Erastus 29, evening

  The Enterprise scooted along the waves, creaking and swaying as it moved at a steady clip. More than half of my crew, the greenhorns, were taking it badly. They stumbled, held onto the railing, and a few were pale and green. Despite the trouble, my officers had it handled.

  I occupied a strange pce while the ship was moving. Sandara knew better than I did how to keep the Enterprise moving, so I let her give orders and direct the men. When her shift was over, Rosie stepped in. If there was a discipline issue, Cog stepped in.

  I was learning, but there was no point where I was the best man for the job. Luckily, I had another task that allowed me to be visibly ever-present without tipping my hand. I commanded the skies, and they obeyed. The winds were strong, steady, and carried us precisely where we needed to go. I was like unto a god, they all knew it, and there wasn’t a single sign of strain in my face. After all, Autopilot was doing the heavy lifting; I didn’t even need to stay on deck.

  I wonder if they would be more impressed if they knew I got this power by massacring an army of ghouls with a fourth circle spell, thus impressing Besmara? No real natural pce to weave that into a conversation. Then again, from what I heard Sandara cimed I won command of the winds from some nature god in a card game before driving away in a Lamborghini full of nymphs. That, or I slept with Besmara and she was so impressed she made it a gift. Even if they knew the real story it would just blend in with the rest.

  I patrolled the ship, checking in on the swabs hunting rats in the hold and making brief small talk with anyone that wasn’t busy. Of course, I also gently asked what their current duties were. My crew wasn’t big enough to support freeloaders; I would remember anyone who seemed to find themselves with excessive free time.

  In the evening, I invited my officers and passengers to dine with me. We all drew straws to see who would be the first to take the dinner shift, and Sandara was the unlucky one. While the rest of us ate a delicious curry in my cabin, courtesy of Salyar, she was stuck on deck with ship biscuit and a bit of cheese. We worked out a schedule from there, cycling through our roster so that there would always be an adult in the room should anything happen during dinner.

  Varossa attended the meal in her bck uniform, wearing something akin to scks and a suit shirt under her jacket. She had a heavy mace slung at her hip, which I asked her firmly yet politely to put in a barrel by my door.

  No weapons in my room. I even dropped my gun in there. Of course, I don’t really need my gun to fight.

  “So, Varossa, any chance you’ll share our itinerary with the rest of us?” I asked, not expecting a straight answer.

  I let go of the winds for a moment, and reached out to probe her surface thoughts. I found nothing but an iron wall, shutting me out completely. (Read Minds: failed)

  “I prefer to keep my cards close to the chest, Captain.” She said, fshing straight white teeth, “It’s in the vicinity of Port Peril; that should be enough.”

  “What can I say?” I said, “I’m a trusting soul, but I’m terribly curious. For all I know, you’ll be taking us to the Dahak Isles to rob a dragon.”

  She didn’t flinch or anything, but Varossa took a second after I said that. Just long enough to blink.

  “Well, if such a thing were necessary I’m confident that this stalwart crew could manage it.” She said, then took a bite of her food.

  She’s a good liar, but she isn’t made of stone. That probably means she knows about Kelizar, and that is at least part of the pn. Thank you mission log. So, can I get anything else on her?

  I held a knowing smile, and under the table I made a few subtle arcane gestures. There was more to any person than their sexuality, but it wouldn’t hurt to check Varossa’s. I finished my Detect Sexuality spell, and there was nothing there.

  Oh. I get it. She’s not just someone with a high will save. She isn’t vulnerable to mind reading at all. Add it to the list, I guess. Makes surfaces wet, can’t have her mind read. Smile and nod, Emrys. Smile and nod.

  ??????????

