The Finger of God: a Thalassia novel
Page 9
“I could.” He said carefully. “But what of you, the Golden Fleece; what of Lexi?” He looked out of the porthole, at the shining lights of New Boston. “What of them? Should I run away, like I did with those on the airship, leaving them to die?” There was a bitter note in his voice.
Dolores set the ring carefully on the table. “Well, I suppose that we can make as good a profit heading north, as we can heading south. Dimsdale, you say?” She stood and reached up to a narrow shelf, set high on the wall, where she carefully picked up something small that glittered enticingly. The object that she set on the table was a tiny mechanical man no more than 3 inches high, made of cunningly crafted ceramic and crystal. Almost all. On the inside of the small man, Hedric could see a tiny coiled spring of steel. The Captain took a small ceramic key, wound the man, and set it down on the table, where it promptly walked around in circles, making thin cheeping sounds. “This was made in Dimsdale, and is an example of their poorer work.” The mechanical man was doing somersaults now, finishing up with a tiny “Ta da!” “We should make a splendid profit.” Dolores picked up the heavy ring and handed it back to Hedric. “You might want to find a safe place for this.”
The young man took the ring, looked at it for a second, and handed it to Lexi, with a little smile. “Why don’t you hold on to this? I really don’t have a safe place to put it.”
Mother and daughter exchanged a quick startled look, and then Lexi closed her hand over the small precious piece of jewelry. Her face was unreadable, her eyes deep sapphire pools Hedric felt he could easily lose himself in. “I’ll hold it for you, Hedric, until you need it.”
He swallowed as he felt the color rise up his cheeks, and he put a hand over her closed one.
Across the table, Captain Dolores Isenhart watched the two young people, the beginning of a smile pulling at the corners of her lips.
“Tad!” Doander was shaking his shoulder, and Hedric managed to pry one eyelid open.
“What?” With one open eye, he saw the first silver light of dawn peeping gently through his porthole. “Oh gods.” His voice was gravely from lack of sleep, and kept warbling between the tenor of childhood and the baritone of an adult. He swallowed, and his mouth tasted like dust. “The sun isn’t even up yet. If it isn’t an emergency, come back in an hour. Better yet, make that two hours. We didn’t get in until late.”
“Tad, the Captain wants to see you.”
“Gods! Doesn’t the woman ever sleep?” He swung his feet out of the bed, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.
“You’d better shave, too. You’re looking a little scruffy, and the Captain doesn’t like scruffy.”
“I just shaved last week, Doander.” Hedric complained.
“You need it again.” The other boy was laughing. “I think that it’s part of growing up.” He gave Hedric a sly, sidewise look. “Like Lexi.”
“What?” The other boy stumbled putting on his pants, and sat down heavily on the bed. “What do you mean?” His face was flaming. “I didn’t think that…”
“Oh don’t worry. You’ve got to be the stupidest smart person I know. The whole crew is rooting for you.”
“But we’re just friends.” Hedric tried to explain, but just digging himself in deeper. “We just… Ah, we haven’t…”
Doander sat down on the bunk beside him. “I’ve seen the way Lexi has been looking at you, especially when you’re not looking.” He patted his friend’s arm sympathetically. “She’s WAY past simple friendship. You’d better get used to having her around, or start running right now.”
“You know that I wouldn’t run away.” Hedric replied stubbornly, and Doander gave him a noncommittal shrug, as if to say “there you have it.”
“You finish dressing. I’ll get you a bowl of hot water from the galley for your shaving.”
The Captain was waiting for him in her cabin, dressed, neat and looking as fresh as a mountain stream. The boy wondered how she did it. “You sent for me, Captain?”
She glanced at the light streaming in her porthole. “You took your time.”
Hedric looked at the floor. “I had to shave, Captain. I wouldn’t want to report to you looking like a slob.”
Her smile was almost sympathetic. “Growing up fast, aren’t we?”
“I guess so.” He mumbled the reply.
“Some of the crew will be going to the Lion of Pangea Inn for a small celebration tonight.” She paused and looked at him carefully.
“Would you like me to cover for them?” Hedric guessed. “I have no problem with that.”
Her smile was warm. “You are a good crewman, Tad. The rest of the crew wanted me to make sure that you were officially invited to the party.”
“Me?” He was stunned. “They want me?”
Her smile widened. “You’ve fought alongside the other members of the crew, you’ve spilled your blood on this ship, and you saved my…” She stumbled for a second, and Hedric knew that she had been about to say “my daughter.” “Navigator. You spared lives when you could have taken them. You are a part of my crew, Tad Swimming, like it or not.”
He felt his ears turn red. “I like it, Captain.” He replied in a small voice. “When do they want me there?”
