The port was less a city and more a wooden scar on the coastline, smelling violently of salt, dead fish, foul-smelling sprawl of wood, wet ropes and tar. The journey here had been grueling; Aeryn was quiet the entire time, her silence a heavy, smothering cloak that made the distance between her and Rissa feel like miles. Now, standing amidst the chaos, Aeryn pulled her hood low, shrinking beneath the brim of the rough cloth, hiding the ghostly white streaks that had spread into her rich red hair.
Rissa, however, was currently engaged in a very loud, very public screaming match on the docks, with the people of the most decrepit vessel, a fishing trawler whose only discernible sign read, PORT TALOS CARGO ONLY.
"What part of 'bugger off' don't you understand, little gal?" a burly fisherman spat, blocking the gangplank of a weathered, barnacle-encrusted cargo hauler. He was missing a tooth and smelled like he bathed in brine. "Read the sign!" he said in between chewing tobacco, "Cargo only! Fish. Crates. Barrels. We ain't running a nursery for lost brats in fancy orange leather!"
"Aye! You two scrawny things," another man barked, spitting a dark stream into the water. "Get yer flea-ridden carcass off the deck. Cargo only. We ain't running a bloody refugee cruise."
Rissa planted her hands on her hips, her eyes flashing. "Refugee? Me? Okay me… but SHE?" she said shockingly while pointing at aeryn. "Mate! we are the most valuable freight you'll ever carry!"
The fisherman, whose name might have been Grog or Scab, squinted at her. "Carry? You look like spoiled fruit to me, gal. Where's thy crate? Where's thee manifest? We got salt cod and industrial tallow. That's it."
"We are cargo!" Rissa shouted back, slapping her own chest. "Look at us! We take up space! We have weight! We are arguably more valuable than a barrel of pickled herring! And we smell better! Well, she does," Rissa pointed a thumb back at Aeryn, "I smell like a horse, but that is a noble scent!"
The fisherman and his three mates erupted in a fit of crude, wheezing laughter. Rissa's insults were so over-the-top, so aggressively ridiculous, that they completely disarmed them. They slapped their knees and pointed, giving Rissa all the attention.
"Noble scent! Did you hear that, boys? She thinks she's a crate of perfume! Get lost before we toss you in with the scraps!" Grog said while laughing.
From the high railing of the upper deck, a cloud of foul-smelling pipe smoke drifted down, followed by a voice like grinding stones and sea shanties.
"What in the blazes is all that noise, Grog? Sounds like a bloody parrot arguing with a mule!"
A hulking figure leaned over the rail, the Captain. He was a mountain of a man with a beard like a tangled net and a patch over his left eye. He was grinning, revealing a row of gold and rot.
Rissa looked up, shielded her eyes from the sun, and offered him a flamboyant, mocking salute, her eyes gleaming.
"Ay captain! This gal is the mule!" Grog replied.
The Captain's grin widened, his good eye crinkling at the audacity. "I think you are the mule, you scrawny pest! Tell me! What you want, lad?"
Rissa immediately responded, matching his energy. "We want to take this boat. Sire"
"Well, well, well! Look at this! A sassy little firecracker! A cheeky lad aren't you?" the Captain roared. "Listen up, brat! I take cargo to Port Talos. I don't take headaches. You look like a whole crate of bad decisions wrapped in cheap leather. Why should I risk my ship and my reputation on the likes of you?" he said while smiling and pointing at her up and down with his pipe.
Rissa immediately dropped her hostile stance and adopted a theatrical tone, like two old drinking friends. "Because, your reputation is already sunk deeper than your anchor! Look at this tub! It smells like a retirement home for dead crabs! Taking us is the only thing that will make this trip interesting! Besides, your crew looks dull enough to carve fence posts out of!"
"Dull?!" the Captain bellowed, thoroughly entertained. "My Finn here can tie seventeen knots blindfolded! You can't even tell a foremast from a flagpole!"
"That's because I ride things that have legs, Captain!" Rissa shot back. "And Finn! Look at him! He is clearly terrified of me! He just wants to go home and tell his mum he met a beautiful, intimidating brat!"
Finn blushed furiously, covering his face, clearly regretting why he came out on the dock at that exact moment. The Captain roared again, slapping the rail. The entire exchange was a bizarre, lighthearted exchange, Rissa's raw charisma instantly transforming the tension into easygoing banter. He took a huge puff from his pipe, blowing a smoke ring into the salty air.
"Fair enough!" he roared. "Ay! like that lad mates! Get her on the boat, before she insults us all into walking the plank!"
My friend too!!! Rissa exclaimed.
"Yeah yeah come on, We need someone like you to swab the decks with that mouth of yours!"
Rissa beamed, giving him a salute with two fingers. She winked fiercely, a chaotic flash in her dark eyes.
"Captain Granpa, I ain't no lad by the way! I am a lady! I don't think thou saw clearly with thy remaining one eye!"
The crew went silent for a heartbeat, jaws dropping at the insolence. Then, the Captain spat on the dock missing grog from a few centimeters, and then just laughed until he was red in the face, tears streaming from his good eye. He let out a huge, rattling puff of smoke from his pipe, then just gestured emphatically with his stump of a hand.
"A lady with a tongue like a whip!" he roared. "Fair enough! Fair enough! Get your friend and get on board before I change my mind!"
He gestured with his pipe towards the deck, signaling his men to stand down.
Rissa turned to Aeryn with a double thumbs-up. "See, My Lady?!"
But aeryn was absent minded. She didn't realize until all was set. Nor did she smile back at her. She felt a cold dread settling in her stomach as she walked toward the gangplank. The water below was calm here, sheltered by the harbor walls. It was the deep, vibrant blue of the Azure Dominion, commonly called liquid sapphire.
She had been avoiding anything and everything that reflected her image for days. She had turned away from polished shields, closed her eyes when washing her face, and avoided looking too closely into Rissa's bright eyes, from fear of seeing herself. But as she stepped onto the narrow plank, the sway of the boat made her stumble. She gripped the rope railing, looking down to steady herself.
There, in the stillness between the dock and the hull, the water was impossibly clear. It acted as a perfect, cruel mirror.
Aeryn froze. The breath left her lungs in a silent rush.
The woman staring back at her was a stranger.
There they were the white streaks, devouring the rich blood-red of her hair like a creeping frost. But it was her face that made her heart sink like a stone into the depths below.
Her skin was translucent, pale as parchment. Her eyes, once a fiery, vibrant hazel, looked washed out, dull and sunken, rimmed with dark, heavy shadows that spoke of a soul-deep exhaustion. She didn't look like a powerful elementalist. Neither did she looked like a Queen. And honestly she didn't look like aeryn either.
She looked like she was dying.
"My Lady?" Rissa's voice came from the deck, light and concerned. "Are you coming? Do you need me to carry you? I can do it! I lifted a calf once!" though it felt like a joke, rissa was clearly saying it from a oncerning heart.
Aeryn tore her eyes away from the water, her hand trembling on the rope. She pulled her hood down so hard it nearly covered her eyes to hide the tears threatening to spill.
"I am coming," she whispered, her voice hollow.
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