As me and Golden Hind walked to my bedroom, I started re-thinking my current situation.
Despite being bonded to this woman through an inescapable, magical pact, Hind has done very little to abuse that power. Yes she showed what she could do to me if I stepped out of line, but despite wanting to bang me constantly, she was actually being very respectful of my boundaries. Well mostly, being man-handled by her tentacles is annoying as hell, but at least she wasn't sexually assaulting me.
Now with these powers I discovered, along with Hind telling me about the growing threat of Echo fleet, the pact was looking more and more like a good thing. It still creeped me out that I had to use sexual fluids to 'sign' the damn thing, but I couldn't complain too much about my enhanced abilities.
Hind sat on the bed and smiled up at me, patting the spot next to her. Since I didn't want to ruin her good mood, I obliged. Despite single-handedly wrecking a pirate frigate not too long ago, being this close to Hind still made me anxious, mainly due to her insane libido, or am I just a prude? Could be the case...
"Darling, you won our little bet from earlier, so how do want me to reward you~?" Hind asked huskily, gently running a finger down my clothed chest. I blushed shyly, still technically a virgin since all she'd done to me was kiss me, and wank me off with a tentacle.
"Hind...I have no idea what to do, you know I'm a virgin." I told her honestly. Hind laughed at that before cocking her head at me.
"I know, I just still can't believe that, have you...always been this shy around women?" She gently probed, rubbing my shoulder as we kept talking. I sighed, the question had brought up bad memories for me, tying a knot in my chest.
"Well...when I was younger, Dad always worked a lot so he never had much say in what I did, but my step-mother never liked me going out on my own. She never liked it when I mentioned talking to a girl, even if I just mentioned a small joke a female merchant had told me, heck I didn't know what sex or masturbation was until I was 17...I'm 24 now." I admitted to Hind. She looked surprised for a moment before replying.
"Whoa...that explains a fair bit, no wonder you didn't know how to jack off." She giggled a little, scooting closer to me, but in a more solemn tone of voice she added: "Its OK if you don't want to do it with me right now, I can wait until you're willing to." She then smirked at me before finishing with. "But please don't wait too long, or I may need to punish you~" She playfully threatened.
I laughed nervously. "Riiiight...so anyway..." I stood up to break the tension and to find the energy to change the subject. "Back in the Red Gates, you mentioned something about the Fountain of Youth, and that its the main base for the Echo fleet right? What exactly do you need me for?" I asked her. Hind put her hand on her chin in thought.
"Well, mainly I need back up, last time I went to the Fountain of Youth, I had other kansen with me, as well as the Commander." She got up and started pacing back and forth as she explained herself. "Right now my friends have their own issues in other areas of the world, even if they could contacted to help us, we'd risk Lord Vickers intercepting it, heck the only other person I could contact was Mary Celeste, she'll be meeting us to help find the way back to the Fountain."
"Mary Celeste? Wow..." I thought she was a myth, while I've occasionally glanced what I thought were 'ghost ships' out at sea, I always passed off what I saw as tricks of the light, or poorly illuminated merchant ships on the horizon. I'm not superstitious, but after seeing literal magic, a cursed sword and now tentacles made of water coming out my back, a ghost ship didn't seem as far-fetched as it otherwise would have.
"Shes instrumental in scouting for storms, we'll need her help getting back to the Fountain of Youth, since the only way in is through a storm." Hind explained, getting to her feet and heading out on deck, I follow her as she keeps speaking. "We left the Fountain a smoking ruin when we were last there, if Echo fleet have returned to their former strength somehow, investigating its current status is a good place to start."
"Yeah I guess that makes sense, but what about Lord Vickers? With him hunting you, this plan to get to the Fountain is going to be much harder." I point out. I saw Hind hesitate for a moment, before touching the stump on her forehead, but then she clenched her fist as she kept walking to the steering wheel.
"You're right, we need to find out what his patrol routes will be before we attempt this, set your course North-East." She tells me, pointing in the direction she mentioned. With a thought, the Ballista responds to my internal orders, the sails billow as they catch the tail wind.
