up in the center scowling like they owed him money.
“I request parley!” he yelled. “Under a flag of peace.”
“You don’t seem very peaceful.”
“That’s because I’m not, you old… oh, dammit. I’m angry but I’m not a savage. I’ll behave.”
“Step ashore, then.” The woman waved at the dock. “We’ll talk.”
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