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Life has changed for the better. Not so long ago Patricia was serving drinks to pirates in a tavern, and now she is a pirate captain herself! Fortune had finally smiled on her. The dull everyday life was colored by pure magic. The saber hovered over the cabin, guarding Patricia’s sleep. In addition to goblins, trolls, and boggles, the crew even included swamp elves. They were tall and green-skinned. Patricia had only seen tiny elves before and naively thought they were all as small as pixies. The swamp elves turned out to be hulking men whose skin was sprouting slime and moss. The tavern elves tended to leprosy by climbing into beer mugs. Their size was perfect for such hiding. If they were discovered, they blew a whirlwind of magical beer bubbles in the drunkard’s face that would make him lose his mind and dance in the street all night. No one believed the complaints of the drunks in the morning. Many complained that they were enslaved by elves, not ale. Naturally, they were only mocked. It was until disaster struck.
One day some drunkard swallowed a beer elf, and his stomach swelled, sparks ran along his skin, and the elf laughed from his gut. Everyone thought he had a ventriloquist inside him. The poor guy lost his bearings and hit the iron hook with his belly. The freed elf flew out of the belly. The murder was blamed on the pirates.
Patricia remembered how the drunkard’s body hung on the hook like a meat carcass, while the mocking elves circled around the hook and cheered:
«How easy it is to fool people!» They chanted.
Now they were helping her to pirate. And she had thought that magic tricks were easy only with drunkards in the tavern.
The first ship they captured was a galley. There was nothing to eat. But the vampire ship did, both the ship’s owners and the galleys’ oarsmen. Its ropes and sails caught its victims in a cocoon and smeared them in a bloody stain. The blood would quickly disappear, soaking into the ship, and the sails would turn boiling white again. This was great, because sailing with bloody sails meant being under suspicion forever. You could tell a bloody ship belonged to pirates. The ship itself didn’t care, it was all about food. It easily accepted the presence of a captain, as long as the captain leads it on a voyage for game. But the crew lacked other values.
«We don’t see eye to eye with the ship,» Patricia sighed. «I want wine, spices, silks, and sharp Menuel’s weapons.»
Menuel had the best weapons, and Etar had the best silks and tastiest sweets, but the ships of opportunity were only warships, not merchant ships. Patricia’s blood-hungry crew easily boarded ships with heavy equipment. One captured ship had an unusual cargo – barrels of lead.
«What was in them?» Patricia polished her saber and watched as the goblins dragged the barrels to the deck from the sinking ship. «Is it gunpowder? Or is it mercury? Definitely not wine. The packaging is not typical of wine.»
«It is a fire wine,» one of the goblins replied.
«No, it isn’t! There is no such thing as a fire wine.»
Patricia opened one of the barrels and was astonished. Inside the barrel, liquid fire was bubbling.
«Is this really drinkable?»
«Yes, it is!» The big goblin snatched the barrel and took a big gulp, then snorted insolently.
«And you didn’t burn your throat?» Patricia wondered.
The goblin shook his horned head. Then he clawed at his stomach. His eyes bulged and turned orange, and sparks flickered across his fur. The goblin grinned contentedly. He was enjoying the effects of the fire wine.
«Do the others drink it too?»
The goblin nodded.
«Drunks,» Patricia muttered under her breath. The goblin took no offense. Everyone here liked fiery wine that burned the palate. And this was her team! All monsters! She didn’t know that before.
Patricia was getting discouraged. The other pirates had taken the treasure, and all they got were barrels of wine. In frustration, she stabbed one of the casks with her dagger.
«No, don’t tear them off!» The jumpy creature from the hold squeaked, but it was too late. An orange trickle flowed onto the deck.
«There’s fire in every barrel, not wine!» Patricia was indignant.
«It’s fire wine,» the Bogles grumbled resentfully. «Don’t you realize that this is the highest kind of wine?»
«And who drinks such wine? Are they suicides? Are they condemned to execution? It will burn your throat!»
«Dragons and dragons’ friends drink it,» replied the Bogles.
«But it will burn our ship. Hurry up and get buckets of water!»
Are there buckets on board? Patricia didn’t even know. But the flames on deck went out by themselves. Did the ship soak it up?
«Our house isn’t on fire,» the pixie flipped in the air.
«It is the ship, not the house!» Patricia corrected her.
«It doesn’t matter!» The pixies scattered and the goblins began to drink heavily.
Patricia stepped away from the horde of monsters. They were pouncing on the barrels of fiery liquor. The barrels didn’t even have corks. The goblins were smashing the lids with their paws to get to the contents.
«Hey, Captain! Look at me? Do I fit in with your crew?» A female voice squeaked from somewhere above.
Patricia looked around. There was no one around, except for the strange, stiff gargoyles on the sides. They looked like they were about to come to life. Could she have been approached by a ghost? There’s no sign of it, by the way. Are there invisible ghosts?
«How is about that?» The unfamiliar voice came from above again.
Patricia raised her head, holding her triangle with one hand. There was no one flying in the sky above the ship. So she couldn’t have been called from the sky.
«Look here!»
A beautiful gray head with pointed ears hung down. The eyes on the gray face glittered like amber. A thick cloak covered her narrow shoulders. The lady resembled a dunghill.
«Do you like hanging upside down?» Patricia asked puzzled.
