…sprint up the stairs.

You run past the men and their questioning looks, hitting the stairs hard and taking them two at a time with each step. It still takes time to reach the top of the landing. You look left and right, seeing dark corridors stretch in either direction, while right in front of you there is a set of double doors that seem a likely target for your search. Reaching to open them, you jump as they open themselves, swinging outward in one violent explosive movement that nocks your hand and skims you nose.

Your heart skips a beat.

There she is, standing right in front of you, the woman you came to this island to see and kill. She wears a long red coat that has a white outer trim and various gold buttons and finery. A frilly white shirt sits inside the open jacket and above that you see her surprised expression, exaggerated by makeup that widens her eyes and reddens her lips. Long blond hair and blue eyes; it can only be her.

Exhausted from all you’re running, you double over gasping, resting your hands on your knees as you catch your breath, yet unable to fully look away. You manage to wheeze out a perfectly prepared lie.

“Coronac Navy is here! Attacking the town! Seen it with my own eyes!” You throw a point at the front door for emphasis.

As you look down at the floor, you see the boots of someone else, fine enough to belong to the other captain that she was no doubt meeting before the sound of all the fire, ****, explosions, and general ruckus reached them. Your captain. You gulp, hoping he doesn’t recognise you, and flinch as he roars your way.

“DAMN IT ALL!” He run past you down the stairs.

Looking at his back you see that he is quite a small man and remember the words of the other pirates as they chased you, calling you one of Roland’s. Captain Roland’s. From what you remember of such a captain, the height fits, and the very obvious red and yellow pattern on the back of his billowing jacket links him to you for sure. He jumps the last few steps, scattering the men in fine clothes like swarming rats. They watch him go with confused concern. As he reaches the door, he nearly runs strait into another man storming the building as you did, wearing the white and red of the Wendigo crew, though torn and bloody in some places. He opens his mouth to speak. Roland cuts him off with a shouted bark.

“We already know!”

It leaves the new comer looking relieved as he’s shoved aside. He looks to his captain.

Captain Washkin has been silent, thinking of the situation and ways out of it. You straighten, watching as a change runs through her; seeing a member of her crew look to her for orders, she immediately starts giving them.

“Tony! Get the men out the cellar and into position around the house!” The new comer, Tony, moves immediately, running into one of the side rooms. She turns her attention to the door guard looking in at the scene. “Rock! Go down to the inn and docks, tell everyone you meet to break off and re-group here!” Like Tony, he runs off without question or hesitation. Captain Washkin turns her attention to you. “You! How many and where! Show me on this map!”

She grabs you by the arm and drags you through the double doors, into a windowless room lit by candles and dominated by a large table in the middle. Chests and dressers line the walls, with another door leading further in, making this an antechamber to a likely master bedroom. Grabbing a map and sweeping everything else off the table, she roles it out and holds it flat with both hands.

You lean in, it’s a perfect map of the island, even including the ruined buildings as tiny black squares. Notes had been scrawled all over it, leaving it so detailed that you would have promised half of the reward just to look at it before coming here, if not more. You point at it.

“Three big ships: here, here, and here. They deployed rowboats of men moving up the coast from this point here,” you point at the places that you would deploy such men and boats if you had them, dragging your finger across the shore to the clearly marked docks, “to here.”

“Damn!” She looks at the map, figuring out what to do as you take a step back. Without looking at you she continues. “Go to the ballroom, look for a big create against the far wall marked with a red cross. Break it open and distribute the weapons inside to-”

Your stiletto slides straight though her heart, its tip just pointing out the front of her chest and snuffing the words out of her throat. Three drops of blood leap from the tip. They land almost exactly where the phantom ships are.

Her arms give out and she slumps down onto the table, covering the map with her body. It’s done. You reach over to her neck and pull the delicate silver chain around it, removing the amulet that will act as proof of the deed. Lacking a bag, you throw the chain around your own neck, letting the blue jewel in its centre sit between your breasts. You try and pull out your dagger from her back but its stuck fast, held in place by her dark heart and both sides of ribs.

Footsteps hurry up the stairs, you turn and see ‘Tony’ running up them. He’s about your age, maybe slightly older, 26 to 27, with blond hair and a reasonable amount of muscle. You note this down in a second, knowing that one way or another, his youth, his muscles, and the labours he had just run, will soon be matched against your own.

“It’s done, what about-“

He sees the body, his face rippling through shocked expressions, jumping quickly from confusion to denial, and ending on rage.

