Chapter Text
Artoirel was in his cabin when the bowsprit of the Misery speared through the side of his ship with a sickening crack. The massive galley towered above the waves, yet it came out of the morning mist as silent as death, its wrought iron arms reaching to catch the Quicksilver in a deadly embrace.
He rushed out onto the deck amidst shouting and confusion. His navigator, an Elezen woman of fifty summers called Lisellette, caught him by the arm.
“Pirates, milord,” she said. “We’re being boarded.”
“What should we do?” he asked, panic rising in his throat, threatening to choke him. He’d gone over it countless times with his crew, trying to assuage their fears-- pirate activity had died down since the end of the blockade, they only took from Garlean ships… empty words, now.
She drew the dagger at her hip. “Fight like hells, and pray to the Fury that they let us leave with our lives.”
Artoirel dove into the chaos. A Midlander man had one of the sailors cornered on the quarterdeck, and Artoirel lunged, sword out, just as the man turned and shoved his axe between them. Artoirel’s blade clanged off the head uselessly, the force of it making his arm shake and his head ring. The man hefted his axe and took a step forward, and Artoirel saw the sailor behind him make a quick escape. He breathed a sigh of relief even as his opponent took another swing at him.
Artoirel found his footing and dodged the blow, knocking the man in the side with the pommel as he stepped out of the way. The man cursed, whirling on him, and Artoirel was about to strike back when the entire boat rocked beneath them, accompanied by the horrible shriek of wood snapping under metal. His opponent grabbed the mainmast and held on, but Artoirel went sprawling, arms flailing out, trying to find purchase on the heaving deck.
When the ship righted, Artoirel found a knee in his back and a knife at his throat. The last thing he saw before being dragged away was an elegant figure, Elezen in shape, cutting through his crew like a blade through water. Though they carried an axe like the rest of his crew, they did so with a sort of grace that put Artoirel in mind of a knight more than a pirate.
The encounter lasted no more than a bell. The ship was capable of sailing thanks to the instruction of the older sailors aboard, but none of the battle-ready members had any experience fighting at sea and were quickly overwhelmed by the axe-wielding brutes. Perhaps if they had been dragons it would have been a fairer fight. None of this was fair. He had failed his father again, and now he was going to die a thousand malms from home.
Artoirel was separated from his knights and taken to the deck of the Misery in ropes, where he was dragged before the Elezen man he’d seen earlier.
“Cap’n,” his Roegadyn captor said, “I don’t think this is a Garlean ship. This one appears to be the head of the expedition.”
The man’s cold blue eyes swept over him and Artoirel felt them on his skin like the winter wind. “Damn this fog. We can see if they have anything worth nabbing and then turn them loose.”
“How dare you,” said Artoirel. “We are carrying supplies to aid in the Doman rebuilding effort. You would take from helpless refugees?”
“Mouthy, aren’t you?” said the man. He spoke with a drawl that Artoirel could not quite place. Lominsan, perhaps, but something polished and familiar lurked beneath.
“Filthy pirate,” said Artoirel, his hands curling into fists. “Release me, or-- or else.”
“A lord’s son,” the captain said. “I can tell by that frilly fur coat you wear. As useless as you are beloved, spending your parents’ fortune on wine and pleasure.”
“You’re wrong. I have always put my house first in everything I do.”
“Even worse,” he sneered. “What, do you fancy yourself a knight? Too proud to beg for your crew?”
Artoirel gritted his teeth and said nothing. The man was right, and it fair sickened him that his first thought was not for the safety of his knights but the pride of his house. His scraped knees began to ache where he knelt on the deck, his shoulders straining from his arms being pulled back. The captain prodded him on the leg with a scuffed brown boot.
“Is this your father’s ship? Awfully nice one, considering you people haven’t left your frozen rock in decades.”
“Take my life in exchange for theirs,” said Artoirel, “for if you let me live, I will surely hunt you down for what you’ve done.”
The captain gave him what was almost a pitying look. “Well, I deal in spices, not murdering little lordlings playing at charity,” he said. “Suppose we drop you off and be done with you. Mordyn, make ready.”
“Aye, Cap’n Carvallain.”
“Carvallain? I remember the man.”
The crew stopped what they were doing. All turned to look at Artoirel, save the captain, who stopped walking but kept his back to him.
And oh, Artoirel knew he should not have opened his mouth. But the Fortemps men were never known for their self-preservation.
“He retired to Western Coerthas for the shame of losing the Durendaire heir at sea.”
The man turned, his cold blue eyes narrowing.
“Incredible,” Artoirel said under his breath. “The very spit and image of your brother.”
Carvallain-- nay, Tristan de Durendaire’s lip pulled back in an ugly snarl. “Release the others back to their ship,” he said. “Put this one in the brig.”
--
Of all the damned boats in the thrice-damned sea to stop, it had to be the one with an Ishgardian on it. An Ishgardian who knew who he was .
Carvallain paced his quarters, fuming.
“Captain,” said Swyrfryn nervously. “You can’t mean to keep him down there forever. And killin’ him seems more of a trouble than anything.”
Admittedly, he had panicked and handled the situation poorly, but there must still be a way to fix it that did not involve dropping the Fortemps son to the bottom of the Indigo Deep, as much as he’d like to. He was a strategist, for Navigator’s sake. The lapse in judgement was concerning.
