The Questing Game

by James Galloway

  "Tarrin, are you crazy?" Deward demanded in a fierce shout over the howling wind. "Get back under cover!"

  "The crow's nest is tangled to the mast!" he shouted back. "It's banging all over the deck, and we don't do something, it'll break something else! What do you want me to do with it?"

  "Try to tie it down!" he shouted in reply. "If you can't, then cut it loose! And for the sake of the gods, be careful!"

  "I'm always careful!" Tarrin shouted back, then made his way back to the staircase.

  He struggled out onto the open deck, holding onto the aft mast while another wave broke over the ship, then moving towards the flapping half-ton piece of debris. He saw another wave about to break over the port side, and realized that he was out in the open. Cursing, he dropped down and drove all twenty claws into the deck below him, flexing his claw muscles with everything he had to keep them secured as a powerful surge of water slammed into his prone form. He felt his claws tear the wood as the water sought to uproot him from his spot, and lost his purchase with his left paw as a sizable chunk of the deck came up with his paw. But the other three appendages held firm, leaving gaping holes in the deck as the Were-cat quickly sized up the bouncing crow's nest, and grabbed hold of it as it swung past him. Claws dug furrows into the deck as he wrestled the huge chunk of wood to a halt, then pushed it towards the mainmast. The wind caught at it and picked it up off the deck, and Tarrin had to fight with every mote of his strength to keep it from bowling him over. The wind changed direction before it overwhelmed him, letting him literally throw the chunk of mast up against the mainmast. He scrambled for the mainmast himself as another wave crashed over the bow, claws holding him to it as a leg kept the piece of mast from rolling away with the water. He grabbed at some dangling rope tied to the broken mast and lashed it quickly around the broken end of the crow's nest, then ducked down between the mast and the nest as another wave came over the bow. He pulled at a rope tied to the crow's nest and looped it around the mast, then tied it quickly and securely. That gave the crow's nest three separate moorings, and as a wave crashed over the starbord beam, he saw that it was somewhat secure. There was no way he could immobilize it, but it was good enough to keep it from breaking through the deck.

  Soaked to the skin, his ears burning from the salt water accumulated in them, and feeling the exertion in his chest in a slightly uncomfortable manner, Tarrin scampered back to the staircase below as the ship dropped into a trough between waves, giving him a good few seconds of flat deck to cover the distance. Once there, he grabbed the rickety door of the companionway and pulled it shut, then secured it from the inside with its bolt which had been thrown in the tossing of the ship. He nearly slipped on the wet stairs as the ship lurched to the side as he went down them, but caught himself before making an embarassing tumble down the steps.

  He returned to Allia's cabin a little worse for wear. Sarraya took one look at him and laughed. "You look like a drowned rat!" she told him with a grin.

  "That is something I'd rather not do again," he said fervently as he anchored himself against another lurch with one paw, and put a ginger paw to his chest with the other.

  "What happened?" Allia asked, grabbing hold of him again.

  "I tied the crow's nest to the mast," he replied as the ship rolled. "I nearly got swept off the deck twice. Those waves are powerful."

  "Never mess with nature," Sarraya chuckled. "She's tougher than you."

  "So now we just ride it out," Allia surmised.

  "Not much else we can do, deshaida," Tarrin agreed.

  "What, a, mess," Camara Tal said slowly as she, Tarrin, Sarraya, Allia, and Dar surveyed the damage.

  The waves had scoured the paint off the hull. It had snapped most of the ropes they left up, but had not pulled the sails off the masts. It had broken the mainmast about six spans under the crow's nest, the mast and small platform sitting on the deck where Tarrin had hastily tied them. Some of the deck planking around the masts had buckled in the storm, as the masts swayed in the wind, pulled up like uprooted sod in a horse pasture, and some parts of the railing had been broken away here and there around the deck's perimeter. The mainmast had a long, very visible crack running from about ten spans over the deck to nearly halfway up its length. It was a span wide at its widest point, and deep enough for Allia to put her entire forearm inside. Renoit's performers moved to clean up the debris that littered the deck, from broken ropes and smaller boards ripped free to dead fish and some seaweed. There was a dead eel hanging from the lashed sail on the aftmast.