You hop over the rest of the table, slamming through the door leading further into the mansion. For a moment you see a very elegant bedroom, flitting through your vision as irrelevant dross as you scan it for exits. The sound of a sword sliding from its scabbard vibrates in your mind; he didn’t have a sword on the stairs! A quick look back shows that he had drawn Wendigo’s sword. Smart. Perhaps you should have thought of that. You see the bedrooms open window and run towards it, not checking what is below before stepping up onto its frame and climbing out. It leads onto a short tiled roof, softening the steep drop to the lawn. Hearing footsteps right behind you, you drop down, watching as the sword swings and bites into the window frame where your head was a half second before, catching and breaking on one of its metal hinges and sending its razor point rattling down after you as you slide across the tiles. You only just grab the last of them before falling off, yanking your arm and slowing your fall. The blade tip flashes past, missing you. You hang from the roofs edge, looking down before letting go and falling to the ground. Impact turns into a fall and a roll, dispersing it, but sending twin shocks to jolt up your legs. You feel your muscles strain to compensate, staggering your attempts to stand again.

Setting off at the best run you can manage, you make your way toward the treeline, towards the back of the island. There will be some cliffs there that may be difficult to climb down, but it should put you right in line with the meeting point mentioned by your guide, and after a reasonable swim, you’ll be getting as far away from this island as possible. As you approach the darkness ahead, you give a quick look back at the house and see that the murderous pirate had not climbs down after you; he’s nowhere in sight. It worries you for a moment, making you look about desperately, but you really are alone. He just gave up? You see the orange glow of the sky as the fire rages on. Flakes of ash dance in the air. Perhaps he has more to worry about.

You see movement at one of the manors sides. It’s the pirate, broken sword in hand! He scans your way, finding you and running straight towards you, forcing your run to turn to mad sprint, diving you through the woods and foliage. He chases you down like a man possessed! He must have gone downstairs and out the back!

You run through the dark tree’s, narrowly avoiding ankle catching roots and low hanging branches, hearing the panting sounds of the man chasing after you. Your own lungs burn with exertion, the nonstop action from the inn onwards taking a hard toll on your body. Sweat pours from your forehead and the sting in your legs builds with each sprinting step they take. Letting him catch you is not an option; his angry raging snarls alone could tell you that; he is thoroughly beyond reason. Running like the wind is by far your best strategy, and even as another low hanging branch nearly takes your head off for the tenth time, you keep running, driven by your **** need for survival.

The woods end and a rough lumpy field takes its place. It stretches out before you, decades without care or attention, with grass waist high in some places, and you run through it without hesitation. In the distance, the grass falls away, the sea beyond. The cliff! You’re almost there!

The breathing behind you is louder than ever, pushing you forward with every ounce of strength you have as it closes the distance. For all there are no gnarled roots, the ground here is worse, its tufts of grass and unexpected dips well able to turn an ankle of stagger you to a dooming fall. You feel fingers brush you, hear stomping feet thunder in your ears, feel breath on your neck. Your jacket betrays you. It finds its way into the grip of the man and slows you at his insistence, straining the lone button at its front. Another arms wrap around you, pulling you. It slides down your legs as you try to get away, tangling around them and stopping their paces with sudden clenching brutality. He falls, your body continuing to move forward as your legs are pinned, the **** swinging you down into the grass and knocking all the scant remains of air from your burning lungs. You try to stand, kicking free with some success, but finding yourself still born down by the heavy hand gripping your jacket. You manage to turn instead, breaking his grip as your back is laid to the earth and sending a knee his way. It’s not enough. Leaning back and putting weight on your legs, he lifts the broken blade up, turned to a downward driven dagger, and plunges for just below your ribs, to pierce your diaphragm in a killing blow. The broken tip is a diagonally slanted point, still sharp enough for the softness of skin, and you dodge as best you can, using your pinned legs as leverage to drag your torso sharply across the ground to the side, while throwing arms up to catch whatever you can.

It misses below your ribs, landing in the left side of your belly, about a long thumbs length inward from your side. You feel the shudder of it grinding into the dirt under you before any pain.

Breathless as you are, you give a strangled yell. The blade feels like cold fire running across the muscles and tendons of your abdomen, the pain slowly spreading out as though pushed by a poisons touch. You feel where it cuts straight through and pokes out the other side, mouth agape and silent in horror at your spitted self.

As quick as he stabbed you, he pulls the blade out, tossing it away before you have time to fear a second blow. It disappears into the long grass. Your exhausted legs kick, grinding dirt as you writhe in the new sharp pain, growing and spreading like the rays of a morning sun without end in sight. It screams at you, and you wail under its ****, voice coming scratchy and mewling as your head falls back. Your hands clutch at your side, stemming the blood that oozes quickly out of the wound.

The man stands up and looks down at you, the moonlight reflecting off the tears on his face, and sudden miserable anger twists his expression, as though reminding himself of what you had done. He kicks you in your unwounded side; not only causing a dull crack only you can hear and giving you another great pain, but making you involuntarily lean right, opening your wound more and making you scream with its tear. He leans down, squatting, filling your vision, and the world goes briefly white as a clenched fist slams into your eye. The world goes wild, spinning dizzily. He punches your face again, in the cheek, and then again right on your nose, a sickening crunch declaring it almost certainly broken. You taste blood, hit again and again, suffering the **** with a single blindly groping hand, until he backs off momentarily. You spit some of the blood from your mouth, letting it flood down your cheeks and chin. Everything hurts, with your side maddening you most of all.

