10. They Keep Secrets Safe

[Novak]

Novak's nameless ship found port once more, and he disembarked before any cargo could. Merchants lined up for their part in the dance: the butcher for the fat, the carpenter for the ship, and the florist with a replacement cask of rose oil.

Novak stormed past in search of answers.

The winding shanty lanes of Craylock churned with locals. Many beasts spent their leisure time gambling on the fighting pits, where grog and sleight of paw wrested any coin the stilted odds could not. Those with empty purses fished the adjacent River Cray for easy meat, queued for a shift on a working vessel, or hocked 'found' jewelry at any passers.

Novak's boots slammed craters into the muddy path as he ran through the busy village. Slow-moving carts were vaulted over like a ship's railing. A few graceful pivots kept the quick paws of picaroons from stealing his purse.

Yet, a chain of plucked pheasants along a tavern's alley stopped Novak's charge.

He'd seen game birds plucked and lined for smoking hundreds of times before. Now he saw a hedgehog sweeping up dropped feathers and wondered.

He wondered what other ferals knew love and language, if this sweeping hog knew, or if he'd even care if he found out. Deeper still, he wondered what games the pheasant chicks played, what cries they uttered before the hunter drew its bow, and what other truths were ignored in favor of an easy meal.

Novak spat into the mud and charged on.

Only a few structures in Craylock were made with an architect's eye. First, the Crock o' Dawn tavern Novak had passed, which visitors confused as a town hall for its grandeur. Then the docks and shipping yards, which were mastercraft against the lowtown sprawl of lean tos, fortified huts, and gated burrows.

Beyond those, one manor stood immaculate upon a distant foothill.

A dry path guided Novak to the hill's top. The Northern standard of timber joints and masoned stone comprised the manor's four walls, and its iron-bound entry rose taller than a badger and twice as wide. Novak slammed the knocker and waited until his tail bristled at the silence. He fished under the front garden's border for the emergency key and let himself inside.

"Cap-" Novak punched the door frame, entered the manor in full, and started again. "Elken! Stir yourself!"

The main hall of The Captain's Manor stretched the entire expanse of the first floor. Nobeast attended the tables used for playing cards and signing contracts, or the bar for those booted from the Crock o' Dawn. Novak spotted a pile of spent wine bottles by the sunken hearth, which focused the low firelight into rainbows along the walls.

Novak sniffed at a bottle, caught the fresh spillage along its neck, and sprinted upstairs to his former captain's bedroom.

"Feign sleep all you like, but you will answer for your lies!" Novak barked at the blanketed, rat-sized lump within the four poster bed.

The rat-sized lump did not mutter, burp, or even breathe.

Novak gripped the velvet sheet and pulled strong enough for wrenching Vulpuz from Hellgates. Beneath rested Elken's coat, stuffed with pillows and molded into a sleeping rat's figure.

The illustrious Captain Elken Stallworth had fled his home.

Novak sat upon the rat's bed and gripped furrows into the mattress. Elken's scents swirled upward as Novak fumed: the crisp of salted fur, the stab of candied ginger gnashed into a paste, and the simmering promise of clove oil. The clove dominated, and Novak followed its trail after catching his breath.

Within the coat's folds rested a scented letter weighed down with a medallion. The penmanship ran quick, uneven, and diagonal upon the parchment scrap.

~*~

Dear Captain Novak,

You've survived your first outing. Ensure that my trust remains well placed.

A wave rushes towards Craylock. There's gold in its wake for those that'd ride along, and disaster for any who'd stand against. I've left to guide its flow, and I do not know when I'll return.

This medallion will keep you dry in the meantime - it better for the cost.
Show it only to those who ask.
Otherwise, keep your nose clean, your vessel fishing, and your questions to yourself. You were taught what to do, so do it.

You can borrow my coat for now. I'll even let you say you won it off me.

Yours kindly,

- Commander Elken Stallworth III of Craylock

P.S. - Clean up before you leave. This hero will not return to a broken home.

~*~

"'Commander?' But he's retired..."

The letter shook in Novak's paw.

"And what wave...? What does he mean?"

Novak crumpled the paper on remembering the last lines.

"Clean up!?" He threw the balled letter. "Not a mention of the pups, not a hint, not even a 'goodbye.' He doesn't care about what we've done, what he's left!"

