King of the Seas (5)
The King of the Seas was certainly more powerful than any other pirate crew out there. The ship we'd boarded was better armed than the pirate vessel alongside us, and its sailors were of a higher caliber.
But the sailors on that other ship clearly didn't see it that way. As the King of the Seas drew near, they grew visibly irritated.
"What do you want, Loki?"
One of the sailors called out to the King of the Seas with a slouched, insolent posture.
"Loki? You think you've earned the right to call me by name?"
Loki — the King of the Seas — snarled back. The sailors crossed their arms and sneered at him.
"We're not your subordinates anymore. We're equals now. Just pirates, same as you."
"Pirates or not, you all swore an oath to keep the discipline."
"Spare us the discipline talk. Who's going to thank us for keeping it? Is our ruined country going to come back just because we did?"
"You little—!"
Loki seized the sailor by the collar. The rest of them drew their blades in unison.
"Hey, what are you doing? Protect your captain, will you?"
The boatswain called out to his own crew. Our sailors drew their swords too and came rushing over. In an instant, the deck was thick with the atmosphere of an imminent bloodbath.
"Enough!"
The situation shifted the moment the other ship's captain appeared. He matched my image of a pirate perfectly.
A shaggy beard, a garishly colored parrot perched on his shoulder. Half of his front teeth were gold, and clenched in his mouth was a cigar as thick as a club.
"I told you not to mess with my men again, Loki."
He said to Loki in a gravelly voice.
"Have you forgotten what I said would happen if you broke the discipline again, Harald?"
"Ha, that damn discipline."
Harald took a long drag on his cigar.
"Don't talk about the discipline like it's worthless, Harald. Without even the most basic rules, what separates us from pirates?"
"We are pirates, Loki."
Harald exhaled through the tip of his cigar and pointed at Uld.
"In my opinion, those fine lords and ladies didn't board your ship willingly. Am I wrong? You call it 'piracy' when you kidnap people without their consent and squeeze a ransom out of them."
Harald's men snickered. Loki's eyes narrowed.
"They're nobles of the Empire."
"So? If you torment imperial nobles, will Lord Solitas turn a blind eye to your sins?"
"It seems you've forgotten we're at war with the Empire, General Harald."
…General?
"Have you forgotten how our country fell? How many of our people yearn for independence? Are you truly prepared to say you've forgotten that history?"
A blue light smoldered in Loki's eyes. Rough waves crashed against the dock. The sea was answering his rage.
"Oh dear, how touching."
Harald flicked the ash from his cigar into the sea.
"Then I suppose I should call you Admiral Loki. It truly pains me, watching the ghosts of a fallen nation cling to old titles and honor each other so. Hmm?"
"Kyaaak!"
Harald thrust out his thick hand and wrapped it around a slave woman's waist.
"Just live and enjoy yourself. No one in this world remembers the Kingdom of Alkaraz. No one's ever going to recognize us as a general and an admiral."
Harald's hand began groping the woman shamelessly.
"And what was that about being at war with the Empire? That's just your delusion. We raid merchant ships, we kidnap nobles… and the losses we've inflicted don't amount to a speck of dust to the Empire. A war is the kind of thing Duke Esterzy is preparing — the kind you wage with a Grand Master and a knight order at your command."
"…I remember it clearly."
Loki said.
"The days when the Kingdom of Alkaraz was called the Jewel of the Western Sea. I… remember those who died fighting to protect our country."
"Then go die huddled up with others like you, all sentimental and pathetic. We won't interfere with you, so stop shoving that moldy old Codex down our throats."
So Loki had been an admiral of Alkaraz. No wonder — he'd felt far too much like a regular soldier to be a mere pirate.
The Kingdom of Alkaraz was one of the small nations swallowed whole by the Empire. Because Emperor Pelion was an expansionist, refugees who'd lost their homeland overflowed everywhere.
King Sandor, who had come to my domain as an envoy, was another king who'd lost his country to the Empire. The difference was that he'd handed his own country over with his own two hands.
It seemed every pirate here had once been a sailor of the Alkaraz navy. Originally, they must have agreed to keep the 'discipline' so they wouldn't forget their duty as soldiers — but the years dragged on, the war showed no hope, and men like Harald were bound to rot.
"A moldy old Codex, is it… Is that what you all think too?"
Loki turned to his own sailors and asked.
"Answer me, all of you. Are we nothing but the ghosts of a fallen nation?"
"……"
An uncomfortable silence settled over the dock. Loki met each sailor's eyes, one by one.
"If anyone here believes our 'discipline' is nothing but a moldy old Codex, and that our war is a fool's errand — then leave my ship now."
The sailors began glancing at one another.
"No need to hesitate. Each of you will simply walk the path you believe is right. Will you keep your pride as soldiers of Alkaraz to the very end? Or will you wallow as pirates who live for today and die for today?"
"What's there to think about, you fools? Your captain just told you to choose."
Harald snickered.
"Soldier or pirate, it's all the same. Sooner or later you'll be caught and strung up on the gallows. There's exactly one difference. While you soldiers are keeping your precious discipline, we'll be living it up."
Harald grabbed the slave woman's hair and wrenched it tight. He planted his boot on her back and forced her to her knees before him.
"Your captain gave you a chance to choose, so I'll give you one too. We happen to be short on deck-scrubbers. Anyone who'd rather be my lackey than play soldier, step forward now. This is the only chance you'll ever get."
It was getting interesting. I turned my head and snapped my fingers. At once, one of the pirates dashed into the galley and came running back, balancing a plate piled high with food.
"At your service."