This is it; moments from victory, you’re going to die.

So unfair.

Greif still unsatisfied, he puts his idle fingers through a hole in the left knee of your trousers, worming in before pulling it wide and ripping a tear right up to your waist, splitting them completely. The trousers were practically rags before, and now take the name in earnest; only the right leg and the thin ring of fabric still around your left knee keep them attached to your body at all. You spit more blood and moan, aware that your woman hood is completely exposed and what that means, powerless to stop it.

He drops his own trousers to about his knees and shuffles forward, getting down on top of you. You try to push him away, but your arms lack any strength and quickly go back to holding your burning side and keeping your blood in your body. You feel him, lining up, spreading you, and brushing your lips and the curl of your shorthairs. You spit at him, or try to, sending only more over your chin. Arms at your side, he enters in one quick thrust.

You moan in pain and disgust, gritting bloody teeth as he starts to **** his member back and forth. His eyes show no pleasure, only cold anger as he starts slamming into you, battering your flower with a vengeance. Each thrust goes deep and sends jolts of pain through your side as his hips push you, rocking you against the ground and twisting the skin of your wound. Your eyes close tight, squeezing out the pain as you feel his sack slap against you, teeth bared in a gritted rictus, **** to block out the unwilling use of your body. Powerless to fight back against him, you feel your life dripping out of you, wetting the dry grass with your blood, tears welling in your eyes from the overwhelming pain and violation. Seconds march as minutes, each thudding thrust distinct, and soon minutes march as hours, stretching the tense moment with the same consistent effort with which he stretches you. You simply have to take it, waiting until he is finished with you.

You turn your head to the side and see a world of grass. Ash gently falls amongst it, a light grey snow, mocking you in sympathy as your world burns. Your face burns, your side burns, your cunt burns. The great explosive fire that threw them here is so far away, yet you burn. He moans down at you, the first sign of his growing pleasure, save for the weakening of his hateful pounding thrusts. The dry friction inside you lessens at some slimy substance begins to lubricate things, painting raw walls in a lubricant promice. You think of what he is going to do; the natural end of this. You pray for it to end soon, yet fear what happens when it does; surely **** will claim you before his seed takes root.

Whether from blood loss or some final violent vengeance of his, that end, at least, seems certain.

You feel his mouth close to your ear, his every breath catching with every thrust. The wet slapping sound you heard, coming from the darkness of the building you past or the inn so long ago, now echo’s into the night from between your legs. You wonder if the one eyed woman is still alive. You left her stabbed in the back, being **** in the dark by a man who wasn’t even enjoying himself. Strange that you now find yourself in such a similar situation. The lack of enjoyment didn’t stop either of them, and now his breathing carry’s a myriad of quiet ‘Ahhh’ sounds, filling the night on each panting pound of your sorry folds. His tempo increases, the pain in your side flaring anew. Not long now.

You try to focus on the distant sounds of flames and yelling, now hearable over the woods by some faint degree; some are yells of pain, some are yells of rage, with a crackle of burning wood throughout. So faint are the yells and clamour, you wonder if you’re imagining them; anything but the sounds closer to you. Sounds of your own pained and fearful whimpering, sounds of the hardness rubbing in and out of you, of his strained breathes and the rustle of dry flattened grass pulled back and forth, of skin on skin in hard and soft collision. A deep breathy hum sounds, right above you, containing some pain and some rage, but mostly pleasure and satisfied vengeance. The motion stops as he buries himself deeply inside. Heat and wetness, more than before, spill, each emission accompanied by a slight jolt running through him, inside and out. Twitch... Twitch... Twitch. It coats your insides, growing as it keeps on coming, spilling and soiling, plugged by his hilted length and buried deep beyond his stretching, into your core.

You spit blood before looking up at his face, finding it twisted by a sweet sorrowful pain. His eyes open and look down into yours, length still pouring into you with each shudder of his body, and he puts one arm on your shoulder, leaning himself back from you to **** himself in deeper at the waist. His other hand jerks your top, breaking its button and exposing your gravity flattened breasts. He doesn’t even look at them. He has eyes only for the blue stoned necklace resting between your bosoms. His twitches lessen, the spilling seed forcing its way inside you abating, and he grabs the necklace in his free fist, ripping it from your neck and breaking the delicate silver chain in the process. The last sticky emanation coming out of his rod ceases and he spends a moment looking down at you.

