Characters!
The four of them met in Jack’s rooms. Someone of his rank rated the sort of hotel suite that came with a planning room, complete with decent maps of the East and Gulf coasts. Besides, you couldn’t hear the shouting and hammering from here.
“The ship we’re looking for is called the August Emancipation. Second Republic registry,” Jack drawled, “if you hadn’t already guessed from the blessed name. She’s a Chesapeake Ram schooner, one hundred thirty feet long, three-masted, gaff-rigged. The Emancipation was on the Providence-Baltimore run when she disappeared, somewhere around here.” His finger tapped the map, in the general area of the Barnegat lighthouse ruins.
His navigator peered at the map, still slightly owlishly. Sober or drunk, though, Arwen Gonzales knew her charts. “That’d be off course for the Yankees,” she noted. “They hate getting too close to Cursed Jersey. We sure about where they ended up?”
“The client said they were able to get a half-assed scrying off,” Jack replied, “although they didn’t use those exact words. You know how bad that area gets.”
The weathermage snorted. “No, you don’t,” said Half-Elf Charlie. “I know how bad that area gets. You can taste the Dominion curses up there, if the wind’s right.”