Story behind the comic? I started this story RPing on Warcraft 3 with my friend from Australia. Of course, this story starts much, much, much earlier than the RP did, but still, it's fun to write. I'm actually debating asking if someone would help me with turning it into a comic, since it's badical like that but I can't draw vurrer well no mores D:>

Anyways, here is the first part of our little story, to be continued as I write more.

***


The river took its course from the peak of Mount Griswold, cold and high, beneath the ice only a trickle, growing steadily as it wound through the round tunnels honeycombing the icecap, flowing over a cliff and into a basin of frigid water, swelling with the springtime melt and roaring down the mountainside and into the valley below, rising above farmland and farm alike as it always did. Flowing through the valley and into the steppes, it meandered east and west, eventually splitting into five beings, each reaching out towards the sea. Only one, though, ran deep enough for ships, which sailed up against it into the port of Pravil, capital of the realm.

It was a large city for the backwater country, far in the north of the world. Its denizens were of a lively sort, living in bright houses not flamboyant or garish, tall and well built with tiled roofs unlike the thatched and sod homes of the farmers. Loud and bustling even in the fog of the morning, the men set out for the outlying mines, where they stayed for five days before returning home on the sixth to be with their wives and daughters. The people were not without their complaints, but they made it by day to day, thinking theirs to be life enough as they saw it.

The city sprawled over four miles, with the houses packed tight together, huddling to the wide streets and their backs to small alleys. Banners lay in the streets after a night of festivities, as an heir to the throne had been born but a day ago, a dark haired girl named Katerina. Thieves had used their opportunity well, and today the watch was out in force in the northern half of the city, patrolling from the great chapel down to the King's house before ending their patrol at the guardhouse in the middle of town. Few ventured into the poor quarters on the south end of town, for it was a land of lawlessness governed by the compliance of the law with the more influential crime lords. But it was there that a plot was hatched.

"I am finding it hard to believe that you are wanting this to be done," one of the men said, his hand extending towards the sizeable bag on the table. His fingers were long and thin, fingers that stroked and grasped and flourished all in the same movement. He popped a knuckle on his right hand, which sat idly by his side.

"Perhaps I am not being clear on the matter that is at hand," the other man said. He wore a cowl about his head, veiling him from the other man--all he saw of his face were the flashes of yellowing teeth and the traditional long beard. His hands undid the drawstrings of the pouch on the table, and then he upturned it, revealing the glittering scales of gold clinking down upon the table, glinting in the torchlight, giving the room a sparkling glow as the light speckled off into the shadows. "All this for you to be taking the girl. Only one condition is to stand; you are not to be killing her under any circumstances."

***

Gaunt and tired, she sat over the scrap of parchment as though it were the greatest treasure she would ever receive, eyes darting over the scrawled words as over facets in a gem, the quill clutched in her hand scribbling away with a terrible haste. The floor lurched, the walls went horizontal, and she cursed rapidly as the inkwell tipped over upon the table, sending dark tendrils searching in a flood, seething and angry, wrapping around the parchment and then spilling over onto it, but then the floor lurched again, sending the inundating tentacles scurrying back and off the side of the table. In a swift motion she swiped the paper up in her cradling hands and reviewed the damage. Over half of it was now simply a black sheet, and the rest rendered illegible by a meandering delta of ink.

"Oh, damn it," she said, eyes watering. It had been a good story, too. About a woman pirate who sailed the seas, benevolent and yet fearsome. A woman she wished she could be. She dropped the parchment in resignation, watching as it drifted down to the floor beneath her hammock. The candles flickered as the boat rocked again with increasing fury. A storm was coming. "I might as well be going to sleep," she conceded, and fell into the hammock as the ship lurched again. "And hope that they are not needing me," she added as the shouting on deck rose up in a crescendo.

After an hour of listening to the assembled din chorus on, she realized the futility of trying to sleep.