Rohaan's eyes widened as he stared up at her, alight with the kind of wicked joy an arsonist finds watching a wildfire. His little fists curled and raised in the air like a mighty conqueror, he roared, "MASTER JA'AISEN!" Clearly, he approved of that development. His shout brought a curious Berlin to his door, peeking his head out and shaking his head with a faint smile. The captain was wearing only his loose white shirt, not his dark vest, and he wore no shoes. A pipe was in his mouth, hanging from the corner between his teeth; the dark wood was gnarled, showing years of subtle chewing and clenching of teeth. It was encouraging to see Rohaan speaking to Hanabaptiste, and heartening also to see her willingly engaging without any visible fear or trepidation. When he brought the lad on board two years prior, he not only had to convince the kid, but his crew, too. He understood the hesitation. Even he was nervous taking on a shifter. But slowly they all learned that he was quite human after all, and Berlin came to understand why he was the way he was. There was a lot he didn't know, but he could sure guess as to what kinds of hardships brought the boy to such a fierce existence.

Rohaan accepted the paper and charcoal and began scrawling out each letter that he knew, softly sounding them out as he made sure they were the right ones. He wrote R, O, H, A, N, I, J, S, E, B, and after a long time of scratching his head and trying to remember, he wrote L. Essentially, he knew the letters in his names and Berlin's. He pointed at each in turn, showing her the pronunciation as best he knew. Of course, his idea of pronunciation was based wholly on how either his name or Berlin's was spoken, and it did not occur to him that letters like E could have multiple pronunciations.

"That's all I know," he said. "How many are there anyway?" He studied the other letters on the paper, then circled all the ones in her names that he didn't know. "What are these ones? I know it says Miss Seuville, you said so. But what are the names of all the letters? And where's the eeee sound at the end when you say it? Because it's got one, but you don't say it. Right?"


-----

Uban visibly relaxed. "Good. I like both of those as they are," he chuckled. "I mean...yeah. I s'pose there's no harm in seeing what it's about, eh? You'll have to really start me off at the beginning, but uh, aye, I'd be honored to learn from you." And he was. Uban loved both Pieter and Berlin, but there was something about the older sailor that Uban saw in himself, or perhaps something he wanted to be--he wasn't exactly sure. Besides, his father, when he was still at home, was a lousy drunkard who left working the farm to him most of the time. He had not been a kind man, but Uban loved him anyway--he was still his father after all. But when he'd killed Torvin, that sense of familial kinship was torn away from him. His sister no longer wanted to speak to him, and his mother just cried whenever he tried to talk to her. He was sent away, and from that moment on, they were gone. Uban felt like an orphan until he joined the Borealis, where at least he felt like he belonged. Now, for Pieter to see something in him worth cultivating, to take him under his wing and share with him something that was so important to him...well...it almost felt fatherly.

"Does this mean I'll get me some fancy tattoos like you got? That's what those are, ain't they?"