I’d told my crew that I planned to harry ports and naval vessels. After our first successful raid, most of my crew seemed to expect that I would have gotten the urge out of my system. My orders to continue doing what I’d already planned seemed to disturb them.

There’s a reason most people don’t join the military or become adventurers. Well, there were a lot of reasons not to do either – particularly the adventuring shtick. What was most relevant to me was that most people didn’t have it in them to make war. Sure, they often resorted to violence and sometimes they didn’t regret it. The most unlikely people could even turn into killers when fate pushed them into the right situation.

But to plan and coordinate encounters where you would either face death or kill others … not many could do that and stay normal. Even armies split decision making and segregated duties: the strategists planned, the officers complied with orders and led their men, the grunts said ‘yes sir’ and did the killing. When a position needed someone who could plan death, face the consequences, and not turn into a monster, the whole organization worked to identify candidates within their ranks.

I didn’t have that. I had a batch of former slavers; most of whom had found themselves where they were with the simple urge to get by until something better came. I had the former slaves on board; some had been sentenced to slavery for various crimes, others had been enslaved to repay debts or sold for a profit, a few had even been kidnapped from the street where they had no one to support them and say they still had rights.

Out of this hodgepodge of candidates, I suppose I should have been impressed that they had fought under my flag as readily as they had. As it registered with them, however, that I couldn’t or wouldn’t free them and intended to commit the crimes of piracy without the profits, they withdrew. The thought of being part of a war without end, battle after battle, slaughter after slaughter, was too much.

We ambushed a trireme two days from our raid at Gildra; nearby islands seemed to be sending aid in the form of food or troops – as if I would stick around to do more to the port. We surfaced scarcely 30 yards from them and brushed their port side, shearing their oars. We came about as the rowers frantically tried to shift some of their large instruments from the starboard side to give them back their mobility. Depending on multiple factors, some rowing vessels could outpace deep draft sailing ships like mine. This one couldn’t manage it before we came about and threatened to shear off their starboard oars too. After strafing the ship with artillery we boarded, Phillip and Zander leading their respective teams.

At least, those were the two that were supposed to be leading it. Phillip had sat down on the deck and begun to cry. When his tears stopped his expression was vacant.

I took over his team. If the trireme had surrendered and we’d left unscathed I might have been able to discipline him in a milder manner, but one man died and another lost his hand. So I found myself standing on the quarterdeck, overseeing the caning of the most competent fighter/leader I had. What else was I supposed to do? I’d never served aboard a military ship, but I’d heard what Phillip had done was considered a capital offense. I refused to do that to him, but I couldn’t just pat him on the back and say “it’s okay” to him when nearly all the other fighters would then throw down their arms.

But I knew when I was standing there, looking down on the administration of justice, that I wasn’t helping things. So many of the crew turned their faces from Phillip to me, as though saying, “How can you let this go on? Didn’t you once willingly agree to be whipped for our sakes? What happened to that man?”

I had no answer for their non-verbalized questions. If I could just undergo the pain of the whip again to have my crew’s loyalty, I’d do it. It couldn’t be that simple though.

Having him caned was supposed to be my mercy, as I didn’t want him to undergo the increased pain effects of the ship’s whip, Promise of Misery. Nor did I want to chance the details of the new curse the whip might inflict. We were all cursed already, thank you. The whip stayed hidden in my cabin.

I don’t think anyone on the crew thought I was being magnanimous by ordering him caned.

Phillip’s team liked him a lot more than they liked me. I knew I was directly ostracizing them, but didn’t know what else to do without giving up my fighting force. On a broader scale, it was the first time I’d administered a punishment like this. I imagined the whole crew was now wondering, “will he start handing out punishments to the rest of us?”

What probably hurt me the most was how Phillip didn’t protest a bit. He didn’t say anything in his defense, he didn’t say anything about the cruelty of it. He took the number of hits I’d determined to be just, and then took Myota’s hand to be led to the surgeon’s cabin. He never met my eyes.

