Sareneth 26

I walked through the monochrome light of the hallway, illuminated by a single eternal flame. Syl’s parting words echoed in my ears as I set out to seduce an impressionable young woman away from the community that raised her.

“We’re going to need to convince her, kill her, or fool her.” Syl had said, “She’s loyal enough to go straight back to Harrigan if we don’t stop her somehow. For all we know she was supposed to keep an eye on us ever since you distinguished yourself.”

Caulky seems sincere to me, but she could still be an enemy. I’ll start simple. 

I knocked on the first mate’s cabin, hoping against hope that everything would just work out somehow. Caulky cracked the door open, attempting to glare at her late night caller, but it came off as more of a pout than anything else. The revolver in her hand was a bit more menacing, but her fluffy white romper was adorable. It helped that her glare failed to survive eye contact.

“Oh. Emrys.” She sputtered, eyeing me in my formal robes. “I didn’t expect to see you. Did you need something?”

“Just to talk.” I said with a smile. “We didn’t get the opportunity during dinner. If you’d rather sleep, that’s fine, but I figured we could spend some time together if you’re interested. If we stay up late enough I have a spell that can eliminate the need for sleep.”

“Really? Sure.” She said, perking up. “I was worried you’d be angry. I really did think your invitation went without saying.

“What? Not at all.” I lied, concealing my irritation, “you didn’t mean anything by it, and it’s perfectly reasonable to want to stick to your top officers at first. I wouldn’t have had much to contribute, I’m sure.” 

“You didn’t miss too much.” Caulky assured me, “those two were just cooking up ways to make things run more smoothly. It’s his first command so Seb really wants to make an impression and try some fancy Chelish stuff out.”

“Seb?” I asked, curious, “you mean Plugg?”

“Right. Captain Plugg.” She answered with a nod, before muttering the name to herself a few times. “Captain Plugg, Captain Plugg, Captain Plugg.”

She opened the cracked door wide, beckoning me into her room; it was spacious, with enough room for a large desk and multiple sea chests. In all likelihood, they were mostly empty. Her four poster bed had enough space to accommodate guests, and was shrouded in curtains to keep out the light. She even had a few small, round windows made of thick glass.

“You’ve known each other a while, haven’t you?” I said, taking a seat at her small table. “He’s the captain’s son and you’ve been Harrigan’s cabin girl for a long time.”

“Yeah,” she confirmed, “leastwise since he was shipped off to boarding school to learn how the Chels run things. I stayed with the Cap’n instead and learned how we do things in the Shackles.”

Damn. He’s probably like a big brother to her. That doesn’t necessarily mean she loves him, but knowing someone since you were a kid means something. 

“Was he always like this?” I asked, “you’ve gotta admit he’s a bit of an asshole.”

“Kinda,” she admitted with a meek shrug, “back before, he always wanted to be like his dad. Kinda sucked at it, though. He was a bit shrimpy when he left; next to the Captain he still is. That’s why he was sent away, I think. Half to spy, half to get strong. Not many safe places to learn magic in the Shackles, you know?”

“So he sent him to an enemy nation?” I asked, flabbergasted, “how old was he?”

“Twelve. He went under a fake name.” Caulky said, “I think the Captain hired someone from Aspis to legally adopt him, but he was at a boarding school for the fancy chelish noble types. Don’t judge him too hard. It’s gotta be hard to make friends in a place like that.”

Shove a kid into a box full of noble brats from an evil empire, he comes out knowing binding magic and how to murder people using his family influence as cover. Checks out. That said, I’m not really here for Plugg. I’m proud to say I don’t have much experience manipulating girls into bed when they weren’t already kinda into it. Autopilot, go. 

“Yeah, it probably did have quite an impact on him,” I said sympathetically. “I’ll keep it in mind, but enough with heavy topics. You seem stressed. Would you like me to rub your shoulders? I have some skill in that area.”

Her cheeks flushed darker, but she did not allow embarrassment to guide her actions. 

“S- sure.” She stuttered, “what do I do?”

“Just sit on the bed,” I said softly, soothingly, “and face away from me. I’ll take it from there.”

I sat behind her, and began feeling her shoulders through the thin fabric of her romper. I felt her tightly wound muscles under my fingers, and began easing away the tension. She was taking her new position very seriously, and had clearly worked herself into knots throughout the day. 

“Just relax,” I whispered in her ear, “I’ll take care of you. I can make you feel very good. Would you like that?”

“Yes,” she answered with a tremor in her voice. “Whatever you think best.”

