The Storyteller: Of Gem Traders and Pearl Divers

[annarti.livejournal.com]

Nineteenth Birthday

When they returned to Ryas a year later, with Argo’s and a second captured pirate ship in tow, Tu was gone. The story was that the Orana had visited in the dead of night and its crew had broken her out of prison, paying off or slaughtering dockhands and prison guards as they needed.

Sen was able to shrug and roll her eyes, frustrated, but ultimately she found she didn’t care. All it meant was that Tu and the Orana were back on the top of Captain Gendas’ list of targets.

Instead, she and Kaiji instead went to the taxation office on their own errand, fingers laced together as they stood in the queue.

‘I want to know about my parents,’ Sen said when the clerk asked how she could help. ‘I’m Sen, daughter of Jin and Uti. They died when I was born, and I don’t totally trust the story I was told about them.’

‘Well, you’ve come to the right place to find out,’ the clerk said, far bubblier than anyone working in the tax office had any right to be. ‘What ship were they on?’

Sen grimaced. ‘That’s part of the problem. I’m told they were on Horizons, and that they died in a pirate attack.’

‘Oh,’ said the clerk, her face suddenly falling in a nervous expression. ‘I see.’

Sen shrugged helplessly. ‘I’m nineteen, so they would have married at least that long ago.’

‘Right. Just take a seat on the bench over there and I’ll see what I can find out. It could be tricky going that far back without a definite ship to go by, but we’ll start with Horizons first, how about that?’ The clerk bustled off down the aisles of scrolls and records.

As they sat down on the bench offered, Kaiji sighed and rested her head on Sen’s shoulder. ‘She’ll find it,’ she promised. ‘They keep absolutely everything here, especially related to lineage and crews.’

Sen bumped her head lightly back. ‘This could take a while. Sorry.’

Kaiji smacked her in the chest. ‘Don’t be. I suggested this.’ She slapped a hand against Sen’s thigh and stood up. ‘Keep our place. I’m going to go get us something to eat. I think I’ll have time.’

There was time for Kaiji to get a skewer each of grilled squid, eat them, go back and get another one and eat those before the clerk came back.

‘I’m so sorry, ladies!’ the clerk chirped, laying a sheaf of very old, curled papers on the desk. ‘You were right to be concerned, Sen.’

Kaiji squeezed Sen’s hand as she stood and crossed the room back to the desk. ‘They weren’t on the Horizons’ crew?’ She had expected that.

The clerk shrugged in a way to indicate it was a more complicated answer than that. ‘They were enrolled on the crew,’ she said, ‘but they were only entered onto the roster nineteen years ago, and the records of their death and your birth were entered the same day and by the same clerk as their enrolments.’

Sen frowned as the clerk pointed this out on the curled yellow ship roster for Horizons. ‘What does that mean? Were they on the crew or not?’

‘Well, technically yes, and we’re all about technicalities here, but!’ The clerk a cheeky and somewhat proud little grin on her face. ‘Especially in light of your own suspicions, I did some digging—that’s what took me so long. Before their entry onto the Horizons, they were on a ship called Bracegirdles—the captain’s mother was Llayan and that was her family name. They were gem and pearl traders, especially with Llayad. They did a bit of pearl diving themselves and had regular gem dealers in Kazin, then they’d sell their wares mostly to Llayad. But anyway, this where it gets interesting. Three years before you were born, Bracegirdles was declared a black spot.’

‘So they were pirates?’ Sen tried to confirm. Kaiji set her hands on her shoulders, solid and comforting.

‘Not necessarily,’ the clerk said. ‘I mean, we’ll fine ships when it happens, but most often it’s beyond their control as to why they couldn’t make it back to Ryas in time. We never had any reports of piracy and never released a bounty, in any case. Bracegirdles came back the year of your birth, paid their debt plus interest and registered the deaths of your parents and two other crew members, but the cause of death was an icthyo attack. And your birth isn’t mentioned at all. Another two years passed and Bracegirdles was once again declared a black spot, but the ship and crew have never turned up again since. It’s officially a wreck, now.’ She set her hands on her hips and looked down at the curled papers, shaking her head. ‘It’s a puzzle, that’s for sure.’

Kaiji rested her head on Sen’s shoulder.

