Post by Joliette Thorne on Mar 5, 2011 13:23:55 GMT -5
Lucien had been practising, hard, at holding his breath. He had some of that yellow-colored kelp Rowen had procured for him, the stuff that makes water like air to breath, for a while at least, but the youth prided himself in the stamina he'd built through all those months on the oyster-boats, the deep free-dives he'd taken in quest of the mollusc's precious fruit. So he wouldn't be visible for several minutes, unless one was peering directly down into the waters of the reef, so crystal clear this time of year that he'd be able to be seen even close to the coral-crusted reef floor, makeshift flippers and a bamboo snorkel, cut-off breeches and his knife at the ready because there was a hella mean moray eel down here he'd tangled with once or twice outside the barnacle-studded mound the creature used for a home. Call it a vendetta. Today was the day Lucien Thorne Achilles would damn well show that elongated fish exactly who was the boss around here.
Mahri stood on the beach for a while, staring past the cypress to the sparkling water and reef beyond with one hand shading her eyes, just in case there was some sort of glare from the gently (thus far) rolling bay. She'd caught Luc's scent here and it ended where sea met shore. A small boat was at the ready not far off and she, the worry wart she is over that boy, was half tempted to take it out and see if, perhaps, she couldn't find the kid. Damn it, but things seemed to happen around him, and not all of them good. Huffing a breath of exasperation, the lycan marches to the rowboat, not to be confused with the rat of same sort of nickname, and leans into the prow to try and shove the bloody thing into the water. Here's hoping it's not beached too badly.
Leoxander was on his ship, which was anchored not far from that dangerous reef, so Lucien could dive to his heart's delight.
Lucien knew it was down there... somewhere.... lurking like a sailor's bad dream among the billowing vegetation and shock-headed scarlet and white anemones, the garish schools of reef-fish shimmering past. Flippers undulating gently, the boy kept himself relatively still, knowing his scent would eventually find a trail into the coral grotto where he was sure the fang-mawed moray would be sleeping off a meal, or just hanging out malevolently for the sake of being.. yeah, malevolent. "Here, fishy, fishy..." it was spoken mentally, and to himself, while the pressure in his lungs started burning just a little. With a deep-diver's discipline, he soothed the pain by ignoring it and willed himself to last just a little longer before surfacing. "Here... fishy...." And then the water was a mad swirl of debris and coils, a blunt, fierce head with needle-teeth, a thrashing mayhem of slime and confusion, and a sudden, terrible pain in the arm holding that knife. Perhaps someone would see the bubbles.. the faint cloud of pink, tainting the perfect blue and almost waveless surface.
The ship swayed only to the night tide. Leo, on the only hand, took the time to look toward the reef where he knew Lucien to be indulging in his love of treasure dives. He didn't bother to double check to weak lock on the hatch, as Grimrat would have little room to romp, with water surrounding the ship. Even from that distance, wolf sharp eyes noticed the bubbles and writhing beneath the waves, and he immediately dismissed the heavy leathers of boots and jacket from his person, leaving weapons in tact. "Damnit." A sharp curse, realizing, perhaps before others, what was going on.
Leoxander didn't take too long at all to ditch some of his clothing and dive right off the side of the ship anchored at the edge of dangerous reef. There would be parts where he scrambled over the terrain that cut like glass through leathers, but he ignored it in effort to get to the depths that threatened to claim his son. A streak of red left in the wake as he swam strong beneath the churning tide Lucien was buried beneath, a blade grabbed from his waist.
Mahri felt the boat shift then slide until it floated and she could climb in. Pulling the oars through the water wasn't all that difficult. There was, quite suddenly a 'blub' then another, and another until the bubbles boiled, tinted pink. It was that faint scent of blood that had the lycan twisting on the bench, the oars pulled up and nostrils flared to try and get a better handle on just ~what~ she was smelling. "Oh for Gods' sake, Lucien," she growled, nearly capsizing the small float when she dives in. Unfortunately for her, she hadn't had the practice of deep-diving that Luc had and she surfaced soon enough, but she'd been down long enough to see two rolling forms under there. Striking back for the skiff, Mahri grips the edge and tips it just enough to see her pack was still in it, and---for some reason--- it still contained that special Kelp, the same that Luc hadn't used. Having used it once, she repeated the process of chewing but not swallowing, one deep breath and she sinks, letting out the air only to suck in a huge gulp of sea-water in exchange. Gods, it still wasn't comfortable! Atleast though, she'd have enough time to get to that damn kid. Kicking and pulling way through the water, she waits til she hovers a few feet, by her estimation (and with salt water stinging her eyes too) to draw her own dagger. Mahri won't even try to get the eel until she is sure that Lucien can't take care of the slimy thing his own bloody self.
