Chapter Ten
Mark feared he might be one of those men who sailed sickly, but after sitting quietly through dinner with Captain Shuller, his first mate Johns and a few others, he slept through the night and well past morning without even a dark dream to trouble him. In the morning, after checking to see if they were clean, he asked permission to alter, mend and wear the navigator’s clothes, and then for the first time after the longest stretch without, Mark shaved his face and washed his hair.
He felt a lot less desperate as he walked the deck and leaned against the rail. He didn’t know what to do. He wanted to help but he didn’t know how. Words came to his mind but he couldn’t attach most of them to anything. Shrouds. Capstan. Mizzenmast. For-ra and aft’rer, port and star-way, lee and storm. The sailors on Dainty spoke with a slightly different accent than his father. He’d already heard star-way as star-eye, unless that meant something else. He didn’t dare ask.
The men seemed tense, and not just because of the hard, cold wind. Maybe they feared a naval vessel would come chasing after him. Maybe they thought he was a jester and might rope them into an intrigue.
Both of those things might be true, at least in part.
He fidgeted with the handkerchiefs twisted around his hands.
The captain joined him at the icy rail. “Holt told me they were looking for a runaway indentured servant. Said he’d stolen a horse, and money. A lot of money.”
“How much do you want?” Mark asked.
He expected the captain to ask how much he had, but the man shrugged. “I think it’s wrong for men to steal. I think it’s wrong for men to flee their indenture. People owe each other. I owe my men wages. I can’t stop paying them because I decide one day that they’re holding my freedom hostage. But I do have a little trouble with the way the Church manages inherited indentures. A child doesn’t choose to enslave himself in hopes of earning out for something his father dreamed of owning someday. I don’t think that’s fair. I also object to the way the Church sells indentured children like cattle.”
Mark held his silence. He had no idea whether the captain planned to threaten him, embrace him, throw him overboard or offer him something.
He had nowhere to run. He didn’t even have the Church to protect him here. He never thought he’d miss that sort of protection. He’d always hated the idea of asking for it, but it had been there for him nonetheless.
“You would have been, what, nine years old when your father went missing?”
“Eleven, sir.”
The captain nodded.
“I wanted her. The ship.” Mark had to stop right there or his heart and guts would break apart and bleed inside him. He shouldn’t have said anything. He didn’t know why he kept telling this man such private things.
“But something happened.”
Mark twisted the handkerchiefs tighter.
“Holt also said that this servant killed two men during his escape.”
Mark’s head felt as if it would float away and his body seemed to disappear. His mouth dried out and he thought he might be sick.
“How did you hurt your hands?”
Mark unwrapped one of them. “On buckets.” The sharp air quickly numbed his hand.
“Buckets?”
“Buckets of water. And I cut them on ice and rocks trying to get here. I have soft hands.” Mark wrapped the wounds back up. The pain helped keep him focused on the words in the conversation and away from the memories that tried to force their way into his mind.
“Did you kill a man or two recently, Mr. Seaton?”
“You’ll know I’ll deny it whether it’s true or not.”
“Who were they?”
“Jesters. I didn’t kill them. They killed each other in a duel.” He must have left something behind with them, or maybe because it was Obsidian, Gutter might have guessed Mark had been involved, or maybe it was just an excuse someone used to widen the search. Hells, the Church might have just decided he must have done it so that the mavson wouldn’t have to go to the trouble of an actual investigation. Regardless, if the guards had mentioned it, that meant his name was irrevocably associated with Obsidian and Lake’s deaths.
“You knew them?”
“One of them.”
“You were there?”
“Captain Shuller, I know I’m at your mercy. And I know you won’t believe anything I tell you. I don’t understand why you’re asking me all these things unless you need justification to throw me overboard or you’re bored or you have some cause you’re trying to recruit me to. I wish you would just tell me what you want from me.”
“Actually, I’ve believed almost everything you’ve told me. I do have my doubts, but the story you’re not telling me ... I want to know why you’re going to the islands. The real reason.”
Mark’s heart started to pound, but at least his head felt attached to his body again. He wanted to ask who Rohn Evan was. He wanted to trust this man enough to tell him that though he had something he needed to do for a dead man, what he really wanted more than anything was to drop off the signet ring and the code book and sail away until he didn’t remember anything of his old life at all. Not even his mother.
Damned little is left of her anyway. Just her death. Her death is always there inside me.
“Normally I charge ten ar for your sort,” the captain told him. “I’ll settle for eight. Lucky number and all. If you have it. If not, then you’d better get to work. My first mate could use some help in the kitchen. You may have noticed we’re a bit short-handed.”
“I’ll pay you eight and I’ll help too, if you teach me a bit about sailing.”
“Fair enough. Help with cooking first, and when your hands heal up, my men will show you the ropes.” The captain tapped the rail and let him be.
Mark stared at his retreat for a while, then his face curved and warmed, like spring sunshine had woken him from a bad dream. A moment later that sick feeling of dread returned, but it wasn’t as dark as before.
He just hoped he could keep his possessions stored away where no one would snoop into them.
