Nobody Likes Fairytale Pirates (9 page)

Din began to rifle through what
sounded like paperwork.

Uriah leaned closer to her.  “Our
new client is somewhere around 5’9”, shoulder length dark brown hair, and of
unknown nationality.  His countenance is what I would describe as ‘fidgety,’
working his way up to ‘
squirrely’
.”  He paused.  “He seems unusually
nervous and has checked the door five times since he sat down.”  He paused
again.  “I don’t think he has any money on him though, so if this goes bad,
don’t bother searching his corpse.”

“Age?”  She asked.

“45 or so.”  Uriah guessed.

“I’m 39!”  Din snapped, sounding
insulted.

“But he
looks
45, Dove.” 
Uriah defended, then turned back to the man.  “I’m sorry, but you know it’s
true.  I can’t exactly
lie
to my quartermaster as I’m describing the
scene, now can I?  She needs to see what I see, and
I see
a man who
looks 45, if he’s a day.”

Din made a small unhappy sound but
didn’t protest the issue further.  He pulled something out of whatever it was
he was carrying and held it up.  It rustled like paper, but was rolled.  “My wife’s
grandfather left this to…”

“Oh, shit.”  Ransom sighed in
resignation and long-suffering expectation, recognizing where this was headed. 
She threw her hands up in exasperation.  “
Here we go
…”

Uriah giggled in delight,
appreciating her take on the situation.  “Oh, a
treasure map!” 
He
clapped his hands together eagerly, like a giddy little girl.  “I
love
treasure
maps.”

Unfortunately, that wasn’t a joke.

Despite the many, many fruitless
treasure hunts they had been on over the years, the man continued to see
nothing but the huge chests of gold which were supposedly at the end of each
new map they encountered.

Her partner took an innocent glee
from life sometimes.

On good days, Ransom thought it was
cute.  Even endearing.  The rest of the time, she wanted to beat him over the
head with a shovel.

Today… was a shovel kind of day.

“If you had a treasure, why would
you bury it?”  She asked her partner rhetorically.  “I’ve never understood
that.”

“So you can draw a map!”  Uriah
pounded his fist down on the table.  “The very second I get my hands on a
treasure, is the very second I bury it again and begin to devise a series of
fiendish traps to keep people from stumbling upon it!”

Unfortunately, that part probably
wasn’t a joke either.

Her partner was a strange man.

“This map leads to a cave filled
with riches.”  Din continued, rustling the paper, probably spreading it out on
the table so that Uriah could see.

“Hear that, Rance?”  Uriah asked
enticingly.  “
’A cave of riches
.’” 

“Can we make sure that
this time
the…”  She began.

“Yes, yes,” he interrupted,
sounding put-upon, “
obviously
we need to make certain that the people in
question understand the concept of money, just so there aren’t any
disappointments again when we see exactly what represents ‘wealth’ to the
locals.”

“Yams.”  Ransom made a face at the
recollection.

“Yes,” Uriah agreed, “yams.”  He
paused.  “But to be fair… they were
delicious
yams.”

“You ate their entire economy.” 
She deadpanned, shaking her head in disgust.  “And you don’t even like yams.”

Uriah clapped his hands and laughed
hilariously at the memory.

“No, no.  This treasure is the real
deal.”  Din assured them seriously.  “I just need some people who know what
they’re doing to back me up on this.  This is a dangerous area we’re heading
into.”

“We’re pirates, not mercenaries,
‘Rai.”  Ransom reminded her partner, talking around their client.

“For the right price, I’m willing
to expand our repertoire.”  Uriah offered the man.  “I can assure you, I know
how to take care of myself.”

Ransom didn’t bother to point out
that Uriah’s true skill was indeed taking care of himself… but not necessarily
his
clients
.

Din evidently didn’t notice that all-important
distinction.  “I just need someone who can take the lead on this and safely get
me to my riches.” 

“Mounting a treasure hunt is not a
cheap endeavor, Mister Din.”  Uriah explained.  “There are all sorts of costs
and expenses which even the most
frugal
of entrepreneurs will incur
during the planning phase alone.”

“I’ll pay you two thousand for
supplies and expenses now, and I’ll give you an additional fifteen out of
whatever it is we find.”  Din offered.

Uriah was silent for a long moment,
obviously taken aback by the amount but trying to hide it.  “The fifteen comes
off the top.”  He pressed, recognizing an opening for a bigger cut.  “We take
our share, then you get the remainder.  And if there is only fifteen or less in
the haul, we take it
all
.”

“I’m agreeable to those terms.” 
Din decided.  “But believe me, there will be
plenty
to go around.”

“Dove?”  Uriah asked.  “Our best
course of action?”

“What’s the map look like?”  She
leaned closer to the table.  “It legit?”

