I came to my senses amongst the remains of the privateers' ships. Part of a mast lay across my breastplate and orc corpses were scattered around being picked apart by skittering creatures with pale white shells. I pushed myself out from under the mast, sending a dozen of the critters scurrying away in surprise.

I was in deep water, I could feel the pressure of it pushing down on me. I looked in every direction, but hoping for landmarks was a stretch, particularly when one wasn’t actually on land. I knew the Nedra had been travelling parallel to the continent so I just needed to pick the right direction and move until I hit land. Unfortunately, I had no idea which direction was the correct one. I could wind up walking all the way to the Eastlands if I wasn’t careful.

I needed navigation skills, and I was fortunate enough to have a wealth of information decaying all around me. I started approaching the corpses. I passed one whose head had already been mostly devoured by the skittering critters, another that was missing half his skull from a swordblow, likely my own, and one with the head crushed by a falling piece of mast. Finally I found one that was relatively unscathed. I brushed a few of the pale creatures aside and cut off the orcs head. It was a woman, middle aged by orc standards with an intricate tattoo of a fish running under her chin. I removed my helmet and placed it over her head.

…

I felt a sense of honor and respect that kept a tremendous rage and pride in check. A duty that had been honored by my clan for generations which eventually fell onto my shoulders. It was a weight I carried gladly. There was a compass, passed on by my forefathers, that I kept in my pocket to keep my ancestors with me. There was the sensation of rope sliding through callused hands, of drawing back an oar, feeling the resistance of the water, and tying off a ship, making a snapping sound as I pulled the rope taut to check the knot. Every time I performed these tasks I was echoing my ancestors, building on their legacy.

More recent impressions were clearer. I felt a powerful respect for my captain, a woman like me, but also a captain who came from nothing, who treated her crew with honor and respect. I remembered the day she changed. Her hazel eyes shifted to gold and her already grand ambitions swelled. Within a year she wasn’t just a captain of our small raiding vessel, but a captain of captains in charge of three. I watched her fight and bleed for us and I returned the favor. I heard her order to attack and I charged, a suit of armor stood over the corpses of a dozen of my comrades. He was silver as moonlight, with intricate etchings over his breastplate, his faceplate was drawn down and the sharp slant of the visor gave the impression of a bird of prey. His dark blue gambeson showed through like midnight peeking through moonlight. He struck me with his shield and I felt my ribs shatter from the impact and then I felt the cold water hit my back. I couldn’t inflate my lungs and sank like a stone. I saw an enormous shadow rising toward the boat as I fell into the depth, all light leaving my sight.

…

I returned my helmet to my head. My gauntlets were experiencing a slight tremor and I flexed my fingers to settle them down. The goblin head hadn’t been nearly as intense. Lythia had been a thoughtful person possessed of powerful emotions. Even though I only ate a small part of her essence, it left me shaken. I reached into the corpse's pocket and pulled out the compass, realizing as I did so that if I’d simply searched her first I could’ve avoided absorbing any of her essence. Then again, I felt grateful to a certain extent that I had. I would be able to take her skills, passed down for generations, and ensure that they would survive. I took note of the pattern on her thick wool sweater, Irontooth clan. I looked over the other corpses, memorizing them as well. There were two from the Viridian Hands, and one from the Deadeyes. I likely wouldn’t get a chance to inform the clans of their loss, but I felt it was important to remember them anyway.

I ate the compass, storing it within myself, and began walking west, monitoring it internally as I moved to make sure I didn’t deviate from my path. During my trek I passed by creatures so strange I found myself questioning if I was still in the same world I’d been in when I’d fallen into the water. They existed in impossible shapes, with little or no coloring to them except occasionally the faintest bit of luminescence. They seemed to float without purpose or move with great haste toward goals unimaginable to me.

After a few hours of walking and observing odd creatures I saw a light in the distance. At first I thought it was a larger luminescent creature, but the light didn’t move, and only got larger as I got closer. Eventually I was able to make out the details and realized it was the wreck of a ship. After walking closer I realized it wasn’t the ship that was glowing, but instead there were glowing humanoid figures moving among the wreck.

I approached cautiously. The ship was enormous. A royal transport vessel from what the bit of essence I’d just eaten could tell. I went to the nearest glowing figure. It was a man, an elvish sailor swabbing a nonexistent deck. I waved at him, but there was no response. He faded into nothingness and a larger group appeared. I moved over to them. There was a man and a woman dressed in fine clothes and wearing simple crowns. The man was dark haired with a plain face and the woman was tall and beautiful with long blonde hair. Across from them stood a man in clothes even finer than theirs. His hair fell in gold ringlets down his back and his facial features had a predatory, but handsome look to them.

“Thank you for allowing me to be a guest on this voyage, your majesty,” said the man with the golden ringlets, bowing as he spoke. I was surprised I could hear him, but I supposed that clearly whatever I was seeing wasn't bound to the physical laws that governed the world.

“It’s no trouble at all, Count Glint. You’re always fine company,” said the man in the crown. The woman at his side didn’t speak, but the way her eyes worked their way over the Count made it clear what she was thinking.

The image faded and across the ship was another scene, I moved over to it. The count and the queen were wrapped in a lover’s embrace. She was clutching at him almost desperately while he lifted her and carried her to a space I presumed had once held a bed. The image faded before things got too interesting and another vignette appeared, this time at the port side. Count Glint was standing against the railing, surrounded by men with spears. One man was holding back a crying queen and the king stood stone faced, regarding the count.

“You’re going to die for this!” The King shook his head looking down, then looked toward his wife, “How could you?”

