i want to taste you again
The distance between Torchline and King's End isn't a terribly large one - enough for any skyship to make the trip within a day, certainly - but the drop in temperature is stark and immediately noticeable. Colour leaches out of the sky mere hours after leaving the islands, filming it with a cataract of snowfall and fog, and the air grows teeth that nip at any exposed flesh without prejudice. Down in the Castaway Exchange, the morning is slow moving; stalls are open, their merchants stiff-limbed and hopeful, but there are precious few window shoppers today, and only those who have to be outside appear to be braving the ice-slick docks.
The Ark is anchored in her berth like a seabird at rest, rust-red sails down, the dark lacquer of her hull speckled white with snowfall, and a large brazier burns bright upon her deck to keep the ice from getting too friendly with her boards. She might not be sailing for a few days yet, but the galleon is never empty; some crew move up and down her gangplank to load shipments into her belly, the crates branded by businesses that are almost certainly fronts for more nefarious operations. The ship's mate - a small, olive-skinned man named Murphy - oversees the operations, and will most certainly take note of any skinny thieves named Finch who might come calling to deliver a certain ledger lifted from Rae's Fingers.
Jack, for his part, is in his map room beneath the quarterdeck towards the stern of the ship, a large chart rolled out before him that shows a course he's plotted dozens of times between Torchline and a few small, hidden islands out in the Arclight. He's never plotted it from King's End, though, and so to say he's got work to do is an understatement. It's already been close to an hour of staring and course correcting, though, so it's with a grunt of acceptance - that all men, even Jack Barclay, require a break - that he slumps back into one of the chairs around the table.
His hands move automatically for the cigarettes tucked into the inside pocket of his waistcoat, and as he sets one between his lips, it's already smoking and alight. Closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose, Jack draws the smoke deep into his lungs and waits, willing the imprint of the map now burned into the backs of his eyelids to fade.
The Ark is anchored in her berth like a seabird at rest, rust-red sails down, the dark lacquer of her hull speckled white with snowfall, and a large brazier burns bright upon her deck to keep the ice from getting too friendly with her boards. She might not be sailing for a few days yet, but the galleon is never empty; some crew move up and down her gangplank to load shipments into her belly, the crates branded by businesses that are almost certainly fronts for more nefarious operations. The ship's mate - a small, olive-skinned man named Murphy - oversees the operations, and will most certainly take note of any skinny thieves named Finch who might come calling to deliver a certain ledger lifted from Rae's Fingers.
Jack, for his part, is in his map room beneath the quarterdeck towards the stern of the ship, a large chart rolled out before him that shows a course he's plotted dozens of times between Torchline and a few small, hidden islands out in the Arclight. He's never plotted it from King's End, though, and so to say he's got work to do is an understatement. It's already been close to an hour of staring and course correcting, though, so it's with a grunt of acceptance - that all men, even Jack Barclay, require a break - that he slumps back into one of the chairs around the table.
His hands move automatically for the cigarettes tucked into the inside pocket of his waistcoat, and as he sets one between his lips, it's already smoking and alight. Closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose, Jack draws the smoke deep into his lungs and waits, willing the imprint of the map now burned into the backs of his eyelids to fade.
like a secret or a sin
JACK
- Secret Telepath
- Functionally Immortal (Forever 35)
- Two small star tattoos beneath his left eye
- Click for The Ark!
