Interlude – Captain Roguetooth

The ocean surrounding them battered hard against the hull of the Roguetooth, and its crew struggled tirelessly to maintain the vessel’s course. The third day after they left Leeside was the hardest, and the night seemed to be a battle of attrition as the ocean tried its best to swallow the Roguetooth up, but the ship endured and the sun rose high in the sky that morning like a victory flag. The crew collapsed where many of them stood when the storm finally filtered out and blew away as if it never existed. Old Bill, who was the oldest and bravest sailor to ever bless the Roguetooth—had been taken. His crow’s nest stood empty, but ever vigil without him. He must have been swept from its peak and lost amongst the billowing storms.

“To Old Bill,” said a crewman, raising a bottle of spiced rum to the blue sky above. “The man had salt in his blood and returned to the mother that drowned him.” Every crewman rose a bottle, or a cup, or simply their fist, and some looked up at his crows’ nest—unable to consider anyone more worthy to replace him.

The captain looked out at the ocean that day, slightly hypnotized by the rippling waves that lapped against the hull of her ship and eject its white foam up into a fine mist to shower her face. The taste of salt on her lips was nice and the taste (to her at least) was more real than pain itself. She took a sip from a bottle of rum and tipped a mouthful overboard, to become swallowed up amongst the mass body of water.

“For you Old Bill,” she said quietly and turned to return to her quarters. Inside her neatly spaced cabin, she saw Rolo waiting for her, a young half-orc with Skin as blue as an iceberg. He had grown out his beard and it made him look older, but Roguetooth still saw the youthful wiriness to it. He did not say anything to her, only approached. His well-muscled arms comforted her as they began to touch her, softly at first—then more roughly as she preferred.

Rolo comforted her that day and when they were done, Roguetooth re-joined her crew on the deck. A soft fog had floated over the deck like a great cloud, and Roguetooth noticed the youngest of her crewman had taken the position of Old Bill in the crows’ nest. He was brave like Old Bill; he had stopped that elf when he tried to board her ship back in Leeside. The fact he was the youngest of her crew while Old Bill was the oldest—had an odd sort of irony to it.

“Keep those eyes sharp kid” she bellowed up at the young lad.

“Yes, captain!” he called, waving an energetic salute that made her smile. Old Bill did not exactly have sharp eyes but could taste danger on the wind like a sailor might taste the direction of the wind using the tip of a wet finger.

As the captain passed her crewman, they all threw her the respectful “Captain”. That was until she reached the head of the ship and looked out at the vast ocean that stretched out before them. They had a long way to go until they reached Yuanland, and from there she could start anew. It was bold what she had decided to do, to essentially cut and run, but she had accrued too much debt within the lands of the Empire to stay; better to start again.

The salt wind whispered its approval as it blew a gentle breath from the north as if to weakly veer the ship towards Yuanland faster. Roguetooth looked north and tried to imagine the destruction that awaited there and the hell that occupied Wetbrook. It had been decades since a town had been overthrown by monsters, especially within the borders of the Empire. No, Roguetooth would rather be heading in the opposite direction to that headache.

“CAPTAIN!” shouted the boy up in the crows’ nest loud enough for all the crew to hear. Everyone looked up momentarily to see the boy pointing out north, as if he saw the hell in Wetbrook spill out over the ocean, as a matter of fact, he did; and Roguetooth stood idly for a second—they all did—when they saw the horror that raced to meet them.

Out on the open waters, a gathering mass of black spiders approached. The captain contemplated whether this was a dream, a nightmare until she found her voice call out: “To arms!”

Skidding across the ocean’s surface like ice skaters across a surface of ice, a dozen black masses approached. The legs of the spiders were in such a massive disproportion to their body, it was difficult to see them, the legs were long and thin and equally distributing the spider’s weight on the surface of the water, or so it seemed. It was not until the horde got closer Roguetooth discovered the Spider’s legs glowed blue.

Above the mass of water-walking spiders flew a human, her blonde hair trailed behind her in a golden ribbon and the deck of the ship erupted with the echoes of the captain’s orders.

Her crew managed to get a volley of cannon fire off from the starboard side, the chain reaction of explosions peppered the ocean, causing large blooms of foam water to erupt up like lava from a volcano. Roguetooth saw one of the cannon shots hit a water-spider directly in its bloated body, detaching its hair-thin legs from its body. At first, Roguetooth took the pieces that exploded from the body as part of the water-spider itself, until she realized the ‘pieces’ had legs too. Then she realized the water-spider were simply vessels like her own ship, transporting small bundles of giant spiders on their backs.

“Captain” she heard a crewman shout and when she turned to look, she saw a two-handed axe flying towards her. She caught it reflex ably and gripped it tight, she had about five seconds from then before the water-walking spiders exploded against the side of the ship, their large bulbous bodies harboring many spiderlings that swarmed up to meet them.

As if to verify her discovery, the captain saw a flood of giant spiders rush over the frame of the ship and board the deck. A wave of battle cries, screams, and hissing filled the deck of the ship. Roguetooth saw a spider lunge at her and brought her axe up in a heavy over-head arc to embed into the spider’s underbelly, which immediately caused its legs to curl inwards and die. Black blood burst from its core to coat Roguetooth, and the taste of its corrupted blood forced her into a rage.

She cut her way through the tangle of spiders that swarmed on her crew and for every spider killed, five more seemed to take their place. Many of the crewmen were swallowed up beneath the tide of spiderlings in an instant. She looked up at the crows’ nest just in time to see a fireball explode its peak into splinters of wood, body pieces, and flame.

“AWWWWHHHHHHH” Roguetooth roared, slicing the legs from a spider feasting on top of one of her crewmen; it was Rolo and his guts spilled out causing her feet to slip and slide across the deck.

Her deck was alight with fire and death, and Roguetooth cut fiercely through the onslaught of spiders that now swarmed her, she did not feel pain or notice the wounds that were inflicted on her until something hit her hard, hard enough to stop her in her stride. It hit her like a cannon shot to the stomach and she felt her feet leave the ground from its impact. Her head collided with something solid and she felt hot blood run down her spine. Roguetooth’s wits sailed amongst a sea of turbulence and her legs completely abandoned her as she tried to stand.

“Come on…Get up.” She said meekly under her breath, but it felt as though her body had forsaken her, perhaps abandoned ship.

Through the double vision, she managed to make out the blonde woman she had seen flying above and noticed the spiders move aside for her. The fight was over it seemed, and the deck of her ship grew quiet.

Despite the blonde woman’s lean and slender frame, she pulled Roguetooth up—all two-fifty pounds of her—as easily as a mother lifting her baby.

“Sphene dust,” the woman’s voice asked simply.

Rogue arched her neck back to pool the blood that was in her mouth into her throat, then spat down wickedly into the face of the woman. It came out in a spray and only seemed to hit the woman faintly.

The woman smiled at the remark.

“Search the cargo-hold,” she ordered, and the spiders moved to obey. “Find it fast, we have more ships to board”

The woman smiled back up wickedly at Roguetooth who still hung suspended in her small hands unable to move. There was a snap, and Roguetooth fell.

The spiders circled to feed.