Startup 83a: Quinn

Age: 7

Mama said not to go out in the storm.

She said that it was an extra bad storm, the worst one she’d seen since she was a little girl. That seemed stupid to Sandara. Her whole family, all eight of them, lived in Drenchport. It was always stormy, and they were on land. Papa had told her a long time ago how safe people were in Drenchport during bad weather. It was boats that were in danger when it was stormy, so Sandara wasn’t in any real danger.

Ok, she had to jump out of the way of a basket that someone had left out to get caught in the wind, but Sandara was quick. She was fine, and she was on a mission. Papa had been out to sea when the sky started getting dark, working on a fishing boat like he usually did, but he hadn’t come back before the storm started. That meant he was in danger, and she intended to do something about that.

The Master of Gales, lord of Drenchport, was exactly where Sandara expected him to be: floating above the harbor, whipped around by the wind and dancing through the tentacles of his giant squid. His robes flapped in the wind along with his long gray hair and beard, and she could hear his laughter over the racket of the storm. He seemed a little bit busy, but Sandara needed to talk to him, so she got to the highest place she could find near him and started yelling.

“Mister Master of Gales!” She yelled, “Could you please tell the storm to go away! My papa is still offshore!”

This, along with several other equally impassioned pleas, went completely unanswered and probably unnoticed. Sandara had been soaked to the bone before she’d even arrived at the harbor, and by the time she gave up she was hoarse too.

Well I didn’t want his help anyway. I can find someone way better. I’ll ask a god, and they’ll do it instead. That’ll show him.

The only problem was that mama and papa didn’t really talk about the gods much. Sandara knew they existed, but as far as she knew they were just like pirate lords with even more amazing magic powers. The power to hear people that were super far away was on that list if Sandara remembered correctly, which seemed very relevant right at that moment.

There was something about praying to their holy symbols somewhere in there, and the only holy symbol Sandara knew about was the skull and bones. It looked a lot like the skull and chains, the symbol of the Shackles, which Sandara had thought was neat when she’d heard about it. More importantly, Besmara’s holy symbol was easy to find.

Sandara stared at the flag snapping in the wind for almost three minutes before she decided on her approach. She took everything she knew about pirates and what they wanted and assumed that Besmara would want those things extra hard since she was an extra piratey pirate. They liked making and winning bets, they liked holding onto their money, and they liked getting more people on their crew.

“Alright Besmara!” The seven year old yelled, addressing the nearest holy symbol, “I’ll make a wager with you! Assuming you aren’t too chickenshit!”

Besmara didn’t magically appear, so for all Sandara knew she was just yelling at the sky. Even so, things would be a lot better if Besmara was listening so Sandara decided to proceed as if she was. If she was ignoring Sandara too, then the girl didn’t really have a third idea so she’d be shit out of luck.

“Listen up! I bet you that my papa isn’t coming home! He’s probably already dead!” She said, trying to take a smile, “If I’m right, I win the bet and you owe me twenty gold. If I lose, you win, and I promise that I’ll come work on your crew when I grow up.”

She crossed her arms and glared at the flag. She was quite proud of herself. Drunk men were always trying to recruit mama into their ships when she worked at the tavern, and papa said Sandara was just like mama, so obviously Sandara would be a very desirable crew member when she grew up.

Sandara would take the money if Papa really was dead of course, Mama always said that money was super tight for a family of eight. Twenty gold was more money than she could even imagine so that would probably set them all up for life. She really hoped Besmara would want to win, though, and make sure Papa came home safe. Papa was super nice when he wasn’t drunk, and he was still nicer than a lot of the men in town even when he was.

A few days later, after the storm passed, a single man washed ashore near Drenchport clinging to a bit of driftwood. Arnest Quinn crawled back to his two room apartment, and he was in no state to go back to work for almost a week. He was alive, though, and he was home.

