Pirate? ayee.. I was one.. Once upon a time.. a long time ago.. however with distance and speed it seems just like a moment ago..

Robert Talon grew up in the publishing guide.  He was young when dropped into the guild due to both parents dying. His fortune was to have his inheritance used to purchase his guild card to become a future publisher.  The story picks up in Germany.  From there his life moves on after a brush with the religious order and then off to sea where he will become a well known pirate named Ender the pirate the scourge of the seas and maybe an adventurer into the new world.

Now to find a race that more or less fits that origin story.

Chapter 1; Chief River Rates POV

The sound of drums played beautifully, the vocals of my people sang loud we n’ de ya ho, and I sang along with them, and danced to my heart's content. The raging fire was warm, burning to the great spirit above, as we looked to the burning sun over the horizon line, and thanked him for our days on his  great earth. Though times were tough due to the pale faces, we had much to rejoice for, much love to give to one another, and with the great spirit’s blessing we feasted from the bountiful hunting expedition. From the wild beasts that was hunted down by our great warriors, we carved a bit of the beast at a time,  and passed it around serving the elderly first before the rest of us. 

“Brother, what have we ever done to deserve such great blessings from above?” My half brother spoke approaching me from his Shamans teepee.

“We have honored him greatly,  and so we shall live in the spoils.” I replied. 

 

When everything seemed to go right, when we were settling down for the night, I heard the drums of war, and we were forced to dress. I sported my headdress with pride, and bared the rest my tribal armor made of hides from our expeditions. Chirping into the air we let out a war cry, calling out to the rhythmic beating drums, and warned them of our presence. Before too long, we were engaged in combat with the pale faces who shot from thunder rods, but we remained out of rang and our archers shot at them, until we were in close range. Using a hand axe and a shield, I helped carve through the opponents, until the last of them lay on the ground begging for mercy. Grabbing ahold of one of the recently dead, I began to scalp him peeling back the skin in front of him whilst he remained restrained, and then presented him with the finished product. 

I looked at the dead soldier, whose head I scalped, and reanimated it from the dead as a zombie. The zombie rose from the ground, proceeding to rip is face off that otherwise slumped down, and our captured soldier was all too quick to soil himself. I spoke to him in a dark tone, while my Tribesman laughed,  and the zombie translated,  “Go home, tell your people that Chief River Rat wants nothing to do with war, if you come with war, I'll bring you death!”

 

Releasing him, we watched him run with haste,  his cowardice lead to graceful speed, and we watched him travel into the woods. After he was gone, I looked to my warriors and pointed out the foreign weapons to my warriors telling them they could be of use to us. I raised the rest of the dead, having them carry their items, fallowing us as we lead them to our ancestral home, and then ordered them to remove all loot from their possession. 

“Now spirits, walk into the light and find your rest. The smell of burning flesh fled the air, as the zombies walked into the fire, and disintegrated right before our eyes.

We were in peace. For the time.

Three days passed.

It was a calm night which we enjoyed a regular festivities this time calmer than the last and we told stories to one another about the legends of the land. I spoke to the children telling them of the man-beast known as the wendigo; He would come in the night steal to steal anyone away from their loved ones to eat them, all before letting out a crackling how much like a wolf to warn those careless in the night. The intent for the story was not to torment the children but to remind them of their ever-loving parents who guard them, and always to respect them. 

It was around this time when the coward returned, but he was not alone as with him he brought a dark woman whose face was covered by a tanned sack. There are marks of on her that I could see clearly from the distance, as if she was obviously retain and beaten for many days.  Now stuck to do her master's bidding, I began to hear her chant words, so I began to chant mine louder until it became a war or magic. A dark cloud rolled out from her sack, filling the air with a form of pestilence that began to swarm around our teepees, and before I could bend into her will my half brother joined me in the chant and together we resisted.

