6 - Scales

by SilkyNoire

This wasn't the first time Sariel Liadon had been captured by pirates and tied to the mast of their ship in her smallclothes, and it probably wouldn't be the last.

You're probably confused. This isn't that uncommon for the half-elf, but you could do with an explanation.

A few days ago, Sariel stole a treasure map from a merchant passing through Waterdeep. That was before she knew that strange hooded men were also after the map. She vaguely recalled getting drunk and trying to swim in Deepwater Habor to impress someone, before waking up in the brig of this ship. The pirates had whistled and jeered at her whenever they passed by, but that was something she was used to.

There weren't just pirates onboard, though. She'd seen creepy hooded men aboard, who the pirates gave some respect and distance to. They were probably the ones who had been after the map and had her kidnapped.

Despite her best efforts, she hadn't managed to escape. She'd misplaced her hair pin at some point, probably when she tried to drunkenly swim in the habour. The pirates had been awfully resistant to her charms, even when she was as scantily dressed as she was. Clearly they feared the robed men more than they lusted for her.

This morning, two pirates brought her from her cell to the top deck of the ship, where they tied her hands above her head to the mast. The whistles quieted quickly when a robed man stepped on deck. He stood before her. All she could see behind his hood was his chin and jaw.

"Do you know why you're here?" He asked softly.

"Usually it's for a ransom. Sometimes there's other reasons." She quipped, winking to the nearest pirate.

"It's because you, girl, are an idiot of the highest order!" He suddenly snarled.

She was unfazed. "Yeah, I get that a lot. Usually from Em-"

He interrupted her by grabbing her chin. "Only the one who opens the map may enter the Temple!"

She could see his eyes now. They seemed... wrong, somehow.

"Temple?" She asked, mildly concerned now.

"The Temple at the bottom of the sea! We were to find the artifact inside for our master, but now you must be the one to open the way! The guardian and the barrier-"

His ranting was interrupted by the ship suddenly shifting, as if it had collided with something.

The hooded figure - a cultist, Sariel figured - pushed her head to the side and called to the captain.

"Did you hit a reef!?" He angrily shouted.

Sariel couldn't see the captain, as she was tied facing away from him, but he sounded annoyed. "No, we're in deep sea! There's nothing around for mi-"

With a sudden crash, the other pirate ship sailing next to them exploded into splinters. The ship's hull was cracked in two, and there were shouts and screams from its crew.

"Captain! There's something in the water!" A crewman shouted.

Before anyone could react, the ship shuddered and groaned. As everyone was distracted, Sariel spied her dagger and its thigh sheath on a nearby crate. It was the only thing other than her smallclothes that she had been wearing when she was abducted, so the pirates must have taken it too. For pirates, the two that had tied her to the mast didn't tie very good knots. The entire time she had been face-to-face with the cultist, she had been wriggling her way out of them. Now, they were loose enough for an escape.

One of her untied legs came up to knee the cultist in the stomach, then another leg connected with the side of his head. A neat trick that Kate had taught her. She finished undoing her bonds as a pirate spotted her, then came charging at her. She wasn't proficient enough with unarmed combat to fight them, and summoning her bow would take too long. Instead, she ran right at the oncoming pirate, then tucked and rolled right under his attempt to tackle her.

She grabbed her thigh sheath and put it on in a matter of seconds. When she looked back up, there were five pirates, cutlasses drawn, surrounding her.

"I say we carve 'er up, feed 'er to the thing eatin' us!" One of them shouted. Sariel didn't like the others agreeing with that.

She looked at the pirates, and at the relatively calm sea behind her. It didn't really feel like a choice for her. She stepped up on the side of the ship, turned around, and swan dived into the sea. As soon as her vision came to her, her eyes went wide.

A massive sea serpent was circling the ship just below the waves. It was at least a hundred feet long, and could probably swallow her whole without noticing. She watched in horror as the serpent slammed into the pirate ship, cracking its keel.

Suddenly, she had a thought. Maybe this was the 'guardian' that the cultist had referred to in his rants? If so, it probably made its lair near the temple the cultists were after. As Sariel watched the pirate ship slowly break apart and begin to sink, she made her decision.

She swam to the surface, took the deepest breath she could, then swam down to the serpent. She grabbed on to one of its fins, then held with her arms and legs as it began swimming into the deep.