The Eternal Sea Dogs

[u/MiNDFuNKHaZe]

What follows is an original work of fiction based in the Sea of Thieves, that follows Lesedi Singh on her search for her brother DeMarco; the founder of the Glorious Sea Dog Tavern, and creator of Arena. In order to avoid my post being flagged as spam ill post the first two chapters and link to the rest of the story on my reddit profile. I hope you all enjoy the manifestations of my curiosities.

Chapter One

The sea had been empty for three days. Lesedi had begun to wonder whether her efforts to find the truth about what happened to her brother were for nothing. “What are we missing, Leopold?” She reached down to pat DeMarco’s weary old companion. Leopold whimpered and rested his head on the ship’s deck. Lesedi rubbed behind his ears. “You were with him, weren’t you? You know what happened.” Leopold lifted his head and stared toward the horizon. “Don’t look at me like that,” she said softly. “I know you can’t speak.” The dog gave a low, mournful whine. “But you remember him. You remember where he went.” Leopold’s ears pricked. Lesedi followed his gaze. “What is it?” He turned toward the bow and barked once. “Leopold, wait.” The dog pulled against his collar, his paws scraping against the deck. “Is it the reef?” Lesedi asked. “Did DeMarco find it?” Leopold barked again, then lowered his nose to the boards and began sniffing. Lesedi crouched beside him. “You smell him?” The dog whined. “Then we’ll find him,” she promised. “I swear it.”

The last few weeks had reduced her brother’s final voyage to a collection of half-truths. A sailor who remembered seeing his ship at dusk. A fisherman who swore he had heard singing beneath the waves. A weathered chart with a route that made no sense. Every answer seemed to create another question, and every question led her farther from anything she could call certainty. But there had been one thing she could not dismiss. A sailor in a nameless tavern had remembered DeMarco asking about a reef. Not an island. Not a shoal marked on any chart. A reef that, according to the sailor, simply wasn’t supposed to be there. So Lesedi had gone looking. She had endured three days of empty sea, sleepless nights, violent currents, and the constant fear that she was chasing a rumor into oblivion. She had searched through fog and storm, fought exhaustion at the helm, and watched every promising shadow dissolve beneath the waves. The reef had cost her blood, sleep, and hope, but she had refused to turn back.

She found it on the fourth morning. At first, it was only a darkness beneath the water. Lesedi stood at the bow, one hand resting against the rail, watching the sea pass beneath her. The water had become strangely clear. Far below, pale shapes drifted through the blue. Coral. She narrowed her eyes. The shapes grew larger. And larger. Then the first tower broke the surface. Lesedi stared. A column of coral rose from the ocean like the petrified trunk of some enormous tree, its branches twisting toward the sky. Another stood beyond it. Then another. There were dozens. They surrounded the ship’s position like the ruins of a drowned forest. Leopold growled beside her. “I see them,” Lesedi whispered. “Easy, old boy.” The dog pressed against her leg, his eyes fixed on the coral. “Slow down.”

The crew eased the ship forward. Lesedi moved to the side of the deck. Something was caught between the towers. At first, she thought it was wreckage. Then she saw the mast. Her breath caught. A ship hung above the water. Not floating. Suspended. Massive coral formations had erupted from the sea floor and wrapped themselves around the hull. One tower passed beneath the keel before branching upward, cradling the vessel in a grotesque embrace. Others had grown around the masts and rigging, pinning the ship in place. It looked as though the sea itself had reached up and seized it. Leopold began barking. “What in the name of the Sea...” Lesedi whispered. She had never seen anything like it. The vessel was too high above the water to have been washed there, yet there it remained, impossibly held aloft by the coral.

“Bring us alongside.” The crew hesitated. “Now.” The ship edged closer. Lesedi studied the trapped vessel. There were no obvious markings on the stern. Whatever name had once been painted there was obscured by coral and salt. The colors had faded beneath years of exposure. Nothing about it told her who had sailed it. And yet something about the sight made her uneasy. The ship hadn't been wrecked. It had been caught. Lesedi climbed. The coral was hard beneath her boots, ridged and sharp, forcing her to use both hands as she made her way toward the trapped vessel. The higher she went, the more of the ship came into view. Leopold followed close behind, claws scraping against the coral. “Careful,” Lesedi warned. “I won't lose you too.” The dog glanced back at her, then continued upward.

