RP:Vessel of Mystery

Summary: Barnabas finds himself a captain once more of a strange ship that by all rights shouldn't float. With the troblin shamaness Dyzz by his side, a key player in its acquisition, they work to get it in working order and uncover its secrets. By chance (or fate) Celaeno and Rilling find their way over and are recruited into helping translate the odd spell book that goes along with the ship. Joyous reunions and scary surprises abound!

Fisherman's Wharf

The stone boulders that previously formed the structure jutting out into the ocean quickly give way to a much wider oaken wharf of water-proofed planks and the occasional granite pillar. This spot is as far out to sea as the wharf reaches and has thus become the most popular location for fishermen of both business and pleasure. There are literally dozens of fishermen, some with little wooden boats, and others content to simply cast their rod over the side. Many of those gathered chat amongst themselves amidst the calming sea air, the soothing sounds of the ocean and the salty tang of the seaweed that clings to the pillars of wood and stone that hold the wharf above the sea. To provide to the needs of the fishermen there is a small wooden stall and a merchant pedalling all kinds of useful gear and equipment from rods to small bags of writhing earth worms that can be uses as bait. The only route away from this place is following the stone and wooden structure that winds back towards majestic Cenril in the east.

Barnabas Bones stood tall, a head over most bodies that busily crowded the wide harbor of Cenril. He was dressed in some striking white finery, interlaced with ostentatious embellishments of gold thread, and this contrasted sharply with the rough and worn textiles that the working men about him wore. Most were consumed with laborious tasks such as the setting and hauling of ropes and winches, loading and unloading of various cargos, and the transport of wagonloads of fresh fish that were presumably netted a few hours prior, before the sun rose. The smells and sounds raised an appropriate din. Bobbing at its suspiciously secured moorings along the many sleek and trim ships at the docks was one particularly decrepit vessel, covered in slimes and algaes and corals as if having been fossilized along the seabottom. And yet, there it sat, floating despite the many gaping sections of its hull. A few sailors curiously puzzled over this craft, but most were too busy with their labors to mill about it. The lanky pirate, unlike the bustling teamsters and gangway men, remained rooted where the marinas met and funneled into the quay as he conversed with his blue-skinned company that was Dyzz. "So, we got a 'ealthy source o' lumber on its way this evenin', but if nailin' a board t'the deck goes anything like tryin' to peel off that slime, the ship won't 'ave none ovvit. Like we're missin' somethin', Dyzz." As he spoke he began to fish about in his oilskin haversack and his mottled gaze followed random passersby as if there were something to guard about its contents.

Dyzz was a head shorter than anybody else at the pier... two heads shorter. Next to the tall Bones, she was quite the figure. She wore her usual garb, but with a curtain of flaming hair full of shiny treasures, and a bandana on her head. "Dyzz gots you lumber, Dyzz'll get you's a way to put it on." Wood didn't take to the ship. Like trying to heal the undead, it was... counter productive, at best. They had to find a means to integrate it, if the captain was to have his ship visibly passable. Dyzz didn't much see the point, but then again, she was more limber than a human, or zombie, and much less concerned with the consequences of falling off of a moving vessel. She'd taken her stone headed axe into the woods a few hours back, and dragged back wagonloads of lumber, which meant she probably had something in mind in the way of making it work with the ship. "Wood could use bit a seasonin', but Dyzz don't think that'll be an issue, if can find a way to make it accept. And Dyzz think know the person for ferreting out them secrets." Martuld was a good deal more intelligent than Dyzz, and had a particular slang and manner of speech that distinguished her greatly from the troblin. "Celaeno comin'. The spirits will lead her to us. They say she's the one to help, so it'll be ok." She certainly put a lot of faith in the spirits. Dyzz leaned on a great club that seemed more sized for an ogre than a troblin... but have no doubt, she could swing it just as effectively.