Sandara decided that the world would be better if she was in a position to talk directly to Besmara, so she had lost the bet fair and square and she needed to pay up. She packed her few worldly possessions for when Besmara would come pick her up, but the Pirate Queen never did.

Sandara’s friend Konrad had an uncle who worked for the Hurricane King and he said only the very best pirates got to be on Besmara’s crew, so Sandara determined that she’d just need to become one of the very best pirates so she could qualify to pay back her debt. Looking back on it years later, Sandara was fairly sure that a random street urchin in Drenchport did not have an uncle that worked for the Hurricane King given that he didn’t even have two parents or an apartment, but he’d been close enough to right and that’s what counted.

••••••••••

Age 10

Since Besmara never showed up or sent any signs, Sandara stayed home for a while. Mom spent most of her time mending clothes, and she didn’t need kids underfoot. She said so all the time, usually before pushing them out the front door and locking it until dinner.

Sandara and her brothers and sisters would disperse then, and see what they could manage. Courier and guide services were lucrative, since no one wanted to run around in the rainy streets, but the Quinns needed to be careful about that. The street kids didn’t like other people taking their jobs, and that’s when they weren’t being pressured by adults to lure idiots into traps. It was hard to keep track of who was in charge at any given spot at any given moment, so the Quinns moved as a pack whenever they decided to work. Sandara’s big brother Aster had a real knife and everything.

On the day when Sandara saw a sign, Aster was working with Papa. No sense picking fights without the biggest Quinn, so they dispersed. Most of them joined in on a pick-up game of Rukh, but Sandara took the opportunity to look at the ships. That’s when she saw the omen.

There was a parrot on the bow. It was looking right at her. Parrots were the sacred animal of Besmara, so probably this was the omen she’d been waiting on. She was mostly just a drain on mama and papa, another mouth to feed, and she was always planning on leaving. Why not leave today? She was old enough to be a cabin girl, so why not start her pirating career right now?

She quickly found Bomo. He had a good memory but other than that he was a bit slow, which was perfect. She told him that she was heading to a ship to be a cabin girl now, and promised to write a note for him when she was next in port. He’d remember. He’d tell mama and papa, but he’d tell them when it was way too late. The ship was getting ready to cast off, and the crew was busy with preparations. She slipped past and hid in the hold. They’d have **** but to accept her as a crew member if they were already at sea!

As it turns out, no. No, they did not have to accept her as a crew member just because the captain’s pet parrot stared at her for a bit. She was tossed in the brig, occasionally handed some ship biscuit and water, and otherwise ignored until the ship made port in the recently established port of Hell Harbor. There, she was roughly pushed out onto the dock and told to fuck off.

She had quite a few things to say to the captain, but he kicked her in the stomach before she even got through all the swear words she knew in common. She stumbled back, clutching at her gut and looking around. One guard looked at the captain disapprovingly, but hardly looked at Sandara. The rest of the ship didn’t even take that much note of the exchange. None of them cared. Nobody cared.

Sandara decided that the omen was still an omen. Not because she had any evidence, but because her life would be a lot better if that parrot was the start of a chain reaction ending in amazing things somewhere downwind. Deciding it hadn’t been an omen wouldn’t do her any good, so she held on to the hope instead.

After all, Hell Harbor was a pretty nice place. A bit stiff, but there’d been a guard that actually cared slightly that a kid was getting beaten in public. That was a real improvement already. Maybe the omen had just been to get her here, where she could sign on with a way better ship. That was probably what it was.

••••••••••

Weeks later

As it turned out, while the people of Hell Harbor weren’t inclined to hurt children, instead they preferred to ignore them. Sandara was beaten a few times for stealing food, so she knew she wasn’t invisible. They just didn’t care to acknowledge her. That, somehow, was far worse.

She considered stowing away on a ship, but didn’t want to risk ending up somewhere more dangerous. Or worse, finding her way back home with nothing to show for it. She needed to get a job, but apparently nobody wanted a cabin girl that looked like her.