A standing mirror waited just behind the bedroom door, reflecting a seething Novak upon the bed's corner. The scarecrow of a marten was nearly too tall for the frame though he sat hunched. His coat was thick and faded, like faded sailcloth, and the sash on his hip carried the Aegis Borne sigil in rose-pink stitching: a curved shield aimed skyward, inlaid with a single gem, and held aloft by outstretched arms.

Elken's coat, a tailored beaut of silk and leather that he'd 'won,' remained by his side, unworn. Novak knew he'd vanish in its folds.

And then he remembered the medallion still clutched in his off paw.

The brass disk depicted a blackened sun behind a ridge of jagged mountains. Novak could not tell whether the sun rose or set, yet its sharpness dispelled his furrowed brow and made him all too aware of the world's silence.

A silence which lasted only until the door downstairs creaked.

Novak remade the bed, realized what he'd done, and upturned the mattress before leaving with Elken's coat.

"You'll not find a party here." Novak spoke clear and loud as he descended, unable to see the entry for the way the stairs curved. "I suggest you leave while-"

Another mirror knelt by the wine bottle pile, poking at them as though they were a nest of strange eggs. This younger marten wore Aegis Borne in gold lines upon his forehead instead of on his hip sash. He also wore his saber openly, and thought nothing of chucking an inspected bottle over his shoulder.

Another marten; a northern marten. Novak knew again the whisper of wind along the fen.

"You live in luxury," said the visitor.

"It's what most assume, but none of this is mine. And you are?"

"Have the seasons changed us so much? I'm Zandir, cousin." The whisper swelled to a highland roar in Novak's mind. For a moment they were once again at the skyward pools, picking pin bones from mudfish. "Your crew insisted you'd be here, and I seek transport."

All the highland whispers salted to slag at the mention of the crew.

"Then my crew is a pack of squawking gulls, but I'm glad they sent you my way. I had to-" Novak retucked Elken's coat into his armpit. "-retrieve a thing or two."

"Not more wine I hope." Zandir made no secret of sniffing in Novak's direction, and then gestured at the empties. "I expected to find a deadbeast given the pile. Possibly a cult."

"Not yet, not yet." Closer up, Novak spied the grin behind his stoic visitor's stance. "But how much I drink will depend on where you wish to go."

Both martens chuckled, clasped forearms, and said in unison: "North winds sweep us together, not apart."

Novak ushered Zandir out the door, locked it behind, and led the way through Craylock.

For a long stint Novak only listened as his cousin spoke of the northern tribes: of rolling pockets of reflected heaven never quite frozen or flowing, of winter root stews salted by family-passed stones, and of the cheeky hogbabes always testing the limits of their marten protectors. He told tales of the journey south, and how a Craylock shakedown found him within minutes of entering the village's border.

And he spoke of a sable who also sought transport as they stopped by the harbormaster's gate.

"She's the burnt one, Mekai. Very touchy." Zandir gestured far down the dock, where Mekai and her band waited patiently by Novak's unnamed vessel. "She gathers warriors, and she's trying to recruit me into her scheme."

"You speak of her scheme, but what's yours?" Novak folded his arms. "You've told me every bit of home, down to nan's washing schedule. But you haven't told me why you need a ship."

"Must I?" Zandir spoke more with the ocean than his cousin.  "Have you told anybeast why you left home?"

Novak recognized this shade of the mirror as well, and wondered if Zandir counted either the whitecaps or the billow of clouds above.

"Fair point. We'll keep our secrets safe." Novak winked despite his even expression. "I'll help you and the sable, and don't worry about travel fare. Your toll will come out of her purse."

"And what, pray tell, of your pending fees, hmm?" Both martens turned at the new voice: the younger with a paw on his saber's hilt and the elder stepping between his cousin and the newcomer. Harbormaster Sizzlesnout's refined drawl did not match his kilt or horde name. The ferret cinched up his singular garment and stuck his cherry-red nose high in the air, still only coming up to Novak's chin in the pose.

"Only a single pup offloaded on your first outing, Captain Novak," said Sizzlesnout. "I worry you'll not be able to afford your license and docking fees."

Novak remembered the club hanging along the inside of his long coat, the weight growing heavier with Sizzlesnout's every word.

"The renewals were handled in Spring, as they always are," said Novak.