I worked systematically down her body, starting with the arms, then her feet and legs, before moving towards her core. It was a fairly standard procedure that hardly required my attention; I did it more or less nightly whenever I was home. It was even enjoyable, with Caulky serving as a passive and appreciative recipient; always preferable to being snapped at and interrupted the whole time. 

She wasn’t facing me, so I was easily able to weave my Detect Sexuality spell into the work. She found me attractive, and had a distinctly hazy idea of what she liked in a man. She enjoyed praise and being placed on a pedestal, but it was all very vague. I thought it likely that she was a virgin, with her interests still largely unformed. 

Call me a pig, but virginity is not really what I was expecting from a cute girl on a pirate ship. Maybe Harrigan was effectively a shotgun dad? It’s not like I saw her around the crew very often until after I added her to my party. 

I began weaving in light kisses on her sensitive skin. By the end of the hour the poor girl was practically limp. I could have left her there, escaping as she drifted off to sleep, but I had a greater goal. 

“I could make you feel even better, if you’d like,” I breathed in her ear, “If you want me to leave, say the word. Otherwise, we can keep going as long as you like.” 

(Diplomacy (seduction) 7+7=14) 

(Caulky Tarroon Sense Motive 8+1=9)

(Success. Caulky Taroon will consent to a sexual encounter)

It’s a single opposed roll? I’ll need to be careful with this. 

“Yes.” Caulky murmured dreamily. “That sounds nice.”

I had been waiting for the dice results to pop up, so I wasn’t caught off guard by being in control again. I snaked my hands around to her front and began massaging her small breasts while I considered how to progress. She let out a surprised and pleased squeak that let me know I’d have a while before she got bored.

I don’t think I need to use Autopilot for the sex itself. If she’s really a virgin and this is her first time, or close enough to it, I just need to be careful and avoid hurting her and she’ll probably love it. Best not to push things too hard and fast. 

I was gentle, and given her desire to feel special I thought that the every-step consent style would work well on her.

“May I kiss you?”

“May I unlace you?”

“May I kiss your breasts?”

“May I take off my clothes?”

“May I touch you wherever I like?”

“May I enter you?”

I knew the answer each time; if she’d been more confident I suspect she would have demanded I go faster. She was literally panting with desire by the time I pulled her gently to the sheets and lined my cock up, and was wet enough for me to glide right in. Her low moan was incredibly satisfying to hear.

••••••••••

Sareneth 27

Caulky clung to me afterwards, so I couldn’t bring myself to go back to my room. Given that I was trying to build bridges, leaving her to wake up alone felt wrong. If nothing else, any time I tried to move she would tense up and tighten her arms around me. I decided to forgo Keep Watch that night, and slept pretty well with Caulky wrapped around me. She just about passed out very quickly, her blissful smile slowly slackening as she felt asleep.

When the bell called us for breakfast, we cleaned ourselves quickly with a washbasin and a few towels in the corner of her room. I’d pulled out for obvious reasons and she’d refused to get up after we were finished, so she had dried white flakes to scrub off of her stomach. She blushed furiously when she saw my naked form in the morning sunlight. I hadn’t bulked up much, but I was already looking much better shirtless than when I first arrived.

“It’s up to you what you want this to be,” I told her quietly. “I’m already kinda involved with someone else. I get it if that’s a dealbreaker.”

“No,” Caulky assured me, averting her eyes while she pulled on her work clothes. “No, that’s fine. I already knew about Syl. I need to think. Is that ok?”

“Who’s the First Mate here?” I chided.

Me. I’m her first mate. Heyo! I’ll see myself out. 

Likely due to her lack of telepathy, my words reassured her. She pulled on her red jacket, smiled, and nodded.

“Right.” She agreed. “My call. I’ll tell you when I’ve had some time to think.”

“Yes, ma’am.” I saluted playfully.

She really does need to get better at putting on a good face for the crew. She’s really good at stabbing things but I don’t think she’s doing the rest of the job all that well. Say what you will about Plugg, you generally know what he wants. 

Caulky left first, and I slipped out a few minutes later for breakfast with the crew. (Stealth 7+9=16)

••••••••••

I joined the line to pick up ship biscuit from the kitchen, which the chef passed out disdainfully. Harrigan had confiscated much of the rice for the Wormwood, figuring that Kroop could fill out the stew with it. That had been the centerpiece of Rahadoumi rations, so a barrel of biscuit had been passed back to compensate.

“Finish, Pearlteeth!” Rowe commanded as I approached, using her nickname for Conchobar, “Goblin can’t start day without music. You finish, you play, I sing.”