Uriah was silent for a moment, apparently
studying the markings.  “It appears to be a crude rendering of the Wasteland
and the Southern Isles.”  He tapped the map.  “And there is some kind of giant
spider lurking in the margin.”

“That’s a squid.”  Din corrected.

“
Well, it looks like a spider to
me
.”  Uriah snapped, losing patience with the man.

“Is this treasure guarded by giant
spiders?”  She shook her head.  “Because I hate giant spiders.”

“It’s not a spider!”  Din slapped
his hand against the map.  “For the last time, it’s a
squid!” 

She ignored him.  “Uriah?”

“Spider.”  Her partner repeated
matter-of-factly.

“
Squid
.”  Din insisted. 
“It’s purely decorative!”

She pointed at her partner.  “So is
he,
but he can still kill you if you piss him off.” 

Uriah laughed again, obviously
liking that.

She leaned back in her chair.  “Uriah?” 
She asked him simply.

“The map is signed by Captain
Poledouris.”  He partner announced seriously, humor forgotten.  “That’s his
seal.”  

“You sure?”  Poledouris was a
legend in the piracy game.  If he had been a part of making the map, it was
legit.  “That could be faked.”  She argued.

“It’s real.”  He assured her. 
“What do you say, Dove?  Wanna go questin’?”

“Okay.”  She leaned back in her
chair.  “Looks like we’re going on a treasure hunt.”

Several Days later

“I just want to go on record that
none
of this
is my fault.”  He reiterated to his partner, just in case she was
confused on that point.  “Not where we are, not the kidnapping, not that
tedious chase, and not the resulting yet entirely unavoidable tragedy.”  He
crossed his arms over his chest.  “None of it.”

“Well, it’s
someone’s
fault.”  She reminded him logically.

“Personally, I still blame our
former benefactors.”  He decided after a moment.  “Had they been more
honorable, we wouldn’t have been placed in our current situation.”

Ransom didn’t look entirely
convinced by that line of reasoning.  It had been almost a year since they’d
seen their previous clients.

“He practically
dared
me to
do it.”  Uriah tried, altering his tactic.  “Surely, you saw… or
heard
as
it were… how he just
jumped right out in front of us,
waving his arms
like a lunatic and wailing like a banshee!  I took him as some kind of
highwayman!”  He threw his arms out in exasperation.  “I ask you: how much was
I supposed to take?  At some point, I simply had to act to preserve my own
safety.”  He placed his hand to his chest.  “I had no choice.  There isn’t a
court in the land which would convict me of any wrongdoing in this matter.”

“Your grasp of the legal system
amazes me, ‘Rai.”  She agreed dryly.

“I don’t
want
to call
myself
the victim here…” he thought aloud, “but I suppose by any fair reading, there’s
really no other way to look at it, is there?”

“I think
she’s
going to look
at it another way.”  Ransom warned.

“Oh, I didn’t like her anyway!”  He
waved a dismissive hand.  “Or her silly, ugly kingdom!”  He gently swatted
Ransom’s shoulder with the back of his hand.  “You and I have moved on
since
then, haven’t we?”

“Not really.”  She shook her head. 
“No.”

“We’ve done bigger and better
things than she ever could have dreamed!”  He continued, warming to his topic.

“Nope.”  She shook her head.  “Unless
you somehow did them while I was sleeping or too drunk to remember.”

“We’ve risen above her monstrous treachery
and her scandalous ingratitude!”

“You betrayed her, then stole her
money.”  She reminded him flatly.  “A lot of money.”

“Most of that just went to pay off
our debts though.”  He scoffed in dismissal, as if her point were ridiculous. 
“It doesn’t even
count
as stealing if it’s just to pay off debts.  In
order to be ‘stealing,’ there must be actual profit involved.”

“Again, your conception of the law
is just a thing of wonder.”

“All I’m saying is that if she had
paid us what she had promised us, we wouldn’t have had to seek employment with
the enigmatic Mr. Din, which means we wouldn’t now find ourselves here,” he
gestured to the docks of Cormoran, “searching for a suitable vessel.”  He
pointed down at the man at their feet.  “And this lad
wouldn’t have,
once
again,
forced us into regrettably necessary action.”  He nodded, utterly
convinced by his own argument.  “As always, I find myself the victim of an
ungrateful and callous world.”

“You’re sure he’s not dead?” 
Ransom nudged the unconscious man with the toe of her boot.  “’Cause he sounds dead. 
I don’t hear breathing.”

“Yes, I’m sure he’s not dead.”  He
looked up at the sky, feeling unappreciated.  “For the last time, he will
recover.”

“I still think he’s dead.”  Ransom
insisted, her voice unemotional.  “I think you finally killed him.”

Uriah stared down at Ryle for a
long moment, then frowned.

