The Rose and the Skull

1

The smaller, nimbler Ergothian pirate ship steadily drew away from Donkaren, much to the chagrin of the slower ship's captain. Sir Wayhollan Farstar stood on the forecastle of his war galleon and pounded her skull-carved rail with his mailed fist, watching in disgust as the black-sailed sloop receded toward the shore of the Isle of Cristyne. He'd hunted the black sloop across the Sirrion Sea and down the coasts of Northern Ergoth for many a week now, and just when it seemed she was in his grasp, she'd escaped, aided by a fair wind, slipping past his sentry ships in the night and sailing south. If ever she reached the harbors of Cristyne, there was little even he could do. Cristyne was officially neutral territory, but the people there cared little for the authority of the Knights of Takhisis, even going so far as to harbor wanted pirates-"privateers" they called them. Everyone knew the citizens of Cristyne were allied with the Knights of Solamnia, and Captain Farstar suspected the black sloop was but a front for Solamnic operations. From Palanthas to the Bay of Balifor, she had harried the Knights of Takhisis's shipping for many a month, knocking off supply ships and avoiding every war galleon sent to capture her. Donkaren was a fast warship and her captain experienced, but as he watched the sloop grow smaller and smaller, Captain Farstar knew she'd escaped once again. That knowledge ate at him like a cancer.

"More sail!" he shouted.

"Captain, we've run up every yard of cloth we have on board," said the first mate behind him. "We can do nothing against this unfavorable wind."

"Where can we find more wind?" the captain wondered aloud.

"In the olden days, a cleric might have served, praying to our Dark Queen for a wind to aid us," the mate answered, "but of course, nowadays… "

"Nowadays Takhisis doesn't answer our prayers, I know," the captain finished for him.

"You haven't got a rabbit's foot, have you? I'd settle for a little luck."

"Nay sir," the mate chuckled. "I haven't. A kender's foot is luckier, they say."

"You haven't got one of those, have you?" the captain asked.

"Nay sir. I lost mine in a game of dice before we set sail," the first mate said solemnly. "We might toss salt over our shoulders."

"That's only if you spill it, to ward off bad luck," the captain said.

"Aye, that's right. I had forgotten, sir," he sighed. "Me old mother used to have a store of knowledge about such matters, the gaining and losing of luck. Let me see if I can remember any of it, though I fear it was all poppycock." He snapped his fingers and slapped the palm of his hand against his forehead, as though trying to knock loose the memories from his brain.

Captain Farstar checked the progress of the black sloop. It was but a tiny dot in the distance, almost lost against the rising bulk of the Isle of Cristyne.

The captain swore under his breath, but the mate was still stuck on the subject of good luck. "There was something about a broom and a chair," he said absently while tapping his teeth with his finger. "Perhaps you are supposed to swallow something. Now what was it?"

Captain Farstar was just about to lift the mate by his belt and throw him into the sea when the lookout above called, "She's turning, sir!"

"What's that you say?" the captain shouted.

"The black sloop, she's tacking east, sir," the lookout answered.

"Are you certain?" he asked as he ran to the bowrail and peered as best he could over the waves.

"Perhaps it was bread," the mate muttered.

"Yes sir, she's turning hard to port. It looks as though she's got into some reefs and is trying to avoid them," the lookout said.

"There are no reefs on the north side of the island," Farstar remembered aloud. He barely made out the profile of the ship against the dark shore of the island, and he wished he had some kind of farseeing glass like the kind the gnomes made.

"She's running, sir. She's putting on full sail and running!" the lookout shouted with joy.

"Takhisis be praised. Maybe she does still hear our prayers," Captain Farstar said.

"Prepare to come about!"

The first mate was jolted into action. The ship began to creak and groan as the sailors hurried to their tasks. He shouted up to the lookout, "What's she running from?"

"Can't tell, sir," the lookout answered.

"Come about. Helm, steer for the head of the island. We'll catch her there." Donkaren heeled over as the helmsman steered to port and the stronger wind took her sails. Salt spray began to burst from her bow as she cleft the waves, gaining speed.

"There's a true lucky sign," the first mate shouted into the rising wind. "A dragon-shaped cloud, blowing in from the west."

"I see it," the captain shouted in answer.