  "Definitely a mess," Dar agreed. "Where do we start?"

  "Looks like we'll start by limping into port," the Amazon said. "That split in the mast is fatal. We can't use it like that. Renoit's going to have to put in and get a new mast."

  "Posh," Sarraya sniffed. "I can fix that, easy."

  "How? I don't think you can sew that up."

  "I'm a Druid, woman," Sarraya said bluntly. "I can urge the wood to fix itself. I can even put the top of the mast back on, if someone can hold it still long enough."

  "Sounds like it'll be alot faster than finding a port," Dar said. "The only port of any size near us is Arkisia, and that's a few days out."

  "If I can get some help, I can get the top of the mast back up there," Tarrin offered. "But we'll have to put the rigging back up first, because that split's causing the mast to bow. Sarraya can't fix the mast until it's been pulled back up straight, and I don't think all of us are strong enough to pull that thing back up."

  "Let's go talk to Renoit," Camara Tal said. "He'll tell us what we need to do."

  "We?" Sarraya said pointedly.

  "We. Unless you want to swim back to shore," the Amazon said bluntly.

  "Why swim when I can fly?"

  "You won't be flying far after I get done with you, sprite," Camara Tal warned. "Now let's go. We need to get back under sail. We're sitting ducks like this."

  Renoit did indeed know exactly what to do. The four of them found themselves divided up into work details with the other performers. Dar and Camara Tal helped clean up the deck and bring the rigging up out of storage, and Tarrin, Allia, and Sarraya were up the masts with the more nimble members of the troupe, accepting ropes from the people on deck and slowly knitting the rigging back into place under Renoit's careful eyes. He directed them from the deck, using a hollow cone to amplify his voice and make his commands easier to hear. Tarrin and Allia proved quickly that not only were they well suited for the task, but their ease at heights made it very simple for them to restring the rigging. Tarrin could easily jump from one mast to the other, so long as he was willing to sacrifice about twenty spans of altitude, and he could do it holding onto the ropes that had to be strung across them. Tarrin and Allia mainly worked to set the ropes, as others came in behind them and tightened them or adjusted them, and unlashed the sails and returned them to their normal places. Over the course of the morning and afternoon, the ship's rigging slowly reappeared, until the last rope was tied into place about an hour before sunset.

  The work felt good. The time on the ship was nothing but an endless cycle of boredom and anxiety for Tarrin, and to be able to do something, to put his inhuman gifts to good use for the benefit of the others was strangely satisfying. He didn't even mind taking instructions from Renoit. Just to be doing something, to see their labor slowly take shape as the rigging was reattached, brought a simple pleasure to him that showed on his face. By the time they were done with the rigging, he felt nearly disappointed. He wasn't winded in the slightest, though the exertion had begun to gnaw a bit at his chest. That was a good thing, for Sarraya had been repairing the damage to the mast even as they finished raising the rigging, and she was nearly ready for them to bring up the broken section.

  "Faalken!" Tarrin shouted from near the top of the mainmast. He had a coil of rope on his shoulder, and he took it off and began unlooping it as the curly-haired Knight scurried over from where he'd been helping them nail deck planking back down. He had
his shirt off in the summer heat, and he was just a little sunburned.

  "What is it, lad?" he shouted back.

  "Tie this onto the top of the broken part of the mast," he shouted down. "Make it good and tight. When you're done, climb up here! I'm going to need you!"

  "Me, climb up there?" he said in surprise.

  "I can't do it alone!" Tarrin replied. "You can tie yourself to the mast when you get up here!"

  "I'm more worried about getting up there, lad!" he shouted. "I'm not built for climbing!"

  Faalken had a point. He was very agile and quick-footed, but climbing a mast was another thing. "Nevermind, I'll come get you!" Tarrin said, tying his end of the rope to the topsail's jib and climbing down the mast quickly and easily. Faalken had the rope tightly secured to the broken mast section by the time Tarrin got down, and picked up a good length of rope and tied it around his waist, then looped the remaining length around his waist and tied it to itself. Tarrin looked up to Sarraya, who was at the top of where the split had been. The split was completely gone where she had already passed by, the split wood rejoined by her Druidic magic. "Sarraya, you ready for this?" Tarrin shouted up to her.

