LINK - Theme Music - "Washed Away" by Flight Paths
A thousand days, slowly drifting away
From the storm clouds over you
A lonely place, 'cause there's nothing to say
After all you put me through
Fighting cold and afraid, crashing under the waves
Nothing left to hold onto
Empty ocean of pain, rising over the wake
It's the hardest thing to do
In the undertow
Fate won't let me go
But I won't be washed away
Sinking like a stone
Shaking in my bones
You won't take my heart away
Beyond the sea, someone you used to be
The many faces of truth
So far away when there's nothing to gain
And everything else to lose
Fighting cold and afraid, crashing under the waves
Nothing left to hold onto
Empty ocean of pain, rising over the wake
It's the hardest thing to do
In the undertow
Fate won't let me go
But I won't be washed away
Sinking like a stone
Shaking in my bones
You won't take my heart away
When I just want to breathe in
When I just want to breathe in deep
In the undertow
Fate won't let me go
But I won't be washed away
Sinking like a stone
Shaking in my bones
You won't take my heart away
A thousand days, slowly drifting away
From the storm clouds over you
A lonely place, 'cause there's nothing to say
After all you put me through
Fighting cold and afraid, crashing under the waves
Nothing left to hold onto
Empty ocean of pain, rising over the wake
It's the hardest thing to do
In the undertow
Fate won't let me go
But I won't be washed away
Sinking like a stone
Shaking in my bones
You won't take my heart away
Beyond the sea, someone you used to be
The many faces of truth
So far away when there's nothing to gain
And everything else to lose
Fighting cold and afraid, crashing under the waves
Nothing left to hold onto
Empty ocean of pain, rising over the wake
It's the hardest thing to do
In the undertow
Fate won't let me go
But I won't be washed away
Sinking like a stone
Shaking in my bones
You won't take my heart away
When I just want to breathe in
When I just want to breathe in deep
In the undertow
Fate won't let me go
But I won't be washed away
Sinking like a stone
Shaking in my bones
You won't take my heart away
~ Somewhere in the Sea of Swords. Winter, 1354 DR... ~
A clouded, moonless night. The quiet lapping of the oars in the dead air, the dim outline of the furled sails of their prey, the seemingly unsuspecting merchant galleon drawing silently closer.
Aside, that is, from the relentless, faraway roar coming from the angry red and orange haze above her, heard faintly as though through so many thick blankets, fading slowly as the blackness of the ocean depths waited patiently below her. Shattered hull debris, heavy braided ropes, cannonballs, and so many scattered personal effects rained in slow motion through the water around her, ghostly remnants of the dying hulk from which they'd fallen.
The cry of her crew when they caught sight of their assailant, just minutes before the grappling hooks fell.
Auburn hair floated around her in thick tendrils, hazel eyes whose light was fading, turned listlessly upwards to the rippling red haze above as she descended. A bubble brushed past paling lips as her lungs weakened and relaxed a little, slipping.
The flashes of cutlasses as they sprang from scabbards.
It's better this way...
A bright flash erupted above her as dull thud hammered her in the chest like an unseen fist, likely a powder keg igniting, jarring her temporarily back to a languid consciousness as Carah watched the fading visage of the Red Fortune's death throes. The throbbing in her head had subsided, though how long ago it had, she couldn't say. The water was getting colder, numbing her senses. Even the familiar terror that would come when her lungs could not find air for too long had abandoned her.
Dismayed shouts of surprise at unexpected resistance. A call to retreat.
Let it happen...
They said that your life flashed before your eyes just before death claimed you, yet no such visions had been granted to her. Maybe that had been a lie, too.
Just like after the Black Days, it seemed that all had been taken away. There was no one with her, no one with which to share her final moments. She only continued to drift down, down, and further down, towards the infinite darkness of Umberlee's unknowable locker.
She thought she would get see them one last time.
The concussive shock that throws her from the rigging of the ship, flinging her to the deck. The screams. The explosion.
Darkness.
You're alone, there is nothing left for you up there...
