The Yellow Rose creaked a little more than Cold Snap expected. Well, he really couldn’t be too sure about it. He hadn’t been on this ironclad long enough to know the difference between a “normal” creak and a “bad” creak. It simply sounded creakier than usual, and that was enough to raise the hair on his neck.
Today was much the same as previous days on the ship. As the youngest and most inexperienced of the crew, he and Nebula were given the jobs no one else wanted to touch. Most days, that would be boiler duty. Today, he’d beg to shovel dry coal.
Yesterday, the ship had survived a harrowing ordeal against an enraged hammer bunyip. The massive beasts were known to turn other ships into matchsticks in their territorial ire. The Rose wasn’t other ships, yet she still bore scars.
They could be large: a bent rail on the deck. They could be small: a sheared rivet thrown across a hallway. However, the most dangerous of them all was the smallest of them all: leaks.
Obviously, every ship, no matter how well-constructed, would have a leak somewhere. That’s why every ship came with some sort of pump to keep the water outside where it belonged. Things got tricky though when the in-go exceeded the out-go, and the upkeep would be their downfall.
The crew had worked throughout the night to jam plugs and tarred ropes into the holes and separated plates, but it was simply a stop-gap. The Rose needed repairs, and she needed them quickly.
In Cold Snap’s estimation, this ship was an incredible work of engineering, assembly, and rigidity, but that came at the cost of maintenance. When the ship was in tip-top shape, it ran as smooth as fine silk. When it wasn’t, such as now, she was a cantankerous beast that demanded attention at every point. She worked the crew to exhaustion.
What was worse, the ships rigid construction made repairs that much more difficult. Several of the experienced engine workers ran around the decks dragging along a small forge. One of them turned a metal handle almost constantly, while another passed out flared, cherry-red rivets to crew members wielding tongs. These would be dropped into a waiting hole and then pounded into oblivion. They couldn’t reach all the holes, but it would have to do.
Snap, with only the basics of smithing under his proverbial belt had to shovel wet coal. One of the ten compartments that held the Rose’s coal was along a ruptured seam. Water seeped into the compartment and the adjacent room before being halted by those peculiar sealed doors.
It left the two rooms a black, mucky mess. The coal chunks floated in the water and stained everything it touched. Cold Snap and Nebula waded in the mess, feeling the dye in every part of their coats. They scooped the sludge with buckets, and someone up top heaved it up and overboard.
Snap never wanted to taste coal again. He kept his mouth far from the gunk and was still tasting it! He wasn’t even sure if he would ever get the color out of his coat, but he kept dipping.
Finally, the buckets scraped bottom, and they shoveled the worthless coal into the buckets. Water still trickled onto the floor around them, but at this point, it was washing away the black film and leaving the ship’s standard gray primer.
After hours of backbreaking work, Snap sat in an exhausted heap. Earth ponies were strong and near unstoppable, but as far as he was concerned, that was only on dry land. Even back home, he had never worked so hard.
At least now, he could see the Yellow Rose’s wound. The ship’s sides were made out of heavy plate steel, and the hammer bunyip had pulverized this section like foil. Steel crinkled like a rag at a joint in the plates. The rivets were gone, as well as the supporting rib beneath.
The rib, or what was left of it, was actually wood, not metal like he expected. That construction peculiarity alone was perhaps why the damage was so localized. The timbers absorbed most of the blow and crumpled. Perhaps metal did not have all the answers to construction yet.
That blow was nearly a disaster for the ship. The coal bunker had not been closed, and the water would have flooded compartment after compartment had one of the engineers not caught it quickly and sealed it off. Sailors whispered how quickly it would have gotten to the engine room otherwise. Snap did not know what that meant, but he suspected that was a very bad thing.
He turned to the black lump beside him. “So, want to be a miner?”
“Buck no,” the lump said.
“How about a blacksmith?”
“Buck no.”
“How about a”-
“Buck you,” the lump said as it lifted its head.
