Water & Storm Country

by David Estes

  Remy laughs again, and this time it sounds so good I can’t help but relax the tension in my body. I slump down next to him. “What the hell’s so funny?”

  “You are already a Rider,” he says, mimicking my tone from earlier, when I’d said the same thing to him. He looks right at me, and the sun, which is arcing back toward the horizon, lights up his brown eyes.

  I roll my eyes, but I can’t stop the smile that forms on my lips. Turning away to hide it, I say, “You followed me like you were hunting a jackrabbit. Why?”

  “Look at me.”

  “No.”

  He grabs my arm and I feel the same warmth, the same breathlessness that I felt before, when we were close together atop the mound. It’s like when the sun breaks through the clouds on a warm summer’s day, and you feel it on your skin, melting together with the breeze and becoming a part of you. I grimace, as if a nest of biting ants have slipped into my pants.

  I look at him and my breath catches in my throat. The intensity in his expression takes me by surprise. “You seemed upset when you left the stables. I wanted to make sure nothing happened to you.”

  Although I feel a flutter in my chest, I scowl at him, shake off his hand, stand. “I don’t need you looking out for me,” I say. “Don’t follow me ever again.”

  I run, refusing to look behind, although I can feel Remy’s grin on my back.

  I run the entire way back to the camp.

  Chapter Nine

  Huck

  The captain of the Mayhem is a big man, broad-shouldered and bearded, not unlike my father.

  The similarities end there.

  His silver medals are smudged and rusty, the exact opposite of my father’s, which are polished every morning before he pins them to his shirt. His uniform is wrinkled, faded and dusty, like he’s been keeping it in a corner of his cabin, only bringing it out when absolutely necessary. He blinks twice too often, like he can barely keep his eyes open.

  “Is this my new lieutenant?” he asks in a booming voice as we approach.

  Hobbs strides forward, pushing a scroll forward toward the captain. “Here are the boy’s orders,” he says.

  Ignoring Hobbs’ verbal jab, I hurry to catch up and step past him and his scroll. “Lieutenant Jones, at your service,” I say, extending a hand, trying to look confident, although my legs are shaking. I lock my knees and look the captain in the eye, like my father taught me to do. Always look a man in the eye when you meet him. Not only will it prove your strength, but you’ll discover much about theirs.

  The captain locks on my gaze, his blue eyes red and swollen. I’m not sure about this man’s strength, but he didn’t get much sleep last night. But neither did I, so I guess that makes us even. The thought brings a smile to my lips.

  “Captain Jebediah L. Montgomery, the Third,” the captain says. “But everyone just calls me Jeb,” he adds with a red-eyed wink. Turning to Hobbs, he snatches the scroll and says, “Thank you, Lieutenant.”

  I expect Hobbs to leave, but he stands there, unblinking, his usual scowl blanketing his face. I think Captain Montgomery expects him to leave, too, because he says, “Thank you, Mr. Hobbs,” again.

  “Read the orders, Captain,” Hobbs says, looking out to sea absently.

  “Are you giving me a direct order, Lieutenant?” the captain says, his voice taking on the shape of anger, but not quite reaching the thickness of it.

  “Just read them,” Hobbs says, still staring at the ocean, ignoring the captain’s question. A show of disrespect like that to my father would earn him a week in the brig, or worse. I’ve seen my father send a man into the sharp-tooth infested drink for looking at him the wrong way. A ship is only as strong as the men that occupy it, he used to tell me. And the admiral must be the strongest of all.

  This’ll be good, I think. I wait for it, for the explosion, for Captain Montgomery to order his oarsmen, who are waiting to launch the landing boat into the water, to bind Hobbs, to send him back to The Merman’s Daughter to be dealt with by my father.

  His eyes narrow and his nose turns up, but he doesn’t say anything, just calmly unties the blue ribbon from the scroll, unfurls the brittle pages, and reads the long, elegant script that I recognize as my father’s handwriting. I try to read along, but the tall captain is holding it too high for me to see much more than a few words.

