Behind the ten reserve ships of the pirate fleet stood a massive Galleon. And unlike the other pirate's ships which were all different varieties of thin sleek galleys, the Galleon was bigger, fancier and much better equipped, because, after all, it was the Ravager's personal ship, as such, it had to have the corresponding dignity.
In fact, if it wanted, then this ship could even go toe to toe with two Braavosi warships on its own.
Not that the pirate king Ravager would ever take such risks with his own life.
Standing on the deck of this ship, were all the cruelest, strongest, smartest and most useful pirates in this fleet. Along with their Master Ravager, the only person sitting on the deck, they were silently keeping watch on the battle from afar.
"How much longer now?" calmly asked the Ravager in a low gravelly voice while signalling his aide, a 13-year-old young lad to refill his wine, "You can throw a few more ships at them if this battle can end faster..." he continued callously as if the lives of the pirates weren't worth waiting a few minutes, "...Things could become complicated the longer the battle goes on."
"Don't worry, Master," came the smooth answer from the most well-dressed man on the deck, "We don't to use more pirates... the battle should be over soon enough." The advisor replied while bowing his head.
"Fine, then." The Pirate King nodded waving his hand indifferently and the advisor turned back to command the battle.
The advisor placed the far-eye back on his eye and peeked closely at the battle in the distance. He was the one who actually controlled the whole attack from his position on this ship.
He was the one who decided when it was time for which ship to retreat and for which ship to take its place.
And he was doing all that using just a few different coloured flags and a few capable subordinates.
The signals he used were so complicated that they completely went above almost every pirate's head, except for the ones he had specially trained to follow his orders.
If someone asked any pirate in this fleet what was the secret behind Ravager's rise to become a Pirate King of Essos in just a decade, then most of them would attribute it to his cruelty, his ambition, his connections, or maybe even the huge number of ships under his command.
But if they asked this question to Ravager himself, then he would unhesitatingly point towards this scholar-like man commanding the battle and looking absurdly out of place in this gathering of fierce pirates.
Ravager was quite grateful for the day when he managed to snag this man from right under the nose of one of Volantis' most prominent Noble families.
Because, if it were not for his man, then Ravager wouldn't have so many ships under his command, if it were not for this man then he wouldn't have a record of winning 9 out of every ten battles his fleet was in, and if it wasn't for this man's ability command a naval battle, then Ravager didn't think that he could have ever become a Pirate King.
And Ravager always made sure that this treasure of a man would never be able to leave his side... 'even if he wanted to,' he thought as his eyes involuntarily went towards his young aide who immediately shivered at his gaze. This young one hadn't left his side since before he was a toddler, as he was the key to keeping this treasure of a man locked under him.
'But it's still not enough...' he thought as his eyes turned back to the battle in the distance. He didn't want to be just a pirate king, he wanted to be the Pirate King.
He didn't want his name to be taken along the likes of Salladhar Saan and Crow's eye, he wanted to be above them, he wanted to crush them underneath him, he wanted to be the only Emperor of the Sea, of all Seas.
He wanted the name Ravager to resound across all the continents, to strike fear in his enemies... from the Nobles of Westeros to the Sealords of Braavos, from the Magister of Pentos to the Great Masters of Slaver's Bay.
The mere mention of his name should be enough for them to piss their pants and offer him all their riches and their wives to him...
And now he had finally learned a valuable piece of information from his worthless, that could give him a chance to achieve this ambition of his. And he wouldn't let go of that chance... at any cost.
Ravager thought while involuntarily making a tight fist with his left hand before turning to the side, "Rulk! What happened to that task I asked you to do?"
A huge black man with his upper body naked and full of scars bowed from behind him and replied, "I sent three of my best men, Master. They should have reached the coast of Braavos by now and should soon send us the location of that Westerosi..."
"Good, that is good," Ravager nodded with a cruel smile on his face, "We not only need to thank that shipping company for this gift of Braavosi merchants but... also show him what happens when someone crosses one of us... Isn't that right, little Jack," he towards his son with clear disdain in his eyes.