Artoirel did not strike him as the type to be susceptible to threat or bribe, which was irritating, but surely there was something he needed that Carvallain could give him in exchange for his silence. If not money, then perhaps the might of the Kraken’s Arms or further aid to the people of Doma.
“I just need to,” said Carvallain, scrubbing a hand over his face, “speak with him, or-- or something. We’ll release him when we hit land. What colors did you say they were under?”
“A-- a black and red unicorn, Cap’n.”
“The Fortemps brat. Sweet Navigator, I kidnapped Edmont de Fortemps’ firstborn son.” Carvallain groaned and sank into his chair.
Swyrfryn scratched his beard thoughtfully. “I don’t know who that is, exactly, but I know you’d never let personal business get in the way of, well, business, so I trust your judgement on the matter.”
“Thank you, Swyrfryn. I will take my leave to see him, then.”
He decided to discuss it with Artoirel over dinner. Carvallain usually took his meals by himself in his quarters, but perhaps some good food might gain him favor with his prisoner. He ordered the cook to steam some fish and make it as bland as possible, like how most Coerthans enjoyed their supper.
Carvallain descended belowdecks to where the man was being kept. There were no other prisoners, just the lord in his fur coat sitting in his cell, looking more cross than anything. He was broad of shoulder and chest, built like a soldier, and he would have been handsome but for his thin-lipped expression and dour brow. When Carvallain approached, he stood, gripping the bars of his cell with enough force to whiten his knuckles.
In the course of dealing with prisoners, Carvallain went in expected threats, bargaining, blackmail. He did not expect the first thing out of the man’s mouth to be, “What happened to you?”
Carvallain spread his hands. “I was abducted by pirates. They made me their captain.”
“But you did not try to return.”
“You’re the Fortemps son, yes?” Carvallain said. Someone with as much blind devotion to his house as this poor fool could never understand why Carvallain had to leave.
His prisoner straightened up. “Artoirel de Fortemps. Have your forgotten?”
“Last I saw you, you were no more than a boy,” said Carvallain. “Hiding in your mother’s skirts. Cor, and Lady Abrielle was the terror of the Pillars.” Carvallain’s memories of life before the Kraken’s Arms were at times hazy and blurred, but Lady Abrielle de Fortemps stood out, sharp and imposing in his mind. She was, by his estimation, one of the worst of them, and that included his own father.
“I’d ask you to not speak of my mother in such tones,” said Artoirel with a sniff. He looked affronted, scowling in the dim lantern light. Or mayhap that was just his face. “I’m surprised you even remember me.”
“Of course I do. We were playmates at more than one party, sneaking around the gardens and hiding from the nursemaids. Our houses were always close.”
“No longer,” said Artoirel. “Do you know what losing you did to your father? Lord Charlemend despises the foreigners who stole his son from him, I daresay the very pirates you joined, and he grew distrustful of outsiders. You know my father has always held a more liberal view of such matters.”
“I neither know nor care for the politics of Ishgard,” Carvallain said. “How could I? I was but a child when I left.”
The resulting tense silence was broken by the arrival of his assistant with dinner. Artoirel watched stone-faced as Gerald wheeled in the cart. Maybe he was seasick. He was already fairly pale. Carvallain resolved to let him have some fresh air later. He did not think himself cruel, and the sight of the man in his bedraggled coat stirred a sense of pity in him.
No, cruel was the nobles that would let their city’s people die in the street without giving them a fair shake. Nobles like Artoirel and his father. But they’d help the Domans, hypocrites that they were.
He noticed Gerald scowling at Artoirel.
“You know him?” Carvallain asked, jerking his head toward him.
“Watched him fall on his arse when we took his ship,” said Gerald. “So, aye. I know him.”
Carvallain laughed and shooed him out. More than a little sullen, Artoirel stared at the meal Gerald had left for them.
“We make land at Radz-at-Han in three days,” said Carvallain. He picked up the plate and sniffed it. There was hardly any spice at all. He tried a forkful of fish, wrinkling his nose. How Coerthans lived with this sort of thing was unfathomable. Pity his ships never passed near there. “I am considering dropping you at the port, with the assurance that if you breathe a word about my life with the Arms, you will live to regret it. Do you understand?”
Artoirel glared at him, but he nodded. Carvallain took a bite of boiled popoto, chewing slowly. “It seems only fair that I offer you something in exchange for keeping my secret. So I will return to you the value of the goods I took from your ship. We can pretend this never happened.”
“I have a request,” Artoirel said.
Carvallain waved his hand. “Yes, yes, go ahead.”
“If you have any mercy in your heart, you must allow me to write my father as soon as possible and inform him that I am alive,” said Artoirel. “The shock of losing another son might be the end of him.”
Carvallain paused, his fork halfway to his mouth. “Another?”
“My half-brother Haurchefant was killed a year ago.”
The name stirred some faint recognition in him. “I remember him, barely. Always running around with the Haillenarte boys.”
“Chlodebaimt perished at the battle of Steel Vigil,” said Artoirel.
“Mm.” Carvallain made a vague noise of acknowledgement. “I will allow you to tell him you are alive and on your way home. But I shall be inspecting the letter.”
“I only want him to know I yet live,” said Artoirel. “I am a man of my word.”
“That,” Carvallain said as he got to his feet, “I do not doubt.”