You lie on your back, bleeding and soiled, looking up at him. Your side still burns and bleeds through your fingers, weak arms unable to stop its flow any more than they could stop his. He looks about to say something,

“I-“, but he changes his mind, a twisted scowl returning to his face.

Instead of words, he dredges phlegm from the back of his throat, spitting on your face to land on the teeth of your gritted mouth and your sawing, bubbly bloody nose, before withdrawing his still semi erect manhood out of you. The tools creamy coating still connects you as he stands, with strands of white seed dripping down to his claimed territory. Amulet in hand, he takes one final look at your broken form before tugging up his trousers and simply walking away.

You lie in the field as you hear his grassy steps recede. The night air fills your broken nose with the smell of blood, with sex and ash mixed in as it rains down gentile flakes onto your exposed hips. Your semen coated lower lips -painted with the dribble of the barest fraction of what he deposited- starts to cool in the open air, taking with it the soreness of his friction and the heat of his absence. The vast majority of his leavings are within you, squirming up into your core, and while you feel you could perhaps squeeze some of the river you, trying makes you cry again with pain.

So, you are to be left, to die slowly in your **** and blooded guts. You look up at the stars, the faces of the gods looking down at you, watching and waiting to see what you will do next. **** seems like such a welcome option. To join their side and look down at the world. To see its suffering and not be part of it.

Alas, the gods don’t care for quitters. You reach down to your left hip and pull on the loose cloth of your ruined trousers. The fabric breaks and tares easily, its fighting spirit torn out of it by your attacker. You slowly and painfully wrap the long strip of cloth around your waist, pulling it tight and tying it, wadding the stray patches to the wound and stopping what is left of your blood from leaving you. You take one more rueful look at the heavens before turning over and crawling towards the cliffs.

Every drag of your body is agony unending and the cloth quickly reddens over your wound. Eventually you can see the cliffs below. Rocky and broken, they stand as steep slopes of loose stones, far too steep and loose to climb up, but possible to slide down to the rocks below. After you do so, rolling painfully, it is just a mile long swim to the spot your guide waits for you. He assured you that the current wouldn’t steer you far wrong.

After a long time, panting, sweating, bleeding, and profusely cursing, you crawl into the salty sea water and start to paddle.

You don’t know how long it took to get to the waiting boat or if you even did. You remember being pulled up on to it by a cursing old man. You remember looking up at the stars smiling down at you as he rowed on.

It was a month and a half later that the sweating fevers and strange nightmares abated. Both had been inconsistent, frequent visitors in that time, and they left you weak beyond measure. You remember the face of the wizened old woman you now know as Adda, wife of your guide, feeding and watering you as the weeks went by. The residents of the small fishing island were a kind lot, but there ‘wait and see’ approach to medicine left much to be desired. It was two months after your swim that you gained strength enough to lift your head. Your heart had sank at the sight; that against all the odds, your wound, the fevers and blood loss, your belly had swollen with child. It was overwhelming. Those were dark times, filled with tears and cursing. If you had had the strength for it then, you may have been driven to end it all, gods be damned.

Over the coming months, the village cared for you and nursed you back to health. You dreamed often, of cutting out the cancer growing in your womb, or drowning it when it was born, or other dark thoughts set on erasing the biggest scar of your ****. Those dreams were spurred by other mad dreams, your child bearing his face, growing up to **** you again, or it crawling from slow healing wound at your side, made constantly worse by the stretching of your belly. To distract yourself, you fixed nets and cooked meals, all while looking out to sea and wondering where he was and what he was doing, like some doting fishwife. Not out of love; it let your despair and fear slowly give way to burning hatred, which smouldered to a need for ****. Even so, the dreams of infanticide continued.

On the day of the birth, the life he **** inside you came into the world. The ordeal lasted far longer, hurting as much, if not more than, the time of conception. You remember holding the child after, her blue eye’s staring up at you.

She was a celestial: belonging with the gods and twice as beautiful.

All thoughts of grief, rage, fear, and hopelessness, fled your mind at the sight of her. All the misery you endured that night and the months after paled in comparison to the joy you felt. She had been your long night and bright morning, and you had cried for days.

Thinking of her brings a smile to your face. One not easily controlled. She is with her godmother for tonight; her godfather has brought you out here, to another far off island.

To Selka Island.

It was easy to learn who had turned in the necklace and claimed responsibility. Tony Brittle, now Lord Brittle, was in residence. The joy you felt on the day of her birth didn’t invalidate the months of swearing vengeance before it. Not at all. Not to mention that your daughter should have some of her inheritance. It’s only proper after all, and Lord Brittle, slayer of the Wendigo, was by all surface accounts, a proper sort.

You float ashore amid the seaweed, darting across the sands and creeping into the bushes. A pirate lord will die tonight. You see a guard in the distance walking along the beach. You wonder for a moment.

Should you take his uniform? Interrogate him? Sneak past?

So many choices...