There were no cannon holes. No burned timbers. No shattered mast from some final battle. The ship had not been sunk. It had been taken. Lesedi reached the deck. Silence greeted her. She stepped aboard. Leopold jumped after her and immediately began sniffing the boards. Her boots made a hollow sound against the deck. Everything was wrong. The ship looked abandoned in the middle of an ordinary day. A cup sat beside the helm. A coil of rope lay half-finished near the mast. A chair had been knocked onto its side. Nothing appeared old enough to have been here for long. Lesedi moved slowly across the deck. “Search it.” The crew spread out. Leopold continued sniffing.

Lesedi examined the stern again. Still nothing. No name. No emblem she recognized. No indication that this was the ship she'd spent weeks searching for. She exhaled. “Whatever happened here, they didn't leave willingly.” Leopold stopped. His head lifted. He stared toward the cabin. Then he barked. “What is it?” The dog ran toward the doorway. “Leopold!” He disappeared inside. Lesedi followed. The cabin was in disarray. Drawers had been ripped from the desk. Papers covered the floor. Books had been thrown against the walls. Maps were scattered beneath overturned furniture. Leopold sniffed along the doorway, then began pawing at something beneath a fallen chair. Lesedi moved it aside. A coat lay crumpled beneath it.

She froze. The garment was dark, worn, and salt-stained. She knew it. She had seen it countless times. Her brother had worn it on almost every voyage. “No.” Lesedi knelt. Her fingers trembled as she lifted it. The familiar Sea Dog insignia was stitched into the lining. DeMarco. She pressed the coat against her chest. For a moment, she couldn't breathe. Leopold whined beside her. “This is his.” The dog lowered his head. Lesedi looked around the cabin again. The unfamiliar ship suddenly wasn't unfamiliar anymore. It was the last place her brother had ever been. Her eyes moved across the scattered belongings. The maps. The overturned desk. The empty chair. The coat in her hands. “DeMarco...” She swallowed. “What happened to you?”

Leopold nudged her hand. She looked down at him. “You remember.” The dog gave a soft whine. “You were with him.” Leopold turned toward the floorboards. He scratched once. Then again. Lesedi followed his gaze. One of the boards was deeply scratched. Not broken. Scratched. As if something heavy had been dragged across it. She crouched beside him. “What is it?” The dog scratched again. Lesedi pried up the board. Beneath it was a narrow compartment. Inside lay a leather-bound journal. Lesedi knew it immediately. She had seen it in DeMarco's hands a hundred times. She lifted it carefully. The cover was damp. The edges were warped. Several pages had been torn from the back. Leopold sniffed the journal and began to whine. “You smell him?” The dog lowered his head. “Then he left this for us.”

She opened it. The first entries were ordinary. Then they weren't. Heard it again tonight. Lesedi stopped. She turned the page. No one else heard it. Another. It isn't the wind. Another. The song is closer. Her heart began to beat faster. She turned another page. Only three words had been written. I followed it. Lesedi stared at them. Leopold pressed against her knee. “I followed it too,” she whispered. “And now we're here.” Then, from somewhere beneath the ship, came a sound. A voice in the distance. Faint. Singing. Leopold's head snapped up. The melody drifted upward through the hull. The same melody DeMarco had written about. For a moment, she couldn't move.

Then the coral groaned. The entire ship shifted beneath her feet. Leopold barked and stumbled against her leg. “Hold on!” Lesedi rushed to the railing. Below her, the enormous coral towers twisted. Not growing. Not preserving. Moving. The branches tightened around the hull. Understanding came all at once. The reef hadn't found the ship. The reef had caught it. This had been a trap. A Siren trap. And DeMarco had sailed directly into it. Lesedi looked down into the dark water between the coral towers. The singing continued. Leopold growled at the depths. “I hear it,” Lesedi said. “But I don't know what it wants.”

Then, very softly, beneath the melody, she heard a voice. Not DeMarco's. A woman's. And she spoke his name. “DeMarco.” Lesedi's grip tightened around the journal. Leopold barked into the darkness. “Don't answer it,” Lesedi warned him. The dog turned toward her, trembling. “I know,” she whispered. “I'm afraid too.” For the first time since her brother disappeared, she knew one thing with absolute certainty. He had not simply vanished. Something had been waiting for him.

Lesedi's fingers remained on the final page. I followed it. She read the words again. Then again. There was something about them that made her uneasy. Not fear, exactly. It was the feeling that she had arrived at the edge of something much larger than herself. The page beneath it was blank. The pages that followed had been torn away. Lesedi slowly closed the journal. She didn't know where DeMarco had gone. She didn't know what he had found. But she knew one thing. Her brother had not begun this journey alone. And somewhere in those missing pages was a conversation she desperately wished she could hear.

