Trans-Coastal Sapphic

Give no Quarter

"Ambergris, c'mon whose got some? 's the only way we'll know for sure." Valkyrie insisted, holding out her hand expectantly. It was a commonly known myth that one whiff of the strong-smelling substance would make any merfolk immediately infatuated by the wearer. She knew that they had found some before on a previous adventure not long ago and that it had to still be on board somewhere; no one of common sense was willing to have the material out in the open inside of their home. The captain looked around, listening to a few of the women mutter amongst themselves before one ran below deck to search. A moment later the girl returned with a small piece of the waxy grey treasure, handing the ambergris to Val. Slowly but confidently Valkyrie approached their prisoner, exposing her to the piece with a sly smile, waiting eagerly to see the potential mermaid's response.

"What's-ah! Ohhh..." Coraki mumbled, immediately feeling herself begin to slip away hypnotically, overwhelmed into a whole new state as she quickly caught onto the scent held out in front of her. Bright green eyes dimmed as her pupils dilated, looking up at her sweet Valkyrie with nothing less than complete infatuation. Every muscle having once struggled to escape her bindings, suddenly all at once relaxed, almost leaning in so she could be closer to Val like she could never leave her love behind. The surrounding crew cheered at the success of their experiment, they had done it! But the results left Valkyrie with an inexplicably uneasy feeling inside. Somehow this seemed...wrong... To do something like this to a poor young girl, to manipulate her mind without her consent...

"A-alright that's enough!" Valkyrie started abruptly, pulling the hypnotic piece back. "You." She looked at the young woman who had given her the ambergris, "is this important to you?" Surprised initially by the question, the crew member shook her head and watched in confusion with the still marvelling crowd as their captain went to the edge of the ship and cast a piece away into the sea before turning and starting to walk away, stuffing her hands into the pockets of her trousers. "Now stop your gawking and get back to work, we've still got sea ahead of us before the island..." Jan got up and exchanged concerned glances with Ferran who tried to start following her friend below deck as she let the crew go with a dismissive but preoccupied wave of her hand. Ferran slowly followed down the softly creaking steps and snuck down the hall to stand against the wall near the open doorway of the lavatory; listening as Val desperately scrubbed at her hands, almost violently trying to get the smell off of her.

"We did it Val...a real mermaid! Aren't you excited? That's half a treasure in it of itself, it's amazing!" Ferran exclaimed as she stepped into view in front of the door, her excited tone, and the encouraging smile on her face faded back to worry as she watched her sister fixate on getting herself clean. "Are you okay Kyrie?" "-I'm fine." The girl immediately interjected, drying her hands and facing the doorway. "Come, just go on now, there's still work to do." Val insisted, her urgency not settling her friend's concern any, but friends or not Ferran would respect her captain's wishes to be alone and she promptly returned above deck to take command until their captain felt better. 

 A few moments after Ferran bowed out and went back to lead the main deck, the other woman reappeared from below with a small bucket of water and a sponge. Valkyrie paused mid-stride when she saw that her mermaid prisoner suddenly had a pair of legs instead of the scaly green tail that she had possessed upon her capture. 'Is this some kind of trick? Or magic?' she thought to herself, looking at the unconscious, now half-human looking girl tied to the Folly's mast. 'No..she shouldn't be able to do magic, we made sure to keep her out of the water...or is this how they disguise themselves?' As she pondered this, Val took off her coat and wrung her sponge out into the bucket of saltwater and began to dab it onto the fish to keep her from burning up. The mermaid, still a touch drowsy from the earlier display, kept her eyes closed tightly until she felt a splash of cooled seawater touch her skin. Coraki's big green eyes then opened wide and she gazed up at her captor, still nervous and afraid, but grateful for a bit of relief from the blazing hot sun. She hadn't even realized her tail had gone until the feet she was standing on gave way back into her tail while she received a proper drenching.

"Are you going to kill me?" The mermaid's meek voice managed to pipe up, Val chuckled a little to herself, a small smile curling at the corner of her lip as she shook her head and continued to wash the remaining scent of the ambergris off of her catch. "...eat me?" she asked in a smaller voice, causing Val to laugh a little louder.

"If I wanted to do that I'd have to kill ya FIRST! Wouldn't I?" Valkyrie tried to joke, immediately realizing the error of her humour and trying to change her phrasing, seeing the look of terror on the girl's face. "Oh no no! Sh-, sorry, no! You aren't gettin' eaten or killed or anythin' like that. You're okay." She told her softly, gently dabbing her face and forehead with the cool water before dumping the contaminated contents of the bucket overboard. "I'm Captain Valkyrie...Val, this is my ship. You can understand me I take it?" Earning a small nod from the girl, she smiled a little more genuinely, listening intently as the girl spoke.

"What are you gonna do with me? W-what was that stuff, you're not gonna use it again are you?" The more questions Coraki asked, the more frantic her voice became, the fact that she even spoke the same language so well was a wonder to Val that the sailor really had to force herself to listen to the worries of the mythical creature. "Where am I? Where are we going?! I wanna go back!"
 "Hey! Hey now, jus' calm down, hush now, I'm not gonna hurt ya I said!" Valkyrie tried to reach out to pet the mermaid's hair reassuringly but took her arm back and held them both in the air in surrender when she saw Coraki flinch back. The captain sighed and set the bucket down, this was fine, she could manage to hold a normal conversation if her catch was willing to talk. "Hey now, it's okay. You..can understand me then? Interesting. An' it seems like you speak the language alright, but you must have your own language don't you? What's your name?"

At the endless bombardment of questions, Coraki had been nodding her head along easily in reply. She was about to open her mouth to reply when a familiar voice, yelled out her name from the ocean.-

"CORAKI!!!"