Forums » Fantasy Roleplay » Rise of the Valko: A Pirate Werewolf RP (OPEN!)

The Valko is a decrepit ship making berth in the somewhat unsavory docks of the rather dodgy Port Tall Rock. Port Tall Rock is struggling to be a respectable place to ship cargo and carry out business, but is more widely known as a gathering place for those what do business a mite more outside the lines, so to speak. For every upstanding shop with a gilded, finely scripted sign out front, there are at least two rum-soaked taverns and a dark alleyway or six down which you could bribe a man or threaten him with his life. The docks of Port Tall Rock, though they be graying and seagull-ridden, boast proud, strapping merchant ships with important cargo that are guarded day and night by equally strapping soldiers. Among such esteemed vessels are scattered a great many other ships of not such great acclaim, ships the authorities overseeing Port Tall Rock are hoping to eradicate like vermin in a field. Every day, life for those who sail under no flag save the black one becomes a little less easy.

The Valko flounders in her moorings, needing a devoted crew to keep her afloat. Her sails are tattered and her mainframe is sagging. She's just survived her maiden voyage and been limped into port with a hold full of fantastically illegal things and a need of...just about every sort of attention could need under the sun. Her captain, Alyce Connors, is in search all along the streets and jetties of Port Tall Rock for such a crew as would take on duties of a...piratical nature. Though anyone wishing to crew the Valkowill need more than loose morals and a taste for cold steel. They'll need to have heard the song in the darkness; a call to all Were brethren who possess a taste for freedom and a second skin to wear when your human one gets a bit stifling. Yes, a ship crewed by werewolves. A marvel in and of itself, innit? Assisting Alyce until she is able to find her own crew are her father, the esteemed Captain Rufus Connors and his carpenter, Evka. With the help of her father's pack, Alyce hopes to set sail for new ventures with her own pack of ne'er do wells. Unfortunately, time to repair her ship's damage is short, as day by day, the authorities circle a little closer.

Afore settin' sail with us, there are a few things it might be absolutely wonderful to know about this particular game:

The Werewolves: Werewolves (called Weres) are natural-born, and cannot be created. They start life as wolves and remain so until the time they hit puberty, at which point they involuntarily experience their first change. From there, they can change freely from human to wolf at will. Unfortunately, they don't ever bring clothes with them in these changes. They are a good bit larger than their wholly wolf cousins and retain any distinguishing physical traits (scars, lost limbs) in both forms. Weres are very long lived, sort of a play on dog years. Alyce is in her eighties, Rufus closing in on three hundred. When in human form, Weres retain their fantastic sense of smell, which allows them to immediately recognize other members of their kind. They also possess in human form a somewhat enhanced strength. To other humans, Weres in human form are not at all distinguishable from ordinary humans.
Traditional Were society is very stifling, and most Weres shun their 'second', human skin, preferring to stay wolves. They are, to put it mildly, quite pretentious. This leads a great many youngsters to leave their home packs and strike out to glory in their clever human bodies. Sometimes, especially for Weres recently discovering life among humans, human social customs can be a bit strange and a lapse into wolf customs not altogether unexpected. Even 'civilized' Weres will never truly lose their wolf nature, but those that have ventured into human society have embraced the more-than, other-than nature of their existence and delight in it. No angsty werewolves here!

Playing: Alyce is looking for other Weres to be her crew, as humans are not nearly as long-lived, nor are they as tolerant of Were customs. While the human crew members she's had dealings with have turned out to be right good chaps, she'd rather have her own kind aboard. Though, if you had interest in playing a human (in a werewolf game? Really? Well, okay...) attempting to join the crew, they wouldn't look down on you. Too too much. When in Port Tall Rock, it's considered polite to not go changing into a wolf and running around in the daylight, that sort of thing is saved for night time, when a run around the docks can be quite fun. Blending in with the humans is crucial. The current situation is that there is a dire need for a crew and repairs to the ship, and that the authorities are keeping a close eye on all activity not considered trustworthy, so being sneaky about your piracy would pay off greatly. There have also been rumors of a cursed ship in the Port Tall Rock dock waters, and unearthly howlings at night. Sneaky, ya gotta be sneaky about these things.

