ABLEE

  The soft, creaking floor beneath my foot felt so strange after years of treading stone. A giddy chuckle bubbled up my throat. It was dark here and so warm.

  The soft, sleepy smell of smoke curled in the air. Flickering firelight beckoned me from somewhere deep within the structure. I could have curled up on those floorboards and gotten my best rest in years if pure excitement hadn't been coursing through me.

  Wisps of the cool mountain breeze drafted from behind, and the sound of clinking glass bottles came from ahead, followed by a hoarse man's voice, "Ey' now, is that a draft!? What a novel concept!"

  Someone was here?! How?! This wasn't part of the Keep; I knew that for certain. Was I trespassing in some unsuspecting person's home?

  I quickened my pace, my toes bouncing off the floor. Pop. Pop. Pop. "HEY!" I shouted.

  There was a crash and a clinking riot like a wind chime in a cyclone, "Uah-huh!?" the man's startled voice replied.

  I was too giddy to notice as my chains rose behind me; their shackles yanked my wrists, and my feet left the floor, rising higher and higher as my back slammed into the ground. My breath left me, and as I struggled to drag it back in, light cut across the room from a door flung open.

  The flame-backed form of a pirate met my gaze: tricorn hat, overcoat, and the handles of a cutlass and flintlock pistol poking from his sides. There was something off about the scene's lighting; it filtered through the edges of his form and the door frame, like peeks of canvas through a work's first brush strokes.

  "A-a pirate!" I said, bucking my legs beneath me, trying to push myself back where the chains weren't quite as taut, "This is the greatest!"

  "Well now," he said, leaning against the door-frame, "wasn't expecting company."

  I finally gathered enough slack to rise to my feet. Looming behind the pirate was a cabin scene suited for the cover of an adventure comic, the kind that'd have a skeleton's arm hanging from a loose attic door. Its floor was a mosaic of empty emerald-green and jasper-brown bottles, filtering the glow of a stacked stone fireplace. Its shifting flames appeared to be nothing more than a series of glowing images, each replacing the last at a speed my eye could barely track. Looking up at his shadowed face, I asked, "Who are you? Where are we!?"

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  "Pinbeard, lass..." He straightened up and grabbed at the corner of his hat, trudging toward me, "...Captain and sole resident of this painted brig." He turned to look back at his litter-strewn domain, his long spike goatee bobbing with each word.

  "What, THE Pinbeard?" I asked, "How'd you end up here? Aren't you supposed to be dead?!" I reached out and slapped his goatee, rattling it like the end of a rapier, SPROINGGGG. He was like a character from a children's book; a laugh pulled itself from me, "Ha-haha!"

  "Ey!" He recoiled, swatting my hand from striking it again, "Aye, I'm THE Pinbeard, or as close as ye'll find." He turned away in a scowl, grabbing hold of the end of his goatee, his hand shaking to a stop. What sort of bizarre place was this? A living painting, a pirate pulled straight from history, where the hell was I?!

  "Hmph, okay then, I need answers, Pinbeard!" He was a cross-hatch of brushwork, a painting of a weathered sailor who breathed, his rum-blushed cheeks the red of wildflowers. I grabbed the sleeve of his ruddy, orange leather jacket. It felt real. "What is this place? Why are you here?"

  He cleared his throat, a sound like churning wet gravel. The white lines of spittle between his yellow teeth were something I'd struggle to depict. Whoever painted him, if he was really painted, was good.

  He leveled his eyes, their whites matching the yellow of his teeth, down his nose at me, "It's a place for forgotten things." He glanced down at my tattered over-alls and the chains hanging from my unwashed arms, "Suppose ye' meet the requirements."

  "What?!" His remark lit inside me like a torch to a haybale, and I slammed my palms into his chest, "Don't act like you know who I am!"

  He veered lazily behind my strike, turning in a full circle and rounding about with his flintlock pistol drawn, "Ye'r hardly a mystery."

  He only held it level at me long enough to imply what he could have done. Then, he returned to the fire-lit room and lowered himself into a rugged wooden chair. Plucking a half-full rum bottle from the table beside him, he took a long swig. I glowered at him.

  "Looks like ye'r real blood and fire, redhead, not an imitation. I'd garner a guess on what brought you here, runnin' from somethin', right?"

  Despite the resentment burning within me, I couldn't stop myself from nodding.

  "Well ye've found another dead end..." he said and huffed. Leaning back and propping his chair onto two legs, with his back against the wall, he continued, "...nothin' here for ya besides a picture of a long-passed sea-dog."

  "Shut up!" I yanked against my chains, and my arms dragged behind me. The pirate was now well out of reach, "If there's no other exit, I'll just leave through the Keep. Give me your sword and pistol."

  "Heh, that wouldn't help ye' girl, even if I was inclined to do so." He waved his bottle toward the painted curtain on the wall behind me. billowing in the cool breeze, "Ye' won't be taking anything beyond that drape that ye' didn't bring in yerself."

  "That's one of the rules... of this place?" I asked, this useless pirate was holding out on me, "So you do know more, spill it!"

  He stroked his chin, pausing to think, "That drape, it's yer work, right? No one else made it for ye?"

  "Yeah, that's right, very life-like, I'd say."

  "Then I suppose some explanation is in order..." Bang! He was cut off by the sound of a gunshot from beyond the curtain, and then another, moments later.

  My thoughts drove straight to my brother Cline; he had to still be here in the Keep. He could be in danger, and I had no time to bargain with Pinbeard, "Damnit, I've got to get out of here; just help me!"

  He stood and trudged to my side, snatching the chain on my right wrist and bringing it up to his eyes.

  I nodded, "Yeah, we need to get rid of these! Not sure what to do with 'em; paint just slides right off," wet paint did, at least. My eyes dropped to the pistol on his hip.

  "Aye, think I've got a file 'round here somewhere..." He said, releasing my chain. More gunshots reverberated from beyond my cell.

  "No time!" I grabbed the handle of his flintlock, pulling it loose and rushing away from him as my other hand bundled my chains.

  "Hey now, lass, wait a second..." He stumbled forward, reaching for his weapon. I didn't falter; my left hand was wrapped in layers of chain. Pinbeard was rushing me, "...I've only got one—!" he shouted.

  I pointed the barrel to the bundled links atop my left hand, gritting my teeth. I would have begged the fates not to cripple me... if there'd been a moment for it.