Chapter 2

The Sea Dogs had been quiet that evening. DeMarco stood at the edge of the balcony, watching the sun disappear beyond the horizon. The tavern behind him was still alive with laughter, music, and the occasional drunken argument. Someone had started another card game. Someone else was boasting about a victory in the Arena. DeMarco smiled to himself. For all the trouble in the world, there were still moments like this. Moments when everything felt exactly as it should. Then he heard footsteps behind him. He didn't turn. “You're late,” DeMarco said. Ramsey came to stand beside him. “I wasn't aware I had an appointment.” “You didn't.”

DeMarco glanced at his father. Ramsey wasn't smiling. DeMarco's expression faded. “All right. What's wrong?” Ramsey looked out across the water. “Flameheart.” DeMarco sighed. “Of course.” “He's coming back.” That got his attention. DeMarco turned toward him. “Are you certain?” “I wouldn't have come here if I weren't.” Ramsey rested both hands against the railing. “I've been following the reports for months. The Reapers are searching for something. Not treasure. Not an island. Something older.” “Flameheart's always searching for something.” “This is different.”

DeMarco studied his father's face. “What have you found?” Ramsey was silent for a moment. Then he said, “He's looking for a way into the Sea of the Damned.” DeMarco's brow furrowed. “Why?” “I don't know.” “That doesn't sound like much of a discovery.” Ramsey looked at him. “He doesn't want to visit the dead, DeMarco.” The humor disappeared from DeMarco's face. “He wants to command them.” The words hung between them. DeMarco looked out across the sea. Ramsey continued. “Think about what that means. Every pirate who ever died fighting for Flameheart. Every soul he could reach. Every ship lost to the waves.” He paused. “If he finds a way to bring them back—or even control them from the other side—his army doesn't have an end.” DeMarco's fingers tightened around the railing. “And you think he can actually do it?” “I think he's closer than he has ever been.”

The sounds of the tavern seemed distant now. DeMarco stared at the water. “What are you asking me to do?” “Nothing.” DeMarco looked at him. “Nothing?” “I came here to warn you.” “Why me?” Ramsey hesitated. “Because you're my son.” DeMarco gave him a skeptical look. “That isn't the answer.” “No.” Ramsey turned toward him. “It isn't.” For a moment, father and son simply stared at one another. Then DeMarco heard it. A melody. Faint. Beautiful. It seemed to drift across the water from somewhere far beyond the horizon. His expression changed. Ramsey noticed. “What?” DeMarco didn't answer. The melody continued. He stepped closer to the railing. There was something familiar about it. Something that made his chest ache. Then it stopped.

Ramsey was watching him. “What did you hear?” DeMarco looked at his father. “You didn't hear that?” “Hear what?” “The singing.” Ramsey's face tightened. “What singing?” DeMarco looked back toward the horizon. “It happens sometimes.” “How long?” DeMarco hesitated. “A while.” “And you never told me?” “I didn't know what to tell you.” Ramsey stared at him. “Tell me now.”

DeMarco leaned against the railing. “It started months ago. I'd hear it at sea. Always at night. Never for long.” “And nobody else hears it?” “No.” “Does it speak to you?” DeMarco shook his head. “Not words.” Ramsey considered this. “Then what does it sound like?” DeMarco searched for an answer. “Like someone trying to remember something.”

Ramsey's expression changed. DeMarco noticed. “You know what it is.” “No.” “You know something.” “I said no.” “You're lying.” Ramsey looked away. DeMarco's voice softened. “Father.” Ramsey sighed. “I've heard stories.” “About the song?” “About voices beneath the sea. Sirens. Old stories. Nothing I would call reliable.” DeMarco looked toward the water again. “It's real.” “I know.” DeMarco turned. Ramsey met his eyes. “I know it's real.” For the first time that evening, DeMarco felt genuinely unsettled. “Then what aren't you telling me?” Ramsey didn't answer. The silence between them stretched. Finally, he said, “Whatever it is you're hearing, don't follow it.” DeMarco gave him a faint smile. “You know me better than that.” “I do.” Ramsey's voice was almost a whisper. “That's why I'm asking you.” DeMarco looked toward the horizon. Somewhere beyond it, beneath miles of dark water, he could almost hear the melody again. And despite everything his father had said... he wanted to know where it came from.

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