Nebula was not even recognizable. The only spot of color was his horn, and even that was spotted in grime. He never was particularly strong or enduring, and being a unicorn had not done him any favors there, but he looked exhausted. Not just exhausted, but absolutely beaten down.
He reached out and gave his friend a comforting pat. The pat felt more like a “splat” though. “We’ll get through all this. It’ll get better.”
“Can’t happens soon ‘nuf,” Nebula said and heaved himself up.
His magic weakly grasped the door latch and began pulling, but it suddenly clanged out of his grasp. The burly minotaur crewmate stepped through with a heavy sledge and a steel cylinder cradled in his arms. His eyes glinted as he saw the two filthy, ragged ponies. “Ahh, good job tiny pony, but here’s where real work gets done.”
He sauntered to the buckled plate, broke away the last remaining wooden splinters, and set the cylinder against the steel bone of the Rose. The cylinder clacked as he worked a small handle, and the cylinder stretched until it made contact with the compromised hull.
The minotaur suddenly strained against the load, but kept pumping. For a long second, nothing changed. Then the heavy plate shifted and bent back into place.
More of the crew started hauling in timbers and tools and repeated the minotaur’s work on other parts of the hull, but it took two or three to equal the muscled giant. Yet, equal him they did. The metal groaned under their irresistible load.
Cold Snap watched in growing fascination as the ship seemed to heal under her crew’s ministrations. The joint was tarred and shaped. Then rivets were passed through the holes from someone in a magical bubble outside. The minotaur spit on his hands and grasped the sledge. Corded muscles twisted, and like a tight spring, he slammed the heavy head into the glowing ingot.
One hit. Two. That was all it took, and the now-graying rivet looked as solid as the world’s foundation. The rest followed suit, and timbers went up behind them. Soon enough, Snap would never have believed that it was ever damaged.
“Is there anything they can’t do?” he asked in awe.
Nebula didn’t bother lifting his head. “How about not get us smashed to bits on this stupid...umm, what are we doing?”
Snap looked back at his friend. “What do you mean?”
Nebula rolled and winced at locked joints. He waved a hoof at the room in general. “This ship. This...thing. Why is he keeping us around?”
Not a word.
“Neb, I can’t”-
“Yeah, yeah. You can’t. Fine, but then what is he after? And why do we have to be part of it? At first, I was glad he didn’t dump us on a remote island to figure out our own mess, but now I’m starting to reconsider that notion.”
He rolled to his back. “Think about it, and I’m not asking you to spill whatever he’s cooking. We find out our good friend Mr. Horn is hauling along some hot goodies. Everyone has to have one. Come get one with the sticky-hooves discount!
“The captain is after this thing, whatever it is, and because of that, we’ve been in fear of our hides twice within as many days. And he is as determined as ever to keep going with it! Just how much more does he expect this ship to take?”
His voice fell. “Just how much more does he expect us to take?”
Hooves clanked nearby. “As much as necessary.”
Cold Snap looked up from his friend and at their newcomer. Mr. Horn leaned against the bulkhead and seemed to be studying either their cleanup job or the crew’s repair skill. Either way, he didn’t let it distract him for long. “You two should get a bath. You could use it.”
Snap finally let out a broken laugh. The sound magnified inside the metallic cell until it was harsh and primal. He stopped and regarded the hippogriff. “And where? In the sea? I guess it would get the soot gone, but then the salt would be almost as bad.”
“You say that now,” the hippogriff said as he flicked away an errant piece of coal, “but I think you’ll change your mind later. I didn’t mean the sea though. I meant fresh water. Not just the daily rations or the weekly shower. I mean as much as you want. What then?”
“You drank the seawater. Didn’t you?” Nebula pointed an accusing hoof.
Snap didn’t hold his friend’s derision. “You know something we don’t. It’s your business to know things others don’t. So what’s it this time?”
