Read Online Voyage of the Basilisk : A Memoir by Lady Trent (9781429956369) by Marie Brennan - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Marie Brennan
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his misbehaviour. But Jake’s desire to stay was no whim, and so he persevered, though he be up to his eyebrows in muck. And so, one step at a time, Aekinitos began to teach him more.
Not directly, of course. The captain of the Basilisk had better things to do with his time than train a single boy. But he put Jake into the care of his bosun, a fellow of mixed Anthiopean and Erigan ancestry named Cranby, and that fellow undertook to make my son a sailor. Jake learned the parts of the ship, the points of the compass, how to tie more knots than I knew were geometrically possible. He did tedious work like picking oakum out of old ropes, scraping barnacles off the hull, and (yes) swabbing the decks. Eventually he did more interesting things like holding the reel when someone else threw out the log-line to measure our speed. Much, much later, Aekinitos let him hold the sextant again, and learn how to take a sighting so as to chart our position.
And Jake loved it. Sailing is exhausting, back-breaking work, but the complaint I heard most often from my son was that he was neither large enough nor strong enough to do more. A boy his age was no use in handling sails or hauling on ropes; he would only get in the way. But Jake vowed that he would someday be like those men, and after seeing the labor he was willing to endure so long as it was on a ship, I believed him.
The bulk of that, however, lay in the future. In the immediate term, we finally escaped the doldrums, and when we came to port at Axohuilli in Coyahuac, I did not send Jake home. We reprovisioned and asked some questions, then set sail for Namiquitlan … where, we were told, there were feathered serpents to be found.
FIVE
Namiquitlan—The cliff diver—Meeting Suhail—Among the ruins—Suhail’s theory—The feathered serpent—More taxonomy—Domestication
Coyahuac reminded me a great deal of Mouleen, the only other tropical country of which I had personal experience. Here the vegetation was equally thick, the trees towering giants laced together with vines and ferns. Beneath the canopy, I sweltered almost as much as I had in that swampy land. But there were differences: rather than being half-drowned by muddy rivers, Coyahuac had no surface water, all rainfall soaking through the porous ground to gather in underground streams and wells. The verdant life that rose above it was a thin skin over rocky bones, and here and there the bones showed through.
Such was the case with Namiquitlan, where we went in search of feathered serpents— quetzalcoatls, as they are known in the local tongue. The waters in the region of that town are an intense, deep blue, even close to shore, for the ground there drops off precipitously; even the harbour of Namiquitlan is a mere pause in the sheer face the land presents to the sea. We passed close to one of these sea cliffs as we came into port, and those of us not occupied in the task of keeping the Basilisk safely clear of that peril crowded to the rail for a good look.
Twenty meters of stone gleamed gold in the westering sun, an emerald cap of thick vegetation spilling from its edge. I looked at that cap and sighed. I knew from experience that finding dragons in such an environment was not easily done; and here, unlike in Bulskevo, we had no guide arranged in advance.
I was about to say something on this matter to Tom when Jake tugged at my sleeve. “Mama, look! There are men on the cliff!”
My son had good eyes. The movement was well hidden in the vegetation, and not easily identified. After a moment, however, three men came up to the edge. Two hung back; the third, dressed only in loose slops, went to the very brink. A local, I presumed: his skin was rich brown against the pale fabric. “What is he doing?” Jake asked.
The man had peered over the edge briefly; now he retreated some distance, almost to the trees. I opened my mouth to say, “Perhaps something blew into the sea,” when the man turned and, sweeping
Not directly, of course. The captain of the Basilisk had better things to do with his time than train a single boy. But he put Jake into the care of his bosun, a fellow of mixed Anthiopean and Erigan ancestry named Cranby, and that fellow undertook to make my son a sailor. Jake learned the parts of the ship, the points of the compass, how to tie more knots than I knew were geometrically possible. He did tedious work like picking oakum out of old ropes, scraping barnacles off the hull, and (yes) swabbing the decks. Eventually he did more interesting things like holding the reel when someone else threw out the log-line to measure our speed. Much, much later, Aekinitos let him hold the sextant again, and learn how to take a sighting so as to chart our position.
And Jake loved it. Sailing is exhausting, back-breaking work, but the complaint I heard most often from my son was that he was neither large enough nor strong enough to do more. A boy his age was no use in handling sails or hauling on ropes; he would only get in the way. But Jake vowed that he would someday be like those men, and after seeing the labor he was willing to endure so long as it was on a ship, I believed him.
The bulk of that, however, lay in the future. In the immediate term, we finally escaped the doldrums, and when we came to port at Axohuilli in Coyahuac, I did not send Jake home. We reprovisioned and asked some questions, then set sail for Namiquitlan … where, we were told, there were feathered serpents to be found.
FIVE
Namiquitlan—The cliff diver—Meeting Suhail—Among the ruins—Suhail’s theory—The feathered serpent—More taxonomy—Domestication
Coyahuac reminded me a great deal of Mouleen, the only other tropical country of which I had personal experience. Here the vegetation was equally thick, the trees towering giants laced together with vines and ferns. Beneath the canopy, I sweltered almost as much as I had in that swampy land. But there were differences: rather than being half-drowned by muddy rivers, Coyahuac had no surface water, all rainfall soaking through the porous ground to gather in underground streams and wells. The verdant life that rose above it was a thin skin over rocky bones, and here and there the bones showed through.
Such was the case with Namiquitlan, where we went in search of feathered serpents— quetzalcoatls, as they are known in the local tongue. The waters in the region of that town are an intense, deep blue, even close to shore, for the ground there drops off precipitously; even the harbour of Namiquitlan is a mere pause in the sheer face the land presents to the sea. We passed close to one of these sea cliffs as we came into port, and those of us not occupied in the task of keeping the Basilisk safely clear of that peril crowded to the rail for a good look.
Twenty meters of stone gleamed gold in the westering sun, an emerald cap of thick vegetation spilling from its edge. I looked at that cap and sighed. I knew from experience that finding dragons in such an environment was not easily done; and here, unlike in Bulskevo, we had no guide arranged in advance.
I was about to say something on this matter to Tom when Jake tugged at my sleeve. “Mama, look! There are men on the cliff!”
My son had good eyes. The movement was well hidden in the vegetation, and not easily identified. After a moment, however, three men came up to the edge. Two hung back; the third, dressed only in loose slops, went to the very brink. A local, I presumed: his skin was rich brown against the pale fabric. “What is he doing?” Jake asked.
The man had peered over the edge briefly; now he retreated some distance, almost to the trees. I opened my mouth to say, “Perhaps something blew into the sea,” when the man turned and, sweeping
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