Chapter Ten: Sailin' High
Athellenas
Stay! Stay! You saucy sailor boy,
Do not sail afar;
I love you and will marry you,
You silly Jack tar!
'Twas but to tease I answered so,
I thought you could guess
That when a maiden answers no
She always means yes!
It was suppertime, the most festive of times for any crew of Centralian sailors. The main hold of the Centralian naval flagship, the Resolute, was choc-full of jovial sailors and infantry soldiers from the 1st Element, half-finished tankards of mead, and enough seasoned food to make even the most obstinate of men lick their lips.
Warmaster Athellenas shouted out the words to the chorus of the old sea shanty at the top of his lungs, not caring if he was off-pitch. Hell, none of the sailors were, so why should he bother? His voice was only one of hundreds.
The ship's bosun, a grizzled old gent from the Aippolos Islands, would sing each verse of the shanty in his guttural, gravelly tones. After each verse, every single soul on board the Resolute would roar out the chorus, pounding the planked floors and tables with their feet and fists.
Jerrod was sanding on top of one of the tables, leaning against a support beam, fervently strumming a lute, providing the shanty with its much-needed background music. He was joined by two other crewmen; one playing a reed-flute, and the other beating a set of Karamja bongos. The resulting music from the three instruments mingled and blended with itself, and then infused itself into the words of the shanty.
Athellenas grabbed his tankard of mead from the table, thrusting it up into the air as the soldiers and sailors began roaring out the shanty's chorus again. The food on the Resolute was fairly good by normal standards, which meant very good by military standards, but the mead…the mead the sailors kept stored in the flagship's hold was phenomenal.
There was a pleasant buzzing in the Warmaster's head by the time he finished singing this chorus. The lamps were flickering, casting perpetually-moving shadows all over the place. Athellenas did not feel overwhelmed by the constant music and the rowdy behavior of his soldiers; quite the opposite, in fact.
Today was the last day of the two-week-long voyage over the high seas from Port Sarim to Aqatios, a small Menaphite port town situated on the River Lum. Tomorrow morning, the Centralian fleet would make port at Aqatios and Athellenas's army would disembark. Tomorrow was going to be the first day in a long, potentially bloody march south through the Menaphite Empire.
King Osman, the monarch of Centralia, had been receiving increasingly disturbing reports from the Menaphite Pharaoh about hordes of monsters sweeping through the Menaphite desert. Athellenas had orders from King Osman to assist in the possible defense of Uzer, the Menaphite capital. The catch was that Zamorackian hordes had already swept through the northern reaches of the desert. Athellenas would have to fight his way south, find a way to break through the Shantay Pass, and find another way to cross the Elid River. Only after he accomplished all of that could he reach Uzer, and he would potentially be stuck fighting off waves of monsters in the process. It was not going to be an easy campaign.
As such, earlier in the day Athellenas had issued orders to all of his commanders to allow the soldiers to act outside of regulations throughout the night. The Warmaster was certain that there were parties and feasts just like this one going on in all of the other ships in the fleet.
The festivities were not just for fun; Athellenas ordered them to happen because he knew that tonight was going to be the last night his soldiers would be able to slack off without any major consequences. If they slacked off and let loose in the days ahead, they would die. They knew that. This was their chance to 'let it all out'.
As Athellenas downed his current tankard of mead, the ship's bosun finished the final verse of the shanty he had been singing, ending with a fierce chord procession from Jerrod's lute.
"And now, my esteemed, muscle-headed, overcompensating brutes—I'm sorry, I mean soldiers," Jerrod mock corrected himself as he addressed the crowd in the hold. The good-natured insult sparked an uproar of boos. A hail of half-eaten fruit and pieces of food sailed through the air towards Jerrod, but the Cleric—who had already grabbed his elemental staff before saying his joke—simply raised his hand and snapped his fingers.
The orb that formed the top of Jerrod's staff glowed white and the incoming food was deflected, splattering back to the floor. Jerrod only got a speck of potatoes on his tunic. He calmly brushed it off and continued to speak.