Mr. Horn lifted his claws to his jacket as if to rub them, but he saw the black smears across his claws and thought better of it. “I only know that the crew is talking. They’re restless. Not mutinous. Land’s sake, I don’t think that word even exists in their vocabulary. No, they’re eager for something to happen. And what excites a sailor more than liquor, land, or lust?”
“And nothing else? Nothing new from the captain?” Snap asked.
Mr. Horn’s eyes darted over to Nebula. Then they settled back on Snap. “Nothing I have been told about. He keeps this whole matter close to his chest. I’m not sure why this little treasure hunt is so important, or even what the treasure is. The whole thing is so vague that it could be anything you want.”
“What about the other note?” Snap asked before realizing that he shouldn’t say anything around Nebula.
Mr. Horn glared meaningfully at him to please shut up before the captain decided to throw blabbermouths overboard. Nebula caught the message, shoved his black hooves in his ears. “Lalalalalala.”
“I have no idea what it is. I took a look when the captain was elsewhere about his business. What?”
Cold Snap felt a cold chill run down his spine. “You...sneaked into the captain’s cabin?”
“No. I resumed independent investigations.”
The room was silent.
“And, no. It’s total gibberish. Whoever wrote it seemed to throw it on with no sensible pattern of lines or curves or even having things not written on top of other things. Damnedest part is I know it’s important.”
“And everything else?”
Mr. Horn held up a defensive claw. “Look, I’m only a curious courier. I leave the investigations up to those more qualified than me. And I need to be getting back to work. I suppose you’d best do the same.”
He turned for the door, and then hesitated. “Though if you do want to conduct your own investigations, his door can be easily opened. It just takes a moment and a small knife between the door and jamb.”
The room was silent once more, broken only by Mr. Horn. “Good day.”
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Why?”
Cold Snap asked himself that question in near silence. He couldn’t think of a good reason. He had no reason to be outside Captain Gideon’s carved door. He had no reason for keeping a knife swiped from the galley tucked in his mane. He definitely had no reason trying to give himself a crash course on burglarizing.
Yet he was still here. He could see the rolling fields of hyacinths and spear-like blossoms carved on the captain’s solid oak door. He could smell the oils used to give it its luster and vibrant grain. He could see the tiny crack between the door and the wall.
All it would take would be to slip the blade in that crack. With a quick swipe up, he could open up the door and answer his own burning questions. What was the secret behind Grimlock’s grim map? What was the carved thingy? And what was the messaged carved in the box lid?
In the back of his mind, he knew that if he went inside, he went against astronomical chances that Captain Gideon had made any headway in his research and would only jeopardize his standing on the ship.
Then why was the knife blade touching the lock? His hooves tightened around the handle, and his pounding heart demanded he give the final push while his head screamed at him to think.
He pressed a little bit and felt a tiny give.
Something scraped inside. Ice flooded his gut. The great door muffled everything on the other side, but he could hear them: the confident, predatory padding of the captain’s paws. Paper rustled. Something thudded on the other side.
Captain Gideon had dropped something heavy on his desk. More pages rustled. A book then? Or a stack of papers? Was this his search for the Fountain of the Seas? Or had he heard that faint rasp of steel on steel and was coming to find the intruder ready to break into his sanctuary?
Cold Snap felt a cold sweat break out on his brow. Reason finally reasserted itself. As silently as he could and as fast as he dared, he withdrew the blade and tucked it back in his mane. He took a few slow breaths to still his pounding heart and prepared to leave the captain to his ship.
Then another sound came from the other side of the door. Captain Gideon’s voice echoed behind the wooden portal, but it was different than the powerful, demanding master of the Yellow Rose. This was precise, flowing, and melodic.
“...is flowing, and the starry skies are bright,
She walks along the river in the quiet summer night:
She thinks if I remember, when we parted long ago,
I promised to come back again, and not to leave her so.”
Captain Gideon was singing. His strong voice was subdued, as if he was singing to the hen his song captured. It echoed with his voice’s rich timbre and painted the picture of perfect longing.
