Audemus Dawnspark

Polaris

In the pellucid waters of this harbor, moonlit and still, the copper-bottomed hull of The Meadowshine looks less a color reminiscent of her namesake and more ethereal mother of pearl. Just an illusion — easily dispelled, unlike some others — dissipating readily into the ripples of his wake.

An orange flame dances along the wharf, a sentry’s lantern in steady patrol. A pause in his own choreography is required, sculling gelid water until the stage is once again his. An astern, unsecured Jacob’s ladder, slick with biofilm, limply drifts in the currents of the bay.

It almost seems too easy to sneak aboard, pruned fingers moving on wooden rungs, but it’s just another lapse in security he’s all too happy to take advantage of.

Or maybe he’s just very good at being in all the places he shouldn’t.

He leaves a trail of crystal lattice, drying himself with ice instead of heat: his soaked clothing a frosty carapace, his movements sloughing off salt rime and powder. A brinicle made alive, though there’s nothing here for him (now, or ever?) to touch and freeze the life from.

Everything is quiet, including the captain’s cabin.

There’s a speckled cerith in the desk drawer. It’s chipped on the aperture, notched with a sharp groove that brings a pinprick of blood to his fingertip when he takes it for his own. In its stead — tit for tat, life for life — he leaves a sliding knot suede thong.

Attached, a gyroscopic mechanism on the end, raw brass that’s just as likely to leave a mottled green pattern on the skin than not, and suspended between, a clear glass marble, worn smooth with age. Both materials piss-poor conductors for enchantment, but despite it, glowing with a network of stars, magically attuned with unerring aim towards the north celestial pole.

Taking the time to stow away his method of entry — more fun to leave people guessing — he opts instead to leave through a hawsehole barely wide enough for even his own slender form. The mooring rope reeks of dying algae bloom, but he shimmies down it anyway, not wanting to have to explain his presence here to anyone. In that regard, a corroded mooring bollard makes for a perfect hiding spot as a second watchman makes his rounds.

He resents the implication that he can’t play nice with others, that he has to do it for anyone’s sake but his own. He’s perfectly capable: it’s just a matter of playing by his own rules.