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# The Blue Marlin Crew

## Main Crew

### Captain Scarnax

Scarnax grew up in the Desert Rim, but his life was broken early when raiders took him and sold him into slavery. He spent his youth chained to an oar, rowing until his hands bled and his back hardened. When pirates struck the galley they cut his chains, and he joined them simply because he had nowhere else to go. Years passed before he earned enough coin to walk away from that life and buy a ship of his own. The Blue Marlin became his second chance.

He carries himself like a man carved from old rope and sun baked wood, rough voiced and sharp eyed, yet the hardness is not the core of him. Scarnax cares deeply for his crew and goes to great lengths to shield them from the world he came from. Under the scarred exterior is a man who values loyalty, fairness, and the idea that no one aboard his ship will ever live in chains again.

### First Officer Nasheem al Azali

Nasheem al Azali was born into a noble house of Zarhalem, raised among courtyards, tutors, and the quiet certainty that the world would always bend in his favor. That certainty shattered when palace scheming ruined his name and stripped his inheritance. Forced to flee, he rebuilt his life at sea, where charm and talent mattered more than bloodlines. The Blue Marlin took him in when few others would, and he has never forgotten it.

He is handsome, quick witted, and sharp with a blade, the very image of a gallant swashbuckler. Nasheem values honor above all and treats generosity as a duty rather than a choice. In crisis he remains calm and steady, the kind of man who can smile even while the deck tilts beneath him. Beneath the confident exterior lies a quiet determination to prove that his worth never depended on the wealth he lost.

### Navigator Pelonias

Pelonias was born on the Olydrian isles, where most lives are mapped out long before they begin. He wanted none of it. He ran away while still young and signed onto the first ship that would take him. Years at sea shaped him into a skilled navigator, and he earned a reputation for knowing the major trade routes better than men twice his age. That career ended when pirates captured his ship. It was there he met Scarnax, chained among the same prisoners, though their paths split when the pirates later divided their spoils.

Pelonias eventually found his way to Estoria, worn thin but unbroken. By chance he met Scarnax again, this time as a free man with a ship of his own. Pelonias signed on without hesitation. He is steady, thoughtful, and rarely rattled, with a quiet habit of staring at the horizon as if measuring every possible future.

### Boatswain Caelin Durnach

Caelin Durnach once made her living running supplies from Ardenvale into Caerduin, slipping past imperial patrols with nerves of iron and a grin that dared the guards to look twice. Years of close calls and the growing presence of imperial ships finally pushed her to quit before her luck snapped. The sea was still in her bones though, and the Blue Marlin offered honest work that felt just dangerous enough to keep her sharp.

As boatswain she runs the deck with a firm hand and a sharper tongue. The crew calls her Mother, a nickname she neither approve nor disapprove of in public, but secretly guards like a treasure. Caelin looks after the ship, the rigging, and every sailor aboard as if they were her own stubborn brood. Under her watch the Blue Marlin feels less like a vessel and more like a home that refuses to be broken.

### Carpenter Galenor

Galenor is more than the Blue Marlin’s carpenter and smith. He is the man who built her, plank by plank, from a design no sane shipwright would have drawn. Sailors argue whether he is a genius or a madman, and the truth shifts with whatever invention he unveils that day. Some of his ideas are brilliant, others disastrous, and he treats both outcomes with the same delighted fascination.

He is a big, jovial man from the Olydrian isles who left home to chase greater opportunities in the shipyards of Estoria. There he found work, reputation, and eventually the chance to build something entirely his own. The Blue Marlin became his pride and joy, a creation he loves with the devotion others reserve for family. He keeps her running with endless energy and a kind of cheerful obsession, always convinced that her best improvements are still ahead of her.

### Medical Officer Junia Favora

Junia Favora is an imperial woman in her early twenties who began life as an indebted apprentice, bound to serve a healer whose work she came to despise. The woman specialized in "slave customizations", and used Junia as little more than another tool. The longer she stayed, the more certain she became that remaining meant losing herself piece by piece. When a chance to flee appeared she seized it, escaping with Amaxia and Skarnulf on the fastest ship in the harbor, the Blue Marlin.

