Sitting at the bow of the ship sharing the first watch, the moons in the sky sank slowly, Throkk and Deruzz gazed upwards sharing a tankard. It always refilled and the thick beer was growing on Throkk. “Needs some blood” muttered Throkk. Deruzz leaned across and took the tankard as a distant gull cried out in the twighlight. “My friend, you do know we don’t do that, we haven’t done that for years!”. The boat listed further to the port side. Throkk gave a long inhale, flaring his nostrils. The air was heavier, more moisture in it. He knew instinctively he was nearing his destination. He raised his hand to give the signal to hoist the jib. He needn’t have done it. After all this time at sea the crew had a finely tuned sense for what Throkk wished for. This suited him, he was a man of few words and the crew of the Santoku had grown around him. He took a quiet satisfaction is the discipline he had instilled into the crew and the respect that he had earned. Throkk’s massive bulk had grown more lean these past weeks at sea and his thigh still ached from where it was pierced by a length of the ship. His blood had poured out from the artery nearly killing him, that very blood know stained the side of the Santoku. The crew were sure it gave the ship preternatural strength. The quartermaster took a long draft from the tankard and pointed to the horizon. “You’re tense Throkk, you’re clenching your jaw. We’re still two days out, are you sure you want to go through with this”. Throkk forced himself to release the tension in his muscles and turned. “Yes Deruzz, there is a great need. We must go. The Armada is no longer trapped but we cannot rest in Porta Verde. Not now”. Throkk cast a glance upwards to the third Moon, now alone in the sky. Closer it seemed. He didn’t dare tell of his visions, his nightly communications with his ancestral spirts, he didn’t want to believe it himself.
Deruzz broke the long silence, “Throkk…” he paused “we never discussed your… skill. We saw what you did to the Kraken it was godlike…”. Throkk snorted, “I nearly died. It died first though”. Deruzz paused, drawing closer “We have lost this ability. Please, tell me. Tell me about your rage. Where does it come from? What does it feel like?”. Deruzz trailed off under Throkk’s gaze. The grim redlight flickered and cast shadows over the two unlikely friends both mentoring the other, one on the Orcs of the modern age and the other on the Orcs of the past. The waves in the dark sloshed against the side of the ship as the sounds of a muted bell rang out marking the chage of the shift. Throkk picked up the stick he had been whittling and shaved another careful slice; the beginnings of a spoon. Deruzz lost hope of an answer and stood in the comfortable silence, he had grown used to this.
“It starts with a drumbeat.” Throkk paused for a moment and sighed, staring into the distance at something only he could see. His gaze lifting to the moon now, the light of it always reminded him of battle.
“It starts with a drumbeat. I can feel it in my chest as my heart increases, not panicked but steady, almost deliberately, like a drum, like music, beating out a rhythm, it calls to me. I feel it in my chest and it grows. Harder, louder, trying to rip out of my ribs, like being lashed with a whip there.” Deruzz, held his breath, not wanting to break Throkk out from the distant stare and his uncharacteristic talkative mood. “I can feel my blood thicken and my arms and lips go cold, the music rises to my ears, it sounds like a river in a cave pulsing. I feel a hunger and sickness deep in the pit of my stomach. My mouth dries out and I can taste metal. I can hear a song in the music, a beautiful note driving through me, ever movement feels like that of someone elses. Then darkness descends, the world turns to shades of black and white, the only colour is the deep red of blood.” Throkk looked up at Deruzz who couldn’t help but shift uneasily under that intense glare and step back as Throkk approached him.
“Everything is heightened even the pain, the pain is the most glorious of all. It drives the music to new heights. It is like being underwater and all I can hear is my breathing and my heart growing faster, more urgent. I can feel each sinew and fiber of my muscles and above it all is the hunger, that dark hunger that can only be satisfied by driving my spear through the heart of another foe.”
Throkk now towerd over Derruz grasping him by his shoulders, squeezing too tightly. Throkk blinked and pulled himself back from the edge of the black rage, taking a staggering step backwards and stared off into the distance once more, as if willpower alone could make land appear. Deruzz could feel his own heartbeat growning and swallowed.
“You appear to have broken your spoon dear friend”. Deruzz gestured with the mug. Throkk looked down and unclenched his fists to reveal the shattered remains of the spoon and shook his head slowly.
“It was to be a gift for some old friends.”
Deruzz smiled, “never mind, around you there are always more splinters in need of carving to be found”. Throkk grimmaced darkly and looked up once more to the lights of the moon.
In the back of his mind he could still hear the distant sound of the drums.