  Erastus 30, early morning

  The small keg of water wasn’t ideal workout equipment, but it worked as an impromptu medicine ball. A nice, moderately heavy weight to up the difficulty while I did squats. Across the room from me, Rosie was lifting a 4 pound mace with her left arm. I was no physical therapist, but I’d taken it upon myself to help her get her new arm up to speed; to that end, I picked up a set of increasingly heavy blunt weapons in Goatshead. When she worked her way up to handling the 15 pound sledgehammer without any difficulty, she’d be far enough with her recovery that I’d consider it a win.

  All that muscle didn’t come from working out; she worked hard and it just came naturally. She’s never built up part of her body on purpose before.

  “How does it feel?” I asked, finishing my set. “There should be a dull ache, but if you feel sharp pain you should stop. It should feel like a hard work day, but one you’ll bounce back from.”

  I looked Rosie over, checking her form. Pumping iron was new to her, but she’d picked up on the concept quickly enough. I was fairly sure that if a guy’s entire arm was green he should stop, but zombie goblin arm prosthetics were slightly outside of my area of expertise; I just needed to trust her own ability to detect injury.

  “It’s fine.” She said, though she was sweating. “Thanks.”

  I looked down at her withered limb, and suppressed a sigh. The light mace might as well have been a feather in her right hand, but she was struggling to hold it steady.

  “If you injure yourself, we do have Sandara,” I said, “that said, I’m pretty sure that’ll undo any good you managed today. The point is to slightly injure yourself in exactly the right ways, so that you heal stronger. Healing magic just puts you back to where you were, I think.”

  I’m not sure if the same applies to Infernal Healing, of course. That copies the way that devils can heal themselves. I’m not sure if devils pack on muscle like mortals, and if they do I’m not sure if I want my muscles partially made out of primordial evil. Hell, maybe Sosima would be willing to give it a try; she’s into that shit.

  “I know, I know.” Rosie said with a sigh. “It’s just frustrating. I have an arm again, but what’s the point if I can’t use it?”

  “Well, it’s not your dominant hand anyway, so you’ve got that going for you.” I hedged. “That said, I think we might want to try something for manual dexterity if it’s sore tomorrow. I’ve got some ink and paper, or we can try tossing a ball back and forth.”

  “I’ll try pying catch with Rowe.” Rosie promised, “and I’ve been trying to eat with only my left hand, like you said.”

  God, I hope I’m not just fucking her arm up somehow. It’s not like I’ve done all that much PT myself. Syl seemed to think it would help, at least.

  Dierdre stepped into the room, greeting Rosie with a wave. I moved into the corner with her, where she floated up a few feet so I wouldn’t need to look down at her.

  “You’re right, milord.” Dierdre told me, with a touch of irony in the honorific, “She doesn’t have an aura, she doesn’t have detectable thoughts. Her ckeys are normal; if anything my magic slides right off of her and reads them instead. Creed is wful and evil, and Hinson Chaotic, incidentally.”

  I looked at her amulet again, suspicious. I’d checked it with detect magic again on a hunch, thinking it might be somehow connected to her unusually high retention of memories. It did maintain a record of her own thoughts and feelings, but it probably also got her killed.

  The amulet allowed her to read thoughts, but it was a two way street; she’d broadcast anything she was thinking to her targets. Worse, no matter how many times I reminded her to not use it she just forgot about the drawback. She could use her aura reading to check someone’s alignment safely, but if she used her amulet to read minds, she was exposing herself. Even if she was invisible, nobody could miss her if she started broadcasting her entire internal monologue.

  Still worth it to maintain her sense of self across bodies. Even she agreed, in the fifteen minutes before she forgot about the drawback. Now she’s even more attached to the thing, since she remembers the part where it keeps her mind backed up, but not where it got her killed.

  “Did Varossa respond in any way when you tried to read her?” I asked.

  “Hmm? No, of course not.” Dierdre said. “She just kept writing in her journal.”

  “Did you see what she was writing?” I asked. “That could be useful.”

  “No, I’m not certain what it was, but it wasn’t Taldane.” She said, “or Sylvan, obviously.”

