Bastian had no more wine in his system, but he was drunk on the mystery as they dashed towards the poor district of Port Sapphire.
Why and how was Roy (now Gorgo) able to transmigrate without dying?
It was perhaps a question that Bastian could answer later, and they had more important things to do right now. He focused again, putting all his effort into scanning the street with his eyes.
He saw a woman with a petite body and tired green eyes fighting a woman with a sturdy build. Their argument was about a laundry basket, as far as Bastian and Amanda could even decipher their screams. It seemed like the sturdy woman was winning. They were both dressed in old, dirty rags.
The bigger woman was putting her hand on the throat of her enemy when the lithe girl threw her hand and seemed to go for the eyes.
Bastian cringed. Eye gouging always looked so nasty.
The sturdy woman loosened her grip and screamed in horror. Just a fraction of a moment later she turned and ran, holding her still seeing, yet bleeding eye.
"Nice move," Amanda said approvingly.
"I think we should go talk to her," Bastian said, slicked his hair back and stepped across the street.
The petite woman had such beautiful straw blonde hair that it seemed like a sin and a shame to have it running down her back, uncombed, unwashed. She was panting, holding her throat and shooting murderous glances towards the escaping woman.
"That must be some pretty important laundry if you are willing to blind a woman for it," Bastian said, finally catching the attention of the blonde, unkempt beauty.
"Aye, Cap'n," she heaved, wiping sweat off her brow. "Her husband likes to collect underwear. If you know what I mean."
"And she just goes along with it?" Bastian clicked his tongue disapprovingly. "You seem like you are dainty, yet in reality you could probably fight off dozens like her. Do you fight for yourself or for others?"
"If you ask if I have a family, then no." She shook her head sadly. "But I do have a landlady to whom I owe many responsibilities."
"And what if I gave you a place to live with less responsibilities?" Bastian asked with a sly grin.
He knew for a fact that a pirating life was not all work. Many hours were so devoid of meaning on the high seas that - according to the books he had read about this topic - pirates had a genius level of inventiveness when it came to fashioning new games and imaginary scenarios. At least the work on the ships was often as short as it was intense, if there were enough crew members.
"Sounds like a mighty good offer, which makes me suspicious," the woman said. "Might I ask you two to have a cup of tea and talk about it in length?"
The little room was, as was usual in a poor part of town, just a room in a small apartment with no kitchen of its own. They had to wait around for a family of three (two of them were rowdy young boys who made as much noise as a music festival in the normal world would have made) to finish preparing their supper, and then they retreated into a marginally private space that the blonde woman alone inhabited.
Over the years, Bastian had found out that the decorations of a room could say a lot of stuff about the person who lived there.
This was the room of a hopeless romantic with a fixation about the sea.
Endless collections of seashells, poorly drawn ships on the wall - and countless other pieces of nautical paraphernalia. It all made for a pretty cute room, until one noticed the knife collection. Bastian had never seen a poor person with so many impressive and practical knives. Some of the blades had dark red spots on them and he did not feel like asking about their origins.
"So, I assume you have a place in the brothel for me," the blonde woman said sadly. "Cap'n, I really don't think I am cut out for that kind of work."
Bastian shook his head. "I am disappointed to hear that you think of me as someone so lowly. I have an entirely different proposition for you. What is your name?"
"Melinda," the woman said.
"Melinda. Tell me a bit about yourself."
Melinda, having been orphaned at a young age, had spent years and years honing her tough woman skills. Said skills included fighting, stabbing and doing other people's laundry for a fee. She could manage any task hurled at her, being now 22 years old and skinny as a twig yet equipped with small yet powerful muscles. Packed full to the brim with firepower and an attitude that made wild hounds scared of her, she had always missed the place overseas of which she had only the vaguest of memories. This yearning had become a generalized sense of longing towards the sea. Melinda had tried to find a fisherman she could date and eventually marry, but none of them wanted to take a woman out to the sea.
As the tale began to revolve heavily around nautical issues, Bastian courteously interrupted her and crossed his arms on his chest.
"Do you think you would make for a good sailor?" he asked.
"I think so, yes. I am hardy and I know several useful knots." This peculiar lady blushed a little.
"Well, how about piracy? Are you inherently opposed to it, or does the promise of swashbuckling adventures excite you? Treasures and fights? Quests?" Bastian grinned wildly and took out his gun to place it on the table for Melinda to have a look at something she probably had not seen too often.
Flintlock pistols were the peak of technology in this world. Bastian would have to borrow old Bastian's memories later in order to be able to shoot.
Melinda's eyes widened.
"But - but I am a woman…"
"That is precisely why you are the right person for this job."