Together we may have ordered her plots to spread the pestilence within our tribe, but the curse went through and sunk deep into my bones. I could feel the agony burn within me it brought a chill to my heart and set my soul aflame. The curse gave me a strange hunger...it was not for the Flesh of man like a wendigo, but it was something else… I could now see things that I'd never seen before... I could now see souls. With a dark craving for them.

 

Though our languages were different,  I could understand her words, and they came with a dark venom, “You must now feed from one soul ever 7 days,  or die,  every day in between you will suffer quick aging….” 

BANG, 

BANG,  the sound of a thunder rods went off, and the woman lay dying, before a pellet rang through my chest, but refusing to die I hooked onto the soul of the witch, and pulled it into myself healing the wound,  before I rose her from the grave to fight against the storm of soldiers charging towards us. The war became a massacre,  for both ends,  I was the only one left standing. The pale faces held no care to whom they slaughtered, our children, our elderly all lay dying. They cried to me their hearts full of pain and their bodies breaking inside as they slowly bled  feeding the Earth. “Take us with you!” My half brother cried, “Take us with you so that we may be one forever, hear my cries brother, if you seek revenge spare the innocent!”

I felt his words touched my very soul. In return I did what they asked. Those who remained on death's door I granted them merciful death. One wave of my hand over the area I pulled in their souls for myself and feeling the power from them rage within me. I was addressed with adrenaline a numbing sensation to any pain that I could feel, now with an army both of my tribesmen, and the pale-faces I sought the death of the remaining members of that Village. I would not stop until the last man was killed. What's a perfectly executed plan I had these zombified pale faces lead me and My tribesmen in as if we were captured. Once we were let in the village walls,  chaos was unleashed upon them. Only the men of age were brought down those of the elderly class were left unharmed, as well as the women and children.

Leaving the village, I took one of the horse carriages that I could use as I brought the zombies back to my ancestral home, and buried my native members into the ground for their last rites, and before I sent the pale-faces into the fire. I screamed into the night crying as my soul now was burning from the others I consumed, I cried into the night for the lonely feeling that burned in my breast,  and became a constant reminder with every thump my heart produced. 

“I would have handled it differently but might I say you did quite a job over there you relieve me of many enemies and most likely many others so your heart is in great tragedy I offer the most solemn condolences…” a beautiful voice called out from sight. 

“ I have angered the great spirits, it must be, have you come for me? I retorted,  “Are you sweet death, because now I am surrounded by death while full of life and yet wish For it's sweet embrace.”

There was a moment of silence. Only the sound of the nature around me, a few times I could hear steps being laid around me, but when I turn there was a deer eating the grass near the fire. His rack was enormous. It was a golden moment, in the sorrow and looking at the deer I thought of one of my tribesmen members.

“Death should not come so quickly for a brave Warrior such as yourself. She replied, now in a different location. “For death fears those that are stronger than itself…”

“Who are you? Why have you come?” I questioned with my eyes shut and my heart open.

“If nothing more I give you a sweet kiss…. not like any other kiss….this kiss will make You follow me to the ends of the world….” She spoke gaining ground with gentle steps, “I know what she did to you, and I can cure it!”

“What kind of magic could you hold on your lips?” I questioned as she drew close and touched my hair, “Would it be such magic that helps you speak my language or have you been around long enough to know the way I speak?”

“You could say I've been around I've been watching your kind, I've been watching their kind as well. I am of my own kind what we have in common is our own differences.” She said with a beautiful laugh, “My name is Lumenaera, I am from the Star Dancing tribe, a tribe much like your’s was… We share that kind of …. Mutual solace, I was with them right up to the bitter end. 

“ I am Chief River Rat, or at least I was a chief... if anything this failure has taught me that I should not hold such power.” I replied mourning for their deaths.

“How often do you see a man take responsibility for their actions? Yet here you fought, they fought, they died, and you lived…” She said sternly like a mother's scorn, “The difference between death, and life is not that which is for taking but that for which is giving!”

“They gave their mortal lives for this cause, my people gave me their souls instead of resting with the great spirit on my behalf. They travel with me now, now they sit, I see them here spirits joined with me around the fire.”