“Give me a moment…”  He quickly
beat on the boy’s chest until his heart once again began pumping.  “See!?!”  He
looked up at his partner.  “He’s
fine!” 
He laughed at her overreaction.
 
“
What did I tell you, huh?”  He dropped the boy’s head back to the
cobblestones with a thud, then winced, hoping he hadn’t cracked his skull.

“Or he
was
, until you just
split his head open.”  His partner summarized.

“He’s just resting.”  He glanced up
at her again.  “I think the kidnapping really took a lot out of the poor little
lamb.”

“You’d think he’d be used to it.” 
Ransom observed.  “Hell, this is the second time
we’ve
kidnapped him and
we barely know him.  Imagine how many times people who actually give a shit
about him abduct him.”

Uriah pursed his lips in thought. 
“I don’t get the sense that too many people
do
care about the lad
though, so I think it probably has more to do with good victim selection on our
part, rather than any predisposition on his.”

“His sister cares about him.” 
Ransom said ominously.  “And her giant.”

Uriah made a face.  “Oh, they’re
the ones who caused this whole thing.”  He pointed at Ryle.  “Their fiendish duplicity
forced our hand!”  He slapped the back of his hand into his palm.  “Again!”

“Huh.”  She sounded dubious.

“You disagree?”  He put his hands
on his hips indignantly.  “Surely you can’t be insinuating that this is somehow
my
fault.”

“Let’s just say you’d better not
call me as a character witness when this goes to trial, because…”

“I
want
it to go to trial,”
he declared with complete conviction, “so that I can clear my good name and
receive an apology for the vile slanders which have been spewed upon me by my
cold-hearted accusers!”  He slammed his fist into his palm again.  “I will be
vindicated!”

Ransom ignored him, continuing her
thought.  “…I think I’ll just tell them what
I
remember happening, which
was that you started walking down the docks, looking for the ship in order to
hire it for our little treasure hunting excursion, saw Ryle walking the other
way, and you both panicked.  He took off at a run in the other direction, you
chased after him because his sister—the new
queen
of this land
—
and
her very large husband told you
specifically
to never ever,
ever
return
to their kingdom, and you were afraid that the Swab was going to tell them
about your unauthorized visit here and sound some sort of alarm.  You then
proceeded to scream at each other about who had been following whom, until you
both worked yourselves up into even more of a panic, at which point he tried to
run and you decked him, knocking him down a flight of stairs.”  She pointed to
the unconscious man and gestured to the exterior staircase they were standing on. 
“Which brings us up to date.”  She shook her head.  “And, just for the record,
you are
not
going to represent us at trial.  You’re already the pirate
who’s murdered the Queen’s brother, adding perjury and innumerable procedural
crimes in court to that list is simply out of the question.”

“I didn’t murder anyone!”  He
defended passionately, then paused.  “Except that fellow on the transport ship…
but even
you
have to admit that he had it coming.” 

She shrugged, unable to argue that
point.

He tapped his fingers on the
banister, trying to formulate a plan.  “Any ideas?”  He asked her seriously.

“I’m thinking we’ll need to somehow
conquer time travel and go back to an hour ago to keep you from being an
idiot.”

He chuckled.  “Oh, you’ll have to
go a lot further back than
that
to keep me from being an idiot, Dove.”

They both laughed pleasantly.

He frowned down at the boy again.  “Red
or Black?”

“Black.”  She waved a disinterested
hand at the unconscious man.  “Just leave’em.”

“We can’t do that!”  He pointed
down to the bruises forming on Ryle’s head and body.  “He’s injured.”

“So… you want to take him to a
doctor?”  She sounded surprised.  “Really? 
You?
”

“No!”  He scoffed at that ludicrous
notion.  “I meant that if he’s found dead and covered with bruises there will
be an investigation.” 

She frowned again.  “So you’re saying
we’re Red here?  Seems like an extreme response to a complete nonentity like
the boy.”

“Black.  Just with a little Red
mixed in.”  Uriah clarified. 

“Pink?”  She arched a dubious
eyebrow.  “We’ve never done Pink.  I don’t think we even
have
‘Pink.’”

“No, not Pink, just a different
shade of
Black
… but with Red added in.”

“That’s called ‘pink’.”  She
repeated unemotionally.

“Well,
whatever
.”  He rolled
his eyes.  “Call it whatever you want, but I want to drag him out of here and
keep him from telling his sister and her giant that we assaulted him!”

“’We’ didn’t do anything.”  Ransom
shook her head emphatically.  “That was aaaaaaall you.”

“We’re a team!”  He pointed at the
boy.  “When
I
beat the Queen’s brother into unconsciousness…”

“…
and
throw him down a
flight of stairs.”  Ransom added for him.  “Don’t forget that part.  The court
sure won’t, no matter how distracted they are by ‘Operation Pink Flag.’”

