“All on deck!”

On any other morning, the raspy, booming voice of the quartermaster would have been enough to get every last man on board up and running. But this morning had not been like all the others: hours before the sun had even crept over the eastern horizon, the shrill scream of the cabin-boy had woken up the entire crew. Waking up to a dead shipmate was bad enough: it could be a sign of illness and of more deaths to come. But this was no ordinary death at sea: this corpse was lying in a cold puddle of dark blood, with eyes widened with terror, and a black red-feathered arrow sticking out from its throat.

As each man had taken in the grisly news, the rumours had started, as wild and uncontrollable as fear itself:

“Probably some lone pirate, right?” asked the squat, broad-shouldered man who was supposed to watch over the ship with Ishgar.

“This was no pirate’s work!” had said the young cabin-boy, his mouth quivering with terror.

“Joddhèn’s right! No man could’ve made that shot in the dark!” had said Dóndû, the ship’s physician.

“And look at his eyes. He looks like he’s seen a basilisk!”

“Don’t tell Joddhèn to look at his eyes, he’s already about to faint!” another had then added.

This attempt at levity usually gave way to some roaring laughter, leading to more comments about the cabin-boy’s pristine appearance, his saintly countenance or the low rates his mother charged in the back alleys of the port. But today, not even the toughest crew-members were in the mood for such charming revelry. No matter how much bravado they put forth, they were visibly shaken by the gruesome sight. Even young Joddhèn, who was no mind-reader, could see that fear in their eyes: the very same fear that had crept upon his mind.

Then the quartermaster roared his order once more, in a somehow even louder voice:

“All on deck, you worm-spawns! Form ranks! Or do you need the lash to wake you up?”

The perspective of starting the day with a whipping brought the sailors back to reality, and they quickly fell in rank. Silence settled slowly among them, their conversations quieting to continuous whispering. There was no need to get on the quartermaster’s bad side: had half the crew been killed during the night, he would have still expected nothing less than complete obedience from his underlings. Not only for the sake of his authority or pride, but for the sake of his own head. He was responsible for the crew before the Captain: if any of them were to disobey a direct order, the penalty would fall upon his own shoulders as well. And the Captain was not a tender man, especially not when dealing punishment!

They all stood there expectingly, facing the forecastle at the back of the ship. All eyes were locked on the ebony door that led to the Captain’s cabin: in the half-light of dawn, it seemed even darker than the night sky. Deadly stillness fell on the bridge. The lazy waves barely rocked the ship under their feet. Joddhèn tried to contain the shiver that ran down his spine. He looked about him, and was reassured to find the same fear on the faces of the other crew-members. The men were uneasy. Even the quartermaster looked nervous; shot through his body, down his spine and up to his fat chin, sending it quivering like a dead jellyfish.

Then, suddenly, the silver handle twisted, and the ebony door was flung open. Captain Monazrán walked out of his cabin on the deck and stomped across the bridge of the forecastle. As he moved, the green gems set upon his dark grey leather armour caught the rays of the rising sun. He laid his hands on the handrail, his stark, raven-haired figure dominating the crew.  With his usual stern expression, he cast his eyes over them, then spoke.

“So. We have a dead man on board.”

He paused, as if waiting for a response from the crew. Then in a clearer, more threatening tone, he continued:

“Why has his body not been thrown over already? Why is his blood still staining the bridge of my ship? Or do you expect me to scrub the floor myself?”

His gaze passed over them, and stopped on the quartermaster, who paled suddenly and barked: “What are ya waiting for? Get to it, you sea-rats!” and the sailors immediately turned toward the corpse, and bumped into one another, each of them wishing to be the one who would satisfy the Captain’s order. Joddhèn was pushed, shoved and knocked around, until the Captain shouted: “Wait!”, and the crew stood still once more.

Monazrán leaned over the parapet, staring at their haggard faces, and eventually pointed a finger at Joddhèn:

“Let the cabin-boy take care of it.”

Joddhèn’s shoulders sagged, and his heart sank. For a moment, he had hoped that the Captain would pick someone else as his personal punching-bag for the day. But he had learned to expect it: ever since he had set foot on board the Jade Talon, Monazrán had decided to treat him in the worst possible ways. The Court of Justice, in its unfailing wisdom, had decided that serving five years as a cabin-boy would be enough of a sentence for a young man of noble-blood. And for a time, Joddhèn had thought he would be treated as any other cabin-boys of his rank: with three meals a day, little manual work, and enough time to study maps or learn about sails and tides and the Four Winds. Instead, Captain Monazrán had decided to treat him as no better than the son of a common thief (which was not so far from the truth).

