Rosewind Harbor

The salty air blew through my hair as the bright sunlight warmed my skin. It's almost like Earth. I thought. The merchants called to the people as they passed, selling their wares. Fish, tools, food, and other trinkets. A young water dragon leaped out of the sea and next to a jeweler's stand, cracking open a handful of oysters, picking out the perfect pearls inside. Maybe not too much like Earth. I joked to myself. As I ventured further down the boardwalk, I heard the shuffling of boots against the wood docks, followed by soft confused murmuring. "Where did it come from?" Asked one of the fisherman. "No one knows. It was empty when it arrived." A massive warship was docked at the end of the harbor, with seemingly no damage. No one knew what to make of it.

The ocean was never my favorite place to be. The salty air gets stuck under my nostrils the longer I stay. Only this time I was by the harbor to get a jewel appraised. The jewel I found was said to hear the echoes of the air dragons' whispers or so I was told. Hearing the merchants talk about the warship kinda recieved my attention. I whispered to myself "A warship... that appeared out of nowhere?"

As I walked along the docks and took a deep breath of the salty air, I smiled to myself on how much I loved the beach. Wind blowing through my short purple hair, bright blue sunny skies, and the murmurs of the merchants talking about the latest catch. I over heard about a warship and walked towards the fishermen. I was pretty intrigued on where it was from and walked faster to get a better look at it. As I continued to speed walk I saw Helix and waved “Couldn’t resist taking a look at it too huh?”

At the corner of my eye, a young purple hair girl appeared. All I could think of was Athey and sure enough it was her. I did a small wave of hello and resumed to keep my eyes on that warship. That ship was getting more, more and more attention as more fishermen start to approach the edge of the boardwalks.

I saw Athemise and Helix close by. "You guys know anything about this?" I asked.

Ambrose walked down the dock with Ruby perched on his shoulders and holding Aldrich's hand. The fire dragon had heard whispers of a warship appearing in the dock and out of curiosity decided to check it out. He wasn't surprised to see a few familiar faces there. Always the same group who seemed to snoop around. "Greetings Athemise, Lacey, Helix." He said cooly before looking up at the huge ship.

"Hey, Ambrose." I greeted back. "What do you think happened? No damage, no crew, it just docked here with no one noticing somehow."

I heard the voice of the a familiar friend, Ambrose. "It seems the warship has gotten your attention too. This warship has sparked a ruckus hasn't it?" I said in reply and resumed aweing at the ship. I want to go towards the ship but didn't know how to approach it. I examined the side of the ship, the windows and looked for anyway to get in the ship. "I feel like the ship is drawing me in" I whispered as the waves swayed back and forth, hitting the docks as the salty air picked up again.

"Have any of you been aboard yet? I was thinking of checking it out." He said as he took Ruby off his shoulders. "Ruby you go say hi to your ma right now." He said to the little psychic and pointed to Athemise. "Anyways, I'd like to go in it and see it for myself."

"Are we even allowed to do that? I imagine law enforcement would be on this by now." I said. Well, unless we're in a "Harry Potter"
situation where the students have to do everything themselves. I thought. "Well, maybe just a peek." I said hesitantly.

"I suppose checking it out would seem fun. Somebody has to check it out anyways. I'm sure none of these fishermen would do it anyways." Some of the fishermen backed off when they heard me. I grabbed my sword's hilt and viewed the ship again. "I must be blind or the sun is making me blind, but I could've sworn I think I saw a person in that window" I whispered to myself

"With everything we've already medled in are you only now JUST worrying about law enforcement?" He said with a rare chuckle. Aldrich pointed up at the ship and asked in his excited voice, "Can we go too Daddy?!" Ambrose shook his head and jerked his hand back towards the inn. "Certainly not. You take your sister and wait for me at the inn. If I don't come home by tomorrow morning you are to call Cyrus and go to his house." The small fire dragon was about to argue when Ambrose growled out, "If I find out that you two put so much as a toe out of that inn before tomorrow I'll flay the hide off your backs. Now get going!" The two children needed no second bidding and tore off down the road. Of course Ambrose would never lift so much as a finger to harm eitherone but he wasn't very good at parenting.

"And I'm sure these fishermen would let us examine this boat without any hassle" I chuckled as I saw the little ones argue.

