Chapter Text
Saemon Havarian and his men cackled like hyenas as Filvandrueth retreated into the Captain’s cabin to make good on his lost bet. Imoen trailed after him a little confusedly, as she had largely done after their escape from Spellhold.
“Oh, hey Immy,” Dru greeted as he turned around, surprised for the first time to see that she had followed him in. He considered his options, and decided, “Yeah, you’ll do. Your fingers are nimble. Care to lace me up in this?” He held up a corset and dress that Saemon had, for whatever unthinkable reason, kept stored in his cabin. It smelled like moth and salt, but Dru knew he could probably still effectively fight in it if he had to.
Imoen drew back a bit, surprised or uncomfortable. “You’re really going to wear that?”
“For the day,” Dru said and nodded, and grinned. “I keep my promises. Now turn around unless you want to see me naked.”
“Gross,” said Imoen and turned her back to him, folding her arms across her chest. Dru quickly divested himself of his armor and clothes and slipped the dress over his head, and then cleared his throat so Imoen could lace the corset around his middle. Once she was done, he slipped on his boots and armored gloves, leaving off the rest of his armor out of discomfort, but tied his sword belt on over the skirt, and as an afterthought ripped the skirt up to his thigh on both sides to give him better maneuverability.
“Ready?” She asked him as her hand hovered over the doorknob. “I think you look great,” she said encouragingly.
“Of course I do,” he huffed and marched through the door when Imoen swung it open.
There was some mocking laughter from Saemon’s men until Dru’s swords swung out of their sheaths in a fluid motion, and the elf challenged anyone to fight him with his eyes. One pirate took him up on the offer and slung his scimitar at Dru’s head.
The battle was over in seconds. Dru’s greater freedom of movement was an advantage even on the rocking ship, and he quickly disarmed the pirate and kicked him away, and then the next one that charged at him with a lazy overhand strike. It was soon three on one, nothing particularly heated but certainly with real weapons, and not a single blow was made on Filvandrueth.
When all his enemies were disarmed and on the ground, Dru sheathed his weapons and took a bow to the clapping of all the crew, and his friends on the top deck that had witnessed his fight. “Well done, sir!” Saemon called out.
“I think I prefer ‘madam’ while I’m in the dress,” Dru corrected, holding up a gloved finger.
“Madam, that outfit is a disaster, but you wear it well,” Saemon concluded. He handed out a package, oblong and heavier than his sword in weight. He unwrapped it and let its cloth and leather tie fall to the ground as he held it up in the light. It was large and silver, and shimmered white in the sun – the blade from a two-hander.
“What’s this?” Dru wondered, admiring the edge with his fingers as he took off his glove to examine it.
“Your winnings,” Saemon said mysteriously, and retreated into his cabin, closing the door behind him abruptly.
Dru stared after him with a confused expression. The ship rocked gently. Then, it rocked not-so-gently, and sent Dru into a crouch as Imoen fell to the ground. Jan went flying and Dru had to catch him, and he ran for the edge of the ship before the little roguish inventor could capsize.
“This reminds me of the time that my great-great-uncle—” Jan started to tell a story in a high-pitched, panicked tone, as Dru hauled him back on board.
“Not the time, Jan!” Dru snapped and ran to assist Viconia who had fallen as well. Minsc, Jaheira, and Anomen stayed upright.
Aerie and Haer’Dalis ran out of the bowels of the galley and onto the deck just as the next rock shook the ship and sent Aerie tumbling, with Haer’Dalis catching her in his arms.
Out of a portal, three warriors emerged behind Filvandrueth and Viconia while five more appeared on the other end of the prow, and two at the stern. They were scarred and unmistakably githyanki from their outer-planar armor and weapon design, and they howled a battle cry in their language before immediately engaging the sailing crew and Dru’s company in combat.
Minsc and Jan were the first to fall into the sea as the ship rocked horribly, and figures began to jump out of the water onto the boat that Dru couldn’t identify. Everything went flying, and Jaheira transformed into a huge puma and flew at a githyanki that nearly gutted Viconia. Dru had the two-handed sword blade in his hands and used it to block blows coming at him from two githyanki who snarled at him in their fervor. He looked to the starboard side of the ship where Minsc and Jan were floating in the ocean, Jan struggling but Minsc maintaining a hold on the little gnome.
Imoen was the next to fall, and Dru without hesitation grabbed the blade, tossed it to the side where the githyanki went chasing after it, and dove into the ocean after his adopted sister. He didn’t just escape Spellhold with her just to lose her so suddenly. Viconia screamed something after him that he didn’t hear, and the world briefly went black as he hit the water before he resurfaced.
He spotted shadowy figures beneath the water circling, massive fish or some manner of creature he couldn’t identify, before he started swimming toward Imoen who was bobbing up and down in the water and struggling to tread.
“Dru!” She cried out in relief when he got a hold of her.
“I have you,” he shouted and started swimming toward Minsc. Holes had started to appear in the hull of the ship, punctured by githyanki from the inside and the other creatures from the outside and beneath.
Jaheira went flying into the water next, followed by Aerie and Haer’Dalis. Viconia was the last to fall and Dru told Imoen to grab onto his back while he swam for the drow, since he didn’t know if she could swim and she was still wearing heavy armor.
It was all he could do to keep them all upright and above the water, before one of the planks of the ship went flying and collided with his head just as Viconia and Imoen slipped from his grasp. He drifted down, down into the deep and dark green water where everything became cold and started to fade. Dru accepted his drowning with relative aplomb – he didn’t want to die, but he knew he’d be in Bhaal’s realm soon. There was no fighting it anymore. “Just one of those days, I guess,” he said as he let out all the air in his lungs with one big expel. Everything finally went dark.
When he awoke, it wasn’t to Bhaal’s realm at all, all of his companions were still with him. There was no sign of the captain, or his crew, and seventeen shark-people – sahuagin, he heard Gorion’s voice lecture in his head – pointed spears and halberds at him as he and all of his friends laid about on sandy ground gasping for air inside a magical bubble. He was fairly confused by the fact that he was still alive, and wondered absently if anything actually could kill him or if he was doomed to survive until the bloody end of Alaundo’s saga. Still, it was never in Dru’s idiom to deny his fate, so he stood up on wobbling, wet legs, wrung out his skirt onto the ground, and grinned at the sahuagin around him.