He looked up. The lookout was shouting and pointing at something, but he couldn't hear what the man said. He walked back along the starboard rail to get out of the spray so he could see. Following the line of the lookout's arm, he saw the man pointing to the same cloud the first mate had spotted.

The cloud was indeed dragon-shaped. It had even grown a little in the last few minutes.

Suddenly, the cloud dipped lower, closing on the fleeing black sloop. Captain Farstar felt a lump rise in his throat and watched in growing terror as the cloud slipped in above the mast of the Ergothian ship. Rooted to the deck, he could not turn away or shout orders; he could only watch in horror. Fire boiled out from the cloud and descended on the tiny pirate ship, flames leaped along her deck, swallowed her sails. Little globules of fire began to leap into the water all along her sides, and Captain Farstar knew they were the shapes of men, the ship's crew, now living torches desperately seeking the water.

The dragon banked, rising, and turned for another pass at the pirate ship. At that moment, Captain Farstar found his feet and his voice.

He turned and raced toward the helm, shouting, "Bring her round, bring her round! Put the wind at her back!" So riveted by the sight was the helmsman that the captain reached the helm before he responded. Captain Farstar threw his weight against the wheel and swung her around himself.

As the ship turned, the wind rippled out her sails and filled them with a boom. They strained taut, and the masts creaked; the ship lurched forward. The crew had not moved; they all watched the spectacle in silent fascination. Captain Farstar glanced back over his shoulder.

The black sloop was a pillar of fire and billowing black smoke. The dragon glided over her bow, headfirst into the flames, and it settled on her, beating its wings to hold itself aloft. The monster was so enormous, the pirate ship looked like a toy beneath it, and she sank almost immediately under the dragon's weight. The sea closed over her in a rush of steam, mercifully dousing her flames. The dragon rose off her, pounding the air with its huge wings, and aided by the thermals rising from the steam, it soon soared high above the wreck. Only the ship's mast still stood above the water-charred and licked by flames. Captain Farstar turned back to the helm.

His crew erupted in yells of delight, cheering the dragon. "Captain, why are we turning?" the first mate asked. "He's a red dragon, for sure. You can tell by his fiery breath. The reds are our allies."

"Open the weapons locker," the captain responded. "Distribute crossbows to all hands!"

"Why, what for?" the mate asked.

"Do it, man!" the captain ordered.

With a puzzled expression, the first mate turned to obey. As he walked slowly along the poop deck, he returned the questioning gazes of the crew with baffled shrugs while he fiddled with his keys, searching for the one that opened the weapons locker. Spray from the leaping bow drenched the deck and the sailors on it.

One of the men pointed and said, "Here he comes."

"Coming to check us out, to see why we're running, I'm sure," the first mate responded lowly, so his voice wouldn't carry.

"He'll not attack, once he sees our flag, will he?" a man asked, brushing salt spray from his eye.

"Of course not. Once he sees our lily and skull design, he'll leave us be. No red would dare attack one of the Dark Queen's ships," the mate said. "Ah ha! there you are." He slid the correct key into the massive lock sealing the weapons locker and turned it. The lock popped open.

"By the gods, he's a big one," the crewman said with undisguised awe.

"Nay, he only looked big in the distance, on account of…" The first mate's voice trailed off as he glanced up and saw the dragon approaching on the wind. He stepped back and shouted up to the captain, "Sir, what kind of dragon is that? He looks awful big!"

"He's not one of ours," the captain answered.

His eyes still locked on the dragon, the first mate opened the locker with a sharp jerk on the handle. He stepped inside and began handing out crossbows and boxes of heavy quarrels.

The captain maintained his stand at the helm while sending the helmsman below to assist the first mate. He stood alone, the sharp sea spray dousing his hair, and muttered unheard curses into the wind, occasionally glancing back to check the progress of the dragon. As it drew closer, the dragon's wings seemed to spread out across all the sky, from horizon to horizon. Never before had Captain Farstar seen such a dragon, and he'd served in the Dark Queen's navy since before the Chaos War. He had heard of such dragons, new dragons from across the sea. Larger and more powerful than any dragons ever before encountered, they cared little whom they attacked or whom they destroyed.

The first mate ordered the sailors and soldiers of Donkaren to their posts. The captain, watching his crew moving as though in a daze, their eyes ever on the dragon, already knew his ship was lost. Still, he held to the wheel, hoping against hope. He drew his saber and glanced once more over his shoulder.