The count smiled. “She did it with enthusiasm, I'm happy to say.”

“Silence! Men, kill this wretch!”

Count Glint widened his eyes in mock surprise before smiling. He opened his mouth and a burst of flame enveloped the spearman in front of him. He then calmly walked toward the king, speaking as he did so. “You should be honored. I don’t choose just any man's wife to sleep with.” He chopped through the neck of two spearmen who attacked him with his left hand, sending a spray of blood across the deck. “Actually,” he smiled, “come to think of it, I’m not that picky.”

The king was cowering against the deck when the Count reached him. “My...my lord I had no idea it was you. I beg your forgiveness. Please, just spare me and my queen.”

Count Glint reached down toward the king and snapped his neck with a single movement of his hand. He looked across the now burning deck over at the queen. “Good luck Myrdith, and you’re welcome”. He launched himself into the air, golden scales covering him as he exploded into a great winged beast and flew into the night.

The image faded and was replaced by a woman holding desperately onto a piece of timber, sobs wracking her body as she floated slowly west toward the shore. After a few moments, that image faded as well and I was left in the dark.

The spectre of the King appeared, this time alone and looking directly at me. He looked me up and down, then nodded, seemingly satisfied. I began moving toward him, but he vanished before I took my first step. I stood in the dark for a few moments.

I’d witnessed something important, that much was clear. Count Glint had to be related somehow to the children of Aurum which meant that they had something to do with dragons. It should have been obvious in retrospect. The goblin chief had flown a banner with a dragon on it and spoken a word of draconic, Donyin had been covered in scales, and Vash grew a tail of gold. Dragons weren’t something that any of my essences knew much about, they’d been extinct for a long time. Pebble only knew that they’d all been killed, but his focus had always been in practical dungeoneering studies and Sevald’s knowledge of them had mostly to do with a childhood dream of slaying one like an ancient knight. Still, it was a place to start.

The coincidence of it was strange. I just happened to fall into the ocean in such a way that my path would cross this sunken ship? That didn’t feel like a realistic possibility. I felt a kind of unease in my straps, like I was being pulled in directions without my consent. Considering the effects of divinity on me, that was deeply unsettling.

I checked my internal compass, and began making my way west again. Myrdith had floated in that direction, so with any luck the debris from the Eastland ships would’ve also drifted that way. If I was truly fortunate my companions would already be there searching for me, assuming they convinced Jase to take the risk.

...

After about a day of walking the ground began to slant in a distinctly upward direction. When I scaled the first sandbar I could see the beach in the distance, a scattering of debris strewn across it, and a ship anchored at its northern end. I aimed for the southern shore, slowly and carefully making my way in that direction.

I emerged to the sound of screaming seagulls and a firm ocean breeze. I then practiced a kind of rolling stumble as I made my way to the northern part of the beach. When I started getting closer to the boat a group of men combing the beach pointed at me and hollered back toward the ship.

Soon a group of people was making their way toward me. Kyren, Stone, and Dorsia were leading a smattering of sailors toward me. I fell to my knees in front of them as they reached me. Kyren placed her hands on my chestplate and I screamed internally as she cast a healing spell, but I allowed it to keep up the masquerade.

“Sevald, thank the gods you’re okay!” Kyren wrapped her arms around me in a hug.

“Water,” I muttered in my raspiest voice.

Dorsia grabbed a flask from her belt, opened it, and handed it to me. I tilted my helmet away from them and swung it back as if I hadn’t had fresh water in days, which as far as they knew was true.

“Thank you,” I said, pushing myself to my feet, faltering slightly to sell the impression I’d been through an ordeal, “I’m surprised you’re here. I would’ve thought you’d be in Buryn by now.”

“We couldn’t leave you behind lad,” said Stone clasping as close to my shoulder plate as he could reach.

“How did you convince captain Jase?” I asked.

“Jade did. She’s been holding him at claw point for two days now,” said Dorsia.

“She is? I’m surprised she’d do that for me.”

“She said that if we found you it would clear the debt she feels to you.”

“What about you, how’d you survive? What even happened?” asked Kyren.

“A child of Aurum happened. An orcish sea-captain named Vash. I was her target, not the ship.”

“That explains why they trapped you, but not the wreckage.”

“A kraken. It came out of nowhere and destroyed the ship. I managed to hold onto a particularly big piece of driftwood and eventually I floated to the shore.”

“Driftwood? Really?” Asked Stone. Kyren and Dorsia looked incredulous as well.

It was the best I could come up with. By all accounts I should be dead. “Yeah, it’s all a bit of a haze though.”

As I finished speaking, Jade and Hrig arrived. Hrig wrapped me in an embrace letting out a quiet, “I knew you’d make it.” I returned the gesture with a strong squeeze of my own.

I turned my attention to Jade. “Thank you, I heard what you did for me.” I held out a hand. She grasped it firmly.

“We’re nearly even now, though honestly I was just the first to act. I’m fairly certain everyone else was moments away from the same. I even saw Kyren start to move toward Jase with a dagger before I made my move.”

I looked at Kyren, who simply shrugged in acknowledgement.

“And where is Jase now?” I looked around, “And where are the rest of the sailors for that matter?”

We all turned our attention to the Nedra, which was pulling up a small rowboat filled with the crew of the beach. Jase was standing on the deck making a particularly rude gesture. The Nedra's sails opened and it began heading back to sea.

“Can’t blame him.” said Stone, scratching his beard, “we did hold him hostage for a while.”

“Well,” said Hrig, “I guess that means we’re walking the rest of the way.”