If you want to join, you're welcome to! Just gimme something I can look over and then get to it!

The Crew
Captain: Alyce Connors
Carpenter (temporary):Evka
Muscle: Captain Rufus

Alyce marches down the gangplank, soaked in water and scowling, the sound of her braid slapping wetly against her back punctuating her strides. When she steps onto the dock, she turns and shakes her fist at the ship. "No more leaks, ye damned beast!" Her shout frightens a pair of seagulls that had been canoodling on the railing and they take wing, squawking angrily at having been disturbed. For good measure she gives the part of the hull she can reach a stout slap in reprimand, knowing full well the ship is impervious to such petty things as verbal and physical abuse. She had been trying to bag up a bit more of the silver that had so recently made its way from the dining tables of the Duke of Illipoor's stateroom and into the hold of her own ship when an ominous groaning had begun. Seconds later, the hold was invaded with water via the faulty sealing around a port side window. Eyeing the window now, after it has been patched hurriedly by Evka and her ever-handy tool belt, she heaves a sigh. The port side window now, the starboard side tomorrow I'm sure., she thinks to herself. A flash of white calls her attention to the return of the amorous seagulls. As they land, a decidedly serious-sounding crack stirs them away again.

"Oh, HELLS," Alyce growls, storming back up the gangplank to survey the damage. Her hands brush over the sparsely varnished railing and come away with two split, separate pieces of wood. There is a thud as one of the railing support posts topples onto the deck. "Hells," Alyce mutters again, trying to fit the pieces of railing into a reasonable facsimile of their original configuration.

A burly block of a man appears from the dock crowd, though he was a good head and shoulders taller than any of them. He somehow manages to feel small in spite of this. A map is clutched upside-down in his sweating palms, and he's squinting at it, his magnificent brows shadowing his eyes. A smell seems to catch his attention and causes his chin to rise, nostrils flaring as he sniffs the air.

A passing sailor gives him a strange look, and the heavy man offers him a toothy grin. "Oh, eh, is good smelling bread, ja?"

As the sailor hurries away, the Northman (for he must be a Northman, with that accent and build) meanders down the dock that the Valko is tethered to. He scans its hull for any sign of identification and, upon finding none, squints up at the fretting Alyce. "Ah, I am, eh, lookings for de ships known as de Valko, ja? It has been saying to me, 'hey, Isleif, dis ship, she is ams wonderful, a fine ship to beholding. Come see her, ja?'"

A smell reaches Alyce, who had been staring moodily into the brackish harbor water. She closes her eyes for a moment, letting the scent clear a path through the other things she can smell and make itself at home in her nose. Leather. Sea water. Earth. Wet fur. Seal blubber. Woodsmoke. Got it. Opening her eyes, she turns as Isleif is speaking, a smile spreading bit by bit across her face. Throwing the stray piece of deck railing over her shoulder without a backward glance, she strides springily down the gangplank and goes toe to toe with the Northerner. Hands on her hips, she cranes her neck up to assess him, holding his eye and standing tall on on the balls of her feet for a split second. She walks a wide circle around him before coming to stand in front of him again.

"Indeed, my wondrously tall Northern friend. Your nose has lead you true, this be the Valko and I be Alyce Connors, her captain. Not as fine a ship to be beholding as she could be, I'm afraid. She's right glad you've come to see her all the same, accourse. What brought ya our way? Somethin' on the wind, ja?" She asks, raising an eyebrow the slightest bit at Isleif as she schools her face into a passably solemn expression.

Irma had never smelled the sea before this past week. It's something she had only realized when she came within range of it, the strange scent of salt and fish and something vaguely like rotting greenery and a thousand other smells that it had taken her an embarrassingly long time to put together into "the ocean." Six days later she's still a little bit overwhelmed by it, and she looks slightly dazed as she wanders the docks, hunting for the ship she'd come to find. Add in all the other scents of the port city and docks, and she's nearly on top of the red-haired woman and the oversized man before she catches their scents. As soon as she does, though, there's not any doubts.

