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[center][sup][h1][color=black] B R I N L A I T H[/color]
[color=gold]B R I N L A I T H[/color][/h1][/sup][/center]

[center][b][color=lightgray]10th of Midyear, 4E 200[/color][/b][/center]
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[i]All I can hear above me is fire, steel, blood, and screams...[/i]

The Nord woman known as Brinlaith remained hidden in the lower decks of the [i]Arslan's Fortune[/i], dagger drawn and held in a steady hand. The storm winds had been brutal, and she'd been fool enough to go to her room and try to get some sleep, only to be jarred awake by the sound of fire spells hitting the deck, alarm bells, and a ship ramming into their hull. Whoever these pirates were, they were either recklessly aggressive or desperate, as the Breton crew cut down their first wave, and still they attacked. Brin knew few outlaws willing to fight when death was a distinct possibility, but maybe the sea created a different breed.

She'd offered her services as a healer to the captain in exchange for passage to High Rock, but with the arrival of the full force of these pirates, it seemed to Brin like the only way to keep this crew upright was going to be necromancy, and that was magic she did not possess. She weighed her options: fight with the Breton crew? They were outmatched, probably mostly dead already. Abandon ship? She had no idea which way to even swim, nor if they were even close to land. Betray them, try to join the pirates? She'd be leaving herself at their mercy, a thought that made Brinlaith sick to her stomach. She needed to get above deck, carefully, and see what she could see. Instinct would guide her from there, as it always had.

She crouched by the door of her quarters, hearing two pirates marching her way down the hall outside. A few were heading below, in search of either easy prey or the chance to be the first to lay hands on precious cargo. Either way, they didn't stop to search Brin's seemingly empty room. As they passed, she stepped out of the doorway, behind them. The nearest was a Redguard man, thin and bald and clearly not thriving from his life at sea. A spell lit in Brin's hand, dark red and angry. She pressed it to the bare, sun-cooked skin of his back, standing up to whisper in his ear.

"Make a mess for me."

She shoved him forward, towards the Imperial woman that had come down here with him. The Redguard flew into a rage, hacking with his cutlass into the side and back of the other pirate. She fell, taken by surprise by her former ally, and Brinlaith watched as he kept slashing, a good one finding the base of her neck, and that was that. She surged forward, now with fire in her hand, and thrust it right into the Redguard's face as he turned around. He screamed, blinded completely, and staggered backwards. Most of his face had burned off, but in his magically-induced rage, he tried to keep fighting, swinging at the air. It was easy work for Brin to sneak around to his side, then shove her dagger through his ribs. He stilled quite suddenly, and dropped.

Brin took a moment to regard the two corpses she'd made, a sudden burst of extreme violence that she'd caused. It occurred to her that she probably could've let them keep walking. [i]Some healer I am.[/i] She took a second to see if anyone was drawn to the noise, but the chaos on deck seemed to have drowned it out.

Onwards, to the deck. Brinlaith stopped at the top of the stairs, taking it in. The ship was burning, the crew was dying, and with all the damn smoke and the darkness of night, she couldn't hope to see if there was land in any direction. She was a fierce fighter when it came down to it, but as she surveyed the scene on the deck, all Brin saw was death. Instinct guided her again.

And it took her right back down the way she came. The lower decks had friendlier shadows, fewer pirates, and if need be, the pirates had already blasted a few holes in the hull with spells that she could escape through. [i]Not dying here. Not tonight.[/i]