Startup 50: Corporate Hospitality

Rova 8, afternoon

More than half of my crew were in the hold, sleeping off a few hard days even if they hadn’t been shot, when the dragon arrived. He burst from beneath the waves with wings outspread, creating an explosion of water droplets that soaked my remaining crew right as they’d started to dry out. If anyone had managed to miss that, his roar would have certainly drawn their eyes. His azure scales glittered in the light, shifting constantly as he flapped his wings to maintain position directly in front of the bow.

“Greetings, oh guests within my realm.” Kelizar roared in a booming voice, “Know that I am a beneficent lord over these waters, and will tolerate your intrusion should you provide proper tribute!”

What a ham. Well, I guess I can’t blame him. He’s a goddamn dragon.

Kelizar was bigger than a horse, probably around the size of a brown bear. In terms of absolute mass, Filli was almost as big as him. If he’d just been a big lizard, even with wings, I’m pretty sure we could have taken him. Unfortunately, my bestiary informed me that he was also probably a better sorcerer than I was, so I didn’t like my odds in a straight fight. I also didn’t want to drop hundreds of gold pieces or one of my magic items on paying him off, so I’d come up with a cunning strategy.

At least he decided to pop up in front of the Enterprise. This would be a little awkward if he’d been over there with Gobron’s Ship.

“Welcome to my ship, mighty Kelizar!” I shouted, “It would be an honor to host a lord of the depths; I hope you would accept the hospitality of one from above the waves.”

Kelizar looked down upon me, by every definition, for a few moments. Then he swooped towards me, and I felt my body tensing to dive out of the way. However, he landed directly in front of me, turning his elongated face to look more closely. He moved on to Sandara, who was at my side, before answering.

“Perhaps.” He rumbled, “What entertainments might one such as you be able to offer a dragon?”

I winced as his six inch long claws scraped along the newly repaired deck. I’d spent all morning casting mending on every square foot, and now I’d need to do so again. I plastered a smile onto my face, though, since I was trying to be a good host.

“Food cooked with flame by a master chef, and fine drinks from the mainland.” I said, “I have musicians, storytellers, and demonstrations of skill, speed, and magic. Would you care to eat in my cabin, or should I have the table set up out here? I promise, the rain will not resume so long as your visit lasts. After we eat, you may choose your tribute from among the offerings I have prepared; I didn’t know what you would want.”

Sandara leaned against me, flashing our guest a winning smile. Syl was busy stage managing and Sosima was among the entertainers, so I’d deputized Sandara to be my “date” and apparently eye candy. She’d unbuttoned her shirt enough to make good use of her modest cleavage, and it seemed that Kelizar could appreciate attractive humans.

“Oh yeah,” Ve’ra had said the night before, “Dragons are all randy bastards, and they’ll sleep with anything if they’re in the mood. Why do you think the most common kind of sorcerer is dragon blooded?”

Good to know your intel is good, Ve’ra. I can’t imagine literally every dragon is a horndog, given your career, but it seems to apply here.

“I enjoy the feeling of sunlight upon my scales.” Kelizar said, looking around the deck. “I suppose I shall be a good guest.”

I tensed involuntarily when I saw a swirl of orange magic swirl around him, but it turned out to be nothing to worry about. Alter Self, or Bipedal Form as it was often called in non-humanoid circles, was a common spell that allowed the user to take on the forms of most conventional civilized races. Unlike Disguise Self, which makes minor, purely aesthetic changes, Alter Self transforms the caster into their rough cultural and aesthetic equivalent. If anything, he was disarming himself. (Spellcraft 5+13=18 success)

As the orange smudge enveloped Kelizar, he shrank down to half my height. A shirt, necktie, vest and jacket popped into existence on his upper body, with a pair of matching slacks forming over his legs. He had taken the form of a kobold: spindly, scaly, and slightly shorter than Rowe.

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Filli and Cog, the strongest people on my crew that were not otherwise occupied, hauled the table and chairs out onto the poop deck. Naomi followed quickly, setting the table with quick, efficient motions. Kelizar took his eyes off of Sandara to track her movements, especially when she bent over to place the centerpiece.