Cold Snap momentarily forgot about his plan to escape. Instead, he remained still and put his ear close to the door.
“She’s the sweetest rose of color this soldier ever knew,
Her eyes are bright as diamonds, they sparkle like the dew;”-
“Bark!”
Snap recoiled from the auditory assault and thumped loudly against the floor. Meanwhile, the barking and snuffling on the other side of the door continued unabated. Captain Gideon’s song ended. “Whoever is out there, come inside immediately.”
The ice in Cold Snap’s gut was replaced by lead. He rubbed his ear and slowly resigned himself to his fate. The door opened soundlessly. Captain Gideon sat at his desk, papers and books scattered across the top. Sucat, the little traitor, sat happily in his corner and wagged his tail.
The griffon looked him over up and down. Finally, he smoothed out some loose papers.
“Cold Snap, you possess a singular talent for interrupting my privacy. Are you sure that is not your true talent, and that bush on your flank is a farce laid on you by higher powers?”
Snap gulped. His mark wasn’t a bush, nor was it a farce. He was actually quite skilled at cultivating various herbs, barks, and resins useful for incense and perfume. However, he was not about to give Captain Gideon the satisfaction of a retort.
The griffon set aside a page and pulled a book closer. On its pages were lines of text and illustrations of art and sketches. All he could see from this distance was squiggly lines.
“I take it there’s a good reason for spying outside my door?” the captain asked as he turned a page and scribbled a few notes without sparing Cold Snap a glance.
Well, there was something Snap had asked himself for the past few minutes! “Well, sir, I wanted to know if you…”
The captain stopped his note-taking and looked at him. “If I what?”
He didn’t sound particularly happy. Snap thought quickly. “If you had managed to make any progress on the artifacts recovered or if I might be able to assist on any research?”
Silence descended on the room. Snap could probably have heard a pin drop onto the captain’s plush carpet. The captain laid his quill across its stand and leaned onto his desk. “Shouldn’t you have duties to be attending to?”
“Already done, sir. I am here of my own free will, and I’m one of the few who has seen these artifacts personally. I’m volunteering to help you.”
Exactly where had that caravan of nonsense come from? Surely the griffon captain would laugh it off and kick him from the room. Cold Snap mentally prepared himself for an extended stay in the boiler room.
The laugh and order did not come. The gray bird sat silently, his brow furrowed in thought. “These studies have proceeded, slower, than I would prefer. I doubt that you can add any knowledge I already possess or have access to, but additional eyes would be a welcome change.”
Sweet celestial monarch from his ancestor’s homeland. That worked. The captain tucked away one of his notes and pulled out another page covered in his clawwriting. “I am yet to make any determinations on the artifact. Simply put, it has no markings on it that may indicate origin, and it does not seem to fit into the existing schools of magic, indeed, assuming it is magical at all.
“The box has also proven to be a unique challenge. The wood is not one I recognize, but I confess to not being an expert of dendrology. The writing is practically gibberish. It shares almost nothing in common with the various known languages across the world.”
“So, Captain, what about the others? Do we have a heading?” Cold Snap asked as he gently picked up the jeweled artifact.
The captain held a claw out and waggled it side to side. Then he realized the gesture was lost on the digit-less pony. “Somewhat. The description is very basic, but given the geography of the griffon kingdoms over the years, I have a guess or two. Follow my logic closely because it it fraught with assumptions.
“Grimlock was known to live in the eastern regions of the First Conclave. A physically fit griffon is able to maintain a speed of eight-and-a-half leagues per hour, and an average northerly tailwind is five leagues per hour. Our hypothetical griffon can maintain this pace for eight hours every day for thirteen days. Does this make sense?”
Cold Snap simply nodded. He wasn’t familiar with the nautical measurement, but he did not feel inclined to interrupt the captain for that. He rubbed his hoof over the artifact’s various curves and edges. No doubt the captain had done the same and gotten nowhere, but he liked to think he was being productive.
