Long Days in Paradise - The First Book of the Shards of Heaven

by Amos T. Fairchild

Chapter 7 – Katerina II

  Life be own, live or die

  by quick of hand, by bright of eye.

  In darkness creep; in silence strike.

  Rat we eat, but fish we like.

  I

  Jorden's monologue was not a particularly long one. It told of his recent life in the Domain, but not a great deal of his life in his previous world. Taf just sat and listened. Like most she didn't seem all that surprised, but appeared at least more interested than most.

  “An outsider then,” Taf said at last, the aestri now far from weary. Her eyes glistened, the vertical slits of her pupils now contracted to a no more than a dark line. “One of Beyond. That explains much. You should have said so before. No wonder you are so silly!”

  Jorden glared back, the aestri knowing more about both worlds than he had at first assumed. “You know about it then? About my world? Everyone in this place seems to know about it, yet nobody there has any idea this place exists at all.”

  Taf shrugged. “I have heard enough to know that I wish to hear no more of it.” She turned from him and relaxed back into the netting. “An evil, vile place like no other. The source of all evil, they say.”

  “Well this stupid place is no paradise either!” Jordan blurted. At first it had seemed so, yet they never were. There was always that catch to paradise. “I was quite happy and comfortable before I got stuck in this madhouse,” he lied. He tried to forget about his poor health and lack of a real life. He felt too well in this world to think about what it might be like to go back now.

  The aestri glared back, raising herself to her haunches on the netting. “And this was a world of peace before the coming of your kind. At least you are no more than an idiot!” Well, that might be true enough, Jorden thought. He couldn't argue with that.

  Then, with a snort and a gesture that inferred disgust, Taf leapt from the netting, diving into the turbulence below and vanishing beneath the violent surface. Jordan gasped a cry, crawling rapidly to the supporting rope to peer below. He was almost tempted to dive in after her, but that urge was quickly overpowered by his inherent fear of certain death. But what of the aestri?

  This was the one friend Jorden had thought he had made since the house of Tsarin. Now he was worried she was a friend lost because of some pathetic little argument, perhaps even literally lost at sea. She was probably close to the truth in any case. His world indeed a place of horror and death and war and famine. Although the corner of the world that Jorden had lived in was one of relative peace, it was hardly representative of the earth as a whole. An evil, vile place. Not far from the truth at all.

  It was a difficult few moments for Jorden Miles, a period of quite some anxiety worrying over his new friend in the vastness of the green seas of the Domain. It seemed to be an eternity before he at last glimpsed the aestri scaling a nearby trailrope. He waved but received no reply, not that he expected one.

  Jorden shrugged as Taf vanished somewhere amongst the deck above. He tried to convince himself that it wasn't important. She was obviously a just a girl who would be of no help to him at all. Just a pathetic creature as trapped as he was in the nightmare that surrounded him.

  But no matter how he tried, he couldn't convince himself that he didn't need her.

  Now he had only the company of the rolling sea, and the odd wisp of light that hung in the white sky. It was not a substitute for a sun, not the familiar sphere of blinding flame that comforted those of the real world, but a mere marker of time. As was its dim red sister of the night.

  And what would fill the skies when the Time of Darkness came, he wondered. Indeed, what actually was this Time of Darkness that brought such fear to the hearts of those who called hell their home. If the present world was the best of it, Jorden mused...

  He sighed and seemed to drift toward sleep, the sea racing to a blur, the flare of light dipping toward the horizon. It was much that same as what had happened within the lawn of Tsarin, something that seemed so long ago, and although it was not a pleasant experience, Jorden at least knew that it was somehow normal.

  It would pass.

  II

  When the chill and nausea had subsided, Jorden dared raise the lids of his dream-eyes. The red flare-moon was already rising into the night sky, the sea still churning beneath. It was as near to normality as he could come in this place, his mind again at one with his surrounds. The reality of the sea was there. It was a sea beneath in which he would most certainly drown if he fell.

  Jorden returned carefully across the ropes to the dim hold of the ancient vessel, stumbling through the dark and unfamiliar ways before coming at last to his tiny prison. At least he still had a sense of direction. The air stank more the ever, the dust choking even worse. It was bad to now have the memory of the outside world beyond the Katerina's belly as a comparison.

  God, he thought, do I really deserve this? Alone again, sitting in a cage that wasn't even locked.

  Time painfully passed him by.

  One of the sailors eventually thumped into the hold with bowl and mug in hand. It was another tepid greenish stew that looked much like that of the previous day. He also had the best of the ship's water in the large mug. Jorden gazed on absently as the member of crew wandered toward the cage. He was an ugly little man that probably had a heart of gold. Looks were so deceptive, more in this place than most.