She tried. For all she could, she tried to remember. But memory stayed just out of reach, like an ephemeral dream that evaporated faster the more you tried to touch it. Her mind simply refused to register anything but the muted, faraway rumble like that of a far-off thunderstorm, the soft churning of bubbles, and the faint sensation of the water rushing past her as she sank.
She was cold. Numb. And so... very... tired.
...it's better this way, Carah...
She fell.
Consciousness. Dim, gray-green light, punctuated by the flickering and flashing light of the fire. She couldn't breathe, and yet she found herself unable to struggle for air.
"Carah..."
Her eyes fluttered open. It was as if she had heard that voice. As though it had whispered in her ear, but that was impossible. The light above was fading. The ocean was claiming her. She was alone. But the voice had been there. It seemed familiar somehow, yet she could not recognize it.
Had she imagined it? Was this finally the prelude to the visions she'd expected, here, at the end?
As she sank, all was thunderous silence.
Something inside her stirred. She suddenly became aware of the salt water stinging her eyes, the smothering, suffocating lack of air. Her fingers twitched, and less than a second later she convulsed, feeling the sudden fire of agony in her chest. Wide-eyed, she looked all around her, seeing nothing but the inky blackness of the ocean until she caught the faintest glimpse of the last remnants of the fading light.
Animal panic overtook her senses, the sudden desire to fight, to survive overriding all else. Previously uncooperative muscles suddenly flared to life, and she began to swim toward it. She was only faintly aware of the sudden pain in her legs and arms, the throbbing in her head. Only two things filled her attention: the burning in her lungs, and the burning light far above her.
She kicked.
"Go towards the light, Carah...
It was hard to tell if she was making progress. Despair, jealous and angry, fought to reclaim its place at the forefront of her mind, clashing with the sudden, inexplicable, stubborn need to live. The light seemed so far away...
She kicked.
Her burning lungs tried desperately to draw anything into them.
She convulsed again, and against her will her diaphragm drew her lungs open like a bellows. If she were able, her cry of dismay at her body's betrayal would have been piteous as she felt the cold seawater pour into her windpipe. The despair was overtaken by raw panic.
She kicked...
"Don't... the light..."
She broke the surface.
The calm waters lapped at her chin, hair slicked back against her head as a geyser of seawater spewed from her lips and nose, and a seizing, sputtering fit of coughing wracked her. Several times she felt the swells wash over her face, the hands of what lay below her gently, relentlessly trying to reclaim her, refusing to give up its prize. The pain in her chest radiated like an explosion out to her limbs, and she felt them grow heavy, as if tied to rocks, and threatening to pull her under all over again.
Something solid bumped into her, and on desperate reflex, she clung to it.
She coughed. The tears stung her eyes, trying to flush the salt and particulates from them as more seawater bubbled out between her lips. Her relief was a small thing, deep seated and distant, but it was there. Her face fell with a thump against the shattered chunk of wood that had been her salvation, arms slung across it, and she hung, floating, bobbing with the gentle swells. The water lapped and probed at her lips, and she spat weakly.
Slowly her senses came back to her as the panic subsided, but the pain remained. She was alive. She was grateful for it, she wanted to live. And wanted to die all the same. Her lungs screamed in agony, her legs felt like they were on fire, her head pounded as if something were constantly drumming on it with a hammer.
The ringing in her ears faded enough to hear the sounds of falling rain and roaring flame. Slowly, faltering, she lifted her head, turning her eyes towards the light.
The Red Fortune burned. The brig's mizzenmast was completely gone, and its stern was slumped pitifully into the water, the hull lolling drunkenly to port. Voracious flames flicked red tongues out of a sky-high column of thick, acrid black smoke which lazily curled over her head into the rainclouds, becoming lost in the gloom. Heavy raindrops fell through the smoke, dragging ash and soot with them as they splashed and pattered all around her in a steady drone that blended with the roar of the dying ship.
Carah turned her face to the sky, her eyelids fluttering against the drumming rain, and a hand lifted to wipe at her face, smearing faint black trails of soot from her forehead across her cheek. She looked around her for any sign of her crew.
It was only her. No one else. Not even a body. And no sign of the other ship.
