We had gained steadily in numbers since I came on board, but there were still a number of empty hammocks, so we all had plenty to do. There was a lot of cursing by the Master as we raw beginners fumbled with a rope (which I was beginning to think of as a line, but could never call a sheet without giggling) and despite all our practice nearly tripped each other up trying to follow orders. He was a hard taskmaster, but even I could guess that our lives would soon depend on knowing what he wanted done and doing it as swiftly as possible. Still, I managed to glimpse the gangplank being hauled on board and the last line cast off from shore. It all went very quickly. We were madly busy as we left our anchorage and I felt the ship begin to move. We were on our way.
I will never forget the feeling of hauling on a line to help set the sail, glancing towards the quay and watching the land draw away from me. With a moment's thought I stand even now on that deck. I can feel the gentle glow of the sunrise on my face as we set out. The air is salt and chill, with a hint of much colder to come.
I remember thinking, This ship is as unlike Joss's riverboat as a full-blood stallion from a gelding pony; a different creature altogether. The river has its own kind of life, and all moving water a certain rhythm of its own, but a river flows only in one direction. For the first time I feel the sea rock the deck beneath my feet. It is a stronger feeling than I expected, and the sea wind is wilder, with more on it than salt. I remember my terror two days past at first seeing so much water, and shiver again with it even as I laugh at myself. I think even the bards cannot describe this feeling, this world so close to our world and yet so far. It is strange and wondrous to feel living water not dead rock beneath my feet, and the air cold and clean and other.
Thanking the Lady for my farm-hardened hands, I finished helping to set the sails, unfurling the wings of the ship to catch the breeze. It was a wondrous feeling.
Just as well. It had to last a long time.
The space we had to live in was horribly cramped. I was easily the tallest person among the Harvesters, and I realised why after my first night on board. No tall person with sense would ever go near such a craft. I could hardly stand up in the morning—which was just as well because there wasn't room for me to straighten there belowdecks. Once I could finally stand upright I found a free instant to ask the Master if there were a few feet of deck unused at night where I might sleep. That was where I first learned that, despite the empty berths (which by the time we left were packed with various odd items that would fit nowhere else, and securely stowed using the harnmocks for netting), every inch of space was taken up by at least two things and I was lucky to have the space I had. There were so many people on the ship at that time that I never saw the half of them, especially if they were not among those of us who were working our passage.
I spent such free time as I could find with an older woman from the East Mountains. Rella was a small woman, she came not as high as my shoulder, but her strength was near the equal of mine. She was sturdily built and managed most things well enough, but she could not hide the crooked back that made many of the others shun her. I barely saw it, for to me she was a window on a world I had not yet discovered. Her accent was strange and she used words I had never heard, and she was the first person I bad met from the East Mountain Kingdom. I got her to talk about her home and every ward was gold to me, and she was grateful for the attention. She took to looking after me in her own gruff way. It felt good to have someone to talk to, even someone as curious as Rella.
The first week of the voyage is mostly a blur, for which I am thankful. The few clear memories I have are of badly cooked food, horrible smells and some of the hardest work I have ever done in my life. There was always too much to do, cleaning the ship constantly, tending the cattle we carried, drilling in the ways of the ship until we could all but do them blindfolded. There was more to keeping a ship in order than I had imagined, but I was glad enough for the exercise. The days were cold and growing colder and anything that kept us moving I was grateful for.
The weather grew worse the farther west and north we sailed.
At the end of the first week even the greenest of us had gained some semblance of sea legs, and the worse of the seasick had recovered. Others had taken to life at sea as if born to it. I leaned a little more to the second than the first, and thank the Lady I was not seasick, but it took me ages to find my balance on this moving creature. At first I fought the movement and lost every time. Once I started to think of it as a willful horse I seemed to manage a little better, but as the weather worsened I had to spend more and more time just staying upright. I caught a glimpse of the Captain as he passed by one afternoon to take a reckoning on the mysterious instruments he used, and as if he had shouted I heard his thoughts turning on the Storms.
That was when I began to be truly frightened.
That night things got worse. If before the ship had groaned in the wind now it cried out like a wounded man, shuddering from topsails to keel when a contrary wind fought with what I had first imagined to be masts stout as trees, but now saw as tiny wooden sticks that stood between us and a damp, mournful ending. A thin strip of sail on each mast bore us flying westward over the rough seas. I learned later that the usual practice in rough weather was to strike all sails and wait out the storm—but here the Storm never ceased, and movement was our only safety. The waves battered at the hull of our fragile home, lifting and dropping us in a wild dance, rolling and pitching until the strongest of us felt queasy. There had been no cookfires for days, and the cold food within and cold water without were as depressing as the thick blanket of grey skies all around us.
The morning of the ninth day out, I at least was convinced that I would never see land again. I cursed myself roundly for being such a fool as ever to leave solid ground, and I swore that if I came out of this alive, I would never set foot on a ship over the deep sea again.
Well, I swore a lot of things back then. I meant it at the time.
That morning, though, I committed my soul to the Lady and prayed for a painless death. It felt as though every roll would be the one that sent us belly-up. The winds whipped through the rigging, plucking at the taut lines like harp strings playing an endless dirge. I was thankful for the regular duties that gave me something to think about rather than simply worrying about staying alive. Still, if I stayed working belowdecks too long, I felt I was in a cave. Better outside than in if we went over, I reasoned. Probably wrong, but I have always hated caves. Besides, the noise was louder down there, and I was terrified. My fellow passengers were no better off than I, and some were worse. The seamen were too busy to be frightened, but they none of them looked much better than we did.
Suddenly there came a shout from the bow. This was nothing new, it had been happening about once an hour for the last day and night. I never did find out exactly what it was they shouted, but the meaning was always the same—take hold of something solid and hope you can hold on. I reached for the rail and looked up.
And up.
A solid wall of water was poised to break on top of us and send, us to the bottom. .
I was too terrified even to scream. I closed my eyes, whispered, "Lady, protect us," wrapped both arms about the rail and hung on like grim death.
And the wave crashed down. There was a terrible splintering sound like a branch breaking from a vast tree. I was swept off my feet by the force of the water, flipped over the side still clinging to the rail, fluttering in the rushing water like a banner in the wind and fighting not to breathe in. I held on with all my might and blessed the pure strength of my arms and hands. As the water receded I struggled to pull myself back on deck, shaking in every limb, coughing out seawater.