  The seaman paused briefly, a flick of his eye to the open prison, then to the thin frame of Jorden miles. He sniffed and wiped the moisture from his hairy upper lip. “Shit ring,” he grumbled, “I figured you'd work it soon enough. You look like a clever little shit.”

  Jorden's jaw dropped noticeably. Then he offered a vague gesture toward the stern. “Taf did it. I haven't touched it!” The sailor stared blankly on, little activity apparently within. “Taf. Young girl...” Jorden demonstrated her approximate height.

  A grunt. Then he shook his head. “The aestri? Should've figured as much.” The sailor deposited the meal. “Well you might as well stay out as in, you don't look the type that'd manage a swim to port. You ain't going nowhere, I think.”

  Jorden was almost at a loss for words. “Well... Thanks, I think. It feels so good to walk around again...”

  “Don't thank me – gotta ask Captain first. I'll ask if I can get you on deck.” Jorden nodded his approval. “You might as well work for your keep.” The seaman paused to look at the green slop and actually managed a broken smile. “Captain might even give you something worth eating then!”

  And with that the seaman left the food and departed, the cage left unlocked.

  III

  Jorden was still trying to eat the last of his meal when Taf returned and crouched at his side in the cage, the two large fish she carried tossed to one side.

  She stiffed cautiously. “Doesn't smell worth eating.” Her dark eyes flicked to Jorden's. “Probably days old.”

  Jorden snorted in return. “I don't doubt it, but I haven't much of a choice, do I. Eat this or starve.” He watched Taf shrug in return and look away. Again he felt an attraction toward her. He felt that it was like they were both trapped in a nightmare, and although he had just met her it was as if she were some sort of kindred spirit.

  “Sorry about before,” he said eventually. “This world of yours gets to me at times, but it's hardly your fault...”

  Taf flicked her slitted eyes back in his direction and shook her head. “You are man and I am aestri. You have no need to apologize.” She reached for the larger of the fish, a coloured species that would have been unrecognisable to even the most experienced angler of the waters of the Pacific. To Jorden it was simply a fish. “I just want to be your friend,” Taf added in her gentlest of tones. “I brought you this. I knew they would not feed you well.”

  Jorden gingerly accepted the gift, handling it as he might a live grenade. “Ah...”

  “Nobody else on the Katerina will talk to me very much,” Taf then said, “except for Johnathon, and he is busy much o
f the time.”

  “It would be nice to have someone to talk to...” Jorden began. The fish was wet and slimy in his grasp, and not as dead as he would like it to be. Dangerous looking spines jutted out at various angles from more places than he cared to count. But it was two spans long and potentially some nice fresh food food. “If we had somewhere to cook these,” he said hopefully.

  Taf frowned. “They are better as they are. Fresh and moist and juicy...” She smiled at the sudden look of horror on his face. “But you are man and not aestri, and prefer it cooked. I know.” She snatched back the fish, holding it firmly with her hard angled nails, then picked up the other with the same hand. “Trust me, I know what is best. But we can hardly eat in this smelly place. You can come to where I sleep. There is plenty of room, and it is much more comfortable than this cage.” She stood and went for the open door, pausing there to await Jorden's approval.

  He glanced only briefly upon his lavish appointed quarters before standing to follow. Not a hard choice. “If you're sure you don't mind...”

  “I wouldn't have asked, silly.”

  He wondered what his mother would would say. He also wondered if he cared. She was always worried about all the bad girls. Whatever they were supposed to be. He smiled. “Why not. Though to be truthful I was beginning to think that you were some sort of stowaway. I'm surprised you have a cabin at all.” He was mostly just trying to make conversation and avoid the difficulties of the moment. It was like receiving a gift from someone you hardly knew and not knowing how to thank them, so you change the subject and act friendly.

  Although at the moment he wasn't acting – he did like Taf – yet somehow it was difficult accepting her invitation. Perhaps it was the encounter with Tsarin, or just that he was so damn far from home. Or at least he thought he was far. It was getting hard to tell. Paradise, this wasn't, but then paradise couldn't exist, and if it did you'd likely soon be sick of it. That would have to be his new philosophy to brighten a dismal life.

  Of course Jorden had also learned that the seaman who brought his food, and he used the term food loosely, knew of Taf. So she was not a stowaway. It was true that the seaman did not seem to speak all that well of Taf, but at least he knew her, perhaps all too well.

  “I don't have a cabin, silly.”

