Sarai hated the feel of the cold metal shackles around her limbs. It reminded her of the straps that held her body in place as she screamed in pain and terror back in Svalbard. Every moment she spent in them, she could feel the madness clawing at the back of her mind. She bit down on her lip hard enough to make it bleed and relaxed as she felt the howling of her mind fade away. She tilted her head back against the planks of the ship down in the hold with the other slaves and grit her teeth against the sound of the other cargo whispering amongst themselves. Helpless, pitiful, frightened creatures, singing hymns or reciting the names of loved ones. Fighting against the rising tide of their fear that battered against her like a tsunami was exhausting, and she found herself increasingly irritated by her fellow merchandise. Face your fate with some dignity, she thought to herself bitterly, no one is coming for you.

One of the crewmen climbed down into the hold, stalking down the lines of slaves and passing out small portions of food. Enough to live on, not enough to completely eliminate the sharp ache of hunger in their bellies. Smart way to keep us on a leash. She watched him intently, but when he came to her, he threw some bread at her, same as he did the rest. Not yet then. She tore off a chunk with her teeth and then handed the rest of her bread to the child next to her, chewing slowly and disregarding the little boy’s excited declaration of gratitude.

She’d made it this far, and gods help her, she would make sure she was free. After what she’d done, there had been no leaving Svalbard as herself. To turn on the man who held her leash, to rip him to shreds and laugh as his blood dripped down her face, they’d declared her mad. She’d seen the notice and her smile had been feral. Mad indeed. But she’d choked the madness down as she stood over their graves, carving three small stars into the skin of her inner forearm. The pain and the blood soothed her and she whispered their memories into the stars for hours until she could hear them begin to whisper back. The thought of it made her laugh, short and harsh. Perhaps she was still mad after all.

Her cue came with the water. She recognized the man she had paid off to sneak her onto the ship in the first place. He’d been cheaply bought. She didn’t think much of him, certainly not enough to feel bad that he’d likely be executed once she was gone. As he hovered near her, holding the water ladle to her lips, she felt the small key, hard and foul tasting on her tongue along with the water. He moved to go on to the little boy, and never even had the chance to scream before Sarai had her chains wrapped tightly around his throat, crushing his windpipe. She held tightly, grinning as his fingers scrabbled at her chains, until slowly the fight drained out of him and he was unconscious.

Sarai spat the key out into her hand and unlocked her chains, ignoring the voices of the other slaves as they begged her to free them. She stripped out of her clothes and pulled the crewman’s on to replace them before locking him into her shackles.

“Please Miss?” she heard the little boy’s voice, and she paused. The howling had sprung to life again and was tearing at the skin of her neck. “Please take me with you!”

“You’d be dead before we hit the water.” She told him coolly, keeping her eyes locked ahead. “Save your fight for when failure won’t just turn you into fish food.” She hauled herself up onto the deck and ducked immediately into a small crevice between some crates, hissing with pain from the bright light. She’d been in the hold for weeks, and this was the one thing she couldn’t control for. Luckily, her eyes adjusted quickly and when she stuck her head back out, no one appeared to pay her any mind. A smile flashed across her lips and she took a deep breath of salted sea air to steel herself, walking with purpose towards the side of the ship. All she had to do was make it to the rails and jump.

AUGUST 29, 1473

The sun burnt bright overhead and Sis couldn’t help but find it a good omen. Clear skies ahead and a stiff wind behind made for a swift journey and a quicker cash out. The shipment that’d been waiting for them at the Svalbard coastline had been an easy one. Quick, painless, done. While not particularly exciting, it was overall the best option to receive, especially considering how touchy the Helm was about conflict on Svalbard turf. The short answer was don’t, and the long answer was the same, but with more words to impugn your honor and mental ability. It’d been easy enough that her presence wasn’t even really necessary, more on ceremony than anything else. She’d watched the line board with an indifferent stare, eyes more focused on any sign of misbehavior than on faces or numbers. Once they’d pulled anchor and cast off, she was back to her normal duties in between. Nobody worked a single job or lazed about if their first was done and she was no exception. She reclined against the rail, ragged and rent netting pooled in her lap one that it was her job to fix. She had the patience and the skill to weave the ropes back together in working order, and it was best done in the sunshine rather than the shitty lighting down below. Better to enjoy the day while they had it, too.

