Swamped

It's Chip, the navigator. Who doesn't usually come to the bridge unless something important has come up about the route, and isn't looking particularly good right now either.

"South," Chip mutters. "South!"

Before you can ask what's going on, Donnie rushes in behind you. He's dressed in full surgical gear, and has blood all over his gloves.

"I don't know why Chip's wandered this far, but now that I'm done, I'll be sure to get our navigator back to rest," he says.

"How's the patient?" Bertha asks.

"She's stable, but not much better than that," he says. "Should be fine for at least three hours, which means I can get back to my other patients. Wouldn't hurt if I could get some help there, too."

"You know better than I do who's reliable in the infirmary," Resk says. "So go take them along."

"I would, but most of the sailors with experience there are already patients. I was going to ask Buster and Haley, but they're busy overseeing the cannons. I wasn't going to take them off that without your approval."

"Mr. Resk, do you think we need both on the cannons?" the captain asks. "They do have expertise there."

"Probably not both. They work well together, but I'm sure Ms. Haley can manage fine with another assistant. Go ahead and take Mr. Buster with you and fill him in on the patients' needs."

"Thank you, sir," Donnie says. He puts his gloves in a thick pouch and grabs Chip by the arm, then walks off.

"Did I miss something?" you ask.

"Medical emergency. Couldn't move the patient from her room. Don't see a reason to go into further detail about it, it's pretty much taken care of the best we can manage right now," Resk says. "Got anything for me, Wiz?"

"Well, I managed to work one thing out, but I haven't the faintest idea what it means. As best as I can tell, the flight symbol is what's concealing the spell that's pulling us down."

Resk blinks a few times.

"Now, Wiz, magic isn't exactly my specialty, so clarify something for me? How does that work? I didn't think magic symbols could do more than one thing at a time."

"That was my understanding as well. My best guess is that it's not the symbol itself, just that the source is in the same place. Possibly a second symbol under the floorboards. But I can't say for sure."

"Not without digging up the floorboards, I imagine," Resk grumbles. "And let me guess, that would mess with the symbol and maybe sink the ship."

"Quite possibly. Though I believe there may be enough space for a grebling under the floorboards."

"So dig up some other floorboards and ask one of the greblings to have a look," Resk muses. "But all our grebling sailors are busy. I suppose we could ask our special guest, but I wouldn't want to press her into doing that while we're under attack." He pauses. "Speaking of guests, has our Flaming Messenger spoken with you? I gave him a list of things we discussed."

You hold up the list.

"I'm aware. The messenger himself has vanished." You see no need to clarify what you know of how it happened. "Though I did manage to get what I believe to be the message he had for us."

"Is that so? Well, let's hear it then."

"No," the Captain says. "For my ears only."

"You're the captain," Resk says with a shrug. "Or are you making this order in your other capacity?"

The Captain doesn't say anything. Resk makes no further comment as he and Bertha leave.

You're just about to share the message with the Captain, but before you can, he has some words for you of his own.