"My esteemed soldiers, I now present to you, for your entertainment, enjoyment, titillation—whatever you wish to call it—a sight you will likely never see again in this world!"
The hold quieted down a bit. Not completely; it would have taken a miracle to bring silence to a ship's hold full of borderline out-of-control soldiers, but it quieted down enough to actually notice a difference in volume.
Jerrod stepped off of the table and crouched down out of sight for a moment before returning to the table with a red mahogany fiddle.
"Oh, great…" Athellenas whispered, grabbing another tankard of mead from the table he was sitting at.
"Your great, noble Warmaster, over there," Jerrod motioned towards Athellenas with his lute, "Before he became the honorable old bore he is today, he used to be one hell of a fiddle-player!"
Laughter rolled through the hold, accompanied by men banging on the tables, calling for a song.
"Now, I know that he would absolutely love to play a song for all of you degenerates!" Jerrod continued. "What do you think?"
The soldiers in the main hold all cheered, waving their tankards of mead around in the air, shouting for their commander to go up.
"Come on, Warmaster, do it!" the men who were also sitting at Athellenas's table encouraged him.
Athellenas glanced over at Sir Derren at the next table down, raising an inquisitive eyebrow. Derren merely grinned and gave a nod in response. Athellenas sighed, turning back to his tankard of mead. He downed it in three gulps, then steadily rose to his feet, grabbing another tankard as he got up.
The soldiers started clapping and stomping their feet, riled up by Athellenas's compliance.
The Warmaster drank from his latest tankard of mead as he stumbled forward through the maze of tables, naval personnel, and soldiers, being careful to avoid stepping on food, broken glass, or passed-out men as he went. The buzzing in his head was still there, and his movements were not quite as coordinated as they usually were. Whenever he moved his arm, for example, it would always go a good length further than he wanted it to.
Athellenas reached Jerrod's table in the center of the hold. The Cleric extended a hand down to him, and he grabbed it, hauling himself up. "You'll pay for this later, you know," Athellenas grumbled to his old friend.
Jerrod's grin only widened about a millimeter in response. He held out the fiddle, waving the bow invitingly towards the Warmaster.
Athellenas took the bow and fiddle. He paused for a moment as the old feeling of the instrument gradually returned to him. He remembered back when he had been in his prime, the long nights around campfires that he had spent with Jerrod in the wilderness during missions, playing his old fiddle opposite Jerrod's lute.
The Warmaster plucked a few strings, making sure the fiddle was tuned. He placed the bow onto the fiddle strings and, after taking a quick breath, started to play. He went slow at first, but the melody quickly picked up and turned into a sharp, rousing tune. Jerrod's lute came in, providing the other half of the melody, which took Athellenas's already-good tune and brought it fully to life. Within seconds, the soldiers and sailors in the hold were all stomping their feet on the floor, banging their tankards to their tables—some were even lifting the tables and banging them on the floor to keep up the beat.
Ages come, ages go; hey nonny-nonny-ho!
Never was there a tale of more woe,
Than of the Noble Green Rabbit of long-ago!
Athellenas belted out the words to one of the old bar tunes he and Jerrod always used to play together, not caring if he was off-key. Everyone in the hold was drunk to some degree; they wouldn't care.
Jerrod joined in, singing his own version of the harmony.
Noble Green Rabbit was green as could be!
Never a rabbit as green as he!
All through the land, it was told;
He lived in a den made of gold…
The song continued on, painting the strange tale of an intelligent rabbit with green fur which goes on to become king of its land. However, in the resulting arrogance that came from his receiving great power, he ends up losing his loved one—a rabbit with soft blue fur. He then proceeded to lead an army to take revenge…the whole song was very random and abstract. Athellenas personally had no idea how someone got it into his head to write a song about rabbits for heaven's sake…but on the other hand, the tune was a very rousing one, and the words, however bizarre, went with it perfectly.