Her eyes glanced up at the sound of yet another set of feet on the deck. People were around, about and between on the portly ship, massive hull made for holding cargo more than speed or maneuverability; and that meant it took a lot of hands to keep her in working order. Still, though, Sis knew most all of the regulars by face if not by name. That one she DIDN’T. Her stride was confident, the clothes were no more ill fitting than half the greenhorns they picked up every now and again but something still threw up red flags, the sheer instinct one that raised its hackles at the sight of her. Her eyes narrowed and a pensive look furrowed her brows, even if a smile still graced her face.

“What’re you wandering around for? Didn’t no one get you something to do yet? C’mere, lessee if you’re any good with the nets.” It’s not a request coming from the suspicious officer and she hauled herself to her feet, one hand still tight on a bundle of the snapped ropes. Her other waved the ambling stranger closer, eyes giving her a thorough once over. The short sword still clung to her hip, the thick leather belt her home for a number of useful tools she might need on hand. The simple white shift is stiff with salt from the sea, and her hair was too, albeit more organized in the typically complicated braid she kept the riotous curls bound in. In sharp contrast, this strange recruit is anything but. The clothes were stiff but her hair was clean and there was not a trace of grime on her face or hands. She'd say soft looking, but they weren't, merely...strange for anyone calling themselves her crewmate.

Something here STANK, and she intended to find out what.

The voice from her right stilled her breath and the madness snarled its way to new heights behind her eyes as she felt time slow to a crawl from the adrenaline rush. She knew without even having to look who it was that called to her. She remembered the woman from when she was marched on board, shackled, hunched, and with a black eye she’d given herself in order to distort her appearance. With how long they’d been at sea, the swelling and bruising on her face had gone down, and she certainly wasn’t hunched now, but Sarai had seen the sharpness in the woman’s eyes as she oversaw the boarding of her merchandise. And whatever Sarai looked like now, it sure as shit wasn’t a fresh faced slaver recruit.

Her tight braid and time in the hold had kept her hair and skin mostly free from the crust of salt that coated everything on the ship, and the experiments performed on her kept her body looking soft and fresh, no sign of the rough life she’d lived. Perhaps in Dorsum that wouldn’t be a problem, but here? She had counted on no one looking at her twice before they heard her body hit the waves. So much for that.

In the span of a single caught breath, she measured the distance between herself and the railings versus the potential risk from the woman watching her closely. The other woman cut a powerful figure, and the ease of her pose and the cheer of her smile read instantly as a lie to Sarai. This woman was dangerous, and Sarai knew it. Any other day, she wouldn’t hesitate, but the rationed food had taken its toll on her as much as it had anyone else down in the hold, and she knew that she wouldn’t hold her own well enough to take risks. Besides, the woman was closer to the rail than Sarai was. Passing her was no longer optional, and passing her in silence was now out of the question.

She let out the breath she’d been holding and put on a smile that matched the one she was faced with. Her steps veered towards the other woman, and she nodded respectfully. “My father always said I had the quickest fingers he’d ever seen.” Sarai answered cheerily. She counted her own heartbeats as the distance between them closed steadily, forcing herself to identify a new attack with each beat. She had perhaps a dozen beats to find one that stood a chance, but she dared not slow down or change course now.

With three beats left, she found it, and she held out her hand as if to take the net.

Sis, on the whole, was not the most book read person on the block. Math was a chore, writing essays was not her forte and heavy intellectual rigors were like as not to be passed off to Mini. But there was one thing she was good at. PEOPLE. Body language and the tone of a voice were an open book to her, more even than she could articulate at times. She trusted her gut and the internal flags she could just about plant on a person after a glance. This one was no different. A slinking grace to her walk, the constrained power in her limbs. Even in the bright glare, she’d long since picked out the subtle glow that said eximius. And as she drew closer, Sis drew in breath, a long inhale through the nose. The dense stench of bodies packed together like sardines, terror and sweat and leashed panic. No shred of the open air, the sea and salt that coated everyone who spent more than five minutes above deck. It was possible she’d just spent long enough down there to be wearing the stink like a second skin, but she didn’t think so. She didn’t trust like that. This could very well be overkill, and if it was, she’d fork over the apology AFTERWARDS.

