Most nights aboard the Rose went smoothly once the rum appeared, right up until the point they didn’t.

Meg had joined them this time. She sat on an overturned barrel, nursing the same cup for hours and watching the crew’s antics with detached interest, as if she was happy to observe a problem she had no intention of solving.

Doyle’s bottle had made another appearance as well. It claimed fewer victims than before, mostly because the crew had finally learned what happened to people who accepted it.

At some point after the fourth round, James had decided the foremast needed climbing.

The decision would have been less foolish if it hadn’t been the same foremast he’d spent hours warning everyone not to trust under unnecessary strain. That warning had seemed important when he was sober.

He made it halfway up before the rope exposed a flaw in the plan.

There was a sharp crack, a burst of profanity, and then James discovered that descending required considerably less effort than ascending.

For a brief moment he pinwheeled through a tangle of rope with all the grace of a man losing against the laws of nature.

Then gravity won outright.

The rigging slowed him just enough to ensure he experienced every stage of the disaster.

Cudjoe caught most of him.

The deck claimed the remainder.

Meg watched the entire performance over the rim of her cup.

"Well," she snickered, "it’s nice to see your commitment to quality control."

Cudjoe didn’t argue the point. He set James on the deck and went to find something less idiotic to supervise.

By morning, James ached in places he’d never previously considered capable of aching.

The crew, naturally, found this hilarious.

Several hours and entirely too many comments later, the worst of the entertainment value had finally worn off.

By noon, the sun had heated the deck until it felt more like a cooking surface than a ship.

Nobody seemed particularly concerned.

The Rose moved steadily through calm blue water with full sails overhead. Tar and salt hung thick in the air. Whenever the wind weakened, the smells lingered over everything.

Farrow crouched beside the starboard guns, inspecting them with his normal expression of suspicion, as though expecting them to fail personally.

Near the foremast, Briggs supervised two sailors who had somehow managed to make the same mistake twice in a row.

He said nothing.

The silence conveyed his opinion well enough.

Somewhere amidships, the crew had discovered a shanty.

"What will we do with a drunken sailor?" someone shouted.

He missed the rhythm completely and was proud of the achievement.

"Early in the mornin’!" half the crew answered.

They had enthusiasm, if not accuracy.

"Shave his belly with a rusty razor!" Kit yelled.

Then he apparently forgot the next verse and solved the problem by repeating razor twice more until somebody else rescued the song.

"Way hay and up she rises!"

The crew dragged Kit back into the performance whether he was prepared for it or not.

James stood at the wheel and listened.

The noise rolled across the deck around him.

Ahead of the bow, the horizon had begun to change. There was still nothing obvious to see, but experience suggested something waited beyond it.

Two days of philosophical breakthroughs and one ill-advised fight with your own foremast. I wasn’t sure which one would finish you first.

James glanced toward Cudjoe.

The quartermaster stood several yards away, arguing with Grey over a chart. Neither man appeared willing to surrender his position. They were close enough to notice if James started talking to himself.

He lowered his voice to reply.

"Where the hell have you been?"

I was still here. I just wanted to see what would happen if I stopped providing guidance. The answer involved gambling, intoxication, and a conversation about liberty with a woman being paid by the hour. An impressive use of free will.

James snorted.

"And if I’d decided to sail this whole lot into Kingston and hand us over to the Navy myself?"

You assume there was a correct choice. That’s adorable.

James fell silent.

A cold suspicion crept in.

The answer sat badly with him.

The troubling part wasn’t the suggestion that he lacked free will, but because it suggested the choice itself might have been part of the experiment.

Exactly as intended.

James ignored the implication.

He already had enough problems competing for attention. Nassau was close, and reaching port took priority.

He considered the matter another moment, then let it go.

"Fine. What is it you want me to do about it?"

Instead of an answer, something appeared before him.

⚔ [QUEST ISSUED]

Make Yourself Useful

The Rose returns home short on prizes, short on crew, and short on good leadership. Nassau remembers who departed. It is about to judge who returned. Recruit sailors. Repair the ship. Replenish supplies. Find funds. Prepare for the next voyage.

Reward: ???

Pirates become surprisingly good at spotting bad leadership when there’s less money in their pockets. Consider fixing the listed problems before they start comparing notes.

James read the objectives.

He’d been planning to do all of it regardless. Now he found himself searching for a reason not to.

"So the grand revelation is that I should fix me problems?"

Yes. I realize that level of complexity may seem intimidating.

"Lovely chat, as ever."

The wind shifted.

Beneath the familiar scent of salt, James caught woodsmoke and the scent of growing things.

That combination meant land.

Sailors learned to trust such signs long before their eyes confirmed them.

"LAND HO, YE BEAUTIFUL BASTARDS!"

The shout cracked through the deck as Kit’s voice failed to settle.

"’Bout bloody time!" someone shouted from amidships.

"I’m kissin’ the first whore I see, I swear it on me mother!"

"First round’s on whoever still owes me from the card table!" Pete yelled back.

That earned groans from at least three different men.

Near the bow, one crewmen had started crying about how much he’d missed dry land. Nobody seemed inclined to stop him.

Even Meg leaned over for a better look.

James had spotted the island too. It sat low and green against the haze.

Looking at it was slightly awkward.

He knew the place and didn’t know it at all.

The original Calloway had walked those docks countless times. He had known which taverns watered down their rum and which ones considered deception unnecessary.

Those memories were there, but they didn’t create familiarity. If anything, they made the unfamiliarity more obvious.

Nassau continued to grow larger as the Rose approached.

James kept both hands firmly on the wheel.

⚓ [ALLIED TERRITORY — NASSAU]

Faction : Flying Gang

Status : Pirate Republic

Population : Approximately 2,000

Stability : Contested

Harbor : Major, Protected by Reefs

Facilities : Taverns, Brothels, Shipwrights, Markets, Warehouses, Plantation Estates, Careening Beaches

Faction Status : Member in Good Standing (Review Pending)

Nassau currently hosts roughly two thousand pirates, criminals, and other entrepreneurial failures. You should fit in adequately.