Jorune: Strange Allies Sequence 1.2

The work is hard, and the ship's pilot, Wen Lonson, is as severe a muadra as you've ever seen. Thankfully, you are beneath Wen's notice most of the time, as Renno and Lej watch over your work. You learn the ropes before too long: stacking crates, positioning cages, unfurling sheets, tying down lines, swinging booms...this all comes pretty naturally to Yongap, but the others quickly get the hang of the basics. Finally, the cargo is secured, the wind ripples in the sheets, and even each of you can feel that the crystal ship is straining at the dock to take off sailing across the sky.

At sunset, Wen Lonson's order comes to cast off, and you all work to coil rope for a time while the towers of Kaigon dwindle to the south. Renno explains that the wind is always from the south in the evening, around this part of the continent, so evenings are a time of reduced duty in rotation. At other times you'll have to be working hard, tacking to keep the crystal ship moving along at a speed needed to arrive in Reet in time and on schedule. It quickly gets cold this high above the ground, and Wen allows the off-duty crew to light several braziers on clear areas of the deck for idle crew and passengers to warm themselves and drink some hot rusper as the stars wheel by overhead.

It is while you are warming yourself at a brazier that first night, trying to keep warm enough that your overworked muscles don't get too stiff, that Miniri hears and Marik sees that some people very like Hentak and Elonpo - the merchant and bodyguard - are passengers aboard the ship. They both recall their conversation that Vordenir had with the merchant back at the talmaron aerie, and their bronth companion confirms that it is indeed the same man (once they point Hentak out to Vordenir). Strange...but perhaps he sold all his wares at Kaigon in a day, and is now traveling north to Reet with a new shipment of goods to sell?

The night is cold and clear, affording you unobstructed views of the stars and the seven moons shining down from above. Aside from the chill winds, there is very little sense of motion aboard this "ship," as it is so enormous. The sense of vertigo is you approach the edge is alarming, because the ship is actually scudding along quite fast, augmenting the speed of the isho flow with a prevailing northern wind billowing the full sails.

At one point shortly before you retire for bed, Wen Lonson calls most hands into the rigging. You all furl the sails while the larger members of the crew - including Lej, Barragar, and Vordenir - swing the booms to tack the vessel west. It turns out that the Champion was overtaking a small skyrealm. In the end, the maneuver wasn't necessary, as the vessel floated up higher and passed above the tallest trees on the skyrealm, in addition to some distance to the west of it. This caused an uncomfortable queasy sensation in your stomachs which you've never felt before this. Looking down and to the right, those of you in the rigging were able to get a good look at the skyrealm; it's a newer one because you can still see that water spills over the edge from ice the remains on the taller crags near the center of the floating island. Most of it is covered with vegetation, and you see the flashes of some light deep within the trees, followed by a bellow from some creature still on the skyrealm. Afterward, Wen has to reverse the process, tacking back east as the ship settles again to a lower altitude.

Wen Lonson rouses you the next morning for your shift. You spend the day doing various tasks familiar to Yongap: braiding, tarring and coiling rope; checking the cargo; adjusting the sails; washing the deck; and so forth. Of the working of the ship that causes it to levitate on the isho winds there is no sign, though Marik would have expected caji to be involved. It's possible that it's hidden.

There's also tasks that are unique to the crystal ship. There is an open invitation for sailors and crew who have a facility with ranged weapons to shoot the Giar, a sightless native flying creature that likes to roost in the rigging of crystal ships. They're edible, so bagging them can augment the ship's stores, but mostly they're a nuisance, scavenging food and leaving droppings on anything below. There's also a roost of talmaron that must be tended; these are used in cases of emergency for conveying messages, or for crew to fetch water or other supplies in places where there is no docking tower for the crystal ship itself.

So, for this first night and day aboard ship, you may provide
a) what crew task you are working on aboard ship (particularly if they relate to skills/foci or character interactions). These do not need to be limited to what I've described above, if something else occurs to you that seems reasonable.
and
b) what thing you do in your off-duty time (also relating to skills/foci or character interactions).

Basically, you can describe two things you do, but one should be related to your work on the crew, and if there's a skill involved, name it. If a roll is needed, I'll let you know.

Once he relaxes enough to stop looking over his shoulder, Yongap falls easily back into the routine of Sailing. His ease with the work makes quick friends with Renno and some of the other rough-around-the-edges crew, though Wen Lonson never seems satisfied with anyone. Wen doesn't like the crew mingling with the passengers, but Yongap is able to leverage his camaraderie into some games of Whellak, a gambling game he learned from some salu years before and which few of these Jaspians know.Miniri tries to appeal to Wen Lonson's better nature, wheedling for softer work. This does not curry favor with the other crew members, needless to say. So they are skeptical if not downright rude when the genteel crugar offers to tell them a story. But her unexpected charm and deft skill with a tale leave an impression on the crew. Aside from the ever-suspicious and disapproving Wen Lonson, none of the crew have any particular interest in her background, and so she doesn't need to do more than she has done to distract them from asking about her motives for joining the crew.Marik spends his time literally learning the ropes from the rest of the crew. Even though they are pretty different, the rest of the crew sort of lumps Marik and Yongap together as "those little guys." Marik's eagerness to learn coupled with Yongap's camaraderie with the more gruff and grizzled crew results in Marik's being accepted by some of the crew, too. Renno introduces the muadra caji to many of the crew; Marik takes mental notes as to who might have useful skills or information he could learn in future. While on duty, Marik spends time (when he can avoid the fish-eye of Wen Lonson) watching the Gauss Valley roll past underneath the ship, exhilarating at seeing familiar geography from this unusual perspective. He's flown on occasion, but always before it's been on talmaron, and the view there is obstructed by wings and constant flapping motion. By contrast, the view from the rigging is serene and Marik can appreciate the scenery. Gythaar climbs even more nimbly through the rigging, his eyes taking in as much of land and sky as he can while being worked hard by the brutal Wen Lonson. He can see clouds form and dissipate, and gets an inkling of how the moons interact with the isho, which influences the physical weather as well as the isho weather. Unfortunately, Gythaar doesn't have the social graces exhibited by Miniri, and many of the Jaspian crew barely contain their anti-crugar prejudice.As night falls and their shifts end, Barragar prepares to lead the others on a little excursion...