“My crew recently won a small skirmish, so I was planning on having a celebration regardless.” I told Kelizar, “Then I remembered we would be passing into your territory, and thought it would be a delight to have you as the guest of honor.”

“Oh yeah, the captain loves meeting powerful and important people.” Sandara chimed in, “He has tea with a Shae princess once a week, you know. Be careful though, he might start talking business. If that happens, he just won’t stop.”

“Well, I’ve nothing pressing to do.” Kelizar said, “I may hear him out if I’m suitably impressed.”

In actual fact, the celebration was more about giving everyone a bit more food and drink and a day of rest after the storm. Half of my crew were nursing broken bones or other lingering injuries, which needed either bed rest or Sandara’s Lesser Restoration spell to fix. A bit of dinner theatre would be a welcome diversion, but I absolutely wouldn’t have bothered making a big production if I wasn’t entertaining a guest.

Naomi and the goblins served Salyar’s improvised feast while Sandara chatted away with the dragon. I was, unfortunately, distinctly uninteresting to him. He gave the chubby goblin matrons and Naomi equally appreciative glances when they brought out a few bowls of spiced lentil soup, and was more than happy to enjoy Sandara’s company.

“So, I hear brine dragons build their own kingdoms underwater.” She said, “How’s that work? I know our lords up here pick an island and secure it against invaders; do you do something like that?”

“Something like that, but in my case I inherited.” Kelizar agreed. “A few years ago my mother was murdered, you see. I arrived on the scene and took charge of her servants; the merfolk are absolutely lost without a firm hand guiding them, you know.”

“Oh I’m sure; I’ve always wanted to meet a real dragon.” She said, “I can’t imagine you’ll limit yourself here forever. A smart dragon like you, maybe you’ll even expand onto land, or rule all the seas of the Shackles.”

Cog came out to juggle knives, which I thought was pretty damn neat, but unfortunately Kelizar could not give less of a shit. He was too busy burning a spell to change to a different humanoid form, one obviously more tailored to his current company. A tall, narrow faced man with long, silky blue hair and a robe made of blue scales.

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My eye twitched slightly as Sandara leaned in closer and laid her hand upon his arm, feeling muscles that he’d compressed into his human pretty boy form. I involuntarily remembered that I’d been sorta neglecting Sandara since I’d arrived back at the ship.

I’ve been busy! So was she! Dealing with day to day operations on the ship is her job! Ugh. I should have made time for her. Then again, she’d probably be flirting with him no matter what. The whole point of this operation is to butter him up. Hell, she might even be laying it on extra thick just to make me feel insecure. This is Sandara we are talking about.

Kelizar took a moment to enjoy Naomi’s shocked response to his new face when she brought out the next course, thanking her in a voice that sounded too deep for his human appearance. While he did, Sandara met my eyes with a wicked smile. I raised one eyebrow; knowing that she was trying to get a rise out of me somehow made her fawning much easier to handle.

“Ahh, your ship is just full of beauties, isn’t it?” Kelizar said to me, downing what I belatedly realized was the last of four bottles of wine, “I will admit, I was worried after you started with a muscle man. I suppose you had to check if I preferred gentlemen?”

I looked towards the bow and saw Conchobar, Rowe, and the three new goblins filing out and taking their places on the foredeck. Rowe stood out front, wearing a leather vest and shorts that went down to her knee. It was much more skin than she normally showed, revealing smooth, toned arms and legs. The goblins behind her wore similar getups, though their bony knees and elbows stuck out awkwardly.

Kelizar wolf whistled beside me, and I turned to see that he’d transformed in another swirl of orange, this time into a rotund goblin man. Oddly enough, his newly curly hair remained the same length, though on the much shorter frame it seemed much longer. Sandara watched with a bemused expression as he dropped all pretense of refinement and stood so he could see more clearly.

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“Hey beautiful!” He boomed, “How about you skip the show and come sit on my lap!”

Rowe looked up at him with an expression of wordless disdain, then drew her revolver. I tensed up for a second, but she only used it to bonk each of her background dancers for staring awestruck at what was apparently a vision of masculine goblin beauty.

