Chapter Three Hundred and Forty-Four - The Golden Gold Inn of Goldpass

“Caprica!” I cheered as I jumped off the Redemption and ran across the dock. One of the princess’ guards tried to stop me, but I just made myself smaller and slipped under his attempt to grab me.

Then, with a big leap, I launched myself in the air and crashed into Caprica’s waist with a giggling whomp.

Caprica laughed and patted my back with one arm. The other, I discovered, was busy cradling Orange close to her side. “Orange!” I cheered as I grabbed the spirit cat. I spun around with Orange’s lanky frame held out before me, then I pressed my nose against hers and laid a few kisses against her face. “I missed you too,” I said.

Orange gave me the longsuffering look of a cat who did miss someone but didn’t want that person to know.

“Hello, Broccoli,” Caprica said.

“Hi!” I replied. “Wait, I need to hug Bastion too.”

Bastion raised his arms up and I flung my arms around him, squishing Orange in between us. His expression softened a bit, even if he kept his arms raised like he wasn't sure what to do with them.

By the time I was done hugging Bastion my friends had descended from the tied-down airship and the wyvern knights had come to a landing a bit deeper into the docks where the local dockhands and guards were giving the big almost-dragons a wide berth.

“Hello, Princess Caprica,” Amaryllis said. Next to her, Awen gave Caprica a little wave and Calamity hurried to pull his hat off his head, then he licked his palm and ran it through the tangled hair atop his head.

“Hello everyone,” Caprica said. “So, before anything else, can someone please pry Broccoli off of Bastion?”

“Oh!” I said as I let go of the Paladin. Were we making a scene? Bah, that didn’t matter. “Did you want more hugs, Caprica?” I asked before walking over and hugging her some more.

Caprica laughed and rubbed my head, which was easier now that I was at the same height as her, minus the ears. “Broccoli, am I losing my mind or have you lost some height?”

“Nope! I have a skill to change sizes,” I said. I let go of the skill and popped back to my normal Broccoli-height. “See?”

“That’s... interesting. I’ve never seen a skill like that before,” she said. “Anyway, how was your trip? I see you’ve made a new friend?”

“Oh! Right, Princess Caprica, Paladin Bastion, this is Calamity Danger, he’s the best hunter ever and when he grows up he wants to be an airship pirate.”

“Meow, wait a moment,” Calamity said. “Nya might be right about that, Broc, but don’t go telling it to crown-folks. That’s just trouble.”

“I don’t know if you’ve been with Broccoli and her friends for very long,” Caprica said. “But you'll discover that Broccoli doesn't treat authorities with any special reverence.”

“Well, that’s fine by me!” Calamity said with a smirk. “But these three have been nice and fair to me so far, so they won’t hear any complaints from me.”

Caprica smiled. “That’s nice to hear. If you three vouch for Calamity, then I’m certain I’ll be happy to call him a friend. Fantasies of piracy aside--we can’t have a royal endorsing that sort of behaviour, you understand.”

“Yes ma’am, I understand, ma’am,” Calamity rushed to reassure. I grinned. Calamity was a good guy, and a better friend, so far.

“So, are we going to stand out here all day?” Amaryllis asked. “It’s a little warm to be standing in the sun.”

Caprica nodded, then gestured further down the dock. “Come. I have the inn all to myself. I’m the first royal to fly into Goldpass in over a decade, so I’m getting the special treatment. I’d usually discourage that kind of thing, but it does have its advantages. The inn’s owner fell over himself to offer us the entire building for as long as we need.”

“Won’t he lose a bunch of money from that?” I asked.

“He’ll likely earn it back once word gets around that a princess found the accommodations acceptable,” Amaryllis said. “Besides, I imagine Caprica’s guards need to sleep somewhere too.”

“Indeed,” Caprica said. “Why, with a smaller inn I might have had to ask my guards to sleep three or four to a room. I might even have had to share a room. Perhaps with the diligent Paladin Bastion.”

Bastion glanced our way, but he was currently busy doing his ‘I’m scanning everything for trouble’ routine off to the group’s side.

We ended up meeting the wyvern knights near the docks’ exit. They were waiting in an orderly row, helmets off and tucked under one arm while they stood at parade rest. Their wyverns were sitting on the road behind them, taking up a fair chunk of space, but no one seemed brave enough to complain about it.

Caprica stopped before Winnow and smiled at the knight who stood a little straighter. “Knight Winnow, was it?” she asked.

“Yes, your highness,” Winnow replied.

“I heard good things about you. Thank you for escorting my friends back safely. I appreciate that you’ve gone above and beyond.”

“Just doing our duty, ma’am,” Winnow said.

I smiled but held back a laugh. It was strange to see people get so nervous around Caprica. It was as if they didn’t know that under all the princessness she was just a normal, if very motivated girl, with normal girl problems and a normal girl crush on her friend and paladin guard.

Caprica made a bit of small talk with the wyvern knights before asking them if they could stay in-town for a little bit, stating that she might need their help later on. And then we were off again.