"Where are we going?" I ask her, checking my compass to double check we were going the right way.
"Dark rock basin, its a fishing village spread out across a small, jet black archipelago, but more importantly it has a Royal navy outpost, they'll have information about Lord Vickers' movement, we need to know where he will be to make a safe expedition to the Fountain of Youth." Hind replied. I gulped, if Hind was discovered, we'd end up in a shooting war with the Navy, if we needed to do this, we needed to lay low.
"Hind, how exactly are we going to do that? Walk in and ask?" I sarcastically stated. Hind looked back at me with a smirk.
"I have a plan, listen carefully."
A few hours later...
It was almost evening by the time I docked the Ballista, I found a small jetty on Dark Rock Basin's largest island, just big enough to fit the frigate alongside. The island itself wasn't exactly big, only a few miles long and half a mile wide. It lived up to its name however, any exposed rock was a very shiny black, likely obsidian, very jagged looking in the warm light of the evening sun, this gave the whole island a slightly sinister appearance, kind of creeped me out looking at the spiky looking mountain in the island's centre.
It was surrounded by a rough circle of smaller islets, on the biggest one, was the outpost me and Hind were looking for, but the word 'outpost' didn't do it justice; this place looked like a mini- fortress: cannons lined the tops of its stone walls, a massive portcullis hung above the only visible way inside, which itself was only accessible by water, basically if you attacked this thing from the ocean, you'd need to swing around the whole fort before being able to get inside, credit where its due; that was good design.
Me and Hind agreed to execute the plan at night, so we still had a few hours to kill. I climb off the Ballista, and Hind also climbs off. I was about to ask how she was going to blend in, (since a freaking antler would be hard to hide) but then I realised she had magically made it vanish, along with the stump on the other side of her head. She'd also changed her hair from its normal black, to a light blonde, instead of the tattered black dress she always wore, she was also wearing a shorter light pink dress, along with what looked like a blue kimono over the top to contrast it, neither the dress or the kimono did much to cover her sizeable cleavage however. After disembarking the ship, she flashed me a smile while flicking her now blonde hair.
"Surprised Darling? I can look perfectly human thanks to a little magic, hence why my antler is gone~" Hind stated with a small giggle. "Normally I don't need to do this, but since we're right next to a Royal Navy outpost, I should stay incognito." I blinked in surprise at her new appearance, but eventually I just brushed it off as Hind being Hind; we had a town to explore.
As the two of us walked around, we decided to take a look in the nearby shops. Nothing really jumped out at either of us at first, but as we perused the wares, I caught sight a merchant selling small sculptures of the black obsidian around us, jagged, but hauntingly beautiful formations, almost like shiny black snowflakes. The man running the stand caught me staring, and started pitching them to me.
"Like them sir? They're called 'dark-flakes', unique to Dark Rock Basin, they resonant with your bio-electric field, amplifying your natural strength, intelligence..." He then leaned closer and quietly said these last words: "...and sexual stamina~" Me and Hind both stared down at the dark-flakes, assessing if these things did as the merchant said, or if they were just a scam. I was cringing a little at the merchant's words, but Hind seemed intrigued.
"Interesting, how do they work?" She asked him. The merchant smiled, he put on a glove and picked up one of the dark-flakes, then he reached under the table and pulled out a small silver ring, with obsidian etched into it where a normal jewel would normally be.
"Simply wearing one of these rings, or touching a dark-flake with your bare skin will activate the effect, a raw dark-flake can be found anywhere on this island, these I just keep on display so people know what to look for, a ring made like this for easy use is 10 coins." The merchant explained. Hind then gave me a smirk hearing that price, I sighed as she kept staring me down.
"You still owe me you know darling~" She teased. I shook my head as I produced a small coin purse and dumped the coins on the table.
"We'll take one, they do look nice." I tell him. The merchant took the coins and handed Hind the obsidian ring.
"Pleasure doing business with you." He called to us as we walked away. Hind giggled as she put on the ring, admiring it on her finger. She took a deep breath as the ring glowed a slight purple, a small pulse of energy seemed emanate from the obsidian crystal, even though I wasn't wearing it, even I could feel a small wave of energy flow through me, for Hind the effect must have been even greater, she sighed happily, examining her body.