Lucien was.. not dealing with the eel, at all. Moreso trying to keep from being dragged arm-first into the coral enclave of the fish's dark-mouthed home. The creature had started backing in already, powerful tail coiling around the ancient chest that was its erstwhile treasure, the shape of which Lucien had spied a few days ago while he peered into the cavern while the eel was out hunting. The hulking form was too regular for coral, and the neon fish who somehow safely occupied that dangerous territory had illumined a verdigris-colored handle... Treasure was the last thing in his mind right now, though, the boy nearly blinded by the swirl of his own blood in the saline waters, the seabed muck stirred up in the struggle. Oh yeah, and the having his arm chewed off by the damned fish thing. The eel's head was about the size of your standard pit-fighting dog, and every bit as cheerful as it ignored Lucien's flailing opposite fist and continued to drag him bodily closer to its lair...
Grimrat , upon waking from his unconscious slumber, instinctually recognized that whatever predicament he'd managed to get himself into wasn't a good one. The momentary amnesia, brought on by whatever knock to the head he'd received at the hands of the tattooed man, wore off all too quickly and the memories of his capture flooded back, and immediately instigated a primeval panic and desire to survive, thus the tight, dark and fishy smelling hole he'd been stuffed into wasn't enough to contain him. He slammed his emaciated frame upwards and into the latched door of his confines as soon as he'd understood his dire situation, the result of this barrage was the lock's destruction and the goblin's emancipation, though to what end? He stood on the deck of the rocking ship unable to move from the total fear of his surrounds.
Leoxander just wasn't going to take that risk, with his only son. Perhaps Mahri would witness the captain diving in, then the pool of red that would surface long before either Achilles male would. But he finally found hold of the other arm and tugged firmly enough to perhaps dislocate a shoulder joint, but also dislodge a hungry grip from the dying creature. Not only would he push the boy up toward the surface harshly, but he would make certain his fingers stayed latched around the water-weightless trunk he saw that his offspring had fought for. Both would reach the air coughing or gasping while the Captain went for the eel's corpse, knowing it would feed well for dinner, that night, with it's size.
Lucien, fortunately, hadn't the wherewithal to notice the several sharks who'd come to circle the scene lazily, smart enough to know not to tangle with their old enemy, but irresistibly drawn to the hope of having the scraps after it was done with its meal. Mainly he wouldn't notice them because he'd lost consciousness, at about the point where his father had ripped him loose from the moray's tenacious grip, and gotten an unintended lungful of water in the process. His mortal enemy .. not so mortal now Leo had done with it... would make no struggle as it was dragged upward. Lucien was still hacking water from his sore lungs.
Leoxander finally came up to the surface, grasping Lucien over a shoulder since Mahri seemed to be out of commission, in the water. "Damnit.. I need some help up on deck..!" He called angrily to whomever heard him. But it seemed no one did. Maybe if Grimrat realized how easily the lock was detached or picked, he could come to an unlikely rescue, but nonetheless Leo was determined to get the unconscious, hacking youth to the ship's hull.
Grimrat remained frozen with fear at the broken entrance of the prison he'd just escaped until he heard the irritated cries coming from the water, to which he hesitantly decided to investigate, ever the conniver, he'd turn the situation to his favour if there was a chance. However, upon reaching the railing and searching the great blue for a moment, he saw the tattooed man that'd captured him and hauled him aboard the ship he was now trapped upon, that same instinctive fear returned in a n instant, "Master, I get the rope then!" He cried in that shrill voice, whilst searching for a coil long enough to throw out to the man, "Ere, 'ere master, I'll pull you up." He threw the rope he'd found over board in the direction of the struggling pair.
