Markus was taken aback for a moment, though he did well to hide it. He had expected a quick vote or to be shot down immediately, not some strange pirate ritual. Morgan likely knew nothing of this either, else he would have said something. The room had grown quieter, now only with a few vague whispers reaching anyone's ears. Markus could even hear the creaks of the aisles and chairs, and the breathing of the cutthroats surrounding him. The slayer captain barked out something in a strange language. If memory served, the Dwarf tongue was called Khazalid. Sketti fired back a retort like a whip, and Markus couldn't tell if they were arguing or if they were old friends. 

"Well?" The Brettonian Captain asked impatiently. 

Markus wasn't certain what they were expecting really, so he would wing it. He did that a lot more than people expected, though he wouldn't remain Captain long if word got out. Hopefully his decision to make Emmaline his woman wouldn't haunt him in such a manner, but there was no worrying over it now. 

"Most of you were born of the sea." He began, his voice cutting into the silence. "I wasn't. My father wasn't a sailor. His father wasn't. I was a bastard, born in the border country. By the sea yes, but...it was only a few years ago when I left the battlefields of the Old World to sail, and it was only a fortnight ago that I became a pirate." Even before his words left his mouth, there was a sudden burst of shouts and general mumbling. Only when Jaego Roth glared at those that surrounded him did it subside. 

"Move along, boy." He said, gesticulating with his pipe. 

"My crew was underfed. Underpaid. We worked through storms and waves, raiders and serpents! And our captain took the lion-share for his'self. Yet I was loyal, until the day he told me to keelhaul a friend. I refused, and he threw me in the brig. It was that night when another crew member busted me out of my cage, only for me to find out my friend had been killed during my captivity. I went up on deck, walked into the captain's cabin, and strangled him to death. No one questioned my authority that night, and no one has since. We've gotten a sweet haul on our first week, and merely three days later we were waylaid by treacherous elves!" Sketti and the other Slayer thumped their arms. 

"We were fighting a two to one odds, and we cast them down into the depths! I come here to show my worth and the worth of my crew. To break bread with you and make berth here. To give ten percent of my booty to the Republic, and to trade the rest for gold and whores for my crew! I ask only to be apart of the court, as a Captain myself. If you accept me, we have an accord. If not, then you can suck my cock!" 
[@Penny]