Insanitium Geographica

Hope It Floats;; Figuratively and Literally

"O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead."
- Walt Whitman

--

From the minute he first laid eyes on it, Mesquite knew it was his ship.

Knew by the way the wind swept through the rigs, stirring the sleek white canvas beneath and drawing a groan from the slow-sinking hull, the waves like foam-slavering hounds at its feet. It was a different sea on that day; but then, Mesquite was a different dragon, back then.

"The name, Sir?"

A brief sideways glance was all it took. The young dragon shrunk beneath the weight of the Captain's gaze, barbed tail coiling inwards to touch against the paintbrush in his talons.

Colour and venom. Mesquite bit his teeth down together, flicking an ear indecisively before simply turning away.

The painter could wait; for now, he would watch. Watch the galleon rise and fall in its place, tethered to the dock yet still searching, searching for the outer reaches of the harbour in a desperate attempt to answer the commanding voice of the wind.

Mesquite's gaze wandered briefly back to their party - SkyWings swooping overhead, mere singes of dark against the otherwise azure expanse. The floor below teeming with white-golden SandWings, eyes so deeply in contrast with the brightness they seemed to produce an effect almost hypnotic. A few scattered figures already aboard; a plump ship's cook and an unwilling SeaWing navigator, accompanied by a pair of aggressive-looking SkyWing guards.

Would a ship really hold so many dragons? Worry flickered through the Captain's mind for a moment. It was a new promotion, to say the least; and far beyond his typical field of work. But alas, the Prince had commanded it be - and who was he to argue?

I can threaten that SeaWing if there's any trouble.

There. The thought comforted him as, distracted, he shifted his wings and studied the boat once more. A trio of MudWings had begun to make their way aboard, hefting between them a broad sack he knew to be filled with gold.

"Hope it floats," Captain Mesquite muttered, shifting talons and treasuring the sensation of sand between his claws. How long would it be before he felt sand again?

Perhaps a day. Perhaps never again.

Perhaps...

"Perhaps" can wait, he thought to himself with a growl.

That was when he realised the painter was speaking:

"Hope it what, now?"

"Floats," Mesquite said, flicking his tail to indicate his displeasure. The young dragon bobbed his head and shuffled hastily away, pausing to test the wings before spreading his wings and leaping up to hover against one widespanning side of the ship.

"Is that one word, or two?"

"Three," the Captain hissed, then paused. "Wait - by all the snakes, not the name, you -"

"Sir!" A voice from behind him called. "The troops are ready to board."

Caught between two places at once, Mesquite breathed a silent sigh to the heavens. Far overhead, the SkyWings were circling, in a descent formation not unlike that of the carrion birds he had observed so often in the starving outskirts of the Sand Kingdom. The ship was their quarry, and they the parasites far below - waiting to swarm and take their fill for as long as the sea would permit.