In a fit of what could only be described as compassion, Keelin didn’t run the man through, but instead gave him a shove that sent the old fool careening off the jetty into the murky waters of south port. He spent a moment flailing about before paddling to shore, all the while attempting to both keep his head above water and shout insults Keelin’s way – all of which seemed to revolve around his mother’s profession and how she most certainly went about it on her back.
Keelin stopped, turned back to his ship, and shouted up to one of his crew. “Anyone ain’t one of our boys comes anywhere near the The Phoenix, Olly, and you show them a real warm greeting.”
Olly laughed and gave a mock salute from his perch on the railing. He was a small lad, ever jovial and never without a quip or a story, but never had Keelin met someone so eager to get to the stabbing when there was stabbing to be done.
South port barely deserved the name, Keelin decided, and not for the first time, as he set foot on dry land. It was little more than a collection of rotting wooden huts held together by rusting nails and the tenacity of their inhabitants. North port was big, loud, heavily populated, and bordered on being considered a town in its own right. South port was small, run down, populated only by the dregs of humanity, and left discarded and forgotten by all those with better sense. Or, Keelin decided, all those who weren’t trying to hide from their past.
An old dirt road led out of south port into the looming forest, which Keelin knew from past experience was hot, close, and insect ridden, filled with dangers both mundane and beyond explanation. He also knew that the old dirt road led to Fango.
Yanic coughed, and Keelin noticed his first mate was standing beside him with a knowing smile on his face. “Boys are unloading the loot. All is left is ta haggle with Quartermain, Cap’n.”
“Suppose we best go see the old bastard then,” Keelin said. “Watch my back, Yan. Hostile waters and all that.”
With a last glance back towards his ship and one last glare at the harbour master, who was still preoccupied with insulting, threatening, and cursing Keelin all at once, they walked into the jungle.
Fango was by no means a normal town even by a pirate’s definition, and Keelin well knew piratical definitions were broad, meandering, and colourful at the best of times. The jungle on the Isle of Goats seemed to resist almost all efforts at deforestation with something approaching intelligent aggression. The more trees the residents cut down, the more sprang up from seemingly nowhere. An old sailor might fell a tree and build a house in its spot, and within a few months hundreds of new saplings would tear through the building, slowly turning it into an uninhabitable wreckage. The inhabitants of the town had, therefore, after many years of war with the jungle, learned to live with their giant wooden neighbours. Buildings were constructed around trees, some of which were the only reason said buildings were still standing. Keelin knew all too well that the town’s brothel had a giant of a redwood standing tall and straight in the main common area, and the owner had actually built cushioned seats onto the trunk upon which to display his wares.
Many industrious residents of Fango had even taken to building their houses halfway up the trees, so that a ladder was needed to reach their homes. Just how they’d managed to accomplish such a feat was a mystery to Keelin, but he suspected it took time, effort, and a lack of acrophobia. The result was clear though; the inhabitants had not only compensated for a lack of space by building upwards as well as outwards, but had learned to live with and even take advantage of an aggressive forest that resisted most normal attempts at habitation. Unfortunately, the entire town was under the sway of Tanner Black, and that cast a dirty shadow on what should have been world-renowned innovation.
“Place has grown some since we were here last, Cap’n,” said Yanic, staring in wonder at a building that was constructed around five separate tree trunks. It was at least three storeys high, and judging by the sign hanging outside it was a new tavern that had sprung up in their years of absence. “Prospered, ya might say.”
Keelin caught himself nodding along absently. “Let’s just go see Quartermain and get this over with.”
Their arrival went anything but unnoticed, and more than a few sets of eyes followed Keelin and his first mate as they entered Fango. One child, wearing dirty rags for clothing and no shoes, spotted them and ran off, scaling a tree without the use of the ladder set into its trunk and disappearing into a building at least thirty feet from the ground. A moment later an older face, female and wizened, leaned out of a window and watched them pass.
One giant of a man – Keelin guessed he stood at over seven feet – made no attempt to hide his interest in the newcomers. He watched them with a smile and pointed them out to his companions. Keelin noticed all three were armed, and all three looked as though they knew how to use those arms. He found himself thankful for the comforting presence of his twin cutlasses hanging from his belt, but wished he’d possessed the sense to instruct Yanic to come similarly prepared.
“Do folk seem a little… hostile ta you, Cap’n?” Yanic said as they approached the area of Fango that Quartermain called his own.
“Wary, I think is more appropriate, Yanic.” Keelin felt a distinct lack of confidence in his own words. “You would be too if you lived under Tanner’s rule.”
Yanic cleared his throat. “I did live under Tanner’s rule, and I was not wary – I was hostile.”
Keelin stopped outside a door he remembered well, a door with a sign nailed to it that read “Quartermain’s”. He looked at his first mate. “You were very hostile.” With that he pounded on the door three times and waited for a reply.
It wasn’t long before a muffled “Come in” drifted back, and Keelin pushed open the door to find the place much as he remembered. A burly oaf of a man, shorter than Keelin but with arms as thick as the trees that sprouted through the building, stood to the side to allow the pirates to pass. He nodded his thanks to Quartermain Junior and stepped through the doorway.
Quartermain Senior was standing behind a wooden counter, frowning down at one of numerous scrolls haphazardly sprawling its surface. “Sorry about the mess. Busy time and all that.” he said, indicating the immaculately kept front of his business. He looked up, squinting. “That you, Stillwater?”
Keelin grinned at the reaction; it had been many years since he’d last been back to Fango, and it was good to know those in charge still remembered his face. “Aye, ’tis me, Quartermain. How is…”
“Very sorry about this,” Quartermain interrupted just as the door slammed shut behind Keelin.
Keelin spun around, both hands going to the hilts of his cutlasses and both cutlasses unhooking smoothly from his belt. The first thing he noticed was Yanic looking anything but comfortable with a knife to his throat and a Quartermain attached to its hilt. The second thing he noticed was the person rated second highest on his “never wanting to see again” list.
“Stillwater,” Elaina Black said in a voice that fair dripped with smug satisfaction.
“Elaina,” Keelin replied in a voice that left no one in the room under any illusion that he didn’t regret making the decision to come to Fango.
Yanic cleared his throat. He looked panicked.
“Yanic,” Elaina said by way of greeting.
“Long time no see, Elaina. Ya mind telling this fool to drop his knife?” Yanic said, his voice rising with every word.
“Of course, Yanic, just as soon as your captain drops his, eh. So how about it, Stillwater?”
Keelin considered his options and decided they were camping on the bleak side of hope. He had no doubt that in a fair fight he could take both Elaina and Quartermain Junior, but he also had no doubt that Elaina never fought fair – and the first proof of that was the knife currently pressed to his first mate’s throat. With a heavy sigh he dropped both cutlasses to the floor and took a step backwards.