The battle raged through the decks and holds of the ships, moving like ebb and flow. Without a spoken word, we stuck together, running through the labyrinth from knots of fighting to knots of fighting. Until we found the first crewmen and officers of the Albatross, in the process of finishing off the Wyldlings they had attacked in the rear. It was a bloody day.

It had shifted from an all-out battle to surrounding pockets of enemies and overwhelming them with numbers. There were parts of the battlefield where the bodies piled up waist-high. Again without a spoken word, at least not in my presence, the tactics shifted. All of our fighters that were injured or too low level to risk it began to drag out the wounded while finishing off the Wyldlings, leaving the fighting to the professionals. Mercy was a word forgotten in the shadows of the broken ships.

"The gods will see us tonight.“ The burnt man with the door, who had taken up the axe of a Wyldling, said gravely as we looked upon a scene of carnage. Dozens of wounded, groaning, and screaming humans being carried away by their peers, while others went over the battlefield with cold steel and dead eyes, cutting throats and piercing eyes. "Even if they did not know who we were before this day.“

"I hope they see the desperate struggle for freedom, and not this.“ I mumbled. I had seen war. I had trained for war. I had known that this would be the outcome. It did not feel good, as necessary, and normal as it was.

"War is war.“ The one-eyed woman said. "It is the way of the world. The weak fall and the survivor's level. There will be leveling tonight. Nights after battles are always celebrations. Nothing like war to learn to swim or drown.“

"So many dead.“ Veneir mumbled absently through his veil as he took the scene in.

The mute woman squeezed his shoulder in sympathy, but her eyes were hard and cold as she looked over the bodies. We all have had a part in this.

Meanwhile, the mage, who had lost a leg, sank down on the ground panting and wincing.

"I have no more Spells to cast and not enough Mana for another Knack.“ He wheezed, massaging his scarred stump.

"You have done enough.“ The big man nodded. "You too, Veneir. Bring Thimotheus out of here. See if there are people tending to the wounded. If not, make sure it is happening.“

"There is a [Surgeon] on the frigate.“ I interjected. "And people with the [First Aid] Skill. Find them, if you can.“

Veneir nodded. "I‘ll come and get you, Thimotheus. Just rest a minute.“

The crippled mage sank back against the wall, closing his eyes in pain, while he tried to control his breathing. Veneir in the meantime went around, talking to the people milling about. The big man bent down to Thimotheus, reaching out with his hand. But the mage slapped it away.

"Save it, Manus. You still need to fight and I will survive without further help from you. Heal someone that would die without it.“ Manus hesitated, but in the end followed the wishes of the wounded mage.

"Let‘s end this.“ The one-eyed woman said, gripping her sword. Another spoil of war. "There has been enough blood for a day. The sooner we finish, the more help we can give the wounded.“

The silent woman nodded emphatically, tipped her ear twice, and then pointed to the ceiling with one of her knives. After a second she indicated with another gesture that we should follow her.

The last battle of the day had been the fiercest one. The Wyldlings had been pushed back until they had no more room to retreat. Dozens of human bodies were scattered around the upturned ship they defended, oftentimes brutally ripped apart by claws and fangs. Fighting had stopped when we arrived, both sides eyeing each other warily over the battlefield. They had retreated to a ship on the far side of the ship pile, almost hanging over the sea.

We all stood with the rest of the fighters, bleeding and tired as we all were. This was going to be a bloodbath. The Wyldlings, especially the ones in the ship ahead of us, had proven to be formidable warriors. Not only were they comparatively high leveled, but they also had a few fighters capable of turning into behemoths with them. They had torn the last assault to pieces, although that had happened before we arrived.

I wanted to shout for them to surrender. I wanted the killing to stop. Most of all I wanted to see no more dead humans this day. But I remained silent. Because one way or another it had to end now. Surrender was not an option anyone would accept.

The stalemate continued until Higgins arrived with a few of his crewmen as backup. He came up to me, after briefly studying the situation.

"May I advise my Lord to back up a few feet, maybe behind that railing?“ He gestured towards the ships in our back, then shouted with a voice used to screaming over the elements of the sea. "Back up 10 feet! Clear the deck!“ He came to stand beside us, eyed by everyone around him. As I shot him a questioning look, he stated: "We have war ballistae, my Lord. We will clear this rabble out in no time. On your convenience, my Lord.“ He looked at me expectantly.

I nodded. It was time to end this. Higgins nodded to one of his men, who scampered off to the side, climbing up the aftcastle of another ship, and began unrolling and waving a flag. A heartbeat later, dozens of ballistae bolts cut through the old wood of the upturned ship like tearing through paper. The structure imploded in a rain of splinters, wooden beams and planks flying everywhere.