“…
you
beat up the Queen’s
brother.”  He finished, ignoring her negativity.  “That’s what being in this
partnership is all about.”  He reached down to their victim, taking on a
clandestine tone.  “It’s also about grabbing a leg and helping me drag him out
of here before anyone sees us.”

“Please don’t assault and kidnap
anyone else, ‘Rai.”  She struggled to heft up the boy’s legs.  “We don’t need
to make any more enemies today.”

****

Uriah found the ship he had hired,
only to discover that his client was already aboard and waiting.

Generally, Uriah hated it when
people arrived before he did.  It allowed them to become familiar with the
location, plan out strategies, and most likely place booby-traps.

But Uriah was also accused of being
paranoid on occasion, so perhaps it was just that his client liked to be
punctual.

He strolled up the gangplank,
smiling at Din like he didn’t have a care in the world.  “Good afternoon!”  He
gestured to the craft.  “I trust that this vessel is to your liking?”

Uriah didn’t really care if it was
or not.  Din had given him gold to put a down-payment on hiring a ship for two
months, at which point Uriah promptly pocketed half of it and hired the ship
and crew with the remainder.  Thankfully, things were so bad in this world at
the moment that people would basically work for any amount of money if you
offered it to them.  Utter desperation and despair created such a wonderful buyer’s
market. 

Din really should have known not to
put him in charge of the money.

First rule of piracy: you should
NEVER put a pirate in charge of the money.

“Yes, it looks fine, Captain.”  The
man began.  “I’m just anxious to…”  He trailed off as he saw Ransom dragging
Ryle behind her by his legs, up the gangway.  “Wait… who’s that guy?  And why
is he dead?”

“Merely a hostage.”  Uriah
explained nonchalantly.  “Pay him no mind.”

Din squinted in confusion.  “Is he…
dead?”

Uriah rolled his eyes, sick of
everyone saying that.  “For the final time, no, he’s
not
dead.” 

“He’s ‘resting’.”  Ransom supplied
in her breathy monotone, dragging Ryle so that the back of his head banged
against every tread of the gangway in a regular “thump-thump-thump” pattern.

Din cleared his throat, looking
uncomfortable.  “Well, if his ‘resting’ involves decomposition at all, you two
are going to be the ones in charge of throwing him overboard.”

Uriah shrugged.  “That’s fine.”

Ransom unceremoniously let the
boy’s feet drop to the deck.  “Hell, I’ll do it right now.”

Uriah snickered in delight.

“Hi!”  A lovely woman wearing a
conservative little blue dress and dainty white gloves sprang from the interior
of the vessel so suddenly that both Uriah and Ransom jolted.  “I’m Badroulbadour.” 
She waved at them, like they were new students just arriving in her class. 
“And I just want to say hi!”  She paused.  “Wait… am I supposed to?  Are you
the good guys or the bad guys?”

Uriah doffed his tall copotain hat
to her theatrically.  “We’re pirates, good lady.”

“We defy traditional classification.” 
Ransom added in her charming whisper.

“Moral chameleons, really.”  Uriah
agreed.  “Though not too bad, we’re not too good.”

“You’re kidnappers!”  Din argued
loudly.

Uriah shrugged.  “Again… we live in
a world of grey, I’m afraid.”

“Well… pretty fucking dark grey.”  Ransom
clarified.  “Particularly on that issue.  Probably some ‘Red’ mixed in too.” 
She paused for effect.  “Pink.  We live in a world of dark pink.”

Uriah leaned against the railing of
the ship.  “Oh, half the people I knew growing up were kidnapped.  I don’t know
what all the fuss is about.  This is a cultural misunderstanding, that’s all. 
Let’s not be so ethnocentric.”

“Wait…”  Ransom held up her hand. 
“Huh?”

“Who would live in a shithole like
the Grizzwood by choice?”  He shook his head.  “No, sometimes you need to bring
in outside blood or the whole world stagnates.”  He held up a finger, making a
vital point.  “Or as my dear mum used to say: ‘Fuck destiny.  Just do it yourself.’” 
He sighed in admiration.  “A credo which epitomizes the no-holds-barred pioneer
spirit which the Grizzwood was built upon.”

“Your life is just…”  Ransom made a
soft whistling sound.  “Wow.”

Din’s wife didn’t look nearly as
moved by the words as Uriah was.  “I’m afraid I still don’t really understand
who…”  The woman trailed off and pointed at Ransom.  “Is she… blind?”

Uriah nodded.  “My partner is…”

The woman looked excited over this
news for some reason and cut him off, focusing on Ransom completely.  “I’ve
always wondered… what can you
actually
see?”  Her words were spoken at a
louder volume than necessary and were carefully spaced, as if believing that
Ransom’s blindness came with a hearing condition as well.