• Completed • [Warrick] Rough Waters

[Quio]

26th of Ashan, Arc 717

He knew time was of the essence, and that was what kept him going through the first day of hard sailing. Quio had already been through five long days of surveillance, plus the night of the attack and escape. Then the two more days it had taken to transport his stowaways from the gates of Andaris to the Docks. He was tired, very tired.

Regardless he sailed through the first day, instructing Yanaqi as needed to make her useful on the ship. Vernon Smith and son Derek were quiet where they remained hidden below decks.

That night, however, the false Biqaj sat down to rest. He was supervising Yanaqi as she wrestled and swore with the sails. Just taking a fast break.

Ten bits in and the ship had rocked Quio into a heavy, unbroken sleep.

He dreamed. Smoke, the sight of his sails, a lone figure far away.

When he awoke the next morning it was to the sun in his eyes. One of the suns had just risen, the other remaining below the horizon. Quio moved, his body aching, and forced himself to sit up from where he'd fallen asleep hunched on the deck of the Blackheart. Yanaqi was nowhere to be seen.

The ship had come to a stand still, and he blinked around a bit, groggy, before he realized that they should have been moving. They had little time. He needed to get the Smiths to Warrick and then get himself out of Rynmere entire. But someone had put down the anchor. Why?

Where was Yanaqi?

On the breeze he heard a small sound, far away as if drifting over from the island. Quio dragged himself to his feet and stumbled towards the ladder to the lower decks. The sound got louder. His mind churned slowly, and then all at once reoriented, and the sound made sense.

His heartstone in his throat, he opened the hatch and went down below.

"Speaking in Rakahi"
"Speaking in Common"
"Speaking in Ulehi"

[Quio]

Down in the sleeping quarters, two forms huddled in the dark. All the lanterns had been put out. There was a third body, lying still on a bed.

Quio knew. As soon as he'd made sense of the quiet sobs of Vernon Smith he'd known. The man clung to the edge of one of the bunks. His son Derek lay still as if sleeping before him. Dried blood blossomed against the boy's shirt, and on his pant leg. Vernon's hands grabbed at Derek's and held it tight, pressing the back of the boy's hand to his own face. Not noticing Quio, not seeing anything but his son, Vernon continued to weep.

"Fara," Quio said, unable to come any closer, and the second form, that of his sister Yanaqi, looked over. She seemed almost bored.

She must have seen the look on his face because she shrugged and said, "You were sleeping."

"You should have woken me." Why did his voice sound so loud? He could swear he was whispering.

"I tried," Yanaqi said. Her arms were crossed in front of her chest. She scowled over at him. "You wouldn't wake."

"You should have woken me!"

"I tried!" Yanaqi spat, and then she stormed past him. She shoved him out of the way with enough force to push him back. His side hit the wall and he huddled there, unmoving and unable to say anything for some time.

Eventually, throat still stuck for words, Quio floundered his way away from the mourning man and his son's body.

---

"What happened?" Quio asked, when he was above deck once more. Yanaqi was in her customary place in the wheelhouse, and Quio had sought her out.

"How should I know?" she said angrily. She was picking flecks of dried blood from underneath her fingernails.

Quio realized her hands were stained with it.

He left and retrieved a bucket, and tossed it overboard attached to a rope. The water he dragged up was salt, but it was good enough. He returned with the bucket and a rag to Yanaqi, and handed her both.

She was in a bad mood. "Salt water," she said derisively. But nonetheless she washed her hands clean. It was a slow process.

When she was done, Quio took the rag and bucket and drained them of the soiled water over the side of the ship. Then he came back again.

"What happened, Yanaqi?" he asked. His sister shot him an angry look for having used her Yludih name. Quio pressed on, stepping closer. "Yana, please."

His proximity seemed to do it, or maybe the use of her childhood nickname. She couldn't ignore him. She stepped away, putting distance between them, and looked out the cockpit window at the sea. Face turned towards the east, she squinted against the light of the rising suns. By this time both suns had come up. From this position, one almost seemed trapped behind the black of the ship's sails, haloing the dark cloth in a corona of intense golden-white light. Blotted out. The way Derek Smith had been blotted out of the world.