I knew that Phillip had served in Andros’s army and become a slave based on charges he disputed. To hear him say it, he’d served loyally and intended to become a professional warrior. Men like him were the sort an army might pick to take charge and be counted on for success.

And I’d broken him. I’d broken him before the caning ever took place.

I couldn’t put the fighters under Zander because the man was too unhinged to be a proper leader. Zander was a weapon, not a manger of people. So I found myself promoting Nevil to the position. The man had been a rogue before being caught and sentenced, and his skills were better oriented to stealth and critical hits than straight up fights, but he had lots of Charisma and the others listened to him.

We attacked two more ships with this arrangement. The naval vessel we simply sunk with artillery, but the merchant ship we boarded. After defeating the armed resistance, I had a random half of the crew killed. Apparently word had gotten out that Seaborn let half his victims live, and it had actually inspired some luck-heavy people to surrender and take their chances.

After the ships, we conducted another raid. This time we targeted a shipyard. There were six ships under construction that we reduced to ashes.

I got XP, my crew got XP, I even facilitated quests during every encounter to boost their levels.

My crew weren’t adventurers. Levels didn’t mean everything to them. They wanted to be free – or at least not doing this.

Well that’s tough, because I didn’t want to do this either!

I found myself alternating between sympathizing with them and being angry at them.

After another week of this it must have been apparent to the world what I was doing. We sighted more ships flying flags from different navies, though Antarus was by far the most prevalent. My compulsion from Jones to take risks drove us into challenging a level 6 warship. The battle was strangely anticlimactic. We never even surfaced. Sitting below the ship, we used artillery to disable it and destroy her keel. They sealed off the lower hold with a magical barrier – as was the common practice. We punched holes in it at a higher level than the barrier. They surrendered another deck and tried again.

I don’t know what their rationale was or if they truly had no other options, but as the warship passed us on its way down I couldn’t help but shake my head. I still appreciated looting its stores – warships always had the best enchanted bolts.

At night before I slept, I would spend some time in the mental realm while Arnnaith guarded me. During one of these sessions I was rudely jerked from my own ship into a dark crevasse. If not for the notification that ‘Davy Jones has engaged your mental capacities! You cannot resist your master’s mental effects!’ I would have fought against the shift as a mental attack.

“Ya seem to be taking to the life of a corsair,” came Jones’ casual voice from below. I shifted myself and found him sitting on a wide, round rock.

“I have explicit orders.”

“It’s only for your orders’ sake that you be killing half a crew at a time?” he asked.

“I thought chance was a key element in chaos …”

“I’m not talking about yer round robin executions,” Jones said with sudden impatience, his rock shifting closer to me with a bit of mental manipulation. “I’m expecting you to give me some lip about how you got a taste for revenge, and you’ve learned your lesson and don’t need to be trapped in the isles no more.”

When the rock Jones was sitting on undulated, I realized that it wasn’t a simple boulder that my master was actively manipulating. No, he was sitting on the head of a monstrous kraken, its body filling the width of the crevasse.

It was a bit unnerving.

“I’m not going to give you a story like that. I don’t think I’ll ever love death the way you seem to, and I think you understand that. I’m doing what I’m doing because I’m proving that I’m hard enough for it. When you understand that willing compliance is the best option you could hope for from me, you’ll let me out of the isles.” I considered it for a moment. “My desire to be free from the isles is mostly a desire to be done with the senseless killing. I’ve stopped looking forward to it as I’ve imagined you just having me do more of the same on the high seas.”

“And what, pray tell,” Jones said, suddenly in the water directly before me. “Would you do in the absence of such simple tasks? You’ve already shown me you don’t have the skill for strategy, so don’t hurt yourself trying to think of something.”

I’d shown with success after success that I could learn from my mistakes, but he knew that. His insult was for other reasons. “Who says the purpose of Davy Jones is to be just another monster on the sea? You could …”

Hands clapped before his chest unleashed a burst of water pressure in all directions, sending me spinning through the water with blood coming from my nose and ears.

