Life on the Siren's Call turned out to be not so different from life on the road. I saw the same people every day, and spent a lot of my time trying to stay out of sight, do what I was told and trying not to look suspiciously mage-y. Captain Isabela knew, of course, but she said nothing about it and warned me to do the same, because a young elven deck-scrubber is one thing, but a hidden mage is another. She also informed me that if I became an abomination or was somehow found to be possessed by a demon, she would simply fling me into the Waking Sea and that would be that. She said it so casually I would have missed it completely if I hadn't been paying attention.
As for what the purpose of the Siren's Call was, I wasn't exactly sure. We were doing jobs for money, the Captain said, which was about as vague an answer as she could have managed, so I figured that meant at least some of the jobs were illegal. But Captain Isabela had been pretty nice to me, and any human who's nice to an elven mage kid dumped in their lap on their second meeting couldn't be that bad.
There was also another ship following behind us, sometimes side by side. That was our current job; we were escorting two hundred Ferelden refugees to Antiva. The Blight may have been over, thanks to Neria, but a lot of towns and villages had been ravaged, burnt down and completely destroyed by darkspawn in the last year. It's not like they could have just rebuilt either; whatever lands they relied on for crops and livestock had been tainted by Blight-sickness, and who knows if the land would ever be able to recover from that.
We'd been on the sea for about two weeks, and our navigator, Baron, said we were making good time, so we were due to arrive in Antiva in about a week. We would dock, send the refugees on their way and wish them the best, and then wait for the captain to find us a new job. I wanted to get leather gloves for Zevran, for the next time I saw him. Or a bootstrap, or something, if gloves are too expensive. Antivan leather, that was the main thing.
I'd just brought up my bucket and mop for the daily deck cleaning when I heard the captain calling out to our lookout. "Whisky! Come down here a minute!"
"On my way, Cap!"
Whisky was a tall-ish elven man with wispy blonde hair and freckles all over his face and arms. I didn't think his name was actually Whisky, but everyone in the crew had a nickname of some kind, except for Captain Isabela (she didn't need one, everyone just called her Captain). Some of them were fairly straightforward like Whisky, who loved Antivan whisky but got drunk after one drink. And some of them, I didn't understand, like Square, who was actually a very tall, skinny human and not square-shaped at all, but when I asked why he was called that, everyone just laughed.
Mine was 'little shadow', if you're wondering. It was because I tended to stick close to the captain when I could, for my own safety thank you very much. I didn't know these men well enough to trust any of them as far as I could throw them. That's not to say they'd treated me badly; most of them preferred to pretend I wasn't not there, which suited me fine, and there were a few that even made an effort to make me feel like one of them. Technically I was one of them- I did my share of work, but I sensed there was also some kind of unspoken acknowledgement that the captain would tear their limbs off if they tried to do me harm. Now that I think about it, she probably did actually say something like that when I wasn't in the room. Everyone was a little bit scared of Captain Isabela, even me. But I guess you have to be at least a bit scary, to be a pirate.
I watched as the captain gave orders to set down a walkway so she and a few other men could board the passenger ship. It wasn't long before those of us on deck could faintly hear raised voices. Captain Isabela had gone down the stairs, then stomped back up a minute later, shouting obscenities at the men on the deck. The men shouted back at her and drew blades, and so did the captain.
"Is it a mutiny?" I asked Square, who was also watching the spectacle taking place on the ship beside us.
"Nah, them's Castillon's men, our employer. My guess is it's something to do with the cargo. Wouldn't be the first time someone's tried to sneak something into the cargo without the captain's knowin'."
"But the captain said it's a passenger ship, not cargo? Refugees from the Blight."
"Eh? Maybe it's somethin' to do with one of the passengers, then."
The mystery was cleared up as soon as the captain returned to the Siren's call, blood dripping off her twin daggers. "I am going to wring that scrawny bastard's bastarding neck!" she snapped, marching up to the first mate, Pewter.
"What's Castillon gone and done now, Cap?" Pewter asked, somewhat amused by the captain's outburst. Pewter was the only member of the crew who would find Captain Isabela's ire entertaining. Everyone else wisely averted their gazes, suddenly struck by their profound sense of duty in whatever job they were doing at the time.
"Slaves, Pewter! He knows I won't abide slavery, and I should have known better than to fall for it! 'I've got a nice job for you, Isabela, pick up two hundred Ferelden refugees and deliver them to their waiting relatives in Antiva! That'll make you feel good about yourself!' I can't believe it took this long for me to notice that in two weeks not one of our passengers decided to get some fresh sea air! Because they're all downstairs in chains, Pewter! Stupid, stupid, stupid!" the captain raged, slamming her palm down on the railing to make her point.
"So what's the plan, then?" Pewter asked, unperturbed.
Captain Isabela took a deep breath. "Now," she began, smoothly. "We go to Antiva," she put up a hand, silencing what I assume was going to be Pewter's protest. "To the port in Wycome, not Antiva City."
"And, what? Let them scurry off into untold danger?"
"Better than slavery."
"True enough. Can't imagine Castillon will appreciate us letting twenty thousand sovereigns' worth of cargo run off on our watch, though."
"I can't imagine he will, no. I'm sure we'll sort something out," the captain said, spinning a dagger with her fingers pointedly.
"I suppose this means we won't be staying long enough to resupply, then?"
"No, we'll be needing to take off as soon as we get the other ship unloaded. Do we have enough supplies to make it back as far as, I don't know, Ostwick?"
"I think so, I'll have to check with Sums. I'm more concerned about how the men will react to finding out they'll have to wait another fortnight for shore leave, and it won't be in Antiva City. You know how they feel about the girls in Antiva City."
"And they know how I feel about slavery."
"I'll do my best to belabour that point. Shadow!"
I jumped, not realising that my presence had been noticed. "Yes Pewter?"
"Go tell Sums I need him to meet me in my office."
"On it!"