Lucien opened his eyes to wet, bloodshot slits, in time to get the merest, foggy idea of what in all tarnation was going on. He'd lost a lot of blood, already, and was barely coherent from lack of air and the black spots dancing around like some kind of morbid sea-fairies in front of his vision. He felt the rope being coiled around him, somehow, and heard a deep, familiar voice muttering a curse, something about the chest... The line tugged, maybe the goblin aboard testing the rope, and Lucien was shortly borne through the water, and then upward. Luc came to his senses enough, as his feet left the sea, dripping brine and blood that streamed from his useless, torn-up arm, to catch sight of his father's plastered-down blond hair vanishing once more below into the shark-infested reef. Where a half-dead moray eel floated, perhaps not so passively. "Dad!" Luc gurgled, even as he was hauled upward, thunking on the hull now and then. But the pirate was, as all who knew him knew well, never one to let a treasure go by.
Grimrat coiled the rope around his large hands and pulled, ignoring the fibrous, bloodletting bite of the twine as it buried into his skin from the weight it supported, and hauled the boy aboard with ease. Once his cargo was secured upon the ship the goblin skittled forward toward the boy and studied him with a sneer that exposed yellowing needle sharp teeth, and muttered "Should 'ave left ye down there, stinkin' 'uman." Before inching closer, simian like in his movement, until his face was close enough to the boy's to smell the horrid vileness of his breath.
Lucien's own nose wrinkled at the pungent reek emanating from the ugly critter's maw, which wasn't all that dissimilar to the one he'd just escaped. The youth shuddered, more due to the chill that felt like it was creeping from his bones outward. He hadn't looked at his arm yet, probably just as well, with the torn-up state it was in. The youth opened his mouth to enquire just who in the hell this new ship-mate was... and was promptly sick on the deck. That seemed to rouse him from his torpor somewhat, though, so he'd stagger upright, rich red droplets trailing his path toward the ship's rails. "DAD!" he bellowed over the side, looking like he might just clamber back down into that water to find the submerged pirate.
Leoxander heard the muffled sounds below the tide. Lucien might be a great clam finder, but he had yet to surpass the pirate's ability to hold his breath beneath those waves. After what would seem like an eternity, no pun intended, the rogue surfaced in that pool of blood and mud, delving a hand into the water for the slippery corpse that threatened to elude his grasp. "Son of a..." Anyone on deck would hear the captain's curse from down there. He didn't have the focus to stop and worry for his son aboard the ship with the goblin free.
Grimrat spat a large ball of yellow phlegm overboard, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and laughed at the youth's misfortune, "Not too good are ye?" The morbid, high pitched laugh subsided to be replaced by that teeth baring grin, "Bit sick are we?" He was taking a great deal of delight in the boy's pain and subsequent sickness, which brought on another bout of high pitched laughter, "That arms not lookin' too good, might 'ave to chop 'im off!" His voice was mirthful, and his face jovial despite his surrounds, until of course, that voice echoed up from the water. In an instant the goblin changed, seemed to shrink in posture, like a whipped dog. He backed away from the youth, fear controlling what only moments ago was mirth.
Leoxander struggled for grip on something to pull himself up, that large, stabbed eel slung over his shoulder, and his hair fallen wet over his eyes. One rung at a time, he pulled himself up that ladder and hull, listening to the goblin’s shrieking voice.
Lucien gave a cold, slightly foggy stare to the misshapen little freak cringing and yipping on his father's deck. "Look.." but he was the one to look, down at that injured right arm of his. He flexed his fingers, to see if they worked, and was promptly sick over the side of the ship at sight of tendons working, exposed to the air, and the raw-meat effect of the open wound. "Dad.." he groaned, to the sea, shuddering in pain, as the tattooed pirate came swarming up the rope carrying the cause of his agony like a giant, floppish fish sausage over one shoulder. Then, he judged, it was safe to allow the darkness swimming in his mind to take over, and let it carry him down to what seemed a familiar blackness, where pain and angry eels simply did not exist.
Caedan was down below, carrying on an animated conversation with a barrel of something perishable, or already perished, depending on one's sensitivities. She heard some caterwauling from above, and considered going up to have a look-see.