  “Well, I’ll need to give it some thought.” I said, smiling. “It sounds like an interesting read to me.”

  ??????????

  Erastus 31, night

  I needed to let the winds fade sometimes, if for no other reason than to let Autopilot rest. The logical time for that was, of course, night. I only had a few crew members capable of seeing by starlight, and I put them on the night shift. Without lights, we were practically invisible at night and as such, safe. Of course, that also meant that Jape, Narwhal, Rowe, and a few assistants with low-light vision had to more or less handle the whole ship by themselves.

  They could manage it, and in return they were given plenty of time to rest during the day. On the other hand, it seemed to be a bad idea to try to move as quickly as possible when the whole crew could only see about sixty feet in any given direction. The night crew maintained our heading and made sure nothing snuck up on us, but we slowed down while the day crew slept.

  Personally, I cast Keep Watch and did whatever I wanted. Sometimes I would practice my piano on deck, which Rowe and Cave Mother seemed to enjoy. It was rexing to cycle through the songs I could remember, and the sound didn’t quite reach the hold where people were trying to sleep. Anything from Chopin to Undertale was on the table, and to my crew, it was all equally strange and exotic. Of course, I didn’t usually py for six hours straight. Inevitably I would finish, pack up my piano, and go back to my room.

  “Hey, Sima.” I said, propping my piano in a tall locker. “Any luck?”

  “I’m afraid not.” She said, closing her book and stretching. “Dantalios causes the binder to ooze pus, but his other signs are not easily masked. None of the other documented spirits within the first or second circle even come that close. No one Cave Mother was familiar with, either, which are admittedly only the other entities within her consteltion or approximate power. If Varossa is a binder, she’s going beyond charted waters or she’s binding something very powerful. That also lines up nicely with a total immunity to divination. We should be very cautious about crossing her.”

  The spirits were split into nine general tiers of power based on their power, not unlike spells. A cooperative first tier spirit could fit comfortably into a normal, barely trained pactmaker’s body without ill effects. Binders needed to work their way up slowly to rger and rger spirits, in a process that worked a little bit like putting gauges in your ear. Slow, careful, measured, and a permanent alteration.

  The literature became substantially less specific regarding greater spirits, almost entirely to prevent idiots from rupturing their own souls trying to call heavyweights before they were ready. Doing so could call something called a “ravager event” where minor, near mindless spirits known as ravagers squeeze through the crack you left open and force themselves into anyone nearby. Without the standard protections used by binders, the ravagers would run roughshod over any minds that couldn’t reject them completely with sheer force of will. They would hijack the emotions of the user completely, and slowly devour the soul.

  Ravagers, being almost completely cut off from all sensation 99% of the time, were a bunch of insane, hedonistic sense freaks. If you were moderately lucky, they would drive you to have an orgy with other ravaged individuals, eat until you made yourself sick, or risk overdosing on whatever drugs you happened to have avaible. If you were unlucky, they’d have you set random buildings on fire, start eating your own fingers, or murder your family while ughing like a maniac. If you were very, very unlucky they would be civic minded, and push you into creating another ravager event.

  They did bestow some power, easily on par with most first circle spirits. It was extremely easy to summon and bind one on purpose, putting up guard rails and establishing a time limit. In fact, it was one of the first binding rituals discovered, mostly by accident. I could have done it after fifteen minutes reading Plugg’s forbidden bestiary, but I wasn’t that desperate for power.

  “Is there anything you can do to look into it?” I asked. “Maybe ask other spirits?”

  I know you have a ritual to call up spirits to demand answers.

  She refused to look me in the eye.

  “Perhaps. I’ve been working on something that might help, but I don’t know if it will work.” She said, “I’m still testing it for now. Come here, you look stressed. Let me rub your back.”

  I let her distract me. I wasn’t going to push just yet; not until I knew more. She’d evaded the question the st two times I asked it as well.

  ??????????