«I do!» The lady shook her gray cape and appeared to be a huge bat. She jumped down gracefully and stood in front of Patricia, straightening up to her full height. Its head reached Patricia’s chin.
«How did you get here? Are you even a fairy or a bat?»
«I’m both, and I’m both, and I’m both.»
«What’s the third thing?»
«I’m a bat fairy, that’s the first two things, and the third, I’m a member of your team.»
«How come I didn’t notice you before?»
«Were you too busy enslaving the crew?»
Enslavement! What’s the word?
«I recruited them, not enslaved them.»
«Hmm,» the bat fairy squirmed incredulously.
«What are your talents?» Patricia looked her over from head to toe. Her feet were two paws with sharp claws that scratched the deck.
«Are they talents for what?»
«It is to fighting.»
«How warlike you are!» The gray fairy clucked her tongue.
«I need warriors.»
«The mermaids say that you can’t survive on the seas without strength,» the fairy sighed and showed her clawed feet. «I can tear anyone to shreds. In my claws the enemy is like in a meat grinder, but my main talent is in agility and in the ability to whistle a strong wind. My whistle, by the way, can make people deaf or insane. Would you like a demonstration?»
The bat-fairy put the claws of her little fingers in her mouth and prepared to whistle.
«No, you don’t,» Patricia interrupted her. «It’s better to introduce yourself. What’s your name?»
«Nethopurina.»
«You’re from a race of celestials?»
Nethopyrina shifted her triangular eyebrows in puzzlement.
«I’m from the bat fairy caste.»
«Okay, it’s not about bloodline. So, Lady Netopyrina…»
«I haven’t been called Lady since King Opal threw me out of the castle in disgrace.»
«What did you do to him?» Patricia immediately felt good about the fairy.
«I drank the blood of the wrong lady to be executed.»
«And he threw you out for such a small thing? He loves fairies, peri, divas, and especially the night fairies, the blood-drinking fairies.»
«But it is not me. I was out of place.»
«So was I.»
«You ran away. No one threw you out,» Nethopyrina scrutinized Patricia. «I see your line of fate. By the way, you’re being chased.»
«Is it from Opal?»
«No, it is from somewhere else.»
«I haven’t made any more enemies anywhere else.»
Is Nethopyrina a clairvoyant? She’s a little vague in her predictions. More like a fraudulent fortune-teller from Opal Square. King Opal had a good eye. He knew how to tell the real sorcerers from the charlatans.
Patricia remembered the feast hall at Opal’s castle, the poison glasses lined up between the food, the dishes of meat and blood, and the snide laughter of the peri community. Peri are the female variety of evil genies. Outwardly they are beauties, inwardly they are demons. The King of Opal released them from some ancient candlestick, and all of Opal turned into hell.
Patricia remembered sitting at the feast table between giggling peri, and on the platter in front of her was meat left over from the cut corpse of her uncle who had rioted against the king. It was best not to clash with a king who had subjugated an unclean force. But the fateful step had been taken, nothing could be undone.
«The King of Opal wanted to give you up to the dragon,» Netopyrina determined.
«I’ve surrendered to the dragon!» Patricia kicked a barrel of fire wine that had been forgotten on the side of the ship. The packaging was faulty. The fiery liquor ran down the deck. It’s going to burn!
The puddle of fire suddenly turned green and turned into a swamp. How did this happen?
«Is there room for me?» A green hand rested on the side.
Had one of the swamp women crawled in? Patricia didn’t think she’d ever see one of them again.
«The dragon burned my swamp as soon as you left,» she explained, climbing up onto the deck on the smooth side. «So I choose to travel in your company. It’s safer with you.»
«Staying close to me is like sailing on a pirate ship.»
«Well, then I want to join your crew. Who says a swamp fairy can’t be a pirate?»
«Can you fight?»
«I can be useful,» the swamp fairy pointed to the green trail of slime that followed her through the water.
«It is mud,» Patricia said.
«And what is about this one?» Her wing stretched out and touched the water behind the deck. The waves immediately became mire. «I can turn the ground beneath your enemies’ feet or the water beneath their ship into mire.»
Patricia whistled. That’s even better than strength. The Swamp Lady knows how to be useful.
«You better learn to fight with a saber, too.»
«I’ll try, but it’s unnecessary. I don’t need a saber when I have claws.»
A swamp fairy could cut a human throat with them. Patricia turned away.
«I am Zeligena,» the swamp fairy introduced herself.
«Isn’t that the name of a whole race of fairies with goat hooves under their green dresses?» Patricia wondered. She had met such fairies at Opal’s court.
«Maybe so, but in this case it’s a name, it is not a nationality.»
It wouldn’t have occurred to Patricia to say that fairies were divided into races and nationalities.
«All right, stay, Zeligena. Let’s hope you’re not a spy.»
«What do you mean?» Zeligena snorted insolently. «I’m an honest swamp dweller who was defeated by a dragon.»
«I’m angry with him myself,» Patricia noticed a metal tube on the side of the boat. It looked like a spyglass, but it was fancy.
«It is a morgen spyglass!» Netopyrina was surprised. «It must have been left here by the sea people. Or maybe it’s a gift?»
«You can see the Undersea Kingdom through it,» Zeligenna interjected. «Let me see!»
But Patricia had already looked through the peephole herself and was surprised. The tube showed not the water and the horizon, but the walls of a palace of shells and pyramids of pearls.