"Whoa...what was that?" I asked her. Hind giggled and just wiggled her fingers.
"This is incredible, I feel so...optimized...for just 10 coins? Wow..." I was amazed at response, guess those things weren't a scam then...unless...
"You sure its not just a placebo?" I wondered. Hind looked back at me and shrugged.
"Even if it is, I feel great, plus this ring is pretty so I still say its money well spent." She stated. I couldn't argue with that, nor did I want to; even if the ring didn't actually do anything, it did look beautiful. But as we were discussing the ring, we heard a commotion from somewhere nearby. We both turn to the source of the disturbance and saw a child, roughly 8 to 10 years old, running away from one of the stalls, its vendor in pursuit.
"Stop, thief!" He was screaming as he chased this little red-headed girl, who was clutching a small bag of apples to her chest as she ran down the street. Unfortunately for her, the vendor was bigger and faster, and grabbed the girl by the arm. As she whimpered and struggled to escape he started shouting at her more. "You little bitch, I told you what would happen if I saw you again street urchin!"
This guy then...pulled out a dagger! He was seriously about to stab a child! I didn't care what this town's customs were at this point, that can't be right. Before the vendor could hurt the girl any further, I caught his arm and stopped him. He looked at me with a mixture of shock and annoyance for denying him his supposed vengeance.
"Whoa easy with that!" I tell him sternly, before producing a couple coins discreetly from my pockets, holding it in front of the surprised child. "Kid I think you dropped these." The little girl looked relieved to see me and those coins, the vendor took the coins and left in a huff, grumbling the whole way. Now that she was safe, I knelt down to her level to talk to her more directly. "What's your name kid?" I gently asked. The girl just hugged the apples closer, but did speak up a little.
"M-Mari..." Her voice was very quiet, even for a kid her size, like she'd hardly used it for so long. From the ruined state of her clothes, she seemed to be in dire straits indeed.
"Where are your parents Mari?" I kept my voice low and gentle, guiding the kid from the street into a nearby alley to get her out of the way of the public. Mari kept herself guarded, but she did open up a little bit about what happened to her.
"Parents gone...just me...and sister..." She told me sadly, sounding like she was resigned to this life on the street. God my heart bled for this girl, her situation hitting a little too close to home for me. Hind didn't say anything the whole time I was talking to this kid, though as I talked, I did see her nodding along with me out the corner of my eye.
"Mari, is your sister around here now? Surely you didn't try that apple heist solo did you?" I ask her. She was about to reply when another girl, this one much older, definitely a teenager at least came running over to us, Mari seemed to notice something before I did; she suddenly stepped between me and the girl and yelled to her.
"No! Don't hurt him sis!" The teenager stopped just in front of us, a look of anger and confusion on her ragged face, her scarred and dirty arm clutching a rusty knife, like the one the vendor from before had, just far more dirty.
"I've told you before; grown ups are untrustworthy Mari! Now lets get out of here before that guy sees you with the apples!" She hissed to Mari, trying to coax the little girl over to her. Hind was silent the whole time, to be honest I actually forgot she was there as this happened.
"Relax, I paid for the apples and he's not coming." I tell her calmly. The older girl eyes me with suspicion, but seems to calm down with the vendor not here. "I've known people like you two; you're scared, angry, and paranoid about everyone around you, its easy for me to say this, but please believe me: You're not alone, there are people who can help you, here." I pull out a coin purse and hand it to the teenager, she flinches a little seeing my arm stretching out, but she hesitantly takes the purse.
"Why are you giving us this? Who are you?" she asked me, still a little frightened and suspicious of me. I try to smile kindly back at her.
"My name is Ken, Ken Robin, use that money to take a ship to Thalasso, near the docks is an orphanage, go there and look for a woman called 'Elizabeth', Tell her I sent you, she'd love to help you two." I explain to her. She looks down at the coin purse and opens it, her eyes widen in surprise at how many coins were inside, she shows it to Mari, who is equally surprised and elated. The two of them start to cry tears of joy as they realise I literally handed them a way out of this homeless life.