She has stayed ever since. Junia is calm, precise, and far more skilled than her age suggests, driven by a quiet determination to prove she can heal without cruelty. She keeps the crew healthy with steady hands and a level voice, yet beneath her composure lies the memory of a life she refuses to fall back into. The Blue Marlin gave her freedom, and she guards it with a fierce, quiet pride.

### Ship's Cook Yasmira al Saffah

Yasmira al Saffah comes from Zarhalem, where she served as a gourmet cook in the household of a powerful noble. When he was appointed ambassador to Estoria she followed, expecting refinement and prestige. Instead she witnessed his private gatherings, where cruelty passed for entertainment and guests treated suffering as a delicacy. The moment she understood what she had become part of she walked away and signed onto the first ship that would take her. That ship was the Blue Marlin.

On board she is beloved. Her cooking is exceptional, turning even hard tack and dried fish into meals the crew boasts about in foreign taverns. In every new land she hunts for ingredients, recipes, and ideas, always eager to taste something she has never tasted before. Yasmira is warm and gentle, quick to laugh, and patient with almost everything except one thing. Her kitchen is her castle. Anyone who trespasses learns very quickly that the cook of the Blue Marlin can be merciless when her domain is threatened.

### Diplomat Ayesha Marindar

Ayesha Marindar is a striking woman in her early thirties, born in Mataraaj and trained from youth to navigate courts, tempers, and the delicate dance of diplomacy. She served her homeland with poise and precision until the civil war turned every negotiation into a tangle of shifting loyalties. When diplomacy became little more than a battlefield in finer clothing, she walked away rather than drown in it.

On the Blue Marlin she serves as diplomat and merchant, roles she handles with sharp wit and quicker thinking. Ayesha is a hard negotiator who reads people with unsettling ease and pushes them exactly as far as she needs. When charm opens doors more effectively than argument she uses that too, fully aware of the effect she can have. There is a hint of femme fatale in the way she moves and speaks, yet beneath it lies a mind that treats every encounter as a game she fully intends to win.

### Marine Amaxia

Amaxia is an amazon fighter who was captured during an imperial raid and dragged far from her homeland. The Empire chained her in a brothel as an exotic attraction, a spectacle for men who wanted danger without risk. She endured until Junia helped her break free, and together they fled into the night. They reached the docks, and knowing that soldiers would soon arrive, chose the Blue Marlin because it was the next ship to leave. Amaxia stayed aboard because it was the first place where no one tried to own her.

She is muscular and proud of it, carrying herself like a coiled storm. Her speech is blunt and cut down to the bone, because she wastes no breath on softness. Amaxia has a low opinion of men, shaped by what she survived, and she struggled at first with the chain of command on the ship. Over time she came to respect it, though she still challenges anyone who gives an order she considers foolish. In battle she is fearless, and the crew knows that when she takes the field the fight is already leaning their way.

### Marine Mbaru

Mbaru comes from Zanakwe, where he earned respect as a trainer in the ritual fighting schools. His life unraveled when a young noble died in a ritual blood-duel. The noble’s family claimed Mbaru had sabotaged the training out of spite, and the accusation was enough to make him a marked man. He fled east and spent a short time with the Karuun Rebellion, but he left when he realized their cause was not his own. He wanted survival, not politics.

He is a brutal brawler who fights with the stone club and barbed vambrace of Zanakwe, weapons he wields with terrifying precision. He is just as dangerous with a mace and buckler or the short, wide bladed spears of the Karuun Rebellion, adapting to whatever the moment demands. Mbaru is a huge man with pitch black skin and a presence that fills whatever space he stands in. Though quiet by nature he is fearless in a fight, and the crew trusts him to break any trouble that comes up the gangplank.

### Marine Skarnulf

Skarnulf is a Draknir fighter who was captured by the Empire and forced into the arenas. They called him Ursulus, Little Bear, a joke at first, then a mark of pride. Years of blood and sand hardened him into a weapon the crowds loved. When a crime lord bought his contract he offered Skarnulf freedom in exchange for years of service as a bodyguard. Skarnulf accepted, and served faithfully until the crime lord was murdered by a rival. With no master and no protection he became a target, and he ran for his life.

