Chapter 27 Maximus
Maximus
The rest of the journey to Asteris passed quickly under clear skies.
Ariella, bolstered by her new status as first mate, pushed herself to the limit with her windweaving skills.
She knew the entire crew was desperate for land—for a reset after our turbulent journey—and she delivered magnificently, guiding favorable winds into our sails day and night.
I quickly established a new rhythm on the ship.
Unlike Viper, who’d sequestered himself in his quarters, I made a point of being everywhere—checking rigging, inspecting the hull, overseeing repairs.
The crew needed to see their captain working alongside them.
I praised good work openly, but made it clear that discipline would be maintained.
A pirate ship without order quickly became a floating graveyard.
A handful of Viper’s devoted followers remained. They’d bent the knee when faced with the alternative, but I kept them under close watch. Pete in particular made me uneasy—his eyes followed me with barely concealed hatred whenever I passed.
Sometimes at night, as Kaspar slept beside me, I questioned how long I could maintain this position.
Captaining a pirate vessel meant raids, and raids meant death.
Though I’d spent years as the Reaper, executing Viper’s brutal orders, if there was a choice, I didn’t want more deaths on my conscience.
Yet the thought of leaving the skies made my chest constrict.
Flying was in my blood—the freedom of soaring above the world’s troubles, the endless horizon promising new adventures.
I couldn’t give that up. It would kill me.
I’d been contemplating it, though—grounding myself permanently if Kaspar had wanted a different life.
I’d spent sleepless nights weighing my love of the skies against my growing feelings for him, preparing myself for that inevitable descent.
But when Kaspar had confessed, eyes bright with excitement, that he wanted to stay with me among the clouds, the relief had stolen my breath away.
Like a ship catching a perfect wind, my heart had soared at the possibility of having both—the endless sky and the man who was quickly becoming my anchor.
When Asteris’s capital, Gearhart, finally appeared on the horizon, the crew erupted in cheers.
We quickly transformed The Black Wraith into our newest alias—The Golden Goose, supposedly a merchant vessel specializing in bird transport.
Usually, we’d swap out the serpent figurehead with one of our numerous attachable decoy ones.
But this time, we’d taken the opportunity to saw off the vile thing that had marked us as Viper’s ship.
I leaned against the railing as we approached Gearhart’s massive sea wall—a feat of engineering rivaling even the famous barricade of Sunada’s capital city.
But where Embergate’s wall stood as a grim, utilitarian fortress of dull gray stone and iron reinforcements, Gearhart had transformed necessity into artistry.
Their wall gleamed with polished copper inlays catching the sunlight, and intricate mosaic patterns depicted the kingdom’s history in vibrant blues and golds.
Even their practical infrastructure had style.
“Quite the welcome, isn’t it?” I said to Kaspar, who stood beside me, mouth slightly agape.
The docks themselves stretched before us in an organized chaos of activity that always felt fundamentally different from Sunada’s regimented efficiency. Dockworkers moved with purpose but without the haunted, exhausted expressions I’d grown accustomed to seeing in Embergate’s laborers.
I stood at the gangplank as we docked, wearing my best approximation of a respectable merchant captain—a navy blue coat with minimal embellishments and my hair tied back neatly, no weapons visible.
I’d instructed the crew similarly, and those with the most notorious faces or distinctive pirate tattoos remained below deck.
A dockworker approached, clipboard in hand. Young fellow, couldn’t be more than twenty, with the manner of someone who took their job seriously.
“Welcome to Gearhart,” he said. “Name of vessel and purpose of visit?”
“The Golden Goose,” I replied smoothly. “Merchant transport. Inspector Torres would like to handle our inspection and registration.”
The young man’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “Torres, sir? But I can perform the standard—”
“Torres,” I repeated firmly, sliding a silver coin across to him. “Tell her the shipment of black feathers has arrived.”
The dockworker pocketed the coin with practiced discretion. “Wait here, please.”
Ten minutes later, a woman in an impeccably pressed customs uniform approached with measured steps.
Her dark hair was pulled back in a severe bun, and the badge on her chest gleamed in the morning light.