"Thank you mister!" Mari cheerfully shouts, before hugging my leg affectionately. I chuckle a little and tussle her hair a little as she does, the teenager puts away the knife and holds a hand out to me with a smile, I reach out to grab it and we shake on it.
"Thank you...so much..." She chokes up a little before rubbing away her tears. She and Mari then walk away towards the docks, eager to find a ship out of here. Once they were out of earshot, Hind speaks up.
"You handled that pretty well darling, you have younger siblings or something?" She asked as we kept walking. I laugh and shake my head.
"No not really, that orphanage I mentioned? Dad sponsors it, I used to play with the kids from there when I was younger, sometimes we got homeless kids brought in, they'd be like those two girls; confused, wild, sometimes dangerous for the other kids. Sometimes they'd get so bad that they'd almost be kicked out. But eventually, I manage to get through to them, just ask them what happened, what they had to do to survive, and I manage to get them to calm down enough for the orphanage staff to handle them."
I didn't notice at the time, but as I spoke, Hind became increasingly invested in what I was saying, her face went from her usual flirtatious smirk, to genuine interest in my little story. "After all those times I interacted with those children growing, whether it was my friends, or troubled homeless, I just naturally developed into a guy who's good with kids." As I finished speaking, I felt a pang of sadness in my stomach. I hadn't thought about this in a long time, Hind must have noticed some was off, and put her hand on my shoulder.
"Darling...whats wrong?" She asked me gently, I look back at her and sigh, taking a seat on a nearby bench, Hind sat next to me, looking worried.
"My old friends, the last time I saw most of them, some of the staff had organised a trip on one of Dad's ships, the Red Whale. I waved them off and went back to work, it was only supposed to last two weeks. A month went by with no sign of them, then one day one of Lord Vickers' men came to Dad's office, I overheard him say that the Red Whale's... wreck... had been found..." I turned to look back at Hind as I said this last part.
"...they confirmed it had been attacked by pirates." Hind gasped, clasping a hand over her mouth in shock. "Cannonball holes all over the hull, bloody corpses, and a Jolly Rodger symbol marked in the captain's quarters...with blue chalk." I finished.
"The Blue Baroness..." Hind replied breathlessly, she looked away from me, clenching her fist. "I'm so sorry darling...I...I had no idea..." She raised her head to me, a tear coming from her eye. "No wonder you hate pirates so much...you have greater reason to hate them than most people."
I sigh before responding. "As far as I know, it happened before you and your Tempesta friends were truly known, so I'm not even sure you were operating in Thalassopolis when the Red Whale was attacked, I don't blame you for that." I reassure her. Hind rubs away her tear as I continue. "For a long time I just assumed all pirates were the same, its the reason I've always tried to avoid you all this time despite everyone saying how nice the Tempesta are." I concluded. Hind giggles a little, putting an arm over my shoulders, and cupping my face with her other arm to make me look at her.
"Listen Darling, I want you to look me in the eyes when I say this so you know I'm being serious when I say this: Whatever you need, I'll make it happen, right now you're all that matters to me, know this stuff about you has only proved how right I was to love you." She told me firmly, yet passionately. Holy crap there was a serious fire in her eyes as she told me that. I nod back at her, agreeing.
"Thanks Hind...now uh...whats the plan for that outpost out there?" I asked her. She then seemed to remember something and pulled out a small, boxy device from under her clothes.
"This device is called a 'camera', a present from my good friend Royal Fortune from another land, it will record a copy of whatever you point it at onto a piece of paper, that comes out the front like this." She held the device to her face, the side facing me had a glass structure in front of it. "Smile Darling~" She orders me playfully. I chuckle a little and obey her.
Click
I hear some whirring from the device as Hind watches it with fascination as a piece of paper pops out from a slit in front of the camera...a picture of my face on it! "Nice, it works...now I'll always have your smile with me Darling~" Hind giggles as she hands me the camera. "Use it on anything important inside the outpost; maps, documents, anything that will tell us where Vickers is going." She tells me.
"Alright, we strike at midnight."