She jabbed her broken cracker at Conchobar as she spoke, before crunching the rock hard biscuit in one bite. I was fairly certain that could chip a tooth, so I hoped that goblins just had stronger teeth than humans.

Not that I’m aware of. They seem to mostly eat the same things as the rest of us. (Knowledge (local) 4+2=6) 

Eh, she ran away from home to become a pirate. Gold teeth are on brand; at minimum her jaws are strong as hell if she didn’t need to gnaw on it.

Conchobar winced at the crunching, but continued to use a knife to break down the biscuit in water.

“Calm down. We’ve got time.” He grumbled, “Morning, Emrys.”

“Sleep well?” I asked, as I moved to mimic Conchobar. There weren’t many ways to make Ship Biscuit palatable, after all.

“Not as well as you, I imagine,” he said dryly, taking his first bite.

“No, probably not.” I agreed with a gloating smile. “So I hear you two will be serenading us?”

“Sea Shanty clan very musical.” Rowe boasted in her slapdash common. “Was happy to find out new crew has Chanter, full of strange story-songs. Charcoal Longshanks could have said. Almost didn’t come.”

“Sorry.” I said, “I’ll be sure to include Conchobar in my promotional materials moving forward. I didn’t realize it’d be a big deal for you.”

“Don’t get used to it.” Conchobar interjected. “This is not the life for me. You want a ship entertainer I’m your guy, but I wasn’t built for hard labor.”

“Not with that attitude, you aren’t.” Rosie said as she sat down, trailed by Owlbear. “I’m sure you could work up to it if you wanted.”

“Music man is perfectly good job,” Rowe said defensively. “No losing weight, Pearlteeth. You are good now.”

The rest of the team filed in to eat their rations, and I managed to flag down Sandara with a wave. We met in the corner of the room, where I could interrogate her a bit. It wasn’t exactly private, but the general clamor meant that we weren’t likely to be overheard.

“So, Besmara punishes people sometimes, right?” I asked, “when they piss her off?”

“Or if they have something she wants.” She answered with a shrug. “Why?”

“How does she do that?” I said, “I doubt she’s showing up in person for every little thing.”

“She’s the queen of sea monsters.” Sandara noted, “so usually she sends some of those to deal with them. That, or she curses the guy so that everything that lives in the sea knows instinctively that she wants him dead. Usually comes with a black mark on the hand.”

“Do people ever kill someone and make it look like Besmara did it?” I asked. “She’s a goddess. There must be tons of people that get offended on her behalf; does she like that or not?”

“Depends on the guy.” Sandara answered with a wavering horizontal hand. “Probably the target too. Most of all, it probably comes down to whether or not it makes her look bad. There’s a right way to settle things, you know?”

“On shore?” I guessed.

“On shore.” Sandara confirmed. “She really doesn’t care what happens on land.”

“Thanks.” I said, “there was one more thing.”

Before she could react, I stepped in, grabbed her by the back of the neck with one hand, and kissed her hard on the mouth. My other hand darted low, pulling her in to press against me by the small of the back. As I suspected, after the initial surprise I received no pushback. (+1 influence with Sandara) When I pulled back, I appreciated Sandara’s crooked grin for a moment before leaning in to whisper in her ear.

“Start praying for a spell to deal with fatigue.” I commanded, as firmly as I could manage without Autopilot. “If I want you, I don’t want you to be too tired again.”

“Alright, Sir,” she agreed pleasantly as we parted ways, “I'll consider that.”

You’ve already got lesser restoration prepared, ya tease. I just didn’t think pushing was the right move last night. Especially when I had alternatives lined up. Tonight… Well, I’ll need an update from Caulky first. 

I returned to my seat, provoking a few wolf whistles. Though we’d only had sex a couple times so far, Syl and I were known to sleep together occasionally. The atmosphere was thick with that set of rumors, and I’d just kissed one of the most desired women on the ship in full view of the crew. Wishing to be as theatrical as possible, I turned to the mildly amused Rahadoumi girl sitting next to me.

“Last night went pretty well.” I said conversationally. “I tried what you suggested and it worked out just fine.”

••••••••••

The rest of my day was spent on my actual job. I had Autopilot check the inventory first, only paying enough attention to be sure he wasn’t damaging anything, with the intention of checking his work later. I had menus to peruse, and Knowledge checks to make.

The Bathysphere Jellyfish is quite strong and sturdy for its size, and capable of puppeteering corpses for combat. It’s most impressive trait, however, is the ability to create a bubble of breathable air for an individual willing to wear it. It will slowly feed on the wearer’s breath and body heat, creating a useful symbiotic link. (Knowledge Planes 14+2=16)

That’s great and all, but according to the bestiary it does 1d2 damage per attack and is entirely helpless outside of water. I need extraplanar monsters I can send after Scourge, dammit.

