Admiral Stanislaw Karolski, until recently simply Captain Stanislaw Karolski of the Kislevite Frigate Beluga had been tasked with seeing the cargo of spices aboard the Shisha Dream safely to port in Luccini so that the de Roelef Boy could use his family's contacts to transform spices into the coin that his new Principality so desperately needed. Then he was to see that coin transported safely back to Ijssel. To perform this undertaking, he had been given the entire fleet of Ijssel as it now stood. Three ships with some one-hundred-five guns and one-thousand-thirty-one crew between them. It had worked fairly well, as no Sartosan Pirates had been foolhardy enough to challenge so many guns in one place. The only issue was the current round of wars in Tilea. Luccini and Remas had been going at it again, and this time the City of Pugno had declared independence from Luccini as the Republic of Pugno as part of that and fielded a Galley Fleet. Ships were sometimes stopped and inspected by various navies. Fortunately, they had only been stopped once, by the fleet of Luccini, and were able to convince the Captains of the pair of Galleasses that had stopped them of their intentions.
While in port in Luccini, they even had some time to take in the local rumors. It seemed the fighting had spread north. Now, not only were Remas and Luccini going at it but so too were Miragliano and Trantio. Tobaro and Pavona had yet to pick a side, but many considered it only a matter of time, though most felt that Tobaro would seek to increase its control over Eastern Estalia rather than fight fellow Tileans and that Pavona was more likely to get involved in the fighting between Trantio and Miragliano rather than Luccini and Remas. Meanwhile, the de Roelef Boy's family connections were transforming their spices into gold. By the time they had to set sail, news had come in about a pair of battles, the first was that Luccini had successfully stormed the city of Verezzo and was now in complete control of Remas' ally, the Republic of Verezzo. The second was that Trantio inflicted a great defeat upon Miragliano at Viadazza, though news of Pavona entering the war on Miragliano's side and having forced Trantio to abandon their foothold north of the River Tarano had reached them.
At any rate, that was no concern of Admiral Stanislaw Karolski's, what was his concern was that he had to now ferry more than a million and a half guilders back to Ijssel safely and without incident. Fortunately, the weather was seasonable and the crews knew the waters well enough to avoid the various perils of the local seas. The usual Sartosan Pirates and Arabyan Corsairs gave his well-armed flotilla a wide berth and not even the razorbills that infested the coasts near the Appucini Mountains seemed eager to attack such a well-armed flotilla. You would have to be a complete madman to do so with fewer guns or ships. Of course, that did not discount the possibility of attack altogether, a fact that sadly the crews would come to find out all too soon.
It was noon on their second day of sailing, and the Ijssel flotilla was just heaving perpendicular to the Black Peninsula, near where the tip of the Penninsula opened up into either the Black Gulf or the Bay of Wrecks when it happened. Istvaan in the crow's nest called out, "Ship ahoy astern!"
Admiral Karolski raised his spyglass to his eye and spotted the ship. It was huge, easily twice as big as the Beluga and half again as big as the Colorful Raconteur. It was an ugly thing, looking more like two ships nailed together by planks of scrap wood, forming a ramshackle catamaran type of ship. From the patchwork sails on one side, a grinning red skull design glared out, from the patchwork sails on the other, a grinning green skull leered out. Both skulls had tusks instead of teeth. It figured that the only Pirates foolhardy enough to attack his well-armed flotilla would be Greenskin Pirates. They probably saw it as a chance for a good fight.
"Pirates?" Asked Wladylsaw Kosciuzsko, his first mate. Like Stanislaw himself, Wladyslaw was from a Druzhina Family in the Coastal Western Oblast. Unlike himself, Wladyslaw was from the town of Chebekov, a provincial port compared to Stanislaw's Home port of Erengrad. Still, the man knew his business and was quite deadly with that hatchet of his. They'd need his skill if the Greenskins closed enough to board.
"Not just pirates, Wlad, Greenskin Pirates." Replied the Admiral.