  Thankfully, he mutters parts of it as he reads: “Captain Montgomery…I hereby present my son…a lieutenant on The Sailors’ Mayhem…improve efficiency, morale, order…” He looks up at me at that part, chewing on his chapped lips. Before I can stop myself, I look down at my feet, trying to count the grains of sand on the toe of one of my boots. I’m not sure what that says about my strength, but it can’t be good.

  Only when the captain continues reading do I look up. “Lieutenant Hobbs is ordered to oversee Lieutenant Jones as he becomes acclimated to life on a new ship.”

  “What?” I say at the same time as the captain. Both of us turn to look at Hobbs, who ignores us.

  “There’s no room for another lieutenant on my ship,” the captain says.

  “I don’t need a babysitter,” I say. Especially not one like Hobbs.

  “They’re not my orders,” Hobbs says to the sea. “The Deep Blue knows I don’t want this anymore than you do. The admiral insisted.”

  “No,” the captain says, and the soft breeze of relief washes over me. It’s the captain’s ship—his rules.

  “The admiral said you’d say that,” Hobbs says, finally looking away from the ocean, meeting the captain’s stare. “He also said his decision is final, and if you make me call him off his ship, well, let’s just say you don’t want to do that…” Sometimes the implied threat is more effective than the threat itself, or even carrying out the threat. This whole meeting is becoming a demonstration of the lessons my father taught me growing up.

  The captain’s face is getting redder by the second, and I swear he’s about to burst into flames, but then he turns away stiffly, making a show of stomping toward the boat. “Get in,” he says over his shoulder. “Both of you.”

  I’ve barely just met the captain, and yet, because of Hobbs, he hates me already.

  ~~~

  I’ve never seen a ship like the Mayhem.

  Just like on The Merman’s Daughter, there are men and women everywhere, but they’re not all working. In fact, I don’t think half of them are working. As I scan the decks at mid-ship, I spot a dozen people lounging, men and women alike. To my left, a fat, grizzly man is slumped against the side of an overturned barrel, his hand tucked beneath his belt. On my right, a skinny fellow with a long, curly mustache snores loudly, his arm around a sleeping woman with a top so tight and low my cheeks flush. With each exhalation, the hairs of his mustache flutter.

  Above me, the sails open, but not in an orderly fashion, one at a time, like on my father’s ship, but almost all at once. The wind catches them despite the numerous holes and tears in the thick cloth, and the ship lurches forward. I grip the splintery hand rail to stop from falling over.

  “A damn, bloody mess,” Hobbs mutters from beside me. For once, I agree with Hobbs.

  But something’s strange, too. Despite the distinct smell of stale grog and fish that lingers in the air like a cloud, and the strange array of men and women working and lounging, the decks appear to be clean, well-scrubbed and free of clutter. The contrast is stark.

  That’s when I notice them. The bilge rats. There are only four of them, compared to the dozens that work the decks of my father’s ship, but they’re scrubbing away at the lower decks like their very survival depends on keeping the wooden planks clean. Like all bilge rats, they’re brown-skinned and skinny, but muscular, too, because of all the scrubbing, I guess. Two are boys about my age, maybe a few yars younger, with sunken eyes and a wiry hunch to their bony shoulders. Another is an older bilge rat man, probably the oldest bilge I’ve ever seen—maybe nineteen, twenty. Usually the bilge don’t live that long, not with the Scurve
running through their small, dirty living conditions like a crashing wave.

  The fourth rat is a girl who looks around my age with long, dark hair, almost to her waist, braided tightly down the center of her back like a black spine. She’s on her knees, raking the brush back and forth across the deck with a tenacity and fervor at least twice that of any of the boys working beside her.

  I’m dimly aware of Hobbs stalking across the deck, following the captain. Someone says my name, but the world has melted away, and all I can see is this bilge rat, working harder than I’ve ever seen anyone—rat or sailor, oarsmen or deckhand—work. For what? For the ship that’s the red, swollen pimple on the fleet’s backside?

  And then she suddenly stops and turns, as if sensing my gaze.

  And she sees me, looks right at me, her braid swinging behind her, her legs pushing her to her feet. Her eyes are a beautiful shade of brown, almost creamy, the perfect accent to her sun-kissed skin. But they’re flashing with something I didn’t expect. Not wonder, interest, or admiration—nothing good like that. They’re narrowed and burning, almost like the sun is in them, shooting rays of heat at me. She speaks.

  “What the bloody scorch are you lookin’ at?” she says, and I’m not sure what I’m more surprised by, the tone of her voice or her words. On my father’s ship, a bilge rat speaking like that to one of the sailors would be thrown overboard, no questions asked. And I’m no ordinary sailor. I’m an officer and the son of the admiral.

  The world that had melted away like a puddle of candlewax in a frying pan returns with a whoosh, as a burst of wind whips over the hull and across the deck, from starboard to port. The only motion is from the men manning the sails, who continue to struggle to get the right tension and direction. Everyone else is frozen, as still as human statues, watching.

  The other three bilge rats have stopped scrubbing and are sitting cross legged, brushes and hands in their laps, their eyes wide. Those of the sailors who aren’t asleep have stopped whatever they were doing. They’re looking at me and then at the bilge rat, back and forth, back and forth, probably wondering who will flinch first.

  Captain Morrow is standing on the quarterdeck, staring down at me with interest. Hobbs is halfway up the steps, arms crossed, frowning. My father’s spy. For why else would he be here? And this is my first test, whether by chance or design, and I’m totally screwing it up. I’m looking around me like a scared little boy, hoping someone will come to my rescue—

  “Well?” the girl says, tapping her foot.

  —but I’m a lieutenant,

  “Are you gonna answer or what?” she adds.

  —son of the admiral,

  “Or are you too scared?”

  —and she’s nothing more than a servant, one of the rats that come from nowhere, to scrub our decks and clean our clothes…

  But she’s kinda pretty, in a she-looks-like-she-wants-to-punch-me-in-the-face kind of way.

  And I don’t want to cause trouble on my first day, not when trouble seems to have such a knack for finding me.

  In the silence, my boots are like hollow thunder as I walk across the deck. I know where I should be walking, where Hobbs would walk: toward the bilge rat to teach her some manners.

  Feeling shaky, I reach the steps to the quarterdeck and climb them, brushing past Hobbs and ignoring the captain’s eyes following my every step.

  “I’d like to see my cabin,” I say, my voice coming out high and weak.