“I am not some monster!” Jones shouted. “I am not a plaque on the ocean. I am not an entity of chaotic evil. I am not a dealer of souls or the Ferryman. That tripe is fine for talk amongst the shore folk, but I expect my own creation to know better than to say it in my domain! I am a man who has transcended mortality and been burdened with righting wrongs. You are a ship rat that can’t see beyond the next wave! Freedom is what you want? What do you intend to do with your freedom? You’re a creature of whimsy, who’d drift wherever the tides pulled without clear direction – as you’ve clearly shown!”

I opened my mouth to work my jaw, feeling like I’d been socked by someone with 30 strength. Jones seemed to think I had something to say in rebuttal.

“This is going nowhere,” he muttered. With a wave of his hand, he banished me from his mental domain.

Standing aboard my own ship in my own domain, dark clouds began to roll over the sunny sky. I stared at the words etched into the dark wood: Jones’ orders. They’d been imprinted on my psyche, and showed up here in my mental domain ever since.

“You will not advance your level so the experience from your enemies will be sweeter. You will avoid investing XP into that wreck of a ship you’ve claimed and instead focus on your abilities. And because you seem to have reverted to the courageous level of a guppy, you will not pass over opportunities to gain more XP, not even if it puts you in mortal peril! The sea is not a tame place, and you need to learn to gamble again as you ride the currents!”

“I want you to sail to the Broken Isles. I want you to attack, raid, and destroy until you’ve gotten over this squeamishness of yours. You understand – you are not to leave the isles until you’re willing to slay whomever it is necessary to slay.”

The courage of a guppy, the foresight of a ship rat. I very much wanted to say his words had been baseless. Maybe I could say his comment on my courage was false: I had achievements and XP to show I had guts, even if I didn’t like to press a fight.

But it was what he said about foresight that really bothered me. I’d been assuming that Jones had given me orders to kill and cause chaos because he was a chaotic monster who wanted death. Now he was denying that. Could it be that Jones had a motive behind his orders beyond punishing me?

After stewing on it, I decided it didn’t matter. Jones had a chance to enlist me to his cause willingly, and he’d burned that ship as far as I was concerned. I wanted my freedom. I wanted to be FREE!

I felt my heart strain, as if it was trying to burst from my chest while simultaneously being squished down. After a moment the feeling ended and I fell to my rear on the deck, breathing heavily and clutching my chest where it felt like my heart had been squeezed into pulp.

The mental realm showed a different aspect of many things; including my struggle against Jones’ control. My utterly pointless struggle, even if Jones had commented before on how my heart was more difficult to control than expected.

Foresight … goals … what did I want? Jones was right, freedom wasn’t an end of itself. I had to want something that required freedom to have.

I wanted to sail. I wanted to spend time with the ocean …

I was doing that now.

I wanted to wake up in the mornings without anyone above me controlling me …

I’d lived under the rule of one Captain after another, not all of them good. Being a free Captain of my own? I’d already been shown how responsibility for your crew limited that kind of freedom.

Responsibility … I thought back to the conversation I’d had in Dagat with the incognito general over a game of stones. He’d given me some advice on freedom and responsibility. He’d also said that there were always choices to be made, if you were willing to pay the price for them. What would be my price for getting away from Jones? Would it be worse than the price I’d paid to get away from Lawless Jack?

Dagat … it seemed like a lifetime ago, back before I had the Death’s Consort. So much has happened, and I’ve had to change to keep up …

I left the mental realm. The waves in my head weren’t as soothing as the real ocean when I was brooding.

Arnnaith was startled when I got up after exiting Tadra rather than go to bed, as I was accustomed. “Where are you going?” he asked with wide eyes and obvious surprise.

“Some fresh air,” I said simply. The half-elf boy followed me closely as I left my cabin, and I had to plainly state that I didn’t want his presence while getting my air.