"Figures. Greenskins are the only ones stupid enough to try and sail something like that." Bit out Wladyslaw.
"Signal Henri over on the Raconteur. Tell him we have Greenskins inbound and need to delay them long enough for the Shisha Dream to escape from the engagement zone. Then signal the de Roelef boy over on the Shisha Dream and tell him we'll delay the Greenskins as long as practicable and he's to continue sailing east for Issjel no matter what we do. Our priority is getting that coin to port." Ordered Admiral Karolski.
Wladyslaw nodded and headed over to begin relaying the orders to Togudai, their resident flag semaphore man. Togudai was unique among the crew in that he was an Ungol from the Northern Oblast. Not many Ungols felt the call of the sea, but Togudai was one of the rare few. His keen eyesight honed from practicing mounted archery on the steppes of the Northern Oblast made him a natural at Flag Semaphore, as he could accurately read flags even from far away or through fog and mist. A few moments of signaling later, the Raconteur dropped into formation alongside the Beluga as they waited for the Greenskins to get within range of their guns. As the seconds ticked by and the Greenskins drew closer, the Shisha Dream and her precious cargo got further and further out of the combat zone. Just prior to entering canon range, the Greenskin ship opened fire with bow guns, large balls of iron falling woefully short of the two ships of the Ijssel Flotilla.
Oddly enough, once the Greenskin monstrosity inched a little closer, a rough voice carried over to the Ijssel fleet on the wind. "Oi! Warp'ead,iz ya sure dis spell fingy iz gonna werk? Whatta ya mean itz already werkin? Ah Zog it, lemme do dis. Ahem, 'tention you'ze humie gitz! Dis is da Dred Kaptin Snikktoof talkin' to yaz! We'ze been kroozin' 'round lookin' fer a good scrap fer a while now an' 'ere you'ze gitz come wiv all uv dose fancy shootas! So's I sez ta meself, Sniktoof! If'n dem humies dun scared off all o' da panzies in da area, why not 'ave a go at 'em yerself? Dat way, wen you'ze krumped 'em, it'll prove you'ze da biggest an' da baddest Korsair in dis 'ere Blak Gulf! So'z you gitz betta not run off loik da over humies dat was wiv ya, got it?" Came the voice in horribly broken and guttural Tilean.
Then, as if by magic, a foul-smelling wind blew in from the west, filling the Greenskin ship's sails and causing their ship to lurch ahead rapidly at the two ships of the Ijssel Flotilla. Immediately the Raconteur opened fire with a full broadside and Admiral Karolski had the Beluga follow suit. The cannonballs lanced out at a continuous pace, plunging into the ramshackle hulls of the Greenskin's makeshift catamaran, lancing through sails, and clearing decks. On one occasion, a rather large Orc in what looked to be a leather buff coat stitched together from a number of repurposed, smaller, human-sized buff coats, took a cannonball from one of the Beluga's six-pounders right to the face, bashing in the bloody thing's skull. Still, despite the death toll among the crews of the oversized catamaran, and the damage to the vessel itself, the Greenskins came rushing forward, wildly firing off cannonballs of their own haphazardly as they did. If anything, it seemed to make the foul beasts more eager to get to grips with them!
Eventually, however, the Greenskins got within fifty yards, then twenty, fifteen, ten. At the ten-yard mark, the left and right mainmasts of the makeshift catamaran finally splintered and for a moment, the Greenskins were dead in the water, just outside of boarding range. Unfortunately, that was when a Goblin in a particularly slime-crusted robe marched up to the right foredeck of the catamaran and produced an odd-looking mushroom. The Goblin devoured the misshapen, purple and green speckled, thing and waved around its gnarled wooden staff, screeching in some incomprehensible Greenskin language. Two things happened then, the first being that the clearly a Goblin Shaman's head exploded from raw warp stuff being channeled. The second was that a wave rocked the ocean and just nudged the Greenskins close enough to board. First on deck to go over the rail was a large, 8-foot-tall Orc with what looked to be metal spikes hammered into its jaw where the tusks should normally be. The Orc was bare-chested, save for a large vermillion padded cloth buff coat that hung loosely around the shoulders. On its head sat a wide-brimmed cavalier hat with a ridiculous blood-red plume. He had in one hand, a cutlass that was more slab of wickedly sharp, devastatingly heavy, slightly curved metal. In the other, it had a pistol that looked like nothing so much as a canon on a stick, with naught but a crude serpentine lever for a trigger. That Orc was surrounded by a quartet of other orcs in similar gaudy dress, wielding similarly crude weapons. It would be comical if not for how deadly they were.