“Ah, goblin women.” He said, turning to me with a grin and resuming his more refined demeanor. “They can be so fiery. Does she belong to a friend of yours, or are you a true man of culture?”

I kept a carefully neutral face as I considered what to do. For a moment I very seriously considered bringing out the mirror and starting on plan B, risks be damned, but I felt a gentle hand on my forearm.

“We picked her up down south.” Sandara said, “It’s good fer the Cap’n’s ego to have at least one lass on the ship who isn’t interested in him.”

She squeezed my wrist as she spoke. Even if I did decide to just kill the guy, it would be borderline suicidal to jump the gun. Sandara leaned in close.

“Calm down, mate.” She whispered into my ear, “If Rowe was really upset the music would have already started.”

I took a breath and smiled back at the disguised dragon.

“Yes, and since then she has entered into an arrangement with a good friend of mine.” I said, hedging my bets. “They seem quite happy as things stand.”

“Give him my congratulations.” Kelizar said, “She looks like a fast runner. I suppose I should have asked before I changed.”

Conchobar looked up at the table with a pained expression, making it clear that his sharp ears picked up the majority of the dragon’s words.

Sorry, buddy.

“She prefers to defend her honor with black powder.” I said, “It makes it harder for others to chase.”

He laughed, and turned back as Rowe began her performance. I blinked a few times as she did, as she sounded very unlike herself. The words coming out of her mouth sounded oddly like Mandarin, but seemed to stretch and expand as she spoke in goblin for the first time since I’d learned the language myself.

“Welcome, Sea Chief, to this hold.” She said in three words, “I will sing for you a song of the Clan of Those Who Sing the Song of The Tides, and how we conquered the lands of Firegrass Isle.”

She then began to sing a rapidfire history of the Sea Shanty Clan that rattled around in my head, as I heard both the gently rising and falling melody accompanied by Conchobar’s expert flute and Autopilot’s translation. It was like having both an auctioneer and Eminem explaining the local history of Goatshead to me as quickly as they could manage, all with perfect flow. Every tiny aspect of her intonation, cadence, and body language carried additional meaning that added to the deluge of information. The fact that each of the three other goblin girls were adding supplemental information about the wider context of the Shackles and the state of Goatshead before goblins arrived made it all the harder.

No wonder she thinks Common is a slow language. Wait, how do these other goblins even know this song? Did she just teach it to all of them overnight?

I was still almost perpetually hungry after my days long hike through the ocean, but I forgot about that until I specifically requested that Autopilot summarize the song and just listened to the melody as an art piece. It really was quite pretty, but that was no reason to waste food. We’d killed one of the chickens to make chicken and rice, and I was scheduled to miss the next entree.

Rowe finished the song with a quick rundown of her own life since leaving the clan, placing specific emphasis on the number of suitors she has maimed, which I thought was a nice touch. The backup dancers even twirled their own looted shotguns during that segment. If Kelizar took it as a threat, he didn’t say anything. He clapped merrily when the performers took their positions near Cog, and I started to wonder if Kelizar was actually particularly bad.

Sure, he literally stated that he’d like to tie my friend up in his basement, but I just rescued a dozen goblin girls. Half of them immediately started looking for my basement and tied themselves up unprompted when they found it. He hasn’t even tried to cop a feel with Sandara. Honestly that’s better than I would have expected from half the guys at the frat, with the way she’s been acting. Ok, if he doesn’t cross the line from sleaze into creep he gets to live.

Naomi and the older goblin women brought out the next course, heralding the arrival of Sosima. She played into the sexy sailor aesthetic more than she ever had before, wearing a tight dress under Sandara’s armored coat. It was the same one I’d enchanted back on the Wormwood, a very handsome blue with gold epaulets that honestly would have been a better fit for her real face than her Tiefling disguise. It clung snugly to her upper body, unbuttoned at the front and hanging down to only her hips.

We’d shuffled it around, handing it to Rosie first so it would reshape to her compact frame. After that, Sosima pulled it on and it grew somewhat as she pushed her arms through the sleeves. It would not finish reshaping to fit her body as armor until she pulled it forward to button up, leaving it in this tight, costume-like form that framed her cleavage quite nicely. It looked fine, which wasn’t hard because Sosima could make a burlap sack look runway ready, but we had mostly gone through the process so she’d have unobtrusive armor if a fight broke out.

