Posted by Moore on March 22, 2004 at 16:40:07:
We are close to Perpignan now. We did not encounter "Hand Keeper."
The rowers, flirting with Diana, asked her if she knew anything about pirates. She said she knew a little about them, but wanted to know more. Diana asked why men became pirates. I answered for the profit; the rower answered for freedom - which show the difference in how we think. A seaman's life is difficult; a seaman has to face storms, sea monsters, and horrific living conditions. Pirates use caravels, lightly built, and designed as a fast and maneuverable vessel. Caravels often have permanent fighting platforms. A large ship like a caravel, with its strong frame and streamlined hull, has a large cargo capacity for carrying stolen goods or an additional hundred men or more for boarding actions. Pirates like to capture their prize without a fight. In "safe" waters, a merchant ship may not have many marines or any sea-mages. These merchants ships would surrender quickly, knowing that any form of resistance would lead to slaughter.
When pirates fought other ships at sea, they would try to board the vessel, rather then risk destroying the valuable merchant ship and its cargo with spells or artillery. When the ships were along side of each other, the pirates would throw grappling hooks, and fight fiercely in hand-to-hand combat. Cutlasses, short stabbing swords, knives, and pikes are favored weapons among pirates. It is dangerous for pirates to try to grapple with an unknown ship, especially in the frontier. First, there is the inherent physical difficulty in matching speed and headings and jumping between vessels yawning and pitching on the open sea. Second, powerful adventurers are often hired to escort valuable cargo, and one well placed ball of fire can consume the most powerful wooden ship. Everyone fears fire on a ship.
We came around a bend in the river and could see the town, and its gatehouse and wall. The rowers told us not to make any sudden moves, lest we be mistaken for pirates that may have taken over the barge. The repercussions of such a mistake would involve catapult boulders.
I asked the rowers if pirates are such a threat, then why have such a large and massively fortified brick gateway, instead of a larger and better defended sea wall. They told me pirates are not limited to attacking by water. Pirates can land at a desolate area on the coast, disembark from their ship(s), and then travel overland to the area they wished to attack, be it a town or rich mine, for example. The pirates would typically capture a local commoner to learn the lay of the land, and what defenses the nearby target had. Then, if the pirate' strength was deemed sufficient, they would attack. If successful, they would take the best loot, and return to their ships.
Pirates are executed when caught. I showed Diana the tarred bodies suspended in individual cages from gallows lining the river bank. The authorities would hang the pirates, then leave their bodies to rot away. This shows the fate of all who would dare to be pirates. Almost every pirate has a nasty short life, and dies in battle or on the gallows.
"Do pirates make their captives walk the plank?" she asked. "Where did you get such a silly idea?" the rowers teased. "Where would be the fun it that? The pirates would not be able to se their victim's suffering." They continued telling her (and exciting her, I believe) about popular pirate tortures such as sweating and masting. Sweating involves a captive being forced to run around the mast until he drops from exhaustion. The pirate's cutlasses provided motivation for the captive to keep going with painful jabs to inspire greater speed. Masting involves a prisoner tied to a mast and used as a target. The pirates would throw broken bottles or knives, and try it hit specific spots on the prisoner's body with arrows.
Pirates often torture their prey in other manners, and informally compete for the title of cruelest. A captive of a vicious pirate might expect to have his arms or legs cut off, or his tongue pulled out. Cutting off a captive's ears, nose, or genitalia and forcing them to eat them is a common theme as well. One pirate who captured a town north of the Camargue, who is known only as the Transmuting Hand, roasted her captives on a griddle.
Another pirate, Doar the Stutterer of the "Spliced Dream," makes a habit of locking captives inside the hold of their ship, and then scuttling it. Diana seemed particularly agitated by this story. The rowers described how the water would rise inexorably up the prisoner's bodies as they were trapped, knowing they would drown soon. The trapped prisoners would claw and fight each other at the hatchway, desperately struggling to break through. She moved against me as they told the story, licking her lips and running her fingers through her hair. The doomed souls would be trapped in the dark hold as the cold water crept up and up. They would wait until the hold filled with water, then would have to greedily search for pockets of air to prolong their lives in the hope of salvation. Diana grew more agitated and moved closer into me, so I bid them to stop and speak no more of Doar the Stutterer.
They obeyed, and told us a story of pirates who became ruthless bandits when they where trapped ashore when their ship panicked and sailed off after being spotted by a warship. Durus is the leader of this band. Durus and his men live a hard life. They have no friends anywhere. They live off the land, or do raids just for supplies. Their frustration at being marooned shows itself in their evil. They attack small farmsteads, and do horrible things to the dwellers within. Mothers are forced to have sex with their sons, father with their own daughters, and other things that I will not write about. And this can go on for days, until Durus and his force have consumed all of the livestock and all of the food reserves meant to last the family for the rest of the year. There are even rumors he would put people on spits and eat them if there wasn't enough food to feed his men. Durus and his men would leave nothing behind but an empty shell of the farmstead.
The rowers told us of a last group of pirates as they rowed us around the seawall and to our assigned dock. These pirates would raid in the late summer through the fall. From the descriptions, these pirates are odd fellows. They loot and plunder like traditional pirates. But they also seem keenly interested in personal glory in combat. These seasonal pirates use different ships then are usually found in the seas. Their ships have shallow drafts, and they can row far up rivers and raid communities thought to be safe. The ships can even be portaged between bodies of water on rollers.
The seasonal raiding pirates raid for a season each year then disappear. No one knows where they go. Instead of fighting like civilized men, they have berserkers among them and fight in irregular battle formations. Each of their warriors, even the youngsters who can count only twelve summers, fights better and is stronger then civilized men. Instead of mages hurling balls of fire, the seasonal raiding pirates have rune casters. The rune casters can inscribe runes on swords to aid them bite through armor, runes to give super human strength, and even runes to protect the wearer from being wounded by a sword blow.
Diana seems quite excited by the rower's tales. I think she likes stories of sex and violence. I need to sell the fish and vegetables I traded for, get warehouse space with security for the bulk trade goods, and send word of my arrival to Charity Palace before I get us a room for the night.