She was alone.
She felt the hopelessness creep in again, or perhaps it had never left. She didn't know. With a pained grunt, and the stinging familiarity of her throat clutching, she strained to pull herself more fully onto the bobbing chunk of debris. It took her several attempts, and she nearly slipped free twice as her grip failed her on the slick wood. Splinters dug into her calloused palms, and she thought she felt a trickle of blood, but didn't look to see.
At last she settled up onto her chest, floating on the jagged plank face-down, and collapsed with her elbows underneath her. She felt the sooty rain beat on her back, pounding grit and ash into her sea-soaked hair and clothing. Her vision blurred, and time became mushy.
For all she knew, she only blinked. The rain was still beating out its numbing drone, but it was clearer now. But the roar of the fire had subsided. When she lifted her head, she could still see the plume of black smoke rising from the water, but it was much farther away now. The angry red light was now but a dim, pulsing ochre glow. It was difficult to see from this distance, but the hull appeared to have slipped further into the water now.
She drifted, alone, cold, and without hope, laying her head back onto the plank. The tears finally came.
It was better this way.
The things she had done... and for what? Revenge? Who was left to take vengeance on? Velen was gone. Tethyr was gone. Her home, her family, her life... Everything. It was gone. She had never learned or come to understand who, or what, had taken it from her, and there was nothing she could ever do to get it back.
A lack of direction? A sense of belonging? A new family to cling to? She had been taught better than this. Her father had defended the peninsula from pirates, and she had repaid him by becoming one. And no crew of misfits would ever replace the safe, loving home that she had taken for granted until she lost it.
She deserved this. She had preyed on the innocent, and finally they had met one that was prepared for them. They'd gotten what was coming to them. Everything she had done in the name of some sort of perverse justice, it had been a lie. A lie she had told to herself to justify a petty little girl's unbridled anger at a world she felt had wronged her.
She cried. Not for herself, not for pity. She deserved no pity. This was justice.
She cried because she had betrayed her upbringing, her brothers, her father. She had allowed directionless anger to control her, lashed out at those who had never wronged her. And only now, at the end, beaten and doomed, did she recognize her mistake.
She cried because she had been so selfish.
The rain pounded around her. Rivulets of ash and soot continued to wash slowly out of her hair, running around her cheek as it pressed into her makeshift lifeboat, her shoulders and back quaking gently as she wept. The swells of the water lapped quietly at the jagged edges of the plank, and at her, hands that had previously tried to drag her back under now seeming like comforting touches, reassuring her.
"It's not too late to change, Carah..."
She lifted her face, and wiped at it with a palm, leaving another faint streak of ash which promptly fell away against the rain. A shiver went through her. It was getting colder. She had to keep moving, or she was going to die out here.
She wasn't ready. Not yet.
Blinking away the haze in her vision, she wiped at her eyes with a thumb, and looked away from the dying glow of her ship. Without the interference of the flames, her eyes had adjusted somewhat to the darkness. There had to be something... anything out there. But all she could see was the glittering black the rain falling into the ocean in every direction. Dark clouds overhead, rolling, tumbling.
She couldn't find the stars. Her throat clutched on her again as she bit her lip, continuing her hopeless search.
"Look..."
A break in the scenery caught her eye. She had to stare for a moment for it to come into focus. Far off to the east she could make out gaps in the clouds, pinpricks of light peeked intermittently through them as they rolled past, and the black background of the night sky.
No... almost black. There was an outline...
A silhouette.
Land.
She couldn't judge how far away, between the darkness and her aching head. But she knew it was there. It was the only thing she had.
"It's never too late..."
She wasn't ready. She was better than this. She owed that much to them, at least.
Shivering and alone, she forced her aching body to obey her, turning her lifeboat towards the silhouette, and slowly, steadily, she started to kick again.
The darkened sky flashed slightly as a bolt of lightning arced from cloud to cloud behind her. The rolling peal of thunder followed, and she felt the spark within her grow, driving her forward. She refused to give up. There was always hope, no matter how dim.
She was going to make it up to them.