The dragon came in at mast-height. The scales of its underbelly were the color of desert rock-a dull burnt orange that seemed to radiate heat. Its bulk filled all the sky, its great shadow blocking out the sun, so that it seemed the ship had sailed into the Abyss. The dragon's wings robbed Donkaren of her wind, and her sails began to droop. She slowed. The sailors and soldiers along her rail stared up in fascinated horror, like nestlings hypnotized by the serpent approaching their nest. The dragon's great head, almost as large as the ship itself, snaked down to gaze at them in return. The dragon seemed almost to hover above them, to hang impossibly in the air, its wing tips dipping hissingly in the sea. The heat emanating from its body beat down on the crew's upturned faces like an unseen sun, drawing the moisture from their mouths and their eyes, drying ropes and rigging, stiffening salt-encrusted sails. Steam began to rise from the decks.

"Fire your weapons!" the captain shouted, but it seemed as though the sound of his voice was also sucked up by the intense heat of the dragon's body. "Damn your hides," he croaked. "Attack!"

The dragon's great head snapped around to stare at the captain at the sound of his voice. Captain Farstar stiffened, then staggered back as if from an unseen blow. The dragon's jaws parted.

The first mate had dragged his crossbow to his shoulder. His muscles felt numbed, paralyzed, like in a nightmare, every movement an agony. He sighted at the dragon's eye and pulled the trigger.

At that moment, the dragon breathed. A pillar of white hot liquid fire descended upon Captain Farstar and burst through the deck to the cabins below. Wood, canvas, rope, flesh, all erupted in flames or turned instantly to ash from the heat. The first mate watched his bolt rise toward the dragon's eye, trailing smoke. The fletching turned to ash without ever catching fire, and it veered off course, striking the dragon's neck and bouncing off its scales. As it fell, it burst into flame and was consumed before ever it reached water.

And then it was gone. The dragon vanished from overhead with a roar of wind. Fire leaped along the rigging. The ship's pitch seams began to bubble as flames raced below deck. Men dashed about, screaming, some of them alive with flame, others wild-eyed, crying, tears streaking their soot-stained faces. They abandoned the ship in droves, and those who could swam for the distant shore of the Isle of Cristyne. The dragon swooped over them and doused them in flame. The sea exploded in steam.

The first mate stood at the rail, an intense heat, burning through to the soles of his feet. He knew any moment the deck would collapse, but his only thought was to remain with the ship. "She's my ship now, my duty. I'm her captain, if only for a moment," he said aloud, to no one. A flaming yardarm crashed through the deck behind him, and roaring flames shot up through the hole. As the rigging burned through, the wind lifted the sails out to sea. Ghostly flaming sheets rising on the breeze, they shredded into tatters and wisps and fell with a hiss into the water. Donkaren began to settle as she burst her seams and let in the sea.

Then, the dragon came again, like a whirlwind, its huge wings thumping the air as it descended on the ship from above. As it dropped, it stretched out its claws and took the ship by the bow, staving in her sides with its massive talons. The dragon was much too large to settle on the ship, so it kept its wings moving, but still its massive weight dragged her down by the bow. Her stern rose into the air.

The first mate held to the door of the weapons locker to keep from sliding down the ship's sloping deck. The sea rushed up, dousing the flames but sending up a scalding steam. With a groaning hiss, she slipped below the waves, and the first mate, holding tight, went with her. The blue closed over his head. He released his hold and rolled in the sudden quiet of the sea, feeling her cool hands ease his burns.

As he slowly sank into the dark, the first mate saw the ship rising above him. He watched in awe as her blackened sides slid by him, massive, like the passing of a great whale. She rose to the silver surface overhead and burst free of the water, leaving it and taking to the air. Her passing pulled him up with her, and finally, he too breathed free air again.

He bobbed on the surface for a moment, then found a bit of wreckage and climbed wearily atop it. He noticed with some surprise that it was the door to the weapons locker. Exhausted, he rolled over and looked up at the darkening sky. There he saw the dragon, rising, Donkaren gripped firmly by the bow and streaming water out all her holes. Like some great bird of prey with a fish in its claws, the dragon flew slowly away to the west.