  ~~~

  Hobbs sneers, looking at me with no less distaste than he would if I was a rotten fish on his supper plate.

  “A bit of grog and a shiny new officer’s uniform don’t make you a man,” he says, spitting out the word man.

  I have a hundred comebacks planned, clever words that would put him in his place, teach him some manners, shut him up and make his face go red, but as I try to speak, they jam in my throat, a jumble of disjointed words, tangled, turning to ash, choking me. My mouth is dry, and whatever threads of pride and dignity I had left this morning have been snipped by the scissors of fate and my own weakness, worthless except to a scavenging bird seeking to build a nest.

  Because I walked away from a rat. A rat who insulted me (with pretty eyes), who made me look like a child in front of the men I’m meant to lead. I know what my father would’ve done. Strutted up to her, slapped her hard across the face, probably kicked her to the deck, and had her thrown to the sharp-tooths. Made an example out of her.

  The bilge rats will respect you if they fear you, he once told me after I’d just watched him manhandle a new rat who wouldn’t stop crying. The boy was no older than me at the time, seven yars old. A child.

  And his words from earlier: Beware the bilge rats…They’re not like us. They’ll do anything to bring you down, to make you as low as they are. Don’t trust them. They are tools to be used, nothing more.

  It’s almost like he knew I’d have trouble with them. It took me all of a few seconds on my new ship to fail at the hands of a bilge rat.

  Lost in my thoughts, I’ve forgotten about Hobbs. “Don’t you have anything to say for yourself, boy?” he says, stepping forward, so close I can see the dark tobacco stains on his teeth.

  I feel tears coming, but I hold them back, determined not to fall further into the deep sea of embarrassment than I already have.