As it turned out, I did have a bestiary in the SRD. Unfortunately, the only entries I could read were the ones which Autopilot had made a knowledge check for. That made comparison easier, but unfortunately the summonable sea monster economy was in shambles. The Bathysphere Jellyfish, despite being quite small and not particularly dangerous, was still capable of dealing lethal damage and thus somehow managed to be one of my best options.

My last successful knowledge check, the Fuath Gremlin, was a little fey asshole that loved climbing onto ships and causing havoc. In theory they could drown someone by magically summoning a bubble full of water around their head, which had seemed just about perfect. Unfortunately, the DC to negate this ability was rather low and one could just scrape it away like salt water jelly, rendering it mostly useless against anyone that wasn’t restrained.

I didn’t love it, but it was looking like generic lesser water elementals would be my best bet, to be summoned and deployed whenever the ship reached the shore. They were beefy enough and fully capable of bludgeoning someone to death in his sleep, but they lacked the sea monster aesthetic. The “Besmara did it” explanation, already a bit flimsy, seemed unlikely to hold much water at all if I sent them.

Better than sending demons, at least. It’s already pretty well established that I can summon things from the outer, moral planes. Not everyone would assume I can pull from the inner elemental planes too. Then again, I’m doing this partly to pick a fight with Plugg. 

I checked my mission log, as I tried to every day. In addition to another reminder that Aaron Ivey, whoever he was, needed saving from Bonewrack isle I had two new additions.

Eat at the officers’ table

Rewards: 1 exp. Lesser Transformation Potion: Human

Are you just trying to signal boost my beef with Plugg? I can probably cheese it, at least. Should be easy enough, but what is the reward? 

This pale tan potion transforms its imbiber into a human for 24 hours, including adjusting its physical and mental stats appropriately, replacing its instincts with those of a human, and stripping it of all innate powers it would not have as a human. It will also learn the Common language of the region, if it does not already speak it. The greater version is similar, but not temporary. (Spellcraft 16+8=24 Success)

That’s… probably useful. I think. I can’t think of any immediate uses for it off the top of my head that aren’t silly, mind. I don’t think I’d be able to sleep with Dame Dierdre while she’s a one foot tall fairy, but if she were a human I might have a shot. She’d also probably be a lot stronger as a full sized human, which would be a more practical reason. 

Acquire the exoskeleton of an ankheg

1 exp, Masterwork Ankheg Breastplate 

The fuck is an ankheg? 

The ankheg is a rothè sized burrowing insect with a particularly rugged chitinous hide, frequently used to make high quality lightweight armor. They are notoriously aggressive and territorial, and known to secrete acid from their mandibles. (Knowledge (nature) 16+2=18. Success!)

Brutal. Incidentally, the fuck is a rothè?

A subterranean type of livestock, I believe the closest surface equivalent would be cows?

Cool. Well. If we run into a giant creepy crawly, we can kill it and get some decent armor I can enchant. Win win. 

The last thing it occurred to me to check during a midday workout was my achievements tab. I’d slept with Caulky; that meant I’d increased the ticker on Layer of a Thousand Women by one, and unlocked the second perk.

Tantric Arts: gain the Body Control Sphere, granting you mild conscious control of your body’s functions. Gain 5 ranks in the Escape Artist skill. Gain the ability to roll Escape Artist to gain a +3 bonus to saves and checks to avoid the exhausted, fatigued, nauseated, paralyzed, or sickened conditions or damage from poison/disease. Treat all temperature based weather conditions as one band milder. Your need for food and water is halved and your need for sleep reduced by 2 hours per night. Finally, your refractory period is halved and you may roll Escape Artist to improve or reduce your chances of causing a pregnancy by accelerating or restricting your sperm count. 

Well then. No one of those perks is incredibly good, but it’s a big pile of things I kinda want. Those mostly sound like fortitude save things, and I’m still made of tissue paper. I’ll take anything to shore up my weaknesses. The reduced need for sleep might be useful, if it stacks with Keep Watch. Two more hours of exertion gives me so much more freedom. 

All in all, I was quite pleased with the spoils of seducing Caulky. I sincerely hoped that it would keep her on my side whenever conflict inevitably arose with Plugg, but you’ve gotta live in the moment sometimes. I passed the rest of my day playing the role of a good, dutiful worker and trying to puzzle out the finer points of magic item crafting. It was a role that autopilot excelled in.