Chapter Text
“It starts with a cutlass.
To be more accurate, it started long before the cutlass was worn by Captain Arith of the Red Doe.
It starts with a rainstorm, a child, and a Captain.
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It starts with a child of 10 summers, though they know not the sun’s embrace. It starts with a small island in Western Eberia, one that has not known peace from the rain since the child was born.
How the child got there, sheltered under cardboard and ruined ceilings in the Old Village on the North Coast of the island is another story.
This story continues with a sob from the child. They can’t help it you see? Their Doctor is dead, and they are sitting in the rain amidst the ruined structure of a house that, if things had gone differently, they could have grown up in. Obviously a child is going to cry about the sensation of tacky blood between their fingers and cold numbness in their legs. They’re a child, and they are alone.
But that sob, that single cry, reaches the ears of a Captain. And because the Captain is a kind man, he yells for his doctors to get ready, and runs to seek out a pain he might be able to cure.
Do you understand where the story is going now? You understand enough of people with kind hearts, don’t you?
Pirates are hardly any different.
So act one of the story concludes with a hand offered with a gentle smile, and the shine in the eyes of the one who reaches up to take it. Wariness of strangers is not really something you can afford when you’re cold and soaked and in the rain, and this child does not understand enough of society for pirates to be ‘evil’.
It is important to note that the Captain’s name was Eyik, not Arith, for what little good the distinction did in the end.
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The cutlass does not appear until a couple of acts later.
(“What happened in between?”
“A story for another time perhaps. One we don’t have the time nor the joy for tonight. Just know that the child was happy, and the crew was both kind and restless, but they stayed out of trouble for the Child's sake.”
“Did they have a name?”
“You’ll see.”)
Technically it is not a cutlass at all, but a rapier made of pearly steel, but the Child called it a cutlass, and so the crew will call it that as well. It’s never a good idea to argue with your doctors after all, even if said doctor is only 14.
It was, after all, the child that found it.
They would never tell the crew exactly where it was spotted, only that it was somewhere near the cave the scientists of the crew gathered crystal and rock samples in, and no one really bothered to ask. Instead, they simply smiled softly as the child bounded up to the Captain and presented him with the weapon.
The Captain is never seen without it after that, the sword joining his coat and hat as trademarks of the man.
I think you can begin to see where this story is going now.
After all, Arith and Eyik are two very different people.
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(“Inian, where the fuck are you finding these stories?!”
“Just a little something passed down in my hometown dearest Meryl.”
‘And which hometown would that be?’
“The one on a boat, darling.”
“How come not even Rheno knows this one?”
His smile goes soft and sad for a moment.
“According to the sailors that told me, it’s never going to be finished. At least, not satisfactorily. You’ll see what I mean.”)
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It ends, or maybe just begins a new chapter, with a Queen crowned in flowers.
She is not alone, because Captains rarely are. There is a mūcamah next to her, lavender hair shining under the sunlight in a perfect contrast to the Queen’s crimson, red eyes complimenting the Queen’s lavender, and they ask to speak with the Captain.
The Child has heard of them of course. 17 years old is old enough to be in the loop when it comes to pirates, and everyone has heard the story of Blood Doe Arith and her desertion from Voigen’s crew. Everyone knows that Iri of the Compass followed.
They want the crew. The Captain puts it on a trial period. They have been playing it safe for years because of the Child onboard, but 17 is almost an adult, and the Captain has barely been able to stop them from leaping headfirst into battles.
The duo give them violence and riches.
That shouldn’t matter.
They vote. The Child is not invited, and the Captain only allowed to count them.
It is nearly unanimous. They let him keep the coat and hat, a ‘mercy’ dipped in boastfulness. The Child hates them already.
The Captain could have pulled rank. Could have stopped the takeover. He didn’t. He accepts his new role as quartermaster and doesn't use it for revenge. The Child resents that a little bit too.
You know this story now don’t you? The Ballads sung about the Red Doe and the crew she carries are legendary.
Hang on in there, there is still more to tell. (“Or read, if you’re Rheno”)
There was more lost at that first battlefield than an eye or hand, after all.