Leoxander left the meal, or the eel, on deck as he moved over to Lucien with a frustrated look. he wasn't about to let the damned boy bleed out to a reef or sea monster wound on a limb. He would yell to some crew mate or another for dry cloth and quick bandage the injury until Mahri or Terra might tend to it. Until then, it was likely Lucien would feel ill with a hint of fever, and so Leo took him at once to the warmer atmosphere below, into his quarters to cover him on hammock with a few blankets, so he'd try out. He'd find Jolie to help with all this fussing.
Mahri stood on the beach for a while, staring past the cypress to the sparkling water and reef beyond with one hand shading her eyes, just in case there was some sort of glare from the gently (thus far) rolling bay. She'd caught Luc's scent here and it ended where sea met shore. A small boat was at the ready not far off and she, the worry wart she is over that boy, was half tempted to take it out and see if, perhaps, she couldn't find the kid. Damn it, but things seemed to happen around him, and not all of them good. Huffing a breath of exasperation, the lycan marches to the rowboat, not to be confused with the rat of same sort of nickname, and leans into the prow to try and shove the bloody thing into the water. Here's hoping it's not beached too badly.
Leoxander was on his ship, which was anchored not far from that dangerous reef, so Lucien could dive to his heart's delight.
Lucien knew it was down there... somewhere.... lurking like a sailor's bad dream among the billowing vegetation and shock-headed scarlet and white anemones, the garish schools of reef-fish shimmering past. Flippers undulating gently, the boy kept himself relatively still, knowing his scent would eventually find a trail into the coral grotto where he was sure the fang-mawed moray would be sleeping off a meal, or just hanging out malevolently for the sake of being.. yeah, malevolent. "Here, fishy, fishy..." it was spoken mentally, and to himself, while the pressure in his lungs started burning just a little. With a deep-diver's discipline, he soothed the pain by ignoring it and willed himself to last just a little longer before surfacing. "Here... fishy...." And then the water was a mad swirl of debris and coils, a blunt, fierce head with needle-teeth, a thrashing mayhem of slime and confusion, and a sudden, terrible pain in the arm holding that knife. Perhaps someone would see the bubbles.. the faint cloud of pink, tainting the perfect blue and almost waveless surface.
The ship swayed only to the night tide. Leo, on the only hand, took the time to look toward the reef where he knew Lucien to be indulging in his love of treasure dives. He didn't bother to double check to weak lock on the hatch, as Grimrat would have little room to romp, with water surrounding the ship. Even from that distance, wolf sharp eyes noticed the bubbles and writhing beneath the waves, and he immediately dismissed the heavy leathers of boots and jacket from his person, leaving weapons in tact. "Damnit." A sharp curse, realizing, perhaps before others, what was going on.
Leoxander didn't take too long at all to ditch some of his clothing and dive right off the side of the ship anchored at the edge of dangerous reef. There would be parts where he scrambled over the terrain that cut like glass through leathers, but he ignored it in effort to get to the depths that threatened to claim his son. A streak of red left in the wake as he swam strong beneath the churning tide Lucien was buried beneath, a blade grabbed from his waist.
Mahri felt the boat shift then slide until it floated and she could climb in. Pulling the oars through the water wasn't all that difficult. There was, quite suddenly a 'blub' then another, and another until the bubbles boiled, tinted pink. It was that faint scent of blood that had the lycan twisting on the bench, the oars pulled up and nostrils flared to try and get a better handle on just ~what~ she was smelling. "Oh for Gods' sake, Lucien," she growled, nearly capsizing the small float when she dives in. Unfortunately for her, she hadn't had the practice of deep-diving that Luc had and she surfaced soon enough, but she'd been down long enough to see two rolling forms under there. Striking back for the skiff, Mahri grips the edge and tips it just enough to see her pack was still in it, and---for some reason--- it still contained that special Kelp, the same that Luc hadn't used. Having used it once, she repeated the process of chewing but not swallowing, one deep breath and she sinks, letting out the air only to suck in a huge gulp of sea-water in exchange. Gods, it still wasn't comfortable! Atleast though, she'd have enough time to get to that damn kid. Kicking and pulling way through the water, she waits til she hovers a few feet, by her estimation (and with salt water stinging her eyes too) to draw her own dagger. Mahri won't even try to get the eel until she is sure that Lucien can't take care of the slimy thing his own bloody self.