"Y-Yes," Even though Jack was as large as his father, he turned into a nervous cat in front of his father, "But didn't the Advisor say that it would be hard to catch them at sea and that we should negotiate with them and buy from them their method of seafaring—"
"Che! He may be a very smart man but... sometimes he makes things too complicated." Ravager snorted with an uncaring look on his face, "I am Pirate King, boy. When I want something, I just simply... take it." He said confidently before turning back to his son with a look of disgust, "Not that a halfwit like you, who was made a fool of by that Westerosi not once but twice, would understand something like this..."
"Haha," The nearby pirates all burst out laughing at that.
Jack gritted his teeth at the humiliation as the surrounding pirates openly laughed at him, uncaring that he was their captain's son, "B-But it wasn't my fault father, it was that cunning Northern Shipping—"
"Don't give me excuses, boy. You whore of a mother gave me enough of them before I killed her," he turned to Jack with a menacing look on his face, "And what have I told you about calling me your father before you have earned the right to it, boy?!"
"T-To not do it."
"So what am I, then?"
"M-Master."
"Good, at least you can learn..."
"B-But, Master," Jack said as he hurriedly tried to change the subject, "Do you think it wise to openly provoke Braavos like this," he asked while gesturing towards the battle in the distance, "Wouldn't they just send their full might after us because of this..."
"And, so what if they did?" Ravager scoffed while comfortably leaning back in his chair, "Where are they going to attack? We're pirates, Boy. I have no home that they can ravage, I have no castle that they can loot, and I have no people that they can capture. The sky is my roof and the sea is my floor... If they attack me in Stepstones, I'll go to Slaver's Bay. And if they still follow me there, I'll just go and reave the shore of Westeros... Their mighty strength has no meaning if they can't attack me..." he scoffed.
"Besides it's their own fault for dangling this ripe fruit in front of me... they can't really expect a shark to spare its prey now, can they?" Ravager finished with a fierce smile and Jack reluctantly nodded his head.
"It seems they are giving up, Captain," The first mate announced while pointing towards the Naval battle in the distance that was finally reaching its conclusion.
None of the Braavosi warships had actually started sinking yet but they had taken enough of a beating to know that it was only a matter of time... So the Captain in charge of the Braavosi fleet decided to cut their losses and run away with all his ships while abandoning all the bulky merchant ships as bait because, after all, their lives were worth much more than the goods and people on those merchant ships.
"Signal them not to pursue the warships anymore and to surround the merchant ships," The Ravager ordered and the Advisor immediately nodded his head before making his subordinate wave a couple of green and blue colours from left and right.
"That took long enough..." Ravager grunted, standing up from his throne before ordering the pirates around him, "Board the ships. Kill every man who resists and shackle everyone who surrenders. If there are women on board then the captains get their first pick and they can use them for three days before they are sold but remember... if anyone wastes a valuable young virgin product once again, I'll string their naked bodies on ships without caring about who they are." he ordered and the pirates around him hurriedly nodded their heads
He then turned to Advisor, "Count all the loot and make sure that no one steals anything, and if you find a thief, just hang them." The advisor nodded as the Pirate King left towards his cabin to rest after giving his last order.
...
The camp of the Company of Rose which had been mostly empty for the past few days was bustling once again, as the victorious soldiers began ambling in.
Every single returning warrior had a wide smile on his face, and even the injured ones were laughing and joking.
The atmosphere didn't feel at all as if the sellswords were coming back after a battle, instead, it felt as if they had just gone for a peaceful walk and were now coming back after a picnic.
And why wouldn't they be happy... after all, a head-on battle between three big sellswords companies, consisting of more than four thousand warriors had occurred, and to think that their side had emerged victorious without taking any more than a handful of casualties and injuries... it was almost magical.
"Oi! Tark! Karl!" A guard loudly called his friends while waving his hands, "Come here, You fuckers!"
"Ah! Darren, my friend, it's so good to see you again—"
"What the fuck are you talking about, you idiot! We saw each other just two days ago."
"Did we? Ah! I thought more than a week had passed since we left the camp... Aren't I right, Tarl?"
"Yes. I mean, we marched for our destination, we reached our destination, we fought the battle, we killed our enemies, and then marched back to our camp... It's hard to believe that it all happened in a matter of days... it honestly still feels like a dream.
"Was the battle really that easy?" The guard knew that the battle was a successful one from the smiles on their faces but he couldn't understand why they were exaggerating it so much...
"Easy? Easy?! It was fucking massacre, my friend, we absolutely slaughtered them... our usual training is more exhausting than this battle..."
