Just a Hop, Skip and a Chomp Away, Open

[Abaddon the Black]

Mmmmm. Such yummy fish off the coast of the place Star called "The Docks". Abaddon hadn't found such good fishing since they stopped on that little island aways from Shalador six moon cycles before. Of course, the crew had gotten mad at him for eating most of the fish, but he didn't mind. The fish had been so lovely.

Abaddon swam around the Sea's Whore idly, slightly bored with the crew's preparations for the upcoming voyage. Starling had told him about the venture, how they were going to sail to the end of the realm and beyond, to the Shadow Realm. Personally, Abaddon thought the idea was about as smart as tunas fighting with dolphins and hoping to win, but he had kept the thought to himself. Of course, he was going with them, so he supposed that made him an idiot as well. But no way was he letting his Queen sail into uncharted waters without him.

He toyed with the idea of swimming under the ship again, but after the last time, which had included some strong witchfire balls, he had decided to only do that while out on the open sea. After all, Lir had looked rather serious the last time…

He swam around the ship for a bit, taking uninterested bites at passing fish and other sea creatures before something towards the docks caught his attention. He cautiously approached, nosing around the brightly colored nets before swimming away. Daft humans thought pretty colors would get fish into their nets? Idiots. Deciding that the Whore wouldn’t go far without Starling trying to contact him, Abaddon swam out past the underwater cliffs to hunt in the dark depths of the ocean. Maybe he would find something to bring back to the ship.

[Starling Greene]

Starling strolled about the beach, digging bare toes into sand while her boots hung from lightly clasped fingers. It had been a long while since she had been at the Docks. The last time she had sailed away from here, she had been sailing away with a newly stolen ship. The Whore had not always been hers. It had belonged to her husband. When she had sailed away with her ship, she had left him behind - along with any plans of seeing him ever again.

Now she was getting ready to leave again, on a voyage to the furthest reaches of the Realm. She didn't know when she was going to come back, or if. Looking out to her ship, feeling the presence of each man on it as firmly as the fingers on her hand, her mind began to wonder if she was going about the right path...

She smiled as she saw a dark shape off the coast, disappearing past the rocky outcropping that separated the Docks from the next territory. Vanishing her boots and splashing into the shallows, she sent a message on the Rose, casting it out into deeper waters where she knew a monster lurked. She wanted to forget her worries for a while. It was time to play.

*Findin’ anythin’ tasty?*

Not caring about her clothes, she kept walking until the water came up to her waist, before suddenly diving into the salt and swimming out to open sea. It was good if Abaddon was finding something to amuse himself. If he had been too near the ship, Star would have suspected that either he or Lir would have ended up in need of medical attention. And the Queen didn’t know if the Healer she had just hired on was quite prepared to heal massive shark bites - or massive sharks.