Finally Yanaqi shrugged and said, "He got worse in the night. I was working the sails and you were supposed to be helping me." There was annoyance in her voice. Quio heard it to be accusation. "But you fell asleep. Later the older one came up from below decks--"

"Vernon," Quio interjected, Yanaqi never remembered people's names. She did it on purpose.

"Yeah, whatever. He came up all upset about something and screamed at me. He screamed at me. He tried to wake you but you had passed out. Eventually he gave up and ran back downstairs. Then I tried to wake you so you could deal with it but you didn't wake. I went to Uleuda but you weren't there. I couldn't find you anywhere. I had to come back without you. Back to the man and his dying son."

"I was dreaming," Quio said faintly. He had not been to the Uleuda in almost a full cycle. She should have known that. She would have never found him there.

"Yeah, well, you were dreaming and I was downstairs, trying to get the guy to stop screaming. He was so fucking loud."

"What did you do?"

"He wouldn't stop."

"Yanaqi, what did you do?"

"Don't use that name!" she told him, and then spat out, "I helped him, okay? He wouldn't fucking quit it until his son was alive or dead, not in between, so I helped him. The boy's wounds had gone bad and they stunk and were swollen and he was bursting open and his body was too hot with fever, so I pressed my hands against his belly to keep his blood inside. That's what you're supposed to do, isn't it?"

He couldn't tell if she was being purposefully obtuse or if she really didn't know. "But pressing on it didn't help. It seemed to hurt him. Then what was I supposed to do? He was dying and in agony. Like he had been poisoned. So I kept my hands on him, trying to hold him together, and all the while his father fell apart. The man raged and screamed and begged the gods. Like they might help him. Imbecile."

"You should have woken me."

"Seriously, fuck you," Yanaqi said, scornful. "Are you a doctor? No. You couldn't have done anything either. It's not our business. People live and people die."

Quio gritted his teeth. "And what of Derek?"

"What do you mean 'what of him'? He took his last breath and he went. After that the old man finally shut up about it, at least for a while, but then he started crying again. Right before you came down."

"Speaking in Rakahi"
"Speaking in Common"
"Speaking in Ulehi"

[Quio]

"What are we supposed to do?" Quio asked, because he was at a loss. He had saved Derek Smith, he had saved him! And now this. Derek was supposed to live. Despite his injuries, he was supposed to push through, he was supposed to have a life! What was the point of it all? To be a slave and fight and get hurt and live, and be freed and die? Why had this happened?

"I could have taken him to the doctor," Quio said. "But I saved myself. I could have, I could have saved him, but I didn't. I didn't. What if I got caught?" It didn't make any sense. He was Yludih, he could have changed his face and hidden himself in an instant, what had he been afraid of?

"I saved myself and cost the boy his life," he said. "But I didn't want to show Vernon and Derek what I really was." Currently, he was still in the guise he had stolen, that of Earnest Freeman. He hadn't changed back.

"Of course you couldn't show them what you are," Yanaqi said from across the little room, and now she strode back to him and grabbed him by the bicep, forcing Quio to turn towards her. Her fingers dug into his arm. "Of course you saved yourself! If you had been caught you would have been killed. You know what they do to Yludih--"

"I should have stayed. I would have been okay--"

"You would have died! They would have found you. You showed that man your true face, didn't you? That man whose identity you stole." Yanaqi clenched her fingernails further into his arm when he didn't answer and shook him. "Didn't you?"

"Yes," he muttered, not looking at her.

"That means that man knew your alias. If he knew that, the knights would have found you. Even if you hid they would have found where you lived, that inn, and they would have found your stupid boyfriend, and they would have used him to get to you! Don't you see, that's what they do. They cannot be trusted."

"Hart?" Quio asked, and for a moment the boat rocked so fiercely, even on such a calm day, that he nearly slipped sideways and fell. Yanaqi's hand was there to hold him up.

"Yes, your boyfriend couldn't be trusted either. He would have ratted you out--"

"No, Hart!" Quio said. "You-- you just said that they would find Hart, that they would use him to get to me! Didn't you?"

