☼ : A memory my character has with yours that they’ll never forget - Cero
The past blended with the present in that gods awful cell. Sometimes she relived the cruel and wicked things she had done. And sometimes she experienced the death of her mother and baby brother over and over again. But…
Sometimes…sometimes what she recalled was innocent and carefree. One particular one she relived and harbored a feeling of hope; that she’d make it out of the hell she was in.
“What if I don’t like it? What if I fall in? The ocean isn’t like the swimming pond at home. I don’t know if it’s gonna be safe.” An eleven year old Gallaria stated with youthful conviction as she stared up at her uncle.
“Hush now, sweetling. Don’t you trust your Uncle Keelin?” The kind man with her father’s face and the opposite of personality and capacity for warmth. The young redheaded elf pursed her lips in thought. With a small sigh, she nodded her head.
“Yes, Uncle Keelin. I trust you.”
The sights and sounds of the Silvermoon docks brought a broad smile to Keelin’s features as he led his niece to a ship. It wasn’t his ship, the Dusk Rose, that she had seen in pictures and in her mind’s eye. “Uncle Keeling, this isn’t your ship.”
Laughter filled Keelin’s chest. “No, sweetling, this is a ship that belongs to a good friend of mine. Cerothyn Zeddicus. He’s a rascal of a scalawag, but I wouldn’t trust our maiden voyage to any other man. I want to show you everything. And!”
With a flourish, her uncle pulled out a wooden rapier. “Cero is a fine swordsman. He’s agreed to teach you how to handle a sword.” Gallaria’s eyes lit up and she took the sword. She looked up as Cerothyn himself greeted them at the walk up to his ship.
“Ah, there’s the lass who’s going to follow in her uncle’s footsteps. C’mon board, my friends. Everything is ready for our little adventure.” He gave Keelin a loaded grin which plainly read, ‘You owe me bigtime.’ Keelin just returned the grin with a cheeky one of his own.
Over the next couple of days, Gallaria’s days were taken up by all the sights and sounds and tasks of a working sailing ship. On the third day, the day they were supposed to be headed home, a storm set upon them. A fierce one, at that. The ship rocked and rolled in the ocean’s maddening waves. Gallaria had been instructed to stay in the cabin but she was prone to disobeying at times.
Gallaria made her way up to the deck and immediately regretted it. The ship pitched to the side and she went tumbling. Screaming in abject fear, she was about to fall over the side of the ship when a strong arm caught her around the waist.
“There now, lass. I’ve got you.” Cerothyn murmured in her ear as he made for the underbelly of the ship. When they were safe, Gallaria started to cry, clinging to the Pirate as if her life depended on it. “There, there, love. It’s alright. Let’s get you back to bed afore your uncle finds out what happened.”
She was tucked back into bed as the storm finally began to release its hold on the ship. Gallaria spent the rest of the journey glued to Cero’s side, following his every move like a little shadow.
Gallaria roused herself from the memory as the door creaked open. It was the Inquisitor.
No matter how much he tried, how much blood and screams he pulled from her, she would not break.