I left Kelizar in Sandara’s capable hands while I took my place next to Sosima, resting my keyboard upon my lap. I had mostly focused on doing solos in my old life, so playing accompaniment wasn’t exactly my forte, but Sosima was a professional. She insisted that everything would be fine as long as I played the song she’d provided me with exactly as the sheet music said.

I vaguely worried about tonal whiplash as I started; Rowe’s song had been a staccato storm of information, while the song Sosima had picked out was a slow, sultry song. I didn’t know much about Chelish opera, but apparently it was a big tent with room for Jessica Rabbit style lounge music. I’d asked about it just the day before.

How exactly is a wealthy heiress singing a song about how much she wants to find the right man not already hitched?

As it turned out, the answer was that her father refused any suitor that was insufficiently heroic, and kept laying out increasingly ridiculous and dangerous tasks. The whole opera was a comedic series of musical vignettes about men dying while they tried to get in this lady’s skirts, eventually concluding with the father being executed for manslaughter of half the bachelors in his home city. She married the lawyer, who had killed the biggest threat to Cheliax around.

Must have been an awkward honeymoon.

The way Sosima played the role, strolling languidly across the deck and singing a song throbbing with need, I could see why men lined up to die for her. She’d apparently sung it before in a school production before joining the navy, and many times afterward; it had made her very popular both as a popular girl in school and as a morale officer. Kelizar definitely seemed to agree, having resumed his pretty boy human appearance once he wasn’t focused on Rowe.

That’s either a good sign or a very bad sign. A bunch of quick changes like that means he doesn’t expect to need those spells for anything serious. Of course, the question is whether he doesn’t think they are important because he isn’t expecting a fight, or because he’s so strong that second level spells aren’t a serious concern.

Sosima ended the song by doing a circuit of the ship, briefly touching every guy available as she sang the last section. Of course, that was easy since only me, Conchobar, Cog, and Kelizar were on the deck. The rest of the guys were getting some rest, assisting Syl below deck, or focused on keeping Gobron’s ship nearby while we drifted.

“And I need to know,” Sosima sang, running her fingernails down Kelizar’s cheek, “who will be my man?”

He clapped, his pork curry half eaten, as Sosima walked back to my side with a satisfied smile. Another masterful performance complete. I couldn’t resist giving her a quick peck on the lips; I absolutely did not want Kelizar to get the wrong idea about what kinds entertainment I was providing.

I retook my seat next to him, along with Sosima who sat in the until-now unused fourth chair. She’d taken the hint and sat very close, holding my arm possessively even as she gave the dragon a thousand watt smile. Sandara raised an eyebrow at me, all but saying I’d pay for giving Sosima so much public affection.

“You’re a lucky fellow.” He laughed. “I’ve got a whole city and the prettiest ones always want their own husbands. How’d you convince them to share?”

“Oh? Easy enough; I snatched them both from the jaws of ****.” I said, smiling at Sandara.

“Oh yeah, won my soul back in a dice game with Pharasma.” She answered, eyes twinkling. “Sosima here was actually transformed into a rampaging beast when he met her, but she fell head over heels for him at first sight. True love’s kiss broke the spell and all that.”

“Close enough.” Sosima said dryly.

“So just do that kind of thing.” I said, “I really don’t see why more people don’t.”

“I believe I told you a story about that just last night,” said Sosima, sipping some of Sandara’s conjured rum. “Most who make the attempt die the first time.”

That got a belly laugh from my guest.

“One of the only good stories I’ve heard your people tell about dragonslaying.” He said to Sosima, “Are you from Hell Harbor? I’ve always wanted to visit the opera houses there, but my underlings are utterly incapable of managing my territory long enough to justify a trip that far.”

Sosima raised her eyebrows.

“No, I’m from Kintargo, far to the north.” She said, “Where is Hell Harbor? I didn’t know there was an opera scene anywhere in the Shackles.”