Celaeno was indeed coming, though through no intention of her own as she made her way from Cenril's Great Library with fresh dark circles under her eyes, perhaps more visible against her tawny skin in the daytime. The sun's rays on her face glared like she had drank too much, when really she had been staring at runic and historical texts with small print for too long. Her winter robes still gave her enough protection against the cool seabreeze for her to be comfortable and her keeping her gauntlets tucked under her sleeves aided in keeping the metal from becoming too icy to the touch. When she glances back toward in front of her, nearly running into a sailor walking past who managed to twist away with his load at the last moment, she forgets her usual muttered apology when she spies the ocean and a peculiar craft. She may not be very knowledgable about ships and sailing them, but she knew when something shouldn't be seaworthy...especially with so many gaps in the hull. Her nose wrinkles and her curiosity drives away the tired glaze over eyes as she wanders closer. It meant she was distracted enough not to spy either of the two owners of the craft and stood in the middle of everything trying to figure it out. She could be a quite the unintentional nusciance when she found herself in a trance…

Rilling me heard a familiar voice the voice of one she had thought long gone. A wispy breeze gathered with her step as she wandered perplexed towards the confusing nostalgia. Thought of a unorthodox early beginnings cycled through her head glazing over details, yet leaving the base importance and impact. It is then that the scraggly looking child would be visible draped in an old and worn leather tunic stained and worn with time as well a similar quality capped adorned upon a head of matted hair. Appearing no older than 5 at most the elf featured child had striking features of pale white skin, patches of scales, violet glazed eyes and most striking of all a small pair of what appears to be dragon wings. The winged child would stop and stair at the group before remarking in her confusion. “Aye, you be all ones I seen…” After oncluding this fragment the childs ees would go wide as she stared up at the troblin before her, once much larger than her and now practically almost on equal footing “Ah..aw.. Aye see you a’gen?” she choked out in her absolute loss for words.

Barnabas spoke with his face nearly buried in the pack that he searched. "Better t'work an' fit it while th'woods green, by m'own experience anyways," he suggested to Dyzz. The little blue prophet thing said a name then that sparked the pirate's recent memory, a person whose brain Barnabas very much intended to pick about certain specific and esoteric topics, and this gave him pause in his rummaging to look up. First to Dyzz, then down the pier a short ways to where the very person of mention stood, as if she just spontaneously materialized. His dark dreadlocks swayed against his neck and shoulders as he turned his head back to Dyzz, then to Celaeno and back again. Her precognition, though he was beginning to expect it from her, forced a slackened look of incredulity over his face. Barnabas hadn't mentioned the woman to the goblin shaman -was she rifling through his mind, or was it simply that none of this was coincidental, and that morphic fields had intertwined the threads of fate here on this midday scene along the coast? An approaching orphan would have seemed to indicate the likelihood of the latter, but Barnabas had already turned towards the end of the pier by the time Rilling hailed Dyzz in her enigmatic way, and he hardly noticed that the blue goblin didn't stick at his side as he did. A smile had fallen on his lips once he followed Celaeno's distracted eye to the anomalous ship. A ship that, most certainly, would be a fish castle if not for some very unnatural magic. "Quite a sight, innit, friend?" said Barnabas as he took a few steps down the pier, not entirely concerned with frightening the unaware woman, as demonstrated by a sudden clap of his boney hands not far over her shoulder. He glanced back to see Dyzz being engaged by Rilling, and shook his head. Kids, he thought, oughtta be smarter than approach any tusked blue-skinned stranger they see walking the Cenril docks...Then again, this child sported a set of wings that gave even him cause to hesitate. "My recent windfall," explained Barnabas to Celaeno vaguely as he turned his attention back to the ship with a sweeping gesture, almost as if he didn't see the great state of disrepair -nay, veritable decay that it was presently in. "An' it's somethin', alright. A fine bout o' coincidence I seen ye walkin' about though, cause I meant t'ask yer educated opinion on some matters. Ye recall m'specific field o' interest I questioned ye about back in Kelay, aye? Well I'd be graciously in yer debt if ye took a bit o' time t'appraise somethin' fer me..."

Dyzz couldn't have been prepared for this, for Rilling to appear so suddenly. It tugged on her heartstrings in an unspeakable way, like a child coming home. She dashed, straight at Rilling, and tackled her to the ground. She was showering her with kisses, and her face was streaked with tears. She was crying, and she was making no sense. "Rillingwherhaveyoubeenwhendidyoulearntotalkhowareyoudoinggobbledobbygarbleydeegook," And so forth. She was clinging to her Rilling for dear life, like she'd never again let her go, and that may very well be the case. For the next few minutes, at least, Barnabas was on his own to ponder these mysteries.