She had a plan: Deception. She just needed to get on the ship with permission, and then she’d be able to prove herself.

Sandara found a bit of canvas and drew Besmara’s symbol on it. It didn’t honestly look much like a skull and crossbones. Sandara knew what it was, and hopefully the people she spoke to would too. She approached a crew in the harbor with her best swagger and brandished it like a blade.

“I’m a cleric of Besmara.” She said, smiling, “Pretty much her favorite person. Let me on your ship and you won’t regret it.”

The captain looked down at her in her stained shirt and oversized pants. Her hair was a snarl of tangles already. She’d washed her face off with water, but she’d missed quite a bit because she didn’t have a mirror to work with. The captain looked at her, took her in, and laughed in her face. He fished in his coin purse and tossed a copper piece at her feet.

“Nice try kid.” He said. “Here’s a coin for making me smile. Now buzz off.”

Sandara swiped the coin, her mouth already watering at the thought of buying bread, and scurried off. She could work with this.

Over the coming weeks, the little red haired girl gained a reputation. She claimed to be a cleric, or a thief, or a celestial, or a sorceress. Anything she could think of, even telling the same person two or three contradictory stories. Sometimes she even got invited into the cheaper bars and got food, as long as she kept running her mouth. She made her incoherent claims, listened to the tales of other men, and a week later she’d be rambling out an embellished version of the stories she’d heard with herself as the star.

It filled her belly, usually. Well enough, anyway. She didn’t starve, which was more than she could say for some of the kids on the streets. She wasn’t like them, though. She wasn’t a beggar. She was a storyteller and a future pirate. The world was better if she could convince herself of that.

••••••••••

Age 12

Sandara woke one day in her alley, the one where she’d stored a lumpy mattress under an overhang. It was a bit rotted, but she hadn’t been kicked out yet. The lads at the pub down the street were good for that sort of thing. If someone decided they wanted that spot, she could always find someone to explain property rights to the poor bastard for her. They liked her; she was the funny storytelling girl.

A shame the officers didn’t share their opinions, or she’d be a ship girl any day now. She had a few job offers to be a swab once she was a bit older, but nothing certain and nothing that would matter until she was at least 15. Or, more accurately, until she could fake being that age convincingly.

She pulled her oversized shirt up and glared at her crotch. It was bloody again. She didn’t properly know why and the lads at the pub got weird when she asked, so she’d stopped trying. She could deal with the cramps, it was the ruin upon her few clothes that bothered her. She was starting to think it might have something to do with the moon, since it usually happened on nights when it was a bit bright, but she didn’t know well enough to do more than shove a few dirty rags down there after the full moon.

She was swapping out her rags by moonlight when a figure stepped into the alley. Sandara tensed. When she looked up, peeking out from behind a pile of trash, the intruder towered over her.

The young girl had a few immediate thoughts. First, that she’d never seen a more beautiful woman. Second, that she’d never seen a more beautiful person in general. The intruder’s face was in shadow, but she had full lips and shiny, clean hair that rippled in the wind. Her heavy coat, lined in white fur, hung open at the front to reveal a massive woman. Generous bosom, muscular physique hugged by tight white and red clothing, and taller than any orc Sandara had ever met.

Sandara knew, distantly, that the lord of Hell Harbor was a man. Despite that, she had a feeling that if this woman wanted to be in charge, she could be. She felt a strange, irrational desire to reach out and touch the woman.

“Hey kid.” She said, “I hear you’re a cleric. I could always use one of those, but I don’t see any clerics here.”

Sandara’s heart did several backflips, tossed about like a ship at sea. She felt shame that she wasn’t good enough for someone like this. She’d wasted this woman’s time. She wasn’t a cleric. She had lied. She didn’t actually know a damn thing about sailing she hadn’t heard from drunks arguing with one another. However, the emotion that rose most powerfully was not contrition, or fear, or even confused desire.

