Echoes in the Mud
The rain in Crimson Bay did not wash the streets; it merely stirred the filth. Water cascaded from rotting wooden eaves, thick with the stench of whale oil, cheap tobacco, and the copper tang of old blood. Down in the belly of the lower docks, the world was painted in shades of grey and midnight blue.
Lucian adjusted the collar of his damp coat, pulling it high enough to obscure his jawline. A few paces behind him, the heavy, rhythmic stomp of armored boots echoed against the wet cobblestones. Valeria’s elite guards were persistent, he had to give them that. They moved like clockwork, their red capes cutting through the salty mist like freshly opened veins.
“Too rigid,” Lucian muttered to himself, a small, dangerous smile playing on his lips as he slipped into a narrow alleyway that smelled strongly of stagnant seawater. “Valeria, my dear, you always did choose men who look grand on parade but get stuck in the mud.”
He pressed his back against a crumbling brick wall, holding his breath as three imperial soldiers marched past the mouth of the alley. The lantern light glinted off their polished breastplates. Lucian waited exactly three heartbeats after their shadows vanished before dropping lower, sliding down a wooden hatch that led into the subterranean drainage network of the docks.
He wasn’t just running. He was hunting.
The underground passages of Crimson Bay were a maze of forgotten smugglers’ routes, flooded with ankle-deep sludge. Lucian navigated them with the casual ease of a man strolling through his own garden. He didn’t need a compass here; his mind mapped the turns by the varying pitch of the waves crashing against the stone walls from the harbor outside.
Ten minutes later, he kicked open a rusted iron grate and climbed up into the back room of ‘The Weeping Barnacle’—a tavern so wretched that even the port authority refused to raid it for unpaid taxes.
The main room was a symphony of despair. Broken men, castaway sailors, and diseased cutthroats sat in the dim, smokey gloom, drowning their failures in watered-down grog. But Lucian’s eyes instantly locked onto a figure slumped in the furthest, darkest corner of the tavern.
Garrick.
The man who had once been the fiercest boatswain to ever command a deck was now a mountain of rags and ruined pride. His silver-streaked beard was matted with dried vomit and spilled ale, his massive shoulders hunched as if trying to shrink away from the world. In his trembling, scarred hand, he clutched a half-empty bottle of the cheapest potato spirit available.
Lucian walked over, his boots clicking softly on the sawdust-covered floor. He snatched a stool from an empty table, flipped it around, and sat down directly across from the broken giant, leaning his chin on his crossed arms.
“You know, Garrick,” Lucian began, his tone light, almost teasing, “I remember a man who could splice a sheet in a hurricane while singing a shanty that would make an admiral’s daughter blush. Now, all I see is a very large, very damp sack of potatoes.”
Garrick didn’t look up. He merely tightened his grip on the bottle, his knuckles turning white. “Go away, stranger. Before I break this bottle over your skull.”
“Oh, you could try,” Lucian chuckled, leaning back. “But your hand is shaking so badly you’d probably miss and hit the tavern keeper. And frankly, I don’t think we can afford to pay for the property damage today.”
At the sound of that specific, irritatingly confident chuckle, Garrick’s head snapped up. His bloodshot eyes widened, staring through the gloom at the sharp features, the mocking smirk, and the dark, piercing eyes of the man sitting before him.
“L-Lucian?” Garrick whispered, his voice like grinding stones. Then, reality seemed to crash into him, and the sorrow in his eyes burned away, replaced by a sudden, volatile fury. He slammed his fists onto the table, rattling the rotted wood. “You bastard! You dare show your face here?”
“I dare do a lot of things, old friend. You should know that by now,” Lucian said, his smirk fading just a fraction, replaced by a steady, unyielding gaze.
“Friend? We are no friends!” Garrick roared, though he kept his voice low enough to avoid drawing the attention of the surrounding drunks. “Where were you when the sky burned? Where were you when Malakai turned his cannons on our brothers? The Iron Oath was betrayed, Lucian! Sold to the highest bidder while you were off playing the wealthy fool in the capital, drinking wine with highborn whores!”
The accusation cut through the air, heavy with years of built-up poison. Lucian didn’t flinch. He didn’t defend himself. He let the old boatswain’s anger wash over him, accepting the weight of it because he knew the pain behind it.
“I was losing everything, Garrick,” Lucian said quietly, his voice dropping its playful edge entirely, turning into something deep, resonant, and cold as the trench. “Just like you did. The only difference is, while you chose to drown in a bottle, I chose to wear a mask.”
Garrick sneered, wiping a hand across his mouth. “A mask of a coward.”
“A mask of a ghost,” Lucian corrected, leaning forward, his eyes locking onto Garrick’s with an intensity that made the big man freeze. “And ghosts don’t stay dead. I didn’t come here to apologize for the past, Garrick. I came here to ask you a question. How long do you intend to let Malakai sleep in your captain’s cabin?”
Garrick’s breath hitched. The mention of the traitor’s name was like a physical strike. “The ship is gone. Malakai has the backing of the empire now. He’s untouchable.”
“Nothing is untouchable if you have a sharp enough blade and a crew crazy enough to wield it,” Lucian murmured. He reached into his coat and pulled out a small, intricately carved wooden token—a broken anchor entwined with iron thorns. He slid it across the damp table. It stopped right against Garrick’s trembling fingers. “The Imperial Navy has Crimson Bay locked down tighter than a virgin’s virtue. Valeria is here, hunting me. But out there, past the reef, The Iron Oath is waiting. I am going to take her back, Garrick. Every single plank of her.”
Garrick stared down at the token. His chest heaved as a violent conflict raged behind his weathered face. The embers of a loyalty he thought had died five years ago were being violently fanned by the madman sitting across from him.
“You’re insane,” Garrick whispered, but his hand had stopped shaking. His fingers slowly closed around the wooden token. “We have no ship, no men, and the entire 제국 fleet is outside.”
Lucian’s smirk returned, brighter and more dangerous than before. “Then it’s a fair fight. Get up, boatswain. We have a midnight appointment with an empire to keep.”