Joash was at the helm, but the decks were otherwise near deserted. “Where’s Mr. Burdette?” I asked him. My first mate was supposed to be at the helm for this watch.

“Below sir,” Joash said casually, though he kept a tight hand on the helm. “He asked me to spell him for a few minutes, and I thought the water would do me some good.” He jested when he said the water would do him good. As an experienced sailor, he would normally speak of the air doing him good, like how I’d told Arnnaith I was getting fresh air. In truth, we were 120 feet below the surface, slipping from one island to the next invisibly.

I nodded. I didn’t have any problem with my first mate delegating duties, so long as he didn’t appear to be shirking them himself.

I made my way to the forecastle so I didn’t have to share space with anyone, and my plans were foiled by an unobtrusive body reclining in the prow.

“Willard Thorpe,” I said, remembering the lads’ name without analyzing him. The lanky, thin 16 year old was the first person to agree to my offer of joining the crew when I attacked a ship here in the isles – back when I was making that offer. His example had convinced 3 of his friends to join too, though one of them was now dead. The lad had been weak with a low constitution when he’d joined. Now he’d gotten a few levels on Sadeo’s artillery teams and bumped his stats a bit, but still looked like a gangly 16 year old.

“Captain Seaborn,” the lad said, seeming conflicted over whether he should stand and salute. I didn’t make the crew do anything like that as if I was a naval Commodore, and when they were having leisure time actively encouraged them not to disturb themselves. The impulse was too strong for the lad, though, and he stood for me anyway.

I noticed that he’d had something in his lap. “Whatcha got there?”

“This?” Will asked, stooping to pick it up. “My journal. Never kept one before, but it seemed everyone else on board was doing it.”

“Does it help?” I asked. I hadn’t tried journaling myself, but had been recommending it because it seemed to help the crew process and accept things.

“It’s interesting,” the lad said, thumbing through his filled pages. “These are some of the most exciting days of my life, I suppose I’ll enjoy looking back on them one day.”

“Exciting? Most of the crew would pick a different word.”

He gave a shy smile. “I’m guessing they never dreamed of being a pirate lord. I’d heard that fancies like that died when faced with blood or hardship, but …” the lad looked at me and shook his journal like it had all the words he couldn’t find. “It’s an adventure!”

I couldn’t help but shake my head. The lad was infected with whatever bug caused people to become adventurers, and he had it bad. I suppose I should be glad for him, he was one person on the crew not contributing to the morale level of spiteful. If he was this elated to be part of the cursed crew, he might be singlehandedly preventing the crew average from being hateful.

“Well Will, maybe someday the world will get to read your … journal …” I trailed off.

“Captain?” Will asked hesitantly.

“I’m sorry, Will. I came up here to think and you gave me an idea to snap me out of my melancholy. Thank you. Now, when to implement it …”

“Implement what?”

“Sharing your story with the world, of course.”

When we approached Skillaboth – the next port we’d planned to attack – I ordered a new plan into motion instead. This time we wouldn’t be razing it, in fact we’d leave this lucky port alone from here on out.

I addressed the crew and asked them to participate. I didn’t need everyone’s cooperation, but this was just as much an opportunity for them as it was for me and nearly everyone pitched in. Soon, we had a large barrel filled with personal journals and some letters. I asked that friends of the fallen bring anything that their friends left behind, and was presented with a much too large stack. So many crewmates lost …

I didn’t read those, but I opened up the last page and made a note in each. ‘Died in the attack by the Spirit of Retribution. Captain Seaborn.’ Not all deaths were from the Spirit of Retribution, but the vast majority were. I deeply wished to send that ship to such depths that only the lost mermaid kingdoms ever saw it again.

When we were ready, we surfaced and waited. Waiting took us nearly a full day, during which a storm front began to close in. Finally, a ship approached Skillaboth. It was a merchant ship on its own, which was nice for us as more and more ships had started travelling in convoys.

