Jordan

Jordan Sulpher stood upon the forecastle of the Ballentine, letting the wind wash his wild blond hair however it may. All about him, the ocean swells rose and fell like the rhythmic sway of a sleeping woman’s breast.

That thought made him smile. He’d done well since he’d taken on running Mashal Angranosti’s flagship vessel – better by far than he’d ever done for himself in his brief career as a privateer. His belly was full, his purse fuller, and for this voyage he’d managed to find a particularly feisty brown-haired whore to keep his bed warm.

The mantle of Captain suited him just fine, gold tassels and all.

It was a light run, an easy one, the course they were on. Not much in the way of cargo, and the ship ran almost weightless on the water, cutting through the waves like a dirk might pierce a soft belly. Already, they’d spent three nights on the seas, racing down the eastern coast of Arjun, towards the Pike. Another four days and they’ll have turned the southern tip of that sword shaped expanse of land, turning north towards the port of Arrabor. It had been a strange voyage Mashal had charted for them, him and his sole companion, but it wasn’t a poor one at that.

To the west, along the jagged line of cliffs that marks the coast of Arjun, the sun had begun to set, and the first of the stars revealed themselves. One of them might have been green. With a smile, Jordan Sulpher turned towards his cabin below the bridge. There was a young lady waiting there. And Sulpher was never one to disappoint the ladies.

* * *

A fist banged on his door, breaking the stillness of the darkened cabin. Irritated, Sulpher’s eyes flickered open, roused from the half stupor he had allowed himself to drift into. Beside him, in the dark, a soft shape stirred.

“Shh,” he said, laying a finger upon her hidden lips, “Let me-“

“Captain!” someone boomed from beyond his door, banging hard enough to make the door shake in its hinges. He could see the flickering of torches from under the portal.

“What?” he shouted back, already pulling on his breeches and boots, a scowl forming on his face in the darkness.

“We need you on the bridge, sir, there’s… Gods, it’s in the sky, you’ve got to see this!” the voice was shrill, frantic. Frowning, Sulpher realized the ship was not moving.

His companion stirred beneath the sheets, “Maybe I should-“

“No,” he said, pulling on a clean white shirt by light of the stars through his porthole, “Stay. I’ll see to whatever this is. Get some sleep, don’t know how long I’ll be.”

“Alright,” she said, and he might have heard a faint sigh preceding the words. Or it might have been the swell of water against the hull.

When he let himself out into the narrow gangway, he found three of his men whispering nervously amongst each other. That concerned him more than he would allow them to see; these men had earned their sea legs, he knew them all. They did not scare easily.

“Show me,” he said, cutting through their murmurings, in a voice as calm and controlled as he could make it.

On the bridge, damned near the entirety of the crew were assembled in a cacophony of heated voices, and even Angranosti was there to be found, silent, but worrying his fat fingers. So intense was the chaos of words on the deck of the Ballentine that night that it took several moments for Jordan to see and understand the cause of it.

“Fuck,” he was compelled to whisper, when he finally saw.

His first thought was a mountain, and it wasn’t that far from the truth. It rose out of the sea before them like a great peak, higher and higher, till it hurt his neck to find its crown. The sheer size of it dwarfed the ship and all the men upon it, together no more than an ant at the feet of this behemoth.

Slowly, as his eyes grew accustomed to the raw immensity of the thing, he began to make out the details. Vertical ledges became fluted pillars, soaked in water and green with seaweed. Shapeless rocks manifested themselves more truthfully as sculpted figures, ancient and graceful. Terraces and balconies, graven in stone all, they made their presence felt, and Sulpher realized that his mouth was hanging open.

“Caster. Caster!” he yelled, turning to the crew, looking for the navigator, “Speak up man! Where are we?”

“Pike’s End, Captain. We’re at Pike’s End,” the man said, shaking his head. “Pike’s End and I’ll be damned, begging your pardon sir, but there weren’t never no bloody mountain here.”

“What is it? Would you look at the thing?” and a hundred other questions spilled out of the mouths of the men, most of them fearful, some of them terrified. Sailors, by and large, had always been a superstitious group, their lives too fickle, and too fragile when stacked against the vastness of the oceans.

“It is a tomb,” said a voice, calm as still water, silent as the day after the storm, “And it is waiting for us.”

With the others of his men, Sulpher turned to see Sepherrin standing by the hatch. The captain’s lips twisted into a silent snarl that did nothing at all for his too-bright smile and rakish charm. Sulpher had not liked this man, but Sulpher was practiced at ignoring the things he had to endure. He had almost managed to forget entirely the presence of this creature.

“How do you know anything about it?” asked Sulpher, his tone barely bordering on polite.

“I know,” said the strange, skeletal man, as he stepped forward to the rail, looking up at the glistening immensity with an eye oddly unmoved by either its splendor, or its majesty, “Because I helped build it.”

“Well,” said Jordan, in mounting annoyance as his men fell dutifully silent at Sepherrin’s words, “Fuck this, and let’s get out of here. Caster, set a course-“

“Assemble a landing party. Six men. We enter the monolith.” Sepherrin interrupted.

“Now you look here, you twisted bastard,” Jordan found himself saying, “This is – my – ship and I’m telling you my men are going nowhere near that thing.”

“Captain Sulpher,” a voice said. The color rising in his cheeks, Jordan turned to find Mashal, standing quite close by.

“This ship belongs to Mashal Angranosti still, no?” said Mashal.

“Yes, sir,” snapped Sulpher.

“Then Mashal Angranosti says that we go.”

Red faced, Jordan stared at his employer. He felt as if his eyes might bulge right out of their sockets. The men were all silent now, all watching. But he was a sensible man, and he valued Mashal’s gold more than he valued his own pride. “Butcher and Pierce,” he snapped off crisply, “Ready the longboat. We’re going in, curse the seas to the whores.”

“Aye, sir!” came the loud retort, as strong arms and resolute men bent to the task.

* * *

Previous: Part 2 – Aros

Next: Part 4 – Sepherrin

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