  Shortly before midnight, Sosima excused herself. She cimed that she wanted to check through her paperwork in her office, going through the inventory to ensure everything was as it should be. The st two days, I’d had Syl or Sandara around. I’d wanted to avoid stirring up discord in the crew, so I didn’t call Sosima out right there. I checked my logs, and saw the update at precisely midnight, every night since we leveled up.

  Sosima used Inquiry. (Roll unknown)

  What are you doing, Sima? I can’t just let this slide forever.

  I crept through the hall, and listened at Sosima’s door. I didn’t put all that much effort into it; my target was distracted with a ritual after all. (Stealth 5+11=16)

  I stood in the darkness, and listened at the door. I sat and listened to Sosima talking to herself for several minutes.

  “Begone, foul creature!” She ordered, a quavering note of fear creeping into her speech, “You are not welcome here.”

  There was a stilted cadence to her voice, as if reading from a script. It was an exaggerated performance, likely part of the ritual. (Sense Motive 16+1=17)

  “How can I be unwelcome?” She purred. “This is my home. Once you are gone, it will be mine alone.”

  “The scarecrow?” She said, horror and realization making her voice shrill, “How?”

  I listened to what sounded like the st ten minutes of a movie, ending with a soliloquy about a man fleeing a farm never to return. Then silence. Then the faint candlelight visible beneath the door shifted from warm orange to bright green.

  “Good show, Lady Aumaxa.” A raspy voice whispered, “It’s a shame your soul is spoken for. It would be a tremendous pleasure to wear your face.”

  The creature’s slithering ugh, barely audible through the door, made my skin crawl. If my log hadn’t assured me this was the inquiry ritual working as intended, I would have thrown the door open, both to back Sosima up and to demand answers.

  “Hollow Eyes, I am told that you have been companion to a woman.” Sosima said, firm and confident. “Minelda Aumaxa. Tell me, what is her path in life? Is she happy?”

  “You ask me two questions and dare to speak of happiness?” Hollow Eyes chuckled cruelly. “Foolish, but I will answer. Minelda walks the path of blood over water, in service to Thrune.”

  The green light faded, plunging the hallway into utter bckness. Sosima sighed.

  “Damn it girl, the navy?” Sosima spat, “I hope I didn’t have anything to do with that.”

  She’s using it to spy on her family? Ouch. No wonder she doesn’t want to share, if she only gets one cryptic answer per day. With that said…

  I knocked twice on the door and entered. Sosima was still sitting in the middle of the floor, a candle in front of her trailing a thin ribbon of smoke. She looked in my general direction, eyes wide with panic. I threw her a bone and called up a set of dancing lights just behind me. I knew how intimidating it would be for me to turn into a backlit silhouette, but she wouldn’t be blind.

  “Evening, Miss Aumaxa.” I said. “I hope you don’t mind, but I would like to speak with you about trust.”

  “Emrys?” She asked, frowning. “What are you doing here? I asked for privacy.”

  “And I asked if you had any method of obtaining information on Varossa.” I shot back. “It looks like neither of us got honesty.”

  “This is my business.” Sosima said, her delicate eyebrows coming together as she gred at me. “You will not take this from me.”

  “I agree.” I answered readily. “There is no immediate danger at this time. I don’t intend to force you to do anything, and I respect your desire to look in on your family. I just don’t like it when my subordinate deliberately withholds tactically relevant information, nor when the woman I often share a bed with lies to me.”

  Sosima’s gre crumbled, and without it she couldn’t meet my gaze. Her eyes darted around, looking at anything else. She was still kneeling, her shoulders slumped.

  “I grant you permission to use this ritual, to the degree it can be used safely, at your discretion.” I said steadily. “All you had to do was ask. I would appreciate it if, in the future, there was no need for further conversations like this.”

  I shut the door on my way out, leaving her in the darkness. I stood in the hallway for a moment, not sure if I’d gone too far.