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The Child and the Captain do not speak to each other until the Child is eighteen, and they are sailing into a massacre.
It's probably not fair of them, to ignore him so thoroughly, but they are young and angry and they still have plenty of time to apologise. Theirs is a crew that does not age, after all.
It doesn't hit them that 'un-aging' does not mean 'immortal' until they're dragging their Captain off the battlefield and into the nearest half-sterile room because all of the other doctors are more focused on Arith's missing hand and Iri's damaged eye than they are willing to spend even one doctor that isn't an apprentice to take care of the one almost split in two right in front of them.
It makes them seethe.
Their Captain is out for a week, and they delegate his duties because nobody seems to care enough to take charge, and Captain never managed to name a First Mate because he knew the burden of burying your grief to take charge as he had done after being given captaincy, so there is no second-in-command to do it.
Only a Child, with hands that still shook after giving stitches.
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(“Same.”
“Cody, put the number-of-hours-without-Meryl-referencing-her-fucked-up-childhood tally back to zero please. Eishi, sit still, I am far from done with your nails.”)
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In the end, the Captain wakes to the Child’s cries and walks again.
The ship fell mostly into disorder while he was gone. The Red Doe sleeps, her Bird by her side. They are not used to functioning without a leader, and the Child could only do so much to manage the supplies in his absence.
The Captain tries to restore order and give instructions, but tensions are high, and soon he is dead to the world again, this time for a knife wound in the eye.
The Child sits and waits. They do not try to help this time.
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The Captain stops trying after that. It isn’t obvious, exactly, but the Child knows what apathy looks like, can see it in themself even, beneath all the anger.
It is a terrifying thought, so they stoke the flames of their anger, coaxing it to burn ever higher beneath their skin.
They stopped ageing at 21, and hide a smile beneath their hand even as their Captain mourns when the eldest of the doctors dies of a bullet in the heart.
6 more crew members die in the following years, 3 of them wryoncazya and 1 other a cazmyrya . They do not mourn any of them, nor do they offer themself as medical aid. Their skills are purely for their Captain, no matter how hard he tries to keep his distance in the name of giving them space.
Then their Captain falls sick with scurvy, to the amusement of the crew, who do not notice and call him old for joint pain and he can avoid them no longer.
They tell him that to get the fruit he needs, the only payment required is to say their name.
It has been decades since they last heard it after all.
But the Captain just smiles, sitting in the silence he had bound himself to, because honourable men are foolish when they take foolish vows.
The Child sits and waits, ignoring the laughter of the drunken crew.
Blood seeps from the Captain’s chest and they argue with a silent figure.
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Their Captain grows weaker, red-and-blue spots appearing on weathered skin and gums swelling. They have to force his mouth open to check him, but there is a plate of lemon slices like the ones the two of them used to share on the deck when the ship was still The Morning Dove, just out of his reach. They are fresh, and sour in just the right ways, his salvation, and they can see his resolve weaken.
It has only been a week at most, and scurvy isn’t quite the same with people like them, so they have no idea how long he has. But their stubbornness lasts, and so does his honour.
There is a funny tradition among sailors, that a fellow sailor from outside the crew is the only one who may absolve a crewmember of a broken vow in place of the Captain.
There is also a tradition that any sailor who refuses to aid the crew is no longer part of that crew.
Do you see where this is going now? A desperate, angry Sailor-Child, protecting their Captain, and a man robbed of everything by the people he kept together?
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(“Oh. Scurvy. This is going to be fun!”
“Eishi, you have a weird sense of humour.”
“Oh fuck off. I’d rather focus on other people’s tragedy than the shitshow I’m holding together.”)
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The Child stares at him, weak upon a sickbed, forced into their presence by the Sea and the Air. They know how scurvy works, know it isn’t a Seacurse, but what else would they call the way the Waves had toppled his fruit into the Sea while the others laughed.
Their Captain is Seacursed in Voigen’s mercy, because if they had to wait any longer, they may have put him in this bed themself.