Now it was Yanaqi's turn to be taken aback. Quio grabbed her wrist. "Didn't you?"

But Yanaqi wouldn't answer. She ripped her arm from his grasp.

"If they find Hart they could hurt him, couldn't they?"

"You don't know that," Yanaqi said.

"They could. If they ask him where I am and he says he doesn't know they might think he's lying. If he's lying, they will hurt him. You said it yourself. 'It's what they do.'"

"They won't hurt him."

"You don't know that! He's not a citizen of Rynmere. The kingdom didn't give a fuck about Vernon or Derek Smith, and they were supposed to be protected, they were citizens of Warrick! Hart's an outsider. They would hurt him. They would." Quio was furious with himself, furious and terrified. He turned, yanking from Yanaqi's grip, and burst free from the bridge. Heading towards the sails.

"What are you doing?" Yanaqi demanded, running after him, trying to grab him again.

"Get off me! I've got to go back! I've got to find him and bring him with or-- or--"

"You cannot go anywhere near that place, not again!" Yanaqi screeched. Her hands had wound their way into his shirt like claws, snagging so he couldn't break away. They struggled on the deck, Yanaqi seeking to stop him, Quio only trying to get free.

"I have to."

"No! There is nobody there to go back to, alright? He's not there anymore." But Quio was still struggling. "Didn't you hear me?" Yanaqi shook him hard enough to rattle his teeth.

"No! Yanaqi stop! I've got to--"

"I said there's nobody there! He's gone, okay? I killed him!"

Quio fumbled at that. He thought he must not have heard her correctly. He still tried to break free. "What?" he asked.

"I killed your stupid boyfriend."

"No." Now he had stopped.

Yanaqi made sure he wasn't going to do anything and then she let him go. "Didn't you think it odd that he was gone? Just gone for so long, and you didn't know where he was? How long was it? Was it weeks?"

"No," Quio said, "No, I thought--"

"You thought he was off playing his games and sleeping with his whores and fucking around. And he was. But I put an end to it."

"No," Quio said. "Why?"

"Because you gave him everything and you gave me nothing. You wouldn't even listen to me, not once, not after everything I did for you, and for him you would cut out your own heart."

"No," Quio said again, but this time very weak.

"--He was ruining everything and he didn't even care about you. He just slept around and stole your money and used it for his gambling and sin--"

"No."

"Yes. He didn't care. He hated you when you lost his stupid ship and you still loved him. He hated that you left with U'frek and went and fought and almost died and you still loved him, why did you love him?

"He made you feel ashamed, he made you hate who and what you are. Don't lie to me--" because Quio was about to protest again, "I know. He didn't even see that you were hurting. When you needed him most he left you alone. He kept going away, going away, when you gave everything, your whole family, your whole race, for him!"

Quio had never seen Yanaqi cry. Not even as children.

"You were a traitor for him!" she screamed, the tears streaming down her face. "My little brother was taken away from me and you went and found a new family and lived with him! You were gone and our father could not stand it, so he took everything good in my life and ripped it apart and all because of him! I had to be the Eloquoi because you couldn't be there, because of him! I had to hurt, I had to bow my head, I had to live with our father's constant disappointment and resentment, with the weight of our family's failures, and I became what I am because of him!"

"And still I found you.

"I found you, and I hated you and I loved you despite it all. But even when we could have gone back to the way things were you denied me and you chose him." She wiped her tears angrily away with the back of her arm. "Him. After those people killed your mother and you learned that nobody but our kind should ever, ever be trusted. Still you trusted him."

Quio had shrunk down to the ship's deck and he knelt there. It was too much, too much all at once. Hart was dead? Yanaqi? Yanaqi had killed him? His father had done what-- what to Yanaqi? Because Quio had not been there?

Hart was dead because Quio had not been there. Hart was dead because Quio had not been the son, the heir he was supposed to be.

He couldn't make sense of it.

Finally he stood to his feet and felt the boat shifting underneath him, like the weight of the world had suddenly gone out leaving him floating alone. Yanaqi stared at him with eyes bright and wide, and Quio stared at her as if he had never seen her before.