  I’m not going to put up with bullshit, not from people I’m supposed to be able to trust. Besides, I’d just look stupid if I went back now.

  ??????????

  Arodus 1 evening

  Syl and I sat in my room, going over Plugg’s library together. The bench embedded in the wall was long enough enough for five people, but we leaned against one another, hunching over a pnar bestiary. Syl examined a page I had picked out, where a gaunt, goatlike humanoid carrying a halberd gred up at the reader.

  “Why, exactly, did you decide on this creature?” Syl asked, “Didn’t we already discover that demons are fairly suboptimal? Is this one weaker to cold?”

  “Well… no.” I admitted. “My magic has gotten stronger, though. I think I can punch through. The real problem will be if it can summon.”

  “Funny how that works with you, right after we do some inane task.” Sandara chimed in, throwing my door open and flopping onto my bed. “I need a fucking drink and some time to rex. Emrys, do the spell.”

  She beckoned me to the bed one handed, any alluring effect undercut by the fact that she was ying face down and fully clothed. It did present her tightly wrapped ass to good effect, and with Sandara one can never be sure if that was part of the pn or a happy accident.

  “Can’t.” I told her. “Syl and I were pnning on doing something before then.”

  Syl turned her head to face us, a smile pying across her lips. She arched her back, removing any question of whether her ass was being dispyed or merely present.

  “Oh?” She said, “go for it. I can watch.”

  Damn it. I had pns, but Sandara is asking for it.

  Syl rolled her white eyes.

  “We are going to need to clear some space.” Syl said. “We might even want to summon it on the poop deck. Too many valuables in the cabin.”

  “Too many people on the deck.” I countered. “It’s definitely going to at least try to fight back.”

  “This isn’t exactly the easy target we discussed.” Syl pointed out dryly.

  “No, but a Lamhigyn isn’t as profitable.” I answered, a bit defensively. “Trust me. Actually, would you mind picking up the rest of the officers? Expin the situation, we can meet them up on the poop deck and decide how to approach this.”

  Syl looked at Sandara, who was “innocently” stretching out on my bed, and snorted.

  “The poop deck, where most officer meetings happen.” She said sarcastically, “why would we ever meet in the captain’s cabin?”

  When she left, I wandered over to my bed. I looked down at her, one eyebrow raised. She looked back up at me with a smile.

  “Miss Quinn. Stand at attention.” I said, “we have things to discuss.”

  “Mmm, no. I don’t think I want to do that.” She said, her eyes sparkling merrily. “This bed, you see. Terribly comfortable. Practically a hazard.”

  I was still irritated with Sosima from the night before. We’d gone with professionalism; I wasn’t quite ready to mend bridges yet. Was it too much to ask for some goddamn honesty when our lives were on the line?

  You know what I need? To blow off some steam. Lucky for me, I have someone right here who enjoys a little heat.

  I looked down at her, and smiled my cruelest smile. I reached down, pced a single hand around her neck, and let the smallest trace of my icy touch creep into my fingertips. (1 nonlethal cold damage)

  “This is my bed.” I stated. “It is for me to decide who is allowed to use it, and who is allowed to leave. Anything on it is for me to do with as I please.”

  “If you’re spoiling for a fight, you’ll need me.” Sandara said, sing-song. “You can’t punish me right now, not really.”

  I squeezed the hand around her neck (unarmed strike: 3 nonlethal damage), and as I did, I hissed a word that stung my tongue. A trace of infernal power flowed out through my fingertips, the rigid power of the Nine Hells entering her bloodstream. (Cast Infernal Healing. Sandara gains fast healing 1)

  “Can’t I?” I purred, “It seems all I need to do is be careful.”

  Sandara squirmed with discomfort, as well as something else. (Intimidate: Coerce 4+12+5=21. DC 19. Target is forced to comply to basic requests.)

  It’s not about the status effect. It’s about the headspace.