On the plate sat roasted potatoes and fish, still steaming.
"Eat while you watch."
The pirate bowed his head with a grin. Uld looked back and forth between him and me, her face full of questions.
"He's a puppet I made."
"Ah…!"
She clapped her hands in delight.
"So it was your sorcery, Lord Iden."
The serving pirate was a puppet I'd conjured with my puppetry arts. The main event was about to begin — I could hardly stroll into the galley myself.
"Something to drink? We have wine and rum."
"Wine for me."
"Then I'll have… wine as well, please."
The puppet poured dark red wine into wooden cups, glug glug glug. It was robustly flavored — every bit as good as what we drank at the ducal residence.
Even as this unprecedented scene unfolded — a puppet serving the hostages — no one, from the boatswain on down, paid it the slightest attention. That was how serious things were over there.
"Damn it all—"
One of Loki's sailors spat out a curse, then—
"I'll go scrub some damn decks."
—and stepped forward to Harald.
"Just a moment."
Harald raised his hand with a sly smile.
"One more condition."
"Which is?"
"I'm a suspicious man — I need to be able to trust your word. If you want to be my man, first prove you're a soldier no longer."
"How do you mean?"
"Well, you see… soldiers live and die by orders, don't they?"
Harald said, picking at his ear.
"Spit at your superior's feet, and I'll be quite convinced you've thrown military discipline to the dogs."
"Fine by me. It's nothing, really."
The sailor didn't hesitate. He spat at Loki's feet, then turned away without a shred of regret.
"Thanks for everything. If we meet again, let's pretend we don't know each other."
Once the first man broke the ice, the sailors stopped caring who was watching.
"You kept that shit-tier discipline all by yourself, huh."
"So noble. I'm jealous."
"We're rooting for you, Admiral Loki. Do go crush the Empire for us!"
One after another, the sailors spat at Loki's feet amid the jeers. The last one didn't even bother with words.
"KHAAAAAK—— ptui!"
He sprayed a thick glob of phlegm onto Loki's shoe, then sauntered off.
Not a single sailor remained at Loki's side now. The only one still standing with him to the end was the boatswain.
"You should go too, Raghas."
Loki said with his eyes closed.
"What do you take me for, saying that?"
The boatswain replied with a dismissive snort.
"Harald's right — it's all my stubbornness. There's no need to suffer and endure for the sake of one damn fool."
"Do you remember what you said when we escaped the Kingdom of Alkaraz, Captain?"
"No idea, you brat. How long ago was that?"
"You said those exact words just now. Word for word."
"Did I?"
Loki smiled crookedly. For a man who'd just lost every last one of his men, he looked remarkably alive.
Loki walked past the boatswain toward me. I snapped my fingers and scattered the puppet.
"Eating through all this commotion — should I call it bold, or just a complete lack of tension?"
"When the ransom's 3.2 million barts, don't I have a right to be treated well?"
"Fair point there too."
Loki smirked.
"You're free. I'll ask the next ship that comes to drop you off at the nearest port."
"You're letting us go?"
"I am."
Loki bent down and unlocked our shackles, one after the other.
"The ransom… you're giving up 3.2 million barts?"
"Business is closed. A man with no crew can't be a captain."
Loki didn't stop at words. He took off his captain's hat and hurled it into the sea. The masterless hat went skimming across the water's surface.
"That feels refreshing. Makes me think I should've done this ages ago."
He threw the shackle key into the sea after the hat, then dragged an oak barrel over and sat down beside us.
"Pour me a drink."
"Wine, or rum?"
"Rum."
A sailor through and through, after all.
I poured Loki his drink. The boatswain Raghas sat down beside him too. Raghas had no need for a cup — he hoisted the whole rum barrel and drank straight from it.
"So what's the plan now?"
Raghas asked.
"No idea. I suppose I'll figure that out as I go."
Loki tilted his head back.
"But I don't feel bad. Do you know how many years it's been since I last felt free?"
The cup went around many times. Setting aside our positions as hostage and kidnapper, we traded idle chatter until the sun went down. Then Loki, his face flushed with drink, looked at me.
"Oh, right — sorry about this. We went and ruined your engagement trip."
"It's fine. This counts as a memory too."
"You were headed for Sirakos, weren't you? If you'd like, I can recommend some sights. There's a route most people don't know about—"
"If you've got nowhere to go, why not come to the Esterzy domain?"
Loki and Raghas both whipped their heads around to look at me.
"You two are nature-attribute Awoken. They say the enemy of my enemy is my friend — wouldn't a duke like Esterzy get along well with men who've lost their country?"
"Not a bad idea, Captain."
Raghas agreed.
"Ain't Duke Esterzy the only man on the continent with the guts to face the Emperor head-on?"
"Rumors always get exaggerated. If the rumors were all true, Duke Esterzy would have already surpassed the Imperial Seven Pillars in his teens — and does that sound plausible to you?"
"He's a young duke, sure, but so what? The knight order's real, ain't it? I mean… they say those knights fight demons as their after-meal exercise."
"We'd be useless there anyway."
"How so?"
"There's no port in the Esterzy domain. You think they'd have any use for a couple of sea dogs?"
Raghas's jaw dropped open.
"Huh. Didn't think of that."
"…There is a port, actually."
I cut in at that point.
"There's a port in the Esterzy domain?"
"Yep. Opened for business just recently."
"You've got it wrong. The northern sea freezes over — a port there is impossible."
"Well, apparently the sea stopped freezing a while back."
"That's the truth."
Loki and Raghas stared at us, eyes full of disbelief. I answered them with an enigmatic smile.