“Just after evening meal, and don’t be late. You and Alexandra are to be the guests of honor. Now, I think that Cookie is serving breakfast, and your engine room could use cleaning.”
The boy bolted to his feet. “It does?” He made to turn for the door.
“Eat first.”
“Yes, Captain.” He was gone.
The Lion of Pangea was a decent enough inn, located only a short distance away from the bustling noisy quay. The main room was high and vaulted, with the ever-present fire crackling in the stone hearth filling an entire wall. Heavy slotted shutters were closed in thick walls to block the noise of the street. Trestle tables and benches scarred from years of heavy use were scattered about the room, but they were clean and the oil lamps on each sparkled in the firelight bathing the dining room in a golden twilight glow. A heavy scent of garlic and turmeric from the kitchen hung in the air like a culinary fog.
The crew sat in a modest alcove set off the main dining room; the warm voices were a marked change to Hedric from the governor’s mansion. The Captain sat at the head of the table, quietly sipping a glass of wine, while her very presence held in check the more boisterous members of the crew. A pretty young serving girl came by, carrying a tray filled with mugs of chilled ale, while another came bearing thick tankards of locally brewed mead.
Hedric tried a mug of the dark ale, and rejected the bitter brew quickly, switching instead to the sweet mead. He handed one tankard to Lexi, who took a tentative sip.
“This is good!” Her face lit up, and she tilted the mug up, taking a longer swallow.
“Watch out for that.” Hedric warned. “It’s potent.”
“Oh bother.” The girl replied, taking another swallow. “I can hold my drink.”
“If you say so.” Hedric watched her dubiously.
“I’d like to propose a toast.” Matthew Imbach, the short dark-haired night engineer with indifferent technical talent, stood up and raised his glass. “Here’s to our young chief engineer, and our first navigator. They both turned fourteen this week—I think.” There were laughs from around the table, because Imbach had a notoriously bad memory. “May his engines run sweetly, and may she steer us straight and true.” He raised his glass higher. “Till we all come safely home.”
The rest of the crew, the Captain included, raised their glasses. “Hear, hear.” The doctor said solemnly.
“Amen,” concluded Gralt.
Somewhere down the table a voice muttered, “Bloody Gralt. Turn a good toast inter a bloody prayer!” Someone muttered something else and Gralt glowered. Serving girls came in with fresh trays, and one of the sailors gave the nearest a friendly pat on the bottom. Gralt growled at the man and the table burst into laughter. The solemn mood was broken.
Sometime later, Hedric discovered a fresh mug of mead in his hand, and he didn’t even remember finishing the first—or was that the second? Things were a bit hazy in his mind. He turned to ask Lexi if she was feeling as muzzy-headed as he, to discover her head on his shoulder, her mouth open. She was snoring gently. Someone down the table laughed, and he looked up to find the Captain’s eyes on his. He glanced first at Lexi, then the Captain, and shrugged. His smile was lopsided. Isenhart nodded microscopically, and turned to Gralt, sitting beside her. The first mate looked up, took in the passed out Alexandra and quickly assigned the soberest two seamen to assist the younger members of the crew back to the boat.
Somewhere along the way Hedric remembered losing his dinner, in a foul ditch along the cobblestone street. On the quay he was sick again, so sick in fact he thought for a moment he would lose his very toenails. The mead, he discovered, tasted much better going down than it did coming back up. He was sweating and shaking when he finally made it back to his bed.
Winter was just around the corner, and things in New Boston were beginning to cool off. The brisk morning air felt good on his face, and helped him to forget for a moment the agony of awakening. Each bang and pop and creak aboard the boat drove sharpened spikes of pain into Hedric’s aching head. His stomach seemed to be trembling, and the cook, as sympathetic as ever at breakfast, asked him if he wanted some fried liver. Hedric had just made it to the starboard rail before he was sick again. Since then he’d managed to get down a small bowl of porridge and an apple, but the effort left him shaking with the effort.
“I feel dreadful.” The voice, so full of pain, made him turn. Lexi stood there, pale as chalk, beautiful blue eyes looking like they had been poached in bacon fat. “This is all your fault.”
He stood braced in the narrow bow, head pounding. “Me?”
“You.” She stood there glaring at him, her hands on her hips. Her swaying motion was making her slightly green, although the boat was rock steady. “You dragged me to that infernal party, and you forced me to drink that vile mead. I hate you!” She spun and stomped away toward the main cabin.
“But…”
Although there was a brief chilling shower, Hedric spent the day on deck watching the men load cargo for Dimsdale. When he had asked her, the Captain admitted that the trip to the legendary toy city would take one to two months, and there were no other sizeable cities along the way. Remembering the wall map in the colonel’s office, Hedric wondered how many of those pins would be red by then.
