“Greenweed stew tonight,” Lis Niklaus said, as the first watch filed into the galley. “Baked sentryfish fins. Fish-meal cakes, suppleberry salad.” It was the third night of the voyage. The menu had been the same each night; each night Lis had made the same jovial announcement, as though expecting them all to be delighted. She did most of the cooking, with help from Gharkid and occasionally Delagard. The meals were spare, and not likely to get much better later on: dried fish, fish-meal cakes, dried seaweed, seaweed-meal bread, supplemented by Gharkid’s latest haul of fresh algae and whatever live catch had been brought in that day. So far the catch had been nothing but sentryfish. Schools of the alert, eager-looking spear-nosed creatures had been following the fleet ever since Sorve. Kinverson, Pilya Braun and Henders were the chief fishers, working from the gantry-and-reel fishing station aft.
Struvin said, “Easy day today.”
“Too easy,” grunted Kinverson, leaning into his plate.
“You want storms? You want the Wave?”
Kinverson shrugged. “I don’t trust an easy sea.”
Dag Tharp, spearing another fish-meal cake, said, “How are we doing on our water tonight. Lis?”
“One more squirt apiece and that’s it for this meal.”
“Shit. This is thirsty food, you know?”
“We’ll be thirstier later if we drink up all our water the first week,” Struvin said. “You know that as well as I do. Lis, bring out some raw sentryfish fillets for the radio man.”
Before leaving Sorve the villagers had loaded the ships with as many casks of fresh water as they had room for. But even so there was only something like a three-week supply on hand at the time of departure, figuring cautious use. They would have to depend on encountering rain as they went; if there was none, they’d have to find other means of meeting their fresh-water needs. Eating raw fish was one good way. Everybody knew that. But Tharp wasn’t having any.
He looked up, scowling. “Skip it. Fuck raw sentryfish.”
“Takes away your thirst,” Kinverson said quietly.
“Takes away your appetite,” Tharp said. “Fuck it. I’d rather go thirsty.”
Kinverson shrugged. “Suit yourself. You’ll feel different about it in a week or two.”
Lis put a plate of pale greenish meat on the table. The moist slices of uncooked fish had been wrapped in strips of fresh yellow seaweed. Tharp stared morosely at the plate. He shook his head and looked away. Lawler, after a moment, helped himself. Struvin had some also, and Kinverson. The raw fish was cool against Lawler’s tongue, soothing, almost thirst-quenching. Almost.
“What do you think, doc?” Tharp asked, after a time.
“Not half bad,” Lawler said.
“Maybe if I just took a lick of it,” said the radio man.
Kinverson laughed into his plate. “Asshole.”
“What did you say, Gabe?”
“You really want me to repeat it?”
“Go on deck if you’re going to have a fight, you two,” Lis Niklaus said, disgusted.
“A fight? Me and Dag?” Kinverson looked astonished. He could have picked Tharp up with one hand. “Don’t be silly, Lis.”
“You want to fight?” Tharp cried, his sharp-featured little red face turning even redder. “Come on, Kinverson. Come on. You think I’m afraid of you?”
“You ought to be,” Lawler told him softly. “He’s four times your size.” He grinned and looked toward Struvin. “If we’ve used up our water quota for this evening, Gospo, how about brandy all around? That’ll fix our thirst.”
“Right. Brandy! Brandy!” Struvin yelled.
Lis handed him the flask. Struvin studied it for a moment with a sour expression on his face. “This is the Sorve brandy. Let’s save it until we get really desperate. Give me the stuff from Khuviar, will you? Sorve brandy is piss.” From a cupboard Lis took a different flask, long and rounded, with a deep sheen. Struvin ran his hand along its side and grinned appreciatively. “Khuviar, yes! They really understand brandy on that island. And wine. You ever been there, any of you? No, no, I can see you haven’t. They drink all day and all night. The happiest people on this planet.”
“I was there once,” Kinverson said. “They were drunk all the time. They did nothing at all but drink and vomit and drink some more.”
“But what they drink,” said Struvin. “Ah, what they drink!”
“How do they get anything done,” Lawler asked, “if they’re never sober? Who does the fishing? Who mends the nets?”
“Nobody,” Struvin said. “It’s a miserable filthy place. They sober up just long enough to go out into the bay and find a batch of grapeweed, and then they ferment it into wine or distil it into brandy and they’re drunk again. You wouldn’t believe the way they live. Their clothing is rags. They live in seaweed shacks, like Gillies. The reservoir holds brackish water. It’s a disgusting place. But who says all islands have to be alike? Every place is different. One island is nothing like another. That’s the way it always has seemed to me: each island is itself, and no place else. And on Khuviar what they understand is drinking. Here, Tharp. You say you’re thirsty? Have some of my fine Khuviar brandy. My guest. Help yourself.”
“I don’t like brandy,” Tharp said, sounding sullen. “You know that damned well, Gospo. And brandy’ll only make you thirstier, anyway. It dries out the mouth membranes. Doesn’t it, doc? You should realize that.” He let out his breath in an explosive sigh. “What the fuck, give me the raw fish!”
Lawler passed him the platter. Tharp speared a slice with his fork, studied it as if he had never seen a piece of raw fish before, and finally took a tentative bite of it. He moved it around in his mouth with his tongue, swallowed, pondered. Then he took a second bite.
“Hey,” he said. “That’s all right. That isn’t bad at all.”
“Asshole,” Kinverson said again. But he was smiling.
When the meal was over everyone went up on deck for the change of watch. Henders, Golghoz and Delagard, who were scrambling around in the rigging, came down and Martello, Pilya Braun, and Kinverson took their places.
The brilliant gleam of the Cross cut the black sky into quarters. The sea was so still that its reflection could be seen, like a taut line of cool white fire lying across the water and stretching off into the mysterious distances, where it blurred and was lost. Lawler stood by the rail and looked back toward the soft flickering points of light that marked the presence of the other five ships, moving along in their steady tapering formation behind them. Here was Sorve, right out there on the water, the whole little island community packed up in those ships, Thalheims and Tanaminds and Katzins and Yanezes and Sweyners and Sawtelles and all the rest, the familiar names, the old, old names. After dark every night each ship mounted running lights along its rails, long smouldering dried-algae flambeaus that burned with a smoky orange glow. Delagard was fanatically concerned that the fleet should keep together at all times, never breaking formation. Each vessel had its own radio equipment and they stayed in constant touch all through the night, lest any of them stray.
“Breeze coming!” someone called. “Let go the foretack!”
Lawler admired the art of turning the sails to catch the wind. He wished he understood a little more about it. Sailing seemed almost magical to him, an arcane and bewildering mystery. On Delagard’s ships, more imposing than the little fishing skiffs that the islanders had used in the bay and on their wary journeys just beyond its mouth, each of the two masts bore a great triangular sail made of tightly woven strips of split bamboo, with a smaller quadrangular sail rigged above it, fastened to a yard. Another small triangular sail was fixed between the masts. The mainsails were tied to heavy wooden booms; arrangements of ropes fitted with threaded beads and pronged jaws held them in place, and they were manipulated by halyards running through block-and-tackle devices.