‘Thank you,’ Sen said, voice hollow. She thought she could figure out what it all meant. ‘You’ve been more helpful than you know.’

She turned with Kaiji clasping her hand, brow furrowed in thought and anger. ‘Tu lied to the tax office,’ she muttered under her breath. ‘My parents were on Bracegirdles when Tu attacked them, then when she killed them and took me on board, she told the authorities that they had swapped crew and that I was only ever part of Horizons.’

‘Why, though?’ Kaiji asked. ‘It mostly made sense when we thought your parents were genuinely part of her crew. Of course she’d feel responsible for you. But if that’s true then you were just the baby of the ship she attacked.’

Sen began to feel sick. ‘What if Tu is my mother?’ she asked. ‘What if I’m actually her bastard daughter, and Jin and Uti both died in the icthyo attack, so she’s been passing me off as their daughter all this time?’

Kaiji shrugged uncomfortably. ‘Except that she and Kes are so tight. And back then they’d just gotten Horizons, a ship all to themselves. There’s no way Tu would have sex with anyone else.’

Sen gave Kaiji’s hand a squeeze, then a kiss.

‘Sen?’ It was a male voice, vaguely familiar.

Sen turned at the sound of her name and instantly recognised the speaker. Kalas, Tu’s crew member who had sought her out years ago and offered her a place on the brand new Orana.

Sen instinctively tightened her grip on Kaiji’s hand and tried to push Kaiji behind her, but her wife had the same thought and both marched an angered step forward. Sen’s heart was racing.

Kalas took a step back and held his hands up defensively with a short swear. ‘Shit. Hey, hey! I’m unarmed. Here as a friend, remember?’

‘Remember when you lied to my face about Tu not being a vicious pirate?’ Sen stabbed back. ‘Yeah, I remember.’ Why was she being aggressive, accusing? She knew who Tu and her crew was now. She had to tread more carefully, or end up like Bracegirdles and dozens—hundreds—of ships since then. She couldn’t have this conversation coming back on Cocoa Black.

Kalas didn’t lower his hands, but he at least had the decency to grimace. ‘I know it looks bad.’

Kaiji hadn’t let go of her hand. It was the only indication Sen had that Kaiji was as tense as she was.

‘Why are you here?’ Sen demanded. ‘Don’t tell me Tu wants to offer me a place on her crew again.’

‘That offer was never taken away,’ Kalas answered.

Sen tried not to snort derisively at that. To refuse an offer from the notorious pirate lord, recently escaped from prison, would not be a smart option. Instead she held her tongue.

‘Skipper wants to talk,’ Kalas said. ‘Pretty desperately. She knows it’s probably too much to ask that you haven’t listened to stories and rumours these past few years, especially when she hasn’t been around to explain them as they’ve happened. She just wants a chance to do that for you, then you can make your choice.’

Sen bit her bottom lip, thinking again of the Cocoa Black. Tu had to know she was on the crew of the best bounty hunter on the waves, didn’t she?

‘How?’ Sen asked, carefully. ‘Is she here?’

Kalas’ relief was palpable. He shook his head in reply. ‘At the island in the harbour off Jita,’ he answered. ‘Anchor away off the coast, then row to the island. Just you two. I’m sure you understand.’

Kaiji squeezed her hand again.

‘Before you go,’ Sen tried, ‘tell me what you know about Bracegirdles.’

Kalas’ face went through a spectrum of emotions: frown deep in confusion, then thought as the name rang a bell, and a series of different ‘oh’s as he remembered where he had heard the name before. ‘Oh,’ he said, finally, staring at the young woman who had been the baby on that ship. ‘Shit. Might be best left to Skipper to tell?’

‘But I want you to.’

‘Right.’ He pulled off his bandana, ran his fingers through his hair. ‘Right. So Bracegirdles was a pirate ship at the time,’ he started, retying his bandana.

‘No, it wasn’t. It was just a black spot.’

Kalas grimaced again. ‘This would really be better left to Skip.’

‘Tough,’ Sen said. She would have folded her arms, but that would have meant letting go of Kaiji’s hand. ‘You’re telling it.’

‘Shit. Well, they were pirates, definitely,’ he said, hands out defensively again. ‘That’s why they were declared black spot, not the other way around.’

‘How do you know that?’ Kaiji demanded, confidence growing with Sen’s. ‘Because Tu told you?’

