“Say again, Topboy?”
“No ship rising to landward!”
Joron turned to Aelerin.
“You have the rump, Courser; I will go up the spine.” And then he was climbing the rigging. Finding sure holds for feet and hands, feeling the rope through the soles of his boots. Making his difficult way up to the top of the ship, where the wind whistled and the wings flapped and snapped in the night breeze.
“When did it go, Topboy?” Hamrish was tall and thin and had to fold his body up to fit into the basket of the topspine. He was Berncast and the muscles on the left side of his face did not work, which made him seem permanently gloomy.
He stared into the distance.
“Not long afore you called, D’keeper. I reckon they either dipped below the horizon or their light went out.” He tapped the gently swinging lantern by him. Below, the wanelights of the ship glowed, and Joron felt disorientated, like he and Hamrish floated amid Skearith’s Bones rather than above the ship, and he fancied he heard the faraway, musical call of great birds. “I was waiting a turn to see if it reappeared afore I said of it.”
“You did right.” From his coat Joron took out Meas’s near-glass, being more careful with it than he could ever recollect being with anything before. “Show me the ship to seaward, so I know what to look for.”
Hamrish nodded and pointed.
“Follow the line of my arm and you’ll see the light, not as cold as Skearith’s Bones, but warmer, so you know it’s women and men live below it.” As Joron put the nearglass to his eye the world changed, jumped and grew, the light of Skearith’s Bones becoming brighter than he had ever known it. “Lower, D’keeper. You’ll see only sky that way,” said Hamrish gently, for he knew it did not do to correct an officer.
“Thank you, Hamrish,” said Joron. He lowered the lens, finding the almost imperceptible line between sea and sky in the darkness. Somewhere a skeer called. Joron scanned along the line of the horizon, occasionally opening one eye to ensure he had not passed the line Hamrish pointed out. Then he found the ship. A fuzzy glow in the night signalled the presence of Cruel Water and all the lives aboard it. “Got it,” he said, then took the nearglass from his eye and swung around, only realising as he moved how small the space was, how low the rail around it, how precarious this perch and how far away the deck. He thought of falling. Of plummeting down through the air. He thought of what the deck would do to a body that hit it and shuddered, tightening his hand around the nearglass so as not to drop it.
A breath. Take a breath.
Lifting the lens to his eye again, he found the subtle line of the landward horizon. Letting the nearglass drift along it, he found only the cold light of Skearith’s Bones and his stomach sank. One ship out of formation or worse, lost, meant a huge area with no eyes on it. More than enough sea for the beast they hunted to slip past. He found himself whispering quietly to the wind, “Come on, come on,” as he stared through the nearglass. But nothing. He found himself haunted by all the terrors the ocean held and all the misfortunes that could befall a ship, but he would not borrow trouble. More likely Snarltooth was simply a little off course. Surely that was it?
“What to do, D’keeper?” asked Hamrish.
Joron took a breath. This would be his first true command decision, or the first of any import at least. He could order Tide Child landward, and if Snarltooth had simply gone off course a quick signal would bring him back. But that risked losing contact with Cruel Water. In the night a signal was easy to miss, as was another ship. There was no guarantee they would spot Snarltooth.
“We will continue to turn the glass every ten minutes and we will keep our course for the night and stay in sight of Cruel Water. If Snarltooth has lost his way he will be easier to find by day. Signals are often overlooked at night.” He tried to sound surer than he felt.
Hamrish nodded, as if Joron’s words were wise and spoken by a man who had commanded ships all his life.
“Ey, D’keeper.”
With that Joron worked his slow and careful way back down the rigging to the slate of the deck, much happier when he felt the stone beneath his aching feet. He found Aelerin waiting for him.
“Courser, you were in the underdeck with Meas before taking your post here,” he said. “Do you know if the gullaime is awake?” He hoped it would not be.
“I do not think it ever sleeps, Deckkeeper, not truly.”
“Oh,” said Joron. “Well, there are things it requires. I have been gathering them in my cabin and must take them to the beast. We have lost sight of Snarltooth, but I have decided to keep course until the Eye rises.” Aelerin nodded. “You maintain command of the rump while I am below. Deckmother, Solemn Muffaz, is at the beak. Call him should you need him.”
“Very well, Deckkeeper,” said the courser. As Joron turned away they added, “I understand Meas wishes you to befriend it, the gullaime.”
“Ey, though Hag knows how a man befriends such a creature.”
“It is lonely, I think,” said the courser.
“Lonely? It is an animal.”
The courser shrugged, and again Joron felt the desire to lift their cowl and see who was beneath.
“It is the only one of its kind aboard the ship. No one talks to it, no one gives it any of their time unless they need it. But if you believe it cannot feel loneliness then I cannot convince you otherwise.” The courser hugged themselves, wrapping their arms tightly around their midriff. “But I would say it is lonely.”
Joron was unsure what to say.
“Thank you, Courser,” he said eventually. “I will keep that in mind.” Then he turned, raising his voice, “The courser has the rump!” and headed into the underdeck, where the heat of the air was joined by that of the bodies packed into swaying hammocks.
In his cabin he gathered together what he had managed to find of the gullaime’s list of needs and stowed them in a variskweave sack. String had been no problem; all he had done was unwind some rope. Cloth was similarly easy to find on board Tide Child, and he had convinced one of the wing-wrights to give up, grudgingly, a couple of his exquisite bone needles in exchange for extra rations of eggs from the kivelly kept on board. Dust had stumped him until he had realised it was everywhere, and he had asked Gavith to keep the sweepings he collected as he went about his duties. So now he had four great fuzzy grey balls of filth that Joron could see no use at all for, but he was not a gullaime, so why should he know how its strange and alien mind worked? The other thing he had found, and had been strangely proud of finding, from the gullaime’s long list of objects it had recited, was a comb. It had some teeth missing but was a comb nonetheless. It had been lying in the darkness of the hold as if waiting for him to find it, and he had remembered the gullaime’s request.
He breathed deeply before knocking to enter the creature’s quarters, steeling himself for the dry smell of it, the way the atmosphere changed around the beast, became something so strange that he was sure his senses sought to reject it – like he stepped into a dream, at once familiar and strange. To be close to the windtalker was to touch the other, to take a step towards Skearith the godbird, the creator, who hatched the gullaime for the Mother, who in turn gave them to woman and man to use. Joron, like all right thinkers, was wary of the gods and the cruel games of the Maiden, Mother and Hag, and he was afraid of Skearith’s ghost most of all, for men had killed her and men had most to fear.