Role

Chapter 5

Her most recent and sweeping maneuver to rise on the ladder of power to
pirate infamy, wealth and power was brutal, but cleverly played. The source
of the mutiny that would allow her to usurp her former captain had been hard
earned, but it was not subtle to the same degree that it wasn't complicated.
In the throes of their final argument, in which she rallied those on the ship
who would follow her, she extended the lengthy claws on her forepaws and
leaped on to the captain's chest, leaving him dead on the deck with six larynx
crushing lacerations down to the bone. With a cheer, this strangely mutated
svirfnebli, barely more than a slave pirate who had proved less than useless,
and possessing greater fortitude than any ship's captain known was hailed as
Captain Ahranisto by the crew of the ship. The name, Ahranisto is a male
inflection loosely translated as meaning the space between the male
apparatus, and its backups, on a hot day. She kept the name on principle, now
ruling over these men with iron claws!

That was the last overbearing maneuver, in the three hundred years since then
she has come to have a king's seat on the throne of a council of dozens of
pirate lords, and is virtually unknown outside of the crew of that first
ship, and the highest level contacts within the council, all but one or two
disloyal men still completely bound by fear and respect to her to this day,
and she has enjoyed this wealth bringing enterprise virtually anonymously
this entire time. She bears allegiances to not only these pirate lords, but
many heads of the Thief guild, being one of its most obscenely accomplished
members never to be mentioned by name. Those who need to know her do, and
those that speak of it go away. The rest is smooth, and she performs a
perfect balancing act with all of the different races and levels of con men,
brigands and pirates while earning profits that can't be described as 'loot'
or 'gold', and feats of criminal organization that can't be called
'profitable' and 'savvy', mostly blood-free. There are no words for this
amount of worldly wealth and underworld influence on someone not wicked, but
one day Ahranisto will perhaps catch on, albeit in a less childish and
insulting manner than before. One spoken in dark corners of taverns with a
hint of fear mixed with wonder and awe to describe the ultimate heist and
long con among aspiring crooks pitching to one another.