The Golden Gold Inn was a pretty establishment set right next to Goldpass’s skyport. It was three stories of worked stone, with balconies on the upper floors and big windows with storm shutters painted a brilliant orange-yellow and a steep peaked roof. There wasn’t much room for landscaping around the inn, since it was squished in between two other businesses, but the owners had clearly tried their best by having a few benches out front with some big pots filled with colourful flowers.

The inn’s interior was a bit different than what I was used to. There was a sitting room and a dining room, but they looked more appropriate to a big home than a tavern. This wasn’t a place that also doubled as a restaurant or anything like that, though I was certain they served food for customers.

“Since we’ve appropriated the entire inn, in a manner of speaking, I suppose you can all have your own rooms. The third floor is mostly unoccupied,” Caprica said.

“Thank you,” Amaryllis said. “We appreciate the gesture. And our purse-strings will appreciate the savings as well, I imagine.”

Caprica chuckled. “I can’t imagine you having a difficult time with gold at the moment, not after the last mission.”

Amaryllis shrugged. “You can never have enough, truly.”

We ended up sitting around the dining room table after which Caprica dismissed most of her guards. They seemed content to start patrolling around the inn, looking all important and tough in their shiny gear while the inn’s proprietor, a sylph called Juley Juleschild, prepared some light snacks for us.

“So, tell me about your latest adventure!” Caprica asked.

We immediately jumped into the story. I tried keeping any exaggeration to a minimum, but I might have gotten a little excited here and there, especially when describing how cool it was to ride on wyverns, something that Caprica, despite having wyverns nearby her entire life, had never done.

I wondered a bit if it was like someone who lived close to an amusement park never visiting it, or if she really hadn’t ever gotten the chance to fly on a wyvern?

Amaryllis ranted at length about the rude mother we met in Riverstart and then we recounted our meeting with Savan and then Calamity. Caprica was a lot more interested when we described riding on pony-back all the way to the crashed airships.

“I received your report, of course,” she said to Amaryllis. “Or rather, an intelligence officer did, but I made sure to read a copy for myself. Two crashed diplomatic vessels is a big issue. That they crashed on Trenten flats territory complicates things immensely. We won’t be able to bring in inspectors to scour the crash sites.”

“I imagine the hunters and other scavengers will be all over the ships soon enough,” Amaryllis said. Caprica winced at that. “The only upside is that it’s unlikely the government of the Trenten Flats will be able to make a fuss about it.”

Caprica nodded, then leaned back into her seat. I wondered if that was comfortable with her wings. “Indeed. So... pirates. Or what we’re presuming to be pirates. I’m not entirely convinced. A big enough and powerful enough group that they were able to waylay an entire diplomatic convoy... that sounds like more than a band of ruffians.”

“There’s this rumour, the one we heard from Three Hooves,” I said.

Caprica gestured for me to continue.

“So, Three Hooves is this cool older cervid lady. She’s missing a leg, which I imagine is why she’s called that. Unless it was her name before too and it’s all a really unfortunate coincidence. Anyway, she said there’s rumours about this big, scary pirate from way out in the west. He might have come to stay in this area, or maybe in the Snowlands to the north.”

“Does this scary pirate have a name?” Bastion asked.

I nodded. “Commodore Megumi. The Sky Killer.”

“That’s... disturbing,” Caprica said.

“Yeah, I know! Why do the bad guys get such cool names?” I smacked the table with impotent fury. Then Awen started to rub my head between the ears to calm me down and I settled back in my seat. “I want a cool name.”

“I can imagine,” Amaryllis said. “Living your entire life with a name like Broccoli must have a toll.”

“What? No, I meant like a title name. What’s wrong with Broccoli?”

“Anyway,” Caprica said. “Let’s bring this back on-topic, shall we? Commodore Megumi. The Sky Killer. I haven’t heard of that name before. Bastion?”

“I... might have. In reports from the Endless Swells, I think. Distant persons of interest. Those are usually either politically important figures, or people who have gained enough levels to become something of a threat.”

“How many levels is that?” I asked.

Bastion hummed. “Usually, the moment a person gains a third class, they’re considered interesting as far as the government is concerned. Even three entirely noncombat classes working in tandem might result in some powerful combinations. Most civilians who reach that kind of level are those with high-risk jobs that afford them a fair amount of experience. Adventurers, hunters, classes that encourage them to stay outside of the safety of a city.”

“That makes people dangerous?” I asked.

“No, it makes them interesting. Which can, in and of itself, be a sign that someone is dangerous,” Bastion said. “Don’t underestimate lower-levelled people though. Levels equate to potential, not competence. I’ve known Paladins who were bested by creatures beneath level ten because they just didn’t know how to handle them.”

Caprica chuckled, and I felt like I was missing out on a joke.

“It’s just a rumour,” Amaryllis said. “But it might be worth investigating.”

“Indeed. In the meantime, we have a direction to search in. I’ll have the wyvern knights patrol the border with the Snowlands; we might be able to spot this pirate camp, especially with the number of ships they’ll have to hide.”

“And then what?” I asked.

“And then... I’m not certain. Our diplomatic channels with the Harpy Mountains have been acting strangely. I suspect that a ransom was finally sent out. What, exactly, these pirates are asking for though... that we’ll have to see.”

***