Chapter 128: Tatric
It was about a day's sail to the region the island was in, and Marco fully expected to get there without significant incident. Even back when they had been cruising these waters in a miniature ship, there had been some other craft that thought twice before attacking. The Foolish Endeavor of today was a whole different kind of beast. Marco knew his own ship, and there was no part of it that didn't look alarmingly dangerous.
So it was more than a little bit surprising when they saw the largest craft Marco had ever seen sitting in their way. It was bigger than any three ships he had seen before, at least in two dimensions. Besides lacking in height, it was huge.
"Oh no. I can't believe it's back," Elisa said.
"I knew it might be. I never thought it would be so soon, though."
A forest's worth of wood made up the long deck, all mismatched and pieced together like a messy quilt. At each corner of the huge deck, someone had attached the entire hulls of ships, which served as pontoons keeping the entire thing afloat.
The deck was strewn with various small bunkhouses and buildings, most of which had smoking chimneys and signs of activity around them. Stands selling various goods made up a lot of the remaining activity as folks sold materials, supplies, and weaponry.
It was the building in the dead center of it all that really stood out, though. It was a massive square building with evenly spaced windows all around it, allowing for plenty of light and a clear view to the sea in almost every direction. On top of that huge-enough construction was the carcass of a ship. Right away, Marco knew it to be Stead's. Things that had once terrified him were hard to forget. It still made him a little nervous, even gutted and turned into a decorative hat for what must have been the largest bar he had ever seen.
Above the front door but just below a ship was a sign carved out of the same living wood they had once clad their ship in, painted in bright white letters.
Female Bar Owner from the first Book's Floating Pub. Troublemakers will be eviscerated.
"Good to see she hasn't lost her spirit," Marco said. "Come on, I'd love to tell her hello."
They tromped inside the bar. The tender saw them almost before they found her behind the enormous bartender's area.
"Hey, everyone, we've got celebrities!" she yelled. "A round on them, I'd imagine. These are the folks who took down Stead, back from the Outer Seas. Unless you chickened out, of course. Did you?"
Marco shook his head.
"Then drinks are on them. They're good for it, trust me."
A cheer went up through the building, and the crew acknowledged it shyly as they worked their way through the tables towards the bar.
Marco leaned an elbow on the bar when they reached her, smiling and feeling oddly at home. “So how have you been? How’s the business?”
The woman barked out a laugh, wiping her hands on a towel before gesturing to the crowd. “Better than I ever thought it would be. The seas are safer now, thanks to you lot. Safer seas mean braver customers. Thanks to you and yours clearing out pirates, I’ve got every sailor, merchant, and drunk within a hundred miles showing up here at least once a week. Sometimes it's just normal folks looking for a thrill. Business is booming.”
Riv folded his arms on the counter and leaned in. “How’d you even rebuild this place? Last time we saw it, Stead’s crew had more or less sunk it. Didn’t seem like there was much left to salvage.”
The bartender’s smile turned sly. “That was thanks to you, too. We pulled materials from all the ships that sank around the Invisible Isle. Wreckage was everywhere, just waiting for someone with the right idea. I brought in carpenters, a few shipwrights, and every sturdy within a hundred miles. We knitted it together from salvaged hulls. It floats stronger than before, and it’s bigger, too. Truth be told, it’s a better bar now than what Stead destroyed.”
She slapped the bartop with pride. “Every plank’s got a story, mostly of dead or dying pirates. I like it that way.”
Plates of food began to arrive, carried by servers with hurried steps. Bowls of fried fish, baskets of bread, trays of roasted root vegetables, and mugs of frothy ale appeared one after the other on the counter in front of them. The smell filled the air with warmth and grease, making Marco’s stomach growl louder than he wanted. The bartender raised a brow at him as she slid one of the mugs across.
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“Are you good for it, Marco? I assumed you were, but you might have shown up broke. Am I going to have to toss you overboard for an unpaid tab?”
Marco chuckled, reached into a pouch, and pulled out a handful of heavy gold coins. He let them clatter on the bar, the sound drawing a few more curious eyes from nearby tables. “Will this cover it?”
Her eyebrows shot up, appreciatively.
“Well, well. Someone really did do well out there.” She scooped up the gold, weighing it thoughtfully in her hand. “You must have had some adventures after all..”