Lucien was.. not dealing with the eel, at all. Moreso trying to keep from being dragged arm-first into the coral enclave of the fish's dark-mouthed home. The creature had started backing in already, powerful tail coiling around the ancient chest that was its erstwhile treasure, the shape of which Lucien had spied a few days ago while he peered into the cavern while the eel was out hunting. The hulking form was too regular for coral, and the neon fish who somehow safely occupied that dangerous territory had illumined a verdigris-colored handle... Treasure was the last thing in his mind right now, though, the boy nearly blinded by the swirl of his own blood in the saline waters, the seabed muck stirred up in the struggle. Oh yeah, and the having his arm chewed off by the damned fish thing. The eel's head was about the size of your standard pit-fighting dog, and every bit as cheerful as it ignored Lucien's flailing opposite fist and continued to drag him bodily closer to its lair...
Grimrat , upon waking from his unconscious slumber, instinctually recognized that whatever predicament he'd managed to get himself into wasn't a good one. The momentary amnesia, brought on by whatever knock to the head he'd received at the hands of the tattooed man, wore off all too quickly and the memories of his capture flooded back, and immediately instigated a primeval panic and desire to survive, thus the tight, dark and fishy smelling hole he'd been stuffed into wasn't enough to contain him. He slammed his emaciated frame upwards and into the latched door of his confines as soon as he'd understood his dire situation, the result of this barrage was the lock's destruction and the goblin's emancipation, though to what end? He stood on the deck of the rocking ship unable to move from the total fear of his surrounds.
Leoxander just wasn't going to take that risk, with his only son. Perhaps Mahri would witness the captain diving in, then the pool of red that would surface long before either Achilles male would. But he finally found hold of the other arm and tugged firmly enough to perhaps dislocate a shoulder joint, but also dislodge a hungry grip from the dying creature. Not only would he push the boy up toward the surface harshly, but he would make certain his fingers stayed latched around the water-weightless trunk he saw that his offspring had fought for. Both would reach the air coughing or gasping while the Captain went for the eel's corpse, knowing it would feed well for dinner, that night, with it's size.
Lucien, fortunately, hadn't the wherewithal to notice the several sharks who'd come to circle the scene lazily, smart enough to know not to tangle with their old enemy, but irresistibly drawn to the hope of having the scraps after it was done with its meal. Mainly he wouldn't notice them because he'd lost consciousness, at about the point where his father had ripped him loose from the moray's tenacious grip, and gotten an unintended lungful of water in the process. His mortal enemy .. not so mortal now Leo had done with it... would make no struggle as it was dragged upward. Lucien was still hacking water from his sore lungs.
Leoxander finally came up to the surface, grasping Lucien over a shoulder since Mahri seemed to be out of commission, in the water. "Damnit.. I need some help up on deck..!" He called angrily to whomever heard him. But it seemed no one did. Maybe if Grimrat realized how easily the lock was detached or picked, he could come to an unlikely rescue, but nonetheless Leo was determined to get the unconscious, hacking youth to the ship's hull.
Grimrat remained frozen with fear at the broken entrance of the prison he'd just escaped until he heard the irritated cries coming from the water, to which he hesitantly decided to investigate, ever the conniver, he'd turn the situation to his favour if there was a chance. However, upon reaching the railing and searching the great blue for a moment, he saw the tattooed man that'd captured him and hauled him aboard the ship he was now trapped upon, that same instinctive fear returned in a n instant, "Master, I get the rope then!" He cried in that shrill voice, whilst searching for a coil long enough to throw out to the man, "Ere, 'ere master, I'll pull you up." He threw the rope he'd found over board in the direction of the struggling pair.
Lucien opened his eyes to wet, bloodshot slits, in time to get the merest, foggy idea of what in all tarnation was going on. He'd lost a lot of blood, already, and was barely coherent from lack of air and the black spots dancing around like some kind of morbid sea-fairies in front of his vision. He felt the rope being coiled around him, somehow, and heard a deep, familiar voice muttering a curse, something about the chest... The line tugged, maybe the goblin aboard testing the rope, and Lucien was shortly borne through the water, and then upward. Luc came to his senses enough, as his feet left the sea, dripping brine and blood that streamed from his useless, torn-up arm, to catch sight of his father's plastered-down blond hair vanishing once more below into the shark-infested reef. Where a half-dead moray eel floated, perhaps not so passively. "Dad!" Luc gurgled, even as he was hauled upward, thunking on the hull now and then. But the pirate was, as all who knew him knew well, never one to let a treasure go by.