"Ah, yes. The renewal of The Crimson Weal, under Captain Stallworth." Sizzlesnout made a show over looking over Novak's shoulder at the distant, nameless vessel. "But I've nothing in my registry under your name."

"You'd grift Stallworth's second? Suicide is an ugly end, ferret."

"I'd value Captain Stallworth's opinion on the matter if he remained in Craylock. But rumor is he's gone missing, so as it stands..."

"As it stands you're shaking down a local." Novak jabbed the ferret's shoulder with a claw. "That's low, even for you."

"I ask for perfectly legal fees to ensure that your dear captain's legacy remains active." Sizzlesnout turned his back on Novak and cupped his paw at his hip. "Though, a small consideration on your part would ensure that any pending inspections are slow to arrive."

Sizzlesnout's cupped paw beckoned for the weight of coins. Zandir's saber hilt rattled against the scabbard, but remained undrawn.

Novak counted the whitecaps along the horizon and considered his options. The club in his coat offered a quick and brutal solution. The dock's edge offered a long fall and a cold lesson for grifting ferrets. The coat still tucked under Novak's arm radiated infectious clove from too many yards of stained silk.

He wanted the coat gone, he wanted Stallworth to explain himself, he wanted all facets of his rat captain simultaneously as near and far away as-

Novak smirked.

"A deposit then." Novak opened Stallworth's coat and wrapped the ferret within. Sizzlesnout struggled at first - nearly drowning in the too-large garment - but then openly trilled as he realized the luxury he wore. "You can tell everyone you won it off him."

"I-I-I couldn't! I mustn't!" Sizzlesnout twirled in place, looking much like a dibbun in pre-play wardrobe. "But if you insist..."

"I must."

Novak considered planting his boot in the ferret's backside and kicking him over the dock's edge anyways. Instead, he left the ferret to his spinning, signaled down the dock to Zandir, and put some distance between himself and the coat.

The nameless oiler's crew lined the rails as their newest captain returned.

Beneath the railing, upon the dock, stood the 'touchy' young sable and her warrior collective. Novak squinted at the ragged bunch. Two mice, one a soft child with a giant pack, and the other a doe he'd seen put in equal work between the pits and the Crock o' Dawn. Then a vixen who wore her cloak's hood up for more than blocking sunlight. And a hare whose scrutiny rested long upon the approaching martens.

Mekai did not speak up as the martens approached. She looked down and aside, as though she sensed Novak's evaluation.

"My cousin tells me you need passage south, and I'm able to oblige."

The sable still would not look up or speak. Novak tried again, despite the audible grumbles from his crew above.

"Whereabouts, miss?"

Mekai spoke low and stern, like an echo off a stone cave's wall.

"Pink, like a flower."

Still the sable did not look up, and Novak realized she studied his sash. The linen rustled in the sea breeze, making the rose tinge of the Aegis Borne stitching sparkle in the light.

"Ah, you like it?" Novak loosened his sash and held the stitching beside Zandir's head. "Tribal mark for us northern martens. Wasn't brave enough for the bleaching like Zandir here, but I'm a fair paw at the needle n' thread."

"It's more than a mark." Mekai grew more excited by the word, until she clutched the stitching in her paws and jittered in place like a pup on its birthday. "You both hold the rune close for a reason; we're here together at this exact time for a reason!"

"Right, er..."

All at once Novak became aware of how the skittery Mekai, his bleached cousin fresh from the pines, and her strange brigade appeared. No one, not even himself, was spared the crew's sneers. They heard full their captain's promise of safe passage for these strangers, of another day without a sea lion haul of significance. The smarter beasts, like First Mate Murray and Hand Brogan, made busy whispering concerns of compensation.

A wisp of clove demanded he pry every coin from the desperate, burned bumpkin for the crew's benefit. Or, better still, to keep his nose clean by turning the lot away and continuing the day's trolling.

You were taught what to do, so do it.

Yet, the pleading in Mekai's eyes.

The same hope and fear that he'd seen only this morning.

"...I'm told you're looking for warriors," said Novak. "I know a loud cat at a tavern just upriver. Calls himself Dannon the Daring. If you don't care for his boasts then we can at least resupply."

Novak tied his sash back on, clapped Mekai on the shoulder to send her stumbling, and made for the gangway.

"Come, we can talk flowers and terms on the way there."