  Jorden's line of thought was lost. “I thought you said...”

  “The Captain has, and the chief officers... and the Doc. Then the crew have quarters in the bow and stern, remember.” She motioned for him to follow on into the reddish gloom. “But they don't give aestri anything at all. The council laws don't say they have to, so they don't. They expect aestri to curl up on a piece of rag and call it home. And then they think they are so generous if they give us the rag.”

  They moved toward the bow and slightly to port. “That's inhuman,” Jorden began, his words fading. In this world there were apparently several shades of humanity. He knew that such levels existed even in his own world. “So why live like this? Why live in such...” He thought of poverty, yet somehow that didn't describe the situation. It was closer to voluntary slavery the way she was talking.

  “I live better than some, but then most aestri live well enough.” Taf stepped proudly on, her footfall silent nonetheless. “Perhaps Captain knows that I do, perhaps she doesn't. They don't care. They throw me a rag and it is my choice if I wish to sleep on it. If I find something better and it does not affect them, then I will have a better place to sleep than on a rag.

  “If they want an aestri on the Katerina then that is the way it will be. Any aestri would think the same.”

  Jorden followed quietly, thinking. “You're right you know,” he caught a final glimpse of her smile as he followed on into the ever darkening hold. “You do talk too much.” Then it was really dark. Either that or Jorden had been suddenly struck blind.

  Taf froze in her tracks, and he stumbling into her. “Do you think so? Every one says that I do, and they chase me off or say they are busy.” There was not enough light for Jorden to see much of her face, but her voice told enough. She was at least a little worried he was being serious. “If you want me to talk less, I will. I'll be quiet until you want me to speak...”

  “I was making a joke,” Jorden admitted, “and you are going to have to keep talking or I won't be able to follow you. I almost need a lead now.”

  He felt a hand upon his own, cool to touch and wet with fish slime. “It is bright yet, but it darkens further on. I forget that you are not aestri.” She led on into that darkness.

  Jorden smiled in the dark. He had a feeling that Taf could see his smile even if he could not see her own. “And I'll try and warn you when I'm joking.” The hand pulled him to the left, his knee striking something. He limped onward. “What I was going to say was: what if your captain throws you off the ship. I mean...” He wasn't altogether sure what he meant. He wasn't even entirely sure of what Taf was doing on the ship.

  Taf glanced back toward him, Jorden totally oblivious to the fact. “They can't. It is against the very commandments of Hura as well as the council laws to throw the ship's aestri deliberately overboard – although some of the crew do it sometimes in fun – but they can't leave them to drown. If I fell off accidentally, I suppose, they could say it was my fault and they didn't have the time to return...”

  Jorden interrupted the aestri. He found he needed to do that quite often. “What I meant was – ow!” Again his leg struck something solid amongst the pitch, a crate of some kind.

  “Sorry,” Taf moved slower and led him to the right.

  “I feel like I'm blind. How can you see in this?” Jorden thought he could glimpse darker patches of shadow amongst the rest and attempted to navigate by them, only to find that his shoulder struck another something.

  Taf's hand firmed on his. “I'm aestri, and I forget that you are not of this world. I could see a rat at fifty footfall in this, maybe more.”

  Rat? Jorden had forgotten that the hold of the Katerina was littered with such things, and the local variety was certainly large enough to worry about. He stepped more cautiously and hoped he didn't stand on one. He hated to think of what disease they might carry. “What I was saying,” he attempted again, “is what if the captain decides to put you of in port and go on without you.”

  “Then that is their loss,” she said easily. “If they wish to be without their aestri, then they are free to do so... and look there. You can see tracks in the dust where rats have crossed. There is one that has run straight off the edge of the platform and jumped to the lower deck.” She pulled Jorden then to a halt. “We have to climb this. Be careful, there is no rail on your side.”

  Jorden found that the blotchy gloom started to slowly spin.

  IV

  There was more light on the higher decks, but it was still little more than shapes and shadows.

  And Jorden found himself again alone.

  Taf had wandered off mysteriously and left Jorden standing amongst the cargo. It was a collection of kegs and crates and svaeso jars and rough woven sacks, Jorden could see at least some of it in the gloom. It was all freshly loaded and bound for the city port of Saljid, tons of produce for this so-called Time of Darkness that everyone spoke of with such devout hysteria.

  He checked some of the bags, opening one and feeling amongst the contents. He removed a odd shaped something, and held it up into the little light there was. Probably a potato by the look and feel. He dared a bite... definitely a potato. He was about to try another sack when something snatched his arm. He jumped accordingly.