"Really?"
"He's not lying Darren. The Company of Cats actually felt like just a gathering of wild cats... Their food storage was on fire, their horses were running away, and all of them were stumbling around like headless chickens... I don't think they even noticed us when until we actually hit their camps..."
"And even then they could barely put up any fight... They didn't mount any defence, they had no sembling of any formation, half of them had no weapon or armour on them, and even the ones who had them... the swings of their swords felt so weak, it was as if they had never held a sword before that day..."
"Yes, In fact, quite a few of them were just holding onto their stomach and kneeling on the ground, waiting for their deaths..." the man explained excitedly while waving his hands, "I wonder if they had eaten something bad before the battle..."
"You're right. I even saw one of them with his pants halfway down, shitting on the side..."
"Yes, Yes, I saw one too... but I felt so bad about him that I left him alone..."
"I didn't. I killed quite a few of those squatters. In fact, I was specifically searching for those shitting idiots because they were so easy to kill, HaHa!"
"Ugh! I always knew that you were an evil bastard, Tarl... but to think you would kill a man going about his business... that is just wrong."
"Who cares! Those bastards from the Company of Cats were always so arrogant whenever we met them in the cities and they always looked at us as if we were just roadside beggars... this will show those cunts their place..."
"Argh! Now I wish that I hadn't been left behind to guard this empty camp..." The guard said enviously. "You all must have gotten plenty of loot too, right..."
"That... we didn't..."
"You didn't? Why?"
"Well... it seems that the commander had an agreement with the Windblown, that all the loot from the battle would go to them... so we had to leave the camp of Cats immediately after the battle was over..."
"What?! That's not fair!"
"Oh! don't worry, we are all going to be rewarded and get a big prize when we start our next contract with that young Northerner called Jon... The commander made a big speech about it and everything..."
"Bah! Who cares about that far-away thing... Hehe, let me tell you a secret, I sneakily stole a lot of gold from the enemy bodies before leaving..."
While the sellswords all around the camp were bragging and having a lively discussion about the recent fight, Jon was having his own conversation with Bran, the commander's son, who had been the one to lead all of these soldiers back to the camp.
"... And about three to four hundred of them scattered and managed to escape but the rest of them were annihilated, and their captain was also slain, so I don't think the Cats will be a sellswords company after today," Bran explained with a satisfied expression on his face, "and even if they regrouped, they wouldn't dare to show their faces in the Disputed Lands for a long long time..."
"Hmm..." Jon simply nodded his head while listening to Bran's report even though he already knew about most of these things because of his friends in the sky, "By the way, where's Gared? I didn't see him come with you..."
"Oh! Father and the commander of the Windblown, the Tattered Prince, went straight to the city of Myr. He wanted to meet with the nobles of the city as soon as he could because they couldn't be sure when Tyrosh would hire other sellswords company to take back their base and their lost land... so they wanted to take care of their rewards and complete their contract before any unfortunate complications arise..."
"That's good then," Jon nodded his head before he took out a few pieces of parchments and a piece of charcoal from his vest, "Here take these,"
"Huh? What's this for?"
"You know how to read and write, right?"
"Y-Yes." It was necessary as the son of the commander for him to know his numbers and how to read a letter, so he learned all that in his childhood.
"Perfect," Jon said with a satisfied expression on his face before waving his hands at the sellswords all around the camp, "I want you to gather all sellswords warriors in our company and do a simple survey on them... I want you to write their names, their measurements, and their preferred choice of weapons. Can you do that?"
"I can... but, Why are you—Wait! Don't tell me, you're really going to—"
"I am," Jon simply nodded his head with a smile on his face, "So I need that information soon... and the ones whose names are on the top would get their gifts much sooner so If I were you I'd write Bran at the top..." He winked before patting his shoulder, "So get on with it, my friend." Jon said as he left the ecstatic boy behind him and began moving in the direction of the biggest tent in the middle.
"Did he say anything? Or try to leave?" Jon asked the two guards stationed a few meters away from the entrance keeping watch on the guest inside the Tent.
"No," one of the guards answered with a shrug, "Other than the cook delivering food, no one has gone in or out of this tent."
"Good." Jon nodded before removing the flap and entering the tent.\
But the next moment he froze and a weird look appeared on his face as Jon saw a completely different scene than the one he had been expecting.