As Athellenas kept on playing, the buzzing in his head still did not go away. His vision began to play tricks on him; it looked sometimes as if it were drifting off to a side, or even tilting, before he realized that he was the one who was tilting. More than once, he had to keep himself from sliding off the table.
Thank Saradomin I'm not wearing my armor… the Warmaster thought to himself as he began the next verse of Noble Green Rabbit.
Athellenas woke up to the creaking of the floorboards as the Resolute bobbed through what felt like coastal breakers. A faint ray of daylight peeked through the openings in the ceiling that led up to the deck.
Athellenas groaned quietly to himself and pushed himself up off the floor. He clutched his skull as he stood up, fighting against the sudden bout of dizziness that overtook him. The festivities from last night had been one of the best he had ever had the honor to take part in, but boy, oh boy; the price for such a night was particularly heavy the next morning.
Athellenas stumbled through the main hold, trying carefully not to stub his toe or step on anyone in the dark. Soldiers and sailors were everywhere; sleeping on the floor, splayed back in chairs; a few were even passed out on the tables. The Warmaster moved past them all and got to a ladder which led abovedecks, climbing his way up to the top.
It was the crack of dawn. A red sun was rising in the east, shooting the dark blue sky through with rays of scarlet and maroon. The reflection of the sunrise was dancing on the waves of the River Lum; stationary, and yet perpetually moving. It was very peaceful on deck at this time of day. The only sounds were the slight riffle of the sails catching the wind, the occasional ting of the ship's bell, and the background creak of the planks as the ship bobbed through the waves.
The River Lum was huge, to be blunt. It would normally be considered a small sea—at its widest point, the river was ten miles across—the sole reason it was considered a river because it stretched all the way from the Southern Ocean to the Deep Wilderness in the north. It formed the eastern border of Centralia, separating the nation from the Menaphite Desert. The change in terrain was nearly shockingly sudden; one shore of the Lum was lush, green, and grassy, while the other was sand, palm trees, and rocks.
While the river's size posed an inconvenient travel time required to cross it, it was large enough to host a huge population of freshwater fish. Both Centralia and the Menaphite Empire had many villages built on the Lum's shore, making their livings off of those fish. In short, the pros of the river far outweighed the cons.
The Menaphite village of Aqatios was not far ahead; the fleet would probably reach it within the next six hours.
Athellenas pulled himself fully out of the opening in the deck, standing up to his full height, yawning and stretching as he regained his balance. He took a deep breath of fresh, river air, breathing in his nose and out his mouth. It did little to alleviate the splitting headache in his skull, but it helped.
A dozen or so sailors were lumbering around the deck, keeping the Resolute from falling apart while the majority of its crew slept off their hangovers belowdecks. Athellenas trudged over to the wooden starboard rail and peered over the edge, watching the wake of the flagship as it slid effortlessly through the calm river waters.
The other ships in the fleet which was transporting Athellenas's 1st Element were all spread out to either side of and behind the Resolute. All of them were similarly quiet. For a moment, Athellenas wondered if it had been a bad idea after all to let the soldier get drunk the night before, but the Warmaster quickly shrugged off that doubt. Sure, maybe the men would not be top-notch fighters today, but they would not need to be; there were no reports of enemies in this area. The men might be miserable today, but last night would do a lot more good than bad. All the soldiers had to do was slog through the hangover of this morning.
"You really learned how to hold your liquor, old friend."
Athellenas did not have to turn around to know that it was Jerrod who had spoken. "How much did I have?" the Warmaster grunted, not moving to turn to face his friend.
"I don't know," Jerrod shrugged, joining Athellenas at the rail. "I stopped counting after your seventh or eighth tankard."
"Saradomin's beard…" Athellenas groaned, resting his head against the rail. "Well, what about you? You had just as much as me; why aren't you trying to keep your head from falling off?"
Jerrod merely waved his staff, giving a boyish grin. "Water magic has its uses," the Cleric replied. "I pretty much forced the alcohol through my bowels and pissed it out five minutes later. Not exactly pleasant, but it spares me the hangover."