Then he shambled towards the anchor and started drawing it up.

"What are you doing?" Yanaqi asked from behind him.

"Drawing the anchor," he mumbled.

"You can't go back," she told him again.

"I know."

"Well--" she faltered. She fell silent. When he turned to look at her she was looking away from him.

"I'll be in my cabin," she told him, and without speaking he went back to working the ship.

When everything was set he called Yanaqi to him again, and together they got the boat moving once more on its course towards Warrick.

To Quio, the black of the sails, once a point of contention between himself and Hart, now signified nothing but death.

"Speaking in Rakahi"
"Speaking in Common"
"Speaking in Ulehi"

[Quio]

28th of Ashan, Arc 717

She tried speaking to him the next day, but Quio wouldn't hear her. He just mechanically worked the sails. Went to the wheel. Steered the boat.

"I shouldn't have told you that," she said, following him around. The Blackheart was a larger ship than the Akor had ever been, but no matter where he went or how he ignored her he couldn't escape her, not for a trill. Instead he put his mind to work. Nothing but work. There was only the Blackheart, sailing, the sea and sky. The line of the horizon before them. The curve of the island to the starboard side. The wet flurries of snow slowly turning to rain and mess and slush. The line of the horizon past.

"I shouldn't have told you I killed him, okay?" she said. "I didn't kill him. I lied. Okay? I lied. But you still can't go back."

"Hart's dead," Quio told her. "That was not a lie."

"It was," she said, frustrated, but he wouldn't listen. He knew the truth when he heard it. That, trial-last... that had been the truth.

Hart was dead and Quio's own sister had done it, the person who proclaimed to want to protect him the most. Derek had died too and Quio hadn't seen Vernon since. He hadn't the heart to see him and so he kept to himself, not saying anything, not thinking anything, just doing what he knew how. Alone. He was truly alone in this world and in every other.

The next time he went down to his bunk to sleep he saw that his things had been taken. Yanaqi. His sword and dagger were gone. Normally he would have rolled his eyes. She thought he was going to hurt himself.

"I'm not going to kill myself," he said, the next time he saw her. He chewed his food without tasting it and chugged some alcohol to help wash it down where it tried to stick in his throat. Yanaqi sat at the table across from him, watching him eat.

"You will," she accused him, and he had the strength to fake a laugh. "You will," she said moodily.

"I won't," he said. "What point is there? Hart is dead and where he is I cannot reach him. Yludih don't go where everyone else goes. We go to hell instead."

"The Uleuda is not hell," Yanaqi told him, but once more he had quit listening to her. He went back to slowly eating his food instead.

Three days passed, and the weather turned to rain, and that made sense to Quio who felt like U'frek himself must be greiving. Finally they were at Warrick, and they traveled up as far as they could along the Kyo River until they reached a point where if they went any further they wouldn't be able to turn around. Quio went down and fetched Vernon, and found the man as far away from his son in the small interior of the bunkhouse as he could be.

"Time to go," Quio told him, and the man followed him back up.

Vernon blinked in the rain and light and inhaled the fresh air as if he had never seen any of it before. Then he turned and left, without a thank you and without the body of his son. He walked down the gangplank onto the soft muddy shore and away, away, away.

Quio was going to let him go, but then remembered and ran after him. "Vernon!" he said.

The man turned to him lifelessly. Quio knew that feeling. "Vernon, take this." It was a heavy pouch full of golden coins, all the coin that Quio had stolen from the Fighting Pits. Blood money. Tainted with the blood of Vernon's dead son. Nobody deserved it but those who had fought and died for it. "And take my advice."

The man looked ready to leave, but Quio reached out a hand and made sure he stayed put. "You and your family need to get out of Warrick. Go, live anywhere but here or Andaris. Okay?"

"Okay," Vernon echoed back at him.

"I need you to do something for me." Derek might be dead but Vernon was not. "I want you to smith a small piece of metal into the shape of a sword, and I want you to take that sword and heat it up and brand its image upon your cheek." Vernon simply stared at him. "The Fighting Pits branded you a slave, did they not?" The man nodded his head. "Then a brand in the shape of a sword on your cheek will identify you as a freed slave, and even if they come to find you they may not be able to take you back. Okay?"