Rilling me couldn’t of also prepared for this, she was indeed not prepared. Suddenly finding herself stuck in the grasp of a very strong troblin she started to quiver and shake as a look of apprehension came across her mug quickly she verbally darted out towards Dyzz “Eeee, please en down…” as she wriggled and writhed growing icey and pointed to the touch. Her hat found it’s way towards the ground revealing the helplessly tangled and uneven cut mane atop of it. The draconian kid’s gaze suddenly shot off towards all her surroundings. “Aynostelee, aye was jus sellin fiiiiishe” she added as a desperate tangent seemingly at random

Celaeno’s half-elven hearing on top of the surprise makes her stumble back into the nearest gentleman walking around her back with a relatively heavy crate of something fragile in his meaty arms. He sways toward the edge of the pier, toward the water, before righting himself and throwing the young mage a glare that could curdle dairy. Perhaps it was the fancily dressed Mr. Bones beside her that deterred any more retaliation. Meanwhile, the aspiring necromancer rubs her shoulder and glances up at the sailor who had oh so suddenly approached her, to her awareness at least. “Good day to you as well, Mr. Bones. It is...intriguing. A magical vessel that even you cannot sink, cursed as you are?” Her tone went up in evident hope as her attention wandered back to mentally picking the thing apart. “You wouldn’t need me to appraise something about your new acquisition, would you?” The joyous reunion behind her makes her swivel around to psy what the commotion was about, only to catch a scantily clad blue woman either kissing or devouring a small child with scales and a set of wings…? The extravagant display of what she assumed to be affection or a late lunch has her slowly turning around back toward the ship, assuming it to be none of her business. Besides, the tiny pair seemed too occupied for questions at the moment and with the decayed ship floating in front of her, she wasn’t in a noble sort of mood.

Dyzz was the one person that wasn't a native to Frostmaw a bunch of supernatural chill and spikes wouldn't affect at all. She did pull back, though, giving Rilling some space. "You sell fish, now? Oh, Rilling. You've grown so much!" Channeling the spirit of Martuld, Dyzz was more intelligent than usual. "Dyzz working on a ghost ship, is spoopy. Wanna come see?" At least she was making sense, now.

Barnabas quickly assessed a similar conclusion from the foray of Dyzz and Rilling as Celaeno: best to leave that one be. The commotion and noises were raucous, and the pirate really thought it in the realm of possibility that his new first mate was in the process of devouring a small child before the whole piblic eye of Cenril. He removed his hat, revealing the looser, matted roots of his ropeyarn head, and held it behind his back in an almost statesman like manner as he matched syepwwith Celaeno down the pier. His eyes lingered on the mass of coral that encrusted what one might presume was once a figurehead on the ship's stern, and as the two walked past it, even finer details of something more likely to be found on the seafloor than on its surface became apparent. Besides gaping holes, there were barnacles and vegetation, even an occasional tentacle to be seen fleeting through the gaps in its compromised hull. A single form could be seen on its slime-covered and pitfall littered deck, but it wasn't moving. The statuesque form stood rigidly at the gap in the gunnels midship where the gangplank laid route aboard from the dock. "Aye, don't reckon even I could sinkit," confirmed Barnabas as he and Celaeno drew nearer to the gangplank. The sentry could be seen in better detail then, too. He wore rotting clothes, but not a scrap of flesh could be seen on account of a shrewdly wrapped crimson fabric across his face. In fact, it was odd this short being stood guard, since it appeared he could not see. Celaeno might have been able to sense a specific necrotic magic radiating from not just him, but the ship itself. "But that ain't necessarily it...they ain't quite zombies like I was chattin' about with ye, but they ain't quite 'live like you an' me." Barnabas stopped short of the gangplank and began picking through his haversack again. "Wot it is, see, is this. Funny thing I found in the cap'n's box...reckon it was a ship log, but I can't make sense ovvit. Looks more like a spell book t'me, runes and other gobbledygook." As he finished his sentence, he produced the object and held it out for Celaeno to see. It was a tome, but not like any usual book of any age. It appeared entirely metallic, bound and bracketted with bands of some rune inscribed black steel. The pages themselves were immacute, thinly pressed sheets of the samr dark metal. Barnabas extended it to Celaeno. "Maybe y'could take a look? Figured y'ad a mind fer learnin' stuff, an' maybe ye know someone 'at could 'elp. I don't know why, but I trust ye."

