Expedition Private Voyage to Croper's Cove: In Trouble on the First Day...?

[Gyles Stowett]

Once every beast had given them the space, Gyles motioned for Morgan to come closer. He thought for a moment how to approach the delicacy of the matter, the circumstances of their mission. For much, he would just have to trust his instinct about her. He motioned to the weatherbeaten chair that had served Lieutenant Tultow sometime earlier that morning during recruiting business, heavy iron frame keeping the thing on the heaving deck beneath them.

Give me a stout seabeast any day. Always a sight more dependable than a powderkeg of squabbling bureaucrats in a pinch.

"Humor a stoat a moment and tell me a little about yourself, Seabeast Morgan." He held up the beaten brass decanter as he rummaged about with his other paw in the seachest under the table. "Brandy?"

They were sheltered here a little in the shadow of the aft awning, but not much. Keen wind enough to mask whatever transpired.

@Morgan Liu

 

[Morgan Liu]

Morgan sat awkwardly, checking the chair first for any visible traps. Part of her couldn't help but feel like there were invisible manacles waiting to hold her down. The offer of brandy gave her pause, her suspicion of any offer being made from someone so far above her in rank warring with the sense that to refuse would be bad form. "Just a little," she allowed, her diction already cleaning up as her mind adjusted to the new social environment. As the captain poured a drink for her, she kept her explanation of her own history brief. "There's not much to tell, sir. I was born overseas, spent most of my life taken from one port to another. Not a very stable kithood, but it did give me a talent for languages. I only wish it had been enough at Urk, sir." She couldn't quite keep the stiffness out of her voice, unable to sit at ease.

She couldn't keep her guilt from rising to the surface as she rushed to add, "I apologize, sir, for my performance in the last mission. I know that I failed in the negotiations with the shrews. I wish there had been anyone more skilled to take my place. Maybe then the calamity could have been averted." Maybe then, all those lives could have been saved.

 

[Gyles Stowett]

"I only wish it had been enough at Urk, sir."

Gyles filled a glass and pushed it across to her. "A catastrophe."

Urk, devil take it. One more power play in the long list of Ministries shoving the Navy about after whatever new bauble caught their eye, the lives of her bold sons and daughters be damned to Hellgates. As different as any two creatures one might pick out on the street, they seemed the both of them to share a strong distaste for current political movements in the Imperium, the Powers That Be and the lives they wasted.

The apology was a surprise. Heartfelt, real. He felt a weight in his own chest. Don't blame yourself for a second for their deeds, blackguards all of 'em. They were alone, after all. What harm could it do? A world of harm. No, he would speak no ill. Not here, not now.

Instead, he spoke Alkamarian. Not the sort of Alkamarian spoken in the courts or high-society parties, or even the cities, but a rough, mountain variety of Alkamarian learned from Miklarian sailors. It would be known to anybeast with a sense of the language that it was secondhand speech, a hand-me-down frayed and patched with its speaker's own idiosyncrasies, but that didn't matter.

"Mé sovegno que vos avai on don pè lé lengouè. Vos sari bin droi de pensa que cé l'è propro pè quaicâ que nos aven ceta rencontra, de verâ. Fau que demando vostro pardon pè ceta petita roussa," and he motioned around them, "mai quécó ... vo' dirâ ... lé chosâ sensiblâ son miei parlâ ren qu'en confidença, vos sabéd."

Spoiler: Translation: Alkamarian: Rustic Miklarian

"I recall you've a gift for languages. You'd have right to presume that is exactly why we are having this meeting, wouldn't you. I must ask your pardon for that little trick, but some, that is to say, sensitive matters are better spoken only in confidence, you know."

He leaned across the table slightly, analyzing her. There was a lot more to anybeast than met the eye. Morgan, however, didn't hide any part of herself. She wore it proudly, from her piercings to her dark leathern jack. Young, rebellious, no high-level motives. Just trying to survive. What better beast to trust?

"Z'imagine que vos avai étâ à Alkamar bin dé foi, nan?"

Spoiler: Translation: Alkamarian: Rustic Miklarian

"I imagine you've been to Alkamar plenty, eh?"

 

[Morgan Liu]

Morgan went from grief to shock in a matter of moments as the captain began speaking... She had to tilt her head and consider the words, parsing them through several of the languages she'd picked up before the roots clicked into place, the conjugations sliding easily around them. Miklarian and one of the Varangian dialects shared a common ancestor thanks to Miklarian sailors who settled on that continent, as did the Callisparians. Many folks tended to look at languages as isolated things, much like the islands on which they originated, but really they were a living tapestry woven by a million paws. Between her lived experiences in Alkamar, Callispar, and Varangia, it was easy enough for her to piece the dialect together.

"Mé so... Mé z'é habitâ dos ans à Alkamar avoué mé mèrés, mas mé z'é ren visitâ Miklar qu'on côp. Mé vo... Mé z'é tot-dia voulu aprèndre lé viéé lengoué miklariènna, mas mé z'é ren zamés avoué la chiance."

"I live... I lived for two years in Alkamar with my mothers, but I only once visited Miklar. I want - I always wanted to learn the old Miklarian language, but I didn't - I never had the chance."

She tilted her head, considering the captain. "Capiten, z'è iunna rejon que vos m'essaiéd su la lengoué qu'est utilisâ pè la majorità di mariniér de la navalleria alkamariènna?"

"Captain, is there a reason you're testing me on the dialect used by the majority of the sailors in the Alkamarian navy?"