  I quickly unbuttoned her pants and flipped Sandara over, surprising her with my strength. After all, at this point I was noticeably stronger than Autopilot. I tugged down her leather pants, not overly concerned about damaging them. She was already swollen, ready. I grabbed a handful of her hair and spped her ass, hard enough to leave a faint red mark.

  “Ow!” She cried, though she also wiggled her ass invitingly. I obliged her with another sp, then fumbled to pull my own pants down while she wasn’t looking.

  Sandara murmured with pleasure as I pressed slowly into her, pulling lightly on her hair as I bottomed out. I spanked her again, and she looked back at me with a challenging smile.

  “Is that all?” She taunted. “Big bad captain, and all you’re giving me are little taps?”

  I obliged her; a gentleman must never leave a dy disappointed. I thrust again, and reached around to pinch her nipples, hard. As I did, numbing cold rushed out through my fingertips.

  ??????????

  My team was waiting for us when we finished, and I met their grumpy stares with a sheepish gaze. It was around dusk, and most of them intended to sleep that night. Sandara, being Sandara, shifted her face into the most aggressively satisfied expression I’d ever seen. I knew she was doing it on purpose, because when we were in the dark her expression had been merely rexed. Sosima met the redhead’s gaze with a sour expression.

  “Thank you all for meeting with me this evening.” I said, bouncing on the balls of my feet. “Syl and I have been cooking something up for a while, and I believe it’s ready to share. As you all know, I am a proficient summoner.”

  “Really?” Rowe asked. “Hear, Deerdah? Proficient.”

  “Shocking.” Dierdre agreed.

  “Ha.” I said, deadpan. “Regardless, I am able to call outsiders to assist us. I can also call them just to have them around.”

  “Like how you bring in Yael every week or so?” Cog asked. “Just a little companionship?”

  “Yes. Just like that.” I agreed. “Today, however, I intend to do precisely the opposite. I would like to call something for the explicit purpose of killing it.”

  My team took that in for a moment, quiet.

  “Why?” Sosima asked, irritated. “What is the purpose of that?”

  I smiled mischievously.

  “I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” I answered. “When the summoning is complete, I’ll want you all to colpse on it. It’s going to be a demon; Syl gets priority, since we don’t have good aligned weapons and her sickle is cold iron. It’ll be best if I finish it off, but it’s not strictly necessary.”

  “If you intend to make this into a regur occurrence, I can bless them.” Sandara said. “And why, exactly, is it best if you finish it?”

  “I get stronger by killing the enemy.” I answered with a shrug. “Syl noticed after I killed the ghouls; that’s what prompted this whole thing. Everyone ready? The sooner that I start, the sooner you all can go to bed.”

  Everyone agreed with that, and let me work on summoning. While they watched, they quietly chatted for a few minutes. Once the gaunt form took on a recognizably humanoid shape, they piped down and readied their weapons.

  The Schir was tall, with thin grey fur stretched over its skeletal body. The creature hefted a halberd, which it readied almost the moment I finished summoning it. With that said, it fell so quickly I almost felt sorry for it. I got over any misgivings the moment I remembered it was a demon, but the poor bastard didn’t stand a chance; it briefly tried to call more of its own kind, but few Schir are strong willed or intelligent enough to cast spells while under attack. I was able to pound directly through its energy resistance, finishing it off after a barrage of bdes and knives from my team.

  But Once the dust settled, there was a dead goat demon at our collective sleeves. I knelt down and plucked up the demon’s halberd. I ran my fingers down the handle, and smiled.

  As expected, a prize taken from an interpnar foe qualified as masterwork, and could be freely enchanted.

  Which means this beauty will simply work better than a normal halberd, and is capable of holding enchantments with an appropriate ritual. To an interested buyer, that means it’s worth a few hundred gold pieces.

  “This,” I said, holding up the halberd, “seems like a good payday for fifteen minutes of work, eh? Hey, Jape. Toss the body into the ocean, will ya?”