Auster 1 Chapter 2

Chapter 2


The sand’s warmth spread over Auster’s back like a lover’s embrace.  He let himself sink into the bleached shore with a contented sigh.  The clouds above charted their own leisurely course across the sky.  A fat cloud, a boisterous carrack like the Battle Boar, bumbled its way past the other celestial vessels.  It absorbed a small tuft of mist into its girth as it barreled carelessly along.  A long stringy cloud, a speeding longship, rowed across the sky with dozens of churning oars.  The whisper of a cog brought its misty inhabitants gingerly across the firmament.  None had a destination in mind, each merely doing their part to add to the flowing mosaic of the heavens.


A cast of miniature crabs scuttled along the alabaster coast.  Their red shells glinted in the sun’s rays as they made their voyage to the cool shade of a fissure.  Birds of bright green and yellow hues soared above, their sweet voices blending in a sonorous choir.  Auster watched as one swooped down into the surf and emerged with a struggling tuna ensnared in its talons.  It flew upward in a spiral, high above the canopy, before letting the helpless fish fall to the craggy rocks below.  The tuna hit stone with a wet slap and ceased all movement.  Auster smiled wistfully.  In a way, he sort of envied the fish.  If he had to pick one way to die, it would be looking from above at the shimmering sea and all its verdant islands in his final moments.


The captain sat up and brushed off the sand clinging to his coat.  Off in the distance, he saw Tomas approaching along the waterline, but he did not rise to meet him.  Instead, he picked up a handful of milky shells and laid them out in a circle before him.  He was just placing the last piece of his small shrine as his second-mate appeared before him.


“Sir, the crew wants to know what we’re doin’ next.”  The second mate stated flatly.


Auster did not look up from his shells.  “The crew wants to know, or you wants to know?”


“Everyone wants to know.”  The bald man replied with a stern voice.  “We been sailin’ around aimlessly for three weeks and everyone wants to know jus’ what the point is.”


“Perhaps that is the point, Tomas.”  The young man clapped the sand off of his hands.  He tugged idly on a loose bootstring in a vain attempt to tighten it.  “What’s wrong with taking your time and enjoying the bounty of the sea?”


“The sights and smells are beautiful, if I didn’t think so I’d ‘a never been a sailor.”  Tomas crossed his arms and waited for his captain to look up at him.  When Auster failed to return his gaze, the second mate continued.  “Comes a time where a man needs to feel like he’s doin’ somethin’ of value in this worl’.”


“So what’s important then?”  Auster said, irritation creeping into his voice.  “Losing men in bloody conflict?  Plundering foreign shores of their meager wealth and women?  Perpetually answering to an employer like a dog on a chain?  I made it clear from the start this wasn’t a pirating ship, it wasn’t a merchant ship, and it certainly wasn’t a vessel in service of any navy.”


“Aye, but you’ve got a group o’ men who only ever known pirating and smuggling.  Pay will only quench their thirst so much.  Men who have a penchant for violence and sit too idle fer too long are prone to act on their baser impulses.  ‘Tis a dangerous combination, captain.”  The second mate continued to stare at Auster with crossed arms.  The captain finally looked up, peering into his dull black eyes.


“I’ve never mistreated them.  I pay them more than they’d ever make in a pirate crew, or even in service.  When we need money we take on a mercenary contract, but nothing that will get anyone killed.  I’m beyond that life, and you know that.  I thought you were too.”  The captain rose to his feet with a hop.  He spun about and faced the thick foliage of the jungle further up the island’s shore.  Digging in his coat pocket, he withdrew his pipe.  The silverleaf design etched in the sides of the wooden base shimmered when it caught the sun.  As he lit a pinch of tobacco placed in the bowl, he murmured.  “I oft wish I could just slip into the jungle brush.  If I could just live simply like a crab; basking in the sun by day and enjoying the dance of the stars above at night.”


“The crew needs a captain, not a crab.”  Tomas cut in.  He placed a light hand on Auster’s shoulder.  “You’re a brillian’ sailor, and as worthy as any to be the master of a ship.  In fact, I never did figger why you didn’t sign on as a naval officer.  You’re fitter for the job than the blue-bloods that fill the Cerean fleet, and well educated to boot.”  He shook his head sadly.  “But yer here now, and you’ve got to lead us.  If ya want to sit and stargaze, you ought to just stay here on this island.  If you wan’ to be a captain, it’s time to come aboard.”


