Emmaline was thankful that her time on the Hammer had hardened her stomach against sea sickness. Even so she would have happily spent the day casting her accounts to Mannan if it meant she didn't have to walk into a Druchii citadel. She had asked Sulandar during a brief moment of respite whether she would be better of pretending to be a slave. The High Elf had pronounced they were all doomed anyway, but on balance a pretty human slave would attract more attention than a slightly short elf wrapped in a heavy cloak. Morek of course had no option, and had nearly punched Emmaline when she mentioned it was a shame there were no Dark Dwarves to disguise himself as.

"If your ship is here, it will be in the slave pool," Idrin sail as he pulled his own disguise into place.

"Slave pool?" Emmaline asked in confusion. The harbor around them was filled with sleek raider, but nothing that looked human, or with the bulk of the Hammer.

"It is a secondary harbor in the caves below the city," the elf explained, "your crew will be there too, those who are still alive."

Emmaline tried to picture a harbor that was underground but it was hard to imagine.

"Why dont they..." she began but Idrin made a chopping motion.

"We are on borrowed time already, I haven't time to explain every detail," he snapped. The elf was trying hard to look serene, but his waspish tone and the tightness at the corner of his grey eyes betrayed his fear. That was only to be expected, a High Elf could expect horrors far beyond death if he were caught in this place.

"Why don't we just sail in there?" Emmaline persisted. Idrin drew in a breath to snarl a response but Morek and Markus both took a step towards him and he quieted.

"There is no reason for a corsair to sail in there, it would raise the alarm. They take ships in there and force the crew to rip them apart for scrap and timber. Its one of the ways the underscore that you are never getting out." Forked lightning snapped overhead to underscore the remark.

_____

Emmaline walked in the middle of the group. Sulandar was at the front with Markus and Idrin at the rear, their pointed ears a better disguise than the stolen arms and armor would be. Emmaline kept her cloak drawn tight and kept close to Morek, reasoning that her plumper than elven form might be somewhat attenuated by comparison to the dwarf's bulk. They were moving away from the docks past what seemed to be warehouses for naval stores with a heavy smell of hemp rope and seasoned timber, moving roughly paralell to a canal that Indrin thought lead to the Slave Pool. There were a few Druchii around, but they were distant sentinels huddled in dark cloaks and staring out to sea, watching for enemies or perhaps hoping to see the ships of rival founder in the fury of the storm. The arched windows of some of the buildings were lit, but no one seemed to be on the street.

"What in Ranald's name?" Emmaline whispered as they began to round a corner that took them away from the docks. By chance she happened to look back to where their stolen vessel, nameless as far as she knew, lay against its dock. Ragged figures had emerged from the hold, they were shouting though over the wind and the rain she couldn't tell what. Not that she needed to.

"Ranald's balls! The slaves are raising the alarm!" she hissed. The ragged survivors were willing to sell out their would be rescuers in hopes of gaining some kind of mercy from their dark masters. Fortunately the deserted nature of the docks was working against them.

"We have to run for the ship, we wont get a dozen feet," Sulandar breathed, tensing to run.

"It is too far for me to burn," Markus growled. Emmaline glanced at him with a question in her eyes. He gave a stern nod.

"What are you..." Idrin began.

Emmaline whispered the words to her spell, drawing a sigil beneath her cloak. Two hundred yards away the masts of the nameless ship shimmered as their tips transmuted to silver. Instantly lightning stabbed down out of the sky directly down onto the conductive metal. Three bolts crisscrossed within a heart beat of each other. The top deck of the ship blew apart in a spray of burning debris and pieces of bodies. The flaming rigging seemed to fall in slow motion, slapping across the deck flaring up as timber began to catch. Emmaline looked green and unwell at what she had done.

"A fire at the docks is a good distraction, and the only way out is with my ship," Markus said with grim satisfaction.