Then again, he’d just neatly given the captain the truth. Would the masks and everything else seem all that damning?
He’d get rid of it all soon enough and then ...
He would be free.
Mark opened one of the letter cases, reading by lamplight while the sea drummed on the hull and rocked the creaky ship in its sleep. The letter still smelled sharply of fresh ink. He unrolled it.
Schooled in the style of Tells and Keener, Lark’s grace, beauty and quiet wit will serve with seductive elegance. His innocent façade works as a political stiletto, his unusual tastes opening paths to hidden rooms. As an entertainer, his voice is unequaled in all the realms. As a companion, his loyalty is unbreakable. As an adornment, he will be the envy of any court. His only flaw is gentleness, a flaw that like water seeps into old wood to shatter the tree in winter. It has been a pleasure to have him in my household. If only men lived forever. I would see this one come into his full.
Lord Merrin Argenwain
Mark’s face burned with a feeling somewhere between pleasure and embarrassment. He reread the letter several times. He had no idea who Tells and Keener were, but he suspected his lack of university training had something to do with a style of training that they, perhaps two jesters, or two lords or some combination thereof, had begun. It didn’t say specifically that Mark was a jester, but it implied it heavily. The lack of surname, the double meaning name, the political bent to the stating of his skills—political stiletto? He shuddered just remembering how it felt to draw a rapier free of a dead man.
Seductive elegance. Every compliment in there implied the work Mark would do. His soul would be stained the colors of corruption from it. The morbai would hunt his soul down before his body had grown cold and joyfully feast on his spiritual scars and character flaws unless a noble protected him.
He put the letter away. The two letters had identica
l puzzle knots, so he assumed that they’d have identical contents. Not that it mattered. He wouldn’t use either letter, or his mask, unless he had no choice. With any luck he’d deliver Obsidian’s things without incident, and then ....
He sat quietly and closed his eyes. The ship swayed slowly, gracefully, rocking him. The sailors’ boots drummed on the decks, light and fast compared to the heavy, deep surge of the waves, and their voices sounded so cheerful. The air had a clean, heavy scent very different from the coast, a purity that eased his heart. That living, salty air mingled with the heady scent of clean sweat, fragrant wood and golden oils spiced with resin. He’d never breathed in a more beautiful perfume. Below it would be far different of course, with the bilge water and so many men living in close proximity with only limited access to water, but he could get used to that, would gladly live in far worse conditions if it meant he could stay.
I could live like this forever, in peace.
He had to find a way.
His time at sea rushed by too quickly. Every day the air grew warmer, and the sea turned brighter, until one day he woke to clear blue skies and warmth he hadn’t felt since last summer. The ship’s rapid, pounding rush through the waters eased to a sluggish roll as the winds relaxed and worked against the sails with the uneven attention of a sleepy lady occasionally stirring to fan her face. The sailors shed all their clothes save their trousers and a scarf for their heads or a ribbon to hold back their hair. Mark blushed at all the bare skin at first, but then he had to try it himself. He badly scalded his skin by midday. It took several long days to heal. The sailors promised him it wouldn’t hurt so badly the next time, but Mark only bared his back for an hour at most after that.
He climbed around like a wild animal as they all worked to keep the sails in the best possible trim, and learned knots, and polished brass. The captain showed him how to measure their way across a chart, and how they gauged their speed and distance on a given day, and how to reconcile their course so that compass, the stars and sun roughly agreed with each other. They had to work a great deal with triangles that had odd sides. The captain seemed pleased that Mark knew how to solve distances by sides and angles and that he could estimate the numbers in his head before he applied the problem to paper. All those measurements mattered all the more because for reasons of wind and current, the captain seldom sailed the ship along the shortest line toward their destination. Often he would stare at the horizon for a long time, seeing things in the clouds and smelling hints in the air that made him veer away from what he’d determined to be the best course only hours before.
As much as Mark thirsted to read sacred poetry someday, he wanted to learn to see the wind like that even more.
The only thing Mark didn’t like was the food after the first few days. It got progressively worse, but at least it didn’t make him sick. The captain provided plenty of wine to wash it down with, which helped. He felt a little sticky from bathing in seawater, but he got used to that.
The captain gave him some salve to use on his hands to help them heal. It worked so well on his skin he used it on his arms and face and throat as well.
All these things made him feel alive. He didn’t feel like a smudged and dented toy anymore. He felt ... free.
Best of all, his music came back. At first he sang under his breath along with anyone else that picked up a tune, but then something relaxed inside and he started singing on his own. As he’d hoped, no one made a fuss about his singing except to request a song, or to teach them lyrics he’d made up. Maybe it was the work. It felt more natural to work and sing than to stand at attention in front of an audience and perform. He suspected that making his own choices and choosing his own time to sing had a lot to do with it as well. He didn’t care why, as long as the joy of it stayed with him.