As soon as that hand extended she snapped into motion, both hands finding their place on the edge of the (not fixed enough FUCK) net, hoping to at least slow the interloper down enough to get her bearings. Eximius were nothing to fuck around with, doing so bare handed and alone was asking to get your ass handed to you. Even as she hurled the net in a flurry of twirled motions long practiced to snag a fish or person equally well, Sis lunged, hoping to knock Sarai to the ground with the weight she had on the other. Salt cracked hands shoved at the other, head to head as she tried to gain the upper hand of this situation. Even still, she wasn’t blind stupid. If she didn’t stack this fight more in her favour and quickly, this was going to go SIDEWAYS. A piercing whistle is her call to action, albeit a strange and unexpected one this far away from port. She could only hope that someone else clued in quick enough to help her before her head got staved in.

As soon as Sis threw that filthy, ragged net at her, Sarai’s face twisted into a snarl. So much for the element of surprise. So much for no more bloodshed. So much for burying the murderer alongside my father’s corpse. So much for fucking freedom.

She closed her eyes and sucked in as deep a breath as she could muster, and the world froze around her as her lungs filled with the scent of the sea, the net, the ship, of her. For the barest fraction of a heartbeat, Sarai was drowning in it, in something warm like good booze or soft fur. For a fraction of a heartbeat Sarai could swear she heard the stars on her wrist whispering something twisting and traitorous back into her skin instead of breathing comforting memory through her veins like usual.

Then she exhaled.

Gold eyes flashed open, muscles flexed with horrible, easy precision, one foot swept gracefully back, weight shifted, and when she felt Sis’s body collide with her, she was ready for it. She wrapped her arms around Sis’s shoulders, allowing momentum to carry them both forward just enough that she could swing her body around behind Sis, just as Sis whistled loudly. Fuck, fuck, FUCK!! Sarai shifted quickly to trap Sis in a headlock and forced the woman down to her knees with her hands braced deliberately around Sis’s head in preparation.

“Tell them to stand down, or I’ll snap your pretty neck.” Sarai whispered, flexing her muscles just enough to demonstrate that she still had enough power left in her body to do it as she counted the different sets of footfalls moving towards them. Fuck, fuck, fuck. It felt good, right, easy, familiar, so fucking good to feel the warm resistance of Sis’s body, Sis’s life in her hands. The thrill of it surged through her, of a good fight, of fresh blood, of fear of pain of power, setting her skin alight with the burning of it. Her muscles were practically vibrating with the effort it took her not to just twist and end this here. To let Sis’s dead weight drag them both down to the deck. To throw her head back and scream her victory into the sky like a broken, vengeful god. ...promised...you promised…YOU PROMISED. The whispers from her tattoos were howls now, and Sarai forced herself to be as still and immobile as stone, tapping her fingertips against Sis’s cheek to remind her of the stakes. “Do it, darling, then perhaps we can make nice and I’ll be on my way.”

Sis cursed in a savage snap of air as she felt the lady slip out from under her shoulder, quicker than even she had expected. The crew nearby were equally quick to respond at her whistle, but nothing was fast enough to stop the situation being flipped on its head. Her breath heaved in and out, a snarl twisting her round features into something savage and angry. But she froze nonetheless. The deceptively strong arms settled about her neck and shoulders made it non-negotiable, at least for the moment. Instead she carefully shifted her weight, still half between on her knees and flat out. One hand flexed, palm flat against the deck instead of the body she’d planned to have pinned beneath her and the other was itching to have the hilt of her sword in her grip.

“Hold up a moment then, we’ll find a way to settle this.” She locked eyes with Mini as the crew circled the still pair, unable to get closer with the threat of Sis’s broken spine between them and retaking the loose quarry. A wink preceded her next statement and Sis smiled to see something shift and ease in Mini’s gaze, even if the most of her stony glare didn’t change. “You think I’m pretty, then, do y—” The end of her sentence is dropped as she went slack and shifted, trusting the stiff posture to save her hide from the loose cannon doing her best to get the better of her. Not today, fucker. A clatter sounded out as her toolbelt and the few strands of pearls hit the deck, cushioned by her clothes and bouncing away across the rough wooden boards. In her place, a MASSIVE wolf that outsized Sarai, now merely clinging to her back.