Athellenas hooted with laughter. "Using magic to make you…that's…oh, Jerrod, old friend, how did you ever end up on Entrana with the rest of those dusty old bores? Other monks would probably consider ritualistic suicide for even thinking of using magic like that."
"I thought I'd get to go rampaging through the land, smiting every drop of Zamorackian filth I stumbled across," Jerrod shrugged. "I'm sure you joined the Army thinking you'd get to wear shiny armor and sack cities, and do other fun crap like that."
"Well…" Athellenas chuckled, "I actually have done those things."
"Oh, you lucky thing," Jerrod rolled his eyes. "At least I haven't taken an arrow to my manhood fulfilling those childhood dreams."
Athellenas winced, remembering the pain of the wound he had received in a skirmish with a Zamorackian cult in the city of Isoldyne, twelve years ago. He had taken an arrow right in his crotch while riding alongside King Lionel, the previous king of Centralia, Osman's deceased father. It hadn't exactly been a warm, pleasant experience. He had lived, even though at the time he had wished he hadn't.
Athellenas exhaled, watching as the sky slowly began to lighten, turning brighter shades of red. "So…you never did explain what you're doing here," the Warmaster reminded the Cleric.
"Hm?" Jerrod cocked an eyebrow. "Growing tired of me?"
"Much as I know you would love to come with me and spear Thammaron right in the heart, I know that you're on a mission. You never told me what Saradomin sent you to do in the desert."
"You probably wouldn't believe me if I did," Jerrod chuckled in response.
"Try me."
"Well, if you insist… The Old Man visited me a few weeks ago," Jerrod started to explain, "right before I showed up in Port Sarim, actually. There was the usual back-and-forth foreplay; He never cuts right to the chase…makes me want to cuff Him sometimes, but…well, you can see why even I would never do that."
Athellenas nearly shook his head in wonder. It was almost beyond belief how…how familiar Jerrod was with the God of Light, the way he spoke and acted with him…some would call it disrespect or irreverence. With Jerrod, though, it was just the Cleric being himself. He was a sarcastic grouch with everyone he met, and 'everyone' seemed to include even Gods.
"Do you know what the Stone of Jas is?" Jerrod asked.
"Enlighten me."
"The Stone of Jas—well, before I go in-depth, know that it has never been seen by any mortal; only by the Gods. The Stone was created by ancient entities of extraordinary power; I would suspect that it was these 'elder gods' that created this world to begin with. When they left, the Stone was all that remained of their power. From it came the Anima Mundi. In simple terms, it is the source of all magic."
"Interesting history lesson," Athellenas nodded. "What does it have to do with-"
"Well, if you'd shut up like a good little Warmaster and let me finish, I'd tell you," Jerrod retorted. "There is a Prophecy on the Stone. Now, before you go and ask me 'What does it say?' like any other ignorant fool, this prophecy is a divine prophecy, not a prophecy of man. It is not etched, engraved, or written in any way that we could recognize. It is only comprehensible to the Gods, and even Saradomin told me that he had a tough time making heads and tails of it."
"Was he able to show it to you?"
Jerrod let out a sharp, irritated sigh. "Again with the interruptions, Athellenas…"
Athellenas rolled his eyes, turning back out to the view of the river. "My apologies. Continue."
Jerrod hid his grin by covering his mouth with a hand for a moment, then continued to speak. "He did show it to me in a way that I, as a mortal, could comprehend. It was not anything written—not a scroll or a book, or anything tangible. It was a series of visions…almost like flashbacks, only they weren't past experiences; they were...events that haven't necessarily happened yet... I won't go into detail, but this Prophecy speaks of the end of this world as we know it. Now, this could mean the actual end of the world, or perhaps it could also mean the beginning of a new Age through the ending of this one. One thing is certain, though: it does mean the end of the war between Zamorak and Saradomin."
"Does it say who wins?"