Celaeno had sensed an odd sort of aura radiating from the ship, though her sense to distinguish what kind wasn’t as honed as a more seasoned practitioner of those dark arts. Those figure gave it away, though, making her stormy eyes near bug out and her jaw slacken with evident fascination. “By every god I’ve heard of...this is a find.” She wandered ahead of the pirate, stepping dangerously close to the edge of the pier where she would be guaranteed to fall in the water and possibly drown if she lost her balance, if someone who remembered she couldn’t swim didn’t stabilize her first. For the third time in that short spanse, she would find herself taken in by something, completely forgetting her manners as she replied toward Barnabas, not even maintaining eye contact, as was proper when addressing someone. “But you have seen them move and conduct actions by themselves, I trust? I wonder what powers them…” It was the words “spell book” that snapped her from her observation. She should have turned back to a dock full of bustling sailors, ready to greedily snatch the lavishly runed, metal smithed tome so she could pour over it as she had done with the literature in the library. What she finds, however, is a flock of corpses in varying states of decay, much like the entities on that ship in fact standing where those sailors, Barnabas, and even the two petite companions once were. They stared at her with hollowed sockets, unmoving and silent. Of course, the others gathered would see none of this, and perhaps a shaman of Dyzz’s caliber would feel something off in the area for as long as the girl apparently stared at the pier as if it were full of such horrors. Her eyes widened with fear rather than glee, the half-elf unfortunately edging back away from where she perceived the macabre vision, right over the edge of that dock unless someone were to react fast enough…

Celaeno had sensed an odd sort of aura radiating from the ship, though her sense to distinguish what kind wasn’t as honed as a more seasoned practitioner of those dark arts. Those figure gave it away, though, making her stormy eyes near bug out and her jaw slacken with evident fascination. “By every god I’ve heard of...this is a find.” She wandered ahead of the pirate, stepping dangerously close to the edge of the pier where she would be guaranteed to fall in the water and possibly drown if she lost her balance, if someone who remembered she couldn’t swim didn’t stabilize her first. For the third time in that short spanse, she would find herself taken in by something, completely forgetting her manners as she replied toward Barnabas, not even maintaining eye contact, as was proper when addressing someone. “But you have seen them move and conduct actions by themselves, I trust? I wonder what powers them…” It was the words “spell book” that snapped her from her observation. She should have turned back to a dock full of bustling sailors, ready to greedily snatch the lavishly runed, metal smithed tome so she could pour over it as she had done with the literature in the library. What she finds, however, is a flock of corpses in varying states of decay, much like the entities on that ship in fact standing where those sailors, Barnabas, and even the two petite companions once were. They stared at her with hollowed sockets, unmoving and silent. Of course, the others gathered would see none of this, and perhaps a shaman of Dyzz’s caliber would feel something off in the area for as long as the girl apparently stared at the pier as if it were full of such horrors. Her eyes widened with fear rather than glee, the half-elf unfortunately edging back away from where she perceived the macabre vision, right over the edge of that dock unless someone were to react fast enough…

Dyzz was perceptive. Even distracted as she was by Rilling, she kept an ear to the wind, and the spirits warned her of danger before it came to pass. She was there when Celaeno started all but leaning over the edge of the pier, and she'd grab the back of her shirt, bunching it up with a twist so it wouldn't tear, and holding her back. She was staring, then, and she could see the fear in her eyes. She tugged her down to the ground when she started backing up, and held her close... with a strength that would brook no protest. "Is bad juju. Barnabas, help Dyzz get her onto the ship. Once she focused, she be ok." It seemed counter intuitive to take the traumatized woman onto a ghost ship, but Dyzz seemed to think she knew what she was doing... and it was Martuld's wisdom she was channeling. If Dyzz had to, she would bodily haul her up onto the ship. "Come, Rilling! Adventure awaits!" She'd call over her shoulder, while cooing to Celaeno. "Shh, shh. Bad juju, but nothing can't handle. Shh, shhh." If Celaeno seemed a danger to herself, Dyzz had all manner of ways to handle it.

