The Withered Land: Dragons and Marauders

Dragons and Marauders, Part Thirteen

She bared her teeth like a snarling wolf when she saw them. They didn't belong here, among the true citizens of the Pang Xa'Omathra coastal territories, among the grim folk who lived in the shadow of the micro-moon known as The Ke'Tareveel.

The Ureeon Dockyard at the naval port was bustling with activity as the Aerieakon air schooner sailed into its assigned berth. The seven building naval port was a crumbling and time-worn technological sprawl set into a narrow basin within a walled collar between the Dockyard's towering pair of mech-aerocranes atop the slumbering volcanic cinder cone called Terash Munyatt, more commonly known as "The Night-Widow's Crown". The Night-Widow's Crown was at the southeastern end of the Sinaudruim mountain range on the island of Ometh Nastreq, an island five and half nautical leagues wide by eleven leagues long, which sat in behind a horseshoe-shaped reef in trans-boundary harbor waters, some eighteen chancks beyond Peravendath's territorial sea borders. The trapezoid-shaped pilothouses of the cranes for the drydock loomed far overhead, sitting atop thick mechanized elevator necks studded with crisscrossing, interweaving external pipes and conduits dotted with clockwork dials and circular joint-casings. The cranes had massive, lengthy tubular projections that ended in hooked flex-tentacles that connected to docking gears universal in both aerial skycraft and sea vessels alike. Ureeon Dockyard was a neutral zone, where both Peravendathian Federated Navy and Ometh Nastreqian Sea Marshal vessels, along with their crews, could utilize the harbor territory's remaining Emperium naval technology from days gone by. Ureeon drydock was a kind of sanctuary away from the heated military antagonism between the dueling sea-going societies.

There were, however, major concerns and restrictions for all other types of incoming vessels, especially those of the mercenary privateers and sell-swords commonly called "Jagveneers", inasmuch both the Federated Navy and the Sea Marshals were stubbornly paranoid about the secrets of their military technology, such as it was, in these later days following the slow collapse of the mighty Emperium.

Rae'vynn Wyyng and her Aerieakon ship's crew were not Jagveneers, though. They were outcast brigands, masterless former naval military conscriptees. There was no name easily describing their status. Wyyng's crew were considered only as roving corsairs serving "the Blade Banished", Outlaw of Kohra'andum, former Assault Commander of Ke'Tareveel's Sea and Air Command, and daughter of Emmizzuhm Serundi, who was himself the Warhound Knight-Prince and son of Mahrkath Serundi. Rae'vynn held a special status amongst the motley denizens of those who traversed the harbor out to the Pnahrryian Sea, since she was considered a soldier of no small renown and a former naval hero.

She felt the heat of her simmering anger suffuse her cheeks and she struggled to contain the urge to launch herself at them as they passed, smiling mockingly at her. The cadre of nine bounty-hunting Xar'queyeks that strolled by her on the arcade piazza were hardened and amoral foes with whom she had traded violent unpleasantries only a few solar heliars past. She drew in a deep breath and held it as their leader, Infantry Commander Layvis Kroule, former Gunnery -Centurion for the Emperium's Extraterritorial Suppression Brigades, passed by, acknowledging her with a smirk and a nod.

What in Nubium's Seven Hellpits was that murdering bastard doing here?

The persistent clamor from the cranes' giant engines was still ringing in her ears, louder even than the roar from the massive whirlpool that sat on the nearby horizon, when she heard Durkka-jan's gruff voice from over her shoulder. She turned to face the gnomish, muscular, golden skinned freebooter as he waved towards the direction from which the Xar'queyeks had come.

"We lost four good men," he said without preamble, his gruff frankness masking the frustration and anger she knew he must have felt. Durkka-jan was very protective of the crew over which he administrated, probably due to the fact he had hand-picked the majority of them and felt like he was their mentor even more so than their leader. "And we have precious little to show for their sacrifice."