Grimrat coiled the rope around his large hands and pulled, ignoring the fibrous, bloodletting bite of the twine as it buried into his skin from the weight it supported, and hauled the boy aboard with ease. Once his cargo was secured upon the ship the goblin skittled forward toward the boy and studied him with a sneer that exposed yellowing needle sharp teeth, and muttered "Should 'ave left ye down there, stinkin' 'uman." Before inching closer, simian like in his movement, until his face was close enough to the boy's to smell the horrid vileness of his breath.
Lucien's own nose wrinkled at the pungent reek emanating from the ugly critter's maw, which wasn't all that dissimilar to the one he'd just escaped. The youth shuddered, more due to the chill that felt like it was creeping from his bones outward. He hadn't looked at his arm yet, probably just as well, with the torn-up state it was in. The youth opened his mouth to enquire just who in the hell this new ship-mate was... and was promptly sick on the deck. That seemed to rouse him from his torpor somewhat, though, so he'd stagger upright, rich red droplets trailing his path toward the ship's rails. "DAD!" he bellowed over the side, looking like he might just clamber back down into that water to find the submerged pirate.
Leoxander heard the muffled sounds below the tide. Lucien might be a great clam finder, but he had yet to surpass the pirate's ability to hold his breath beneath those waves. After what would seem like an eternity, no pun intended, the rogue surfaced in that pool of blood and mud, delving a hand into the water for the slippery corpse that threatened to elude his grasp. "Son of a..." Anyone on deck would hear the captain's curse from down there. He didn't have the focus to stop and worry for his son aboard the ship with the goblin free.
Grimrat spat a large ball of yellow phlegm overboard, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and laughed at the youth's misfortune, "Not too good are ye?" The morbid, high pitched laugh subsided to be replaced by that teeth baring grin, "Bit sick are we?" He was taking a great deal of delight in the boy's pain and subsequent sickness, which brought on another bout of high pitched laughter, "That arms not lookin' too good, might 'ave to chop 'im off!" His voice was mirthful, and his face jovial despite his surrounds, until of course, that voice echoed up from the water. In an instant the goblin changed, seemed to shrink in posture, like a whipped dog. He backed away from the youth, fear controlling what only moments ago was mirth.
Leoxander struggled for grip on something to pull himself up, that large, stabbed eel slung over his shoulder, and his hair fallen wet over his eyes. One rung at a time, he pulled himself up that ladder and hull, listening to the goblin’s shrieking voice.
Lucien gave a cold, slightly foggy stare to the misshapen little freak cringing and yipping on his father's deck. "Look.." but he was the one to look, down at that injured right arm of his. He flexed his fingers, to see if they worked, and was promptly sick over the side of the ship at sight of tendons working, exposed to the air, and the raw-meat effect of the open wound. "Dad.." he groaned, to the sea, shuddering in pain, as the tattooed pirate came swarming up the rope carrying the cause of his agony like a giant, floppish fish sausage over one shoulder. Then, he judged, it was safe to allow the darkness swimming in his mind to take over, and let it carry him down to what seemed a familiar blackness, where pain and angry eels simply did not exist.
Caedan was down below, carrying on an animated conversation with a barrel of something perishable, or already perished, depending on one's sensitivities. She heard some caterwauling from above, and considered going up to have a look-see.
Leoxander left the meal, or the eel, on deck as he moved over to Lucien with a frustrated look. he wasn't about to let the damned boy bleed out to a reef or sea monster wound on a limb. He would yell to some crew mate or another for dry cloth and quick bandage the injury until Mahri or Terra might tend to it. Until then, it was likely Lucien would feel ill with a hint of fever, and so Leo took him at once to the warmer atmosphere below, into his quarters to cover him on hammock with a few blankets, so he'd try out. He'd find Jolie to help with all this fussing.