Instead of an angry prisoner refusing to eat food, he found the Dornish prince calmly sitting on the table in the middle and heartily enjoying the meat and soup that had been prepared for him.
"I see that you've made yourself comfortable," Jon commented with an amused look on his face as he came to a stop in front of the table.
"Hmm..." Oberyn just hummed in reply without looking up as if he was more interested in the delicious rabbit meat in front of him than Jon.
"You're eating quite well for a man who was almost poisoned twice," Jon said after a while when it seemed like Oberyn wouldn't be the one initiating the conversation. It had been quite the sore spot for the man, so Jon was hoping for it to be a good way to begin their talk.
"For your information," Oberyn didn't quite grit his teeth but from the looks of it he was quite close to it, "I wasn't actually poisoned by your trick back in the camp, and the second time was nothing more than a fluke, so don't expect me to fall for that again..." he warned with his signature viper smile before he abruptly leaned back and wiped his hands with a cloth before picking up the cup of ale, "And since I easily can tell that this food isn't poisoned, I figured that it would be better for me eat it to retain my strength for... when I want to escape from this place..."
"You aren't really my prisoner, you know," Jon said while taking a seat in front of the table as Oberyn was finally done with his food, "You can leave anytime you want. After all, I wouldn't be so stupid as to capture a Noble of Westeros... especially one as beloved as you..."
"You've taken my weapon, you've placed guards outside this shabby tent, and you've placed my daughter away from me so that I don't... misbehave." Oberyn drawled in a thick Dornish accent, "I don't know what a prisoner means in that frozen wasteland of yours but from what I see this place is the exact definition of what a prison is..."
"You know who I am?" Jon asked with a raised eyebrow and for the time since Oberyn had met the boy, he saw surprise in his eyes.
"You thought I wouldn't investigate the boys who had robbed me in the centre of the Citadel." Oberyn said with a sarcastic smile on his face, "You're quite bold for a bastard, Jon Snow, aren't you?"
"Bastards need to be bold to survive in this world, don't we?" Jon replied after silently scrutinising Oberyn for a while, "Anyhow, you knowing my identity makes it much easier since you know about my father's honour and—"
"Tell me, then. What would your honourable father think when he finds out that you've forcefully seized a prince of Dorne and made him your prisoner? Which one could even go as far as to say is enough cause for war..."
"You have no shackles on your hands, you are eating the best food that this company can offer, you are staying in the Commander's own tent, and the only reason you don't have your weapon with you is so that you don't immediately try to fight your way out of this camp full of sellswords and injure yourself, and your daughter is already out and about..." Jon replied in a single breath, "So from where I am standing, I am giving you the best treatment I can give to a noble guest in the middle of nowhere. So no, I don't think my father would be too unhappy with me."
Oberyn was silent for a while before abruptly asking, "Where is Obara? Tell me where my daughter is, and maybe I won't try to kill you the next time I have a weapon in my hands."
"Well, when she woke up... her approach was as violent as you would expect from a daughter of yours, so I had to subdue and bind her. But even then she wouldn't stop trying to escape even at the cost of causing herself harm, so seeing that my assurance of not wanting to hurt either of you was not working, I had to take a more forceful approach..."
"What did you do?" Oberyn asked in a dangerously low tone.
"I just told her that if she can beat my young friend Sam twenty times in a training bout, then I would let the both of you leave unharmed and she..." Jon said with a small smirk on his face, "jumped on my offer quite happily."
'Ah that stupid girl,' Oberyn thought while shaking his head as most of his tension left his shoulders, "Aren't you worried that my daughter will kill the little Tarly?" he asked curiously after a few seconds.
"They are both fighting with blunted weapons in the middle of an open training ground, so no." Jon shook his head with a shrug, "Besides, Sam is a resilient boy and learns very quickly. In fact, after three quick losses, he even managed to clinch a lucky victory... so I am not too worried about him."
Oberyn was silent for a while before he nodded and smirked, "This is the commander's tent? Really? How poor is this company?"
"Don't worry, it won't be poor for long, now that it has come under me," Jon replied with absolute confidence, "But we're getting off-topic here, so let us get back to the reason I went to all this effort to talk to you."
"Very well, tell me, boy. What did you want to talk about?"
"I want to talk to you about my plan... to kill the person you hate the most in this world."
/
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