The young Chief Engineer was in the engine room early the next day, checking the machinery for the second and third time, just to make sure that everything would perform flawlessly. He looked up to discover Lexi standing in the doorway watching him.
She shut the door quietly behind her and slowly—very deliberately, shot the locking bolt home before she turned back. She took a tentative step toward him, and then another, until only a scant foot separated them. “I’m sorry for what I said yesterday, Hedric.” Her voice was soft and almost timid. Her luminous eyes, he noticed this time, were red. “I don’t want you to hate me, because I sure don’t hate you.” She sniffed loudly, looking at the deck. “I was up early talking to Mother. She told me not to play around, and to come down here and apologize. I don’t blame you if…”
Hedric stepped forward, took her in his arms and kissed her. It may have been the mutual affinity, or perhaps the twinned K’Dreex they possessed. Hedric felt himself falling into Lexi. He felt her love for him, her young passion. It took his breath away, while at the same time he knew that she felt all that was in him.
She pulled back, flushing. “Oh my!” Panting slightly, she reached out and touched his face with a soft hand. He could feel the electricity there and it made him gasp. “I never knew that you felt that way.” Her eyes were very wide, the blue deep enough for Hedric to drown in.
“You never asked.” He gave her a wicked little grin. “If it’s like this when we kiss, imagine what it will be like when we…”
“Hedric!” Lexi’s face went scarlet, and she seemed to be gasping for breath. “Don’t tease.”
“It’s not teasing, Alexandra. My Uncle Padraig had a term for it. He called it a promissory note. A promise of things to come.”
Grabbing his hands, she looked at him intently. “Do you mean what I think you mean?”
“Yes.” He said simply. The bang on the engine room door made them both jump, but Hedric didn’t release her. “While you are alone in your room, or by yourself at the wheel of the ship, ponder on what it might be like to be the wife of a crown prince, and all it might entail. Then tell me if it is still a path you wish to pursue.” He gave her a quick kiss and released her.
Lexi was still flushing brightly when she unlocked the door.
“How come the door was…?” Doander’s voice trailed away as he took in the flushed faces of the two standing in the engine room. “Oh…sorry.”
Hedric ignored the boy. “Think on what I said, Lexi. Think hard.”
“I will, dearest.” With that she stepped forward and kissed Hedric lightly on the lips. Then she dashed from the room, trailing a light laugh full of silver bells behind her.
“What was that all about?” Doander was watching the back of the retreating girl.
“Yesterday she told me that she hated me. Today she told me that she loves me. I just don’t understand women. What will she do tomorrow?”
“Walk out on you?” Doander guessed wildly.
Hedric returned a mysterious smile. “I don’t think so.” Reaching out a dirty finger, he tapped a pressure gauge, and then pushed the lever on the telegraph to read ENGINES READY.
Chapter 6
The river was called the mighty Mississippi, after another river back on mythical Earth, but compared with this one, the Earthly Mississippi was nothing more than a stream. Up to one hundred miles wide in places, the twisting river was three thousand leagues long; about eight or nine thousand miles, and ran from Cocoa Bay in the balmy south, to the great Bay of Ice in the north. River traffic was generally brisk, especially this close to New Boston, however, yesterday they had only seen a single solitary sail far astern. Today they had the river to themselves and it had only been a pair of weeks since they left the bustling New Boson dock behind.
Hedric pulled his jacket a little closer to his thin frame, as a biting wind whipped across the deck. The air carried that peculiar dusty smell of unshed snow, and to make matters worse they were heading north, into the cold.
“Exhilarating, isn’t it, lad?” Gralt had come up silently behind Hedric, and the boy flinched, clutching the bow rail tightly.
“That wouldn’t be my first choice of words to describe it, Mister Gralt.” Just off the bow, a black headed gull flashed into the chill water with a slight splash, to come up with a small wiggling silver fish. It tilted its head back, swallowed the small creature, and went searching for more. “I think I’ll just stick with damn cold.” The boy mumbled, teeth chattering.
“Don’t blaspheme, boy.” Gralt reprimanded, although there was no heat to his words. “Wondrous are th
e works of god.”
Hedric looked out over the vast roiling muddy river that was more brown than green. The far shore was just a smudge on the distant horizon while overhead heavy clouds were building, black and ominous. “That’s one thing that we agree on, Mister Gralt.” His tone was as dry as his comment. His green eyes studied the building clouds. “I think we’ll have snow by nightfall. The works of god might not seem quite so wondrous then.”
Gralt growled something unintelligible and stomped off.
The snow began just after dinner; fat flakes sliding out of the darkness sticking to Hedric’s upturned face. A deep hush filled the air, and even the gentle rhythm of the side-wheels seemed muted and distant.
< Thank you for being my friend.>
The boy laughed.