Jerrod shook his head. "No, it doesn't. This war can only end two ways; either Saradomin is still standing when the dust clears, or Zamorak is. My job…the mission Saradomin gave to me; I am to find a certain boy who lives in Ullek. I saw him in the Prophecy; he is no ordinary child. Whoever he is, he possesses extraordinary power…in my visions, I saw him invoking the Fifth Element."
"The Fifth Element? A boy using the Fifth Element?"
"Mm-hm," Jerrod nodded. "That boy is in the Prophecy. He will be the one to end the God Wars. Saradomin told me that himself. I have no idea how that will happen, mind you…but that's how it's going down. If something like that is written on the Stone of Jas, for crying out loud, it ain't gonna be wrong."
The very top of the sun started peeking over the horizon, sending the first true rays of daylight arcing through the sky. Birdsong could be faintly heard from the riverbanks as they began to rouse. The water-bugs that occupied the surface of the river during the night now began to scatter as the fish began having them for breakfast.
"Okay, I'm with you so far," Athellenas murmured, looking away from the steadily-rising sun. "There's a kid living in Ullek who, according to some divine prophecy, is going to end the God Wars. Wonderful. One thing, though: how the hell do we know which God he is going to end it for? There doesn't seem to be anything in that prophecy saying that he'll fight for Saradomin, for us."
"No, there isn't," Jerrod agreed, giving his old friend an approving nod. "I see being a commander as long as you have has not dulled your senses; you catch on fast. The Prophecy says nothing about which side the boy will take. And consider this; Saradomin is not the only one who knows of this Prophecy. Zamorak has read it too. I'd even bet old Zaros also knew of it, back when he was still around. Among the Gods, this thing isn't exactly what you would call uncommon knowledge."
"So Zamorak knows of this boy as well?"
"Precisely," Jerrod nodded. "Do you see what this has become? This is a race. Me against Thammaron, the last elder demon, Zamorak's most trusted lieutenant. I must find the boy in Ullek before he is captured by Thammaron's forces. If Zamorak gets hold of the boy, we are all royally fucked, for lack of a better term."
"Is that why Zamorak has invaded the desert, of all places?"
"That was probably his main reason, yes," Jerrod nodded again. "After he deals with the Menaphites, though, regardless of whether he captures the boy or not…we are next. Or the Hallowlands further to the east."
"Hm," Athellenas grunted. That was his only outward reaction to the avalanche of information Jerrod had just imparted on him. "Well, this was very…informative…to say the least… Does this mean you will not be staying with us for much longer?"
Jerrod considered this for a moment. "Tell you what… I'm assuming you're heading right for Iunu?"
"Correct," Athellenas nodded. "Iunu is the largest Menaphite city in the northern desert, as well as the closest one to our current location. We shall make landfall this afternoon and camp outside of Aqatios. At first light tomorrow, we march."
Jerrod considered this for a moment, but no part of Athellenas's plans clashed with his own. "Alright, tell you what. I'll go with you as far as Iunu. Hell, I'll even help you sack the city if it's occupied by Zamorak's filth. But once Iunu is in friendly hands, I'm going to have to split and head south with all possible speed."
"Fair enough," Athellenas shrugged.
"If Thammaron's horde wasn't encroaching on Ullek already, I would stay longer, but…well, time is no longer a luxury of mine."
Athellenas reached into a pocket on the inside of his tunic, pulling out a pipe made out of white wood. He pressed some pipeweed into the pipe's bowl, tamping it down with his thumb. He reached into his pocket again for a striker, but hesitated and reconsidered, thinking of a much faster way. He glanced at Jerrod, motioning towards the unlit pipe.
Jerrod pressed his index finger into the pipe's bowl and closed his eyes, concentrating on something. After a second, the tip of his staff glowed red and a small gout of flame jetted out of his finger, igniting the pipeweed.
Athellenas placed his pipe in his mouth, drawing in a breath of the soft, warming smoke, and then breathing it back out. "I think this is your first time sacking an actual city, if I'm not mistaken."
"Is it as fun as it sounds?"
Athellenas gave a wolfish grin. "More fun than it sounds."