  Hobbs draws his sword and my eyes bulge out of my head, because this close it’s so shiny, so sharp, gleaming and glinting in the sun, glittering silver against the sandy backdrop.

  Something doesn’t make sense. Where’d all the sand come from? It’s all around me, churning like waves, grabbing at my legs, pulling me under. I’m sinking.

  Sinking, sinking, until the beach is up to my waist and I’m at the perfect height for Hobbs to—

  He swings, his blade slicing through the air, right for my neck—

  —and I close my eyes—

  —and I scream—

  —but no sound comes out and I don’t feel my head getting chopped off (can you feel your head getting chopped off?), and when I open my eyes I’m not on the beach anymore, and Hobbs isn’t there, and I’m laughing—of all things laughing—and gentle arms grip me from behind, holding me against the railing, letting the wind sweep over and around me.

  My mother’s head slips in next to mine and she kisses me on the cheek. “You know I’ll never leave you, right?” she asks.

  But I don’t know that, because she did leave me, and then it’s happening again—no, not again, please, please, please…

  The ship lurches and she stumbles and the railing is too low to stop her momentum, cutting her at the waist, the heaviness of her upper body pulling her over.

  In my desperation I grab at her hand, feel my fingers close around hers, every last bit of the weight of her muscles and bones pulling against me, hating me, angry that I’m trying to thwart their plans of pulling her into the sea.

  I’m crying out, yelling for help—Get me some bloody help!—but no one’s close enough, and I’m not strong enough, and she’s slipping, slipping, slipping away from my sweaty hand and my straining arm muscles, and when I look to the side, along the rail, he’s standing there, close enough to see but too far to help.

  My father. Darkness in his stare, because he knows.

  He knows.

  I’ll fail him, like I always do.

  But I won’t—not again. I grip her tighter, and try to stand, to get some leverage. I reach out my other arm, because if I can only grab her with that one, maybe two arms will be enough to pull her up, or at least hold her until help arrives. Surely my father will come.

  I reach, and I’m almost there.

  (Could I really save her this time?)

  And that’s when she slips from my grasp.

  And I scream.

  And I won’t watch this time, not ever again, so I look away, right at my father, who hasn’t moved to help.

  His eyes burn me, set me on fire, the flames hot and everywhere and on my clothes and ski
n. And again, I scream.

  Someone grabs me and I try to fight them off, scrabble with my hands, swing at them, but they’re strong, too strong, and they hold me down, saying “Shhh, you’ll hurt yourself more than you’ll hurt me, lad.”

  I keep straining, but not as much, and only because I don’t know the voice.

  Eventually, however, I relax, slump on something warm and soft, open my eyes.

  Daylight streams through the glass portal above my bed, warming the plump pillow beneath my head. I squint, seeing spots, red and blue and orange, like the fire that nearly consumed me in what I now know was another nightmare. My father’s fire.

  Firm hands continue to press against my arms, holding them at my sides, but not hurting me. “’Twas a dream,” the voice says. “Nothing more.”

  Blink, blink. My mother slipping, falling: blink her away. My father glaring, burning me: blink him away, too.

  A face appears, hazy at first, but then crisp and defined around the edges. Lined but no older than my father. Late thirties, maybe forty. A beard, uncombed and disheveled, brown and patchy like the hair on his head. Somber, gray eyes, like the clouds that encroach on the sea from storm country. A nose that’s bigger than most.

  “Lieutenant Jones,” the man says.

  “Who are you?” I say. It sounds a little rude, although I don’t mean it to be.

  The corner of his lips turns up in amusement. I haven’t offended him. “Barnes,” he says, “although around here most folks call me Barney.”

  “Why are you…” My voice fades away as I realize I’m being rude again.

  “Here?” he says, winking. “Well, firstly, I heard you screaming like the Deep Blue had grown hands and was trying to pull you into its depths, and secondly, I sleep a cabin over. I’m your steward. I’ll be doubling as Hobbs’ steward, too—he’s a rather grouchy fellow, isn’t he?—because we didn’t expect him. I’m here to take care of your every need, so you can focus on leading the men.”