Before very long, Myrin was indeed proven right—the door slammed open and Sorodath was roughly thrown inside, sending him sprawling to the floor. Myrin quickly rushed forward to check on him, but Vivi stayed where she was leaning against the wall and just gave the assassin an annoyed glance.

"Great. You're back," she said casually, crossing her arms. "Is there anything else, or can we get back to escaping?"

"I'm not sure what you're expecting," Sorodath groaned, shoving Myrin away and slowly getting to his feet. "We're still at sea. There's nowhere to go."

"You said you could pick the lock? So do it. If you're wrong, we don't wanna find that out at the last second."

Sorodath was visibly annoyed with being spoken to in such a manner, but he chose not to argue. "I should be able to pick the lock," he said. "But without my tools... I can't promise anything."

"At least try," Vivi snapped. "I don't care about what you can promise."

The assassin gave Vivi a dark look but started working on the door nonetheless. "My point still stands though," he said sourly. "After I've picked it, what then? Getting through the door won't matter if we can't get off the ship."

"Well," Myrin replied slowly, his brow furrowing as he spoke. "When ships like these make landfall, the majority of the crew will be above decks. If we can make it up to the gun deck, we might be able to sneak out through the gun ports and run off into the forest before they notice."

"If we make it?" Morwen cast him a look. "That doesn't sound too reassuring."

"Come on, have a little faith," Owen scolded. "We'll make it."

"A little faith?" Morwen glared at him incredulously. "I'll consider myself lucky if I don't end up killed because of you imbeciles."

"Then stop moping and help us, for crying out loud!" Vivi seethed. "If we all work together, I know we can all make it."

"That's very inspiring, Miss Blackwood," Sorodath interrupted, "but it might not be quite so simple." He stepped away from the door and rubbed his shoulder, which he had been forced to twist into a very uncomfortable position to reach the keyway on the outside of the door. "The pin seems to be too short to pick this lock with, and I have nothing else on me that would fit into the keyway. I'd need my tools... or at least some thin piece of metal to make a tool out of."

"If metal's what you need, I think we're out of luck," Myrin said. "There's none in this room, except for the bars on the door—even this crate is made with wooden pegs instead of nails."

"There has to be something else we can do," Vivi mumbled, biting her tongue. "Did any of you manage to keep something useful? Something they forgot to take away?"

Owen rummaged through his pockets. "I have a spoon!" he cried triumphantly.

"Unfortunately," Sorodath said dryly, "we are dealing with a door, not a bowl of chicken soup."

Owen shoved the spoon back into his pocket and sulked. "Anything can be chicken soup if you try hard enough," he muttered. "Besides, wasn't it metal you needed?"

"A thin piece of metal," Sorodath stressed, clearly having to restrain himself from strangling the impudent half-elf. "That... thing looks solid enough to club an ox with."

Vivi groaned in frustration at the whole exchange. "I said something useful," she hissed, burying her face in her hands and taking a deep breath to calm herself. "Okay. If we can't get through the door, what about somewhere else? Maybe there's a loose board in the walls somewhere?"

Owen and Myrin immediately turned their attention to the walls while Sorodath, who was a head taller than both of them, inspected the roof—but to no avail. "They seem solid enough to me," Myrin said disappointedly, "and besides, half of these walls have nothing but the abyss on the other side."

"Great," Morwen muttered. "I can choose whether to die by hanging or by drowning. Wonderful."

"Keep talking like that, and you won't have to worry about choosing," Sorodath snarled, "I'll just throw you overboard myself."

Morwen clearly wasn't planning to stop talking anytime soon, and Vivi prepared herself to stop the seemingly inevitable fight. But before anyone could say anything, Owen stepped into the center of the room, grinning widely.

"Hold that thought," he said, rubbing his hands together gleefully. "That gives me an idea."