The Offer

The morning was a wretched thing, clawing across the water to beach itself like some decaying carcass on the rocky shore beneath Spree. Rob hauled himself from the straw mattress where Sadie lay, quiet and small. He looked down at himself, letting the events of the previous days wash over him for the first time. He was free, inexplicably. He had no job, a coin purse that would rapidly empty, and he was a known pirate and convict. His eyes dragged down to his knuckles, where the war marks of his people were tattooed under dusky skin.

He ran his hands across his chest, tracing the tattoos that decorated his flesh, marked with the ancient warrior symbols of his father's clan. Then he slipped lower, feeling the rougher marks, made by more amateurish tattooists across his belly. The marks of a pirate and a slaver. It had seemed so right to him when he'd had them added, flush with victory and surrounded by friends.

He shook off the memory and began grabbing his clothes, pulling them on and slipping out into the narrow stone hallway. Wood had to be imported to the craggy island so it was used sparingly in the construction, the few residents preferring stone and covering the walls with woven mats and carpets.

Entering the main floor of the brothel, he took a long look around, admiring the bones of what he reckoned could be a profitable, bustling establishment. The only customer at the moment was a slender, haggard looking man hunched over the bar. The bartender was nowhere to be seen, and he almost let his curiosity drag him over before common sense won and he turned towards the door to leave.

A voice called from behind him. "There's no future for you out there. She says so."