Rilling me seemingly found herself in an odd situation, she was being wrangled in a most unfortunate fashion and noticed the odd pair well normal pair when compared to her and dyzz were up to something in a eerie ship. Why she had never explored this area herself was a question for another day. Before she found herself able to ponder much longer though she found herself saddled and tossed across the troblin’s shoulder’s leaving her agasp as her head dangled upside down. With an exasperated huff the dragonling found herself uncontrollably chilling the atmosphere as the winds became frigid her body heat and temperature plummeted with a loud kasplat she would find herself upon the floor hopefully able to regain her composure to the scene “Ah wen then did aye fin a venture?” she exclaimed while finding her feat. Amidst all the chaos Rilling finally found herself within eyeshot of that strange tome everyone else had been praddling about. Ignoring everything else she found herself grasping at it crazy eager to make off with it.

Barnabas Bones' brow knit in a crumple of confusion as he apparently took on a hellish demeanour in Celaeno's sudden shift in reality. He held the tome out still while her heel slipped over the boards above the sea, and so he couldn't reach out to catch her winter robe in time. Lucky for her, Dyzz came by like a blue blur and yanked her up. Well, maybe lucky, since then the very undead horrors that frightened her a second ago were now ushering her -and quite forcefully- onto this ship. Barnabas wasn't necessarily rough about it, he simply nudged her aboard between Dyzz and the energetic dragonling, with the otherworldly tome in his hand. The formerly motionless sentry took one wide step aside to allow passage from the gangplank to the deck. Barnabas grinned when Rilling hit the deck, literally, but his face stormed over with annoyance when she darted for the artifact he held. With a snap of his long, spindly arms, he held it high and away from the child and shot Dyzz a petitioning look. "Y'aright, Celaeno?" said the captain, standing beside the undead face wrapped sentry, his tone genuinely concerned if a bit strained while he tried to juke the book this way and that from Rilling's inquisitive hands.

Celaeno screamed as she was suddenly grabbed, despite it saving her from a near plummet to the lapping waters below. Concerned and annoyed glances alike were thrown the group’s way from the other sailors gathered around as the wriggling girl was hauled aboard, eyes squeezed shut as she thrashed about in Dyzz and Barnabas’ grasp, as well as some...skeletal fingers? That did not help the image her waking mind conjured up, still under the impression she was stuck in that nightmare world where everyone disappeared, dusty and cobwebbed as if abandoned for ages, and deathly faces took their place. This had happened only a couple times before, enough to make her wary, but none of them had ever moved to touch her. Dyzz might feel the woman’s gauntlets head up under her robe, and anyone else near might feel themselves thwacked by her metallic appendages, that finicky left one going crooked until her name and the odd tiny woman’s crooning snapped her back to reality. She blinked a moment, finally opening her eyes to the busty troblin that shackled her down with surprisingly strong arms and the undead beings milling about. Rilling would receive a proper glare, fierce with warning of violence, despite that she was scarcely out of her toddler years. But at least Celaeno’s gauntlets would cool and her thrashing stilled. That glare turned down to Dyzz next, the half-elf red-faced with evident embarrassment, even as her skin squirmed under the unfamiliar touch. “Unhand me you tiny brute! I can stand on my own.” Whether Dyzz complied or not with her demand, she would turn a softer, yet still stern facade toward the pirate. “I...it’s nothing relevant to the situation. My wits weren’t what they should be for a few moments, but I’m fine now. I...believe you mentioned something about a spell book?”

Dyzz would hold Celaeno until she seemed to be in her right mind, only grinning at her when she called her a brute. She looked to Barnabas before unhanding her though, cautioning him. "She's a dragon, young though she is, Barnabas. She doesn't know her strength. Be careful." For Dyzz, it wasn't an issue... she could handle as much as dragon parent could. Others... less so. She'd pat Celaeno on the head, before unhanding her. "Dyzz'll keep an eye on ya, miss Celaeno. Ye have a care, an worry not about nuthin', ye'll be well looked after. Yer free to study the ship at yer leisure... please do. There's many secrets here, mysteries we're trying to unravel." More of Martuld's influence warped her speech patterns.