A deathly deep snarl shook through her deep chest as she twisted, no longer afraid of the threatening grip that locked the eximius to her head and shoulders. She gathered all four legs under her as she writhed, teeth seeking and finding one leg. She clamped down and slammed into motion, brutal and no longer playing nice. Sandy brown fur stood on end as she shook Sarai like a rag doll and Sis growled as she felt a dense thud sound out. Whatever it was that Sarai had been hurled against, it sounded like it hurt. Liquid brown eyes were reddened and furious as she released her grip on the bleeding leg in her jaws and lunged again, this time bloody teeth darting for her shoulder and neck. Turnabout was fair play in her books.

This was hardly the first time Sarai had found herself suddenly dwarfed by a Dire who got desperate, and as soon as she felt the threat of it in Sis’s muscles going loose, she twisted her fingers tightly into the thick fur that grew out from Sis’s skin. She tried to hang on when the shift was completed, a hysterical laugh ripping itself free of her lungs. As if I couldn’t still snap that neck, darling. But then Sis’s teeth closed on her leg and she bit her lip with a hiss to keep from screaming. Not gonna give you the satisfaction. And suddenly she was being torn free by all the power and brute force of a powerful and skilled wolf. Sarai’s neck snapped sideways as Sis’s massive jaws shook her, and she forced every muscle in her body to relax completely, knowing what came next. Bracing for an impact like this would only make it hurt worse and she was quickly losing ground she couldn’t afford here today.

When Sis released her leg, Sarai went flying, her back slamming full force into the rails on the side of the ship. The force of it was enough to knock every breath of air out of her lungs, and to rattle her brain so hard that when she looked up, dazed, she saw two blurry wolves whip around and lunge for her. Fine. Enough of this then. Sarai reached into her borrowed clothes and curled her fingers tightly around one of her old blades, and just before Sis’s jaws closed around her neck, Sarai flicked the blade out and buried it deep in the wolf’s massive shoulder, grabbing two handfuls of fur and leveraging herself up and onto Sis’s back, legs wrapped around her thick neck. Sarai yanked her knife out of Sis’s shoulder with a grunt and had the large wolf head pulled up and her knife to its neck on instinct. “Mongrel bitch.” She snarled, rage and pain scorching her bones from the inside. She felt a small trickle of blood on her hand as the blade started to bite into skin, and suddenly she was frozen, her father’s voice, his hatred, ringing in her ears. Mongrel bitch, not even fit to be leashed.

Sarai came back to reality, gasping for air and throwing herself off Sis’s back as her knife clattered along the deck boards. Her eyes flashed around quickly as the wolf and other members of the crew shifted their weight to come for her, and she pushed herself to her feet, favoring her bloody and torn leg. Open wounds in the open ocean, well done you useless girl. When Sarai cried out in pain, it had nothing to do with her injuries from the fight, and she twisted her fingers in her hair, howling with Maddened laughter. The voices coiled tightly up her arm, creeping into her ears and whispering pain and bloody threats, as she swayed on her feet. Her muscles gave way at last and she dropped heavily to her knees, body swaying dizzily, gold eyes wide and staring off into the distance.

Stop!

Make me.

Please!!

If you cannot even best me in a fight, what use are you in this war you little bitch?

No, no, no, no, not my baby, not Ria, please just take me! Ria, baby wake up!

The memory of her own screams was enough to drown out the thunderous howling of the voices, but it was also enough to sap her of any strength she had left, and when she lifted her glowing gold eyes to the enormous creature standing over her, she was nothing but a shaking heap of flesh, lips silently mouthing their names in a daze.

Useless, pathetic child. Face your fate with some dignity, no one is coming for you.

Sis snarled again, anger pinning her ears flat back and brown eyes wide with rage as she missed the tricky flea yet again. Instead another hole is poked into her skin as she was stabbed, this time by a knife in her shoulder. This was starting to get on her nerves and she snapped with a click of wolfish teeth at the names hurled in her direction. A mongrel bitch, eh? She was going to show her the meaning of a bitch before the day was through. Before she could get hold of a leg to repeat the scene again, the eximius got off her back, just as quick as she’d gotten on. Sis twisted, ears pricked at the sound of the knife hitting the deck. The fuck was she doing? She hesitated to rush her again as the laughing started, one red eye sliding to Mini at her right. This one was a basket case, for sure. Hopefully she could be fixed enough to sell. That wasn’t her job, though. For now, just getting this situation under control would be enough for her.

