Amara stood at the bow of the merchant ship where salt spray lashed her face as the vessel ploughed through the dark and churning sea. Up ahead, through the misty gloom, she could just make out the ghostly outlines of the Southern Isles.
"So we've arrived in the waters of the Misty Isle?" Amara squinted ahead to peer at the cloudy density.
"Looks like foul weather ahead, m'lady," the captain said, giving her a sideways glance. "We'll be needing to find safe harbour before nightfall."
"Right." Amara pulled her fur-lined cloak tighter against the chill wind. She had waited three long years for this moment, ever since she had first heard the legends of the Hallow Skull from a wine-soaked sailor in a dockside tavern. An ancient artefact of the pleasure goddess, rumoured to be hidden somewhere within the mist-shrouded isles. Whoever possessed it would gain sensual powers beyond imagination, the sailor had claimed. Powers that could bring even the haughtiest lover to their knees in ecstasy...
"Have you sailed these waters before, captain?" Amara inquired, watching the ominous dark shapes of the islands grow nearer.
"Aye, once before when I was a younger lad. But not since the pirate lords seized control of the isles. Dangerous waters now, make no mistake." The captain turned the wheel, steering them between two hulking sea stacks choked with vegetation. Amara caught glimpses of crumbling temples and monolithic idols peering from the undergrowth. This had once been a sacred place, she realized with a shiver.
"And yet you agreed to bring me here," Amara said with a smile, adjusting the silver moonstone pendant around her neck. A gift from her mother, enchanted to augment her innate talents for the magical arts. She would need all her skills and more if she hoped to survive the dangers ahead.
The captain chuckled. "For the coin you offered, I'd sail you straight into the mouth of the serpent god himself."
Amara joined his laughter, though it quickly died on her lips. Without warning, a massive dark shape burst from the sea off their port side, taller than the mainmast. A long, sinuous neck ending in a crested reptilian head swivelled toward the ship, golden eyes slitted.
"Kraken!" the captain bellowed, drawing his cutlass as panicked crewmen scrambled about the deck. The monster dove and started engulfing the ship in its shadow. With a sweep of its mighty tentacles it shattered the mainmast to splinters.
Boom!
"Fowl beast!" Amara raised her hands, channelling her magic. She spoke words that had not been uttered in these islands for centuries. A lance of searing white light sprang from her fingers and pierced one of the kraken's eyes. It reared back with an ear-splitting shriek, thrashing in the crimson water.
"Well done lass!" the captain yelled over the noise. But more tentacles were rising on all sides, which were blocking out the fading daylight.
"Fireball!" Amara aimed blast after blast of magical fire, but the kraken was too powerful. With a groan of snapping timbers, the ship suddenly listed hard to port as the monster ripped the hull asunder. Icy seawater flooded the deck, swirling around Amara's boots. There was no hope now. The ship would sink in minutes.
"We need to flee this vessel!" Amara threw a desperate look around and spied a lifeboat dangling askew from its ropes. Better than nothing. She hurled herself into it and sliced the lines loose with a flick of magic as the ship went down. The lifeboat pitched wildly as she plunged into the dark and heaving sea, not knowing whether the others were safe. Freezing water leaked in everywhere. Amara balled her soaked cloak beneath her and shivered uncontrollably. Through chattering teeth she spoke the words to summon a magical beacon, this was a flickering orb of light that would hopefully attract rescuers...if there were any to be found in this forsaken place.
She had little time for such worries, however, as a dark shape glided beneath her boat. A long, sinuous form, deceptively beautiful. A siren. The creature bobbed the surface, regarding Amara with fathomless black eyes, seaweed tangled in her flowing auburn hair. Without thinking, Amara tugged off her pendant and flung it at the siren. Maybe it could be bribed. The creature snatched it from the air, gazing at it with wonder, then laughed with musical delight and promptly vanished into the depths.
"So much for magical heirlooms," Amara sighed, huddling in the pooling water at the bottom of the boat. She had read tales that told of sailors going mad and hurling themselves into the sea at a siren's irresistible song. But this one seemed content with the moonstone pendant, at least for now. Small comfort. Amara was now utterly alone and adrift in the most perilous waters in the known world, with nothing but her magic to sustain her.
Magic that was fading swiftly as cold sapped her strength. Each whispered spell came harder than the last. Soon she would be helpless, at the mercy of the seas and any creatures that chanced upon her fragile boat. As blackness encroached on her vision, she sent one final plea out into the void. A call that rang from her mind and heart. The plea of a desperate soul longing for warmth, for companionship. For the very fires of life itself...
Rough hands seized her, jolting Amara back to consciousness. She was being dragged from her boat onto a hard wooden surface. The deck of a ship. Torchlight blinded her and angry voices barked all around.
"Back to the brig with 'em, mates!"
"A decent reward's owed the lads for this capture!"
"Have your way later, the captain'll want to see this exotic prize."
Rough, calloused hands groped at Amara's frozen limbs, tearing away her cloak and robes. "Unhand me!" She summoned the last dregs of her magic and sent a shock through her captor's body. He yelped and jumped away. A mistake. A fist cracked against Amara's temple and she slumped, head spinning.
"A fighter and a witch to boot! The captain will pay double for her!" The men laughed and Amara felt herself being dragged across the deck, helpless to resist in her dazed state. She was thrown without ceremony onto damp wooden boards, her cheek pressed to the rough planks by the weight of a booted foot between her bare shoulders.
"Can't fetch a fair price damaged, boys," said a smooth deep voice above her. "I'll handle her questioning myself." The foot lifted from her back.
Amara raised her head blearily as the cell door slammed shut. She could hear the pirates laughing and making crude remarks as they departed.
Her vision finally cleared and she took stock of her surroundings. A small cage suspended over the sea, bars on all sides, barely enough room to lay down. And standing before her on the rocking deck, gripping the bars with black-gloved hands, was the most dangerously attractive man she had ever seen.
He wore flared black pants and boots, with a billowing white shirt open to the waist, displaying a firm muscular chest and a medallion of silver and obsidian. Silky black hair spilled over his shoulders, and his emerald eyes gleamed with predatory intensity.
"Well, well," he purred, "what manner of lovely creature do we have here?" He spoke the trader's tongue flawlessly, only the barest hint of an accent to his velvet voice.
Amara ran through her limited options. She might still be able to incapacitate him with the element of surprise and flee...though in her present state, naked and unarmed, that seemed unlikely. She would have to gauge what type of man he was first. Whether he could be manipulated. She met his gaze steadily, putting on her most sultry tone.
"Does it matter what I am, dark sir? Now that I've fallen captive to a big, strong corsair like yourself." She added the barest hint of magical influence to her voice, weaving a subtle seduction spell.
His grin widened, showing white even teeth. Her spell had not even touched him. "You are skilled indeed," he laughed. "But such magic will not sway me, witch. No, to earn your freedom you must offer me something beyond mere illusion." His eyes explored her bare curves hungrily.
Amara suppressed a shudder, glancing over the pirate's shoulder. Dawn light was breaking now, revealing more details of the ship. It was smaller and swifter than the merchantman, with blood red sails emblazoned with a black axe sigil. Warrior runes marked the prow below a gilded figurehead shaped like a roaring dragon.
This was a raiding vessel, built for speed and aggression. Amara cursed under her breath. By the gods' whims she had been taken by a pirate warlord, the very worst of those who now ruled these islands. Her chances of escaping captivity had just gone from slim to non-existent.