It was a splendid day for the noble citizens of the island kingdom of Ranoa. The fifteenth celebration of the Pirate King's execution was in full swing, and nothing could halt the revelry. Wine flowed freely, as plentiful as water. The tables groaned under more heaping plates than there were people present at this grand affair.
Servers and maids—every bit as dazzling as the elegant men and women dancing through the hall—moved in seamless precision, trained to fulfill any whim before it was even voiced. King Danimere roared with decadent laughter at a jest shared by his general, who offered only the barest of smiles at his sovereign's delight. Nearby, courtly ladies—noble daughters of lofty rank—chimed in with laughter as clear as bells.
Not a single servant looked anything less than beautiful.
Not one geezer wore a frown.
Truly, all was well in Ranoa.
Unless, of course, one remembered the little bar on 8th Street, hidden behind the blacksmith's shop. Its wooden walls had likely been rebuilt a dozen times—or simply patched piecemeal by a weary builder. If you could forget the press of a hundred bodies crammed inside that shadowy space—if you could forget it, as everyone at the royal celebration apparently had—then indeed, all was well for Ranoa.
~oOo~
Silence could be considered in many different ways. It's a heavily opinionated concept, but there are three main ways I would define it: Silence of shock, where your physical ability to respond verbally is thwarted by your brain's inability to process an event; Silence of incompetence, where the ability to respond was never present—this is the silence of the ill-prepared, ill-thought, and ill-educated; and finally, Silence of shame.
"—like dogs!" I exclaimed. "Casting stones at us; sneering when we cross their view. We can't let this stand! We did not fight for this!" My voice echoed against wooden beams.
No one shouted with me.
I surveyed them all: men who had once battled for the freedom we claimed here, now unable to lift their gaze from their ale. Women who had sacrificed everything in that war—who had risked it all for a better future—stared at their laps in remorse.
Not one man or woman met my eyes.
A boy did. "Well, what do you want us to do?!" he demanded. His father roughly snatched his arm, but the boy would not be silenced. "They have guns, cannons, walls! They have five men for every man in this bar. It's impossible!"
At that, he—the boy—maybe thirteen years of age, left the bar just as silent as I had. I realized then that there was a fourth silence—a silence I had overlooked. Silence of fear. I only saw it now, because I had a hundred examples in front of me. In fear, not one person spoke up to agree with the boy—the man—but in their slumped shoulders and trembling hands, agreement was everywhere.
He locked eyes with me, daring me to contradict him. We all knew he spoke the truth. But he was too young. He lacked context.
"We are no weaker now than we were ten years ago, and the odds back then were even more against us—even more impossible." Not one word rang false, this was the truth that they were too afraid to face.
Shameful silence answered me. Shameful footsteps left echoes before the bar door squeaked open, and we were made less than we were just a minute ago.
Soon, it was just me and the bartender.
"Why won't they rise?" I asked the man I'd known since I was a toddler. He didn't answer immediately.
Miles was a man who had fought on the frontlines since my earliest memories—a hero who once shone like a star in my eyes. Back then, I had so dearly wanted to be him, to fight with him. He filled the silence, remorsefully.
"You aren't wrong, Roderic, you aren't wrong," he said, pouring a mug and placing it in front of me. He clapped me on the shoulder and squeezed it in what might have been a reassuring gesture. "Your father would be proud to see you now, were he still with us. But, Roderic..." He trailed off.
I turned my head and saw weakness in his eyes.
"This isn't perfect. We all agree with you, but we're better off now than we were ten years ago. Isn't that enough?" he asked, wearing a faint, apologetic smile. He looked like a stranger.
The Miles I knew was a man who grinned under cannon fire.
I spat in my drink and left. The sound of the chair slamming into the floor was muted by the thunder rumbling in my ears as I walked out.
~oOo~
On the docks I sat, watching the waves crash beneath my feet before the water cleared up and let me see the bottom, the half broken coral reefs that had once grown wildly down there had been broken apart over the years under the keel of large and heavy trade ships.
Footsteps sounded out behind me before the same boy that had questioned me earlier took a seat in the space next to me. For a second we both just watched the waves, and I was content to keep it that way. The constant noise was enough to drown out my thoughts for now, and I was certain that I might do something rash should I allow them free reign.
The boy did not agree, evidently. "You were there during the rebellion," he stated. "No one will tell me anything, no matter which of the adults I ask.." He whispered just loud enough for me to hear it.
