Cartographers will tell you that three-fifths of Ur is covered in water. If follows, thus, that the sea is three-fifths more dangerous, miserable, and deadly.
Just ask Flex Kavana.
He can tell you all that you need to know about sea monsters, pirates, press-gangs, corrupt dock masters, extortionate harbor fees, and salted-everything.
But until today, he’d never seen anything like Brunhilde Schlappinger, is tearing off chucks of the sea monster tentacle that has her wrapped up in its grip.
It’s hard to feel sympathy for a sea monster, but there it is.
How Flex got here takes some explaining.
——
Celaena’s dream is as good as any place to start.
Our adventurers finding them in safer place than they have been in some time, so they collaps on the deck of the Carrick anchored in the harbor.
During their sleep, Celaena had a dream within a dream.
The dream starts surrounded by ravens. In a circle facing outward, they were not threatening, but instead they are protecting.
Watched over by a pair of red eyes, she lay down in the circle of ravens and went to sleep to dream a second dream.
The Angelic Warrior Tadriel is observing a man dressed in a traveler’s coat, a traveler’s hat, traveler’s boots, and a traveler’s bag — items familiar to Celaena from Baron Saturday’s study.
The Baron’s fingers are smoking as he exits a cavern to a hallway of carefull worked stone. The hallway leads through a room with large vats raised on wooden trellises. Beyond it, a stair way decends to a long hallway with a mirrored room featuring a statue in the middle.
The Baron opens a dimension door to the other side of the hall, proceeds down another set of stairs to an enormous chamber with a three-tiered ziggurat at the center.
Climbing the ziggurat, the Baron approaches a stone alter at the top. On the alter there is a device with two vats connected by a coil of copper tubing. The Baron takes out a container. Carefully he opens a spigot at the base of one of the vats. A black, viscous liquid fills the container. He places a stopper on the container, and somewhat carelessly leaves a small amount of the liquid dripping from the spigot he failed to completely close.
——
Pro-longed time on the Craptopia has caused madness to overtake the party.
Celaena awakens tired and surly, and mostly she is irritated that everyone is judging her. Celaena skulks off to a cabin to be alone with a book. The book is not judging her.
Dani has been acting peculiar for some time, finding extreme danger outrageously funny.
Bruni felt the only person in the world she could trust is Dani, who she’d only recently been dangling over the edge of a tower in a city in another plane of existence.
Kasheer, who seems to be the singular force of sensibility and kindness in the party, suddenly felt an enjoyment and satisfaction in killing others.
Maeglin felt that an unfair world was out to get him. No one really noticed the difference.
Brialle was unaffected. A stern, impatient, and all-together school-masterly voice in her head exclaimed, “It’s an illusion, you stupid girl! Shake it off!” And, so, Brialle felt the madness of Craptopia leave, free to peruse her own particular form of madness unfettered.
Dani, amused, was the first to start sorting it all out, and after a long and somewhat meandering conversation with Brialle, they began to restore sanity to the party.
To all of them, that is, except Maeglin who they hadn’t noticed was mad, there being obvious difference in Maeglin before and after his time on Craptopia.
——
One of the first matters the party had to attend to was dealing with the sole living inhabitant of the ship.
A half-elf was chained up below decks.
He introduced himself as Flex Kavana, the captain of the vessel.
The crew rowed to Sea Side, leaving Flex guarded by two sailors. When the crew didn’t return, one of his guards went to Sea Side to see what the matter was. When that sailor didn’t return, his one remaining guard abandoned him and fled the harbor in a skiff.
Flex, not in a position to be especially picky, welcomes his new crew with what appears to be a mix of enthusiasm and dread.
——
The party explored the ship.
The vessel is a Carrick with four decks.
The hold deck below the water line stores the cargo and some of the ships stores. What’s in the hold, we’ll get to that in a minute.
Above the hold deck, the ship rises in fore and aft structures.
The crew deck fore structure is a store room that mostly holds ropes and sails. Tools and materials used in the operation and defense of the ship are found here. The aft structure is the crew cabin. This is a long room with a table in the center and kitchen in the rear. At night, the sailors sleep in this room in hammocks.
On the officer’s deck, above the store room is a strange room with a purpose that isn’t immediately clear. It features forward portholes out of which extend two iron tubes, named “Lombards.” What these tubes do and why is uncertain.
The aft structure on the officer’s deck is the officers’ cabins. There is a narrow hall ending at the captain’s cabins. Forward the captain’s cabins port and starboard are the officer’s cabins — typically reserved for the First Mate and the Ship’s Druid.
Below decks, the ship is quite well provisioned.
It was clearly a war ship, not a cargo ship, transporting — it seemed — mercenaries or marines of some sort.
Last, they discovered seven coffins in the main hold.
Exploring the coffins, they determined these were the remains of wealthier individuals, dead for undetermined reasons. They were quite well preserved in their coffins.
Maeglin took the opportunity to outfit himself in fine clothes.
——
Having explored the ship, they need a destination.
As it turns out, Flex has one in mind.
It is an island that turns out to be the one from Celaena’s dream.
Flex warns them that to get there, first they had to undergo an arduous task. They needed to seek out a rare and difficult device with a name nobody wants to try to pronounce. With only few in existence, they might spend years seeking it. He described an egg that changed metallic colors…
… Which the party was able to produce handily, having found one in the town of Sea Side on the Isle of Craptopia.
Flex activated the egg with word nobody would ever want to try to pronounce.
The egg changes from flashing random color changes to rapid, sequenced series of changes.
Sailing north and east along the coast of Ithulvania, they approached an island well north of the Ithulvanian coastline. The island, not much more than a mile in diameter, appeared to be the base of a tower — not one of THE five towers, which stretched skyward for miles. Nevertheless, this was one helluva tower, judging by what was left of the base.
They approached a narrow channel leading it a long harbor. To get into the harbor, Flex, with the help of Kahseer, managed to sail safely into the Bay of Cliché.
——
In the Bay of Cliché, The Anti-Saturday Squad is attacked by tentacled sea monsters — naturally — because it is the Bay of Cliché.
They defeat the sea monsters in a fierce battle the reveals a lot about the adventures. Braille, as usual, rains down radiant murder on the beasts, which serves as a reminder that Brialle is as deadly as she is flighty (always a good combination). Flex uses Eldritch Blast (!!!) against the creatures. Bruni, grappled by a tentacle tears chunks out of the creature with her teeth, spitting out the carnage only to rip away another chuck — as any debutant might.
The fight over, the Anti-Saturday squad hear’s a voice say, “You could have just rung the bell. They’re trained not to attack when you ring the bell.”