As they walked under the moonlight, Uban merely listened. For one thing, he didn't trust his own voice. For another, he was content to be in silence and just listen to his mentor recount his own first encounter. A sudden rush of fear, like he'd brushed with death and only just realized it, came over him. His eyes, though a little blurry from all the wine, looked at him with some mixture of awe and horror, but then after Pieter finished, he simply said,  "Thank you for not letting me drown." It was perhaps the most sincere thing he'd ever said, and not just because he valued his life and didn't want to die. No, Uban had known all along that Pieter would see to it that didn't happen. But he realized now that Pieter could have done it differently and he chose not to. In some way, Uban knew he cared. And that meant more to him than any prize the Borealis could have ever won. 

---


Berlin had been last to bed and first to rise the next morning. As time ticked on, he could feel each minute passing in an almost physical way, like each passing moment added to his anxiety and his simmering anger towards what had been done to that little port city. To members of his crew. To countless others out there before and yet to come. Typically Berlin was a bit blasé about attacking other ships--sometimes he would chase one down, other times he'd let one pass depending on his mood and how their supplies were doing (or how bored they were). But there were times when he did more than give chase and delight in the plundering. There were times he wanted blood. 

This was one of those times.

Berlin had breakfast ready for the crew. It wasn't anything special--just some oatmeal cooked quickly over the fire. And what gear they'd brought that wasn't actively being used, he'd already loaded and stowed. He didn't have to say anything for the crew to know he was anxious to get underway. He woke Rohaan and Uban, who were still snuggled close beside the fire as man and wolf. Uban, however, was less willing to actually get up, so Rohaan nipped his nose with his pearly wolf teeth gently. That was enough to get a bolt of adrenaline into Uban and truly wake him. 

Rohaan could sense the nearness of their impending battle, or at least that they were actively moving towards it and as they boarded and shoved off, the whole thing no longer seemed like something to be done later on. He didn't let this interfere with his duties. In fact, he was more attentive to them than usual because of it--after all, he wasn't sure how he felt about it all and wasn't keen to think about it, so he poured himself into his work instead. But in the moments between he was fidgety and quiet.

Berlin took some time to study his charts a bit before he pulled Pieter aside. He was trying to speak to him in a casual manner as friends, but his mind was clearly not in the right place for that and he had a business air about him. "I want that galley," he told him, tapping the gunnel impatiently as he looked out at the passing water. "But I don't know where they've gone and my ship, she's fast...but they've gotten distance from us now. How am I supposed to find them? I don't feel keen on letting them go..." he said as if preempting a suggestion that he ought to. And when Berlin got the mind to chase a target, he meant it and would not be easily swayed. "But even if I send Rohaan air-scouting day and night...the sea is so wide. I need your intuition, old friend."