Heavy paws thudded across the deck as she stalked closer, prepared to jump her if she showed so much as a twitch of coming at her again. But nothing happened as the thing in front of her went from laughing to a complete silence, shaking like a leaf and empty eyed. Well, that made it easy. She kept her jaws wide and ready, even as she glanced back at Mini. The two were on a similar wavelength and her right hand didn’t waste time fetching shackles fit to hold an eximius. But there was no way Sis was letting anyone else close enough to this fucker without the cuffs already on her however and once Mini returned, she shifted back with a draft of displaced air and a complete lack of shame. She had more to worry about than the fact her dress was still laying on the deck behind her or the bloody wound tore into her shoulder.

She was quick to take advantage of Sarai’s apparent disconnect from reality, content to shackle her once more. She didn’t walk so much as stumble and the officer didn’t so much as frog march her as DRAG her towards her office. There were more issues to handle then that, and she had every intention of getting to the bottom of it. She gave an errant crew member a grateful head bob as he collected her things, face beet red and eyes averted. If she didn’t have a shackled eximius and an open shoulder wound it would’ve been funny, but at the moment she was all business. Still, it was appreciated as she dumped the eximius in the rough wooden chair in their office. Mini was a watchful eye on Sarai as Sis dressed before the hefty pirate settled across from Sarai, content for the moment to hope the episode she was having would fade. She had all the time in the world and it gave her the chance to bind the hole in her shoulder. She wasn’t goin' anywhere, and neither was Sarai ‘til she got her fuckin answers.

Great. Shackles a-fucking-gain. Just once can’t someone use some rope or something? At this rate I’m going to bite my lip off just to stay sane.

Sarai was stumbling as Sis forced her along the deck and into an office, and if she weren’t still seeing double, limping, and half-crazed to top it off, she might have given a single fuck about the fresh scrapes and bruises. Instead, she was just relieved that most of the work of moving was being done for her by the Dire and her little companion. The heavy door shut with a horribly final thunk and she felt herself thrown into a rough hewn chair. She lifted her head, making an admittedly pitiful attempt to regain awareness of her surroundings and find something to turn to her advantage, but instead her eyes fixed on Sis - mostly naked and still carefully pulling her clothes back on.

Oh. Right.

Sarai's grin was half-feral. If I’m going to die, might as well go out in style. The way Sis moved, the strong muscles were obvious, even if her rounded, heavy figure disguised it, and Sarai tilted her head to the side curiously, enjoying the sight before her and ignoring the hard glare she was getting from Mini. Once Sis was dressed, she settled herself down, and Sarai leaned forward, folding her arms and resting them on her thighs. Her long braid slid forward, its own weight dragging it over her shoulder so that it hung down into her lap, and she licked her lips. What a fight this little wolf had given her. It had been a long time since she’d had anyone nearly as compelling in her grip. If the circumstances were different, if she weren’t about to die a stowaway’s death, she might have pushed her luck just far enough to find out what salt soaked hair felt like under her fingers.

Little by little, her composure was trickling back, and she could focus a little better. Enough to see that Mini hadn’t locked the door. Enough to see that Sis’s shoulder was hurting more than she wanted to let on. Enough to start looking for a plan.

“Shame you took the view away.” Sarai told the other woman casually, flashing her a wicked smile. “I was just about ready to tell you everything you wanted to know.” She lifted up her heels and rested them against the legs of the chair, leaving the balls of her bare feet pressed down into the planks of the ship, her muscles tense and ready. She flexed her shoulders in a fake stretch and began tapping her left heel silently against the leg of the chair in rhythm with her heartbeat, continuing to stretch and flex her limbs for a moment, disguising every test of her bonds as her taking stock of her injuries. Maybe she wasn’t about to die here after all, but there was certainly time enough while she figured that out to see just what it took to make this woman squirm. Sarai hadn’t missed the little glances between Mini and Sis, so she let her head loll backwards on her neck until she was looking at Mini. “What about you, darling, are you a pretty little wolf too? You must be special, the way she won’t let me near you. Perhaps you should go find something to occupy yourself for a while, I’m sure your friend wants to take another bite out of me. Then again, perhaps she likes to share.” Sarai let her head fall forward again and fixed her eyes on Sis with an insincere pout. “Come now, be honest. Slaver like you, little fox like you, for them to let you set foot on Svalbard soil and keep your head....what do you pay for that darling? And how much more do you think they’ll charge you now once they hear you were nearly made to take to tail by a half-dead cieth like me? If you had been a good little wolf and let me go quietly like I told you to, perhaps neither of us would be wondering such things, hmm?”

