Avarice of the Sea | | b o o k 1

10: Enemy Horizons

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:  C H A P T E R  T E N : 

 Two weeks passed on The Avarice of the Sea, and we had long since passed the Brunmere peninsula, and stopped at the east-most island off the coast. It took two days for Cody to convince Avarice that I was safe enough to come back up on deck, but the third day there were storms and I was stuck back in the cell until the fourth. 

My purpose on deck was minimal, but in the later days when my back was no longer stiff from scabs, I convinced Harvey to teach me how to climb the mainmast spokes. I could only ever reach the main boom, but it was still fun just to sit up there and hold onto the mast for my dear life while feeling the wind in my hair. Avarice caught Harvey and I up there once and yelled so loud we swore it was the reason Harvey fell backwards and was caught in the shroud.

On the calmest days, I spent them up on the boom watching the crew work below. There were twelve of them, not including the captain. They rotated work, passed along tasks, and acted like one big family. I realized this after understanding that all their bantering and cursing was just in good fun, and that none of them actually meant to elbow the other in the nose.

There was a fight sometime later between two pirates, one of whom had snatched his monthly oil and vinegar during mealtime. It was one massive clout to the head that sent the pirate thief to the ground, and I clamored down the spokes just so I could hear what was going on. Avarice had taken the thief into his cabin, and the man came out later with a crisscross marking on the inside of his wrist where his tattoos bubbled around the branding mark. Cody explained to me that thieves are branded with that symbol on the ship.

He showed a mark on his wrist of a circle, and above that one a cursive letter I could not read. "This 'un means I killed one of the crew," he pointed to the circle before pointing to the other, "an' this 'un is fer treason."

"Really?" I blurted out, wanting to say more but I kept my mouth shut. I wanted to know everything--I wanted to know what possessed Cody to kill one of his father's crew, and I wanted to know what he did to get the treason mark. For some odd reason, I felt the peculiar interest a lot of newbies might feel when stumbling across the treason mark on the captain's son's wrist. It did not sit well with me.

He nodded and pulled his sleeve back over his arm. That was two days prior to the journey out of the Nomen Strait. We had stopped at Brunmere a fortnight ago, and the men came back to land baring supplies by the cratefuls. They lowered them off of the cliffs and loaded them into the storage space beneath the hold. On the stop at the east-most island of the Brunmere Isle, we kept there for days upon nights. I had never set foot on the island, but after my jump from the boat Avarice was insistent that whoever hung back on the boat, had to keep a close eye on me. Therefore, I was held below the ship in the cell.

The fight between the pirate and the thief started on the fourth night on the island. It became apparent that Avarice of the Sea was well known around the small port of Shire'ren. It was a small, bustling town, but up close and from a distance it was littered with filth on the streets and taverns up and down the premises. The closest I had gotten was on the third day of being on the island when Avarice left his ship to do business with one of the tavern owners, and Cody snuck me out to stand on the dock.

When we first left the ship, I was swaying and stumbling all over my feet. Any attempt at escaping was all for naught, since I could not even keep myself up completely. He laughed and pointed at me in the beginning, and then held me up so he could introduce me to one of the dock boys.