  “I have plenty here,” Taf told him. He was glad to hear her voice. That was good as he could barely see her. “You can't eat cargo, only ship's stores, and we're not really allowed those either.”

  “What the heck are you entitled to? These council laws don't seem to benefit aestri very much.” Taf pulled him steadily on. “Why do I get the feeling that there aren't many aestri on this council.”

  Taf chuc
kled. “You say the most silly things.” He suspected as much. At least the light improved.

  Jorden was lost by this time. He could at least see a lot more now, although to him it was far from bright. It didn't do him a lot of good. They were against the hull, or so he assumed, yet Jorden was unsure of whether they faced the bow or the stern. He was also unsure of how far forward they had ventured and whether they were to the port or the starboard and how many decks down they were.

  He did notice that they had moved into a crowded dusty hold that seemed not to have been touched in decades. Jorden was just guessing, of course, but it certainly looked untouched. Taf, apparently, came often. She had what looked like a well worn path in the dust that the two scuttled along, then she led through a low hatchway, the light better yet again. The area was lit by two shafts of the red light of the flare moon drifting down through two ventilation ducts.

  “Storage,” Taf told him, almost as if reading his mind. “They keep ropes and sails and lanterns and... well, everything in these. All along the outer hull, they are, but most of it has been here since the last aestri was my age. It's mostly old and rotten and useless, but they never touch it. The Katerina is now so old that she will sink with these holds as they are. The shipping masters do not waste much effort on a dying ship.”

  Jorden detected the note of sorrow. “There's still a few years left in the Katerina yet, I bet,” he said, patting one of the thick timbers that rose vertically nearby. He knew nothing of such ships, but he did think the beast looked somewhat decrepit. That, however, might be quite common in the Domain. He was hopeful that it really did have a few more years in it, however.

  Taf stood in the shaft of red light and looked upward, then she glanced to the hull. “It will sink before my time is through, but it will not be that soon.” She pointed. “This way.”

  It was a narrow room, packed near to the roof. It was unclear exactly what it was packed with, but he could see mostly crates that could have contained anything. Jorden also saw a coil of rope, and something that may have been sail material, then just more crates. Crates that unfortunately seemed to be blocking the way Taf was headed. She continued regardless, sliding and weaving amongst the maze of timber.

  She paused only briefly to speak, turning to Jorden as he squeezed between the crates behind. “I can trust you, can't I? If captain knew some of the things I had...”

  “You can trust me,” he said in return as he forced himself through the narrow way, somewhat surprised she would even ask. “Hell, who the heck would believe me anyway!” Taf smiled and moved on.

  There was little to see, Jorden noticed as they came within the opening amongst the crates, but that was more due to the lack of light rather than an absence of items in the area. There was some light, it was true, a red glow issuing from a gap in the ceiling aside the hull – enough to see Taf toss the small sack she carried toward a makeshift table, but he could see little else. There were some other shapes, and levels of platforms fashioned from the crates, and swaying shapes hanging from above, and darker shapes attached to the walls.

  He stumbled on toward one of the walls until his lower leg rammed into yet another obstacle, then reached down to touch what he guessed was something of a bed. It was as near to being soft and comfortable as mattered, and lined or covered with a patterned fur. That was really something of a surprise. “Nice,” he thought aloud. “Your bed, I hope, and not something asleep on the table.”

  Taf giggled. “I know it is bright enough here even for a common man.”

  “Only just.” Jorden sat on the bed. “I don't suppose the captain gave you this.” Stolen more likely.

  “I tanned the skins myself,” Taf said with obvious pride. “Burgo Kaeina taught me how many cycles ago, but some of the powders are difficult to find anywhere but the warehouses of Saljid, and the spotted rat only lives on the Castle Isles, so it takes a long time to make a rug so big.”

  Rat fur. Great! He felt the many seams to confirm that they were at least not giant rats. They did feel a lot larger than those of the real world, however, and a even a little bigger than the huge rats on the Katerina he had seen. “Our own rats aren't quite so useful,” he said as he attempted to overcome the sudden feeling of revulsion. It was a stupid thought, he knew. It was a nice, warm, comfortable rug that smelled only of Taf, and she didn't really smell much at all. “Our rats have hair like wire.”

  “So do ship rats,” Taf told him, “and their hide is too thin to be useful. Only the Island hides are thick enough.” Taf opened the bag and carefully placed the contents on the already cluttered crate she used as a table. Jorden could make out several bottles and jars of various shape, then the glint of steel and the flash of fish scales. “There is always a good store of vinegar and spices aboard the Katerina, and the captain wouldn't mind us having some.” She paused momentarily. “I shouldn't really have a knife though, but I didn't steal it, and I eat fish more than I should.