Sis cocked a brow in Sarai’s direction at the ballsy comment, grin now in its customary place, if a little stiff from the still seeping wound that’d been drove into her shoulder. This one had a fuckin’ nerve of steel, that was for sure. That, or still half mad in a completely different direction. Flirting with the pirate that fully intended to choke her out if she stepped out of line took a certain kind of bravery that you only found in the young, the mad and the foolish. She knew that she fit into at least one of those categories on any given day and only which one was up for debate. Time to find out which one this lady sat in.

“Love, if it was that easy, why the nasty welcome, huh? Offer’s always been open.” It wasn’t if the hard gleam in Sis’ eye and the sneer that curled her shadow’s face had any indication, but the words were more to tease than anything else, string for the cat to bat at. Any reaction told her much and more about Sarai. She shook her head at the ‘stretching’ but said nothing, instead leaning in further.

Mini was more of a tell than Sis, the sour grimace briefly interrupted by the dark haired human's head turning to the side. A rude noise cracked out as spit hit the floor, the silent contempt customary for the solemn pirate. Sis only laughed as the insults turned on her instead. That was quite a spread to cover in only four sentences. "Little artist, huh? You should be a bard, wordsmithing like that. Where'd you pick up that mouth?" Ostensibly friendly, there's no rancor left in it, not even a grudge for the still sore wound. But the intent to pick at her is there. This one had a story and Sis wanted to know it. She'll get to the bottom of how the shackles an eximius should've had got unlocked and how this spitfire ended up and duds indistinguishable from any dock on Gibrantt. Eventually.

Sarai arched an eyebrow wryly. “Need I remind you darling, you attacked me first. I was perfectly content to hop right off your ship, no fuss at all, but then you put your lovely self directly in my way, and how’s a girl to turn down an invitation to dance like that, hmm?” Sarai was watching the pirate intently, searching her face for any sign she was bothered. She wasn’t. She wasn’t fooled either. Fucking sunlight why couldn’t the fool have let me out overnight. Sarai bit back her annoyance and slouched back artfully in the chair, letting her taut muscles relax and sink into the pose. “And I should think my mouth the least of your worries. Come now, you can’t really want much from me, you and I both know there’re few good reasons to have me be sitting cozy here when you’d be much better served by either making an example of me or selling me. So instead of being so grumpy why don’t you just get to asking me whatever it is you so badly want to know, or to beating me up for humiliating you on deck, or to sending your pet off so you can have your way with me. I’ve no idea which it is and honestly I’m too busy to waste a lot of time trying to prepare a neutral response that would be appropriate for all three.”

Tap - Tap - Tap.

“I’m afraid I really just don’t have time to fuck about today.” Sarai threw her a coy smile. Little wolf wants to read me like a book, I’ll give her something good to read. “So there’s no need to pretend you aren’t angry darling, I know perfectly well how much you’d like to bite my head off, so let’s dispense with the play-acting.”

“Hm, maybe that’s true enough. We got off on a hell of a left foot instead of the right, didn’t we.” It wasn’t a question so much as mused to herself, one hand coming up to prop under a strong chin. “Still, hell of a fight you got in you. Learnt well, didn’t you? What’s your name?” Genuinely curious, a glimmer of something keen and razor edged shone in her brown eyes. Not angry, not afraid, merely intrigued in her cutting way.

The dismissive and pointed tirade was met with a short laugh from Mini and Sis alike, if as far apart in tone as you could get. The little shadow had finally had her fill of the mouthy eximius and with a pointed sneer, angled herself towards the door. “Boss, when you’re done wastin’ your time, please don’t let Jeri skive off his duties. Fucker lets you get away with too much, an’ that arm needs lookin’ at.” The short human wasn’t out the door, not about to leave her unofficial captain alone with the loose cannon that was Sarai, but her tolerance for being involved with the conversation was clearly over. A tense back and crossed arms are all she has left for the pair, patience at an end with the whole affair.

