Chapter 10: I hail to you

Tetra launched forward and swung the sword out in front of her, blocking the first pirate's attack. Link stepped off to the side and was in battle with another one, and Aryll was fending off the last.

After a few minutes, it was obvious that either team wasn't having much luck against each other.

"We're too evenly matched!" Tetra snarled at her opponent. "You were stupid in the first place to pick a fight against a foreigner-"

"To heck with it, lassie, we're slackin' on purpose! What, you want us to give it'll we got?" the pirate shot back, and without waiting for an answer, he yelled to his companions, "They're to easy, eh?" The pirate going against Aryll got the message first, and he started to block more often, and feinting. It was all Aryll could do to keep from falling over.

"Link!" she cried out. "By ourselves we can't do it!" Tetra heard her and immediately whapped her pirate with the flat of her blade and barked out, "We're ants and we're separate! What's up with that?"

"I've got the message already!" Link replied, and ran over to where Tetra and Aryll were standing, his pirate running after him.

"Ready? Horizontal slice and parry, go!" Tetra said, and the three leapt forward at their opponents, blocked their attacks with their swords, jumped to the side, and whipped the flat side of the blades close to the ground, with such force that they tripped up the pirates.

The three were now on their backs on the ground, and Tetra, Link, and Aryll were standing off a distance, as the crowd was cheering. One of the pirates, the one that had started the duel, slowly got up and faced Tetra, then walked toward her. The three tensed up as he did this, but then he held out his hand.

"You three are definitely the most bonded pirates on the Northern Seas. I hail to you." he said. Tetra blushed as she took his hand and shook it, looking down at her feet as she let go.

Back at the cafe, Link, Aryll and Tetra were sitting at the bar, discussing the duel that was 15 minutes ago.

"I don't understand why he called us pirates, though," Aryll commented. "I most certainly didn't fight like one."

"You did swell, though," Tetra replied. "Was that your first time?"

"No, my third. First time was against Orca, second was at Feather Flats. Why did that duel start, anyway?" she asked, and Tetra leaned forward and put her elbows on the counter, and her chin in her hands.

"A pirate duel starts when one pirate thinks that he's better than the other," she explained. "It's basically a battle of wit and strength. It doesn't matter how many people are in it, just as long as there is the same number of people on each side. Sometimes it's for treasure, and sometimes they'll last until they kill each other, but usually they happen when a pirate from a different ocean comes to their ocean. It ends when one of the sides admit defeat and say: 'I hail to you'. I guess it automatically means the winner is better than the other, so the loser looks up to his opponent."

"So, why did he do it?" Link asked. "Was it because he wanted to see how tough a foreign pirate from the Great Seas was?" Tetra nodded.

A clap of thunder sounded outside, and the three jumped. Tetra got up from her seat and looked out the window.

"I swear the sun was out a little while ago!" she exclaimed. "And the sky was clear with not a cloud in sight!" Some people who were outside that had gotten caught in the sudden storm rushed into the cafe, and a waitress from behind the counter gave them all towels.

"It's rainin' like 'ell out there! Cats and dogs!" one of the men said at he dried his face. "Suddenly the sky grew dark an' there was this wall o' rain that just, washed over... you can 'ardly see."

The group sat down at some of the tables, as Link jumped down from his seat and opened the door to look outside. True to the man's words, there were big, fat water droplets hammering down, and lightning flashed across the sky. Link counted the seconds, and he had just gotten to 2 when the thunder was heard. He closed the door.

"We're rained in!" he announced. "The storm is really close."

"My crew!" Tetra said with an air of panic.

"What about Quill and Natasha?" Link wondered. "I hope they'll be okay." Just then, some more people entered the cafe. Among them was Quill and Natasha. They spotted Link and Aryll and hurried over to them, and the waitress offered them towels.

"It's really pouring out there," Quill said as he briefly wiped his face with a towel, and started straightening his feathers, which had now multiplied to many. "Nattie and I made it just in time. The storm just keeps getting worse by the moments."

"At this rate, it'll probably turn into a hurricane or something," Natasha said. She was wringing out her shirt. Tetra, Link, Quill, and Natasha all sat down at the bar, where Aryll had been watching everything from her seat.

"I suppose we'll be stuck here for a while," she commented.

"It's drizzling!" Tetra cried as she opened the door. "Let's find the others before it starts raining again!"

"I'm out," Natasha said automatically.

"Me too," Aryll said. She was fingering the wilting blue flower that was in her hair. "I don't want to get caught out there."

"Then we'll go with Tetra," Link said as he and Quill rose and joined Tetra at the doorway, and then they walked out, closing the door behind them.

"We have better check all of the restaurants and shops," Tetra told them as they walked up the empty street toward where the pirate duel had been earlier. The rain had reduced to a drizzle, but they were already wet. They stopped at the first restaurant in sight, and walked inside.

"Aye aye Tetra!" a chorus of voices said loudly from a table at the back of the room. Tetra laughed and walked over to where part of her crew was sitting.

"Boy, am I glad you're safe!" she said. "Is everyone here?"

"No, miss," Niko said. "A couple of our boys are still around somewhere looking for you. They went to the ship as soon as the rain started drizzling."

"We're going to look for them now. Meanwhile, we'll meet you back at the cafe down the road."

"Aye!" the pirates replied in unison, and saluted Tetra as she walked back toward where Link and Quill were waiting, and the three walked outside.

It was still a little misty, but some actual rain was starting to fall. They hurried farther up the street.

"Does your crew really matter this much?" Link asked as they were walking briskly, and Tetra glared at him.

"Of course they do," she replied. "I have less crew than most pirates captains do, and I don't want less than I already have. Besides, they're like family. Damn, we're going the wrong way. We should go back down." She turned the other way and Link and Quill followed her.

"I don't see any post-boxes," Quill observed.

"Is that the reason why you came along? To see if they have a mail system?" Link asked.

"Yes. They must have a post office here if there aren't any post-boxes."

The rain wasn't drizzling anymore, but it wasn't flat-out pouring either. Their pace picked up, and they saw the dock, and their ship. The waves crashed upon the shore in a gray flurry, harder than they would have on a sunny day. A strong breeze blew.

"I can tell when a storm is coming, boys!" Tetra said loudly as they jogged toward her ship. "And I can tell that one is coming right now!"

The plank on her ship was lowered onto the dock, so there was someone on the ship. They ran up onto the deck and she walked over to the door, and knocked.

"How you treat an angry shark?" a voice said from inside on the other side.

"Hello, it's me, Tetra!" Tetra yelled. "You don't recognize my knock? A storm is blowing up out here, and believe me, you don't want to be on the ship when it comes full force!" The door opened and two members of the crew stepped out and saluted Tetra. She rolled her eyes, and beckoned everyone to follow her down the plank and back to the cafe. Lightning flashed across the sky, and only half a second passed when the thunder boomed, and the rain poured down. They ran the rest of the way.