Jess grinned down at the purported sailor white teeth flashing in the intermittent strokes of lightning. The sea was rising and the Weather Witch was canted over as the full press of sail pressed he had a-lee. Tresses of red hair flew like coach pennons in the wind as rain slated down in irregular cloud bursts. Even over the crash of the swell against the bow and the distant thunder the ship creaked and hummed as the rigging took up the strain. It was a good day for deep water and Jess had no worries that the man-o-war they had left grounded would brave the gale. 
Galt tried to rise but Jess planted a booted foot on his chest, pinning him to the deck. She pulled the cork from a bottle of rum with her teeth and spat it away, taking a long pull of the fiery spirit to keep her warm against the gale.
“Clumsy for a topman,” she observed, wiping her mouth with her sleeve as she looked down at Galt with an arched eyebrow.
“Mister Kycek!” she bellowed and in a moment the dwarf was at her side, dressed in a battered tarpaulin coat much stained with tar. He had a pipe clenched between his teeth that glowed when he sucked on it. There was a rumor among the crew that the runes carved in the ancient mirsham allowed it to burn even in a downpour.
“Cap’n,” he greeted, sparing not a look for the man pinned under her knee high leather boot.
“What is the penalty for a sailor who falls from a yard due to his own clumsiness in the Esperan Fleet?” she asked with a malicious sparkle in her eye. Krycek chewed his pipestem for a moment.
“Thirty lashes and a week on bread and water when last I sailed with’em,” Krycek replied, glaring down at Galt as he warmed to the topic.
“What do you say?” she asked Galt.

“Want to take your lashes like a sailor, or would you rather tell me who you really are and what you are doing on my ship?”