“You should be so lucky.” Sandara said, glaring up at the woman. “Why would I want to be on your crew if that’s all you’ve got for me? Get out of my alley, you dumb bint.”

The woman laughed, and the rich sound made Sandara dizzy.

“Sure, in a few minutes it’ll be like I was never here.” She said, “You aren’t going to convince anyone you’re a cleric like that, though. The confidence is good, but you look like a street kid living in a back alley.”

As the anger receded, Sandara’s tongue turned to lead in her mouth. She averted her eyes so she could focus on her words instead of the vision before her. It helped a little, but she was still aware of how sulky she looked.

“Yeah, well,” she mumbled, “I am that.”

The woman crouched next to Sandara, sitting on her haunches. Rather than look at her face, Sandara looked at her boots; they were impossibly perfect too, so shiny she could see herself dimly reflected in the polished surface. She looked like a feral cat, swallowed up in dirty rags with a long mane of matted hair.

“Who the fuck told you that you have to look like what you are?” The woman said, laughing again, “There’s more to lying than telling a story. Presentation, kid; you think I look like this naturally? I chose this look because it’s what gets people to pay attention, and because I like it.”

“These are the only clothes I have!” Sandara whispered, “They’re the only ones I could find.”

The woman whispered into her ear. Sandara could barely breathe, but somehow the words stuck in her mind.

“Then find a damn costume and do something with your hair instead of bitching about it. Quick, too; you’ll never fill out like your mother if you don’t get more food. That’d be a shame.” She said, “Also, how about coming up with a bit more bite to that cleric con? Do some magic.”

“How am I supposed to do that?” Sandara asked, “I can’t do magic! Besmara hasn’t ever listened to any prayers!”

“Why would she?” The woman asked, “What have you done for her lately? Anyway, go to a temple and ask about magic. Any temple will do; just find any priest willing to talk to you. Find out some basic cleric spells that you can fake.”

All of a sudden, the woman was gone and Sandara was opening her eyes like the last few minutes had never happened. She looked around, and the alley was empty. Everything was exactly as it had been when she went to sleep, save that she had a handkerchief stuffed under the rope she used to keep on her baggy leggings. It was made from a shiny black fabric she didn’t recognize, with Besmara’s holy symbol stitched into it.

Years later she still didn’t know what it was made of, but she was pretty sure it was a gift directly from Besmara. A random dream solving all her problems was stupid and didn’t explain her new holy symbol. The idea that a mortal woman who looked like that took the time to talk to a downtrodden child and then vanished wasn’t worth considering. Her tits alone would get songs written about her, even if she’d turned out to be the most useless pirate alive.

••••••••••

Age 13

“What I can certainly tell you, Captain Barker, is that I’m the best damn cleric you’ll ever get.” Sandara said, beaming at a woman four times her age. “At least at the price I’m asking.”

“You’re asking for the same price I’d give any new swab.” Captain Vivian Barker said, an edge of suspicion in her voice. “Why would a cleric ask for so little?”

“‘M still learning, o’ course.” Sandara said. “I don’t think Besmara’s very impressed by life on land, do you? She won’t give me any of the good stuff until I get a bit more saltwater in my veins. Don’t worry, I’ll carry my weight even before we count the magic; just think of me as a swab with a little something extra.”

Sandara gave her best winning smile, and silently prayed that the armor she’d forged for herself would hold up under the matronly captain’s scrutiny. Her hair, though she’d needed to cut it short to do away with the matting, had grown back out nicely once she’d found a chipped old comb to drag through once or twice a day.

Her clothes were a bit too tight, but that was to be expected when you stole a costume from the opera house that’d been tailored for a gnome. She’d been told that she looked a bit like Tessa Fairwind when she wore the dark pants and white blouse, and once she’d figured out who the bloody hell that was she decided that was just fine.

