Authors: Catherine Banks
“I told you I did a lot before I came here too,” I reminded them.
“We knew that by your fighting skills,” Jared said, “But I’m just impressed.”
“How fast can you run?” Esmeralda asked Finn.
“He ran across water,” I told her proudly.
“What?” Jared screeched. “You ran across water?”
“He ran from the shore to his ship in Trian,” I told them.
“Across the ocean?” Esmeralda asked.
“Is it a spell?” Jared asked.
Finn shook his head. “It’s a rare ability that I was born with.”
“As soon as Faxon hears about this you are in for a lot of tests and trials,” Jared said smugly.
“I think I’m feeling ill,” Finn lied.
“You talked to a sea dragon?” Esmeralda asked me.
I nodded my head. “Apparently I was the only one who could hear him. He said it was because I was of royal blood.”
“There’s no mention of such ability in any of our records,” Esmeralda said. She laughed and got an evil grin on her face. “Once again Faxon isn’t here and is missing out on information that he will give his left arm for.”
“That means we aren’t allowed to let him know about it so she can rub it in his face and then make him beg or give her something for the information,” I told Finn.
“Your Queen blackmails her own friends?” Finn asked in shock.
“It’s not blackmail. I have information he wants and it’s not free,” she said defensively, “And it is very rare for me to have information before he does, so I like to hold it over his head.”
“She does blackmail people, but this isn’t one of those times,” Jared said with a smirk at his wife.
She punched his arm and said, “You’re not supposed to speak poorly of your wife and queen.”
“If you let me go blow something up I won’t speak poorly about you for a year,” he bribed her.
“No blowing anything up,” she ordered.
“Have you figured out what you’re going to do in your new town?” Jared asked Finn to change the topic.
He sighed and said, “No. I never learned any trades on land or on the ship and I’m terrible at farming.”
“Why don’t you start a delivery service for small packages and letters?” Esmeralda asked him. We all stared at her and she said, “I’m being serious. If he can run as fast as you say he can then why not charge people and run their items all over the kingdom. You could do all the deliveries in a day or two and make enough money to support you for a month.”
It wasn’t a bad idea, but only if he could run for a long period of time. “That only works if he can run for long distances at high speeds,” I said to voice my thoughts.
“It’s just a suggestion,” Esmeralda said, “But I think it would be a relatively easy job for you, Finn, and you could charge whatever you wanted because you’re the only one who could provide the service at such a fast rate. There are horses who deliver items, but you’re faster than a horse if you can run across water.”
“It’s a great idea,” he said with a smile, “I just have no idea how much to charge or how to start it or find customers.” He seemed depressed about it. It must be hard to go from being the captain of a successful pirate crew to having no knowledge about what to do on land.
“Well that’s easy to fix,” Jared said, “You’ll be the official courier for the King and Queen and as you make deliveries for us word will spread and soon you will have a customer base.”
“We can help you come up with a pricing schedule that you can keep with you to show potential customers. Plus as our courier they won’t try to stiff you for payment or short you because they won’t want to offend us or have word reach us about it,” Esmeralda said.
“Thank you,” he said sincerely.
“I’m back!” Faxon called as he entered the room.
“A sea dragon?” Esmeralda gasped loudly when she saw him.
Faxon stopped in mid-step and looked at us. “What about a sea dragon?”
“Oh I was just telling them about our adventures,” I said playing along.
He finished walking to us and sat down. “You met a sea dragon?”
“Oh would you look at the time,” Esmeralda said and stood up. “We have to go start our sessions. Come on you two, let’s get to work.”
Finn and I stood up and followed Jared and Esmeralda. Faxon trailed after us. “Wait, what happened? Obviously it didn’t eat you? What did it look like? How long was it?”
“Faxon,” Esmeralda scolded, “As soon as we are done testing Finn’s rare ability we will let them talk to you.”
“What ability?” he asked with a scowl. “Why am I out of the loop so constantly lately?”
“Well if you finished that project I have been asking you to take care of for the last year, I might let you know more information,” she teased with a victorious smile.