"Okay," Vernon said again, and then turned and walked away.

This time, Quio let him go.

"Speaking in Rakahi"
"Speaking in Common"
"Speaking in Ulehi"

[Quio]

33rd of Ashan, Arc 717

Derek Smith's body had been left on the ship, and so with Yanaqi's help Quio carried it out. Vernon had wrapped the body in some sheets he'd taken from some of the bunks below deck, and Quio left it as it was, figuring it was the least he could do for the boy.

They carried him down off the ship and away from the river until they found a nice spot of soft land under a tree. Quio didn't know if Derek had liked trees, he didn't know anything about him, but he figured if Vernon or his family ever came back they might find Derek's grave here if they looked.

The Yludih had a small shovel he usually used to muck out the chickens' pen in the ship, and he got to work digging Derek's grave. "We don't have time for this," Yanaqi told him, complaining, but eventually she sat down and watched him work.

It took a long, long time to make a hole big and deep enough, even for a boy not yet fully grown into a man.

It was sunset by the time Derek's sheet-wrapped body was laid down carefully in the grave, and night before Quio had finished patting the last of the earth back into place over him. He asked Yanaqi for his dagger but she wouldn't give it to him. So instead he directed her to carve Derek's name into the tree's trunk, marking the boy's final resting place.

Under that, he told her to carve Hart's name too.

As he watched Yanaqi carve, Quio thought that Derek Smith might have liked to be buried. It was what a lot of country folk did and Warrick was certainly the country. But Hart--

Hart would have hated it. He had told Quio once that he wanted to go back into the sea.

For the first time since Yanaqi had told him Hart was dead, Quio felt tears welling at the corners of his eyes. He tilted his face to the sky and let the icy cold of the rain numb him and wash away all feeling.

Then he and Yanaqi took the muddied shovel, and Quio said goodbye to the grave, and together they walked back and boarded the Blackheart.

By morning's light they were gone, only the grave left behind them, and they had almost lost sight of the island entirely. "Where are we going?" Yanaqi asked him.

"Ne'haer," Quio told her, then mumbled under his breath, "Back to a sea of my own."

Ne'haer was where it all had started.

Ne'haer was where it would end.

"Speaking in Rakahi"
"Speaking in Common"
"Speaking in Ulehi"

[Kaladis Anar]

Treasure Time!

Name: Quio

Knowledge:
Deception: A Very Hard Lesson in Deception from one you Loved.
Detection: Small Slips can Lead to Terrible Truth.
Detection: Spotting when the Plan had Derailed.
Disguise: A Slave can look like a Free Slave with the right Branding.
Endurance: Burying those who Deserved Attention.
Logistics: Well Planned Operations can be Taxing.
Intimidation: Persistence can sometimes Gain you an Answer.
Navigation: Shallow Water Navigation Around the Shoreline.
Persuasion: Proximity and Familiar Names can Influence Others.
Psychology: Last Rites are often not the same for each Individual.
Psychology: Removing your Blades made Self-harm Harder
Rhetoric: The Truth sometimes is Undeniable.
Seafaring: Using a Bucket to Catch Water.
Seafaring: Sailing on Despite the Shock.

Yanaqi: Killed Hart your Boyfriend for Betraying you, Family Resentment and Jealousy.
Vernon: Parted on Bittersweet terms of the Cruellest Kind

Loot: Minus whatever was in the pouch you gave Vernon.
Injuries: None
Fame: +5 One man died but you Gave another his Freedom and the Money to Live it.
Devotion: +1 Thoughts of U'frek's Tears.

Story: 5
Collaboration: 0
Structure: 5

Magic: No points may be used here for magic.

Comment:
Sad emotional and painful outbursts. Excellent plot points for the future with the boyfriend’s death and family hanging over him. I like the distant way the Yludih approach this foreign world it comes off as believable. No problems, all easy to read and follow, great stuff.

Any questions, comments or feedback please pm me.

~