“Then you are still there Chief and should lead by example, even in death there is life but this'll teach you as time goes by…” She said now sitting in front of me, when I opened my eyes, I saw her face, and she was beautiful. Large brown eyes, light tanned skin, gentle brown hair, and the fragrance of honeysuckle flowed from her hair. 

Chapter 2: Rob Talons POV

The year was sometime between the middle ages and Renaissance. The world did not change yet with gunpowder. While magic was stagnant considered a reality but non performing. Instead of hard science of the Renaissance. The world full of concern of death. The plague, which had wiped out a half of Europe was felt through the lose of power in religion and while magic grew.

Life for a bookish person was either reading adventures or nothing at all. I was a publisher of letters, and religious books in a small town outside of Saxon. The company was burnt in the latest round of wars between the papal icy and Lutherans.

That left me to re-read the hidden books that I had treasured and valued for my personal use. The religious war was something of an oddity to me. Why fight by the name of God of love, and mercy with kindness? That did not make sense to me. Even so, my concerns were being taken up with an old friend from days before the wars. He changed since the death of his family. He was searching. Some said the dark arts others for worlds parallel to this one where his family had survived. Myself, I believed in parallel and fairy realm having seen it.

That was a long time ago though. The day was a midsummer day. I required by my guild to carry a stack of papers from Saxon to Burgham. An even smaller town in the middle of the Black Forest. There in the center of the forest I saw the fairies gathering and parading through the orchard trees.

The sight of a young bookish child must have made them laugh. Their laughter not cruel or hurtful but that of a group realizing that were been caught. I saw some of the of royalty there. They bade I to stay the night. Not knowing where I was or what else to do I sat down and watched the most loveliest dance. The whole forest grew towards the fairies and then their portal open from an old tree. And they were all gone in a flash of a moment. This had happened before Luther posted his paper. The whole country was under the Spanish and papal investigators. So I only told my old-school friend about that story. I think that is why he started looking for a chance to be with his family again.

Telling my friend was not such a good deal. For he in turned spoke of it freely one night in front of the local priest. The priest, whom, I was having issues with. Because he would not pay his bill for a printed version of Jewish lore on oddities and spells.

So in the wee hours in the morning someone marked my publishing house with a hex. The soldiers viewing that and being paid by the papal authority had to burn the place down. There went up all my equipment and inventory of papers. I at least was free and had my own place elsewhere with my books. In yet freedom is often just a missed adventure. For my home was searched, and I was presented to the regional priest the next night with all my books. Luckily all they were sermons from the local priest and nothing out of the church's point of view. I was jailed under some made-up law.

The next day instead of more court appearances the whole lot of us were chained together. I was thrown in with a lot of German ex-mercenaries and taken into the port. There they and I were sold as slaves to crew a Spanish galleon leaving for the new world. My old friend was an actual paying customer. Seeing me scrubbing the ship's deck, he squirmed through a little but said nothing to me.

Learning to scrub decks is not as easy as scouring floors. The sea salt burns into the wood sometimes, and the smell nothing like it occasionally. Still I was a live and on my way evidently to the New World colonies.

That night the German mercenaries mutinied. The Spanish soldiers were ready for them but not totally. The Germans did not want the ship they just did not want to go to the open sea. So the whole lot of Germans excluding me stole the two shore boats. They rowed towards the mainland which still could be seen.

The captain was angry to say the least. He commanded the soldiers responsible to be lashed. While instructing others to run out the three long guns to fire upon the shore boats.

The soldiers screaming probably put the mutineers into panic. Thus they put their back into rowing. Because before the galleon could swing towards them. They were out of the long guns range or said the soldiers that fired two shots.

My punishment for this was ten lashes. Now for a bookish person, five lashes and I would be done in for a few days. The ten lashes ripped my back into shreds, and I was ill and sick for a whole three weeks. However, I was forced to work and did so with shortened rations.