Contest

Gökçe turned over the arrow twice to check the flights
before placing the back in the quiver. Blue tinged metal of her bow glinted in
the sunlight. She checked for the wind again, the sails still hung limply from
the masts. They’ve been becalmed for 3 days now. They had rations and water
aplenty, thanks to Franco’s portal. Someone suggested they just leave the ship
and come back for it later, but the dwarf was having none of it. Then another
said they could dismantle the ship and just send it through to portal to be
reassembled later. By then the dwarf had threatened to tie himself to the wheel.

She chuckled at the memory, they won’t be going anywhere for
now. There was plenty of time to kill. She walked down the deck, hands clasped
behind her back, they’ve passed through sets of magnetic islands, floating
rocks amidst the clouds. The charts had said something about graviton
anomalies, or was it anomalous gravitas? She shook her head and went back to
watching the clouds. The islands would flit by, slowly turning on their axes,
never actually touching the ship. Just out of reach. Some even had trees
growing on them. She noted a particularly curious one, about a couple hundred
yards out, with a rock formation. Grimnar had droned on before about how the
wind would have eroded the soft bedrock leaving behind fantastic rock
formations. This must be one of those things. A perfect target. She unslung her
bow and nocked an arrow. Taking aim she let fly. And missed.

Bootsteps came up behind her and Gualterio leaned on the
railing beside her. “10 gold says I can make that shot.” Without even looking
at him she fired an arrow again, this time hitting one of the arches. “Make
that 20.” She replied.

Gualterio lays down a fresh quiver and unslings his bow. He
grabs 3 arrows and fires all in quick succession and almost all of them pass
through the arch. “Hey no cheating!” Gökçe said testily. “We never agreed how
many we could shoot in a turn though ha ha!” Gualterio said. Gökçe shook her head,
“You should have my gold ready after this.” And fires once again, the arrow
deflecting off of a rock. Gualterio let flies 3 successive arrows again, with
precision all hit the rock Gökçe had hit earlier. “Show off”

“Let me show you amateurs how its done” said Franco as he
swings down from the foremast. “I’ve been watching that sad show you two have
been putting on, and frankly, I’m not impressed.” “Let’s see if you can do
better then” Gualterio said, eyebrows raised. Franco grabs his crossbow from
the foredeck weapons rack and slides a bolt in. Just then, as he was aiming,
the wind started to pick up. The sails snapped back to work once more and the airship
had started to move. Someone to the aft of the ship began shouting orders as
they were getting underway. “Looks like you’ll have to teach us next time,
Franco” Gökçe taunted “A minor setback! Observe.” Franco said before firing a single
shot. The bolt, bolstered by the wind flew straight through the arch. But it
wasn’t an arch at all. But a cave opening. The chilling sound of a beast’s roar
could be heard coming from the cave, then came several more. And more. Until it
could be heard all around them. “Uh. Oops?” Franco said before dropping the
crossbow and kicking it underneath a skyboat. Black shapes started to come out
of the caves. Reptilian headed and long necked, greenish spittle dripping from
their jaws and falling with a hiss on the rocks. Some have already spread their
wings and started to follow the *Fury*. “We better get out of here Grim!”
Gualterio shouted. “What now? We’ve only just got underway” Grimnar replied “You
might want to look behind you” Gökçe said pointing. Grimnar turned his head to
see an entire colony of Wyrmlings swarming towards them.

- Edge of Worlds: Year Unknown