Most importantly, she’d come to Barker because her home port wasn’t Hell Harbor. Unless she asked around, it seemed unlikely she’d know anything about the young girl who told tall tales for her supper. Instead, she’d see a decently dressed young woman with a holy symbol, nice hair, and a willingness to work for cheap.

“So, what magic can you do?” Barker asked, and Sandara’s heart soared.

She’s asking questions! That means she thinks I might have answers worth hearing!

“Just a few minor things.” Sandara lied, in the tone of someone speaking an embarrassing truth. “I can make a man lucky, is all. They call it Guidance at the temple. I’m told a lot of acolytes start with just a few minor spells and build up from there.”

That last part wasn’t true. It happened sometimes, but most clerics had a revelation and then almost immediately started channeling positive or negative energy or calling upon their god’s domains. At that point they decided what style of spellcasting they’d like to direct their new wellspring of power into, usually Garundi or Thassilonian, and were off to the races. It wasn’t impossible for someone to start with a random cantrip and build upon that foundation, but it was more common for oracles than clerics.

Thankfully, Vivian Barker of Oyster Cay was a glorified merchant and knew little about magic and cared to know less.

“A bit of extra luck won’t go amiss.” She said, scratching at her chin. “You’d best be ready to work, though. I don’t need a cleric, it would just be nice to have one available. Alright; no sign on bonus until you survive a voyage, but you’re on if you’re ready for that.”

“Yes ma’am.” Sandara said, “If I’m on a ship, I’m happy. Take me away from Hell Harbor, an ye won’t regret it.”

Barker was the first of many captains Sandara served under. Most quickly realized she didn’t actually use magic. The first suspicion that she was lying about her magic would almost immediately lead to her being exposed. However, the canny captains realized something that Sandara already suspected: people do their jobs better when they think a god is helping. Magic was hardly even a trifle next to morale.

It was one such captain that dragged her off to war, knowing damn well that she wasn’t a cleric.

••••••••••

Age 20

Captain Barnabus Harrigan’s raid against the Chels was daring, even reckless, but most people thought he could pull it off. Westcrown wasn’t the capital of Cheliax anymore, hadn’t been for decades, but it was in all the old stories. If he could pull it off, he’d be able to come home laden with loot and tales of striking at the heart of Cheliax. He could do damn near anything he wanted with a reputation like that.

Young free captains flocked to his banner, ready to go on the greatest raid since ol’ Bonefist took the Hurricane Crown. None of the veterans of that war signed up, of course. They’d had their fill of Chelish blood, and for the most part they all agreed that his fleet getting boxed in just past the Arch of Aroden was very predictable. The fact that some hotshot young admiral seemed to be able to predict his every move just went to show that he wasn’t half as smart as he thought he was.

The finer points of international politics were lost on Sandara at the time, however. She was too busy looking at a deck littered with corpses in waiting, and as far as she could tell each and every one of them looked right back at her. Her captain was dead, along with his first mate and quartermaster. The gunnery chief was tangled up in the corpse of some kind of devil and just about to bleed out, and the few people still able to walk were trying very hard to get the ship close enough to the Rahadoumi shore that they could make the rest of the way in the jollyboat.

Sandara could feel her heart mounting a full broadside. She’d learned a few tricks from the surgeon, but these people needed magic if they were going to see sunset. She knew she was a fraud; she had nothing to offer these men.

No. I have something, even if it’s not what they really want.

She walked up to the closest swab, a blocky dwarven woman Sandara hadn’t really gotten along with, and knelt beside her. She laid a hand upon the woman’s chest, wrapped in her holy symbol, and whispered gently.

“You’ll be all right, mate.” She said, “Don’t you worry. Get some rest and you’ll be better in a moment.”

Her words seemed to calm the woman, at least. She laid back and closed her eyes, perhaps for the last time. A song itched at the back of Sandara’s mind. It was a low, droning song that she couldn’t quite place, but it felt profoundly right.