He took a deep breath and asked me the question like he was dreading it. "Please, can you tell me about it? What was so different? "
For a second I didn't want to answer. What was so different? Not much, really, except back then, we refused to suffer, we put our freedom before all, and we backed up our words with action. We fought.
I looked the kid in the eyes and saw someone truly determined gaze back. He did lack context, but no one on this decrepit rock would give it to him. I breathed out a sigh. If no one else would give it to him, then I would. He deserved to know that we had a chance. Maybe that would be enough.
"My father led the revolution," I told him. "He was a man that could talk a fish onto his line, and what I remember most vividly of him, even though he was my father, were his speeches."
I could rattle them off word for word for the kid, but it would not be the same. Each and every speech my father had made during the campaign, I had practiced a hundred times. His heart's spoken truth was gospel to the younger me. Each and every word, heartfelt and inspiring.
"Back then, Miles was the kind of man that could smile through cannonfire, Marissa the kind of woman that would smack you unconscious if you interrupted her surgery before sewing you together, Paul and Kriley were demolition experts that crawled through mud for countless hours in the rain to plant a fuse beneath the enemy flour storehouses. They were all like that."
The boy's eyes were widened. How could nobody have told him this? Were they ashamed of their past, or scared that their words would inspire their children to drag them out of this poverty.
"What's your name, kid?" I asked.
He sniffed a short breath of salt and freedom, and introduced himself as, "George… My name is George!" he exclaimed.
I nodded. I figured I recognized him. "I have fond memories of your father as well," I pondered aloud, reminiscing while the boy looked at me, starstruck. "He taught me how to fight when we were the only ones left in camp, then he employed those very same combat techniques and fought three men alone. He came out with three dog tags wrapped around his wrist. My father couldn't mention Terry's name without telling that story for months."
George was in evident awe. His wide eyes reminded me, perfectly mirroring the way people said I looked back when they told me stories of their latest moves and campaigns.
But then he frowned, and while the mirror in my mind shattered, every cracked sliver still angled back at me.
"Then, what happened?" he asked, confused, still seemingly dreading the answer. Surely, it must have been something awful for this decline to be where we are at now. Surely.
Unfortunately, I did not have any answer I had for him that would satisfy that curiosity or dread, but I told him what I knew regardless.
"We won, We got the concessions we had asked for, we were finally equals with our oppressors. Then my father died of a disease, and the nobility started to transgress on their promises, and I am left as confused as you are right now. Why do the same people who fought for it, not protect their winnings?"
George's eyebrowed were almost knitted together, his brain trying to find the connection that I couldn't. For years I had been asking myself these questions, asking my old idols these questions, and for years I had been left unsatisfied.
The mirror of my soul asked me the question weighing on my heart heaviest of them all.
"Why won't they rise?"
~oOo~
Why won't they rise?
I dropped down from the overhang I'd been perched on for the last few hours, alone now since George had gone to confront his parents armed with the knowledge I'd given him. My feet sank into the thick mud on impact, and almost at once a gentle wave rolled in, smoothing out the footprints I'd left behind—erasing my brief presence here. The south side of Ranoa saw fewer visitors these days, and it wasn't hard to see why. Craters riddled the ground, covered in the undergrowth of the woods, cloaked heavily by the dying foliage of fallen trees. The cliffs, once elegant slopes shaped by centuries—maybe millennia—of crashing waves, were now wrenched apart, leaving jagged edges and frail ledges as the last sight before the sea claimed anyone foolish enough to slip. A fall from here meant certain death; the bones that likely still bleached the ocean floor were a testament to that.
And yet, to me, it was beautiful.
This place was where the world had once gleamed at its brightest—where defiant souls had fought to reclaim their freedom. Here, heroes risked their lives for virtues, for their families, and for each other. Against all odds, they prevailed. This coastline was once a battlefield, and every step I took demanded caution. Even now, shattered cannon fragments spotted the forest floor like relics of that final victory.
I understood why an ordinary person might shrink away from rebellion. Our circumstances—the natives of Ranoa—seemed hopeless. But these weren't ordinary people. We had been here before, in a far worse predicament.
Back then, Ranoa's monarch commanded three thousand soldiers, while our ragged force of rebels numbered just five hundred. With no foothold, no resources, and no real training, we carved a victory from the smallest fragments of hope. We stole from Ranoa their weapons so that we could take them to their throats, sabotaged what we couldn't steal, and rigged what we left behind. Anything to even the scales.