  "I need about ten minutes!" she called down. "Take a break, Tarrin, you've been going nonstop since the storm ended!"

  "I need a break," Faalken grunted, sitting on the cleaned deck immediately. "It's been so long since I swung a hammer, I forgot how hard it can be."

  "I didn't realize you were a carpenter."

  "I never was. My father was a blacksmith. I swung a different kind of hammer before I petitioned the Knights."

  "I should have guessed. You have the build of a smith."

  "At least it got me in shape for the Academy," Faalken laughed. "I didn't have half as much trouble as some of the others."

  "I can see where that could be an advantage," Tarrin agreed. "Where are you from originally?"

  "Arrigon," he replied. Arrigon was a Sulasian city south of Torrian, the city at the end of the road leading from Suld through Jerinhold and Ultern. "Not much of a place, alot like Torrian."

  "It was home."

  "When I was young. My father said I was too much man for one city to hold."

  Tarrin smiled slightly. "I'm sure he did."

  "He would have," Faalken grinned. "What are we going to do with that?" he asked, pointing at the mast.

  "I'm going to pull it up, and when I get it there, you're going to help me hold it while Sarraya puts it back on. There's only room for two, and you're the strongest man on the ship."

  "I think we can do it," he agreed. "That looks heavy, but nothing we can't handle together."

  Tarrin and Faalken waited quietly until Sarraya shouted that she was ready, and they got to work. Tarrin carried Faalken up the mast easily, holding him while he tied himself to the mast and secured himself. Then Tarrin grabbed the rope and dug his claws deeply into the mast, and pulled the slack out of it. Breathing a few times to get ready, Tarrin leaned down, and then pulled up and started lifting the wooden pole and its crow's nest. His chest began to burn angrily as he pulled it off the deck, and its weight made him reconsider his boast that he could lift it. He could lift it, but it was much heavier than the thought it was. He just wasn't sure if he could haul it up. He set it back down and blew out his breath explosively. "What's wrong, lad?" Faalken asked.

  "It's heavier than I expected," he panted. "I need to set myself better."

  "Just throw the rope over the top of the broken mast, and I'll hold it in place so you don't have to bear the whole weight. We just have to be careful that the jagged end there doesn't cut the rope."

  "That's a good idea," Tarrin agreed. He untied the rope and threw the end over the ragged end of the broken mast. The mast didn't split along a long line, it was broken off relatively flatly, and that let Faalken sink the rope down into a jagged crevasse in the wood, which would secure the piece in place when Tarrin wasn't pulling on it. "You got it?"

  Faalken wrapped the rope around a wrist and set himself. "Alright, let's get started," he said.

  It worked surprisingly well. Tarrin would haul the large piece up by main strength, and Faalken would use his leverage to hold the piece in place while Tarrin collected himself for another pull. Pulling the section up made his chest bite at him every time he took its weight, and it left him panting and throbbing every time Faalken took up the weight so he could rest. The section of mast bobbed in the calm wind as the pair manhandled it up, as most of the people on the ship watched them in curiosity. Sarraya flitted up and landed on the broken mast top, by the rope, and watched the two males work to haul up the section. "I've almost got a paw on it, Faalken," Tarrin told him. "When I get it, you pull while I drag it up. Then I'll wrestle it into place."

  "You know," Sarraya said conversationally, "all this sweating and grunting wasn't necessary. I could have brought it up here with magic."

  "By Karas', hammer, why didn't you say so?" Faalken demanded loudly.

  "You didn't ask," Sarraya said teasingly, grinning broadly at the Knight. She just smiled at Faalken's flat stare, but she missed the ominous glare Tarrin levelled on her back. "Want me to take it from here?"

  "No," Tarrin said bluntly.

  "No? Why not?"

  "We got it this far without you. We can do the rest."

  "Aye," Faalken said fiercely, taking it as a personal challenge. "Just shut up and stay out of the way til you're needed."