The human fighters were stunned at first, but a loud cheer erupted around us. I made a step forward. Now surely was the time to capitalize on their disarray. Higgins's arm held me back as he smiled at me politely.

"Just a moment, my Lord.“ He said. A second volley of bolts hit the crumbling ship as he finished his sentence, impacted the debris, whirling it into the air again, carving through the rubble. The ship broke apart, falling together completely now. "One more broadside?“ He was grinning.

I shook my head, which led to the sailor above waving his flag again. Because the rubble stirred. They tumbled out of the wreckage, stumbling around with wild eyes and weapons drawn. Looking for a death more worthy than being cut down by artillery. Instead, they were received with a volley of arrows from our side, from those that had managed to salvage a bow from the enemy. The Wyldlings fell, but not everyone accepted their fate. In the front a Wyldling sprinted on while his flesh moved and flexed under his skin, ignoring the two arrows hitting his shoulders. A column of spines erupted on his back and tentacles unfurled like a twisted bird opening its wings, while he fell on all fours sprinting, roaring through crooked fangs. More arrows sunk in its flesh, without noticeably slowing it down.

Suddenly, Manus roared at my side as well, running towards the thing, door raised like a battering ram. And every step he took, he grew in size, a silvery sheen covering his skin, until he towered over the behemoth, slamming the door in its face. But instead of splintering, the door glowed in silver light, and the two crashed together, stopping the feral assault dead on its track. The silent woman had slipped by unnoticed, whirled under the legs of the behemoth and slid away, spinning on her knees, her knives a blur. Hundreds of tiny wounds erupted two heartbeats later on the legs and the belly of the beast behind her as if cut by a hundred invisible knives at the same time.

The one-eyed woman had rounded the colossal fighter in the meantime. As the assault of the other brought the behemoth to its knees, she moved. Suddenly, she flickered forward, crossing the distance in the blink of an eye. Her body low and straight as an arrow, her arm extending in a perfect lunge, her sword piercing the eye and the skull of the behemoth.

The behemoth fell down, changing back to the Wyldling form, not even seconds after the fight had begun.

And so ended the battle of Shipwreck Bay, where a thousand slaves stormed the wreckage of ships to fight for their lives and their freedom. What followed was a hazy, chaotic day. Everyone was caught up in the aftermath of the battle, wounded and tired, most had not slept the night. But now there was so much work to do that everyone who still could walk got caught up in it.

People wandered over the battle sites, checking for survivors, or finishing off Wyldlings. I finished off a Wyldling that got buried under the debris of the artillery barrage. I got EP for that. It didn’t feel right.

I spent my last Mana on one [Reinvigoration] for a young woman I found buried under a dead Wyldling. I was not sure she would make it. I helped to carry her away anyway.

There were a few voices of control and reason in the chaos. The Captain and his men, for one, were professionals and had an order of command established. They claimed a ship for the Doctor to use as a hospital, organized the transport of the wounded, and claimed a few of the mindlessly milling ex-slaves to help them with their work.

There was Gideon, the [Guardsman], who had improvised a few guard posts, to look out for dangerous scavengers that might be attracted by the carnage. In general, people just wanted to help and find reason after what they had been through. And listened to those that had something to do for them. Manus had lost his door and restlessly wandered the battlefield, using his healing Skill on those that clung to life just barely.

Veneir turned out to be a calm and reasonable organizer who, together with Fjora, the [Chargehand], handled the transport of food from the stocks of the Wyldlings to the surface, the cleaning and preparing of ships as shelter for the night, the batch cooking for all those hungry people and the sorting of the ...just everything. The slaves had been all but naked, and the Wyldlings had not been. It was a grisly task, but it was autumn and we were at the seashore. People would die in the cold tonight. We needed everything. So they received the bodies, stripped them for weapons, cloth, and valuables, and burned them on a pile that reached the heavens with its thick and oily smoke. We burnt them on the far end of the pier, as far away from the living as possible, where the wind and the elements would take care of the cleanup.

Others scrambled over the Wreckage, as we began to call the giant pile of old ships, salvaging everything that could be useful. Not only had the Wyldlings their camps inside the Wreckage, but the ships were hiding treasures of tools, sails, ropes, and a million other things, although often too old to be more than fuel for the fires. A big cog was declared a warehouse and we brought everything there.

And finally, nightfall came, forcing us to stop working and gathering around the fires where huge amounts of food had been prepared. We fell over the food like hungry wolves and what followed was, as predicted, a celebration unlike any other I had seen. We were alive. We had won. Most had leveled at least once in a fighting class, some even more. For one night we forgot that there was a pile of our dead lying not 100 feet away from us in the darkness, waiting to be buried or burnt.