Only someone who knew her well would notice how her right sleeve was always fastened slightly looser—concealing the burn scar that extended from elbow to wrist, a souvenir from our escape years ago.
Torres had once been my fellow officer aboard The Valiant before Eric’s betrayal sent us both running for our lives.
Once she’d helped me escape prison and fled to Asteris, she’d found she was too scarred by our past to return to the skies.
“Good day, sir,” she said, her official tone belied by the warmth in her eyes as she recognized me.
“Inspector Torres.” I nodded respectfully. “It’s actually Captain Reaper, now. You won’t be seeing Viper anymore, but I was hoping we could continue our… arrangement.”
Torres’s eyebrows shot up, and she scanned the deck, likely looking for signs of Viper. “What happened to him?”
“Let’s just say there was a change in leadership,” I replied, maintaining steady eye contact. “One that benefits everyone. Same terms as before, with a bonus for the smooth transition.” I slid a small pouch toward her that clinked pleasantly with gold coins.
Torres’s expression remained professional as she pocketed the pouch, but I caught the slight smile tugging at her lips. “I always knew you’d be a captain one day, Max,” she murmured, using my real name for the first time in years.
The pride that flooded through me was complicated—a reminder of old dreams achieved through means I’d never imagined.
“Very well. Let’s inspect your cargo, shall we?” she announced loudly.
Torres followed me aboard, performing the most cursory inspection I’d ever witnessed. She glanced into the cargo hold, barely taking three steps inside before turning around, then scribbled on her forms.
“Papers seem to be in order,” Torres announced, once we were back to the gangplank. As she handed me the stamped documents, she whispered, “Three hours, usual place. We clearly have catching up to do.”
“I’ll be there. With… someone else too.”
She shot me a curious look before shouting, “Welcome to Gearhart, Captain. Your crew is free to disembark.”
Another ripple of cheers shot around the crew as everyone jostled to be first over the gangplank.
Ariella was one of the first over, and I wasn’t surprised.
She was always eager to visit her family when we stopped here.
Kas and I hovered behind, waiting until everyone else had headed off.
We both had the same thought—that we wanted to be alone together, after so long being crammed in with everyone.
Hand in hand, we left the docks and entered the city proper, where the difference between the two kingdoms became even more apparent.
Sunada’s Embergate had always struck me as a place built to extract—from its people, its resources, its very soul.
The capital city reflected that with its stark division between the opulent noble quarter with its gleaming towers and the ramshackle factory districts where workers lived in perpetual twilight beneath the smoke.
Gearhart, though, seemed built to flourish.
The city rose in elegant, interconnected tiers rather than harsh divisions.
Flux-powered trams glided between districts on elevated tracks adorned with flowering vines.
Buildings of warm sandstone were accented with copper and brass, their facades painted in hues that would’ve been considered frivolous waste in Sunada.
“I’ve never seen so many colors in one place,” Kaspar murmured beside me, his eyes wide as he took in the scenery.
He was right. Where Embergate dressed itself in industrial grays and the stark black and white of wealth versus poverty, Gearhart bloomed in painted facades, flowering window boxes, and bright awnings that snapped in the breeze.
Kas’s eyes traced the network of brass-railed walkways connecting buildings at various heights, the flux-powered lifts carrying people between levels, and the intricate clockwork public fountains that served as both art and practical water sources.
“Those are the manufacturing districts,” I said, nodding toward the western quadrant where elegant smokestacks released not the thick black plumes of Embergate’s factories but thin wisps of steam, filtered through ingenious mechanisms. “They’ve figured out ways to capture and reuse the energy from their production processes.
Makes their fluxstone supplies last longer. ”
Kas’s attention shifted to a mixed group of children playing with a rope—some in fine clothes, others clearly from working families.
“In Embergate, those children wouldn’t be allowed in the same classroom,” he murmured.
“Asteris has its problems,” I admitted, “but they’ve never believed talent only exists in certain bloodlines. Anyone showing aptitude can apprentice almost anywhere.” I glanced at Kas. We both understood the unspoken exception—fluxweavers faced danger everywhere, Asteris included.