Chapter Text
Excerpt from the records of Shyl Bruin, scribe and historian of the Driftfolk Chapter, 3rd Fleethold Commune.
The first Fleethold was built out at sea and born out of necessity.
They hadn’t built a shipyard big enough for the construction, and with the looming threat that was the Dragons, there was no time.
It began West, when two ships found themselves hounded by a pack of juvenile leviathans. By fortune, the whaling crew and the smugglers crossed paths. They stood no chance alone. But together, there was hope yet. What followed was a terse standoff, with harpoons raining into water and the smugglers’ cannons bellowing smoke and steel on the beasts wherever they surfaced. With either crew’s survival solely dependent on the other, they resorted to casting chains and rope to tether their ships together.
The onslaught lasted two and a half days. When it was over, the water was littered with the remains of the men who fell overboard, and the corpse of one Dragon; his scaled belly scorched by cannon-fire and torn apart by the harpoons. It wasn’t a victory by any metric, but to the Men who travelled across sea and under sky it was a lifeline, and the foundation for the idea that would form Mankind’s future atop the waves.
After the attack, the two ships would oft sail together, going so far as to seek one another out at sea. When each captain spotted the others flag, they would wordlessly and without fail, align their ships aside before embarking into open water. There was little camaraderie behind the practice; only the haunting remembrance of what was out there, and the lifeline that their partnership afforded them.
It wasn’t long before word of their unlikely survival spread to every port and quay. Many doubted still scoffing at the idea of two ships tethered together not only survived an attack, but claimed the life of the very terrors that hounded them on land and sea.
That was the case, until a chance change in tide washed the now bloated but still visibly wounded carcass of their quarry ashore. Then, the outlandish strategy became common practice.
Fishing vessel and military schooner, merchant frigate and pirate longships, all took voyage in pairs or triplets. They dared not stray too far from their partner and, at the first chime of the lookouts atop the crow’s nest, cast chains and rope to lash their vessels together.
Over time, the practice evolved to increase the number of ships sailing together. Where at first one could spy two boats abreast on the horizon, it became common to see six or ten or even a dozen boats huddled on the open ocean. It was said that they huddled so close together, you would not see the waves from atop their sails, nor the sky from the waters below.
Partnerships were struck, councils formed, and what was once a fellowship of sailors looking to weather the horrors that hunted them below, became a community of pioneers, establishing a foothold at sea for generations. For the future of Mankind.
Overtime, the lands became a more hostile place. Kingdoms fell, their walls and knights no match for the brutality and hunger of the bulls. Particularly grim were the accounts of Matriarchs, departing from the poor game at sea to join the males as they preyed on Man’s castles, cities and farms. It wasn’t long before scores of people made for the coast; a mass exodus looking to escape the depredations of Dragons inland. For months at a time, ships moved from port to quay, ferrying people to from each corner of the world out to sea. To the safety of the first Fleethold.
It was, as most last-ditch efforts are, born from a union of ingenuity and desperation. A collection of crews came together and resolved to provide the people with a new home on the open ocean. Using their tethered ships as a base, construction began for other, more permanent fixtures connecting them. Turning the two ships into what would soon become the first of the floating cities. Gangways were affixed below connecting the underbellies of the ships. Above, construction began on new floors, with rooms for more cabins, workshops and- reluctantly and following considerable outcry -taverns. Rooms were built, and other captains came from further asea to affix their vessels to the growing mass. The once desperate union of crews had become a bastion of nomadic seagoers. Others would follow their example.
50 years later, and the number of Fleetholds that sail the open seas rival the remaining Last Kingdoms in both size and number. Each ruled by a Commune- a gathering of the captains who gave up their ships to the Fleethold. They are the law at sea; theirs is the final words on any business, complaint or dispute.
But we would be nothing without the Freesails- the ships and crews who choose to not permanently fasten themselves to a Fleethold. Opting instead to keep making a living on open waters, the Freesails travel the waves in packs to do their business independently. They travel from the Fleethold to Fleethold and- on the occasion- land. All year long, ships would dock, fasten and disembark from the various Fleethold Chapters to repair sails and hulls. They would also bear goods from their travels. These ranged from whale meat and reclaimed timber from other Fleetholds, to the rare travels from land-which filled their holds with produce, water and refugees.
Today, none but the wavecutters dare sail the seas alone. Not the wisest choice given our history, but for the men and women who seek out Dragons to hunt, wisdom and self-preservation may well be an afterthought, if it is considered at all. The hardiest-and in some cases, most insane- men and women board ships loaded to the brim with weapons and netting, all for the opportunity to hunt that which, for so long, had been hunting us. Dragon bone, fat and scale is harvested from the carcass once brought to the Fleethold.
The meat was once thought safe to harvest as well. Until the Sacking, until the five days and nights of screams and terror. Until the Stormsons sank, and the first of Fleetholds fell to teach us otherwise. Now, we know better, and only the desperate or deranged still feast on the accursed flesh.
We have ventured, from land to sea for opportunity and survival. We have survived the trials and storms and the attentions of the Dragons. We have built and grown and prospered in our Fleetholds, our cities of wood and sails and ships bound together. Where Man had once struggled, we now were poised to conquer sea as we had land.
But for the Obsidian.
Just as the Matriarch is thrice, four sizes the bull, so is the Obsidian to a Matriarch. No Dragon comes close to matching her size, nor has a female survived as long as her on open sea.
Ever appearing as gargantuan spines cresting the horizons, or as a shadow deep, deep beneath the waves, she has fast become a terror for the new nations aboard the Fleetholds. Old men, drunk and delirious, share tales of a devil with a cavernous mouth and teeth stained red from its victims. A generation which cowered under covers at night fearing the rampage and the bellowing of bulls, was followed by one plagued with nightmares. Of a creature with scales black, vast and terrible, dragging them into the ever-blackening depths.
She was a spectre; a looming reminder that we were still, in their eyes, prey. A devil from below haunting the seas and our collective nightmares. A terror amongst Dragons, a snake in a world of mice.
Few ships have dared to brave the undiscovered reaches of the Outer Waters in pursuit of her. Fewer still are the number ever seen again. If ever the Dragons had a regent, it would be her. Long and damned be her reign.