"It is settled then, shall we board?" Ambrose grinned with an old hint of excitement. He drew his sword and white flame engulfed her deadly blade. She was a gift from Kingsley and blessed with the ferocity of Angtinouth itself. "I say weapons drawn. You never really know what lies lurking even if it was deserted earlier."

The crowd of fishermen opened up to let us through. You could hear them murmur about us, some even gasping in fear. As we got closer, the ship seemed bigger than anticipated. I have my hand on my hilt as we walked towards it. The ship was casting a shadow onto us from the sun. It felt colder to me and the stench salty air picked up again. Sand was coming from the windows and the drawbridge to enter the ship was wide open. Fear was the last thing I want to feel right now. "Weapons drawn indeed" I'm always ready for a quick death match

A strange dread seemed to eminate from the ship, settling into his very bones. Ambrose shivered but did not hesitate. After all, a little fear every now and then reminded him he was alive. "Well Helix, should we sent a scouting spell out first or just chance it and plunge on in?" The fire dragon preferred to seek council from companions before he made his own decisions. Afterall He could be rather hasty.

"Well, these fishermen said no person has ever entered or left the ship. Then again, fishermen tend to give rumors." The thought of a scouting spell was a good idea however, it still didn't put me at ease. Even if we did find something in it, we wouldn't know how big or how many. "I'd say let's enter and chance it. I'm sure we are more than capable of handling a situation. I'm going to chance on these rumors of the ship being empty"

"And I'd bet either something's lurking around or it contains some sort of magic. Odd that a warship would just appear out of nowhere especially during a time of war." Ambrose changed into his ex form, which he was far more comfortable in, and hopped aboard. He perched on the rail for a split second before disapearing from view.

The entrance to me was very inviting but I paid no attention to it. As I walked in I expected some tribal chant or a scary sound to go off. Instead I just walked into spider webs. The view from the boardwalks was still in view but got smaller and smaller. "Some old relics on the walls, some old rusty swords. Not much here a thief would make out of." I turned to the cannons and noticed something odd. "These cannons are warm. Could they be fired recently or be baked in the sunlight over time?"

"If they were fired recently, I imagine someone would have heard them." I said with my bow ready. "Cannons aren't really meant for stealth missions." I heard a clattering down a small corridor, where I guessed the captain's quarters would be. I whipped around and drew an arrow back. "Over there..." I whispered to the others.

Ambrose had gone ahead by himself towards the back of the ship. Slipping through an unlocked door he found himself in what must have been the crew's quarters. He strode down the row of bunks but could find no sign of life. personal items were still strewn about though. In the end he had decided to help himself to what was left. He didn't sense any immediate danger anyways. All he managed to get his hands on were a couple old books, a journal and a few pieces silver. Ambrose was quite interested in the journal hoping it might shed some light on the lives of whoever lived here. The fire dragon took a seat on one of the beds and flipped it open.

I nudged the door slightly and peeked in, seeing Ambrose sitting on one of the bunks. I lowered my bow and entered. "What's that?" I asked.

"A crew journal." He said without looking up from it. "It's..... interesting. Very few of the pages are in common tongue." He flipped the journal around to show her. "The majority of it is in a language foreign to me. All I've found so far is that the owner of the journal was named Alessandro Bagglatio. He was a 48 year old ship's cook. He says something about a cruel captain, a newcomer who became well liked, talk of mutiny and an obscure reference to a battle where the old captain seemingly disappeared. That's only a handful of the pages though. There are at least a couple hundred that I can't read due to them being in a foreign language." He held it out to Lacie and added, "Take a look for yourself. Maybe you'll have better luck than me." Ambrose then went back to rifling through the crew's stuff and pocketed a couple small knives to bring back to his kids as trinkets.

"Interesting, a captain and a full crew. I wondered what happened" I sheathed my sword and walked along the lined up cannons which lead to the armory. The row of spears and curved swords were covered in rust. "Hey guys. Come here." I said out loud. There were paintings of the crew and it's members. An old map. "Seems like they even mapped out the whole land"

"Portraits?" Ambrose repeated in surprise. How unusual. Perhaps not to see one of the captain but for the entire crew? Ambrose left Lacy behind to join Helix. "Peculiar. I've never heard of a warship with portraits of the crew."