Kaptin Snikktoof and his group of Orcs landed right in front of Admiral Karolski on the deck of the Beluga. Snikktoof fired the one shot from its pistol at the first target it drew a bead on, Young Oleg, a gunner's mate who had taken the initiative to rush for a swivel gun that might have taken the entire Orc command group out in one spread of lead pellets. The ball that Snikktoof shot took Oleg full in the chest, ripping a bloody hole through him. The lad was dead before he hit the deck. Now though, Snikktoof had used his one shot, whereas Admiral Karolski still had four, thanks to the brace of pistols across his chest.
"Wich one uv you'ze humiez iz da Kaptin 'ere?" Demanded Snikktoof.
"I am." Intoned Admiral Karolski.
"Gud! You'z didn't run! Now, we'ze buckle swash till one uv us iz krumped, den da rest uv our boyz can go at it. Gotz ta be dramatik wen yer a pirate kaptin, yaz know?" Grinned Snikktoof.
"Very well, I accept your conditions for a duel." Nodded Admiral Karolski.
Snikktoof stepped out from among his four officers and immediately took a lead pistol ball to the chest. "Oi! Wutz da big idear?" he cried.
Admiral Karolski responded with another pistol shot from his second pistol. Snikktoof grunted and moved forward for Admiral Karolski, Kutlass ready to strike. A third pistol shot and a step backward saw Snikktoof kept just out of reach, as a fourth pistol shot blew out the orc Captain's right knee, hobbling him. After firing and discarding all four pistols, Admiral Karolski drew his saber and moved to engage. After taking four pistol shots, Snikktoof was slow to parry the sabre cut and took a cut to the wrist. The Orc's riposte was powerful but slow and clumsy, and Admiral Karolski easily parried, before running his saber down the length of the Orc's Kutlass. Since the Orcish weapon had no guard to speak of, the maneuver wound up severing several of the fingers needed to grip the weapon. Finally, Admiral Karolski thrust out for the Orc's chest, slicing into the Greenskin's heart before pulling the blade out with a twist.
Snikktoof's last words were, "No fair, you'ze cheated." Before succumbing to the sheer amount of wounds and falling over the side of the ship to drown in the waters below.
Before Admiral Karolski could ponder the irony of a pirate bemoaning the lack of a fair fight, the quartet of garishly dressed Orc Officers began to fight each other as much as they fought the crew of the Beluga. It seemed that with their Captain dead, the Orcs began to jockey for power. The crew made short work of them, as did the Raconteur for their boarders. The Greenskins on the Catamaran didn't even stop the two ships from sailing away once they'd cleared off their boarders. They sailed away just far enough to reach a good stand-off range before turning to fire broadsides at the Catamaran again. This time, instead of charging, the Greenskins were too preoccupied with sorting out the new hierarchy to do much more than take a couple more broadsides before limping away with a list to port. The Beluga and Raconteur would link back up with the Shisha Dream several hours later.
They would reach port in Issjel two days after that. . .
XXXX
AN: So yeah, Greenskins may be fun, but they're usually dumb enough to fall for tricks like were pulled here. And of course, once the Warboss is slain, infighting always ensues, making clean-up that much easier.
Thankfully both ships got away with minimal casualties. It could have been a lot worse had Snikktoof not decided to grandstand, or if the Goblin Shaman hadn't miscast bad enough for Mork to decide to pop his head like a melon.
Anyway next we'll be back with Carlo for the lead-up to war.
Stay tuned