Rilling me gasped as the book she was trying to wrestle was suddenly whisked back and forth out of her grasp. Suddenly a perplexed gaze fell upon Barnabas as the wheelhouse inside her head ticked and tocked trying to find a way to get her prize. An odd sight indeed as her thinking came along with alternating of what leg she was standing on back and forth. With that a lightbulb so to say went off and in the blink of an eye she fell head first into the human’s stomach, dive bombing him in a sense. “Aye, annna see the magic!” the small thing bellowed in an excitable yet also crazed tone. Small thing couldn’t even read but in all her Eyrie and Rynvale years had picked up on that books giving her an odd feeling were magic like her.

Celaeno pats out the new plethora of wrinkles in her robes, in her shirt, and even a few in her trousers. Despite Dyzz being an older being--how much mage had no idea--the patting of her head brings an unwelcome and unbecoming scrunching of her nose. “-Eyes- only, please,” she says, voice tight, curt, and perhaps bordering on offensive with its tone. Youthful pride did often trumped reverence for those who had both saved her life and had proven they were much stronger than her. The child’s pleas to “see the magic” garnered a bit more sympathy from the half-elf, having been the same way when she was younger begging her father to “teach the magic.” “Are you alright now, Mr. Bones?” She would check on the one she knew there, first, of course. Even if the young one reacted rather violently, though, she picks up her prize and walks up just behind the blinded corpse-like being, and holds up the book in both hands, not liable to drop it anytime soon, despite that her wrist seemed...broken at a crooked angle, with the way her gauntlet tilted one way further than it should. “The magic is for me, but if you promise not to try taking it, I will let you look at it as I turn the pages. Do we have a deal?” All the while her odd silver hands shined just as bright as that equally metallic tome.

Dyzz heard Celaeno's tone, and while just Dyzz would've been very, very upset to be talked down to... perhaps to the point of violence... Martuld was able to reign in that instinct. She gave her space, and went instead to stand close to Rilling, watching her movements, making sure she didn't summon too much of her power. Goodness knows, even on a ghost ship Rilling could be the most dangerous thing around. Celaeno had her object to focus on now, and Dyzz assumed she'd be alright, so long as she had that. Perhaps they'd talk more when she was feeling more amiable. Whatever was going on in her head, it wasn't all her up there, in her right mind. Or at least, so the spirits whispered. Dyzz crossed her arms under her bosom, and regarded everyone aboard the ship with a critical, scrutinizing gaze, planning, preparing.

Rilling me having regained her senses enough to realize what she had just done quickly backed away, or she would of if it hadn’t been that the human was surprisingly okay with her actions, in fact he seemed to even have a spring to his step and was vigorous to continue entertaining. With a mellowed shrug the dragoness found herself entertained by a new friend after all this time that wasn’t just interested in fishing supplies or directions. Letting out a light chuckle she continued on sparring with him so to say, OR SHE WOULD ANYWAY, all changed upon hearing the elf’s offer of letting her read a heel face turn was had as she dashed towards the lady and sat right in front of her in in an instant, this moment would show a better look of the girl dirtied but in high spirits most notably would be her long and straight knives for ears hinting at an elven ancestors high elf in this case. The girl has large patterns of scales throughout her skin, upon her palms, legs and nose were the most distinguished however. The girl was happy she had got what she had wanted, she just hoped there weren’t one of those word things in the magic thing, she had neglected to remember until now, that she couldn’t actually you know read.

Barnabas patted himself down as if to check that his parts were all intact after quickly catching his wind. His eyes worriedly darted about until they came to rest beyond the undead helmsman he had grown so quickly fond of, and there to his satisfaction he saw the tome safely in Celaeno's grasp. Even if her hand was on crooked. The captain caught Dyzz's motherly stance over the gathering quite endearing, as he couldn't help but crack a smile. "'S'alright, Skelton," said Barnabas to the masked and silent being, even though it was completely unnecessary -the many voices of the undead crew had taken up occupancy in the pirate's mind, and their communication was wordless. Skelton shifted some, facing Barnabas as he addressed him by his new nickname. Compliantly the stout undead being stepped aside to allow Celaeno and Rilling to both inspect the book. Possibly to Rilling's delight, the book did not contain words. At least, not in any conventional sense. It was, as Celaeno would find, entirely unique and something of a runic quandary.