  “It is just so good to have something different,” Taf went on. “In the open sea you seldom see fish, only sea dragon and they are far to big to catch. But there are plenty of fish here close to port. They follow the Katerina and are easy to catch. We should have plenty for days yet...” The knife flashed in the little light there was, Jorden watching as he could, yet he found he was depending more upon his other senses than usual.

  He could hear the flesh being parted amongst the usual groan of the ship, then the odd crack of bone, and the aroma revived some of the appetite he had lost in the past week. “I'll try and make a meal for a man,” she went on, “but I haven't done that before so it may not be to your liking. I can't cook it, of course, but with vinegar and spice...” She glanced toward Jorden who shrugged uneasily. “These have the sweetest flesh. I ate one before the setting of the first light. It was straight from the water and still squirming...”

  “Damn, Taf!” Jordan recalled the tooth and claw of the aestri, and could imagine her shredding the fish live. “I'm not sure I'm that hungry after all.” Okay so he really was hungry, but live fish... Raw sounded bad enough.

  “Trust me,” she laughed. “I wouldn't feed any man a live fish. Try this.” She passed a sliver of cool moist flesh. It didn't move, but Jorden still held it as if expecting it would do so any minute. “They say it is good to soak the meat in vinegar and spice, but I don't like it much. That has just a touch of each. Nice for something different. I get tired of the same thing each day.”

  Jorden nodded in agreement, he was already sick of green stew. That only took two days. And there was a long voyage ahead. He put the fish to his lips and dared a bite, finding it more resilient than expected, then tore a shred loose with his teeth and chewed. Jorden hoped that even raw fish would have to be better than the hideous green stew, and he found that it was somewhat better than that. “That is good,” he said nodding, surprising even himself. He consumed the rest of the moist strip and looked for more.

  “You're teasing again,” Taf smiled, “but there is plenty here if you are hungry enough.” She forwarded a narrow piece of timber piled high with more of the fleshy slivers.

  “No, honestly.” As proof of his word, Jorden ate until there was very little left and then reclined back onto the cozy rat-fur bed while Taf sucked on backbones and heads.

  “You see. You can trust Taf to feed you well, and serve drink, courtesy of captain.” She produced a dark bottle of what looked like some sort of local wine. “A treat to mark our meeting, not something I dare steal often.”

  Jorden smiled.

  They drank to the occasion, neither sure that it was to mark beginning of a lengthy friendship, but both somehow hopeful. Jorden wasn't exactly sure what they were drinking either, but it was warm and fruity and maybe even slightly alcoholic. It was hard to tell, and it didn't seem to be affecting him greatly. “Well,” he said as he sipped the drink. “That was a meal I doubt I would have attempted if I hadn't met Aestri Finesilver.” He took another sip from the bottle
they shared, allowing Taf to drain the last.

  Then she pounced to the bed, curling her legs beneath her and relaxing against the wall of stores. “Now a late walk upon the deck, perhaps. The Katerina is a wondrous sight beneath the second light.”

  “After all the food and drink I doubt I can do much more than sleep. Maybe in the morning.” He struggled to a sitting position. “I really should get back to my cage anyway...”

  “You can stay here,” Taf blurted. “After such a meal I deserve a little company, surely. You can even stay here to sleep, perhaps?”

  Jorden glanced around the tiny area she called home. “I don't think you have room.” The floor, perhaps. It looked as comfortable as the cage.

  “You are afraid to be caught in the bed of an aestri, I know, and I don't blame you for that.” She shook her head. “But nobody ever comes here, and I rarely sleep through the entire night anyway. Lately I have because we have been in port, but on the high sea I only nap while the second light is shining, and you can sleep here when I do. I hardly expect a man to sleep in the same bed as aestri...”

  “It's not that,” Jorden began. “It's...” He stood and stretched. “ I don't want to take you're bed. You've been nice enough already, Taf.”

  “I just wish to be your friend,” Taf put forth quietly. “I haven't much to share, but you can have whatever you wish. If you would like to return to the cage then I will take you. I didn't mean what I said about the fish.”

  Jorden stood quietly and considered the dark trek back, then the stinking torture of the cage, and watched Taf draw a soft white cloth over the warm and even softer fur bedding, and he felt the slightest of chills rolling in on the night air. “I have my hammock anyway,” she added, “and the bed is yours if you want it.”

  Jorden watched Taf climb into the cloth sack that hung from above and turned his attention to the bed.

  It was very hard to resist...