The griffon continued. “That totals approximately 1,360 leagues, or, with some grace given to his possible starting location, somewhere on the zebra continent’s southern coast.”
So, they would be taking this ship into the waters of the minotaur king’s enemies. Was it too late to take Nebula’s muttering seriously and find a way to jump ship?
“So far, I know nothing else. There are thousands of coves on that coast, and I have not finished comparing my maps to Grimlock’s. Though it did get me to start thinking. What creature did Grimlock find? Surely it was not one of the peoples common to the land. Tall? He would have recognized a diamond dog or minotaur. They are distinct.”
Snap said nothing. Where had the captain gone with his line of questioning, and what importance were the specifics of the original owner of the box and artifact that he was rolling between his hooves like a foal’s ball?
The captain pulled his book to the top of the pile. “That brought me to the more unknown species of the world. None of them either fit his vague description or were, quite simply, too stupid to even possess a box like that, let alone make anything like it. Also, the one or two possible species I found were several continents removed. Perhaps not impossible odds, but nothing I’ll bet on.”
Sharp pain flashed in Snap’s hoof. He grunted and lost control of the artifact that then thumped lightly against the carpeted floor. A thin red line welled from his frog that pulsed with every beat of his heart. The artifact lay on the soft carpet, unchanged except for a wet glimmer on an edge Snap had not noticed.
Captain Gideon grunted in annoyance, snapped up the artifact, and tossed a cloth to stem the bleeding. Snap pressed his hoof against the makeshift bandage, more embarrassed than hurt. The gray captain cleaned the blood off the bauble and returned it to his desk. “Now, if you are ready to pay attention?”
Cold Snap nodded vigorously. “Captain, what difference does it make who possessed it first? Isn’t the location and purpose more important?”
The captain spread his claws. “Perhaps no difference at all. However, knowing who held or made it first can yield clues on its purpose, unless you rolling it around like a foal’s ball gave you some miraculous insight?”
The earth pony shook his head. Silently, Captain Gideon gathered his thoughts for a few moments. “Are you familiar with mythology?”
Snap didn’t even have to think about that one. “Not a lick, sir.”
That got a neutral grunt from the griffon. “You should be. Because that’s where I started looking next. Myths and creatures recorded by tribe, tongue, and nation across the world. What could fit Grimlock’s mysterious skeleton? It had to be something tall, as seen by a griffon of average stature; and it had to be unrecognizable. Those are the only clues we have.”
Checking his bandage and reapplying pressure, Snap thought about the captain’s search method. “It sounds flawed. How do you know what they write is even accurate? It’s called ‘mythology’ for a reason.”
That made the captain smile, a fierce, predatory smile. “But it provides opportunities you would never have encountered otherwise. I threw out dozens of creatures for every possible lead. Too small, too stupid, too recognizable, but then it struck me.”
His eyes seemed to pierce Cold Snap to his core. They studied him, as if seeing if he was worthy of hearing what came next. Was he? Or was he to be sent out with the rest of the crew?
“Are you familiar with the curse of familiarity?”
Cold Snap only blinked at the absurd question.
“Come on then. Are you ever so acquainted with something you forget it’s there? Answer this: do you think about growing things, as in the exact method behind it?”
Finally, something Snap understood. “Not really. It’s something I just do. I can do it all day and think about something else.”
The captain nodded. “Precisely. You understand it, and you can put it aside to focus on other things. Not like someone who is totally inexperienced and has to consider every step. This familiarity makes for shortcuts in logic because you think you understand the situation.”
Captain Gideon put a claw on the book before him. Then, he hesitated. “You can read?”
Snap nodded.
“Pony? You can read pony writings, or just minotaur script?”
“My parents made sure I could read both,” Snap responded with a bit of pride.
Slowly, the griffon turned the book so Snap could read it. The title at the top caught his eye. The Myth of Man.
Captain Gideon tapped the page. “Tell me, Cold Snap, are you familiar with a creature called ‘Man’?”