Irma's brown eyes sharpen and refocus on the pair. She glances past them, briefly, at the falling-apart hulk out in the water, then looks again, stepping into range to hear them clearly just as Alyce gives her name. "Valko?" she repeats, her expression brightening.

Isleif smiles what can only be described as a maiden's smile as Alyce inspects him: it is soft and toothless and minute, thoroughly submissive, complete with downturned eyes and blushing cheeks. She may notice that he never fully meets her eyes. The smile remains as she finishes and begins to speak, but it quavers at the large number of words she's using! It takes him several long moments of silence to piece together a response, and he stares at the ship while he thinks.

"This is ams de Valko?..." he blushes harder--my, he came off sounding incredulous! "... oh, eh, she is beings a fine boat..."

He clears his throat and begins fiddling with the tip of his beard, which is only partially braided, as he carefully constructs the next part of his speech. "I am wanting to go on to the sea," he finally admits. "I can repairing, swabbing, many things... but I is ams best on cooking. Eh, try this?" The big Were pulls a rumpled drawstring pouch from a pocket and opens it up, extending it to Alyce--it smells like northern spices and meat, and if she takes a piece, would find it to be seal jerky and probably delicious. Only then does Isleif tilt his head and look at Irma, extending to her the pouch (and the maiden's smile) as well.

"You've come to the right place if you've a wanting to be at sea, friend." Alyce says to Isleif, snagging a leathery piece of seal jerky from the pouch in an eager way that most human folk'd find horrifyingly rude. The smell of it alone reminds her none too gently that she hasn't eaten in awhile, and she tears a big chunk from the piece she's holding with a low, muttering growl. "You're on board," she says through a mouthful of appreciative, noisy chewing. "We'll get to the oath-taking and papered business later. If you've gear to grab and bring here, you can go off and do that, we'll not leave ya behind. Tarry here a moment, though. I think Evka'll need to take a measure of you, so's we can refit our doorways. Can't have our cook strolling about with a bruised noggin, after all. Who knows what he'd put in the soup then."

When Isleif turns his head, Alyce follows his line of sight to see Irma standing nearby. Another today, perhaps her luck was turning around! Really, she ought to repaint the name on the hull. Mentally adding that to the list of all the things the ship needs, she shoves the rest of the jerky into her maw and approaches Irma, shoulders squared and head held high. Regarding the shorter woman, she nods ever so slightly in some unspoken approval of the capable look Irma has to her on first inspection. But there's something...

"I smell naught of the sea on ya. Ever sail before?" She asks, knowing she might have her work cut out for her when the answer turns out to be 'no'. Of course, she reminds herself, most of the crew she'd be getting might have the same answer to give her, but with the ship the way it was, they'd have plenty of time for practicing.

The gargantuan man looks very pleased with himself when Alyce wolfs down the jerky. He beams from ear to ear and runs his fingers through his beard, radiating pride. This only lasts for a few moments together, as he quickly composes himself when she speaks to him again. "I will--ah, yes, okay," he murmurs, blushing bright. "I, ah, can doing... ehm, this," he adds, miming ducking under a doorframe. "Is not big problem to doing that!"

His mind wanders, however, to his room at a dingy portside inn, and all of his belongings that await him. Alyce is in for an interesting surprise!

Though she doesn't know the big guy from Adam, Irma can't help being enticed by the rich scents of the seal jerky. "My thanks, stranger," she tells him, taking a piece and chewing thoughtfully on it. Though startled for a moment by the strength of the taste, with spices that she hardly knows, she quickly grins in appreciation at it. But her gaze quickly goes to Alyce, who is clearly in charge here, given her speech to Isleif.

She'd been expecting that question, and squares her shoulders when Alyce gives it. "Not but on riverboats," Irma admits, with a shrug and a rueful smile. "And not as a sailor on those, but I figure if I have the legs for those, I have 'em for the sea. I can fight and haul and blacksmith, and I take to learning fast."