“There are a few.” He answered. “Kepre Dua does Kiyonin style, and sometimes I can squeeze in a Noh production in Cho-Tzu if I fly fast and double the guard. Hell Harbor is the only place that does Chelish style, and it’s only been around for a decade or so. Founded by some exiled admiral who appreciated the finer things in life.”

I put a hand on Sosima’s and gave her a smile.

“We can look into it once the current mess is resolved.” I said, “It sounds like fun. Maybe we can even look into options to get you back on stage.”

She looked down at the table.

“I’m dreadfully out of practice.” She said, “I imagine it’s quite competitive.”

“Most things worth doing take some work.” I said.

“Later.” Sosima said firmly. “It will not be for many months in the best case, and we need to finish entertaining our guest.”

“Naomi, would you fetch the last act?” I said, “Lord Kelizar has been excellent company, and we may invite him back another day.”

Sandara had scooped up Kelizar’s attention by asking about his favorite theatrical productions. Based on the bluff check scrolling across my vision she didn’t actually care, but she was nodding and exclaiming at the right times for him to entertain himself. I waited for a lull in the one sided conversation to butt in.

“There is one more planned major event, and a proposal.” I said, “You see, I’ve recently come into possession of a second ship. I understand that your toll for passage is by crew, and now there is only one present. I’d hate to cheat you.”

Kelizar’s eyes narrowed.

“I’m listening.” He said, warily. Despite drinking three dinner bottles and an entire barrel of rum conjured by Sandara, mostly alone, he was quite sober.

Yep. Definitely need to sweeten the pot as much as possible.

“I propose a wager.” I said, “A bit of blood sport. I will provide your champion, and you may pick mine. It may surprise you to know that none of the acts today are primarily entertainers. They are all full members of my crew, mostly officers. You can pick any one act to do battle with a magical construct I shall summon.”

“So where’s the wager?” He asked, “What’s on the line?”

“I’ve prepared a selection of offerings that you could choose from.” I said. “If my crew is able to subdue the construct unassisted, then you will be allowed to pick any one of the three. If your champion wins, then you will get three.”

The goblin women carried out the offerings in question. Each was reasonably expensive as gifts went, though I made sure to include a few that I didn’t actually care much about. They included a schir’s halberd, an eternal lantern, a wooden box full of freshly polished silver with a few gold coins near the top, a magic candle that created a zone of truth (stolen back on the Wormwood), and a freshly looted marble statue of Gobron. All of them were probably worth twenty or more gold pieces, some as much as one hundred to the right buyer.

Sosima had suggested offering Lubo as tribute, since she was technically a **** under Shackles law, and I’m honestly not sure if she was serious or not. If I’d realized he could turn into a goblin heart throb I would have considered bringing out the two goblin girls that wanted to be sold off as brides, but in retrospect that would have probably ended poorly since they couldn’t breathe underwater.

“And suppose my ‘champion’ is a very angry dolphin flopping around on the deck?” Kelizar asked, “I know you pirate types, there’s no way you didn’t stack the deck in your favor.”

“If you find yourself dissatisfied with the fight, I will give you two offerings,,” I said, “one for each ship, just as if the wager was never made.” (Diplomacy 8 + 12 =20 success)

“Why not?” He said with a chuckle, “There doesn't seem to be a downside I can see.”

Good. That was the point.

Naomi carried out a cloth covered mirror in shaking hands, and positioned herself near the bow. If I’d shifted to plan B, Syl would have been the one carrying it. Everyone on the ship except Kelizar knew what came next.

“Eh, go with the Goblin troupe.” Kelizar said, “The juggler seems like a ringer, and I’m not about to bet against a captain on his own ship. I assume the last act would have included both of you?”

Sosima nodded with a smile. If I hadn’t been trying so hard to get Kelizar invested, I probably would have chosen Sosima and myself to fight. A solid front line with magical support was one hell of a winning combination.

Rowe, Conchobar, and three goblin girls took position at the midpoint of the ship. Naomi pulled the cloth loose, focused it upon Kelizar, and his reflection stepped out to meet them in battle. Without missing a beat, it took the form of a small dragon the size of a mastiff and lunged forward.

••••••••••

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