Before he knew it he’d fallen in love, not just with music and the sea and the ship’s seductive rhythm, but with the men. They never hurt him. They bickered and some sneered at him, but no worse than the guests and sometimes even the help at Pickwelling Manor when they thought they wouldn’t be overheard. For quite a few days after he made Mr. Gerren’s acquaintance, Mark expected the midshipman to beat him senseless somewhere belowdecks when no one who might care was around to notice, but neither that rough, unpleasant man nor any sailor at all ventured to raise a hand against him. Most likely it was because he was a paying passenger, but he liked to think that the men on Dainty simply weren’t that sort.
And they touched him so freely. At first he thought they might be making unschooled advances, but he quickly learned that a tug on the shoulder or quick clap on the back or cuffing someone’s crown was a form of communication. He envied the ease with which they spoke that silent way. The closest thing he’d seen to it he’d learned in fencing. A tap on the facemask, a slap on the thigh, a glancing touch on the wrist—the sailors touched in the same precise but friendly way as a secontefoil corrected his students. And like fencing, the touch never lasted, except in certain situations such as that strange game they called arm wrestling. He didn’t dare try it. They’d probably snap his arm in two before they realized his fragility. Anyway, he learned to respond, or rather, not over-respond when someone took his hand to change his grip on a rope or touched his arm with a smile when he did something right.
“We’ve had excellent weather,” the captain remarked at dinner just after their third week at sea. “Chances are slim you’ll see a storm or a becalming before we land, so you have the luxury of dreaming about life on the sea as it should be.”
“We’ll miss you,” Johns said, and raised his glass.
Everyone drank, except Mark. Mark set down his wine. “Captain, I’d like to stay on, if you’ll have me.”
Captain Shuller lost that hint of smile he sometimes got in the evening after a day of decent winds. “Excuse us, everyone. I’d like to speak with Mr. Seaton in private.”
They bustled out all at once, and shut the door behind them. Mark’s shoulders sank. He waited for the captain to speak first, but the man just sat there, a hand on his glass, his gaze fixed on Mark’s face.
Mark focused on his hand on his glass. The glass might have been a pretty thing once, but scratches made it look dull. “Thank you for sparing me the humiliation, but you didn’t need to send them out to tell me no. I know I’m not of much to use to you.”
“On the contrary. You’re good with figures. I’ve never seen anyone calculate difficult numbers in their head so quickly. It’s useful in navigation, and it would also be useful to me as far as the ship’s books. I have inventory, payroll and taxes to figure, and they often change depending on the country, the port, the circumstances and deaths and such. I could use a man like you in a number of ways.”
“But you’re still saying no.”
The silence made Mark look up. The captain was still staring at him. “Why did you want to go to the islands?”
“If I tell you can I stay?”
The captain glanced aside impatiently. “I won’t make a promise like that.”
The captain had many fine qualities, but Mark liked his honesty best, especially when so many men would agree to satisfy their curiosity and then later look for an excuse to break their promise. “I should thank you.”
“For what?” The captain finished his wine and set the glass aside in the glass tray. No one on the ship left things sitting loose for long. Everything had a snug home.
His father ran his ship like that. Tight. Clean.
Shipshape. The words were coming back.
“I’ll have an answer from you, Mr. Seaton, to one question or the other.”
He couldn’t say anything about either the book or the signet ring or the captain might demand to see them. So far, at least as far as he knew, no one had ventured into the navigator’s quarters to look through his things. At least nothing had been noticeably shifted and nothing had gone missing. His privacy might vanish if he hinted that he had something dangerous and more valuable than gold on b
oard. “I have a message to deliver.”
“It must be an important message.”
“I have it memorized.” That was true—he’d memorized the code book during quiet times. The only other things to read on board were related to sailing and the captain hadn’t let him touch them.
“It’s something dangerous, isn’t it.”
Mark nodded.
“Was your story about looking for your father a lie?”
“No, sir.” He set the unfinished glass of wine in the tray. “But I don’t think I’ll find him alive. I’m hoping to learn something about what happened to him.”
“And that relates to the message ... how?”
“The message will introduce me to someone who may know something. Maybe I won’t find anything. I don’t think it matters anymore. Whether I learn the truth or not, it won’t change what I want. What I’ve always wanted. What my father did all his life, and what he wanted for me. I want to sail.” He tried to ignore a growing queasiness at the thought of returning to the mainland with Dainty, even as a legitimate crewmember. It would be dangerous, and not just for him.
“Quite a few of my passengers have wanted to stay, passionately. Then they remember how proper food tastes, and fresh water. Some of them come back for a leg or two. It’s rare, but it happens. And then they sail their first storm, or someone is lost overboard, or a sickness travels through the ship, or we’re attacked by pirates ....” He shook his head. “I doubt you’ll come back, Mr. Seaton, but if you’re still willing when we’re ready to set sail we’ll try another leg and see what happens. We’re short-handed, and you’re not a burden. Far from it. But please, consider carefully. I won’t think less of you if you choose another path.”
“Thank you, sir.” Mark stood, and bowed, and retreated to his room. He didn’t want the captain to see how irrationally, stupidly happy he was, nor notice the fear Mark tried to ignore underneath his joy.