Work Text:
The living memory of Eilis Lochlain can be divided into two distinct eras: Before Kingfisher and after. They literally and without exaggeration saved my life when they brought me to the ship. Just some sod with no money, no memories worth having, and a fixation on a missing coat.
Before, I was wandering. With the tensions in the north end of the Empire still simmering after the war I thought it best to head south. Having few skills and no background to speak of, I was not doing so well professionally. I settled into a town just a bit shy of being a city on the southeast coast hoping to find honest work. What I found instead was an undercurrent of lawlessness and an overcurrent of apathy. My first evening there someone broke into my rented room while I ate and made off with the rest of my pitiful savings. That stung. I abandoned all pretense of honesty and figured if everyone else was going to take theirs I may as well take mine. The docks, with their constant bustle and the frequency with which money changed hands made finding a mark dangerously easy. I had only to tuck myself inconspicuously into a doorway by the entrance to the Custom House and most days I could slip enough out of the bulging pockets of those coming and going to afford a halfway decent meal and a roof, if not a bed.
Other days I was not so lucky. There are other methods to make a handful of coin in a hurry, but they come at greater risk. The only upside to my solitude was that I had no one to whom I had to explain my bruises after a “customer” got too rough.
That is who I was when the Captain found me. A slip of a man nursing a black eye from two nights before and praying to every god in the pantheon that his rumbling stomach wouldn’t alert his mark. To this day they swear they would have caught me anyway, but the noise certainly didn’t help. I slipped a hand into their pocket, as I had to hundreds of folks before them, and before I could move another inch, I was pressed against the wall of the alley with a knife at my throat. As I sputtered a complaint that they were going to break my goddam arm, they looked me over once and declared: “you’re going to be trouble, aren’t you? Follow me.” I didn’t even know, yet, with whom I was dealing but if the Captain gives an order you obey. So I followed them straight to their ship and up the gangplank unquestioningly. I assumed that they either wanted to kill me on their own territory or have sex or both but… What did I have to lose?
Before the sun had set I was the assistant boatswain. I had a bunk, a hot meal, and the promise of steady pay. I spent the next few days warily watching the Captain, waiting for them to come at me with their knife (or their knife, if you catch my drift); but they paid me no more mind then they did the ship’s cats. I began to relax into this life. Admittedly it took me a few weeks to realize that I was on a pirate ship; and a few more to realize whose ship. But let me tell you, dread pirates from tales of old are much less threatening when you’ve seen them before their coffee.
The real shock came when I learned about them being a dragon. That is something the stories had all conveniently left out. I was sitting on the masthead in the absolute dead of night one day, as a result of my being completely unable to fall asleep. The skies held that heaviness that promises a storm in the morning, but for the moment the ship was so quiet even the crew on watch was dozing. I saw the Captain slip out of their quarters and make for the stern. The masthead being a dragon with raised wings, I was nearly invisible if I flattened into the hollow of its back, which of course I did in order to spy on this occurrence. I watched them climb to the top of the railing with practiced ease… and jump. Before I worked the yell out of my throat a pair of wings shot up from the point where they had disappeared. They were beautiful. The watery light of the moons caught the ripple of their scales as they flew and even the air around them glowed.
They flew straight back down onto the deck and landed as a human again, their hair still shimmering with the dampness of the clouds. The sound of their boots hitting the planks startled awake the crew on watch and they threw back their head and laughed at the way the men launched to their feet and to their own defense. Without realizing it I snorted at their fumbling excuses as well, and the Captain’s eyes narrowed on my hideout. Once again, I found myself dragged into their quarters and thrown into a chair. They demanded to know how much I had seen and threatened me with a slow and painful death if I went around spreading that information. I swore on my honor as a thief that I would never tell another soul about their lizard-y secret. They wheeled around and fixed me with a wicked smile as they chuckled and told me to be on the deck for watch at the same time tomorrow night and “I’ll show you “lizard,” Trouble.”
After that I spent most nights “on watch.” Really I only watched them, though. I think they enjoyed showing off and I certainly enjoyed the way they would beam at me as they landed and I would laughingly applaud their flying skills. The best was when a storm rolled in. They would fuss over me before leaving, to assure that a stray bolt wouldn’t take me out; then they would launch themselves out of the crow’s nest and into the storm. The lightning would strike out from every direction and collect on their outstretched wings. They would burn like the sun and the air where I sat felt like fire.
Five years I’ve been with the Green Dragon. After two I was – unofficially – the first mate, never leaving the Captain’s side. After three they entrusted me with the information about their [Redacted] and his [Redacted]. I told them everything, too; about my lack of memories and my lack of care to retrieve them. For the first time I had someone look at me as a whole, not just a first impression and it terrified me. But they took it in stride. They were the one that encouraged me to act on the pull I felt to find my coat again. To answer at least that question about who I am.
So a year ago I struck out with a not-insignificant amount of money and a promise to tell them where I went and any ships I took so they could find me. For weeks I wandered into every shitty bar in the northern Empire hoping for a feeling that I had been there before. And after I found the correct place, describing the person from my memory to a thoroughly unenthused bartender led to months of dead-ends. One of those ends led me to Cherdyn and onto the Selkie’s Tale. Purely by chance, I hoped to go north following an – obviously incorrect – trail and the sea seemed to be the fastest way to travel. So I included myself in the cargo, we’ll say, and was rolled onto the deck.