By chance he crossed paths with Junia and Amaxia, who were fleeing their own pursuers. The three joined forces and escaped together, surviving only because the Blue Marlin was willing to take them aboard. Skarnulf is a short, compact man with a fighter’s stance and a predator’s patience. In battle he is sly, fast, strong and aggressive. He watches, waits, and then strikes with sudden precision, hitting hard enough to end a fight before it has truly begun.

### Marine Shaedra

Shaedra is a hunter from Elarune who became a guerrilla fighter after a series of slave raids bled her homeland dry. The last raid came while she was away tracking signs of danger. When she returned her village was burned, and every soul either taken or killed. She has carried that weight ever since, a survivor who wishes she had not survived alone. Her long term goal is to find what remains of her family, though she knows they are likely scattered across the world. The Blue Marlin is the first real chance she has ever had to search beyond the forests she once guarded.

She is a skilled scout and an exceptional marksman with the longbow, patient and methodical in a way few fighters manage. Shaedra rarely speaks of her past, but the crew understands the quiet intensity that drives her. Every voyage is another step on a trail she refuses to give up, no matter how faint it becomes.

## Sailors

These are the crew taking care of the ship. They will rarely be involved on any land activities.

### Raskel Three-Teeth

Rigger. Missing all but three teeth, laughs like a donkey.

### Serren Light-Foot

Rigger. Walks the ropes barefoot, even on ice-cold mornings.

### Mari “Quickhands” Solven

Rigger. Can tie knots faster than most sailors can blink.

### Yorrick Bale

Rigger. Cloud-watcher who believes there are messages in the cloud formations.

### Liren

Rigger. Young boy. Interested in Junia, she doesn't get it.

### Jona Merrish

Deckhand. Builds ships in bottles

### Quill Tendrey

Deckhand. Writes poetry on stolen scraps of parchment.

### Ruddon Clay

Deckhand. Nose permanently crooked from bar fights in three countries.

### Serene of the Tide

Deckhand. Believes the sea is alive and tries to greet it each dawn.

### Vesha Lorn

Deckhand. Keeps tiny bells braided in her hair.

### Merrit Hobbe

Deckhand. Young boy. Never stops talking, ever.

### Marnis Coal

Deck scrubber. Perpetually gloomy but fiercely loyal.

### Kelvan Dorr

Topman. Never speaks above a whisper, even in storms.

### Jex Morrow

Topman. Claims to have fallen from the mast twice and survived both.

### Mella Dune

Sailmaker. Sews tiny charms into the corners of every sail for luck.

### Nira Sand

Sailmaker’s helper. Can weave rope faster than anyone on board.

### Brynn Larrow

Lookout. Can sleep under any circumstances.

### Bram “One-Eye” Ketter

Lookout. Lost an eye but sees farther than most with two.

### Olvar Tatch

Lookout. Runs everywhere, never walks.

### Kip Sawtooth

Carpenter’s mate. Chews wood shavings like tobacco.

### Ollen Marsh

Swab. Tries to befriend every stray cat in every port.

### Pellon Strake

Quartermaster. Sings terribly but with incredible enthusiasm.

### Bren Wicklor

Quartermaster’s assistant. Knows every crate’s contents by memory.

### Tira Wheld

Quartermaster’s runner. Counts everything twice, even conversations.

### Fenrik Gullson

Helmsman. Talks to the wheel like it is a stubborn mule.

### Dachem Holt

Boatswain’s assistant. Thinks every rope is out to kill him after he got tangled and almost drowned. Complains about any untidy rope.

### Nali Drix

Lantern-keeper. Obsessed with care for the lanterns.

### Torren Mile

Helmsman’s mate. Always counting distances in his head.

### Della Sharpfin

Line tender. Has an uncanny instinct for when a line will snap.

### Jerrun Mist

Night watch. Has perfect night vision and rarely sleeps.

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