The inside of the tavern was surprisingly big.

Ryn could see despite the semi-dark as its walls were lit by a fireplace, flickering candles, the red embers from pipes and tobacco-rolls. There must be pushing a hundred people in here, drinking, talking, swearing, arguing, throwing dice, dealing cards, their silhouettes throwing shifting shadows on the walls.

"How are we meant to find one person in here?" said Nuthea. "It's too dark to make out anyone's hair colour."

"Easy, princess," said Sagar. "We ask."

He swaggered over to the bar and motioned for the attention of the nearest server, a hulking man with a stained apron and a scar over his right eye. Ryn and Nuthea followed him.

"You," Sagar said to the barman, "A draught of your best ale, now. We're looking for a man with purple hair. Where is he?"

"Nobody here like that," said the barman gruffly. He rubbed the tankard he was drying with a cloth, not bothering to fetch Sagar's order right away.

"What?" said Sagar, clearly caught off guard. "Don't play games with me. We've been told there's an engineer who frequents your tavern, name of Elrann. Purple hair. Where is he?"

"I told you," said the barman, setting down the dry tankard with a thunk. "There is nobody here who matches that description."

"Bull," said Sagar. "I got my information from a reliable source. Listen, buddy, I'm only in here because I lost my chief engineer in my last skybattle. That's right, I'm a skypirate--believe it. Now pour me my drink and point me in the direction of Elrann Luccavich before I put out your other eye." He brushed the hilt of one of the swords at his side.

The barman leant both his hands on the bar, looked at Sagar for a long time, then let out a loud sigh, audible even over the chattering and clinking noises of the tavern. Then he turned round and pulled Sagar an ale, muttering something like "Bloody jumped-up skypirates...gonna get a shock...don't say I didn't tell you..."

Sagar must be pretending not to hear him.

When Sagar had paid him for the drink, making a big show of flicking his gold piece onto the bar with his thumb, the barman pointed to a corner of the tavern, where at one of the long tables a number of men and women were drinking and talking merrily. "Over there. You'll find Elrann soon enough."

Sagar didn't thank him. "Idiot," he said as he walked away.

"Tosser," said the barman.

The three of them walked over to the long table, Sagar leading the way. As they approached and the sounds from the table grew louder, it soon became clear that the people seated at it were holding some kind of competition.

Specifically, two people at the far head of the table were having a competition. Which is to say, they were both drinking tankard after tankard of ale (or whatever that brown liquid was) while all the rest of the men and women around them were shouting, cheering them on, and placing bets on who was going to give up first.

"Drink! Drink! Drink!" chanted the crowd.

"Thirty silver pieces on Elrann!"

"I'll take that!"

"Forty on Saldor!"

"She never loses!"

One of the two competitors at the head of the table was an exceptionally well-muscled, shirtless man. His arms each looked like three fleshy balls fused together, and the six symmetrical squares of his abdomen glistened even at a distance. Detailed, intricate tattoos decorated his arms and chest, of a ship, a leviathan, two crossed swords. But he was bald and had no hair.

The other competitor was a young woman of small build wearing a dirty set of blue work overalls and a pair of goggles currently pulled back off her eyes to sit atop her head above a heart-shaped face. Underneath those, she wore a bob of shocking hair, shocking enough to be seen in the firelight.

A bob of shocking purple hair.

The woman finished chugging down her tankard, then clanged it down on the table.

"Another!" she cried.

The onlookers cheered. She had a mad twinkle in her eyes and a wild grin on her face.

Eventually, tatoo-man--'Saldor’--finished quaffing his own tankard and set that down too, but with a much slower and wobblier motion.

"Mercy?" the woman said to him curiously.

The man swayed a little where he sat, his tattoos listing left and right like the ship was caught on a choppy sea.

After a moment he breathed "A...nother..." He said it like he was actually saying 'mercy', but that was not the word that formed on his lips.

More cheers. Both the tankards were re-filled, and the competitors lifted them once more to their mouths, tilting their heads back. The woman took to her tankard lustily, gulping down the ale down again. The man hesitated at first, but then glanced at his competitor and shakily raised his tankard to his lips again. Their throats each bobbed as they drank.

Ryn looked at Sagar. "I think you've found your engineer," he said. Mother. Father. Hometown, Ryn thought. Get engineer. Repair ship. Find General Vorr. Get General Vorr. Kill General Vorr.

Sagar just stood still, his brows knotted, mouth open. He looked like the very foundation of his world had been ripped away from underneath him. No, you don't know how that really feels, Ryn thought. I'm the only one here who knows how that really feels.

The woman finished her tankard and set it once more on the tabletop, far faster than the man at her side and than Ryn would have thought possible. She wore multiple metal necklaces under her blue overall which peeked out around the back of her neck, and multiple metal bracelets on each wrist which clinked when she set down her drink amidst the noise of the tavern.

Saldor took even longer to catch up to her this time, but eventually he finished drinking too and practically dropped his tankard on the table.

"Mercy," said the woman. This time she didn't say it like a question, she issued it as an instruction.

The man was swaying again. But he held up a finger, as if to object.

The people at the table went quiet for a moment, craning forwards to hear what he was going to say.

"Mmmmmm..." said the man.

He let out a long belch and fell sideways off his chair and onto the floor.

The woman raised her tankard above her head. "I win again! How much do I get this time?"

A huge cheer went up from the table, followed by whistles and shouts.

"Come on, pay up, she won!"

"I'm not paying you! She must have used some kind of trick!"

"It's no trick, it's just Elrann!"

"I want my fifty silver pieces now!"

"Not my problem your boy can't handle his drink!"

In the clamour it was Nuthea's turn to address Sagar. "Come on then, Skycaptain," she said, "Ryn is right. This is clearly your engineer."

Sagar blinked, then shook his head, his eyes coming back into focus. “We’ll see…” he said, and strode up to the table, still holding his tankard in one hand. Ryn and Nuthea watched from a few paces behind him.

“Are you Elrann?” Sagar said to the woman.

The other folk around the table were still talking and arguing, pushing and pulling coins back and forth, but the woman raised her gaze at this brash question. Her eyes narrowed a fraction but retained their twinkle. She was still smiling.