“Go on, boy” the Captain sneered, “off you go!” and Joddhèn, head hung low, turned around and walked through the crowd of sailors, ignoring them as they jeered and roared with laughter. His ears had grown accustomed to them, just as his nose had adapted to the aggressive smells of sweat, adulterated alcohol and rotten fish. On he walked, step by reluctant step, toward the repulsive corpse…

“I think you’ll need a hand with this one.”

He turned around to see who had spoken: it was the other young ship’s-boy who had embarked with them back at the port. He looked much like any other sailor on board, with his sun-browned, unwashed face, dirty black locks hidden under a floppy deep-brown cap, and ill-fitting brown rags. He was taller than Joddhèn, but looked (and sounded) younger, and yet stronger too. Joddhèn realized he had not paid any attention to him: more than likely, he had remained discreet, never speaking up or standing out from the day he had gotten on board. A good strategy to avoid the inevitable remarks of the crew, or any additional chores that the Captain would so generously provide. In fact, Joddhèn did not even know his name. Probably due to a remnant of his aristocratic background, he was not comfortable with meddling with common folk, especially the street-urchins and gallow’s game that composed most of the crew.

His new companion broke the awkward silence: “How about you wash that blood off, and I take care of the body?”

“Alright” Joddhèn said. He was glad to receive any sort of help, but still had too much pride to truly admit it. “Just make sure you get everything of value from the body before you-”

“Not my first time doing this, Joddhèn,” his new companion replied in an annoyed tone. To him, the situation seemed to be just another chore that one simply needed to get over with, instead of a ghastly experience. As he knelt next to Ishgar’s limp body, he quickly added “and you can call my Ríll, by the way”.

Joddhèn took it as a sort of peace-offering, and simply nodded. He went to the forecastle to take a bucket of water and some rags, tore them up, and started to mop up the dried blood from the bridge. Soon enough, Ríll had stripped the body of all its belongings (which revealed yet another sight Joddhèn would have preferred to avoid), and was grabbing it by the shoulders to drag it from the puddle of dried blood. Joddhèn almost tried to argue that he should be the one carrying off the body (at the risk of being ridiculed for his lack of strength); but Ríll, in spite of his slender figure, was already dragging it off to the ridge of the boat with surprising ease. Joddhèn stood there impressed, until he noticed Ríll’s eyes glancing at him then at the floor. The meaning was clear: he went back to his mopping, and soon had to wash away the trail of blood the dragged body left behind.

He noticed Dóndú, the ship’s physician, had come to study the body: the old man cleared his throat, adjusted his spectacles, touched the corpse’s joints and articulations with his nimble fingers, grumbled and mumbled, took a glance at the pierced throat, and coughed some more. Soon after, the Captain approached, and asked the physician’s advice: Dóndú stood up, pulled on his shirt, cleared his throat again, stroke his messy grey beard and declared:

“This was no brawl: the arrow wouldn’t have pierced this deeply and cleanly in close combat. Must’ve been shot from a bow. From below deck, most likely, considering the angle.”

The Captain’s eyes became colder as he said: “So a lone archer came out of the sea at night, waited for this bloated wineskin of a man to stand above the ridge, shot him right through the throat in one try in complete darkness… and then left, is that it?”

The old man swallowed: “Y-Yes, it looks like-well, something of the sort, surely… Perhaps…” and he mumbled on for a few seconds until his mumble became a whisper, the whisper died out, and he stood silent, under the Captain’s furious gaze. “Throw the corpse overboard” he eventually spat out, “I’ve seen enough of him!”. Then he strode away, and as he passed Joddhèn by, he kicked his water-bucket. “Mop this up, slug, if you don’t wish to taste my whip again!”

With little more than a sigh, Joddhèn went back to work. As he bent over the railings to squeeze out the blood-soaked rags for the seventh time, he saw from the corner of his eye the naked body that was once Ishgar’s hurtling down from overboard and splashing into the sea. He kept wringing his rags, barely even noticing his fingers going numb. Before long, the bloated corpse plopped up from the waters and floated languidly along the boat. It remained there for a while, rocked by the sluggish waves, until they carried him away. Joddhèn was glad he could not see his face. As he came back to his senses, he glanced around, and saw the entire crew was looking at the corpse: from captain to shipmate, they could not help but think of their former shipmate, and the mysterious death that had met him.