The others in the bar got their free round and raised their mugs in a toast. For a time, conversation turned to lighter things. They told stories of the ridiculous sights they’d seen on their travels, the strange beasts Marco had killed, the ways Elisa’s powers had evolved, and the vast and terrible realm of dangers they had again and again barely escaped. Eventually Marco leaned back in his chair and asked the question he’d been holding in.
“And the Invisible Isle itself? How has it been?”
The bartender’s expression shifted mysteriously. She leaned in, resting both hands on the bar. “You should see for yourself. Words won’t do it. It’s changed. I’ll say that much. You’ll want your own eyes on it. Anything else would ruin the surprise.”
That silenced things. Marco nodded and accepted the refusal to answer at face value. He let the crew settle into a table full of laughter and food, joining them himself as soon as he could shake off the mystery of how his short-term almost-a-home was doing. Ale flowed, hours passed, and for once they were allowed a peaceful drink in this bar without piratical interruptions.
It was in the middle of this revelry that one of the bar’s workers approached the counter. He whispered something to the bartender, pressing an envelope into her hand. She frowned, glanced at the sealed parchment, then turned and extended it toward Marco.
“It’s for you,” she said simply.
Marco accepted the envelope, feeling the wax seal beneath his thumb. The cheerful buzz of the room seemed to dull around him as curiosity and unease settled in. The others looked on, waiting to see what the message said.
Marco pulled his utility knife from his belt and pried the seal off the paper, unfolding the document it had kept concealed. It wasn't a very long note.
Marco,
I'm in the capital. I don't know how long for, so it's a good idea to stop by Gulf Isle before you come here. Do me a favor and bring my tools back, if you could. I figure you can afford your own by now.
Maybe I'll be back to gulf by the time you make it here, and maybe I won't. Either way, I'm not going to be paying to have this letter returned to me, so remember to stop by home before you head this way. Remember to say hello to Frisk for me, and I'll see you when I see you.
Tatric
"Weird," Marco said. "Elisa, read this."
Elisa took the parchment from his hand and read the letter aloud, just loudly enough that the crew and the bartender could hear. After she finished, she scowled.
"Yeah, that's off."
"Why?" Aethe asked. "I've never met him so I don't know."
"Lots of reasons. For one, he'd never go to the capital on purpose. I've never been sure why, but he hates it and the people there. Part of it is just that it's crowded, but there's more than that."
"Yeah. Tatric whines about things, too, in his way. He'd complain about this."
"It's weirder that he knows Frisk, right?" Riv said. "You never mentioned that and I'm sure you would have."
"Yeah, he doesn't know Frisk unless he met him since we left." Marco turned to the barkeep. "How long has this been here?"
She looked down at the markings on the outside of the parchment for a moment.
"A couple of months. At least. He chose bottom-barrel postage, so it was on a get-here-when-it-gets-here sort of pace, but the general markings on it make it seem like it was at least that long ago. Who knows when he sent it, either."
"Well, we'll check it out," Marco said. "Thank you."
"No problem. Should I be preparing rooms for you all, by the way? We have them if you want them."
"I don't think so." Marco waved down the sudden protest from Aethe and Elisa before it could get too loud or prolonged. "It's still early enough to get some good sailing in here, and more than safe enough to let the ship plot its own course to Invisible Isle. And this…"
Marco waved the letter gently.
"Has me a bit worried. I don't think there's any reason to panic, yet. Even so, I'd rather not take any stops we don't have to, if we can help it."
They spent a few more hours in the bar, mostly congratulating the bartender on what a great place she had built and answering questions about their travels. By the time it was time to move on, the moon had risen high in the sky and night was fully upon them.
The Foolish Endeavor drifted silently away from the bar into the water with Marco at the wheel, then moved faster as it caught the wind and steered towards the next stop on their list.
"Are you staying up long?" Aethe let her hand drift down Marco's shoulder and arm. "Because I'm going to bed, and it's cold."
"I won't be long," Marco said. "I just need to check a few things."
"Alright then," Aethe said. "I'll wait for you."
He spent a few minutes actually checking the condition of the boat and then just one more thinking about Tatric. He wasn't much of a letter writer, really. Marco couldn't recall him actually ever sending one, really. If he had sent something as enigmatic as telling Marco to stop at home before he went to another place the locals would have told him about anyway, there was a reason behind the letter. He just had to find it.