This and many more are told softly to the Captain. He never responds, silent as ever. Perhaps he cannot. But his eyes open, just barely, as they speak, and his chest still rises as they stop the bleeding carefully.
It is dawn on the 9th day when he caves, lips parting just slightly, without being forced open like they do to check his gums or force food and water down his throat.
Sweat-soaked, feverish and desperate, their Captain blinked unsteady eyes, and whispered their name.
The Child smiled for the first time since they were young and foolish, and handed him the lemons.
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(“So…we don’t get to know their name?”
“Yillieh, I could tell you a thousand different names, and none of them would fit. We don’t know their name.”
‘But you have a favourite one.’
“Perceptive as ever my darling.”
“Ew, affection between the engaged. Boo!”
“...ignoring Meryl, if you must give the Child a name…I prefer Mathyre.”
“Bat? Why bat?”
“It just fits. And most interpretations view them as a bat, so…”
“Fair.”)
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It is a month later when their Captain stops looking them in the eyes, and the fire within them, so carefully smothered in the gift Voigen gave them, roars once again into an inferno.
It is another month before they figure out why.
Their Captain is afraid.
Their Captain is afraid because the woman who has his cutlass is afraid, has been since she awoke after that fateful battle, and fearful Captains make fearful decisions against those they believe wish to usurp them.
It doesn’t matter that their Captain has been a perfect little soldier since the day the two of them arrived. Arith is afraid, and her Bird is afraid, and their Captain is afraid.
And they are angry.
Angry at Arith, who waltzed onto their ship having abandoned her own, and stole everything from them and their Captain without raising a finger. Angry at her Bird, for following her every command with a stubborn loyalty to rival their own.
Angry at their foolish, noble captain, for all the truths he tried to shield them from, for all the times he shut them out so they could live an ignorant, traitorous existence.
Afraid. So very afraid.
And they knew that was what it came down to. Fear.
Fear of the unknown, driving them to learn every Sailor’s Custom.
Fear of the known, turning their Captain into a target of his own design, time and time again.
They pray to Voigen in fear.
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The months pass with nothing.
Arith is afraid only at night, when they sleep hanging from their Captain’s rafters to guard his cabin from her desperate visits.
They steal their Captain’s coat one day and find a thin dagger engraved with the usurper’s name.
They would grin with approval if only the weapon weren’t made of so much fear.
Arith sets down their rapier one day, and they cannot find it within themself to pick it up.
They blend into the background, and nobody remembers that they are a doctor capable of making up for the loss of medical staff, no matter the symbols they wear.
They sit on the bow and think.
Their Captain fades into silence once again, and they pretend not to notice him awake as they hum a shanty they know soothes him.
Crewmembers come, crewmembers go.
The two of them could run.
But their Captain’s fear mutes their anger as much as it does his voice, and they are stuck here, the doctor and their Patient.
Eyik will always be their Captain, but he cannot bear that right now.
So they call him by title in their head, and by name out loud.
One day the Sea will blow them far away from here. But their Captain would not acknowledge it should they absolve him of his vows.
The salt on the air has the same old stale smell.
They sit on the bow and wait.
They hang from the rafters and wait.
They tie their patient down and wait.
They will not be waiting forever."
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Inian breathes in, sipping on the water next to him.
The first plait in Rheno's hair is complete, and she gives him a soft smile, reaching the end of the page he gave her at around the same time. Perhaps she knows what this story means to him, maybe she connects the painted symbol on his cheek to the Eye of Erephytar and can grasp the meaning of it. Perhaps not.
He leans back in his chair, letting the worn red pillows take his tired weight as he turns to look at the others.
Yillieh is undoing zeyr hair for when Eishi gets round to brushing it later, loose curls cascading down her back. Eishi, for their part, has her hand planted firmly on the coffee table to let their nails dry.
Meryl and Cody sit opposite the two, Cody finishing up the last touches on the new design they're trying for Meryl's eyeshadow while the model herself searches for a fidget blindly, wandering hands landing just left of where her actual pile of them was.
Inian debates helping her, but this is funnier.
"Anyways! Who's telling next?"
A beat of silence, then Yillieh raised their hand.
"Splendid."