Which isn’t going to happen, of course, until the wind veers, he reflected sourly.
But at least he had three anchors out, so far they all seemed to be holding, and there was no sign anyone ashore had even noticed their presence. Under the circumstances, he was more than prepared to settle for that for the moment.
“Oh, Pasquale, take me now!” Trahvys Saylkyrk groaned.
He was the oldest of Destiny ’s midshipmen-in fact, he was two years older than Hektor Aplyn-Ahrmahk-and he didn’t usually have any particular problem with seasickness. The last couple of days had pushed even his stomach over the edge, however, and he looked down at the stew in his bowl with a distinctly queasy expression. The ship’s motion was actually more violent than it had been before she anchored, in some ways, as heavy, confused seas continued to roll in from the southeast. She lay with her head to the wind now, which meant she climbed each steep roller as it came in, then buried her nose and kicked her heels at the sky as it ran aft. And just to complete Saylkyrk’s misery, the galleon threw in her own special little corkscrew with every third or fourth plunge.
“ Please take me now!” he added as one of those corkscrews ran through the ship’s timbers and his stomach heaved, and Aplyn-Ahrmahk laughed.
“I doubt he’d have you,” he said. As an ensign, he was neither fish nor wyvern in a lot of ways. Although he was senior to any of the ship’s midshipmen, he still wasn’t a commissioned officer, and wouldn’t be until his sixteenth birthday. As such, he continued to live in the midshipmen’s berth and served as the senior member of the midshipmen’s mess. Now he looked across the swaying mess table at Saylkyrk and grinned. “Archangels have standards, you know. He’d probably take one look at that pasty green complexion and pass.”
“Fine for you to say,” Saylkyrk said with a grimace. “There are times I don’t think you have a stomach, Hektor!”
“Nonsense! You’re just jealous, Trahvys,” Aplyn-Ahrmahk shot back with a still broader grin. Some midshipmen might have resented being required to take the orders of someone so much younger than he was, but Saylkyrk and Aplyn-Ahrmahk had been friends for years. Now the ensign elevated his nose, turned his head to display his profile, and sniffed dramatically. “Not that I don’t find your petty envy easy enough to understand. It must be difficult living in the shadow of such superhuman beauty as my own.”
“Beauty!” Saylkyrk snorted and dug a spoon glumly into the stew. “It’s not your ‘beauty’ I envy. Or that I would envy, if you had any! It’s the fact that I’ve never seen you puking into the bilges.”
“You would’ve if you’d been in my first ship with me,” Aplyn-Ahrmahk told him with a shudder. “Of course, that was a galley-only about two-thirds Destiny ’s size.” He shook his head feelingly. “I was as sick as a… as a… as sick as Ahrlee over there,” he said, twitching his head at the still-miserable Zhones.
“Oh, no, you weren’t,” Zhones replied feebly. “You couldn’t’ve been; you’re still alive.”
The other midshipmen chuckled with the cheerful callousness of their youth, but one of them patted Zhones comfortingly on the back.
“Don’t worry, Ahrlee. They say once your tonsils come up it gets easier.”
“Bastard!” Zhones shot back with a somewhat strained grin.
“Don’t pay any attention to him, Ahrlee!” Aplyn-Ahrmahk commanded. “Besides, it’s not your tonsils; it’s your toenails. After you bring your toenails up it gets easier.”
Even Zhones laughed at that one, and Aplyn-Ahrmahk smiled as he pushed his own chocolate cup across the table to the younger midshipman.
Hot chocolate was even harder to come by aboard ship than it was ashore, and it was expensive. With his allowance from his adoptive father, Aplyn-Ahrmahk could have afforded to bring along his own private store and enjoy it with every meal. Fortunately, he also had enough common sense to do nothing of the sort. He’d been born to humble enough beginnings to realize how throwing his newfound wealth into his fellows’ faces would have been received, so instead he’d invested in a supply for the entire mess. By this point, they’d been away from port long enough it was running decidedly low, however, and the cook’s mate assigned as the midshipmen’s mess steward was rationing it out in miserly doses. But the Charisian naval tradition was that the ship’s company was kept well fed, with hot food whenever possible, especially after a day and a night like Destiny had just passed. Despite Saylkyrk’s obvious lack of enthusiasm for the stew in his bowl it was actually quite tasty (albeit a bit greasy), and their steward had made enough chocolate for everyone. For that matter, he’d even managed to come up with fresh bread. He’d expended the last of their flour in the process, but the result had been well worth it.
Unfortunately, poor Zhones clearly wasn’t going to be able to keep the stew down. He’d contented himself by devouring his share of the precious bread one slow, savoring mouthful at a time, washing it down with the sweet, strong chocolate. Now he looked up as Aplyn-Ahrmahk’s mug slid in front of him.
“I-” he began, but Aplyn-Ahrmahk shook his head.
“Consider it a trade,” he said cheerfully, snagging Zhones’ untouched stew bowl and pulling it closer. “Like Trahvys says, I’ve got an iron stomach. You don’t. Besides, the sugar’ll do you good.”
Zhones looked at him for a moment, then nodded.
“Thanks,” he said a bit softly.
Aplyn-Ahrmahk waved the gratitude away and scooped up another spoonful of the stew. It really was tasty, and “All hands!” The shout echoed down from the deck above. “All hands!”
By the time Aplyn-Ahrmahk’s spoon settled into the stew once more, he was already halfway up the ladder to the upper deck.
It took all the self-discipline Sir Dunkyn Yairley had learned in thirty-five years at sea to not swear out loud as his earlier thoughts about his improvised rudder ran back through his mind.
I suppose the good news is that we’re still two hundred yards offshore, he told himself. That gives us a little more room to play with… and if the spar’s just long enough to keep the tubs out from under her, they may still work, anyway. Of course, they may not, too
…
He watched Destiny ’s company completing his highly unusual preparations with frenzied, disciplined speed, and he hoped there’d be time.
Of course there’ll be time, Dunkyn. You’ve got a remarkable talent for finding things to worry about, don’t you? He shook his head mentally, keeping himself physically motionless with his hands clasped behind him. Just keep your tunic on!
“Another six or seven minutes, Sir!” Rhobair Lathyk promised, and Yairley nodded, turning to watch the longboat fighting its way back towards the ship.
He’d hated sending Mahlyk and Aplyn-Ahrmahk back out, but they were clearly the best team for the job, as they’d just finished demonstrating. Two of the ensign’s seamen had gone over the side while they struggled to get the bitter end of the spring nipped onto the buoyed anchor cable. Unlike most Safeholdian sailors, Charisian seamen by and large swam quite well, but not even the best of swimmers was the equal of waters like these. Fortunately, Aplyn-Ahrmahk had insisted on lifelines for every member of the longboat’s crew, and the involuntary swimmers had been hauled back aboard by their fellows. From the looks of things, one of them had needed artificial respiration, but both of them were sitting up now, huddled in the half foot of water sloshing around the floorboards as the thirty-foot boat clawed its way back towards the galleon.