Calisro sighed. Being in the same port as the Pixie always put her in a sour mood. It’d been years since the Decemvirate all but purchased the ship from her by “gifting” her the vessel she and her crew currently sailed. The new vessel—she’d cheekily named it the Glorious Payoff—never quite made its mark on her the way her old ship had. The Payoff certainly wasn’t inferior to the Grinning Pixie. Hells, being a newer vessel even made it superior in many ways. But the Pixie wasn’t just a ship, it was a lodge. And she never realized what that meant until she was no longer aboard.
Illustration by Kenneth Camaro Her ship—her former ship, she mentally chided herself once again—held so much excitement. More than she and her crew ever expected when they decided not to rob the agents that hired her for transport all those years ago. Piracy was boring in comparison—a realization that vexes her every time she sees her former vessel, and one hitting especially hard today.
“Enough o’ this!” she scolded herself. “Eras would laugh like there’s no tomorrow if I was mopin’ like this where he could see.” She’d talked herself back onto the Pixie several times for “joint operations,” but Eras the Needle, the Grinning Pixie’s current venture-captain, had finally had enough of that excuse. She’d accidentally tried to take command too many times, seems like. “Ship’s not mine anymore. Never really was. Faster you get that into your thick skull, Calisro, the faster we can get past it.” She gazed at her reflection in the polished shield in her captain’s stateroom, the closest thing to a mirror she bothered to keep. “You’re a gods-damned pirate, and even if you don’t care for theft like you used to, the sailing’s still in your blood. ’Sides, it’s not like we gave up on the piracy entirely.” A grin crossed her face as she thought of the countless Aspis transports and merchants flying Chelaxian colors she’d hit, and less savory types as well. “Besmara’ll see me drowned if I turn into a dour mess every time that ship’s in port with me.”
She looked into the mirrored shield, determination overtaking her features. “The Payoff don’t feel like mine ’cause I haven’t let it. Haven’t given it the chance to be the ship it deserves to be. The crew, too. They’re restless. They stayed out because this Society gig was as exciting for them as it was for me.” She began to pace across her cabin. “I’ll be damned if I spend my time sulking over that ship one more day. If adventure and the unknown is what made that ship feel like mine, then I believe we’ll just have to find some more.” She pulled out her sea charts, looking over ports and routes. “Been there. And there. Dozens of times there. Been all over this whole gods-damned Inner Sea ten times over or more. In that ship.” A realization slowly dawned on her face. “Then we’ll just go beyond.”
She dug through her charts, finding some older ones purchased long ago and never used. “Let’s hope that blasted Godsrain didn’t affect these routes too much.” She smiled to herself. “Hells, even if they did, it’ll just make things more interesting. Crew’s been dying for interesting. We’ll be going where the Society’s never been.” She rushed out her door and shouted for her first mate, an old iruxi salt named Ixfial who’d proven his worth countless times after she came into possession of the Glorious Payoff. Much of her crew had stayed from her old days as a Free Captain of the Shackles, but some had left to join that foolhardy assault on the Whispering Tyrant. They never returned.
“What’s the word, captain?” the tall, silver-scaled sailor asked, clearly ready to be back on the open sea himself.
“We’re set to sail? Water and provisions all aboard? I know we’ve got that kineticist we picked up in Riddleport, but I don’t want all our eggs in one basket.” She looked out over the crew and could sense the same restlessness she was feeling.
“Aye, captain. Ready at your command,” he said, grinning at seeing his captain acting more like herself.
“Consider the command given. We sail for Iblydos.” Calisro’s gaze was fixed on the southern horizon, opposite the bustle of Absalom to the ship’s north.
“Iblydos? But we’ve never…”
“Sailed those waters? Of course not! But we’re damned well going to fix that. A little voyage somewhere new wouldn’t cause you to molt on me, would it?” She grinned, chiding her first officer.
He recovered, a fierce smile now covering his face. This was the captain he knew. “Of course not, captain!” He turned to the crew and began to shout orders, readying the vessel to sail south.
As her crew began the arduous work of preparing the vessel, Calisro walked back to her cabin. “Decemvirate thinks they can just buy me off,” she muttered. “I’m a damned venture-captain, same as Eras. Can set up shop wherever I please. A pirate beyond that. Can plunder where I please. This is my ship, and the Glorious Payoff will see to it that we earn its namesake. No one else at the Society to get in my way, no existing relationships to worry about or scoldings from Eliza or that thrice-damned Decemvirate for ‘causing trouble.’ That lot didn’t seem to mind too much when I captured six Aspis caravels in as many days.”
Her old ship now entirely forgotten, she turned back to her charts. “Let’s see what the waters of the Kardaji Bay can offer me. Can’t imagine it’ll be boring.”
Illustration by Fabio Di Bernardi
Josh Foster
Pathfinder Society Developer
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