I checked once again that yes, my own flag was tightly rolled and the blank yellow flag was flying. We were signaling that we had sickness on board, which should keep away any ships that might get into range of analyzing us. It also explained why we were sitting several miles from port, as we were quarantined and staying out of traffic lanes.

That was the ruse the merchant ship would see as they approached. Then we began to actively signal them with mirrors and flags. Our request? Simply that they would take our mail into the port for us.

The request was simple enough, and they could reasonably expect a few coins in the barrel for their trouble. We would just drop the crate over the side and then move away so they could pick it up.

The unusual thing was that once opened, this barrel would identify as Mail from the Condemned. No, I did not create the title, the quest system hijacked that. Just like it hijacked the quest I’d tried to tie to the mail. Originally I was going to offer XP, money, the secrets of the journals themselves, whatever I could to make sure that the mail wasn’t dumped right back over the side. In the end, what the system did was much better.

Quest Created: Message from the Deep.

The crew of the Death’s Consort have arranged to have their journals and letters sent to the wider world. Make sure that the information within this barrel is widely published and shared.

Quest rewards varied by the extent of the knowledge spread.

Whatever rewards I could offer would have to compete with a Captain’s desire to have nothing to do with me – which I couldn’t afford to overcome. A quest sponsored by the world itself, though? With the big-league rewards such quests entailed? I was feeling good about this.

I tried not to feel too hopeful. Tricking my geas not to undermine Jones wasn’t easy. I couldn’t tell the world anything I thought would serve that end, nor did I think I could allow my men to share such information.

But letting my men send off personal journals and letters? Of which, for better or worse, I could not definitively state the contents? Well, I hadn’t felt compelled to stop our mission yet, nor had I dropped to the deck in agony as Jones stripped more attributes from me. I’d call it a success.

When had I decided I was going to take such a risk? Why was I moving from being hostile but subservient to Jones, to making him my nemesis?

Because when I’d looked at Will Thorpe, I’d seen myself. Unwilling to surrender life, with enough daring and audacity to join an ‘evil’ power. Once ensnared, he’d discovered that reality was far more restrictive than his opportunity promised. And I knew – I knew – that if Jones didn’t see me as any more valuable of a tool than I saw Will as, I’d never be granted autonomy. And if he did pay attention to me because I was whatever he needed, then I’d be too useful to let go of.

I wasn’t going to just go along with things and hope Jones had mercy any more. While I couldn’t help but notice more and more similarities between Jones and myself, his mission was not mine, and he had lost his chance to win me over.

We arranged for the pickup. Our barrel went overboard, and we moved away. We weren’t just making room for them, we were staying out of analyze range, so I was looking through a spyglass when the merchant ship picked the waterproof barrel up. They hoisted it over the side, courteously dabbed a towel around the edge to sponge away seawater before opening, and then finally opened the barrel to verify for us that our mail was received and would be passed along.

I watched as those surrounding the barrel sprang away from it like a viper. Many started shouting and gesticulating, and soon many eyes and spyglasses were turned to us.

“That’s our cue,” I said, the wind sweeping away my words before I shouted. “The hook’s set! Come about!”

The storm had come, and we rode it like the cursed ship from the deep we were. Our flag was unfurled, the skull leering and the manacles weighing heavy on the crossed, dagger holding arms. The merchant ship hastily swung about and ran for it, not trusting that having a quest on our behalf guaranteed their safety when I’d so clearly demonstrated to the Broken Isles that I was out for blood.

Not today, because I wasn’t going to wait or another ship to take our mail ashore. I did have a reputation to maintain, however, and soliciting a quest only to turn and chase the questers down seemed in line with the fickle persona I was establishing.

It wasn’t much of a chase, as my carrack wasn’t a speedster and the merchant ship was weighted down with goods. We were faster than them, but they had a lead on distance that we weren’t really fighting to close. The ship turned into the port while we had 200 yards between us. They didn’t slow as they rushed for the pier, possibly assuming we meant to follow and lay waste to the port. We didn’t do that. They had held onto the barrel of mail.

We turned and slipped beneath the waves.