“You’re evil,” he muttered. “Fine, I’ll finish it, but first I want to hear about the sea dragon and know what ability you’re talking about.”
She put her hands on her hips and looked at him incredulously. “Does it look like I was born yesterday? No one gets payment up front.”
“It’s going to take me hours to finish,” he said with annoyance.
“You’re the one who wants information,” she reminded him.
“Harpy,” he mumbled under his breath as he walked away.
Esmeralda waited until he was gone to turn and smile at us, pleased with herself. “And that is how you get the grumpy mage to finish the assignment you gave him a year ago.”
“I’ll have to remember that,” I said.
“If only that worked on Jared,” she said with a sigh.
“I don’t care about being left in the dark,” he said with a smirk.
“I can barely threaten him so usually I have to offer him something instead,” she admitted.
“Is your fighting magically assisted?” Finn asked Jared.
Jared shook his head. “Nope, but most people think so.”
“When you really love fighting it becomes your obsession and the only thing that matters to you,” I explained. “Fighting ranks just below breathing on the necessity charts and even during times of peace you find ways to improve and hone and continue your obsession.”
“Like starting a tournament or festival to test your skills against others,” Finn said.
“That would work if the rest of the people weren’t afraid of you and your abilities,” Jared mumbled angrily.
“No one wants to go up against him,” I explained, “because he always wins.”
“I can’t help it that I’m better than everyone,” he said downtrodden.
“You could start a tournament where anyone from anywhere can participate and they get a prize,” Finn suggested, “I know a few who would be willing to get in the ring with you.”
“Plus outside people won’t know about your skills,” I said with a smile. Aside from knowing we destroyed Trian.
“That will only last a year,” Jared said, but I could see the hope in his eyes.
Finn laughed. “You don’t know much about pirates, do you? If you beat every pirate who comes, then they will train harder and more will come to test your abilities. The younger ones will come each year trying to show their bravery and move up ranks in the pirate community.” He paused and said, “Well, if there still is a pirate community.”
“With Priam dead why wouldn’t the pirates go back?” Esmeralda asked.
“They don’t know if the other kingdoms have given up yet or not,” he said, “it’s not safe enough to risk it.”
“What if you advertised it for pirates specifically?” I asked. “You could do it right after the Treasure Heist Festival is supposed to end so they can do the festival and then try to gain more fame from your challenge,” I suggested.
“It would make it look like they are condoning pirates,” Finn said.
“Some kingdoms hire pirates to raid other kingdoms to continually cause them trouble,” I told him, “And some pirates only police the others, like my dad did. Crilan can be known for advocating for the pirates who don’t harm innocents. It could also be a way for the pirates to see that our kingdom is strong and remind them that if they don’t stay in line there are more than just other pirates to keep them in check.”
Finn didn’t respond and just stared at his feet.
“I think it’s a great idea,” Jared said.
“I agree,” Esmeralda said with a nod of her head.
Finn looked up at them in shock. “You do?”
“Jared would be willing to take on other kingdom’s armies at this point if I let him. This is much more preferable to that,” she said, “plus, I agree with Tilia about showing the pirates that we are more than willing to allow them here if they stay in line. It would bring us more visitors and possibly increase our trades. It could really boost the kingdom financially and morally. Also it might give the other pirates a chance to see the transition your crew and Rocco’s have made and let them know that there are happy lives after piracy if they want them.”
“And I get to have a tournament,” Jared said with an evil smirk.
“You’re serious?” Finn asked.
“We never joke about tournaments,” Jared said seriously.
“We have almost an entire year left,” Esmeralda said, “But we’re going to need to start planning right away and start getting the word out so the pirates, wherever they are, hear about it.”
Finn just stared at us in shock as we sat down and began making notes for planning. After a few minutes of silence he finally participated and gave us his insight as a former pirate and participant in the festival. We were plotting, planning, and discussing until it was well past midnight.
“What if your dad doesn’t want to host the games?” Finn asked me.