“Yo, ho, all hands, hoist the colors high.”

She moved from person to person, gently touching the fallen one by one. She committed their faces to memory and soothed their pain as well as she could, not knowing what else to do.

“Heave ho, thieves and beggars, never shall we die.”

As she crept across the deck, the crew’s pain slowly ebbed away and they were able to rest. By the time she hopped into the jolly boat. Sandara had truly done all she could by telling them that they’d survive because Besmara had granted them a shot of luck.

It was only when they all got home to the Shackles that she found out that the ship had settled, half sunk, upon a reef. Not a single member of the crew who had lived long enough to get a blessing from Sandara died of their injuries that day. A few died trying to swim to shore, and a few more died as Rahadoumi slaves before escaping, but there isn’t a pirate alive who’d call cheating Pharasma once a bad deal.

••••••••••

To someone from the Shackles, an earnest lack of water is almost unthinkable. Sure, you prefer to keep to fresh barrels to make sure it’s clean and keep the salt out, but nobody with access to a bowl ever dies of thirst in the Shackles. It rains too bloody much.

An important thing to remember about Rahadoum, in contrast, is that it’s mostly desert. Dry as a bone and hot as a forge, at least until night falls and it turns cold as a hag’s tit. Someone once tried to explain the geography to Sandara, something about mountains and the Eye of Abendego, but it was so dull that she left the moment she finished the fourth drink he bought her.

The host of survivors from Harrigan’s fleet, those that didn’t abandon him or try to kill him, either learned about deserts quickly or died. He’d done at least enough research to have a map of the area with quite a few wells marked, but those wells were not meant for legions of men and women improperly dressed for the weather. They ran dry quickly, usually fed by small springs that pooled in underground pockets. Harrigan gave his officers and himself pride of place when it came to slaking his thirst, and the rest trailed in afterwards to get what they could.

They lost people constantly. The desert killed more than the Chels had, and there were crews of desert raiders as vicious as any pirate crew in the Shackles. Many of the survivors slipped into Rahadoumi towns, but Sandara remembered something about Rahadoumi banning any symbol of the divine. She wasn’t ready to give up her flag, not even when her throat felt like sand, so she was one of the last thirty people trailing along behind Harrigan through the desert.

She was half delirious when she thought to pray for water. Besmara hadn’t answered Sandara’s prayers often, and when she did she could never be sure if it was really a miracle. It still seemed worth trying, so she wrapped her hand in her holy symbol and whispered her demand. Sandara fully expected, or at least hoped, that she would find an extra well or a tiny spring that Besmara could take credit for.

Instead, she felt rain.

A cloud formed over Sandara, and a few gallons of water sprayed all over the immediate area. Her eyes widened, and everyone around Sandara turned to look, especially those who had been splashed. She looked down at the flag, and prayed again, using the same vague sense of longing at the core of her demand. It happened again, just as random in spray, but clearly at her command.

She laughed, and so did everyone around her. Sandara’s new magic became a fountain, and every one of them danced in it like children, catching slightly salty water that smelled like home in their mouths and whatever containers they still carried.

“Praise Besmara!” They cried, their cheers coming out as croaks through cracked lips.

Sandara saw the outpouring of religious fervor, and she laughed harder.

Ya cheeky bint. These lads are certainly yours now, if they weren’t already.

Sandara could summon water as much as she wished, and she did so near constantly for the rest of the trek. Once they reached the Sodden Lands, they all got their fill of water, but it was easy enough to make their way through with Harrigan and Peppery Longfarthing there to kill anything that stood in their way. It took months, but they got back to the Shackles less than two years after the fleet was destroyed.

Sandara signed on to stay with Harrigan for another voyage after that. Not really out of any loyalty to the man; he’d proven himself a fool. He offered her good pay, however, and he knew damn well that she was a real cleric now. She could stay with him until something better came along, or he decided to do something else stupid.