Still, Sis was oddly quiet, content to let Sarai run until the flood of words had quit. Quite a laundry list of possible reasons and emotions she’d pinned on the dire’s motives, that was for sure. “If it’s clarity y’want, I’m only too happy to provide. I won’t waste your time ‘fuckin’ about’, if that’s what you’re so worried about. Thing I’m most curious about, besides where you got the idea I’m anything close to mad, is how exactly you got out of the hold.” She didn’t detail any of the procedures they had on deck to handle eximius abilities, but there was a list as long as her arm. None of which should’ve allowed Sarai to come strolling out of the hold in some greenhorn’s duds like she belonged. Nor does she bother to threaten Sarai. This would go as long as it needed to in order for her to get her answers, and she didn’t need to throw her weight around to try and prove it. And she certainly doesn't protest her emotional state any further than the throwaway line she'd tacked into the middle of her sentence. Things might go faster if Sarai believed her, but in the end, Sis simply didn't care. The eximius had gave it her best shot and she'd failed. Nothing begrudged there on Sis's behalf.

Sarai cocked her head with interest. “You really aren’t angry, are you? How curious, most people would be. In that case, my friends called me Sarai, and you can call me anything you like. And I bought my way out of your hold the same as I bought my way into it.” A few pieces of gold and a roll in the hay is all your trust was worth to him apparently. Did you a favor really. “I was never part of your shipment. Just needed a nice quiet exit. A vacation, if you please. Thought I’d enjoy an adventure.”

She smiled innocently over at Sis. She’d figured out that Mini still held the keys to her new shackles, and all it would take was one moment where she could surprise the human without Sis there, and Sarai could get free again. Most likely, that meant getting Sis to decide their conversation was done and have her sent back down to the hold. She continued to keep time with her heartbeat, refusing to let her guard down anyway.

The whole day had been the most exciting mess, but she had never begrudged people their attempts at freedom for all that it was her job to hold them back. She knew how it felt to be desperate for that shot of safety. So no, she wasn't mad af Sarai.

The buried pit of rage that flared when Sarai revealed the truth to her? That was a whole different beast, one she left under the mask of a smile for now. It was doubtlessly visible in the sudden tension that stiffened her grin, but Sarai wasn't the target for now.

She nodded silently, mind already on this new aspect to the whole affair. "I wouldn't have done that in your place, but everyone has their way I guess." Her gaze turned to the hard lines of Mini's shoulders as she stood, the fresh wound seeping a new coat of blood. "Mini, you can take this from here, yeah?"

The annoyed grunt of consent was her cur and while she waited until Mini had the necessary help to handle Sarai, she had work to do. Sarai only got another glance, as stern as it was uncaring.

Then, the heavy figure was gone.

Sarai pouted slightly at the careless glance Sis tossed her on the way out the door, but if she was honest with herself, a rarity, she was relieved. Every muscle and limb in her body was aching, the adrenaline of her fight was ebbing away, and she was well aware of what fresh sea water would feel like soaking into her torn and bloody leg, which would make her swim that much worse. As fun as it had been to bat at Sis, it was for the best for all that it end, and anyway she'd gotten her answer. Disloyalty. Even after everything, all she cared about was that fool down in the hold.

She waited patiently, her muscles deceptively loose and her heel still tapping out the rhythm of her heartbeat against the chair. Once she felt Mini start hauling her to her feet, she turned quickly and smashed her head into Mini's with as much force as she could muster, ignoring the voices that sprang to life again in the dazed confusion caused by the impact. She could feel Mini's blood splash on her face, but the other woman was still clearly breathing and the blood merely came from a nosebleed, but she looked as dazed as Sarai felt from the headbutt. Sarai grabbed the keys quickly from where they hung at Mini's waist and quickly freed herself from her shackles before snapping them closed around Mini's wrists and tossing the key off to the side. "Sorry about this, darling, but please do give your little wolf my thanks for the hospitality when she gets back." Sarai smirked at the pirate and then cracked the door open, checking to make sure everyone's attention was occupied. This time, she didn't bother pretending she belonged, instead taking a deep breath and forcing herself to run as quickly as she could to the rail. She could hear shouting, but no one was near enough to stop her this time, and she catapulted over the railing, taking one more deep breath and bracing herself for the pain as she dove into the water below the ship. As soon as she made contact, her leg was on fire, and so were half a dozen other wounds she hadn't paid attention to previously, but she forced herself to start swimming anyway. She wouldn't be getting as far as she'd have liked, but the coast of Dorsum wasn't too far, and as long as she kept moving she might still manage it.