“Then you could host it,” I suggested, “if you want to. Since you were the last champion and I’m sure my dad would give his blessing.”
“I don’t want to host it,” he said.
“Oh,” I said in shock, “Well we can talk to my dad and go from there.”
“You didn’t ask me why I didn’t want to host it,” he said softly.
“Okay, why don’t you want to host the festival?” I asked, giving in to his request.
“Because you and I are going to work together to win it,” he said smugly.
I bit my lip and struggled with what to say. I wanted to participate again and have that fun experience with Finn, but Jax was dead and I wanted her to stay that way.
“It would actually make things interesting if the pirates found out that the princess was participating,” Jared suggested.
“They might think I was cheating if they know I’m the princess,” I said.
“You can’t cheat at the festival,” Finn reminded me.
“We can figure it out later,” Jared said, “For now we all need to head to bed.”
“You know you have to enter the tournament,” I told Finn before Jared got too far away.
“Why is that?” Finn asked me.
Jared had stopped and turned to face us. “Because I think you might be the one to defeat him.”
Jared arched an eyebrow and looked at Finn. “You think you can beat me?”
Finn shrugged. “I can’t say for sure. I think I can give you a run for your money at least.”
“Oh I think he can beat you,” I said to Jared, “He’s faster than you and very skilled with his sword.”
Esmeralda smirked at me and said, “If he is as fast as we think, he could be fast enough to avoid your strikes and hit you before you could block.”
“I think you and I are going to have a match,” Jared said.
“I don’t want to fight you,” Finn said, “You have done too much for me.”
“He’s worried about embarrassing you,” Esmeralda said, “that’s so sweet.”
“After you attempt to escape from our jail we are going to spar,” Jared ordered.
“I think he should wait until the tournament so you won’t know his skills and he can try to win,” I said with a smirk.
“Stop egging him on,” Finn said with a frown.
Esmeralda tugged on Jared’s arm. “We aren’t going to decide this tonight, it’s past time for us to be asleep. Come on.”
Jared and Esmeralda left to their room while Finn and I walked outside.
“Why do you look so sad?” he asked me as we walked hand in hand under the stars. It was chilly, but not enough that I needed a jacket.
“I killed Jax for a good reason,” I said softly, “I’m afraid if I revive her or even participate that terrible things will happen again.” We walked past the one guard who patrolled the castle and he nodded to us with a smile. I nodded back to him.
“We don’t have to participate,” he said reassuringly, “It was just a suggestion because of our talks about it before.”
“You should still participate,” I said, “You shouldn’t hold back from doing things you love because of me.”
He stopped me and turned me to face him. “You should know that I don’t hold back and the only reason I suggested participating is because I want to participate with you. If you aren’t doing it then I won’t either. It wouldn’t be nearly as much fun without you and plus I would be worried the entire time that some other pirate would come and steal you.”
“I told you that I won’t fall for another pirate,” I said defensively.
“I know, but they won’t win the games unless they take my treasure and that is you, my love.”
I blushed and kissed him. “I love you.”
He smiled and whispered, “I made you blush again. I love you too.”
We went to our separate rooms and I went to sleep debating what to do. With our kingdom inviting the pirates it would be unwise for them to try anything against us, especially when we would be the first to welcome them instead of vilify them. Also having my family close by would make it even harder for them to successfully kidnap me. I knew it would make Finn happy to participate and truthfully I wanted to participate very much myself. Maybe Jax should stay dead and the true me should come out. I didn’t need to be Jax. I just needed to be myself.
Chapter Fourteen
TEN MONTHS LATER
The first day of the festival dawned cold and foggy. Pirate ships had begun gathering near the island where I had fought Jared as Jax. Today the pirates would begin their week long attempts to steal as many items from the others as they could. Dad and his crew had agreed to host and first thing that day the Captains and their first mates would gather on the island to discuss the rules of the festival.
I woke Finn up from his bed and he blinked at me in confusion. “Tilia, what are you doing here?” he asked and wiped sleep from his eyes. “Is everything okay?”