Swashbuckler

The deck rolled under her feet and rain lashed down in windblown sheets. Lightning flashed in the near distance, the roar of the thunder nearly drowned out by the crashing waves. Her long blue coat snapped in the wind as she brought her swords up in a parry, steel ringing against steel. She grinned, stepping back with a flourishing spin of her cutlasses.

“You’ve got skill, kid!” she praised.

“It’s over, Captain Rook! Your crew has abandoned you, you have nowhere to run!” the kid shouted, a young Lieutenant. Half a dozen of his comrades were collapsed on the deck behind him. There were a handful still on their feet, muskets aimed but unwilling to fire into the melee. If their powder would even spark in this storm, they weren’t protecting their frizzen pans at all from the rain. They were part of the Holy Westrian Navy, uniforms that were normally crisp and white with golden highlighting hanging heavy with water and blood stains, and had laid this ambush specifically to capture her. Well…ambush was giving them a little too much credit, she’d known this ‘merchant ship’ had been packed with Navy men before it left port. But who was she to say no to such a polite challenge?

“Well, if yer so keen to bring me in, c’mon then.” She gestured with one of her blades and then rasped them against each other as she settled into an easy stance that seemed to ignore the heavy pitching of the deck.

The heavy blow of his longsword slid easily off her cutlass in a neat deflection and she retaliated with an embarrassing swat to the rear as she danced past him, sending him staggering. Then she lunged, her sword ringing against the base of his, knocking it from his hands and overboard into the ocean. Her second sword, she hooked behind his knee with the back of the blade, sending him sprawling. Before he could push himself up, she planted a boot on his chest and leveled her cutlass at his throat.

“Need to watch that footing, kid. Could get ya killed!”

“W-what are you men waiting for?! Shoot her!” The musketmen snapped their aim up and fired.

Well, they clicked, at least. “Gotta keep that powder dry!” she coached with a laugh.

“Anyway, as fun as this was, I gotta get going. What’s your name, anyway?”

“Lieutenant Mortimer Augustus--”

“That’s a horrible name, Mort!” Rook stepped back, her swords rasping back home into their scabbards. “Better luck next time!”

Before Lieutenant Mort could say anything else, Rook grabbed onto a rope that suddenly landed between them from above and she was pulled off her feet into the sky. Faintly, through the rain, a small airship could be seen as it pulled up and away. When Rook was firmly back on deck of her ship, she patted the men on the shoulder that hauled her up and gratefully accepted her Captain’s Hat from her first officer.

“Alright lads, back home to Vivian! We got what we wanted today!”