Fate... and a Fireball

The silence of forgotten memories was deafening. She didn’t remember her mind being this loudly silent before; at least, she assumed it hadn’t been.

Blank scraped the last of her breakfast from the dishes. Pina hovered on her shoulder and snapped at any little morsel she could. Blank winced as the pseudodragon’s needle-like teeth nipped her finger instead of a strip of bacon.

“Wait your turn,” she hissed, reaching back and scratching Pina’s scaly head. “I haven’t forgotten about you.”

The other patrons of the tavern gave her, a slight, blue-skinned tiefling, and the dragon a wide berth, which wasn’t easy in a place as busy as Guy’s. She didn’t mind. Their caution left her in a quiet little bubble, and with the soft morning sun filtering through the big bay windows, it was almost pleasant. If living with a black void for a mind could be considered pleasant.

Pina gave up her attempt at patience and dove into the scraps, clattering dishes and chirping hungrily.

Blank stared out the window, resting her chin in her hand. Cheery white and yellow flowers opened up in the window boxes outside. She wondered if she’d known what they were called before. The woman she had been, Blank imagined, knew a great many things. But there was a heaviness to that woman. Tendrils of darkness surrounded the tiefling-that-was-and-wasn’t-her, and she couldn’t shake them, no matter how hard she tried.

She’d hoped that in a city as large and loud as Tralco, the noise would drown out the looming quiet, but it had only served to exacerbate it. Surrounded by countless many, she’d never felt so alone. She’d begun to consider slipping away again, back to the forest beyond the outskirts of town, but she needed supplies, and for supplies, she needed money, and there was precious little left in her coin pouch.

Pina made sure that not a single copper’s worth of their breakfast went to waste. The little dragon flopped contentedly onto the empty dishes, causing enough ruckus to bring every curious eye to their table. Blank tried not to cringe under their stares.

A shudder ran through the room, and everyone’s eyes shifted ever so slightly. Blank turned to follow their gaze out the windows. A pillar of black smoke rose angrily from the bay.

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Idis walked determinedly towards the harbor, whispered rumors buzzing in his head.

“Ye be looking for Zandeer? Aye, there’s one ship that’s just made port this afternoon. First of them been seen in months.”

He’d continued to ask around, and the hearsay was accordant: The pirate organization known as Zandeer had been quiet around Tralco’s waters for months. Their absence had been noticeable enough to garner gossip, and now, one of their galleons had returned. Those he’d questioned squinted up at him with wary eyes and observed that it was a fine stroke of luck his turning up not two days before one of those red-flagged ships appeared over the horizon.

His pace quickened. No, not luck, this was fate.

In the morning light, his shadow streamed out to his left, dark on the cobblestones. The few people out on the street shied away from both him and it as he passed. Idis reminded himself that they meant no offense. Even in Alkenpo’s largest and most diverse city, leonins were rare. Especially openly weaponed leonins.

A gull flew lazily overhead, its coarse cry reminding him for a moment of another port city, in memory long, long ago and far away. In reality, it had only been three years since he’d left Gladis. Only, three years ago, in that other city, he wouldn’t have been alone.

A gaggle of children darted across his path, snapping him back to the present moment. He shook his head. He could not afford to lose his thoughts in the past; not when his path was so clearly set before him. There was no going back, and all he wanted to do was barge forward. Zandeer was a blight on the world, and he’d sworn to eradicate it. He’d go down fighting, and he’d take as many as those miserable ship-rats as he could down with him.

He’d be damned if Zandeer didn't pay for what they did.

Idis stumbled as thunder like a hurricane shook the ground. He caught himself; others around weren’t so lucky. Screams echoed across the marketplace. Idis swiveled around, his paw gripping his sword hilt and his instincts shrieking for him to move.

People came running from the direction of the beach, panicked and scattering.

“The docks!” A man yelled as he raced by. “The docks are under attack!”

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The sun slowly untangled itself from a forest of masts and rigging, rising over Tralco’s stirring port. Rue took a deep breath of the southern breeze as it teased the loose hair brushing her face. Already, the day was beautiful. She hated it. Another day that she wasn’t on the sea.

If she had anything to say about it, today was her last day in Tralco. No more looking for trouble and only finding clumsy drunks, con men, or roving thieves to bully. She’d take her chances back out on the waves, where the adventuring opportunities were far fewer, but infinitely more exciting. After two long, lonely years of yearning for the sea beneath her, she was taking one step closer to home.

The seawall was cool on her back as she stared into the bright light, trying to make out the flags against the glare of the sun. A sparse array, but she was a hard worker and a good sailor; hells, she’d even be willing to sign on as a cook or helmsman’s apprentice if it meant earning her place on one of them.

Absently, she shifted against the stones and fiddled with one of the earrings in her pointed ear. As a half-elf, she’d have no issue blending in with the diverse array of races that filled the port, but all the same she decided to wait until there was more of a crowd to make her way down to the ships. It would be easier then to evade the guards’ watch, but she supposed it didn’t much matter if they ratted on her; by the time Vev caught wind of her comings and goings she’d be long gone.

A small shape appeared out from under the shadow of a ship. It caught her gaze only because it lacked the usual purposeful stride of a sailor or dockhand. No, whoever or whatever it was, it was distinctly sneakish. The figure paused, swinging its head from one side to the other before catching her eye and stopping dead. It was a tabaxi, small and charcoal gray. They stood like that for a moment, frozen in the other’s stare.

Rue glanced off to the side. There were only two ships moored at the dock from where the creature could have come, and the tabaxi’s slinking attitude piqued her interest.

The breeze picked up enough to bat at the flag on the farther ship. She narrowed her eyes. Before she even fully registered the symbol, her spine stiffened.

Zandeer.

She took a step forward. What was a Zandeer ship doing in Tralco?

There was a spark of dull red light, and the morning quiet shattered.

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Oda landed silently on the wooden dock, heart pounding. In one paw she clutched a stolen pouch, in the other, a bloody dagger. Her freedom stretched out before her in the morning light. All she had to do now was run.

Step by step, shadow by sparse shadow, she snuck along the dock, hoping desperately to be overlooked by the few men working nearby. She paused to wipe her dagger on a loose corner of tarp, and fastened the pouch to her belt. Her belt, her rapier, and a dagger - it was all she’d managed to steal back from the oafs that had stolen her, but it would have to make do. There was opportunity enough to pinch what she needed in the town that lay before her, if she could make it. She slowed her anxious panting and resumed her agonizing creep towards escape.

At long last, Oda felt grit and gravel under her gray paws. She spared a furtive glance up and down the docks, ensuring the way was clear for her dash to the buildings and city beyond. She froze.

Some distance away, a sulking woman with hair blue as the sky stared at her curiously. The woman made no move to stop her, but her gaze swept back over the dock and to the ships moored there, as if to determine Oda’s origin. Even from this far away, Oda saw the woman go rigid and take a step towards her.

She bolted. Just another hundred yards and she’d disappear into the streets, never to see that cursed port again. Almost free.

Behind her, the world exploded. Roaring heat singed her fur, and fire turned the morning light a sickly orange. Screams ripped through the air. In the space of a heartbeat, Oda forgot why she was running. She forgot the pirates and the weeks of hunger and the feeling of her dagger driving into her captor’s sleeping form. All she knew now was she couldn’t stop.

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Part Tw0