Although I say "we," I was mostly an observer back then—a helper in the wings. I trained endlessly, convinced the war would rage on until I was ready. Then, in a sudden flash of triumph, it ended before I ever got my chance to fight. Strangely, I almost felt robbed, before I got over myself. We'd won. At last, we'd live in harmony—finally tasting the sweetness of peace.
My people had seen what I'd seen. They'd fought beside me. These were not fragile hearts.
So why wouldn't they rise now? What changed?
I had no answer.
Picking through the undergrowth, I followed a path I used to walk with older friends. Memories trailed me like ghosts, superimposing themselves over the forest. I saw two versions of the same place: the overgrown, crater-ridden landscape before me now, and the livelier, almost magical battlefield of my childhood. My mind drifted to an apple tree we'd once sworn would bear the sweetest fruit on Ranoa.
To my right, I saw it—I saw the tree, thin and barely taller than me, and at the same time, I saw an imposter; a tree thicker and taller than I remembered, its trunk twisted and gnarled in ways my mind refused to accept. A lurch of excitement tugged at me, and for a moment, I saw it as we'd always imagined: lush, bright, perfect. I leapt onto the lowest branch, which was far sturdier than I thought it should have been, and climbed until I found an apple. It was full and round, shining a familiar red in the afternoon sun.
"Don't mind if I do," I murmured, plucking it. I bit into the fruit eagerly.
The moment I tasted the rancid flesh, the illusion shattered. I gagged, choking on a flavor so bitter and wrong that I nearly retched. Coughing hard, I spat onto the ground, my eyes watering as I took in the real color of the apple's skin: a sickly bluish hue.
"Apples aren't meant to be blue, you bastard.." I cursed it, wiping my mouth as I hurled the wretched thing as far as I could.
Nothing felt more jarring than that sharp reminder: the world I remembered was gone, replaced by something decayed. And I still had no idea why the people who had once fought so hard now refused to fight at all.
~oOo~
"You want me to…what?" I asked, staring at the four teenagers in front of me. Three of them looked uneasy. George, however, was not nearly so spineless.
"Teach us how to fight—how to become stronger," he demanded.
I snorted. "You're the son of one of our greatest warriors"—if he still has it in him—"and you expect me to teach you? I haven't even been in a real battle; the war ended when I was your age."
My fist clenched without me noticing. George glared. "It doesn't matter!" he yelled. "You were there, getting ready. That means you had to know what you were getting ready for! The adults taught you. Now you teach me!" With that, he charged, swinging a fist at my face.
His friends reacted in alarm, but he had no hesitation. I admired his stubbornness.
He let out a furious cry as his punch flew at me. The little bastard. Grinning, I caught him by the wrist, stepped around him, and swept his lead foot out from under him. Off balance, George hit the ground hard, coughing as he tasted dirt.
He looked stunned, and so did his friends, staring at me like wide-eyed fish. Then one—a blond boy with a small teardrop tattoo under his eye—rushed in next. He kept glaring at my feet, wary of getting swept, only to meet my front kick square in the chest. He landed on his rear with a thud, letting out a pained wheeze.
Their companions yelled and lunged at me in retaliation. One threw an ungainly kick at my torso while another leapt with both hands raised for a hammer strike. They crashed together when I sidestepped and clotheslined them. I couldn't help but laugh under my breath, even as George and the blond boy scrambled to their feet for a second round.
Maybe not so spineless after all, I noted.
These kids, demanding I make fighters of them and prepared to brawl if I refused, showed more mettle than the warriors I once idolized. They refused condescension. They refused to live off nobles' scraps. They'd bite the hand that fed them if it ever tried to hold them down.
"The audacity!" I roared, a wild grin spreading across my face. Then I dropped George again with a quick hook to the jaw.
His friends cried out and charged again.
Perhaps the older generation won't rise. But as I squared off against these defiant kids, I realized there might still be hope for this place.
~oOo~
Thanks for reading the first chapter of this fic.
I drew very heavy inspiration from the book series "Virtuous Sons" for this, and would heavily recommend anyone who reads this to go check it out.
I plan to upload twice a week. A new chapter will be out tomorrow, as I upload this one now on a Saturday, but after that uploads will be more evenly spread.
Don't hesitate with leaving a review, negative or positive, I don't mind.