  "Huf-fee," Sarraya snorted, crossing her arms. But her snort turned into a surprised "Eep!" when Tarrin's paw smacked her from behind, sweeping her off the stump of the mast forcefully. She fell about ten spans before she regained control of herself, coming up and getting right in Tarrin's face with an angry expression. "What did you hit me for?" she demanded hotly in her piping voice.

  "Faalken told you to move," he said with a very ominous, low voice, glaring at the sprite through slitted eyes.

  "Why didn't you just tell me to get out of the way?" she shouted.

  "You didn't ask," Tarrin hissed dangerously.

  The angry expression melted off of her face quickly. She seemed to finally realize that she made Tarrin very angry, and she couldn't just run away and hide this time. "Sorry," she said insincerely. "Let me help you with that, so we can finish up."

  "No. We don't need your help," Tarrin said adamantly. "Just get out of the way and let us finish."

  With that, Sarraya flitted to the side and hovered there in silence while the two men finished. Anger giving both of them strength, they grabbed hold of the ten span section of mast and physically manhandled it into position, an impressive display of both power and control of that power. Tarrin and Faalken twisted it carefully to line the jagged ends up, and then they pulled it down into the jagged stump until it meshed into place. Then they both kept strong hold of it against the light wind and the swaying of the ship. "Alright, bug, do your part," Faalken ordered.

  "I am not a bug!" Sarraya said hotly, but she went about her task. They watched her flatly as she put her tiny hands to the wood and worked her magic, watching the cracks in the two pieces of wood fade away, leaving a whole piece in its wake. She moved inexorably around the outside of the mast, making the break seal back into one piece. "Alright, it'll hold without you two," Sarraya said huffily. "I have to do more work on it, so I'll finish it from here. You two can get down."

  Faalken untied himself and Tarrin grabbed hold of him, then he looked up at the hovering sprite. "You better stay up here for a long time, Sarraya," he hissed at her. "If I see you down below, I'll kill you."

  Sarraya put her hands on her hips, but said nothing.

  Tarrin carried Faalken back to the deck, where he left him with Camara Tal and Dolanna and stalked away, very angry. How dare she let them struggle with that beam, when she could have easily brought it up for them! She didn't seem to realize that it hurt him to haul that mast section up. The angry biting in his chest told him that he probably overexerted himself, and would have to mend so
me over again. Yet she stood there and watched them struggle to haul that mast section up, enjoying her twisted little game, enjoying his pain.

  "I think Tarrin is angry," Dolanna said under her breath to the others as Tarrin reached the door that led below decks. The bolt, which had been twisted by the force of the storm, was stuck in the eye, and it wouldn't open. In a fit of pique, Tarrin drove his claws into the sides of the door and ripped it off the hinges, then threw it aside absently, nearly sending it crashing into a startled dancer.

  "I'd say that that's a good hunch," Camara Tal said dryly as Tarrin stalked below decks.

  It took him most of the night to get his temper under control The callousness of the Faerie had been what did it. She either didn't realize or didn't care that it took more than Tarrin had to pull that mast section up. She had the ability to do it herself the entire time, yet she did not, only because she thought it was fun to watch Tarrin struggle. But it had to be done, and Tarrin knew that he and Faalken were the only ones that could do it, so he had clamped his teeth together and toughed out the pain.

  He spent most of the night pacing back and forth in his cabin with Allia dozing on the bed. She was there to calm him down if he got too worked up, but he wasn't enraged, he was simply irritated. Nearly humiliated, for some strange reason, though he had no idea why the event would embarass him. He had brought up the mast section, with Faalken's help. He had done everything he could do to help get the ship seaworthy again, even more, so there was no rightly reason for him to feel humiliated, even at what Sarraya did to them. And yet it was there. And he had no idea why. That irritated him more than anything else about the whole episode. It was probably that the Faerie had known she could lift the mast, and had let them do it themselves. It was humiliating to think that she could do something easily which he could not. Without his Sorcery and with his injury, he was weakened, less than whole, and the Cat in him was very sensitive to that dangerous situation. In the wild, the injured were often singled out and killed by the uninjured, and the instinct of self-preservation kept him very aware of that. It was probably why he seemed even more nervous around the humans than normal, knowing that he was injured and weak, easier prey for any lurking hunter or enemy.