As Tomas turned to leave, Auster produced a small roll of parchment and handed it to him.  “I’ve got your purpose right here.  We stopped in Greywatch for more than my gambling addiction.”  The captain blew a puff of smoke from his pipe before facing his second mate.  “Smuggle run across the South Sea.  We’re picking up our cargo in Tyros.  Narcotics disguised in a shipment of hardwood and grain.  Heavy crates that officials won’t want to sift through too extensively.  Here’s the kicker.  Not only do we have to look out for foreign navies, I’ve been informed that there are rival ‘organizations’ seeking to cripple our contact’s trade power in the underworld, organizations that have considerable enforcement fleets at their disposal.”  Auster took the pipe from his mouth and smirked.  “Sound like enough action for you?”


A crooked grin spread across the second-mate’s leathery face.  “Always takin’ the piss from me, aren’t ya.  Make me look like a bloody fool with my lecturing.  What’s the tonnage and rate?  Who’s payin’ us?”


“40 for thirty silver a ton.”  The rate their crew was accustomed to was less than a quarter of what his contacts were offering.  Though the deal did seem a trite shady, Auster would be insane to turn it down outright.  The money he scraped by at the tavern might be able to fund his wages for another week or two, and they had no other leads.  He would arrive to pick up the cargo, as promised, and keep a wary eye for anything that seemed out of place.  The captain felt no strong obligation to fulfill a contract he deemed too dangerous to continue.  Even if it did get hairy, Auster was accustomed to working his way out of a tight spot.  Growing up in the dingy back-alleys of Ostium had honed his quick-thinking and sharpened his wit.


Tomas whistled.  “Who’s footing that bill, a king?”


Auster shrugged.  “Some small-fry criminal organization based in The Principalities.  I haven’t heard of them.  They’ve probably got a prince or two looking to supplement their treasury with some shadow investment.  I’m more concerned with the ‘how much’, less with the ‘how’.”


“Greenhorns who don’t know our worth.” The second-mate laughed, a hearty rumbling that emanated from his core.  “I’m more than happy to grow fat on their dime.”  He patted his rotund belly.


Auster shared his mirth, but only in appearance.  “Go get the men ready.  We’ll set sail in an hour.  Plot us for Tyros.  Our auspicious journey awaits.”  In truth, he felt trapped by his present circumstances; nothing about it felt fortuitous.  He had sought to escape this feeling his entire life.  It was the very feeling that had haunted him from his earliest days and drove him to the sea.


Tomas nodded and plodded off in the direction of the ship, whistling as he walked.  Funny how a small piece of paper could bring such joy to a person, the captain mused.


A bestial squeal brought him from his thoughts and back to his surroundings.  Auster wheeled about to face the source of the noise.  Several meters deep into the jungle, a thicket shook violently.  Having left his cutlass on the ship, the captain drew his obsidian dagger from the leather sheath strapped to his thigh.  It was a curiosity he had acquired from a volcanic island in the more remote parts of the South Sea, but its sharp edge could slice through flesh like butter.


The shaking continued but did not move closer, prompting Auster to take the initiative.  He cautiously tread through the jungle foliage, struggling to cut through briars and ferns with his knife.  As he neared the source of the disturbance, he realized it was much smaller than he originally perceived.  An adolescent boar had snagged its head in a web of thin vines and brambles.  He drew closer, realizing he was safe to do so, and watched the piglet struggle.  In front of it was a fat truffle, undoubtedly the piglet’s intended quarry before the creature found itself caught instead.


Auster chuckled, walking up to the balled up fungus.  He plucked it off the ground and glanced it over.  How ironic that the delicacy of noble courts far and wide was fit for a pig. “Your highness.”  The captain bowed and presented the truffle to the trapped piglet.  It eyed the ball suspiciously, but consumed it whole the moment the young captain stepped back.


Having had his fun, he brought his obsidian knife down to the neck of the piglet.  He held it down as he sliced at the vines around his neck.  The moment the bindings gave way, he stepped back and let the young boar scamper off deeper into the undergrowth.  He stared wistfully into the darkness of the jungle, wishing he could follow.  Raising a hand to his own throat, he contemplated Larissa’s remark the night they left Greywatch.  He decided that, much like the pig, he preferred the truffle to the noose.