(audible giggle snort and a drink, the bottle set hard down)
"My only one. I only bother to write this now because it's notable. I've never even owned a boat before. We stole it from Ieyasu."
~ Their ships sail, sighting battle ahead attacking a beach, survivors rowing toward them flanking out around unseen.
"They kept on coming. We stopped asking why. They were all just right there, right in our path, every turn ... and there were so many."
~ Small pontoon Taiwanese rowboats pull up alongside, calling for aide, with wounded.
"It's all too much for me. They don't know that but I do."
(a drink, bottle slam)
"It always was since the day I was born and I have no idea how. And now ... I don't even know what any more. There's a mist all around, it's never left us."
~ Three small broad sailed and pontoon Philippine ships sail under their gun's cover, sinking pursuing ships.
"There is something happening here and all I wanted to do was run away for good. To disappear and maybe just to die. I think it's the only thing this fleet has in common."
~ an oar lined sailing galleon from Indonesia taking fire, Chiyome swarming the attacking decks with her crew.
"We run from something wrong just praying blind for something right. From the place that calls us monsters to the place which calls us home."
~ A broad Thai boat, as a deep house follows the growing fleet, sight of it called out by Karasu.
"I didn't want this. This fleet is beautiful. It's bold. Decks filled with the finest and most noble warriors I have ever known. And I have no idea why they follow me. But they do. I have a map."
~ A ship from India crosses their path, western pirates in pursuit.
"I assume the journey. The journey assumes me."
"Shumi."
____
Lightning flashes day to night.
~ Between Two Horns ~
('Revolution' by Public Enemy)
The work their way into the icy Horn of Africa, tall tall peaks to the
north, impassable, shards of beachhead, jagged. To the south the shelf
of ice spewing bergs, Antarctica.
________
This is one of naval history's worst routes. Considered nearly impassable by large vessel by many, and they're doing the more difficult direction in the worst possible season.
But still more likely than a fleet such as theirs making the highly patrolled route through the Middle Eastern seas. In fact the devil's horns route was only passed by those with something to hide.
____
____
The decks are iced in the blizzard, the rope slipping. A ship from the Philippines is crushed against a berg, one from India cut through by jagged rock.
Rescues deploy and pull crew from frigid water ...
The passing knocking sound of the domino weights falling in the Xinhua warship. The crushing and tremble of the cracking ice shelves.
________________
The churning sound of the dervish.
Magistrate - "Is there somewhere within, anything which was once a sailor ?"
A face forms mildly and briefly off center from the dervishes own.
Magistrate - Smiles, "I wonder if he sailed 'the devil's horns'."
The face crosses the dervishes in fear while the dervish grins, grinding.
Magistrate - "Yes, few survived it. The first horn, the tip of southern Africa, the second the southern tip of the Americas."
He leans forward with a smile.
Magistrate - "This was a western term from their maps held inverted, these horns held high to them."
He leans back and pauses to examine the dervish.
Magistrate - "Iced and violent waters, funneled and cooled, heated and washed. None would pass them but to avoid the others who wouldn't."
He stares while faces pass through forms across the dervish.
Magistrate - "Criminals. Slavers. Importers of the drugs and weaponry which would tip those vital scales of gaijin history. With gunpowder."
A deep churning within the dervish as it focuses form.
Magistrate - "As well our more noble friends, of course. But theirs was not the common destination. Theirs to sail north. Straight between the two horns, and through the devil's brow." He stares coldly, "Straight down the devil's throat and into its heart."
A sound of cracking wood, like trees breaking outside with the dervish's seething exhale.
________
The flagship strikes ice hard in the storm, undamaged as Shumi call orders, Karasu sailing sight. Ships behind are roped in tow, each under their own but resisting the other's drift, disappearing into the mist.
____
On the shores of the magistrate's village, the mist drifts in as more like the dervish guest walk from the water, drawing light and color from the ageing shops, the villagers closing with watch.
____
Through the mist the Xinhua priestesses' vessel passes easily through the broad path of broken ice.