‘Yeah,’ Kalas answered, slowly. ‘See, this is why it’d be best if she told it. Ask her that. For now, take my word for it and know that for the three years before we caught them, they weren’t exactly pearl divers and gem traders. Gems are a horrible, volatile business to get into, especially if, say, your doting grandmother’s patronage suddenly gets cut off when said grandmother dies.’

‘But there was no bounty on them,’ Sen pointed out. ‘Why would you bother?’

Kalas made an awkward, strangled noise, then his words tumbled out in a rush. ‘Because they were gem traders and we wanted what was in their hold. Shit, this sounds bad.’

‘Sure does.’ Sen was burning.

‘We never intended on killing any of them!’ Kalas babbled. ‘We were just going to, you know, blackmail them a bit. Rob them until the tax office put a bounty on them, then bring them in. Keep hounding them until then. But they fought back, and, well. Well. We lost a few crew members, too, so Skipper was pretty angry at that, and killed their captain. Except then she found out that there was a newborn baby on board and that she had also killed the kid’s father and the mother lay dying.’

Sen leaned closer to Kaiji so she could whisper between her teeth. ‘I want to punch him.’

‘When he’s done,’ Kaiji growled back, ‘then we can both punch him.’

‘Skip felt pretty guilty about that,’ Kalas went on, looking between the two dark faces before him and trying to ignore their quiet conversation. ‘So, because neither ship had any lactating mothers, she said if they let the baby go, we’d find her—find you someone to feed and raise you, with the condition that Bracegirdles also give over the parents, so you could be the child of a legitimate bounty hunter ship, not a pirate ship. With no captain left, the crew agreed. You know the rest.’

Sen took a deep breath, less to calm herself and more to ready herself. The hand not grasping Kaiji’s tensed into a fist. ‘So Pirate Lord Tu was overcome with guilt over the deaths of a couple of pirates? Is that what you’re trying to fabricate here?’

‘She wasn’t pir—AGH! Fuck!’

‘We’ll meet,’ Sen decided, refusing to shake her hand from the throbbing in her knuckles. ‘But it’s on my terms, and my captain’s terms. Come to the Cocoa Black at sunset—sharp—and we’ll discuss then. Clear?’

‘Shit.’ Kalas held his nose with both hands. ‘Clear.’

STUFF

o I love writing Kalas, but dude, you gotta grow more of a spine. Feel like Tu coulda sent someone with more guts, but then, that'd mean giving up a gutsier crew member to just sit in Ryas and wait for Sen to rock up.

o Bracegirdles is a chocolate shop/café chain in Adelaide, most notably at Glenelg and a brand new one up in Blackwood!

o Home stretch! 10 days, 10 chapters to go.

Comments

[drazzi.livejournal.com]

Tu can you like stay in one place for a while so we can find you? Please??

LOOK AT THOSE GIRLS HOLDING HANDS <3

Hello bubbly clerk, I like you. I also like that things are organised by ship.

Also now I want grilled squid.

Wait wait wait, they were enrolled, had Sen and died all the same day? Or all in the same year??

That is such a Llayan ship man.
Well, a Llayan ship wreak now.

THIS CHAPTER ADDS MORE QUESTIONS AND I DON'T LIKE IT NARTI.

GOD LOOK AT THESE GIRLS TRYING TO PUFF UP AND PROTECT EACH OTHER. I love them

‘Skipper wants to talk,’ Kalas said.
I MEAN JUST FUCK ME RIGHT UP WITH THE TWISTS AND TURNS NARTI CHRIST.

I am devouring this story like more thirstily than Sen I bet. BUT LIKE. MAN.
WHO WAS THE PIRATESS???? Who can say at this fucking point sdbfdg

Kalas had a spine once, but now he's older and its been beaten out of him. This is my theory.

[annarti.livejournal.com]

They were never part of Horizon's crew, Tu just posthumously enrolled them onto her crew so she could claim Sen.

I am nothing if not complicated with my character motivations. Literally the whole point behind Tu, honestly. Is she or isn't she? If she is, since when? NOBODY KNOWS and that's the fun of it :D

Kalas had a spine once, but now he's older and its been beaten out of him. This is my theory.
Given his captain and first mate, a sound theory if ever there was one.